Kenneth Danos is a combat veteran, executive leadership coach, Military Mentor, and board member for the National Board for Leadership Certification who is on a mission to elevate 1 million professionals through training, coaching, mentorship, and certification. He believes that every person is entitled to Outstanding Leadership and has committed to elevating the level of worldwide leadership and unlocking human potential.
Connect with Kenneth Danos:
-Website: https://nationalboardofleaders.org/
-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100088825321744
-LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-national-board-for-leadership-certification/
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-Leadership Resources: https://linktr.ee/McMillionLeadership
-Resilence-Based Leadership Program: https://resiliencebuildingleader.com/
- Discount Code: JMCMILLION
My Mission: I will end toxic leadership practices by equipping leaders with transformational leadership skills.
Together, we will impact 1 MILLION lives!!!
Every day is a gift, don't waste yours!
Joshua K. McMillion | Founder MLC
Kenneth Danos is a combat veteran, executive leadership coach, Military Mentor, and board member for the National Board for Leadership Certification who is on a mission to elevate 1 million professionals through training, coaching, mentorship, and certification. He believes that every person is entitled to Outstanding Leadership and has committed to elevating the level of worldwide leadership and unlocking human potential.
Connect with Kenneth Danos:
-Website: https://nationalboardofleaders.org/
-Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100088825321744
-LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-national-board-for-leadership-certification/
✅ SHARE THIS PODCAST
✅ GIVE A 5-STAR REVIEW
✅ SUPPORT
-Leadership Resources: https://linktr.ee/McMillionLeadership
-Resilence-Based Leadership Program: https://resiliencebuildingleader.com/
- Discount Code: JMCMILLION
My Mission: I will end toxic leadership practices by equipping leaders with transformational leadership skills.
Together, we will impact 1 MILLION lives!!!
Every day is a gift, don't waste yours!
Joshua K. McMillion | Founder MLC
You're listening to the Tells the Leadership podcast. This podcast is for leaders at any phase on their leadership journey to become a more purposeful and accountable leader what I like to call a pal. Join me on our journey together towards transformational leadership. All right team, welcome back to Tells the Leadership podcast. I am your host, Josh McMillian, an active duty army officer and the founder of McMillian Leadership Coaching, and I am on a mission to create a better leader what I like to call a purposeful, accountable leader or a pal, and my vision is simple I want to impact one million lives in the next 10 years by promoting transformational stories and skills.
Speaker 1:On today's episode, I'm going to be interviewing a transformational leader, Ken Dainos. Ken is a combat veteran executive, leadership coach, military mentor and a board member for the National Board of Leadership Certification who is on a mission to elevate one million lives professionally through training, coaching, mentoring and certification. He believes that every person is entitled to outstanding leadership and he is committed to elevating the level of worldwide leadership and unlocking human potential. Ken is a purposeful, accountable leader. Let's go ahead and bring Ken on.
Speaker 2:Ken, welcome to the Tells the Leadership podcast brother, how you doing Good, I'm doing great brother. Appreciate you having me on.
Speaker 1:Yeah it's, I love it like, especially towards the end of the day, being an active duty army officer, this is kind of my I guess decompression in a way. Some people have their car rides, some people have their gym. To me, I personally love kind of having conversations about something I'm deeply passionate about, which is leadership, so it's always awesome to have someone who shares that passion.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's awesome. I appreciate it. My brain is kind of like done after 2pm, so it's more like a downward for me.
Speaker 1:But yeah, what is it? I don't know what book I've read that in, but there's a concept called decision fatigue. So as we go throughout the course of the day, the quality of our decisions exponentially decline. And you know, I'm the same way about two or three o'clock. I'm just like, yeah, let's do that. That sounds like a great plan.
Speaker 2:That's why they wear the same clothes every day, right? You know the same white shirt, stuff like that. We don't have to pick our clothes out, right.
Speaker 1:Well, it's funny you say that the job I'm getting ready to go do is. It's a so-called organization and we wear civilians. And I'm not lying when I tell you that I am deeply stressed out about what I need to wear as a civilian, because the last 16 years the Army's told me, hey, wear this, wear that, wear this. And I'm also a little bit, you know, perturbed that I just spent like two grand on new uniforms for the next two years I'm never going to wear, but I have them.
Speaker 2:So we're good to go. I know that. I know that feeling. You just got to find that one person that really knows fashion. I guess, Because when I was in civil affairs, we wore civilian clothes a lot and you know I had to start wearing suits and stuff like that and I would pick ties and shirt and jacket combinations that my team leader was like no, you can't wear that, help me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I'm from like rural West Virginia, so I have my apparel of choice is I don't even know if this is appropriate to say, but Ranger panties, bright green, neon crocs and usually a sun hat, and that's usually what I wear. So I think, before we dive into this, take the time to provide an overview to the listeners of who is Ken.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, ken, currently, just like you, currently serving active duty Army officer. Right now I'm in a on the commander of a medivac medivac unit here at the Great Fort Nova cell, alabama. Been in the Army for 21 years this year, so this will, this will be the end of the journey for me, ending out on, you know, with the best job in the Army, probably number one, you know, ending in command and number two, probably the best medivac company. I'm a little biased, you know. So, yeah, that's that's where I sit right now. But you know, as far as who I am as a person, you know we might get into it later, but I really love watching people grow. That's kind of one of the things. My highest value is growth. You know, I've done a little bit of soul searching, checking to see what my values were, and growth always ends up on the top of it. So when, any time, I can give that to somebody else, it just is so fulfilling. So that's kind of who I am as a person.
Speaker 1:That's already a great place to start, because it took me until I was probably like 36 to understand the concept of goal oriented mindset and the growth oriented mindset. And I see everything. Everything rises and falls on leadership and it doesn't necessarily mean organizational leadership. You have to lead yourself well at the end of the day and you can't lead others well unless you lead yourself well.
Speaker 1:But this concept of a growth mindset meaning I don't necessarily care if I take down these short term goals, but am I continuously moving towards who I want to become, or is the organization moving to be the best that they possibly can? Are they working to achieve that common vision, shared purpose, all of those things, and it's all focused around growth and what I've learned. The more I grow and the more authority that I have, the more stressed you become when you have a growth or a goal mindset, because there's so many different, competing things on our minds. But if we have a growth, a growth mindset, well then, whatever the day gives doesn't matter. I'm going to figure out a way to kind of work through that.
Speaker 2:So that's already a beautiful nugget and it reminds me of Simon Sinek in the infinite game. Instead of focusing on that next goal and just hitting that next goal, focusing on, there's a just cause that you're trying to accomplish and you have to realize and admit to yourself that the thing I'm trying to accomplish is infinite leadership, and that way is an infinite game. There's infinite ways we can learn as a leader. You know, and become, you know, the purposeful, accountable leaders. Infinite ways we can improve and grow in that he gives examples like solve world hunger or, you know, achieve world peace. There are these just causes that are way beyond us and they're infinite. So once you commit yourself to an infinite game, you know those goals aren't scary.
Speaker 1:There's a concept when I was getting my master's degree because I'll tell you this, when I was getting my bachelor's degree I totally did not challenge myself. I got a criminal justice bat because I wanted to go in the infantry and all of that stuff. So I was like, all right, my OML list has to get high. So what degree has no math in it? And well, the army, you know, got one over on me.
Speaker 1:So when I got my master's degree, it was an engineering and I looked at I looked at the professor and I was like, hey, just so, you know, sir, I have a liberal arts bachelor's degree and the highest math I've ever taken is algebra, nice, and it wasn't pretty, but it was the concept that I learned, the body of knowledge and kind of what you talked about, like that infinite growth mindset, is that we may not meet our full potential, you know, even in this life, like solving world hunger, but we can continue to work towards that goal and then leave that with someone else to carry the torch. And I always have this mindset of when, when I go into a leadership position now, is I look through me, if that makes sense?
Speaker 1:So, I am a temporary person in the seat holding a position, but how am I setting the organization up for long term? Success beyond me, not just myself, and that that's another, I think beautiful nugget. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that same vein. You know, I also see. You know when you're faced with a challenge, instead of seeing yourself facing that challenge. You see it as this challenge has been put here for me to learn this so I can help other people grow in the future. Like every time I have a challenge now, I add it to. All right, I need to teach about this. This is a teachable moment that I want to capture and remember every detail that happened, what steps I took and didn't take. You know, learning about, about people and how we all work and use it, as you know, a teaching tool later on. So, you know, just committing to, you know, teaching people. This kind of stuff is definitely helped me, you know, in the present, and I'm also reminded of people like Elon Musk. You know he says he wants to start a colony on Mars. Right? You think he's going to be alive for that? I don't know.
Speaker 1:You know he may, he may, we'll see, you know technology.
Speaker 2:He might be alive that long.
Speaker 1:So 21 years in the military and where are you serving right now? In Alabama.
Speaker 2:Fort Novasail and I love our name change and let me tell you why. Fort Novasail. Mike Novasail was a. He was serving in the Medevac at the time. He got his Medal of Honor, so I was very happy about that name change. It was, you know, my favorite. Of course, a little biased.
Speaker 1:So I'm stationed right now at Redstone Arsenal in Alabama.
Speaker 2:I honestly didn't know that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well. Well, now I'm gonna go take you out to get a coffee or something because I didn't know that's awesome, yeah, and you're actively a company commander right now. Is it company, commander or battalion commander Detachment company level Okay. That's inspiring in itself, I think, before we even jump into your leadership journey. How do you? How do you manage because this was something that I had to struggle with chasing something you're passionate about, but still being intentional in your current job. How do you manage that?
Speaker 2:I try to find the ways that they match the most, you know. So me committing to a leadership journey, coaching other leaders, teaching other leaders, you know I use that as a tool that's developing me to be a better commander for my soldiers. And then, you know, you learn things more when you teach right. So the more I teach, the more I can, you know. You know that sounds like it makes sense, so I'll bring it into the detachment and use it in some of my counselings or coachings or teachings there. So, yeah, I just try to find the ways they link together. And you know, sometimes the you know, chasing your passion will suffer a little bit especially. I think you understand that, and most people in military are like you know we've, we've for a long time we've had the mindset of mission first. I'm glad we're, you know, people first now. But we, a lot of us, have that get the mission done. You know, at all costs mindset, and that's also something that can be coached through as well. I need a coach too. You know sometimes I accomplish the mission at the deficit of you know other things. But you know, and I realize, you know, you know talking about when you realize you are a leader right, it may be John Maxwell or somebody else says that you know you, you don't make yourself a leader as the people you serve, you know, with that, make you a leader when they start.
Speaker 2:You know I started getting asked questions by professionals. You know that saw my experience and looked up to me and I realized I didn't have all the answers that I could have or should have. So that kind of sparked sparked me. You know, as a medevac platoon leader I had a lot of lieutenants asking me questions and I was like I don't know what I'm doing as much as I think I know what I'm doing. You know it's good to be good at your job but to codify some principles to give people, you know, answers from your experience but you have a mental model that they can actually take and experiment with and use and change if they need to. You know that's kind of where I've tried to get to.
Speaker 2:So that really sparked a a reading journey for me. You know, around the captain, you know ranked level is when I started, you know, just digging hard in the reading. I hated reading before, that you know, but now I try to do it more. But one thing I told one of my section leaders was you had to choose what to fail at every day. You know, pick your not to do list and that's more important than your to-do list sometimes and you will fail at things. So you just got to choose what to fail that every day so that's.
Speaker 1:I love that. So, finding traceability within your day and your purpose, you're already a better company commander than I was. I can tell you that hands down, because when I was and I had the privilege of doing two company commands one was HHC and I had a medical company so I'm pretty intimately familiar with you, know with what you do, and thank you for that, because medical, medical company, medical personnel in general like saved lives on the battlefield. I've seen it. So thank you for everything that you do and then that you teach our men and women because I always say this and I miss it talking to soldiers but the greatest resource that we have as a country is not our technology, it's not all these material things that we have or that we produce and we export. It's the men and women that serve in this country and often those men and women go out and continue to do great things, and I have never met a medic that has been kind of just a crappy person. They've always been a selfless individual. They always put themselves in and line of duty first and try to help in any situation.
Speaker 1:And there's always this there's this one story that resonates with me when we were in Afghanistan that we, we just got done with this patrol and we were in Nalgam and that was where the Taliban originated. That's where Mullah Omar formed the Taliban. And we, we were getting ready to come back in and we heard, you know, grenade go off. But what happened is an individual that was on the other side and the Taliban threw a grenade and it hit this old man farming for no reason, just just to do it out of malice and hatred. The medic ran out there, grabbed him, pulled him in and treated him like no, like it was his son or a daughter, and ultimately ended up saving his life.
Speaker 1:And to me that, when you can provide the same level of care to someone who potentially wants to hurt or kill you, because we didn't know what the story was. We just knew that there was someone out there, maybe they were planting an ID or whatever it was, but that never, that never crossed his mind. And then, from that point on, I've always had a deep love for medics and I have so many stories that I could share, so that I love how you're able to create that traceability. Another thing that you talked about is finding ways to fail, because we all fell in a day but choosing what you want to be intentional with and what you want to let go. Can you kind of talk through that of how do you prioritize things in a day that you intentionally fail at and intentionally succeed at?
Speaker 2:yeah. So right now and again I need coaching, just like everyone else. But my methodology for that it kind of goes off. The one thing book written by Gary Keller and J Pappas in, and then Jeff Woods, you know, does a lot of training and stuff on it. But you know you can read the book. You're gonna have to read it a lot to to get to the level where you can actually use it day to day. But they have a great planner. You know yearly planner and I encourage you know carrying that paper around and it has you open it up and it's got, you know, a full month. You can see all the days. So seeing a long view of time is very important, right? So you know the concept of the one thing is you can only do one thing at a time. You know some people write to do's each day. You know I'm gonna get you know here's my top 10.
Speaker 2:Okay, people don't accomplish top 10. Here's my top five. People don't accomplish top five. Here's my top three. No, still not. You need one thing. You can do one thing today and you time block that time. Block that off and separate it apart from anything, and you don't get to do anything else before you do that one thing. So that's kind of the, the methodology I use for that and the way I choose that is backwards planning. You start with the long-term goal in mind. You know, 20 years into the future. You know, set your five-year goals, set your one-year goals. You know all, all lining up to to achieve the other goals right, and this is like the mentality between you know your infinite game and your goal setting. Like, of course, yes, you have to set goals. You can't just say I want to solve world peace and not have some stepping stones along the way, but you know saying those goals year and you get all the way and they call it time blocking to the now.
Speaker 1:So every you know in your 30-day calendar you have the one thing you're gonna do today and the exact time you're gonna do it, and that's kind of you know what I try to use when I'm being successful at it, so that that's another great point, because we talked about like kind of a growth mindset, but like really digging deeper into that and peeling back the onions is, yes, you're looking long-term, like in a vision, but there's a concept of being able to see it, being able to say it, being able to plan it, be able to replicate it and general portrays had a really good analogy for that and I'm gonna have to find it. But in order to achieve that long-term vision, you have to have some type of metric along the way to make sure you're still going on the right asmoth. So it's just like a land navigation. The first time that I've tried to do that, I was so far off that I I've basically failed the first time that I've ever done it. That is the truest form of a long-term vision.
Speaker 1:If you're walking 2000 meters in a wood line and you have a direct line asmoth, well, maybe you're not going to necessarily walk there, but you can set up intersection points between where roads intersect or like known places on a map, and that all that is is just anchor points along the way to make sure that you're going towards that shared vision that you have. But so I would love to to hear where did your leadership journey begin? What? What drove you to join the?
Speaker 1:army yeah, the army.
Speaker 2:So I think the biggest you know part of it, initially watching all the cool movies you know growing up yeah, the Arnold.
Speaker 2:Schwarzenegger yeah, and Sylvester Stallone era, commando Rambo, all that, you know that was kind of our, our age of people growing up just really inspiring. And then back then and we're back to it now. Or it was the motto, the army motto be all you can be, you know, yeah, and looking back I realized now that that was highlighting my goal of growth. You know, I was trying to be all I could be. I wanted to see what all I could be. You know, I wanted to grow. I didn't know what to call it back then. So now I know what that was. They did change it right before I joined to an army of one yeah, but you know then that didn't hurt me.
Speaker 2:I was still trying to be all I could be, and that was confusing. Like army of one. Is it just me? Am I the one or we all one together? You know, do I go in by myself and I'm an army of one?
Speaker 2:you know, I know that wasn't the intent, but that's what some people were thinking. But yeah, that's kind of what drove me to drive. And at that point, you know, when I was around my young teenage years, I knew some people in the National Guard and I was just fascinated by, you know, all the other gear and you know that this guy went to Desert Storm, you know. So it was just really inspiring to to do that, to do hard things. You know, to challenge yourself and do hard things. You know that's what kind of sparked me. But my mind was made up, you know, after 9-11.
Speaker 2:I was in high school and we showed up for school second period, you know, with our rumblings, first period and the second period we they took us all to the audio visual room and we were watching it on TV and like if I didn't, you know, already want to join, I was determined to join after that because it's kind of like not in my house kind of feeling, if you want to, you know, spark some motivation and people. You know, that's that's, that's the way you do it, you know. So I was, I felt, pulled and called to do that you know for for America.
Speaker 2:I know it's cheesy, but America you know all right team.
Speaker 1:Let's take a quick break from this podcast and I want to personally invite you to our private Facebook community that I call purposeful accountable leaders, or pals, and pals is a community dedicated to inspiring and developing servant leaders by sharing transformational stories and skills exactly what tells the leadership is all about. My goal is to build a community of like-minded leaders that can share lessons, learn, ask questions and celebrate wins when it happens. And my mission in life is clear I will end toxic leadership by sharing transformational stories and skills, and you will find countless transformational leaders in this group. Many of them I have had the honor to serve with in the military. If you want to find a community that can help you grow both personally and professionally, we would love to have you. You can simply search purposeful accountable leaders on Facebook or click the leadership resources tab in the show notes to join. I am looking forward to seeing you guys and continuing to grow together on our leadership journey.
Speaker 1:Back to the podcast. So a certain heart, because not too many people would would sacrifice their personal comforts to go chase something and how you said it, and that is the definition to me of leadership, but it is to inspire and always go back to a John Quincy Adams quote, and it always. This is where I kind of started really formulating my definition of it.
Speaker 1:And if your actions and inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader and you took that moment of pain and then turned it into inspired purpose and then started chasing hard things and and ultimately, kind of the theme that I'm getting with this episode is long term growth. Chasing hard things and and pushing yourself or a better way of maybe saying is kind of stretching your abilities and understanding what you said before. With John Maxwell, the more I learn and this is something that he says it the more I understand that I need to learn. So when I read a book and I understand, well, I think I had like leadership kind of of solved. And then I read another book and like wow, I never even thought of that before.
Speaker 1:That was another way of thinking about the same word and I kind of go back to you know John Maxwell's definition, which is influence. So he sees leadership as influence and the first time I heard that at least for me, it kind of had a negative taste in my mouth because when I think of influence I think of manipulation, but it's not. It's not that it's getting people to inspired around a common vision or shared principles. Yeah, so I love that of how you join the army and you've been in for 21 years. So are you National Guard that entire time did you start off enlisted? And yeah, enlisted when listed.
Speaker 2:But yeah, just a note on that challenging like people want to be challenged they may not admit it all the time, but people want to be challenged. And then, as a leader, that I see that as one of your jobs is to challenge people. Yeah, to help them grow, because that really is the only way you grow is to work outside your comfort zone. You know everything that you want is just on the opposite side of here, so you know. Just a note and a nugget on that. And I've never thought about the servant heart phrase, like you said. That and that kind of you know gives me another term to use. But all the jobs that I went into in the military I can see now that it was kind of from a servant mentality and a servant heart, so I really like that term. But yeah, I started out enlisted 2002, came in and joined as a parachute rigger the recruiter.
Speaker 2:I went to thankless but needed a job. Yeah, yeah, it's a small community and it's great, I said. The recruiter told you know. I went to the recruiters and looked at the jobs. Alright, unmanned aerial vehicle operator that sounds cool. Can I fly remote control drones around everywhere? He's like yeah, you don't want that job you know, you want to be a parachute rigger, you know, and I was like, okay, what's cool about that?
Speaker 2:is they get to jump out of airplanes and I'm like you know, I'm 17, I don't know if my mom will let me do this. He's like don't worry about it, you'll never deploy, you know. So we go to go to mom and say this is what I want to do. You know, recruiter promises me that I'll never deploy with this job. Right, so will you sign this paper? You know where I was a year and a half later.
Speaker 1:I racked, I racked, that's right. Oh man, what the recruiters will say now it's funny that you bring that up too is so. I was general Todd and an OPD not too long ago and we were kind of talking about like the army is trying to find itself again right like.
Speaker 1:So the be all that you can be, which to me that resonates because we're always trying to grow and learn more. And personally the military has been phenomenal, at least from my standpoint, because I come from, you know, rural West Virginia, of where everyone in my family is either went into forestry like literal lumberjacks or coal mining and that's all that we knew and I kind of broke that cycle. But I would have not have been able to break that cycle if it wouldn't have been for the army and it's a ability to stretch me to the capacity that I had within and I absolutely love that. But what inspired you to leave the enlisted corps to go be an officer?
Speaker 2:Yeah, before I answer that, I do want to hit on an analogy I like to use with the military and how it, you know, forces you to grow. And I think a lot of us come into the military like you know, we're trying to get away from somewhere and we maybe think isn't the ideal place for us. You know, it's kind of similar situation. Just a small town, you know, west Tennessee, where I grew up, but I consider the military, you know, kind of like a river or a stream. You know you have a goal, a place you want to go.
Speaker 2:There's, of course, a way to go, maybe walk over some, you know, hard terrain, mountains and whatever, but you know there's, there's a stream going somewhere. You know, and if you just take the initial step, the first commitment, and get in that stream, then it kind of, you know, takes you to where you want to go. You know I didn't want to get up at you know four or five o'clock every morning but I put myself in the military and it was expected you know so that that was a part of the stream that was just pushing me, pushing me down.
Speaker 2:You know I was, you know, being a young person afraid of leading older people and stuff like that, yeah, but the military pushed me into those positions, you know pushed, of course it's you need to volunteer for those. But you know, I felt removing the barriers to the challenge, removing the barriers to the decision, like joining the military, where they make you do stuff, I think is a pretty big part of growing and facing challenges. You know, and you know it could also be said your environment, set up your environment, create an environment where it makes those things easy. But, yeah, parachute rigger for a while. And then I went civil affairs before I became an officer. So I went to civil affairs because I had a good friend as a parachute rigger who had experience, you know, in use of sock, and he said these, these civil affairs guys, this is a pretty cool job. You know you get to go out there before everybody else. You know you get to do all kinds of cool things. So I'm like I'm down for cool things, let's go do it. So I did, you know, transitioned over to civil affairs and it was. It was a pretty cool job, you know. You got to do a lot of cool things, go to a lot of cool schools and and learn a lot. You know about myself and about leadership because you learn things the hard way a lot in those communities, like you just got to mess up and people, you know, punch you in the face, you know, metaphorically. So that was fun working there.
Speaker 2:I worked very closely with my team leader, who was a captain and a major at the time and you know I just I found myself, you know, shadowing him, seeing what he was doing and, of course, when this is my perspective for me coming, you know, being an enlisted soldier. You know you always thought that the officers were, you know, superhuman. You know, like as a camp, coming in as a e2, bv2, danos, going to a company, that captain, a company commander, was like I want to be there. You know that's, that's pretty awesome. They can do everything, you know. So you know I did start doing night classes and all that preparing to be at that, preparing to do that, you know.
Speaker 2:But as you get promoted, like as a parachute rigger, as you get promoted into, you know, leadership sergeant, staff sergeant, you start having more work right so that that process slowed down a little bit. But in civil affairs it was like right at the cutoff of age and I was like I better do this before it's too late. So I just I just bit the bullet and did it after I got, you know, one deployment with them, kind of got my feet wet with them, and then ROTC out of Murray State, kentucky, which is a very small place not a lot of people know about exactly where that is one of my good buddies, zach Shuddy, went through their Murray Murray State awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, go racers and like you, you know, like the degree you got, I got a degree in commissioning into the army, and that's just what we'll call it. Okay, yeah, I think I know what it is, but yeah, integrated studies is basically what we call it, and when people ask me what my degree is, and I just said it's just a degree in commissioning. That's all it was, so you know.
Speaker 1:I'll get.
Speaker 2:I'll get another degree one day you know, it's on, it's on the books, but ROTC there, and you know, I chose med service you know the medical service core because it seemed like there were a lot of options. I like options. I like you know avenues to grow in some of the branches to me, from my personal experience, were very, you know, straight shot. You know this is exactly where you're going to go, you know. So I chose med service because it's you know, there's so many different avenues and places to go. And then, of course, medevac flying helicopters was one of those. So, yeah, I'm me up for that. So, yeah, that's what I've been doing since 2013, when I went to flight school.
Speaker 1:2012 to 13, no well yeah, it's, it's funny they I feel like the the army has switched us in places like because I'm in PO aviation, so infantry officer in PEO aviation helping set the material development for that. But where I work now is within small UAS. So you know, sub, sub three pound quadcopter drones that are rucksack, portable, that were were filled in kind of out now. So it's funny that you you wanted to get into the army to be a drone operator took my job. That's kind of where I'm at right now. But there's something that you just said that I think really want to hit.
Speaker 1:One is that you developed yourself for those future jobs and like the theme that we have within this podcast is kind of continuing is is growth like growth over a long period of time. You're never going to see the results that you want at the beginning. But there's a book that I read. It was called a team and is a concept of an S curve. So when we first start something, we always hit stiff resistance. But if we continue with something, then we'll start to see exponential growth. But eventually we'll hit a plateau because we become good at that, we become efficient at that and then we become content, and contentment bleeds, complacency and and you and I both know what happens on the battlefield when, when units become complacent, that's where the enemy likes to to get a vote with the same concepts. True is where you continue to develop yourself for the future you're looking beyond, and that is something to me that's took a very long time to kind of develop. How did you, how did you just naturally develop that intuition to continue to lean?
Speaker 2:forward. It was probably the value of growth and that that was all I was going off of, you know, and I didn't. I didn't know where it was going to take me. It just I felt complete and felt like I was doing what I was supposed to do when I was growing towards something. So there's all there's. You know, some people look at it negatively, like summit syndrome. You know you're always chasing something and when you get to that summit, you know you gotta find something else to chase, which?
Speaker 1:yeah it's.
Speaker 2:That could be a problem if you look at it a bad way. But you know the gulf is my goal, so I know I'm going to keep going after that, so it doesn't, you know, bother me as much. I don't, like we said, I don't look at that one goal and you know that's it. When I get there I'm like sad about it. It's just I know that consistent growth is is the key in. You know I use a lot in coaching and counseling and mentoring and I tell people you know that consistency and persistency wins. You know, over talent and and all this stuff every day. You know, especially in business, like, if you can, if you as a business, you can outlast all your competitors. You know just that one thing outlast them. Set all your system was up to outlast them. You know the infinite game. Keep that in mind, then you will be successful. You know you're going to be a giant basically. So I've learned that committing to growth has led to that consistency and persistency in in pursuing things.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that consistency and persistency right.
Speaker 2:It wins over lots of things. I'd like to hit on a couple of things you said earlier. We can step back a second, you know talking about the medics yeah, go ahead in the military. I just wanted to say that you know, in the medivac community.
Speaker 2:Our medics are trained to such a high level. You know that it's it's ridiculous. You know how high of a level they're trained to. You know you know their actual paramedics. You know flight, flight certified paramedics who could as easily go out into the civilian work force and make a whole lot more money than you know what they get paid in the army. But they're, they're so dedicated to it and you know I'm just always very surprised and pleased with the, the caliber of the, the flight medics that are in the army. So, you know, just makes me, makes me proud to serve with them and and they're always dedicated themselves to, to serving others and saving others.
Speaker 1:You know, on the battlefield yeah, no, I, yeah, I can't say enough about them. Another story, we'll kind of get into detail. Highly stressful situation quadruple amputee medic applied four tourniquets within 30 seconds and ended up saving his life. So, and other people, you know, you have that fighter flight response. They're kind of sitting there, yeah, so shell shocked, hey, what, what just happened? Hey, let me check myself first. Right, like okay, I got all all, all ten fingers, all ten toes. Nope, he immediately went to that point of friction and then applied the tourniquets. And because he saved that individuals life and I think and I remember this from a Brigade commander telling me when I did my first company live fires, it's just always stuck with me and it's a story that I always tell I didn't know where to place myself when when I was doing that live fire exercise, I knew that I wanted to be somewhere that had good command and control.
Speaker 1:I could see the battlefield, I could maneuver my forces. But he brought up the concept is that you have to be able to look through this and Identify with your intuition of where those points of frictions are going to be on your battlefield, the places where your platoon leaders need help To, where their platoon sergeants are focused on. You know, kazavak, medevac, those types of things. That's where you need to be. You need to be at those points of friction to kind of help the team go through. And it just reminded me of how that medic selflessly dove in head first, not even checking itself, but just to check someone else. I would love to know when was the time that you first had that spark, that purpose of where you were able to Trace your love for coaching to the love of the military, and how did that go for you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it goes back to what I talked about earlier that as a platoon leader you know as a captain platoon leader in the medevac company I started getting you know these first lieutenants coming in and asking me hard questions about you know management, leadership, you know time management, all this stuff and it really sparked me to learn more and as I gave intuitive answers to how I handle things, you know, as I started to see that, you know, I did have a way of doing things and I did have a model that I use. I just never codified it and just seeing sometimes that it did help them. I'm not saying all my answers are right, but Helping them, seeing that they were able to learn from some of you know my mistakes or advice and and grow themselves, really kind of sparked that in me. And you know we you've had the experience. I'm sure we haven't always had the best leaders. You learn from those as well. So I've had great leaders and I've had bad leaders and they're great ones Really inspired me to to grow. You know, like one of my battalion commanders always having LPD and we would do hard stuff. Like you know, a for a PT test add two miles on to the end for a four mile run time, do a 12 mile ruck, you know, shoot your weapon, do a medical lane, and you know that was your morning for you know the shadow warrior I think he's what called that competition, that and doing. You know evasion lanes and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:It's those things that, like I said, challenge people, want that in the in the moment, just like everything that's hard. You're like why am I doing this to myself? Why did I sign up for this? Why is this person making me do this? And then, after your words, you're like look at what I did. I did this and that and that you know.
Speaker 2:So you know you want to give people that, that opportunity. So that's what I want to do for people. You know I want to give them that. Another phrase that I use sometimes, you know, to challenge people to do a little bit more is you know, when you're 80 years old, whatever, when you're a grandpa and you got your grand kid on your knee, you don't want your story to be. You know I was able to avoid as much work as possible in the army and escape by. You know you want to tell them all the hard stuff you did. You know and you know, if, as a leader, I give them the opportunity To face those challenges and that adversity in a safe, controlled manner, where they learn, of course, then I feel like that's, you know, part of my job All right team.
Speaker 1:Let's take a quick break from this episode and I want to share a leadership resource with you, and that is the resiliency based leadership program. Rblp's vision is to create a worldwide community of practice committed to building and leading Resilient teams. So why do you need to build and lead a resilient team? Resilient teams are the key to individual and organizational growth, regardless of being in the military or in the civilian workforce. Building collective teams allows for exponential growth and the team's ability to overcome adversity, adapt and, most importantly, grow. And in bottom line, up front, resilient teams are just stronger together.
Speaker 1:And here's the fact 99% of the people who take that course Recommended to others and I'm one of them. I would just completed my certification and I highly recommend this. And the great news is it's most likely free to you, and if you're in the military, it is a hundred percent free to you. And if you want to learn more, you can look in the show notes for this episode and find the link and use the discount code J MCM. I ll Iowan, and that is also in the show notes. Back to the episode yeah, forward your ford, your legacy. I think, kind of going back to one of the best and worst memories that I have is in Branger School. We're doing the Darby obstacle course, I'm just doing iron mics and this was like three days after no sleep, no food, you know, 12 mile Rock March, 16 mile Rock March, 5 mile runs, all these crazy shenanigans that they have you do, and I'm just sitting there doing iron mics and in my mind, like I'm, like this is the silliest thing in the world.
Speaker 1:Why did I go into the infantry and then, like at that moment in time, an RI, the ranger instructor, standing at the top of one of those towers, looked at me, singled me up ranger, stop feeling sorry for yourself. Men and women came here before you, or, at the time, men, it came before you and they've made the ultimate sacrifice, and they did not make that ultimate sacrifice for you to sit there and feel sorry for yourself.
Speaker 1:Mm-hmm and I'm like, oh, wow, and it just reframed my mind. Is that okay, I'm here for a reason. I feel everything happens for a reason. I think we're all, we all have signs and signals in life that you know point us, regardless of what you believe. But I feel that Kind of divinity in a way points us to the right direction. We always have those touch points throughout our life and I feel like that was one of them. That was one hate quit, feeling selfish and start being selfless. And then I went with you know my battle buddy and started figuring out Alright, how do we maneuver these obstacle courses together, mm-hmm at the end of the day, so we both can be successful, versus me just feeling sorry for myself and then my partner just felling every single obstacle. So that's an absolutely great Mission that you have of going in and pursuing coaching. And again I ask you now, like where you are right now, what, what lights you up?
Speaker 2:Yeah, just seeing people grow, you know, in the military when you get to give someone an award, someone an award, or get to promote then or just congratulate them for doing great, that you know, snapshot in time is like my favorite, you know. I always say, you know, these are my favorite. I usually start those out with these are my favorite times in the army. I wish I could do this all the time, you know, and just give people awards all day, you know, that's the best part. So that's that's what really lights me up seeing people grow and succeed, you know, and that's why it's one of my values, I guess. But you know your story about Ranger school. It's, you know, it kind of reminds me that there are challenging moments that kind of anchor us in in the world and you know, I would say anchor how anxious or Scared we get at other points in our life. Like you know, I could tell for you anytime you're nervous or you think something sucks.
Speaker 2:I bet you think back to Ranger school, you know, of course you probably had other hard things in your life. You think back to that time where you just Didn't want to go anymore, you know, and then you kept going. Like you know it could always be worse, it could always be. I could always be back doing iron mics. You know, and I have one like that where it was in Iraq and we were in those, you know, just eight inch still guard towers around the base, because that's what they build them out of and it was, you know, 20 degrees or so and just freezing to death. You know, overnight you know guard tower shift and and you know, every time I face something hard in my life or think something's hard, I'm like, well, at least it's not that. So you have something to compare it to. You know, you got that challenge in your life to compare it to.
Speaker 1:I Wish I could share my screen right now, but there there's something that I developed, and this is that that I use like personally, because I think affirmations are powerful if.
Speaker 1:There is head-heart hand alignment, meaning that it creates an internal fire, burning desire within you. And I've always had this and you know I developed it through some of the loss that I've had to go through, some of the challenging times that I've had to go through. Then I always reflect on those moments when something bad happens and it's simple. You know, every day's a gift.
Speaker 1:I'm not going to waste mine and whenever something happens that you know tries to test me, then I always view it is that this is not a bad day. I've seen what a bad day is that try to keep stay calm, cool, collected, and you know recent stories my wife was diagnosed with type one diabetes Just randomly out of the blue. We're getting ready to move to Fort Belvoir and you know the next month or two, so that's a significant issue. But I'm looking at it from the standpoint of you know how the events in my life has kind of led up to that. I'm not viewing it from a victim mentality. I'm viewing it from what challenging events in my life has kind of led me up to it.
Speaker 1:And that could be a whole podcast in itself, but it goes back to every day's a gift. You know I'm not going to waste my not challenge anyone To have a strength statement and argue. I think you have one to time the tower guard just being miserable and understanding what a bad day looks like. So can you define what outstanding leadership is?
Speaker 2:yes. So you know, as being an NCO, before you have to memorize the, the creed of the not commission officer and say it a million times. So you know there's a line in there that all soldiers are entitled to outstanding leadership. You know I will provide that leadership and as I began developing, you know how I wanted to frame leadership and my philosophy, really my philosophy is, you know, starts from that phrase. I have a few foundational, you know, foundations. You know they include extreme ownership. You know care, compassion and outward mindset. But that that phrase is always, you know, on my mind, like it's.
Speaker 2:They are entitled, the people who sign up in the military that you are in charge to lead. You know their moms and their fathers, their mothers and fathers sent them to you to, you know, take care of them and grow them up. They're entitled to the outstanding leadership. You have to develop that as a leader in the military and I'm not in charge. All leaders with that, like people, come to you. You're the leader. You have to do that.
Speaker 2:You know we can't get anywhere in the world, we can't accomplish hard things, we can't put colonies on Mars. You know, unless we have Leaders who are willing to be outstanding and I have the you know, one of my buddies, mentors, former platoon sergeants or former former detachment sergeants, wayne, to think for that. His favorite word is outstanding and no matter what challenge he's facing, you know he can always get that word out. You know it's his one one word response to you know great things that happen, bad things that happen. You know everything. So, taking that word outstanding and, just, you know, building it into my leadership philosophy, is is a you know, where I go to, and by outstanding I just mean continuously growing and having the foundation of care for people.
Speaker 1:I love that so kind of with your, your coaching services that you have right now. What is one tool because I always love bringing fellow coaches on here, because we all see Coaching leadership kind of differently but what is one tool that you could share with our listeners, that they could go and employ that right now?
Speaker 2:yeah. So I always think that understanding, finding out your values A lot of people go through. You know life and this is a simple tool. It's just go online and Google, you know a list of values and you see a list of 100, a list of 300. A list of 465, and just take the time and go through those values and start whittling them down, which ones Align with you, which one spark you, which ones you know resonate with you, and get it down to about three and I think that's a good number.
Speaker 2:But everything that you do, all your philosophies, you know they start with that. Like you know you, you you base your leadership philosophy on your values. You know everything you do should be based on your values and a lot of people don't intentionally. You know, when you talk about purpose, purposeful, accountable leaders, you need to purposefully find those out so you can base your, your philosophies and your methodologies on those values, so you can get consistent results and you can teach that. You can't really teach people these models unless you understand your values and you develop that.
Speaker 1:That was one of the most powerful things of me, kind of going through a coaching cohort and I don't know if you know this or not, but it may be some kind of like to to to think on is that the army has a program called the army coaching program and they, they pay you know, senior noncommissioned officers, junior soldiers, junior senior officers to go through this in a international coaching federation accredited program and, even if you never apply it, to go pursue a coaching career. The one thing that it did for me that I wish I would have when I was a commander is JR Flatter, one of the founders of the company. The company was developing a house of leadership and I spent a lot of time writing that down, taking what he had as an example to kind of inspire me. But hey, who am I as a leader? What are all the things that shaped me? What are the values that I hold dear? You know the principles that have guided my decisions through tough times and where do I want to go? When I developed that, it unleashed just a creative spirit with inside of me and a deeper passion and purpose that I didn't know I had.
Speaker 1:And I'm not lying when I say this is the.
Speaker 1:You know I've outlined over 200 blog articles now because I I've lit a spark inside of me that was was I can.
Speaker 1:Destiny in the best way, kind of divinity at its best is that we all have greatness inside of us, we all have a deep purpose inside of us, but we have to find what that is. And I love how you said because that's where it starts is defining your values. You, you cannot make and this is one of the things that I really want to make sure that the listeners, because it's so true, when you are Encountered with a tough time or a tough situation or you're in a tough environment, unless you confidently know who you are and what your core values are, you're never going to be able to make bold, decisive decisions. When you know you, what your values are, you do not question those and you become much more decisive. And I think that's one of the examples and thank you for using that term, it just always sticks with me a purposeful, accountable leader, a pal, and it's that they know who they are and they're decisive when they need to act because they spent that time to think yeah, that's, that's beautiful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll always use that word Intentionality, or intentional, the purposefuls. I like that. You can use it in an acronym better. But I have been through that cohort and you know I did do the same thing with his house of leadership. I started you know what's in my house of leadership and that sparked a lot for me too. So we have JR to thank for this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, that's funny, he hit his, his shield that he kind of built. You know, when we're going through that, he's just touched so many lives and I don't know what your vision is. But for me, you know, I want to positively in fact 1 million lives in the next 10 years, and that's a strategic number because that's a pivot point where I could transition out the military or I could continue to stay in. It really depends on where I am between work, family itself, like where, where, where am I? And yeah, I think that was, that was one of the best exercises that that I've ever spent time on and, I think, something that the Army needs to invest more in. But kind of walk into like the coaching services that you have right now. Could you walk me through what is the, the national board for for leadership certification and kind of where you're at?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so this is, you know, codifying. You know leaders, like we went through a coaching course, you know that and you know to be certified as coaches. You know, pursuing the ICF certification and what that does for us is, you know, enforces accountability on each of us and gives us a way in goals to pursue. So you know, the, the national board for leadership certification, I believe, is a way to, you know, give leaders an avenue again. Put yourself in that stream, that river, and Be shown and faced with these, these challenges, and you know, completing these modules that you need to complete, demonstrating your leadership, learning, working with other leaders, and then you know, at the end, having that, that certification that says to your future employers that you know this person is a certified leader.
Speaker 2:You know it, this you know, I think you you probably experienced the same thing in so many Jobs that people are promoted to leadership because of technical you know competence and tactical competence and they weren't really prepared for leadership at that time Because you know most of the stuff they they were good at had to do with completing the job, you know. So I've seen that as a need and that's kind of why I've, you know, accepted a position on the board for the national board for leaders and you know I'm trying to get the message out there and Make that something that more people, you know, want to pursue. And again, it's purposeful, you know, and it's intentional. You know, if I want to grow as a leader growth is a big thing for me Then I'm going to put myself in some kind of stream to pull me forward to that goal and I think that the community that surrounds this certification is one of those.
Speaker 1:Yeah that I love that and how we're. So we we're probably in a very similar cohort, but we took that and we didn't stop growing and I just see a lot of similarities between you and me.
Speaker 1:So right now, like I'm leveraging the army credentialing program of where and if anyone's listening to this if you're in the military and if you're active duty, if you meet the basic qualifications, the army will literally give you $4,000 a year, no add, so no additional time and service to pursue advanced education requirements and and I'm going through right now and I was blessed to have the founder of it but resiliency building leader program and I'm in, I'm in model six and I'll be taking that certification test pretty soon, but I have, I think you have the same way now. Now you're in that stream and you're pursuing your purpose and you have a. You have a burning desire to, to consume more, because now I look at it from lens like a I don't know how much time I have. I want to learn as much as I possibly can so I can leave the best impact when people that I'll leave. I want to truly inspire people that work for me, but a better way of phrasing it work with me.
Speaker 1:I don't. I don't want to let authority Inspire people to do. I want my actions to inspire people to do. Yeah, I love that. Yeah, and our organization is. Yeah, I love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and our BLP is a great certification. You know, if you are in the military, you know you get it's on the cool. You know credentialing assistants.
Speaker 1:You get paid to get that certification, so there's no reason why you shouldn't you know, pursue that as a leader so so kind of One of the last questions before we get to the final show segment, and I either like asking this up front or towards the end, but I would love to hear how? How do you define leadership now? And over the course of growth? How has it changed?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I always default to the, to the military or the army's definition. Influenced a good one, yeah, but it all starts with influence and I do love, you know, john maxwell and all his teachings, so you know I piggyback on his influence as a simple way to say it, um, influence, but you know, you know I have my foundational principles, um, that include care and compassion for people, so I always tack that on. You know you can influence people to do great things or or bad things, so, um, just just have that care and compassion in there. Um, yeah, one word, one word influence.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love it. So final question before we get to the final show segment. But the kind of where you are right now, what is one leadership lesson that just continues to stick with you?
Speaker 2:conflict management. So there are a few ways to to, to you know, address conflict management. The army gives you A lot of tools to do a lot of things, but it's in a regulation, in a manual, somewhere and you have to read it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know what does, yeah, yeah yeah, that's.
Speaker 2:That's another topic.
Speaker 1:That's a whole podcast.
Speaker 2:There is a tool inside the master resiliency training mrt, uh, called assertive communication and it is a tool that has helped me so much. You know, and I teach that to all, everyone I lead now, um, and I and I printed out often and bring it different places with me, like the last lpd we did. It was there with me and I handed it to them, you know, at the table. But assertive communication is, is the way to go for for conflict management, um, and you have whole books about it now. But if I was to simplify it there, if there is conflict, uh, you have to get those people together you know, and discussing the conflict, just avoiding it or not paying attention to it, it's not going to solve itself.
Speaker 2:Um so, you know, there's that Anxiety that comes when you have have conflict facing you, but you just have to reframe that, you know. Reframe that, like I said for me earlier, is there's conflict here. I'm going to use this experience to to grow from it and to learn how to train and teach other people, depending on which way this goes, and, you know, help me deal with conflict more in the future. The only thing that's 100 is 100 percent certain as a leader is there's conflict. There's going to be conflict between people. So unless you begin to master those types of skills, it will be hard, or reframing, reframing it, it will be continued to be harder, and that's what keeps people away from leadership. I think why they shy away from it sometimes is is conflict management Something?
Speaker 1:you said before too, I think kind of ties into that is that people, I see it um Levels of leadership, leadership, intelligence.
Speaker 1:So, tactical, operational, strategic tactical is where, like you and I, go and we go to a range and we shoot 40 out of 40. Well, our individual performance is tied to our results, but as you grow through your leadership journey, your individual performance is not tied to the results of the organization. It's tied to the individual's results and you're spot on man. Your spot on is that People avoid leadership roles, even when they're made for it, even when they have the right heart to do it, because they avoid, they don't want to be in conflict and I learned this, a powerful lesson. We won't get into it because we're already at an hour, which is. It blows my mind how fast these podcasts episodes go.
Speaker 1:But you either can be courageous for 60 seconds and confront it and work through it or you can allow that 60 seconds of courage to turn in the 60 hours and then continue to erode the culture Of your organization. So it's a choice either confront it, be uncomfortable for 60 seconds, find common ground and work through it, or let it to continue us to erode your, your, culture. It's time for our final show segment that I like to call the killer bees. These are the same four questions that I ask Every guest on the tales of leadership podcast be brief, be brilliant, be present and be gone. Question one what do you believe separates a good leader from an extraordinary leader?
Speaker 2:A good leader from an extraordinary leader. Intentionality, intentionality, intention.
Speaker 1:I love it. So the second question what is one resource? It could be a book, podcast, whatever that you could recommend to our listeners.
Speaker 2:Assertive communication and mrt.
Speaker 1:Okay, I like it All right. Third question if you could give yourself a younger self a piece of advice, what would it be?
Speaker 2:My younger self a piece of advice. Well, that's a good one. Face, you know, face your fears earlier. You know, that's probably what it would be. I would probably uh. Grow, I would have grown faster if I would have faced fears a little bit earlier in life. I felt like I matured a little bit later into understanding that. Uh so yeah, face your fears and you know everything that you want is on the other side of fear, I love everything you want is on the other side of fear.
Speaker 1:Did you just come up with that?
Speaker 2:quote no, no, I was about to say that's an amazing quote.
Speaker 1:So, oh, man, that was good, uh, okay. So final question how can our listeners find you? And then how can they add value to your mission?
Speaker 2:Uh, you can find me by going on the the national board for leadership certification website. Uh national board of leaders dot org. Um, and for those that uh want to begin the journey on certification, you know they they've set up a discount code for getting one of the components free. Um, so you can use the code. Uh buy leaders with the number four, uh leaders, so buy leaders for leaders. And you can go on there and uh enter that code and and sign up for one of the components and I'll be there. You'll see me.
Speaker 1:Can thank you for being intentional with me for an hour kind of talking about something that we both have a deep passion about, which is is leadership. I think this has been a phenomenal podcast and you brought great content.
Speaker 2:My pleasure and thank you for having me.
Speaker 1:All right team. It's time for our after action review. That was a great episode with kin, but what are the top three takeaways you should have from this episode? The first one that I have is because we have such similar backgrounds and where I'm, we're still active military officers, but we have the ability to pursue our purpose and I feel a lot of people out there like that. And what does it come down to? It comes down to finding traceability.
Speaker 1:I love being a servant leader. I loving adding value to people. I love being a coach and a mentor within my current job. That was the traceability of me to pursue my passion. Everything that I do in the military is to be a better leader, while I can also unselfishly apply that to other areas of my life, and part of that is developing this podcast and being a coach and having my own Coaching company. You can still pursue your passion, but you have to be able to find the traceability between that and if you're listening to this podcast and you're saying, hey, I can't do that, my job is too demanding. I am an active duty army officer who manages a portfolio of over $20 million and I have a very, very active lifestyle, both family and work and then just self. If I can do it, you can do it, you can find a way.
Speaker 1:The second key takeaway that I have and I love this metaphor is jumping in the stream. Once you get into the stream, the current will naturally take you somewhere, but you have to choose where you're going to go, and a couple key things that he brought up is Consistency and persistency. You have to be consistent and you have to be persistent when times get tough. What separates great leaders from average leaders is their ability to move through and have the grit, but also to be consistent, and that's the key, right there. Being consistent doesn't mean doing the same thing and getting the same results. Being consistent means learning, adapting and Continuing to take action, continuing to chase hard things. And the final thing that I wrote down key takeaway is Conflict management, and this was towards the end of the podcast, but this is something that I need to bring someone on the show to talk about, because that is the root cause of why People who would be phenomenal leaders or purposeful, accountable leaders do not take leadership roles because they are afraid of conflict management. And he hit the nail in the head it takes assertive communication. You have to be courageous. 60 seconds of Courage of handling a situation that can be a whole podcast in itself between Conflict management, will save you 60 hours. Trust me.
Speaker 1:I, early in my career, have let things slip or, you know, kick the Preferbial can down the road and it only got worse. It's just bad news, doesn't get better with time. Right when you deal with it up front. It's going to be uncomfortable, it's going to be awkward, but it will save you time, it'll save your organization time and you can quickly get past it. So, as a leader, you have to embrace that.
Speaker 1:Embrace conflict management. It is going to happen and that's one of the fundamental rules of leadership is leadership is not likeorship. It doesn't matter what you do, what you say. Someone on your team Is either going to disagree with you or not like you, but that's okay. It's not the job of the leader to be liked. It is the job of the leader to get results and care for their people and be a servant to serve.
Speaker 1:Hey, team, if you like what you hear with this podcast, do me a favor and it would mean the world to me. If you subscribe, you rate, leave me a five star review and and share this podcast with someone who's just starting out on their leadership. I also have additional content in terms of tales of leadership blog and you can find that on McMillian leadership coaching comm, and that would be the best way to reach out to me. Let me know what type of content you want to hear, who you want to hear on this podcast, so I can continue to bring value to you guys. As always, I'm your host, josh mcmillian, saying every day Is a gift. Don't waste yours. I'll see you next time.