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Welcome to the Wired to Lead podcast with Julia LeFevre!
The following is a transcript of the conversation between Julia LeFevre and Damon Young:
* **Julia:** Hi everyone. Today I'm joined by Damon Young. He is a visionary leader, a consultant, and the founder of DKY Consulting. Damon helps organizations bridge people, purpose, and performance by developing leaders who think deeply and lead with clarity. He's also the CEO of Lead Wichita and a voice in our community who believes that transformation begins with discernment, the kind that shapes not just what we do, but who we become. So Damon, I'm so excited to have you on the show. Thank you for being our first guest of season two. Welcome to *Wired to Lead*.
* **Damon:** Thanks for having me. I'm super excited. Um, thanks for the kind introduction and I'm looking forward to a great conversation.
* **Julia:** Absolutely. I knew I wanted to ask you when our first meeting in the coffee shop uh went for a couple of hours and I just thought, man, uh we have a lot in common. So, let's just record a conversation and see see where it goes.
* **Damon:** Sounds great.
* **Julia:** So, I was looking through your new website and I saw one of your articles called "Leaders: We Had One Job," and that job uh is to discern. And so I'm pulling out my Jimmy Fallon uh alter ego and I thought it'd be fun to play a quick game called "Let's Discern". And so these all have to do with uh the Wichita area. So that's that's your clue. And so I want you to discern between uh two things. So for example, number one: I-35 construction or Kellogg Detour, which one would be worth taking if both of them are getting you to the same place?
* **Damon:** Yeah. Yeah. So probably 35.
* **Julia:** Okay. Um, Riverfest Fireworks or Symphony in the Flint Hills?
* **Damon:** Symphony in the Flint Hills.
* **Julia:** Okay. Dillons run or QuikTrip stop?
* **Damon:** Unfortunately, QuikTrip stop.
* **Julia:** Okay. What's your What's your meal? Lunch of pleasure.
* **Damon:** QuikTrip. Now, I actually don't hardly eat lunch at QuikTrip. Actually, my lunch of convenience is probably like a smoothie like at Smoothie King or like that's probably become my new QuikTrip because I'm like I can go to QuikTrip and even if I think I'm getting something like sort of healthy, it's still going to cost me 10 bucks.
* **Julia:** It's true.
* **Damon:** And I and I can go get a small smoothie that's like a vegan kale smoothie and it's like eight bucks or seven bucks. So, it's like I've become the I've actually become a Smoothie King guy for if I'm on a quick like if I'm like on a quick lunch.
* **Julia:** Yeah. Awesome. Okay. Well, now I have to have a smoothie every day, but it's at my Shape It Up nutrition place, so you guys are giving you a shout out for the same reason.
* **Damon:** Yeah, it's good.
* **Julia:** Okay. Well, all all fun and games aside, what I really love about that article is that it points to something deeper. That discernment isn't just a leadership skill. It's really a capacity. Uh, it requires space, reflection, and presence. Um, understanding the deeper story. And in some ways, that's what I would love to explore. On one hand as today as we are entering into a new year is: how can leaders discern growth and restoration from just simple change? And so you have said on I think I saw this on your website that your mission is to ignite and sustain transformation by connecting divergent ideas into a unified vision. And so just curious, how do you see transformation differing from just change especially when it comes to leadership and the spaces that you are in?
* **Damon:** Yeah, I think one way to think about that is if you think about who, what, when, where, why, and how. You know, you think about the questions that could help us discern or the questions that could help us be guided. I think the questions that could help us discern the difference I think that's what I called it in that in that article was like discern the difference between just a goal and goals are great like I always want to be clear when I talk about this like I I come from a high performing background I love goals I love hitting goals I love uh I love winning you know. Like and I don't ever want people to think that like as I'm as I've adapted my approach the last five specifically that somehow this isn't about goals. Like, of course it's about goals. Like, of course you're going to need to hit goals, but the question I would ask would be the ones I would hone in on when I'm thinking about discerning the difference is why, what, and how. So, like, why am I doing it? Because what I'm doing could be if if an outsider zoomed in and watched me do whatever it was I was getting ready to go do, the what might actually look identical. They might see like oh whether he was doing this from a transformational perspective or from a growth perspective um or or just like a simple goal perspective. The what might look the same, but the why could be totally different and the why could also help inform the how. So the how to me it's less about the what, way more about the why and the how. And so like for example when it comes to my own journey uh many many authors I can think about that have been helpful with this but Stephen Garber is one that's been real helpful. He wrote a book called *Visions of Vocation* and he talks in that about the idea of the three what he calls the three R's. Um, so the three R's are revelation, relationship and responsibility. And his contention in that book is there's a lot of vocational despair happening where people are really in deep despair because they're not aligned on those three things. So they might have revelation and that revelation could be information that says we should go do fill in the blank but then we might choose to not do that in relationship with others healthy relationship and we might not prioritize even our the the responsibility. We could overdo our own responsibility and undervalue say the relationship. So our how might be, oh my gosh, that revelation convinced me I should go do something, but then I don't prioritize relationship, only responsibility, and now I've got revelation and responsibility, and I'm going after it with all I got. Well, I would be one that would say, if I'm not going to do it with people and with God, then I don't know if I want to do it. It doesn't matter how I could go accomplish that thing, but I don't want to do it for God. I don't want to do it for people. I want to do it with God. And I want to do it with people. And that act of "with" is now my how and my why. And both of those things feed me. If I so my faith and my relationships give me fuel to keep going because the revelation is only going to go last so long. The implication of the responsibility is only going to last so long. Those those are like empty those are finite fuels but relationship "with" is restorative. And so like that's how I think about it is really get clear. So like for the the person listening at the beginning of the year it's like okay say I have it could be a simple weight loss goal or it could be a career goal or it could be a family goal doesn't really matter but really think through like why do I want to do this who's it for and what how could I shift the narrative from "for" to "with". That how would that change the how? So like for example if I was working out and I wanted to do this with somebody, it's going to change when I work out because I'm going to have to schedule it. And at the at the end of that, we're going to schedule at a time that's mutually convenient and then that's going to be the main driver. So, I think it's just get clear on your guiding questions, really dig in on those, and then for me personally, that it's the relationship part that feeds into the restorative part.
* **Julia:** Well, you've just segued into my world. And so I have to pull out my little blue brain now. I pull out every time. Uh, because the reason that relationships matter so much is that that's what fuels our brain to operate at the smartest part. So the smartest part of our brain is our prefrontal cortex that makes all of the decisions that can think critically, can make good choices, can discern what we what is best. The problem is is that our brain works from the bottom up. And when our brain stem gets the information, it's asking is this life or death? Most of the time it's not. It's not life or death for us. But then it comes into this limbic system, the subconscious brain that's asking, "Do I matter and do I belong?" So these are the existential questions that are driving most of our behaviors. And here's the thing that neuroscientists are finding out is that if you don't have people to do life with, then your brain is getting the answer that you don't matter and that you don't belong. And then guess what? All of your energy is going to resolve that, and your the smartest part of your brain that can make the best decisions doesn't get a chance to flourish and grow. And so this is why relationships, it's a neurological fact that we need connections, safe spaces to be able to do anything new, to to do anything um that has to do with growth or change. So, I just love that all of those play into it because you can't do one without the other. It's a balance. You need all of it.
* **Damon:** Yeah, that's that's fascinating. And and I think I think that the often times when we when we think about setting a goal, so if we think about a a cold resolution as a goal that and it could be a perfectly great thing like I want to lose 10 pounds or I want to hit my quota at work or whatever it is I think we go to that well what do I need? What's what's what do I need in order to accomplish that? And it's like I need willpower, you know? And I also think there's something about I need a percent of accuracy. Like I have to probably get it right way more than I get it wrong. Like when you're when you're thinking about doing a goal, it's like I've got to be really efficient. And then I think then the mistakes when we make mistakes, which we're going to make mistakes, then those mistakes end up showing up like shame and guilt. So you think like and then often we don't want to face that shame or guilt and so then we shut down or we check out and so so it's like I'm going to drive and I would say like in my adult life at least over half of it. I mean a good 10 or 15 years I feel like was oriented around a cycle of: I have to have willpower to do a thing. I'm measuring my accuracy to some degree. I fall short, then I get shame or guilt, and then I check out and or self-cope in some way, and then I somehow dust myself off or get rescued, and then I try it again. And then that that cycle went on for years and years and years. And it wasn't until I started to see like, well, instead of willpower, it's more like surrender. And instead of being doing it for something, it's more like doing it with. And then instead of a percent of accuracy, it's more like a percent of learning. Like, oh, that didn't go like I thought or I made a mistake, but what can I learn from it? And then lastly, that the mistake isn't shame. The mistake is just once again learning, you know, and then that learning. And then you're in a I had a friend tell me one time like, well, it's real simple: do you have a knowing culture or a learning culture? And I was talking about the culture at the company I was helping run and and it was like ah darn we have a knowing culture. Uh, we expect people to know and when they don't they fall in that pattern that I just described. Um, and so it's like no we need to have a whether it's our our own life, our family, our team, our organization. We need to create an environment for ourself where we're we're we're not asking how did it do we win or lose. We're asking what did we learn and then that learning is restorative because it informs the next time and then the relationships whether it's us and God or us and our team members or family they're not anchored in shame or guilt or performance they're anchored in love and learning and then that unlocks all kinds of stuff.
* **Julia:** It does and it sounds so easy like let's just be learners right like let's just flip the switch and not feel shame or guilt. And yet what I'm assuming you because you're laughing with me have experienced both personally and in people that you help lead. It is not that easy. Yeah. And so when I think about leaders or let me just go back to your story. What did that cycle look like? You know how how did you move from that cycle to where you are today? You indicated that especially in the past five years there have been some pretty big shifts. Tell us the story behind those shifts.
* **Damon:** Mhm. I think that it's I mean two things come to my mind is that facing through therapy, counseling, coaching, facing the negative, the fight or flight, like you said in the in your analysis of the brain. Like I don't think I realized how much of my knee-jerk reactions or my uh there's a Victor Frankl quote that that they use in the Kansas Leadership Center managed self section of that curriculum. And Victor Frankl says that there's a space between the stimulus and the response. And in that space essentially is where is where leadership happens like that. So there's a stimulus and a response and there's a small little space and and that's that small little space KLC calls it a conscious choice and I love your brain diagram because like the conscious part is really key. Like I I think it was when I real when I learned about like oh I can make a conscious choice and that means I have to stop. So leadership could be something you start doing. Leadership could also be something you stop doing. And I stopped as much as I could reacting in the moment and I started giving myself space to consider what the right decision was. In that space, sometimes it could be a minute or it could be a month depending on the the choice. But in that space, I started to analyze what are the factors that are going into this decision. And in many cases unfortunately the factor is a need to prove, a need for credit, a need for glory, a need to... and then you start going like well where'd that come from and then you start analyzing you know through once again through professional counseling and therapists and coaching and different people like that. I started to see how much I was still trying to prove something to somebody. And once I slow and that that took years. I mean, it took years to slowly create the space and give myself a little bit of margin to make decisions. Um, in construction, the business I was in at the time, that's really hard because often the decisions are needing to be made fairly quickly. Yeah. Um, and but but what I learned is like you can still take a minute. You can still pause for a moment and just consider who is this decision for? And I think I wrote that I wrote that article you're talking about at near the end of my uh commercial construction experience because I was trying to distill what what is it I've learned and what I've learned is most people most of the time can't afford to take a moment to discern. And I think in that moment you if you that's the other thing I did is I journaled a lot. So, I I would journal a lot about like here's the decision in front of me. Here's the things I'm considering. And then as I would journal and I would like get a new journal, I would I would set time. This became a habit for a good I've been on this habit for almost 10 years. When I finish a journal, I make an appointment with myself to go read my old journal before I write my new journal. So I So when I switch the journals out, this is like a ceremony. So, if you ever see me at the coffee shop and you I have two journals on my hands, like he might just like wave hi and like be like, "Oh, Damon's doing some sacred work here." Because in that moment, what I'm doing is I'm saying, "What did I learn from the last journal? What do I need to carry forward? How is this going to inform my decision-making?" And then I'm and on the back page of every new journal, I usually have two or three pages where I am distilling lessons from the previous journal. And like I said, I'm I'm almost 10 years into that framework and but then that informs like things like personal mission and uh yeah so so journaling and therapy.
* **Julia:** Well, man, you touched on a lot there and the thing that I hope resonates with our listeners is that at the root, so one of the one of my core values is uh digging to the root because real transformation can't happen without it uh to what's driving us and you mentioned you know at the end of the day it was this need to prove this need to earn and those are all again questions that reside in the limbic system of our brain. It's: "Do I belong? Am I okay as I am?" And most of us so one thing I want to be very clear is that what is wired in your limbic system is the sum of all of your experiences up to this present time so it is what has happened to you, how the world, how you have interacted with the world. And all of those experiences are stored in an amazing file cabinet called our limbic system. And we make our predictions about what's coming at us based on the past. Well, our brain pays special attention to the pain, to the times where we weren't uh good enough, to the times where we didn't get credit, to the times where we didn't do enough. And it tells us, okay, you're going to have to do more. And one of the things that I've in the work that I do and again in my own life this was my story as well is that I was letting that need to earn drive everything and it keeps leaders stuck. And so as you talk about: I had to face that truth, that reality in me and it probably felt really negative and yucky. You didn't want to look at that. None of us do. And yet it was being able to look at that square in the face and almost befriend that part of us. Yeah. That it's it's not that doesn't make us bad that we're still earning. It's just the sum of what our experiences have added up to right now. And the hope in what neuroscience is telling us is that your brain is still pliable. There's a neuroplasticity even at the subconscious level depending on what happens now. So there's a little bit and maybe it's a little bit of just semantics but when a lot of people talk about that space between stimulus and response here's the problem. Stimulus comes up here, response happens, the response goes straight back down into your body and our conscious decision hasn't even touched it yet, hasn't received the information. Which is why so many leaders are struggling because we're told there is space to pause but not before your body is already reacting. So leaders who struggle with anxiety, that was me, debilitating anxiety for a couple of years because I was trying to think my way out, but that's not a neurological possibility. I had to get to the root issues that were lodged in my subconscious, deal with them, heal them through rewiring before I could change my body's response. Now, that doesn't mean that I couldn't do deep breathing, do reactive steps in the process. But what I want leaders to understand is that we do have a choice. There is a a place where we get to choose. But there's two sets of choosing. The lasting choosing that will change and lead to transformation is proactive. And it means digging in with a professional like you have pointed to help figure out what is in my file cabinet that's keeping me stuck and facing it. Those are the decisions you can make now because the good news is that new experiences can rewire. And so as you process those things with a professional, a therapist, a neurochange coach, a really good friend who's really good at listening, then a lot of a lot of change can happen.
* **Damon:** Yeah. And I want to hit on a couple things you said that when I think back about my own story. I think that uh in my on my website that you mentioned, I talk about some nomadic principles and I can tell more about where why I talked about this nomadic way because "nomad" is my name spelled backwards. Um, and then I have on there there's another blog and I talk about Prince Nomad which is a origin story of some fairy tales my mom told me when I was a little boy. So, when I was thinking about what have I learned in this adult life and how do I want to share with people, I decided that there's a there's a nomadic principle to it. Nomadic meaning that you're moving... and and one of those is like carry what matters most, which means you're going to have to shed things. And so, the things in the file cabinet like some of these things aren't serving me. Some of these narratives, some of this as I'm processing it continually and I'm journaling it and I'm talking to a coach about it and a therapist about it and a good friend about it. You know, another one that I think you and I have talked about this is I started running uh half marathons and marathons and I had a really good buddy who was a great listener and partly because he was so tired that he couldn't speak but like we were uh he would always say like if we're running so fast that we can't talk, we're running too fast. Like and but but we got we had one year we ran a thousand miles um not all together like but through the course of the year but we we ran hundreds together. So during all of that time this would have been like 2014, 15, 16, I was starting to shed. I was starting to say like: that thing, that belief, that narrative, it doesn't serve me. I think I can let go of it. This and I would I called it the trade-in policy because in my prayer life I would be like I would identify it through journaling and talking and then and I would find it and then I would be like, "This doesn't serve me anymore. I need to trade it in." And I had a and I I'm a person of faith. I I so I would say, "Hey, God, I got this thing. Can I trade it in?" And I always imagined it like it was a big store where it was like in my I'm a imagined person. I like I like to imagine like all kinds of stuff, but I I always imagined like this this big counter with like all these amazing things behind it. And I would bring like the crappiest thing, you know, and like I've got this thing. Can I trade it in for that like super awesome thing right there? And then and in my imagination, uh God uh he never says no. He's like, that sounds great. Perfect trade. I'll take that that bad experience, that need, that ego, that that whatever it is, and I gladly trade it in. And so I so I was just trading things in. But the other thing I wanted to say was what you were saying about um earlier you were talking about uh whole self or wholeness. And I think part of the thing that also is at play here is that we have multiple selves rolling around. We have our work self and our marriage self and our dad self and our Boy Scout leader self and our and and when you start to do this work that we're describing, it's holistic kind of work. Yeah. Um, and so you you maybe you're doing in this like safe confines with a good friend or a coach or or a therapist or whatever, but like that work's going to come with you when you go become the Boy Scout leader. That work's going to come with you when you're at a board meeting. That work's going to come with you. And that and what I have to say to our friends listening is that's good news because you can practice in those environments. Like those are new environments where the new future you're imagining, you can try it on. Like you can say like maybe I'm the kind of leader who doesn't worry about as much if people think I'm a bad dancer. And so you can just try like leading in this different way that might require dancing or... and I'm being silly, but I'm kind of being serious, too. Like I remember a time where Kate and I, my wife Kate, we were I was the incoming uh Chamber of Commerce chair and we were at a fundraiser for Botanica and we were in the VIP room as one is during that season of life and everyone's kind of it's just like middle school or high school though like everybody's like leaned in against the walls and everybody's sipping their drink and talking and it's a good time. There's not a lot of boogieing going on and Kate and I, we're not good dancers to be clear. Um, but we were sitting there and it was like I and I was starting to embrace this idea that I'm a community leader and that like you know and like I can go first like and and and take take the lead. And I and I was like and I was like, "Kate, you want to dance?" And she's like, "Yep." And I was like and I we were kind of like we're we're going we're going for it, right? And we just went for it. And it was like '80s themed, so we were dressed up like '80s people. I had my collar popped up and some sunglasses and I had my hair all feathered and but we just started dancing as best as we know how as hard as we like. We were sweating though. I mean, we were getting after it and you know when the first song ends, people are like, "Is this going to keep going?" We're like, "Oh yeah, this is this is gonna keep going. This is way too fun to stop."
* **Julia:** Yeah.
* **Damon:** But you know what happens? Obviously what happens is people start to come out and then more and more people dance and then like there would there would have been a time in my life where I would have been so paralyzed of like well I finally made it to the big boy table and I'm a community leader so I can't go out there embarrassing myself I have to... but I'd shed a lot of those things and I'm like no this isn't about me embarrassing myself this is about we're all together and it's good to celebrate and it's good to have fun and I'm with my wife and this is a good moment. There's plenty of moments to cry and and mourn and lament. This is a moment to be happy and to celebrate and dog on it, let's do it. And I and it was so that that was uh when I thought back on that I thought I would have never done that five years ago um because I would have thought I had so much to prove and so much to lose if I made a mistake or I cared about what other people thought. But I had slowly shed that. And then in a different environment, I was able to practice it. And then guess what though? When I'm back in a work environment or in a volunteer environment, the idea of taking a chance um is a lot easier because I could practice it. So this so this idea of shedding things even even trading them in I I believe you can trade them in and then integrating these learnings into new and different areas of our life in safer containers. Those are two things that were very helpful to me.
* **Julia:** So helpful and that's exactly when I talk with people about building their capacities that's what we're talking about. And again remembering that our brains are experience dependent. So if we only read a book about or if people only listen to this podcast and think, "Oh yeah, I want to trade it in," but they don't decide to have an experience where they practice it, then it won't change anything. But the rewiring happens through the practice. And you alluded to, you didn't say it right out, but I would say: find safe places to practice so that when you're practicing this with your family or with some friends or in the boardroom and then it goes well, guess what? Your brain gets an update and it says, "Oh, I can be silly and people are still fine with me." And it reinforces this new way of operating. It really is a beautiful a beautiful thing.
* **Damon:** Well, and I think that that that hits on you were talking about this idea of going from uh just simple goals to restorative transformation. And I think I think it applies to the boardroom. Like we're talking about this and of course this is very interpersonal but like at that same time it would have been 2017, 18... yeah, so 2018-ish I remember doing an inventory with a mentor and I was on something like 15 different boards and too many and I was starting to come up with a criteria for how I would start to say no to things and what I would say yes to and one of the things I came up with was: are they okay with just status quo repetition or are they looking for transformational change? So as a system, so like we're talking about the personal, you know, but but what I found is when I started to apply this and when it's like, well, what are we going to do for this conference or what are we going to do for this fundraiser or what are we going to do for this retreat and and generally people are oriented to like I don't know what did we do last year and it's like is that the best question we could ask because I don't know if that question is going to really fuel me to re-up for next year if... right? So like where are we going and and and so I started being a board member um that would I would I called it then like "bend it until it breaks". Like I would ask questions that would try to break the the organization um not mission drift right but like so the loyalty to the status quo the loyalty to this rut that we're in I would I would push against it. And if if people... what I found was people were waiting for someone to do... Now, some organizations are they tell you in direct or indirect ways, "We're not open for that," and that's okay. And then I'd say, well, that's great. This is this isn't one that I'm going to spend my energy on. Um, but the but but what I f- found more often wasn't that people didn't want it. They did want it. They didn't know how. And you were helping them. You were helping an organization. Of course, the brain's probably not the same exact... they're probably a different model for an organization, but the collective memory of the organization was getting shifts and you could make new memories and you could push them in a new direction. And that's where vision comes into play. Like as a leader, you can start to paint a picture of what good might look like and you can say like isn't this worthy of our best work? And then that's where I think um I've become a big fan of the idea of like fractal. So the idea of a repeating, you know, like a snowflake, like you can see a pattern and then you can see it through to infinity. So it's a repeating pattern. And I think this the individual work that we're talking about and then you decide to go push big systems change. Well, guess what? That system's full of people. Yeah. And so, and I don't know how any of that works on a like consciousness level, but I do know that if you cast a vision and then you're willing to be vulnerable and do the work and then you create safety for others to do the work, there's something that happens that is a a 1 + 1 equals 10 type of thing that that you get real momentum unless someone obstructs it. Unless someone says like, "Nope, this isn't going to happen." And then I would argue then that's an environment you should get out of because it's just not healthy. Uh it's not able to grow and be transform transformational in that way and if you're able you should you should exit it.
* **Julia:** Yeah. Well, and I would say that yeah, all of those things play into the neurology of our brains because if you remember, the thing driving us is... and for those of you who are just listening, I'm pointing to my little brain uh model... but the question is, "Do I belong and do I matter?" So, there's something that happens, especially when the leader, the senior leader, is the one who steps out onto that dance floor and starts boogieing and doesn't care what he looks like. That all of a sudden people get energy and they want to be a part of that because I think you're right. People want it. They just need someone. And when our brains can see that they will be connected to someone, it gives them a strength. There's almost a borrowing of strength from one another that helps them move into those spaces. But like you said, sometimes there's a roadblock. And so I know in the past you've even talked about and you you hinted at it that you know sometimes I want to bend it until it breaks, but about the idea that sometimes differences and disagreement can actually lead to that level of synergy that people want. And so I know that that's been a passion of yours to help bring two different sides together to highlight maybe differences. And so I just wondered: how do you help leaders create environments where difference becomes restorative rather than destructive?
* **Damon:** And I think I would frame even I would even throw a different word in there which is like exciting or energizing versus boring like so sameness. So if things were the same then it's like imagine like the same if everyone wore the same clothes and they listened to the same music and they always ate the same food and... think: I just came back from a trip to a to a city where there you know just so much diversity in terms of food and culture and language and colors and so now flip that. If it was this world where everything was the same. Now certainly you could have control. Um I remember there I think it was Craig Groeschel at a leadership a global leadership summit many years ago. He put up on the on the screen that said uh "Control or Growth: Pick One."
* **Julia:** Yeah.
* **Damon:** And that made a mark for me because I was like, "Oh, when you control, you're generally going to make things that are the same." Like, let's make and and in some context, to be clear, that's really wise. Like, if you're building a manufacturing assembly line and you're you're building for uniformity, certainly you're going to build an assembly line a certain way. But if you're growing culture and you're growing leaders, you have to embrace this idea of of lack of sameness, aka diversity. And so, yeah, I think it's a dissatisfaction with sameness that if we do the same things, we're going to get the same result. It's back to what I said about the board meeting. "What kind of fundraiser should we have?" "I don't know. What kind did we have last year?" Sameness. At some point, you start thinking then new, different, better. How is this going to be new, different or better growth? Well, it's going to require new inputs. And those new inputs are going to be, and this is what I started playing with about 10 years ago, where I started intentionally putting inputs into my life that were different than the ones I previously had. And what I started to notice was that my life was less boring and and that there were new and different and better ideas that I would have not considered. And then that starts to get, for lack of a better word, um, I'll just go with energizing. I was going to say addictive, but it start it starts to get like super energizing. Like, I wonder what else we can come up with. Now, here's the rub. We're pretty loyal to our sameness. Like, it's going to it's going to cause a little bit of conflict because like, "Well, we used to do it this way and we're thinking about doing that way." And back to that idea of like energy, it creates energy if you can embrace it because what you find out is that someone might not really have been loyal like they they might have said, "Well, I was... that was Bob's idea and and I just didn't want to hurt Bob's feelings."
* **Julia:** Yeah.
* **Damon:** You know, and it's like I didn't actually care about this way or that way. I cared about Bob, you know, and it's like I love that you cared about Bob. I love Bob, too. And then you ask Bob, "Bob, do you care?" He's like, "I don't care if it would go this way or that way." So now we're actually centered on the right thing. We're centered on a a culture of mutual respect and ideation for the next thing. So often times the thing that we think we're loyal to is not the thing that's actually people are loyal to. But but it takes that conflict to find that out. And and and systems don't change in and of themselves. They get into a cycle of repetitiveness. And so, yeah, being the leader who will will kind of put a wrench in it and make it where it grinds to a halt for a second to ask a couple questions to figure out what we're loyal to, to invite some new voices into it to to make the table bigger, but but remember to be casting the vision of like: "It's not because we don't like you, Bob, or your idea. Like, we want you to come too." And for the most part, I have found that people are very receptive to it. I think that when you throw in our political age, the hard part about all this is that we have media and advertising apparatuses that really use identity against us. And so there's a lot of noise in our world that is telling us the thing that is opposing us is some "other" and it's demonized that other and it they call it confirmation bias like I'm not just right but I'm righteous and you're not just wrong, you're evil. And this this identity marketing or identity politics is tearing us apart because all the healthy work we just got done describing and then how do you create cultures of growth? You start throwing in identity marketing and identity politics and it makes it real hard for me to embrace that new and different person because I might fear they're a threat. And back to your brain model, if I think they're a threat now, I'm not doing my best thinking with my prefrontal cortex.
* **Julia:** There's no thinking going on.
* **Damon:** There's no thinking. And and if you zoom out on culture, doesn't it appear like that's what's happening sometimes? Like we we hear things a lot like, "Well, any reasonable most reasonable people would agree about (fill in the blank)." And it's like, right, most reasonable people would, but they're not reasoning. Um, they're they're acting out of fear because there's this identity marketing/identity politics thing going on. So it's worthy and good work leaders that are listening like to to to create that safe space to invite people in it. And I believe that people and I have a lot of experience at this point bringing people together who you would think would be very diametrically opposed based on the identity quick easy labels. Get them in a room together and let them look at each other in the eye and most the time a really a really cool human connection happens and they find something that they are loyal to that's greater than their difference.
* **Julia:** Yeah. When you can find the common the similarities, it's... and when we can humanize and remember that the other is another human just like you. We have so much more in common than we have that's different. It will change things. And so to me, what I'm finding is that the way forward is for leaders to take responsibility to look at themselves and understand where do I get caught in the fight or flight cycle and what work experiences do I need to be able to grow that to be able to stay regulated when there are differences coming at me? Because if leaders can't do it then the world is... I mean we're following the leader right and it's not going well. And there are pockets where it's beautiful where people are coming together where they are restoring themselves they're getting their own relational needs met outside of their leadership role so that when they come in they can stay grounded and they can help others to do the same.
* **Damon:** Yeah. And I think the thing that um my diagnosis of uh community life and is that like the number one thing that makes it too rigid or or maybe like dries around our feet like concrete and makes us stuck is uh offense. Like when we when we take on an offense and that offense then starts to become a loop where you'll hear it in organizations, you'll hear it in communities or neighborhoods where people could be holding in an offense sometimes for generations. Like they'll they could be unable to make progress or invite new and different piece people into an conversation because they're holding on to an offense that happened and and then rightly so. So this is what we need to ask ourselves as leaders: like is there an offense at play? Is there a leadership move of acknowledgment of naming a reality of a past harm? Of like maybe the offense is there for a good reason. It's not great they've held on to the offense, but the offense might be there for a reason. And like as a leader, how can I give voice and acknowledge the pain or or how can I be present to sit and lament and acknowledge and then and not just say like let's move on, let's move on. Let's go forward. Like yes, that's part that's a leadership move to say, let's move forward, but it's also a leadership move to acknowledge I feel like there's an offense here. There there's a harm and and we should sit and acknowledge or lament together and and and even u- reconcile or reconciliation and then perhaps we can move on. And I think in my role with Lead Wichita that's something I'm thinking a lot about is like: where have past offenses kept us divided or fractured and then what are things we should acknowledge together as a community and then what lament or reconciliation is needed? I'm certainly ready and willing to push forward with the vision. Let's go. But I'm trying to stay in diagnosis for a while to make sure that there's not things that I don't want to just brush past because I think there's some things that we need to acknowledge in some fractures.
* **Julia:** Well, and what you're speaking to is really caring for people and their hurts. And really, that's what leaders are supposed to be doing, right? We're supposed to be caring for the people we're leading and care will directly impact people's brains and it will help them to feel safe and be able to move forward. And so you you kind of read my mind. I was just getting ready to to ask just as we look forward into this new year and you're leading Lead Wichita, what are you hoping to help our city restore in our leadership culture so that we can lead with more connection, collaboration, integration into the future?
* **Damon:** Yeah, I've started working with a problem statement and like what problem are we solving with Lead Wichita and the problem statement as it exists right now is something like "depleted leaders working in disconnected networks unable to measure success or learn from failure." So those three parts: depleted leaders, disconnected networks, and then a way of measuring... and not always measuring so we can have a party, although I love to have parties. If the recidivism number went down significantly, that'd be great. But if it goes up, then we need to have a way to acknowledge and lament like what is happening here. Um, I've been watching the foster care numbers on our dashboard and we have a great partnership with Sedgwick County where we're getting those quarterly updated, not like census track or... but so we're getting them real timely and sometimes the number goes up and what does that do to the cycle? Well, to the leader that was already grinding, working as hard as they could, it's very discouraging to see that number go up and then the disconnected networks. What I'm thinking about there is, you know, how sometimes people will say like, "Let's have an unconference." Like a conference that's like... and then you read it and you go like, "That's still a conference."
* **Julia:** Yeah.
* **Damon:** It's cool that you called it an unconference, but it's still a conference. I'm trying to think about how to really do that. Not an unconference. That's not what I mean. But a... I just am not convinced that Lead Wichita needs to do any new initiatives.
* **Julia:** Yeah.
* **Damon:** I think that what we really need to do is to identify the initiatives that are already going on and serve those depleted leaders. And so there are many people who are wanting us to do a few different things that I'm resisting because I I'm still doing a full landscape analysis and I really think that people should expect from Lead Wichita real integrated activity. And so like an example would be back to foster care. There's two things that are alive right now. Foster care when kids are aging out of foster care that has a disproportionate impact on a bunch of public health measurements. And so we could be measuring many different things on our state of our city dashboard. Many of them are impacted when a young person ages out of foster care. So focusing more networks, more leaders of networks towards that prime mover towards that prime population for progress is what I think we're going to do. So it's like what new initiative would we start? It's like is an initiative what's missing? I think there's a lot of good leaders working on that problem. We should help them. And then um yeah, so I'll stop there, but I think that the so: depleted leaders, offering content, offering the things we've already been doing to encourage leaders, but then identifying network leaders in the different sectors and on that are working on the various issues and then pointing them into relationship with each other to help on really targeted interventions like uh young people aging out of foster care for example. And then ultimately we want to measure through the state of our city dashboard. But I think that measurement shouldn't just be for like winning. It should also be for lamenting when it doesn't go well.
* **Julia:** Yeah, I love that. Almost having a really being honest about what we're measuring and seeing and we can even connect in the failing because we're learning, right? Like we're we're going to become a learning community, not a knowing community. And we do that and when we do that together, it's one of the most powerful ways to be able to move forward.
* **Damon:** Yeah. Yeah. And I think that there's something when we will hopefully that will cause people to new people to get in the game because if people think that I have to know... back to knowing versus learning cultures... if people think I have to know all about that in order to get in and help, it's like no you don't. Like you just have to learn with us. Um, because like on that issue of uh young people aging out of foster care just as an example that we're since we're talking about it the... I I mean I know and believe that there's I'm just going to pick a number but there's there's 50 network leaders that are working in government and nonprofits in faith in in philanthropy that are thinking about that issue. And those 50 leaders, I mean, think of all the leaders in our region, but there's probably around 50 that are super focused on that. And so, how do we come... Lead Wichita needs to be very targeted to say: how do we come alongside those 50 leaders to help encourage them, to resource them, and not disrupt it with a shiny new thing, but to come alongside and serve? And then hopefully that creates that learning culture and also we've we've uh honored and celebrated that work and then maybe new people jump in the game and and they and they want to help with it too. Um, but not help with our new thing that we raise money for. Help the current things that are currently already happening. And and that is an issue because a lot of times whether it's a capital campaign or a nonprofit generally or just the competition of newness generally these things do create competition and and uh we only have so many resources and time and attention. And so my real hope for Lead Wichita in the community is that we can come alongside the this small handful of real of network leaders and really try to help them feel less depleted, more restorative, get them more connected in networks together. And then of course the measurement aspect what we've already talked about.
* **Julia:** Yeah. Well, that gets my blood pumping. I'm just so excited because essentially you're connecting to connect to the people who are in the game already and we know that that will be energizing to everyone involved.
* **Damon:** So I app-... yeah I hope that people I hope that people see in me I I have a proven track record of someone who can get things done and I and I hope that this really models that I don't need to go create something new just to create something new. Like I'm going to choose in lieu of creating a big huge thing I'm choosing to support the things that are already happening.
* **Julia:** Yeah. And and I think that move in and of itself I want to see more of. And so to any of those leaders listening like maybe you do need to create a new thing. I'm not saying cuz sometime I mean the capitalism of of of uh nonprofit work like I believe in it. Like if you have a unique thing, you probably should pursue it sometimes, but just consider that maybe it's it's all about doing more together and not just more.
* **Julia:** Well, I can't think of a better way to kind of wrap up this conversation. So, and and we're about out of time. So, yeah, thank you so much. And I'm just cheering you on as you help our community to do better together. And uh we will definitely or I am a fan and just would love to support you in any way. So, thank you for being on *Wired to Lead*.
* **Damon:** Yeah, thanks for having me. And uh all those leaders listening, if I can ever be a resource to you, let me know. And I really believe that the path that that you're you're on can can and will be restorative. And it doesn't have to just be a bunch of goals/trophies like these should be things that you can eat that feed you and ultimately serve your family and the people you love.
* **Julia:** Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you. Thanks everyone. We will see you next time.