Conversations That Matter with Ed Ross

Guest: Dave Twamley
Duration: 56 minutes

Welcome to Conversations that Matter with Ed Ross! In this episode, we are thrilled to feature Dave Twamley, a distinguished leader whose expertise spans both the athletic fields and the boardrooms of corporate America. As a former D1 athlete and a Wharton School graduate, Dave has demonstrated exceptional leadership throughout his career. Join us as we dive into his journey from the sports arena to corporate leadership and uncover the key attributes that make a great leader.


Episode Highlights:

  • Introduction of Dave Twamley: Ed Ross introduces Dave, highlighting his background as a three-time Ivy League champion and a leader in corporate America.
  • Leadership Journey: Dave shares insightful stories from his early experiences in leadership, starting from as young as fourth grade during a lacrosse tournament. He discusses the evolution of his leadership skills through sports and into his corporate career.
  • Defining Moments: Learn about the pivotal moments that shaped Dave's understanding of leadership and his ability to inspire and manage teams effectively.
  • Leadership Philosophy: Dave emphasizes the importance of putting teams first, creating a psychologically safe environment, and being readily available and approachable as key components of his leadership style.
  • Challenges and Resilience: Dive into the challenges Dave has faced and the resilience required to overcome them, both on the field and in the corporate world.
  • Legacy and Impact: Discover the legacy Dave aims to leave behind, focusing on empowerment, team-first mentality, and fostering an environment of growth and safety.

Key Quotes:

  1. "Leadership is not just about being in charge but about taking care of those in your charge." — Dave discusses his approach to leadership that prioritizes team welfare and collective success over individual accolades.
  2. "The best ability is availability." — Dave highlights the importance of being accessible and responsive to team needs, which builds trust and reliability.

Connect with Dave: Listeners interested in more leadership insights from Dave can connect with him on LinkedIn. Engage with him to learn from his extensive experience and innovative leadership approaches.

Creators & Guests

Host
Ed Ross
Ed Ross, a consultant and solutions architect for over three decades. Ed has dedicated his career to understanding B2B strategy architecture as well as coaching executives on organizational behavior. He has worked with some of the most well-recognized brands in the world on their toughest business problems and believes success comes not just from making sales; but from leveraging sales enablement to improve performance across every department, and by building lasting relationships for years to come.
Guest
Dave Twamely
Area Vice President at Olympus Corporation of the Americas Olympus Corporation of the Americas University of Pennsylvania - The Wharton School Colts Neck, New Jersey, United States

What is Conversations That Matter with Ed Ross?

Becoming a great leader isn't easy. It's not because people don't want to lead well; it's just that there need to be clearer examples of what good leadership really looks like beyond fancy titles and corner offices.

You see, the word 'leadership' has kind of lost its meaning for a lot of folks. It's often associated with those who were promoted after being really good at their old jobs, but not necessarily those who are good at leading people—the kind of leaders organizations really need.

And to make matters worse, most companies don't do enough to help new leaders develop their skills. That's why bad leadership is such a big problem, costing companies billions of dollars every year.

But here's where our show comes in: we're creating a space where leaders can share their real-life experiences—the good, the bad, and the ugly—and celebrate their progress.

That's what makes Conversations That Matter special!

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So, whether you're in the boardroom or the break room, whether you're a CEO or just starting out, our guests have stories and advice that can help you become a better leader.

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If you've ever wondered how exceptional leaders earned their distinction, I invite you to subscribe to our channel and learn from the game-changing leaders revolutionizing their fields and making every conversation count.

GMT20240311-150805_Recording_640x360: [00:00:00] Welcome to this episode of Conversations That Matters. I'm your host, ed Ross. I am excited, excited to introduce today's guest to you. Today's guest is one of my favorite people, leaders I know, not only because of his success in corporate America, but his success outside of that as a D one athlete.

And once you have an opportunity to research his background, you too will become a fan of this young man. He is a three sport athlete, a Wharton school graduate. An area [00:01:00] VP at a company that was ranked as one of the world's best employers and a global 2000 company. Today's guest has had a celebrated career at the University of Penn where he was a two sport D one athlete for football and lacrosse.

He is a three time, that's right, you heard it. Three time Ivy League champion for football. An all Ivy League academic, all area selection for football. It is an honor to welcome Dave Toley and this episode of Conversations That Matter. Dave, welcome to the show. Oh, thank you so much, ed. I appreciate it. I would say, I, I might, I might need you to introduce me to every meeting I, I go into.

I'm humbled with the, the introduction and you make me sound a lot better than I really am. So thank you for, for the, the nice introduction. I appreciate it and I'm honored to be here and I'm humble that you think of me to, to be a guest. Yeah. Yeah. I'm super excited to have you, Dave. I've had the pleasure of knowing you for several, knowing you for several years.

And what I really love about watching [00:02:00] your journey is your constant evolution, right? How you've taken a role and you've fulfilled the expectations and exceeded the expectations in that role, and it leads you to your next opportunity. And so for today's conversation, I just really want to give our audience an opportunity to know more about.

Who is Dave as the leader? What was it like and where did you experience some of your leadership, development in sport outta sport? And then what is your legacy? And we'll tie that up right about, about talking about what's the legacy that you wanna leave for those who are coming through the ranks of leadership that may be experiencing some of the same things that you've experienced.

And so that's kind of our journey today. Does that still sound like, like a good game plan for you? That, that sounds great. I'm looking forward to the conversation. Awesome, awesome. So, Dave, after hearing all the things that you've accomplished on and off the field, I can't help but think you've had the experience of [00:03:00] good leaders and good leadership throughout your career, whether that's athletic, athletic, or in corporate America.

So I, I'd really like to learn a little bit more about that journey for you. What was it like and if there are moments that you can share. That really first illuminated your potential as a leader, like how did you know that you had that thing that could carry it from the field into, you know, corporate, the corporate athlete you are today?

How did you know, like you had the elements of that. Tell us a little bit about that. For sure, and I, I think it's one of those things you, in the moment, you don't always think, oh, I have these elements and I'm gonna be a, a leader and I'm gonna develop that into corporate America. I can remember going way back.

It's funny, I was in fourth grade, we were playing a lacrosse tournament and we were getting ready. There was one game left. And in that tournament, the team, MVP, for each team got a free lacrosse stick. And as you can imagine, fourth grade you get a free lacrosse stick was probably one of the coolest things you [00:04:00] could probably get.

And I remember we had one game left to play and and teammates were sitting there talking about who was gonna be the MVP and everyone was talking about who was gonna be it. And I just looked over and said, guys, you know, we have one game left to play. Why are we talking about that? Let's focus on the game that we have left.

And I didn't think anything of it. I was just sitting there just saying, Hey, this is what we need to focus on. And in doing that, I remember one of my coaches pulled me aside and said, wow, you know, I'm really proud of your leadership and what you did there, and I'm gonna tell you know the head coach what you did.

And I think that was really cool that you were able to take your teammates and get them to focus back on the game. And in the moment you're in fourth grade, you don't really think anything of it. As I think back on it, that was one of the first times me that I was exposed in sports, where you have the ability to set an example through your words.

Most importantly, your actions of how do you want the team that you're on to be focused, to navigate, to perform. And while it might not have been this aha moment, for me, it's something that as I look back on it, you start to realize that the things that you do can [00:05:00] impact others. And while you can be a vocal leader, like I said, most importantly, it's your actions that matter.

And from there. I was fortunate where I had this lens of sports my whole life to see so many great examples of leadership and I, I do wanna call out, sports are not the only way that you can develop leadership. And there's so many different avenues that you can, I happen to look through sports 'cause that's the lens that, that I spent a lot of my life looking through.

But there's so many different ways and avenues. You can be a great leader. But for me that was, as I think back, one of the first times that I personally felt like, all right, maybe. If I'm doing the right thing, if I'm saying the right things and I'm leading by example, I can get others to, to follow. And then from there it's just throughout my career, high school, college, post-college, I've always just tried to lead by example and, and kind of set the standard in, in my mind that way through my work ethic.

Yeah. And Dave, that's really interesting. It's great to hear that as early as fourth grade, you recognized that you had this ability to help [00:06:00] people. Shift their focus, right? It's not that the lacrosse stick wasn't a worthy prize, right? It was that we have a game to play and that game is a contributing factor to who could end up as the MVP, right?

So let's focus on hers things first, and I love that approach. I also love that you pointed out specifically that sports is not the only way that we get access to leadership. One of the examples that we use often because it's very relatable for some, but there are also others that don't experience leadership that way.

They may experience leadership through music, the arts, theater, academics. There's other ways that we can get it. And too often as leaders, we get sucked down this, this crazy rabbit hole of everything is a sports analogy. Mm-Hmm. And the I like to give is I am the worst person for movies. So like if you're ever on that show and you've gotta call a friend, don't call me if it's has anything to do with a movie [00:07:00] guy.

Yeah. And I recall going to a training program and the entire program was based off the movie. I'm gonna date myself here, Indiana Jones. Okay. And the facilitator starts by saying, raise your hand if you've seen Indiana Jones. And everyone in the room except for me, raise their hand. Because his entire content was based on that.

I was lost the entire day. So I love, even in the very early moments of our conversation, you're again, exhibiting what great leadership is is, right? It's like we can't tie leadership to a single thing. And I, I think it's interesting 'cause you'll hear a lot of leaders say, I wanna hire an athlete. I wanna hire someone that played in sports or.

Or has experience in sports because that athletics develop what I'm looking for. But I, I kind of ask that person, do you wanna hire an athlete or do you wanna hire the, the traits that athletics can [00:08:00] essentially help somebody embody. And I think that's really what you're after. And if you find those traits and those competencies, and that's where.

I know competency, interviewing along those lines, figuring out what are the, what are the skills that I'm looking for and how can I find those things. Like I said, it just so happens that I was able to develop a lot of those through sports, but to your point, you can develop 'em through a lot of different ways and, and obviously Indiana Jones is not one of them for you, that you develop those, those leadership attributes yourself.

It is not. And I do wanna say this because you've had such a stellar athletic career, I, I do wanna tap into that so that our listeners who have gone through that journey can appreciate that. Sure. But again, we, you know, I would, I do want to zoom back out, and talk about general field of leadership itself.

And so my next question is more around your ability to realize and identify a moment in your athletic career. You were able then able to pull through in your role within [00:09:00] corporate America. So again, as a three-time champion at Penn, you understand the sacrifice that is required to get to a team goal, right?

It's beyond the individual. How do we get to a team goal? And that requires being a good teammate. It's the comradery. It is the teamwork. It, it's those things that often. Get cited as what's unparalleled about being in sports and being a leader. How have you been able to translate those dynamics into building a cohesive team in your role today?

And what, what motivations and backgrounds do you see as valuable as you're starting to put together that team? Yeah, I think when you look at how you kind of take your, your. Team and motivate them. There's a few things that you wanna do, and I, and I think the first, it's getting that common vision. If you talk about any sports team you've seen, you look [00:10:00] at the, the Kansas City Chiefs that just won a Super Bowl, they're all on the same page.

They have their eyes on the same goal. So the first thing is how can you get a common vision? And I think it's really, really important because if you can get people together, truly bought in after the same thing, not going for individual glory, but for that same, same end, end goal. You can have a lot of people that can perform really well and you have a better chance of achieving it.

The other thing I think is understanding why you're doing something. It's not always gonna be glamorous, you just talked about it. You have to put a lot of sacrifice in. And one of my favorite authors, Simon Sinek, wrote a book Start with Why If, if you don't understand the why you're doing something, it's gonna be really challenging.

And it's not just the why of why do we wanna win this championship, but break it down to the granular details. Why are we I think it's all really important to make sure that you're breaking that down and you're understanding the why behind those things.

So if you can get everyone with a common shared vision and you can break it down and understand the why behind someone might be doing something, I think you'll have [00:11:00] a, a great chance of success. I think the, the next thing though in getting people bought in is you look at a, a big goal that you have. It can be really daunting.

You look at something like we just talked about a Super Bowl that's that's bigger in the corporate world. Hey, we're gonna, we're going to get this new customer, we're gonna convert this account. How can you take what seems insurmountable and break it down into the little tasks that need to get done? And that's really where sports comes in.

Sports you're doing, I played defensive back. I was a corner. You're doing footwork drills consistently. Monotonous, backpedaling. Breaking, breaking, breaking, flipping your hips, you're doing these little drills because it's gonna lead up to that progression of covering a receiver. So in the business world, what are the things you need to be doing?

You can't do it all at once, but maybe what are the three to five things that you can routinely do, or the three to five things this week to break it down in order to have better success as you eventually get that? 'cause if you just take this big goal. Just [00:12:00] say, we're gonna achieve this all at once.

It's not gonna work. How can you break it down and have those little wins and little victories each day? Yeah, and I love that approach, Dave, because oftentimes the big goal is so attractive. The vision, you know, the, the celebration of raising the trophy, right? Or being on stage as a P Club winner, right?

Those things are attractive. Oftentimes people don't step back and figure out, okay, what are the little milestones that I need to achieve on my way to that big vision? And you can use those milestones yes, as celebration points, but you can also use those as ways to determine if you are on track and heading the right direction.

Absolutely. And it doesn't always have to be. And, and you know, I'm gonna talk a little bit about the challenges next. I'm interested in hearing how you've tackled some of the challenges that coming up along that way. But too often the story is told only from the perspective of glory, right? And we [00:13:00] miss those moments, as you said, to slow down and back up a little bit and figure out what are the things that we can be doing incrementally that lead us to that big goal.

So I love that you brought that up as, as a point of perspective. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And it's, it's, I mean, you, you look at any type of success and you mentioned before, it's the little things. A lot of times success is the, the journey there can be very boring, very monotonous, very lonely at times, but it's how can you fall in love with that process?

How can you fall in love with that future state of knowing what you're gonna get in the future? I, it, how can you delay that gratification as a team, as an individual to get what you want, I think is really important. Yeah, and it's tough. One of the things that I love about this podcast series is we talk about the tough aspects.

We talk about those things that quite honestly, most leaders don't have the privilege of going to someone and having a conversation about it for several reasons, right? There's the credibility risk, right? I've been put in this role, and if I'm asking [00:14:00] someone, it appears that I don't know, and maybe people will think I'm not the right selection for the role.

I don't have the chopped for it. This is designed to expose and introduce some of those ideas to folks. And so I do wanna talk a little bit about the challenges. You and I have been in this game both literally and figuratively for a long time. And we just talked about being able to slow down and break bigger goals down into milestones.

But let's talk about the role of resilience as part of your mentality as a leader. And when you think back. About, you know, those moments where you had to demonstrate resilience in your existing role or in a previous role. What stands out about how you were able to strategically overcome those setbacks or those challenges, whether it was in the market, whether it was on the field, whether stands out to you about those challenging moments.

Anybody that's achieved anything worthwhile, you're gonna face resistance. You're gonna need [00:15:00] resilience to get through it. And I think it's ultimately in my interview process when I've hired people, one of the most important thing I, things I wanna look for is what have they overcome?

What have they hit and kept going because it's really easy to have smooth sailing and, and go and continue. And nothing's, nothing's gonna be wrong. You can keep going. I remember a leader at, at my current company, they always used to say, anybody can sail when the seas are calm. It's what happens when the seas get, get choppy.

And I think for me, when I look at. Resistance to my goal, and you, you're gonna need resilience. One of the things that is important to think about is I try to tell myself, and I don't always do this, I'm, I'm human. I wish I could say 100% of the time. I, I tackle challenges this way. But I'll look and I'll say, I've been through, I have this challenge ahead of me.

And if you look at it through, once I get through this or, Hey, I just got this, I'm now the type of person I. Done X, Y, z, I'm now the type of person that has handled that type of fire drill at the office, [00:16:00] or I'm that type of person that battled through that adversity on the field. And now the next time that happens, I've, I've experienced that.

I've, I've. Learned that and now I'm better for it. And that's something that I was listening to a podcast author Ryan Holiday who talks about stoicism and writes Abu bunch of books on it. I, I heard that and I said, that's such a cool way to think about a challenge. It's, this is now a way for me to become stronger in that sense that I'll be better in the future.

And now it's, I've faced that. The other type of thing that with challenges that I think is interesting is, and I. Talk to some high school kids and, and a lot of college kids that I'll network with. One of the things I look with in challenges is I tell people, and this might sound counterintuitive, but especially professionally, try to seek challenges out.

And the reason I say that, because if you can, if you're really competent in an area, you want to be challenged because that allows you to, to kind of show your worth and show how far you've [00:17:00] come. An example, if you and I are both. Taking a math test and you're really, really good at math and I'm not great at math, and we're both asked basic questions, two plus two, three times two, four times eight.

We're both getting those, right? How are you able to stand out? How are you able to show that you're really good? You're begging for that really complex question about integrals or derivatives because that will allow you to show what you know. And so the way I look at it also is if you look at challenges and you flip that.

You say, Hey, this is something, this is a way for me. It's really hard, but I can be the person that can get through this and overcome this. You'll start to seek those out. And so it's hard. I don't always do it, but I try to think of once I get through this challenge, I'll be better for it. And then two, as I tackle this challenge, what a great opportunity to showcase my skillset to be the type of person that can get through this challenge and continue on.

I love that reframing of thinking about challenges and the [00:18:00] outcome once you get on the other side of that. The challenge, pun intended, is that oftentimes it's hard to see that vision when you're in the midst of it, right? And I like to think of it as like driving through a blizzard when you're driving through a blizzard, right?

I spent a lot of time in the Midwest. You're driving through the blizzard, snow is blowing, you know, everything's hitting your windshield, and you can only see so far ahead of you. Leaders often face that same challenge. I love the perspective of thinking about coming out on the other side, but honestly, some leaders are in a position, Dave, but they're just trying to drop, they're trying to make it the next 10 feet, right?

Which is what they can see. Are there specific strategies that you can share of, like, how do you, how do you extend that? I, I love the analogy of being able to drive through the snowstorm, but sometimes you're just trying to avoid black ice and stay on the road, right? So what, how does that translate when you're thinking about getting to the other side, when you're in the [00:19:00] midst of a really tough business decision, something that's mission critical or something that impacts the lives of others?

It's funny, one of the things the really you have to think of is, is the discipline and that broader why, almost going back to it, it's why are you doing this because. Like I said, it can be really monotonous and boring. The process. Talk to any professional athlete or any Olympian or anything, it's, it's, you talk to Michael Phelps, it's countless hours swimming alone in a pool, and that can be probably really challenging.

I, I, I think you ultimately need to one, have a really clear sense of why you're doing what you're doing and, and what does it mean to you intrinsically, but at the same time, I, I think you also just really need to have, have that discipline would be the biggest thing. You're not always gonna feel motivated.

Are you gonna be disciplined? How are you gonna have that discipline? What are the things that you can do every single day and, and continue on that path? Now, like you said, it's challenging. If you're not having any of those small wins or any of those reminders, it's, it's tough. But that's the [00:20:00] role of a leader.

That's the role of a leader, is to take people and to, when they're at their maybe darkest time, help them see that light. And it's really tough as a leader because. Oftentimes, you might not see the light as well, but it's how can you give your team hope? How can you ensure them and that, that they're doing the right things?

And that's where I think it's so important that they see that common vision of, if we can just do these things, we'll have success. And so as you work through it, it's keeping them motivated as one of the hardest things of leadership. And I wish I had cracked the code a hundred percent of, oh, you just say these five words and they'll always be motivated, your teams.

But I, I think ultimately it's. Showing that you're in it with them is a big part of it. I think you mentioned driving through a snowstorm. I would come back with an analogy of it. As a leader, are you on the phone trying to tell 'em how to get to the snowstorm? Are you in the passenger seat with them with a map out?

Trying to help 'em, help 'em navigate? I think if you can be shoulder to shoulder, helping them navigate it gives that sense of, [00:21:00] we're in this together. I have your back and I'm gonna put your interests ahead of my own, as opposed to just directing someone to do something. I think that can help. Navigate the process a little bit easier.

I love that, Dave, and, and that introduces an element that we believe is super, super important to leadership development, which is emotional intelligence. I love that you talked about knowing what they're going through and being able to relate to them, but then also being able to act as a result of that.

If you just recognize that someone is in that position. You're gonna be on the phone in the passenger seat. Well, you're not of great help, right? As the pa, as a copilot, right? I need you to be able to say, Hey, our exit's coming up in a half a mile. And yes, we could have technology that does us for it, but there's nothing like knowing that the person that's sitting in the passenger seat of your vehicle is also on that journey with you.

They're looking at it and they're saying, Hey, we're gonna be getting off here in a half a mile. And then you start to make the adjustments as the driver of getting off on that exit to, to continue on your route. Resilience [00:22:00] and both emotional and emotional intelligence are key characteristics of effective leadership.

How has your emotional intelligence developed through the lens of sports and how has that helped you navigate some of these complexities that you and I are talking about? Whether it's corporate politics, whether it's stakeholder management, or whether it's team performance? Emotional intelligence is one of the most important things that you can have as a leader, as a person, really in life.

So much comes down to it. And sports specifically. I, I think one of the things that you learn emotional intelligence really quickly is during games when emotions are high sports, I played football, it's, it's an emotional sport. There's a lot of emotion involved, just like a lot of other sports. But how can you, in the moment.

Kind of take a step back and realize maybe now's not the best time to go down a certain path around a certain topic, specifically if you're on the field and. There was a, a busting coverage and there was a, so maybe if, if everyone's not a deep sports fan, someone didn't do their [00:23:00] job appropriately, is what a busting coverage is, and a, a player got open that shouldn't have been open 'cause someone didn't do their job.

And if you start pointing fingers and, and that's the time when you bring it up, that's gonna be really challenging. There's gonna be a lot of infighting. You need to say, all right, let's just get the job done. Allow us to get off the field and then we can talk about it later. So it's having that emotional intelligence to understand, now's not the time for me to look at the player next to me and yell at them for not doing something, because that team's running another play in 10 seconds.

We need to be ready to handle it. So let's just put it behind us. Put our egos aside. Do our best to, to stop the team right now and we'll talk about it later. That's one of the things that you start to realize coaches as well. You talk about leadership in sports, obviously a lot of coaches, it's what's, what's the emotional intelligence of when to talk to a coach, when not to talk to a coach?

It comes up transitioning over to the business world. I think one of the biggest things with emotional intelligence as a leader is you have to [00:24:00] understand your words and actions mean more. They're different to your team. A lot of people go from peer to leader, and as a peer on a Friday, you can make a joke about.

You know, someone did something or their quota and you can have that fun, you know, joke about something. As a leader, your words hit differently. That same joke at 4:00 PM on a Friday about, you know, someone, someone's quota performance, they might think about that all weekend and now come back upset on Monday.

Yeah, it's, you, you have to understand that the things that you say, the, the actions that you take, if you are. Late to something, how you handle something, it's all really, really important. So as a leader, it highlights that emotional intelligence. 'cause every word that you say holds more weight. And you have to be very in tune to that to realize what do I say and how could that be taken by somebody?

Because as a leader, you have the ability to make work really, really great for someone. Were [00:25:00] really, really poor. And so the words that you. Use and the, the tone, the body language, it all holds a different weight as a leader. And I've learned that tremendously throughout my career as a leader now because, you know, you, you say and do the wrong thing at times and you realize the impact that it can have.

That's so interesting, Dave, because recently we made a post about the impact that bad managers have on employees. And it's interesting because the research shows that it goes. Beyond just your role, right? So you talked very specifically about, you know, a comment that's made over the weekend and how it can linger and then it brings that person comes back on Monday, right?

Still with the effects of, of what you said or the words that you, you used. It has more impact. A bad manager can have more impact on an employee than their therapist, doctor, spouse, children, the repercussions of what we [00:26:00] say as a leader and the words we choose to use as a leader are far more, they, they extend further than most things than we give credit for.

And, and it's so interesting because you, you talk about that to the flip side, like there's a lot of downside, but what a great thing. On the opposite of that, think about what you can do positively in a person's life as well. And that's why I think leadership is such a, an amazing thing. And it's not something to be taken lightly because you have the ability.

To be a person that can bring so much joy and goodness to someone's not just a person, but to their families. And, and how do you take that and how do you try to lift that person up? Something that's funny, a quick story. Something that I tried to do when I was most recently managing a sales team of, of eight.

I was reading a book and I try to read a lot. I think to, to be a great leader, you have to constantly. Learn because we, I know Ed, you and I had talked about before, leadership is a skill. Yes. It's not something you're [00:27:00] born with. You have to constantly do that. So for someone that exercises or paints, whatever it is, they're constantly honing that craft.

You need to continue to do the same with leadership and to talk about the impact. You know, I, I was reading this book, the former PepsiCo, CEO, Indra Newy said she would write letters, handwritten letters to the spouses or the parents of employees. To let them know how much they value their contribution, how much they appreciated their leadership and, and just what they meant to the company.

And I read that and my first thought was, my handwriting is awful. So I could never do handwritten notes or else they would've no idea what I said. And it would, it would not mean as much, but I thought, what a cool thing to do. And I believe I did it my last two years as, as a regional vice president with my team, you know, writing letters to.

Either, you know, a spouse or a, a family member of, of someone on my team letting them know what they meant to, to me and the company and thank them for sharing with me. [00:28:00] And I, you know, self heat was one of the most rewarding things that I've done. Just a response he got back, but I didn't do it for that. I truly wanted them to, to feel that.

And as a leader, I think it, you don't just do it because you want somebody to come back and work hard for you, you do it because you truly want to show your appreciation. And so for me, it was just such a cool way that. I was inspired by that book that I read to do that. And I don't know, it's just something you have the ability as a leader to make a really positive impact on people.

And if you just stop at the bare minimum, I think you're leaving a lot on the table of things you could be doing to make truly a better work environment for people. Dave, that's such a great point because oftentimes when we think of teammates, we, we think of those people that are in a similar role.

We don't extend that to our family and our families often make greater sacrifices, right? When you have to pack up and head out on a Saturday [00:29:00] or a Sunday to be at an event, right? Like I have a trip coming up across the country. I've gotta leave on a Sunday for a program that runs on Monday, but I've gotta give my body time to adjust to the time difference, right?

So I'm gonna head out late Saturday night, take a red eye to get there so that when I'm up on Monday, right? My body's like, like my fam, my family's making a sacrifice there. But we don't often think about that. So your ability to, to take it a step further and send a note to those family members. A way for them to recognize and appreciate the sacrifices that their mom, dad, sister, brother, whoever it might be, the sacrifices that they're making and shows that someone else's cares.

And one of the things that I like to say is we talk about eq, emotional intelligence. From a leadership perspective, the best high performing world-class leader understands that they can then share that same emotional intelligence with their team. [00:30:00] When their team carries that to their customers and to the community and those they serve, it's the ripple effect that we all look for as leaders.

Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. It's, it's like you said, it's, you have such a great opportunity to impact so many people. If that ripple effect like you just mentioned, and, and what an, what an awesome challenge 'cause it is challenging. What a great opportunity to be able to, to interject that into someone's professional and and personal life, obviously appropriately.

[00:31:00] I'm sure you've heard that teamwork makes the dream work right in sports that's appropriate. You know, the fit within the team can really outweigh individual talent or individual contributions. How do you balance the need for finding the right talent?

As you said earlier, [00:32:00] when folks say things like, I wanna hire an athlete, and I. Cultural fit, ensuring that that person is a good fit for your team. And I'll tell you that this term cultural fit is among my least favorite terms because it can mean lots of things to people and it can be manipulated. How do you ensure that when you go out there and you find a talented individual, that they're the type of person that you wanna work shoulder to shoulder with?

It's, it's a great question and I think you look at hiring, you talk to any hiring manager, there's always gonna be times where you look at somebody that's hired some people, hundreds of people, they're gonna have times when they didn't hire someone who they thought they were or, or something to that extent.

I think ultimately it goes back to the, the, I don't wanna say the safest way, but the best way to ensure that you're getting the quality candidates are doing that competency-based interviewing. What are the skills? Let's say there's 10 skills [00:33:00] that you need. You need resilience. You need someone that can drive results.

You need, you know, someone, whatever it might be, your 10 skills. And then what are tasks, activities, role plays that you can give that candidate to tease out their level of competency when within each of those attributes? And I think if you can do that, you'll give yourself the best chance of finding that person.

Because otherwise it's really difficult because if you just hire someone because, oh, they're. We get along really well or they you know, we have a mutual connection. I know that person so we'll get along. It, it, it doesn't always pan out. You need to hire based on what are the things that are required of this role and how does that person perform across that.

It also makes it easier to compare candidates that way. If you can take a look at a, you know, the objective set of traits that you're looking for, and you can measure each person based on those traits, it's very. I don't wanna say it easy, but it's easier to take a look and say, all right, which candidate would be the best fit?

And you can obviously cater those traits to what you need on your team. The [00:34:00] dynamic you need on your team, perhaps in a certain role, you need someone that fits this set of attributes. You're gonna weight those more heavily than someone in a different area of the team. Or maybe it's a time when you've hired a bunch of people recently and you need someone to come in that's that's really established and ready to go.

It might not take as much. Coaching and upbringing in terms of the skills of maybe the, the specific job. You can weight that differently, but ultimately, I think it's pick your competencies, figure out how they rate against those competencies. And that's probably the best way, at least that I've found so far to be able to do that.

Okay. And I'm not gonna get on my soapbox about competencies and proficiencies, right? But I think that's also what you're hinting at is it's not just about like, what skills do I need? You also have to think about what level of skill do I need for this role? Which candidates in this pool helped me fit, fulfill that particular role.

Like that, that's the way that leaders think. We, we talked [00:35:00] earlier about the similarities between business and sports. We also highlighted that everything doesn't have to be sports related, but I am gonna jump on sports for for one minute. Sure. 'cause in sports, the success is clear, pretty clear cut.

It's measured by wins and by losses. That's not always the same case in business. So how do you measure success in your role today? And then how do you keep your team motivated toward those milestones and those goals that we talked about earlier in the episode? It's interesting. So you talked about, you know, success and measuring with wins and losses and, and one of the things that I.

I guess I, a brief story of how I kind of got into my definition of success, or I should say I poached someone else's definition of success. So I was in college, I was a, a freshman in school, and when you're playing sports, you're in high school and you're recruited to play at, you know, a division one level, you have success in high school.

And a lot of [00:36:00] times people say you're a, a, you know, a big fish in a, in a small pond if you will. And then you go to college and everybody was all conference, all state, all this, all that. Captain of this. So you get there and you're now surrounded by all these different people. And for me, my definition of success was wins.

Losses were your first team. Did you win? How many rushing yards did you have? How many receptions? That was how I defined success. And when I got to college, what I found was I really struggled and I really struggled because now you're coming in as a 18-year-old freshman playing against 21-year-old men that have been there for years, and it's really hard to get that success.

So what happened was I felt myself playing outside of, of who I was. I had to go out and I had to make an interception. So I have to, you know, jump in front of a pass when typically I would maybe take the safer route. And it started to really have a negative impact on me with how I just kept trying and [00:37:00] trying to get these quote unquote wins.

And I was, remember I was sitting in the locker room and there was a book, a little blue book, and it said wooden on the. On on the side of it, and I picked it up and it was a book written by John Wooden, who was a legendary basketball coach at UCLA. And I'll never forget this. I read it and one of the first quotes that I read, I just picked it up, was he defined success and he defined success as a peace of mind, which is a direct result in knowing that you've made the maximum effort to become the best of which you are capable of becoming.

Think about that. He didn't say it's number of trophies and he won, I believe, I think 11 championships in college. It's a peace of mind, which is a direct result knowing that you have made the maximum effort to become the best of which you are capable of becoming. Yeah, I read it. I shut that book, went to the bookstore.

Got it. And that quote changed my life because I look at success now is am I maximizing my effort to become the best of which I'm capable of becoming? You can't. Always control [00:38:00] everything in your world. Yes. And every second that you're focusing on, what you can't control is taking away from what you can't control.

So back to my college days, I started to focus on what can I do to make the best effort that I can be, to be the best player that I can become. I can't worry about other players on the depth chart, the other corner on the other side. I'm gonna do what I can do to be the best I can be. And it changed my athletics career.

And in business it's done the same thing. Sales, it's really easy to scoreboard watch. I. A lot of people do that motivates them. I always think, what can I do to maximize myself? Put the blinders on, work as hard as I can, and when I lift my head up and take the blinders off, you can look around and sometimes you say, wow, you know, where's, where are all the other people?

Because you work as hard as you possibly can. It doesn't always work out that way. Sometimes you take the blinders off and you say, oh, there, there's the pack up there. Interesting. Hopefully it's not that many times, but I've just found. If you can just focus on what you can control and maximize that, that's how I define success, [00:39:00] both for myself and, you know, my most recent sales team when I was managing.

I would always talk about that. Maximize yourself and the, the collective group, the effort will take care of itself. I'm not saying don't worry about other people, but do your job. Do it to the best of your ability and we'll be fine. I love that. This is one of the things that I'm super excited about for your episode and the other episodes that we've taped is we get insight to things that leaders do on a regular basis.

For you, it was coming across John Wooden's book, right? And being able to read that and to hear the definition of success from a different perspective, and then to be able to ask yourself like, okay, what am I doing? What am I doing to fulfill? The talent that I have, the purpose that I have, right? What am I doing?

When you think about your legacy as a leader, Dave, they say all great leaders want to leave a legacy. What do you want your leadership legacy to be or the impact that [00:40:00] you want to have on those that you've led? Sure. I think the first thing that I would hope, if you talk to anybody that. Has been on a direct team of mine, or if it's even an indirect report where, you know, you're kind of leading a project and you're, you're looked at as that leader in that sentence, which, you know, my role right now, a lot of it is that indirect leadership where it's your leading projects, your leading teams.

Without that direct reporting line, my first hope would be that people see, I put that are on my team. I put their interests ahead of my own. I think it's really, really important to be able to do that because as a leader, think about what you get as a leader. You get. You know, potentially a, a nicer car.

You get nice pay, nice title, all these things. But in exchange for all those things, you need to give up and relinquish that self-interest. And I think the best leaders put their teams first. And that's the first thing I'd say is I want my legacy to be that I put my teams first, that I truly cared about my team.

Because, you know, intent has a smell. You can tell when someone's trying to do something. You might think you're being sneaky. The team [00:41:00] knows. I think that's the first thing. The next thing I would hope people say about me is that I brought a sense of psychological safety that my teammates felt like they could speak up without fear of retribution, without fear of, of feeling like they were gonna be judged or criticized based on a comment they made.

Because if you don't feel free to ask questions, I, I think it's gonna be really challenging to do that. And I think kind of the, the third and fourth things I'll say, one is. That I was able to kind of put my ego aside for the betterment of the team. We all have egos, but how can you kind of put that aside at times, say, you know, I'm sorry this was, that was on me.

That's my fault. Take that ownership, I think is so important that I hope they would say that I took the know ownership to the, to the things that I did and, and ultimately I think. My availability is something that I wanna be remembered for. I know it sounds silly, but people joke around sometimes the, you know, the best ability is availability.

I wanted my teams to know that I was there for them when they needed me, and I was [00:42:00] approachable. I was there for them. If I can do a lot of those different things, I, I think you can have a pretty, pretty good legacy, but ultimately you wanna be remembered as something that added a value and, and made things better for the people around you.

If I can do that, I'll be very fortunate and happy with the way that my. Leadership and professional career and personal career played out. Yeah. You know, again, Dave, it's easy for people to see why I wanted you on the show, right? Your ability to put the team first, right? Focus on what their needs are. You talked about psychological safety.

That is huge in my book, right? If people don't feel they can come to you as a leader, they won't. I don't care how many times you tell 'em you have an open door. I don't care how many times you tell 'em, like, I want to be the first to know. If people don't feel safe coming to you about things that they're experiencing or that's happening in the business, they simply won't.

So leaders, if you're listening and your people are not coming to you, right? Pick up the mirror. There's something going on there that you need to pay attention to. So I love that. And then [00:43:00] making sure that you're available for your team, Dave. So often leaders say that, that they're available, I'm here for you.

But then when you reach out, you don't get that same sense. Whether it's they don't answer the call or they take a couple days to get back to you. And even when leaders are super, super busy, something just an acknowledgement that, Hey, I saw you called gimme a day. I'll get back to you. That just, that's a point of validation that someone else matters.

That their effort to reach out matters in that you see and you are there with them. Going back to those attributes that we talked about from emotionally, being emotional intelligence and really doing those things to help them. So I really love those aspects of it, and it's one of the reasons that, again, not only did I want you on the show, you're one of the leaders that I admire because I've seen you demonstrate these things in real time, not just on podcasts, not just talking about them on in an article, but actually demonstrating those things in an actual work environment.

So I [00:44:00] appreciate those things about you. No, thank you for, for saying that. I think, you know, just one of the other things I'll say. We talked about ownership a little bit. I think one of the biggest things a leader has to be able to do as well is take a step back and say, what could I have done differently to make this outcome better?

Because people talk about a lot of the times if someone on your team didn't do something correct or correctly, I should say, a lot of times, oh, this person, they're not focused, they don't do this well, did you go over it with them? Did you set clear instructions? Did you provide good data? Now. There's, there's a, you can go overboard with it and sometimes I think that's one of my flaws is sometimes I'll try to take too much of that, oh, that's my fault.

I should have done you, there has to be that accountability to the person and it's, it's gonna be this ongoing struggle forever. But I think one of the biggest things you have to do as a leader is, my person wasn't prepared for this meeting. They weren't prepared for that interaction. Instead of me just pointing at that person and pointing all their faults, what could I have done better?

Could I have role played it with them before? Could we have set up time to discuss it? [00:45:00] I think that's all really, really important because if you don't look at yourself and and do that, it's gonna be really, really challenging when your team's just gonna say, oh, you never takes ownership for these things.

It's always, it's always our fault. He or she never takes ownership. It's always our fault. So I think it's really, really important to be able to do that. To be able to take a step back and say, all right, what could I have done differently to make this outcome better, I think is a huge, huge part of a leader.

Yeah, and Dave, I agree. It's important that that's done at the individual level, but also at the organizational level. Too often organizations will say, our leaders aren't doing, our managers aren't doing our people aren't doing, and I like to push back and challenge them to say, Hey, give me a, give me an example of where you actually set the expectation.

Communicated what the desired outcome was, but then provided them with the resources for them to get there. It's easy to say, well, my leaders aren't doing this today, but you can't gimme an example of a leader who's demonstrating what good looks like for them. What does that, what does that culture [00:46:00] that you're talking about look like?

How does that translate? What does that sound like? And I tell, one of my favorite stories to tell is I was working in corporate America and I had an employee who we were at that time, we were in an office and we had cube set up. One of my employees comes over and she says, oh my gosh, I think I'm in trouble.

The CEO was walking by my cube, and I think my music was too loud. I'm like, what do you mean? She's like, he stopped in and he was like, oh, you know, great album. That was The Doors, and he named the Year and he named the album that the, you know, that the song was from, and then walked away without saying anything else.

And she's like, oh my God, I'm so sorry. I, I didn't mean, I didn't realize it was loud. I was like, calm down. Let's, let's back up for a moment. Let's do a little bit of investigative work. So I called upstairs to a person on his team and I was like, Hey, have you seen so-and-So, and she's like, yeah. I was like, what's his demeanor Like?

She's like, he's fine. Why? What's up? I said, well, you know, he was down on the floor and, you know, somebody had music going and he [00:47:00] stopped in and made a comment and they're nervous. So I'm nervous. She's like, oh, no, he's perfectly fine. So we were, we were creating a situation right? That didn't need anything.

Mm-Hmm. And I had an opportunity to say like, don't worry, like, but I got nervous, so I, I made things worse because she came to me nervous and then I was nervous and wanted to call someone. But as you said, as a leader, we have to just be able to. Demonstrate what we expect for people. And when organizations can go back and say, here's not only what we asked 'em to do, here's the outcome and expectations we wanted to get, and here are the resources that we provided to get them there.

That is how you get to become a world class organization. Yeah. Not by simply saying, our people aren't doing, my managers aren't doing, it's easy to point the blame, as you said earlier. And one of the things, it's funny, and I'd like to hear from you on this, I, I, I try to do this. On my team, I would, at the end of each week, I would put a little recap or something to think about for the weekend.

But I remember you telling me years ago, I remember you [00:48:00] saying there was one leader you had where you'd show up at work on Monday and there'd be a voicemail. Yeah. I think that was, and I, I think you told me that that would kind of just talk about it and if you could even chart me like what, what was that about?

And like what did that do for you mentally? 'cause I think anybody listening like that's, that's one of the examples of just that little extra touch that I know you had mentioned to me offhand one day and it probably took. That leader, maybe a couple minutes to record that, but it obviously had an outsized impact on you, so I'd like to hear hear that.

Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and again, one of my great leadership stories, this, this leadership team would do two things. Number one, every time we were heading out on a holiday. No matter what the holiday was, one or two days off major holiday, they would send a voicemail. And in that voicemail they would thank us for our contribution.

Contribution, excuse me. And they would ask us to extend that to our family. And they would even say in the voicemail, 'cause at that time I was in healthcare. And that means that not everyone gets the pleasure of taking the weekend off [00:49:00] 'cause we're serving clients. They would say, we realize that some of you won't be able to be off through the weekend because you're on call.

So in advance, we wanna thank you for the sacrifices that you're making, the birthday party that you have to excuse yourself from the sporting event that you won't be able to attend. We realize that you're making those sacrifices. And then on the other side, they would leave regular voice messages for us that acknowledge our progress toward a goal.

So going back to something you said earlier in the podcast about setting milestones. Yes, we had our yearly plan of what we wanted to do, but as we approached those milestones, they used voicemail as a way to keep us focused on those goals, to celebrate the little milestones along the way, and to inspire us to keep moving toward the goal, right?

Like I always say that. Motivation is internal. You can't motivate me to do something. You can inspire me, but you can't motivate me. Ask any parent with kid that has responsibilities. You can try all things to try to get them to do that. You, you. It's hard to motivate [00:50:00] someone else, but they inspired us by sharing our common goals and where we were and what our progress was.

But they also really lived the spirit of an open door policy When you needed to meet with a leader or you had an idea that could skyrocket our performance, that can enhance the things that we do. Not only did they listen. They would provide you with resources, whether that was time, people, tools, technology, whatever you felt you needed to go out and execute against that.

And some of our greatest achievements were things that employees found at way as ways to enhance our overall performance. And so that was how they used it. And I'll never forget that. So even today, I like to send little voice messages to people. Today I use more video than voice, as a matter of fact. Another great leader.

I know I sent her a message last week, just. Thanking her for the way that she always shows up for people around her. Mm-Hmm. And those are things that we can do, as you said Dave, they take literally 30 seconds, [00:51:00] 60 seconds to create and share, but the impact can go decades. I'm telling this story about an experience that I had over a decade ago.

That's the impact that we can have as leaders. Yeah. And it's so funny, we talk about, we've talked a lot about sports and business and. We've talked about competencies and tactics and things, but sometimes, and I always say this, one of the most important things you can do in a one-on-one is ask, how are you doing to the person?

How are you? And it's so interesting to just starting a conversation that way can mean so much to an employee. I know, think about everybody has about when you're, when you have that discussion, because it, it, it separates. It's not just always about business. It's how are you doing as a person, I think shows that you care and.

Once you can get that down, that you, your team knows that you care about them, it takes so much out of it because they, they know your intentions. If they trust your intentions, you might not always say the right thing or do the right thing, but if they can trust your intentions, you can always come back [00:52:00] to, Hey, I apologize that maybe the impact didn't match what I intended, but these were my intentions.

I hope, you know, these were my intentions. You, you never have to have that. Never but less likely to have, to have that conversation of you were trying to do this, and I know if they know your intentions, they know what you intend to do. The impact might not always align, but that's just a conversation. No, I, I, I intended to have this type of impact.

It, it's, it's a good conversation. Yeah. And, and I'll, I'll say this, Dave before we close out this episode. People have been conditioned to think that leaders do not care about them. So even starting with that question of how are you, what we typically see is that someone will say, oh, I'm fine, and then they'll quickly move on to the business matter.

And as leaders, it's an opportunity for us to dial back and say, hang on for a minute. No, I really want to know how you are doing not the business right now. We'll have time to, we'll talk about that today, not the [00:53:00] client. I'm genuinely interested in knowing how you are doing as an individual, and then that gets people to the place where they can actually slow down and say, I'm struggling right now.

I, I'm, I'm, I'm trying to get this thing done and I'm frustrated because I just don't know what I'm missing. And that leads to those great conversations about accounts, business, revenue, productivity, et cetera. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Well, Dave. It has been a honor to have you on this show. You are, again, one of my favorite leaders.

I appreciate all that you bring to leadership from your athletic experience, your personal experience, and your professional experience. These are the insights and experiences and lessons. You've shared with our audience today, and it emphasizes why we selected you for this show, and these are the types of things that conversations that matters as a podcast was designed to [00:54:00] serve.

It's for helping the evolving or the emerging leader just really navigate their own leadership journey. Whether that's on or off the field as the corporate or the, you know, athlete themselves. How can listeners follow your story beyond today's podcast? Where can they connect with you outside of this podcast?

Dave? Please reach out and connect with me on, on LinkedIn. My, one of my biggest things that I try to do is talk to anybody that I can that wants to network connect, please. It's just, my name is Dave Ley on LinkedIn. Shoot me a message. I promise you I will respond if you send me a note and we can have a conversation.

I, I love. Doing that. One of my other things is I always try to connect with anybody that wants to reach out. I reach out to people on LinkedIn all the time and want to connect with them just to, just to network. And I think it's a really important thing to do to, to keep that going. To share ideas. Like we said, leadership is a skill You're always gonna need to grow.

A lot of stuff we talked about here today. I, I don't do it all the time, unfortunately, but I strive to, [00:55:00] and I wanna learn from other people. Hopefully others can, can take something away from today, even if it's just one small thing. But really, if you wanna connect me on LinkedIn, I'm, I'm there. And I would say this to our listeners.

If you are listening or viewing this episode and you wanna connect with Dave, mention that you heard him on the Conversation That Matter podcast that will help him make the association we invite you to like, comment, or follow us on this channel to ensure you're the first to know when new episodes are available.

Dave, on behalf of our entire team, I want to thank you for joining me on this episode of Conversations That Matter. I look forward to watching you continue to evolve as a leader and achieve great things in your personal and professional life. Thank you, and I appreciate it. A lot of fun and, and hopefully I look forward to, to being back again soon.

Thank you. All right. Thanks Dave.

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