Latest / Uncommon Impact / Ben Metzger: Growth, Humility, and the Courage to Start Over

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Ben Metzger: Growth, Humility, and the Courage to Start Over · Uncommon Impact

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_01: What do the Kentucky Wildcats, an unusual hobby, and a regulatory background have in common?
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's credit union executive Ben Metzger.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: He is my guest today on Uncommon Impact.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Hope you enjoy our conversation as we delve into leadership, culture, risk, life, impact, how to navigate it, what to do, how to grow, and how to be willing to undertake change.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: Hope you enjoy it.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Ben, thanks so much for being on Uncommon Impact with me.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate you taking the time.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: My pleasure.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: Great.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: Well, it's great to have you.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: It's great to be speaking to you all the way from Colorado.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's you know 60, 70 something here, so of course I've put a sweater on.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um it's probably actually colder there.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: It was a little chilly this morning.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think it was in the 40s when I went right around this morning, so a little a little chill in the air.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: Well, we were there a couple years ago this time.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: And and we actually, when we were there to speak at your then credit union, uh my wife went with me, and and the day before we went to Rocky Mountain National Park and it was 70 and lovely.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: And the next day it snowed and they closed a bunch of the trails for the for the season.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I guess you have to deal with day-to-day out there.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: It is day-to-day, Nathan.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh this time of the year in particular, I would say it can either be kind of residual summer or full-on winter.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: And thankfully, right now we're still in that uh warmer period, though it looks like the forecast for next week, we're moving into winter pretty quickly.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_00: So unfortunately, we don't have much autumn here.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: It always feels too brief.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we'll be into winter full on here uh very soon.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, as you're getting ready to bundle up and do all that, I appreciate you coming on with me.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to jump in and ask you, you know, the the credit union where you were had been with, Canvas.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_01: Was one you'd been there almost a decade, maybe.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's right, ten years.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_01: And now you're at Wings.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: What's it like going from um one culture to another?
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_01: You start somewhere new.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: What's it when you look at the culture of an organization, how can you tell if it's healthy or one you want to be a part of?
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that's a great, great question, Nathan.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, the the one thing I will say is that both of those organizations have phenomenal, you know, strong cultures.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I do think that culture is something that can be difficult to uh assess from the outside.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: I think the best way to do that is to get to know people at the organization and to talk to them and hear what is it like working inside that organization.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And uh thankfully here at Wings, I have a number of friends uh that I knew through my time at Canvas and had the opportunity to sit down with them and talk to them about what Wings is like before I made the jump over to Wings.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, thinking about culture, you know, not to oversimplify it too much, but I do often think how much do people just enjoy working for the organization?
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: Are they being dragged along for the ride or are they there willingly, really?
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe they've been there for 10, 15, 20 years.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: You see this a lot in credit unions.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: People tend to spend long careers at a single organization.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Certainly that's the case at both Canvas and at Wings.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I think that's a testament really to the culture at both organizations.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: And and so for you, you didn't make it 15, 20 years.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um how do you evaluate where you're being led or or what's the next call, or or when to say, I've done my time here and it's time to.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's easy to get to me, if especially if the culture's it's easy to get comfortable and say, hey, yeah, this is why why change?
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: And now you've gone an hour south and and you've gone from Denver to Colorado Springs in a different organization.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, 100%.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for me, look, I I would say that I'm someone who tends to get kind of restless pretty quickly.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I like to learn, I like to try new things.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: And while I was absolutely given a lot of those opportunities at Canvas, I recognized that the greatest opportunity for learning often comes from joining a new organization with a lot of new people I don't know.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I had gotten to the point after 10 years with Canvas of knowing everybody in the organization, including our board members, all the leadership team there, a lot of the folks on our branches.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I loved it, to be clear.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: Like I absolutely loved it.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: That was a wonderful feeling.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And to your point, Nathan, there is a sense of, oh, like I could just kind of ride this out and be, I don't want to say complacent, I don't think that's the right word, but there's a degree of comfort that comes along with that.
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: But we don't learn as much when we're comfortable.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: I think that we learn when we're uncomfortable and when we're being stretched, right, outside of that comfort zone.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: And so that was really what I would say was the impetus for making the jump over to wings.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I mean change is change is challenging, right?
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: Even when it's good change, it still is on the list of stressors in life, and and uh so change can be hard just in and of itself, but it sounds like at some at some level you're embracing it.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely to grow.
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's uh absolutely right, yeah.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and you I again not to kind of oversimplify things, but you think about how do people learn new things, it's by doing things they haven't done before, right?
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh how does a child, how does a baby learn something new?
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's because the that kid has never done that thing before, right?
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so as I thought about you know continuing my career at Canvas or leaving and going somewhere else, there's the calculation of, well, I think that a new organization would really stretch me and cause me to learn some things that I just simply couldn't do if I were to stay at the same organization by virtue of I I'm I already know a lot of the people there and a lot of the things that we do.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_01: I was talking to somebody just yesterday about they were talking about imposter syndrome and and feeling unqualified, and and I was saying, well, I mean, unless you're willing to do the same thing forever, you you kind of have to go through that because you're always going to step into the next thing that's I don't know how to do this.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is something new, this is something different, I'm being stretched.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so all right, good for you.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let me ask you this then.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: You come in and you're being, I mean, at some level, Wings is hiring you because you have some sort of skill set, you have some sort of ability to do something, right?
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_01: You've got these talents, but you're coming into a brand new setting.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: How do you stay open to learning, to understanding what's going on there, versus, hey, I'm coming in and I've got this knowledge and I'm at this, you know, I'm at this level, and here's what I here's what we should do.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I think the answer to that one uh is humility, right?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: And it's a recognition that, man oh man, I do not have all the answers.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: And that is not false humility here.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: I I certainly don't have all the answers.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: And goodness gracious, it it certainly has been helpful for me, I think, to come into a uh a new organization, a large organization like that, and recognize the insufficiency of my own knowledge and wisdom and how much I have yet to learn in my career.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and perhaps that's again kind of going back to your previous question, Nathan, the value of leaving a place and going somewhere else is because it does make me appreciate that, man, I maybe at Canvas I felt like I had a lot of things figured out.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I get to Wings and realize, oh shoot, I really don't.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of things I need to learn and get better at.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so I think then it goes also to understanding there are folks here at Wings who have decades, literal decades, of experience and wisdom and organizational knowledge that I lack.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so the privilege then for me is getting to sit down with them and learn from their expertise and their learned experience, um, and hopefully helping that you know make me a little bit better both as a professional and as a leader as well.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that totally makes sense.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I've learned over life, over the course of my life, that that I don't know.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um just has such power, one, to free me from trying to come up with some answer that I don't have.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: But then also I think also it just is disarming to other people to hear.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Do you feel, Nathan, sometimes like the farther that you go in your career that you almost realize you know even less?
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Like I kind of feel like I should be feeling smarter, but it's the opposite.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: The farther I go in my career, the more I'm like, oh man, I have so much that I don't know.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: Right, yes.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_01: And and half the time it's trying to understand it enough so I can at least ask questions to continue to.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let me ask you a little bit then about learning and and growth.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_01: And you started off your career as a regulator.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: You're on the governmental side of things, and then you've spent a lot of time as an executive.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: Has there been a through line to your career?
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_01: And then and then also has that been something you've been able to lean on or talk a little bit about how that experience has shaped you and and if it was helpful?
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I you know, uh the answer is certainly yes.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: The the background as a regulator, um, I spent a year with the division of banking here in Colorado, was extraordinarily helpful, especially coming out of law school, to kind of see the other side uh of the calculation before moving into credit unions and really getting an appreciation for what examiners are looking for when they come into our institutions.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and I do think that the perspective it gave me was one of partnership, uh, whereas unfortunately those kind of examiner-institution relationships can tend to slide more adversarial.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the the healthiest ones that I found are more partnership-oriented, and I think then that has given me the opportunity to come into uh Canvas and now Wings and try to promote more partnership uh models between us and our regulators.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um your question of the through line in my career, uh, a couple of thoughts come to mind there.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_00: One would be not so much myself, but I would say just man, I I feel like people have really taken chances on me, and I've had a number of really, really good leaders and teachers in my career who have probably given me more opportunity than I deserve.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's the first thing I would say is I I don't know that I would attribute any success that I've had to my own abilities, but rather the opportunities that others have have blessed me with.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: I would also say that I really like rules, and uh my siblings would tell you pretty quickly that I've always been a rule follower and want to pretty quickly uh get my siblings in trouble if uh they're out of bounds.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so it was no surprise to anyone in my family when I decided to go to law school and pursue a career uh in legal and compliance, and then uh kind of from there moved into some other things within the credit union space.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so perhaps that's also a through line is that I like things neat and organized and by the book, um, but also not afraid to try new things and learn new things at the same time.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: Well, good.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, as a child of you know, I grew up in the 70s and 80s, so I remember a little bit about like the savings and loan crises, and then of course 2008 and 9, and then our mutual friend Andy Janning is doing a podcast now about a credit union that melted down a few years ago.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so I just listened to the podcast on my run this morning, as a matter of fact.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well good.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_01: So regulators are good, and people who who like rules are important role, keep things in balance.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: Right, well, good.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, let me ask you this as your career's gone on, is there something in leadership that that you look at differently or that you've learned that maybe if I talked to you know the Ben who was starting or early on in Canvas, you would see things differently than um than you do now?
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Nathan, last week I was at a uh State of the City uh address here in Colorado Springs.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: It was the mayor of Colorado Springs, and he said something that stuck with me, and it it it it like kind of solidified something in my mind.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_00: He said, um I'm gonna paraphrase it, I don't know that I'll get it as eloquent as he said it, but he said something effective um leadership is not a position.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh leadership is the opportunity to serve and steward.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I think 10 years ago, I would have thought of leadership more as positional.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was a title, it was how many people do you have on your team, where are you in the org chart.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: I think at this point in my career, I think of leadership far more as the opportunity to uh serve, to influence, to steward what is given to you.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um that has been a pretty big paradigm shift in how I think about leadership over the last call it 10 years, 15 years even.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's great, because I think, you know, at the end of the day we have a chance to influence, which is uh, you know, a lot of what leadership is and helping helping others along the way, regardless of position.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I think so often people do look like, well, I'm not a leader, I'm not a and they're selling themselves short or their opportunity short.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and related to that, Nathan, I think that there's maybe a a common perception out there that leadership has one direction, which is you lead those beneath you on the org chart.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: Whereas I have also come to think of leadership, my leadership, as influencing those both technically below me on the org chart and above me on the org chart, right?
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to be one direction or the other.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um that has been another important realization that I've had over the past several years.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: And I would suggest probably even indirect influence on people maybe alongside who are watching you but aren't even on your 100%.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's absolutely right.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, a lot of opportunities out there, and I I think that's a very broad definition that the mayor gave and that and that you're talking about.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, let me shift a little bit from a leadership to risk then.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you said that that you're the type to uh get antsy, and it sounds like it was great that um that you stayed in one place for a decade.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um but as you take on personal risk, right, for you and your wife Kara to go and take on something new, but then there's also institutional risk might be too strong.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um but but this concept of being willing, as you said, when you understand regulations, you can also understand, all right, where's some opportunities?
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_01: Here, here's what the rules are, what are some things within the rules that we can look at, try to whatever, organizationally, whatever, maybe not, and we can keep it, you know, before any credit union regulators come in.
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: We certainly aren't testing any any boundaries there.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um but but when you talk, you know, and because it again it comes to an idea of safety, right, and change and disruption.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: And and so what is it about risk, whether it's in a culture or your personal life, you know, taking on smart strategic risks.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how do you how do you navigate that and what would you tell somebody?
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that uh that culture of risk is so important, and uh particularly I mean we're look, we're we're in the business of taking risks, right?
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: Both as a financial institution and in my opinion, as individuals, we should be in the business of taking risks.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so when something goes wrong and the outcome is not as we expect it to be, I think it's really important that we're willing to sit down and talk about that, not in an angry way or a judgmental way, but a way that respects the process that we used and in an analytical way, to really think about what could we have done differently?
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: What where did we go wrong?
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: What might we consider differently next time?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so that we're rewarding the process instead of thinking purely about kind of the outcome here.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'd be more process-oriented instead of more outcome uh focused, I guess would be my my thought on that one.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, with the discussions then to figure out was the process good, did we do the process again?
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Or are there things to change with it or or the like?
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for sure.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, Nathan, another one, as I'm thinking about your question, uh within an organization when you think about psychological safety, you have to know your people, right?
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: Your team has to feel that you have their best interests in heart, and uh that only comes through spending time with them.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and in my opinion, that should be a lot of in-person time.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: I I've tried to do, and I know circumstances will vary between organizations.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, some of that will be dictated just by different situations, but um, to the extent possible, I think time spent in person with one another goes a long way in building trust between a leader and his or her team members.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so as a leader, I certainly want to prioritize spending time uh with those both uh again below me and above me in the organization, so that we have that psychological safety.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: And and just to follow up on that, you know, one of the things that um somebody said to me years ago was that, you know, for as important as quality time is, and and it is, right?
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to be talking to you and on my phone and and not engaged and whatever it may be.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_01: But at the same time, there's something to be said they said for quantity time, because we never know the moments in which we'll share, we'll interact, we'll have that aha moment, um, unless we're able to just be around each other a bit.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um and then if we try to say, okay, this will be a big moment, let's be together for this 45 minutes today because this will be quality, um, that's great.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: But there is something to be said for just time and and building up that trust.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I find too that trust and concern and care and compassion can often be built in some of the smallest things.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_00: And just sitting down and listening to someone, if that's in a one-on-one meeting perhaps, and taking notes of some of the details that they tell you about their life, uh, whether that's a a kid uh or a family member who's going through something, and then bringing that up again, showing that you're really paying attention and that you're genuinely interested in what's going on in that person's life outside of the four walls of the office, um, man, that that goes a long, long way.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: I had a coach say to me once, I don't have to have my players like me, but it's really hard to trust somebody you don't like.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: And so I really need to be careful.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: If I think there's a reason that I'm gonna push that envelope, then I need to understand why am I pushing this and why does it why do I think this is so important to uh to do that?
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's exactly right.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh very well said, very well said.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: I I would love to say it was a Kentucky coach.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_01: He was actually South Carolina.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: So um it wasn't John Calipari.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I should have I should have just attributed it to him.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um or uh yeah.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_01: So um, well, let me ask you this then.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: Um antique typewriters.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: Oh man, Nathan.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: Do we have another 30 minutes?
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: So um, you know, before we get to my my clothes on on impact and the like, I do want to ask you about that.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_01: Because now, you know, you've seen it.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm sitting there, I'm going through Marjorie Kinnan Rawling's house, you know, the author of the yearling down in Central Florida and everything the way it is, and what do I do?
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: My daughters are like, what are you doing?
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm sending a picture to Ben in Colorado of her typewriter that she typed the yearling on.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um so you've been collecting antique typewriters for several years now.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I have, Nathan.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it is uh a hobby and a passion of mine.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: I started collecting antique typewriters uh during the pandemic.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: It was April of 2020.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, as you'll recall, that was you know, right as the lockdowns were starting, and I think I was driving my wife crazy.
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_00: We were locked in the house on a you know Saturday, and we were getting tired of watching Netflix, and she was like, hey, don't we have something out in the garage that you could go work on and go do?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, ah, I'll go look.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: And so you know, we had an old typewriter out in the garage.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: I had inherited it from my grandmother years before.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: So I took it inside, cleaned it up, watched some YouTube videos, and absolutely loved it.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: Started typing on it that afternoon.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh fast forward to the next weekend, uh, still during the lockdown, uh, Kara was like, hey, do you think maybe you could find another typewriter to work on?
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so I was like, sure, let me let me look on Craigslist.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: So I found a second typewriter, and uh lo and behold, that was maybe a but her fatal mistake was asking me to look for a second typewriter.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Because uh now I I think my spreadsheet would show that I'm over 200 typewriters.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: I own about 70.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: I've I've kind of bought.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Sold, traded a lot of typewriters over the past uh what six years.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, it has become a very serious hobby.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: I uh trade and sell and buy all around the world with fellow collectors, uh attend typewriter meetups across the United States, and uh my website, benmetscrew.com, has most of my collection displayed right there for your for the world to see.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it was fun going to your website because they're so they're not what I you know I came of age again in the 70s and 80s, so my idea of what a typewriter is is governed by that.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: And of course, now it's it's really interesting to see some of these.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um Yeah, a lot of typewriters were standardized in their designs starting around 1920.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: And so my focus as a collector has really settled on the pre-1920 typewriters, um, particularly those from the late 1800s and early 1900s, like the first decade.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um however, I have a little subsection uh carved out for uh portable typewriters that were made for the United States Armed Services in World War II.
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and so I have a little bit of a brag here, but the world's most complete collection of portable uh US uh World War II typewriters.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's a pretty cool collection that I have.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, so would that be I you know, I was gonna ask you, is there a favorite or the old musician's joke of you know, your favorite guitar, it's your next guitar, right?
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't know if it was like that or if those would be do you have a I I do have a favorite.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's my Crandall New Model.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's an 1887 Crandall New Model.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I, along with many other collectors, would consider that to be the most beautiful uh manual typewriter ever manufactured.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um it has Mother of Pearl inlay.
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: It it is a work of art from the 1880s.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh I mean they just don't make anything like that today.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: It is a beautiful, beautiful piece.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: It is uh it's I yeah, I would say my favorite typewriter.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_00: They have one of them in the Smithsonian.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um there aren't many of them out there, but I am uh you know fortunate to have one in my collection.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_01: How fun.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: That's really neat.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: And and thanks for letting me talk about that, and that way I can bypass the content podcast discussion.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: So so let me just pivot back and and I you've been so gracious with your time.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: Let me just ask you a couple of quick things.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, whether it's typewriters and taking on hobbies to to get you out of Kara's hair or whatever it may be.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: Is there something you're trying to improve at?
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: What is there an area where you're like, hey, you know what?
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: I you know, back to that what I things I don't know.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um is that a focus these days?
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Nathan, this has been uh uh an eternal battle of mine is listening for listening's sake and not listening for uh responding sake.
• 25:03
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um and maybe this is the attorney in me, but so often when someone's speaking, my brain is constantly thinking about and processing okay, how am I gonna respond?
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: What am I gonna say?
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: What's the weakness in their argument?
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh how can I uh uh best uh respond to this?
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um I so need to be better at just listening and trying to ask more questions to clarify, clarify, clarify, dig in, dig in, uh, instead of always being on the respond mode.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: Listening well is is so hard.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it is, right?
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just when I think I'm getting better, I still feel like I have so many miles to go.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: I've decided that, and sometimes I try harder than others, but I've learned, you know, I'm I I feel like I'm socially awkward at times or just don't want to interact at times or whatever.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: And I've learned in those settings, if I just keep asking questions and then just kind of listening, and and but then it gets weird because then it takes me a few seconds to process what they've said.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so I know they're looking at me like, did this guy doze off?
• 26:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, no, I'm actually listening, and I'm trying to.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: So anyway, um, well, that's always a good thing to be working on, and um, and it is for attorneys.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, somebody asked me one time, or they asked my wife actually, you know, did he learn anything in law school other than the ability to enumerate all his arguments?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: You know, well, there's three problems with what you've said to me.
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: And she said, Yeah, no, it's really endearing.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um so listening well would be good.
• 26:32
  SPEAKER_01: Um all right, so then finally, you know, we've talked about risk and and safety and things to get better at and doing new things.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, is there kind of something in common when you think about your impact?
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I know you've had it not only at work, but at your church and family and a lot of different areas.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: That you think people who are making an impact are are there common threads or are there things in which you think about the world and and kind of how you are or would like to leave your mark?
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's living for something bigger than myself, right?
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's a life lived in service to others.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um I find that time spent on myself is not that fulfilling, right?
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: And while I do love typewriters, um it's not so much the typewriters, it's actually the people that I meet along the way and the relationships that have formed because of those typewriters.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: I would say kind of alongside that, it's not so much the career that I've had in credit unions, it's the friends and the relationships that I've built in credit unions, and hopefully the influence, the positive influence that I've been on those people and the good things that I've been able to accomplish along the way.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so as I think about people with uncommon impact, I would say that it is those who live lives of service and think of something that they devote them themselves to that is much, much bigger than than themselves.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_01: And that brings us back to your mayor's uh definition of leadership, of service and stewardship and impacting others.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_01: Well, Ben, thanks so much.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: I appreciate you taking the time to share with us and uh and uh go through all that, and best of luck with the transition and developing um figure figuring out how you fit into the culture and what you bring.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Nathan.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: Such a pleasure.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: So enjoyed our conversation.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: Great, thanks so much.