Latest / Something Extra / Best of 2025, Part 1

Transcript

Best of 2025, Part 1 · Something Extra

0:03
Lisa Nichols: Welcome to the Something Extra podcast, where we explore the heart behind great
0:07
Lisa Nichols: leadership.
0:08
Lisa Nichols: I'm Lisa Nichols, your host and the CEO of Technology Partners.
0:13
Lisa Nichols: Last year brought so many meaningful conversations.
0:15
Lisa Nichols: We talked with Jay Chung about redefining success and service.
0:19
Lisa Nichols: Yvonne Carlson shared how to lead teams with clarity and seasons of change.
0:23
Lisa Nichols: And the Commerce Bank team reminded us what it looks like to build trust
0:27
Lisa Nichols: in every interaction.
0:29
Lisa Nichols: Today, we're excited to bring you part one of our Vesta twenty twenty five.
0:33
Lisa Nichols: These moments capture wisdom, humility, and the something extra that sets
0:37
Lisa Nichols: remarkable leaders apart.
0:39
Lisa Nichols: Let's dive in.
0:41
Lisa Nichols: In our first clip, Jae Chung, a partner at Bespoke Compass,
0:45
Lisa Nichols: shares a powerful message on how to surrender fear, shame, and guilt
0:50
Lisa Nichols: to find restoration in God's unconditional love.
0:53
Lisa Nichols: Talk about that a little bit more, Jay, because there may be people that
0:57
Lisa Nichols: are listening
0:58
Lisa Nichols: that are burned out.
1:00
Lisa Nichols: They don't recognize.
1:01
Lisa Nichols: They or they sometimes even admitting it to yourself,
1:06
Lisa Nichols: right, can be hard because you just keep going.
1:10
Lisa Nichols: Keep going every day.
1:11
Lisa Nichols: You know?
1:11
Lisa Nichols: Just keep doing and pushing and pushing.
1:14
Lisa Nichols: What,
1:16
Lisa Nichols: what would you say to that person that kinda has some angst
1:20
Lisa Nichols: in their spirit and just know that there's something not
1:25
Lisa Nichols: not right?
1:27
Jae Chung: Yeah.
1:27
Lisa Nichols: What would you say to them?
1:29
Jae Chung: If that person was sitting right in front of me, I would say, hey,
1:33
Jae Chung: brother, hi, sister.
1:34
Jae Chung: I I've been there, where fear, shame, and guilt
1:39
Jae Chung: is literally eating my soul into pieces, ripping
1:43
Jae Chung: it apart.
1:46
Jae Chung: But will you surrender
1:48
Jae Chung: that fear, shame, and guilt to God who loves you completely.
1:54
Jae Chung: Only when you invite this god into your heart completely
1:58
Jae Chung: will you be able to overcome those fear, shame, and guilt that
2:02
Jae Chung: will constantly drive you to
2:06
Jae Chung: destruction, really.
2:07
Jae Chung: You know?
2:09
Jae Chung: Enemy comes to destroy us.
2:11
Jae Chung: Right?
2:12
Jae Chung: And he's not dumb, and so he's gonna use all kinds of
2:16
Jae Chung: tactics.
2:17
Jae Chung: Oh, look at you.
2:19
Jae Chung: You call yourself pastor.
2:20
Jae Chung: You call yourself this and that.
2:22
Jae Chung: You're no good.
2:23
Jae Chung: You're already tainted.
2:24
Jae Chung: You're never gonna be loved by God.
2:27
Jae Chung: So as long as we live, we buy into that lie, we're never gonna
2:30
Jae Chung: get up.
2:31
Jae Chung: You know?
2:31
Jae Chung: Woe was me is gonna be basically the the last verse you're gonna
2:35
Jae Chung: sing, but that's not what Christ did for us on the cross.
2:39
Jae Chung: And he defeated that.
2:41
Jae Chung: And so I would say it's normal.
2:43
Jae Chung: It's it's human to feel defeated by fear, shame, and guilt,
2:49
Jae Chung: but it's also God's will for you to
2:53
Jae Chung: hold on to the hand of God that'll rescue you from
2:57
Jae Chung: that lie and restore you to be the child of God
3:01
Jae Chung: that is forever loved without any condition,
3:06
Jae Chung: completely loved.
3:08
Jae Chung: And your value is in the eyes of God,
3:12
Jae Chung: estimated by God.
3:13
Jae Chung: So Right.
3:14
Jae Chung: Yeah.
3:15
Jae Chung: So that's what happened.
3:15
Jae Chung: For three, four months, I've been I would pray, and God would remind me
3:19
Jae Chung: again.
3:20
Jae Chung: But and and and know this, sometimes it takes more than one reminder,
3:25
Jae Chung: you know, to to really convince your heart.
3:28
Jae Chung: It's repeated bombardment of God's love in my heart that changed me.
3:33
Jae Chung: It wasn't my willpower.
3:34
Jae Chung: I don't think it was even me trying to be smart about it.
3:38
Jae Chung: There's there's no analysis that's gonna get you out of that
3:43
Jae Chung: slump.
3:45
Jae Chung: The the
3:47
Jae Chung: that that place of darkness.
3:50
Jae Chung: Only God's light, only God's hand, mercy, grace
3:54
Jae Chung: is gonna save you.
3:55
Jae Chung: So cry out to that.
3:58
Jae Chung: It it may take time.
4:02
Lisa Nichols: In this next clip, Yvonne Carlson, chief technology officer at
4:06
Lisa Nichols: Global Media Outreach, shares how her Christian faith provides a worldview
4:10
Lisa Nichols: rooted in kindness, humility, and a belief in infinite possibilities,
4:15
Lisa Nichols: helping her stay level headed and calm under pressure.
4:18
Lisa Nichols: So this is one that I really want you to dig into.
4:22
Lisa Nichols: Over and over, people describe you as having an unparalleled positive
4:26
Lisa Nichols: attitude, a joyful presence about you.
4:30
Lisa Nichols: Are these your superpowers,
4:32
Lisa Nichols: and where does this come from?
4:36
Yvonne Carlson: I don't know if I would say superpower,
4:39
Yvonne Carlson: but I would say outlook.
4:42
Yvonne Carlson: But that is really rooted in my worldview.
4:46
Yvonne Carlson: So as a Christian, as a believer,
4:49
Yvonne Carlson: it's really important for me to show up in the workplace in a way
4:53
Yvonne Carlson: that reflects my faith.
4:56
Yvonne Carlson: So, you know, being kind, being considerate.
5:00
Yvonne Carlson: I think positivity is part of that and that you choose
5:04
Yvonne Carlson: to believe the best in other people.
5:07
Yvonne Carlson: And I think and this is a challenge in tech because tech is usually
5:11
Yvonne Carlson: well well, I'll say it, the scapegoat.
5:13
Yvonne Carlson: Right? You find yourself in those awkward conversations.
5:16
Lisa Nichols: Blame it on the tech.
5:18
Yvonne Carlson: Right?
5:18
Yvonne Carlson: And,
5:20
Yvonne Carlson: giving people the benefit of the doubt
5:24
Yvonne Carlson: and going to work every day believing in infinite possibilities.
5:28
Yvonne Carlson: And I think, as a Christian, I think god of god
5:32
Yvonne Carlson: and how he's an infinite god.
5:34
Yvonne Carlson: Right?
5:34
Yvonne Carlson: He's he's endless.
5:35
Yvonne Carlson: He's boundless.
5:37
Yvonne Carlson: You know, he's the source of my creativity and who I am.
5:42
Yvonne Carlson: So I want to bring that into the places and the spaces that
5:46
Yvonne Carlson: I occupy.
5:47
Yvonne Carlson: And, you know, am I perfect a hundred percent of the time?
5:50
Yvonne Carlson: Absolutely not.
5:51
Yvonne Carlson: But what is good about that outlook is that I have a place
5:55
Yvonne Carlson: to go back to.
5:57
Yvonne Carlson: Mhmm.
5:58
Yvonne Carlson: And then I think that that, hopefully, you know, at the end of the
6:01
Yvonne Carlson: day, it's that humility and that retrospection that we should all be
6:05
Yvonne Carlson: doing, which which links into obviously empathy.
6:09
Yvonne Carlson: It it's going first full circle because it's not if if you'll go through
6:13
Yvonne Carlson: challenges or bumps in the road, It's when.
6:16
Yvonne Carlson: It's when and how do you negotiate them, that's big to
6:20
Yvonne Carlson: me.
6:20
Yvonne Carlson: I think that's an important piece of being a technology leader.
6:25
Lisa Nichols: No.
6:25
Lisa Nichols: I cannot agree more.
6:27
Lisa Nichols: Somebody said to me a couple of weeks ago, he said there and this
6:30
Lisa Nichols: in the dictionary or not, but he said it's the respondability,
6:33
Lisa Nichols: how you respond to those things.
6:36
Lisa Nichols: Right?
6:36
Lisa Nichols: And, you know, the way you just describe yourself, I mean, try to
6:40
Lisa Nichols: when things don't go right or when, you know, a system fails or an
6:44
Lisa Nichols: experiment that you're doing, you know, we we talk about fail fast.
6:49
Lisa Nichols: You know, you wanna fail fast, intact.
6:52
Lisa Nichols: But when that doesn't go right, how do you show up?
6:55
Lisa Nichols: You know?
6:55
Lisa Nichols: Are you somebody else had said, I wanna hear this one.
6:58
Lisa Nichols: I wanna hear your perspective on this one, and it probably goes back to
7:01
Lisa Nichols: the kind of the same thing, Yvonne.
7:02
Lisa Nichols: People said that you stay calm under pressure.
7:06
Lisa Nichols: You know?
7:06
Lisa Nichols: And as I've already said, IT, there there are things that go wrong.
7:10
Lisa Nichols: You're sometimes pushing up against deadlines and budget constraints.
7:15
Lisa Nichols: You know?
7:15
Lisa Nichols: So how do you stay calm under pressure?
7:18
Lisa Nichols: Do you have a secret sauce for this?
7:21
Yvonne Carlson: Well, part of it is upbringing.
7:25
Yvonne Carlson: My dad worked in, the defense industry.
7:28
Yvonne Carlson: He worked on very secretive projects, and
7:32
Yvonne Carlson: he and, there's a lot of what he did.
7:35
Yvonne Carlson: I have no idea.
7:36
Yvonne Carlson: You know?
7:37
Yvonne Carlson: Right.
7:38
Yvonne Carlson: But one thing I always knew about my dad is that he was level
7:41
Yvonne Carlson: headed and and my uncles too.
7:43
Yvonne Carlson: I was really close to one one uncle who is also a software engineer.
7:47
Yvonne Carlson: And they approach things, it's back to that curiosity.
7:51
Yvonne Carlson: Like, I'm not going to expect that I understand the full situation.
7:56
Yvonne Carlson: I'm gonna expect that I have a fraction of the information that I need
8:01
Yvonne Carlson: in order to understand this, really understand this, and, of course, that leans
8:05
Yvonne Carlson: into good problem solving.
8:07
Yvonne Carlson: So I think it was modeled for me.
8:10
Yvonne Carlson: But then again, I think it's back to that, based on my worldview,
8:15
Yvonne Carlson: it's working out of the idea of abundance instead of scarcity.
8:19
Yvonne Carlson: Right?
8:20
Yvonne Carlson: So we're we're in this very performance oriented world.
8:23
Yvonne Carlson: And and I'm not saying that I don't want to compete and, you know,
8:27
Yvonne Carlson: show up well in that way, but But I think it's important to consider
8:31
Yvonne Carlson: that
8:33
Yvonne Carlson: it's not just about winning.
8:36
Yvonne Carlson: It's the manner in which you go about it.
8:39
Yvonne Carlson: So for me, I think that it is is related.
8:43
Yvonne Carlson: I think that's interconnected.
8:48
Lisa Nichols: In our next conversation with Commerce Bank leaders, Beth Feuring, Susan
8:52
Lisa Nichols: Kalist, and Becki Feldmann, they discussed the workplace culture at Commerce
8:56
Lisa Nichols: Bank.
8:57
Lisa Nichols: So ladies, we've talked about this a little bit, but you guys have just
8:59
Lisa Nichols: built such an amazing culture at Commerce.
9:03
Lisa Nichols: And I think as we've just seen from what you guys talked about with
9:07
Lisa Nichols: your women in leadership, it is intentional.
9:10
Lisa Nichols: You're very intentional in how you have built this culture.
9:13
Lisa Nichols: So, well, I know Edge is the the, you know, the
9:17
Lisa Nichols: program.
9:18
Lisa Nichols: Does that is that an acronym for something?
9:21
Lisa Nichols: No?
9:22
Lisa Nichols: It's just No.
9:23
Lisa Nichols: Yeah.
9:23
Lisa Nichols: Tell us tell us more about it.
9:24
Beth Feuring: It is o ur it is our edge.
9:28
Beth Feuring: So, it is
9:31
Beth Feuring: let me think of how to describe it.
9:32
Beth Feuring: So we have been asked it before.
9:34
Beth Feuring: Is it your is it an acronym for something?
9:36
Beth Feuring: And it's not.
9:37
Beth Feuring: It is a a a consistent program that we,
9:41
Beth Feuring: launched internally with we actually, partnered with an external consulting
9:46
Beth Feuring: firm, Centellini at the time.
9:48
Beth Feuring: Now they're Hydross and Struggles.
9:49
Beth Feuring: They have a set core of kind of culture concept that they
9:53
Beth Feuring: will,
9:55
Beth Feuring: put you through and put leadership team through.
9:58
Beth Feuring: So it starts with the top, works its way down through the organization,
10:02
Beth Feuring: and because they do believe culture is leader led, and sustained by
10:06
Beth Feuring: all.
10:07
Beth Feuring: And so, we put all leaders through this.
10:10
Beth Feuring: It's a common language of concepts that we use, and we have
10:14
Beth Feuring: woven that into everything, that we do going on fifteen
10:19
Beth Feuring: years now.
10:20
Beth Feuring: But the the base and the foundation of that is our purpose, our core
10:24
Beth Feuring: values, and our guiding behaviors.
10:26
Beth Feuring: So, it's all a common language that we put
10:30
Beth Feuring: in everything that our team members do.
10:32
Beth Feuring: So from onboarding to,
10:35
Beth Feuring: recruitment to development to sustainability, it's all there,
10:39
Beth Feuring: through the whole life cycle.
10:41
Lisa Nichols: Yeah.
10:42
Lisa Nichols: Well, I was gonna say, I mean, commerce is huge.
10:45
Lisa Nichols: I mean, you guys, I think, have, what, thirty two billion in assets.
10:48
Lisa Nichols: You've got close to five thousand employ I mean, that's hard, right, to
10:52
Lisa Nichols: infiltrate culture that way.
10:54
Lisa Nichols: But what you just described to you, Beth, is it it it it's the
10:58
Lisa Nichols: common thread through onboarding and everything.
11:01
Lisa Nichols: So can you guys, one of you, I don't know, Becky or,
11:05
Lisa Nichols: Susan kinda describe to me because I know when I've talked to you guys
11:09
Lisa Nichols: in the past, like, you know, you've got the master, you know, you get
11:13
Lisa Nichols: the master culture champions, and then you've got those people have champions
11:17
Lisa Nichols: underneath them.
11:18
Lisa Nichols: Can somebody k ind of explain the logistics of that to me?
11:21
Becki Feldmann: Absolutely.
11:22
Becki Feldmann: So it's our culture network really is what it is.
11:26
Becki Feldmann: And I'll I'll start by saying, you know, when I first started at Commerce,
11:30
Becki Feldmann: being part of talent development, I got to attend a culture
11:34
Becki Feldmann: off-site, a culture retreat for our master champs and our
11:38
Becki Feldmann: super champs.
11:39
Becki Feldmann: I was not yet in that role, but I got to attend.
11:43
Becki Feldmann: And one of the things that struck me, Lisa, is, oh my goodness.
11:47
Becki Feldmann: They let us spend eight hours today working
11:51
Becki Feldmann: and talking about culture, and that's when I knew this was the real deal,
11:56
Becki Feldmann: that commerce understands, that we take care of people.
12:01
Becki Feldmann: We focus on our culture, and that impacts, obviously, the team member experience.
12:05
Becki Feldmann: It impacts the customer experience.
12:07
Becki Feldmann: They can feel it, and it leads to business outcomes.
12:10
Becki Feldmann: I mean, that is what makes us different.
12:14
Becki Feldmann: So the I'll I'll kinda start from the top as, a master
12:18
Becki Feldmann: champ.
12:19
Becki Feldmann: Actually, even above that, we have an EMC, so an executive
12:23
Becki Feldmann: management team member who kinda rotates over the years, who is playing in
12:27
Becki Feldmann: that that role.
12:29
Becki Feldmann: So it's not the same person every every year.
12:32
Becki Feldmann: They might hold that role for a couple of years, and then when it's
12:36
Becki Feldmann: when it's time, they'll pass the torch to someone else, to be the culture
12:39
Becki Feldmann: carrier for the organization.
12:42
Becki Feldmann: But below that, there are master champs.
12:45
Becki Feldmann: And this master champ role is in addition to someone's day job.
12:50
Becki Feldmann: So each master champ supports an executive leader.
12:53
Becki Feldmann: And then underneath the master champs, we have our super champs.
12:57
Becki Feldmann: And so these are the people who are, kind of the the arms
13:01
Becki Feldmann: and legs, you know, into the organization, to really make sure,
13:06
Becki Feldmann: that the culture is aligned, to really support a leader within a line
13:10
Becki Feldmann: of business, within a specific area of the bank because we know
13:14
Becki Feldmann: that, you know, there is an overall commerce culture, but there are gonna be
13:18
Becki Feldmann: some specific needs, of certain departments.
13:21
Becki Feldmann: And so that that super champ is gonna be working with that leader to
13:25
Becki Feldmann: say what matters most to you?
13:27
Becki Feldmann: How do your team members like to experience culture?
13:29
Becki Feldmann: And they listen and learn, and they're a partner in making that happen.
13:33
Becki Feldmann: So I currently play the role of master champ in talent management,
13:38
Becki Feldmann: and then I have a team of super champs who I work with to
13:42
Becki Feldmann: really spread the word, and to, be
13:46
Becki Feldmann: the culture carriers to bring that into into the lives
13:50
Becki Feldmann: of everyone at Commerce.
13:52
Becki Feldmann: And Susan got to play that role too, in her Commerce career.
13:55
Becki Feldmann: Susan, were you a master champ and a super champ at one point?
13:59
Susan Kalist: Yes.
13:59
Susan Kalist: I was a I was a super champ first and then got to be
14:02
Susan Kalist: a master champ on the commercial side for almost three years.
14:06
Susan Kalist: So, and what a great three years.
14:09
Susan Kalist: So it's hard to pass the baton, but, you know, it's all part of
14:11
Susan Kalist: the pro the program.
14:15
Lisa Nichols: In this clip, Axia Women's Health CIO, Pallavi Chandak ,
14:19
Lisa Nichols: shares the core leadership philosophy that she lives by, be first,
14:23
Lisa Nichols: best, or different, emphasizing the importance of bringing her best self to
14:27
Lisa Nichols: every new and often challenging experience.
14:31
Lisa Nichols: What do you believe are some of those leadership philosophies that have really helped
14:35
Lisa Nichols: you be successful?
14:36
Lisa Nichols: Because you're very successful.
14:38
Pallavi Chandak: Oh, I'm still learning, still trying, but thank
14:42
Pallavi Chandak: you for that.
14:44
Pallavi Chandak: So my principles, I think they're leadership principles, but they're also
14:49
Pallavi Chandak: life principles.
14:51
Pallavi Chandak: I mentioned one which was to be first, best, or different.
14:55
Pallavi Chandak: It's not my it's I I learned it from a
15:00
Pallavi Chandak: a leader that I came across as soon as I moved to, Saint Louis.
15:04
Pallavi Chandak: I admire him.
15:05
Pallavi Chandak: Even today, I follow him.
15:06
Pallavi Chandak: And, he said this, and it stuck with me because it resonated
15:11
Pallavi Chandak: with my own journey.
15:13
Pallavi Chandak: And then and also the fact that every time in your
15:17
Pallavi Chandak: leadership journey, there's always going to be a first.
15:20
Pallavi Chandak: You're always with me, it I've always been either
15:24
Pallavi Chandak: the first woman or the first engineer or the
15:29
Pallavi Chandak: first Indian executive
15:31
Pallavi Chandak: or the first, the first, the first.
15:33
Pallavi Chandak: Right?
15:33
Pallavi Chandak: And so how do I bring my best into
15:38
Pallavi Chandak: every first?
15:39
Pallavi Chandak: How do I continue to, yes, I'm different.
15:42
Pallavi Chandak: So I know that it's gonna it's going to come with a lot of
15:46
Pallavi Chandak: courage I have to show, but I also have to bring everyone along
15:50
Pallavi Chandak: on that journey with me, and continue to be the best in
15:54
Pallavi Chandak: every role that I have been.
15:56
Pallavi Chandak: So that's one of my principles, to be
16:00
Pallavi Chandak: first, best, or different.
16:02
Pallavi Chandak: Right?
16:03
Pallavi Chandak: Even at Siemens, when I was a hardcore electrical
16:07
Pallavi Chandak: engineering engineer at the,
16:11
Pallavi Chandak: at the on the on the factory floor.
16:14
Pallavi Chandak: They had not worked with a woman before, a woman
16:18
Pallavi Chandak: engineer before.
16:19
Pallavi Chandak: So not only was I their boss, but I also was a gender.
16:22
Pallavi Chandak: They didn't know they've they've only see they they didn't know how to work
16:25
Pallavi Chandak: with a woman.
16:26
Pallavi Chandak: Mhmm.
16:27
Pallavi Chandak: I remember that even the dress code was
16:31
Pallavi Chandak: all male centric, and they had to revise the dress code when I
16:35
Pallavi Chandak: started there.
16:37
Pallavi Chandak: So so so, again, so many firsts, but then there were
16:41
Pallavi Chandak: it wasn't easy.
16:42
Pallavi Chandak: It was bumpy.
16:43
Pallavi Chandak: But then once we were able to build trust with each other,
16:48
Pallavi Chandak: then I learned so much from them because the folks that actually work with
16:52
Pallavi Chandak: the machines are the ones that truly teach you so much.
16:55
Pallavi Chandak: They know they know the process.
16:58
Pallavi Chandak: They know the shop floors.
16:59
Pallavi Chandak: They know the machines.
17:01
Pallavi Chandak: So I'm still in touch with so many of my colleagues, and
17:06
Pallavi Chandak: I learned so much, but it was a it was a hard start, in
17:10
Pallavi Chandak: the beginning.
17:11
Pallavi Chandak: Mhmm.
17:12
Pallavi Chandak: Again, like my Bollywood journey, I I I was the first first
17:17
Pallavi Chandak: to be starting a dance company.
17:20
Pallavi Chandak: The first two, I was on Fox one time,
17:24
Pallavi Chandak: when again, like, when Slumdog Millionaire became a big success,
17:28
Pallavi Chandak: they wanted to show that, as well.
17:31
Pallavi Chandak: And so,
17:34
Pallavi Chandak: it was the first time that a Bollywood dancer had been
17:38
Pallavi Chandak: on a local TV here.
17:41
Pallavi Chandak: So I had to then think about how do I translate Bollywood to
17:45
Pallavi Chandak: Saint Louis, and to Saint Louis audience.
17:49
Pallavi Chandak: So but but it was I I worked hard.
17:52
Pallavi Chandak: We became the best school that we had in town.
17:55
Pallavi Chandak: We became a big company a nd so on.
18:01
Lisa Nichols: The first, the best. I love it.
18:02
Lisa Nichols: I just love it.
18:03
Pallavi Chandak: Be first, best, or different.
18:05
Pallavi Chandak: And then another another philosophy principle is,
18:10
Pallavi Chandak: reward is the journey.
18:13
Pallavi Chandak: For me, it's
18:15
Pallavi Chandak: it's never been about the destination,
18:20
Pallavi Chandak: never been about the the finish line, if you would,
18:24
Pallavi Chandak: but it's always been the thrill of being part of the race.
18:28
Pallavi Chandak: Every connection, every friendship, every experience has
18:33
Pallavi Chandak: been a gift.
18:34
Pallavi Chandak: So that no matter what role I have been in, I I wanna savor
18:38
Pallavi Chandak: every every moment of the role, give my best,
18:42
Pallavi Chandak: and not really think about what I'm what's the end game
18:47
Pallavi Chandak: here and, you know, just focus on the journey.
18:50
Pallavi Chandak: And and that's that's the that's the true reward.
18:53
Pallavi Chandak: So Right.
18:54
Pallavi Chandak: To me,
18:57
Pallavi Chandak: I think those those are some of the principles I live by.
19:00
Pallavi Chandak: There are a few others, but those might be the, like, the the common
19:04
Pallavi Chandak: theme of my, leadership journey.
19:09
Lisa Nichols: In April, I got to sit down with Dave Peacock, CEO of Advantage Solutions.
19:14
Lisa Nichols: In this clip, he defines his aspirational leadership style using
19:18
Lisa Nichols: the acronym PAPI, which stands for pause, awareness,
19:23
Lisa Nichols: patience, and intentionality.
19:25
Lisa Nichols: What would you say, Dave?
19:28
Lisa Nichols: I mean, I I could put words in your mouth, but I wanna hear
19:31
Lisa Nichols: it from you.
19:31
Lisa Nichols: I think I know.
19:32
Lisa Nichols: But, like, what would you say your leadership style is?
19:37
Dave Peacock: Well, I have my the leadership style I I aspire to.
19:40
Dave Peacock: And and so Okay.
19:42
Dave Peacock: And you can appreciate this more than anybody.
19:44
Dave Peacock: Every I'm in a bible studies outside of even CAO forum.
19:47
Dave Peacock: And, I always say the best leadership book in the world is the bible.
19:50
Dave Peacock: Just read it.
19:51
Dave Peacock: And and even for those who don't, who have a different belief system and
19:55
Dave Peacock: you just look at it as stories, there is no better leadership book
19:59
Dave Peacock: in in, you know, Ecclesiastes is a great example of that.
20:01
Dave Peacock: But,
20:03
Dave Peacock: we do a word every year that we work on, and a good friend
20:07
Dave Peacock: of mine started using acronyms because it's cheating.
20:11
Dave Peacock: And so my I think it it really does wrap
20:15
Dave Peacock: up kind of how I want to lead.
20:18
Dave Peacock: As I've been in this role two years, I was a much more thoughtful
20:20
Dave Peacock: around it, and it's Poppy.
20:22
Dave Peacock: And there was well, that's a weird word.
20:23
Dave Peacock: Right?
20:24
Dave Peacock: It's it's it's it's a Spanish word for father, but it also is an
20:28
Dave Peacock: acronym with pause, awareness, patience, and intentionality.
20:33
Dave Peacock: And and so so many times, we we we don't and
20:37
Dave Peacock: I funneled this all the time.
20:38
Dave Peacock: You're just so busy in the action in the moment.
20:40
Dave Peacock: Sometimes you just when things are going on, you need to take a pause.
20:45
Dave Peacock: Make sure you're really aware of been coming from curious around what's going on.
20:48
Dave Peacock: Why is this happening?
20:49
Dave Peacock: Why is this person doing this?
20:51
Dave Peacock: Or why is this situation occurring?
20:54
Dave Peacock: Be patient sometimes as far as how you're gonna respond because sometimes it's
20:58
Dave Peacock: letting things come to you and leveraging your faith a little bit that, you
21:01
Dave Peacock: know, things can can in ways work out, but also being intentional when you
21:05
Dave Peacock: take action and and convicted around it.
21:07
Dave Peacock: So,
21:09
Dave Peacock: that is something I've been thinking about quite a bit this year,
21:13
Dave Peacock: as far as how I wanna lead.
21:14
Dave Peacock: But, you know, if I had to boil it down to one word, I'd
21:18
Dave Peacock: say it's intentionality.
21:19
Dave Peacock: And and that's trying to live every day and and and lead
21:24
Dave Peacock: with intention as far as I mean, I
21:28
Dave Peacock: pray briefly before meetings.
21:30
Dave Peacock: I do things to be really intentional in the moment as much as possible.
21:35
Dave Peacock: Because I think people deserve that.
21:39
Lisa Nichols: Our next clip features Matt Granados, CEO and founder of Life Pulse,
21:43
Lisa Nichols: and his wife, Maria, executive director and founder of the Take Part Foundation,
21:48
Lisa Nichols: detailing their commitment to intentionality through a monthly life date philosophy.
21:52
Lisa Nichols: So how do you keep your marriage strong?
21:55
Lisa Nichols: As you were co laboring together, right, and you're working together on
22:00
Lisa Nichols: these initiatives, we get asked that question a lot.
22:03
Lisa Nichols: So I'm gonna ask you two.
22:05
Lisa Nichols: How do you how do you do that?
22:06
Maria Granados: Well, we've done it wrong, and we've done it right.
22:09
Maria Granados: So it's a it's a constant learning .
22:11
Maria Granados: And now, like, we haven't been in the married game.
22:12
Maria Granados: We'll be coming up on ten years, I think.
22:14
Maria Granados: And, it's been it's been a journey.
22:17
Maria Granados: But for us, like Matt mentioned, it's the intentionality.
22:20
Maria Granados: We had something cheesy that we did with since we were dating called life
22:24
Maria Granados: date.
22:24
Maria Granados: And so every month, we knew we had this fun date coming up, and
22:27
Maria Granados: we made ourselves make a reservation even if it wasn't a fancy restaurant for
22:30
Maria Granados: that month.
22:31
Maria Granados: We made ourselves buy each other a little gift, you know, and sometimes it
22:34
Maria Granados: was like a five dollar gift.
22:36
Maria Granados: One time it was a car.
22:37
Maria Granados: Right?
22:37
Maria Granados: Like, we've done crazy stuff, but, like, when we wrote a hand we we
22:40
Maria Granados: wrote a card, like, by hand, and every time we get asked by the
22:43
Maria Granados: waiter or waitress, like, what are you celebrating?
22:45
Maria Granados: And we're like, just life.
22:46
Maria Granados: And but at that dinner, we weren't allowed to solve any problems for each
22:49
Maria Granados: other.
22:50
Maria Granados: We weren't allowed to do but we were just allowed to hear each other
22:53
Maria Granados: out and see how we're doing across the board, you know, and just have
22:56
Maria Granados: really good fruitful conversation.
22:58
Maria Granados: And I know that that sounds silly to some people to kinda be so
23:01
Maria Granados: scheduled out like that, but it actually was, like, very relieving to someone like
23:05
Maria Granados: us who has so much, like, going on.
23:06
Maria Granados: Like, you understand when you're running a business and you have kids, it starts
23:10
Maria Granados: to get kind of, overwhelming, but give us something to look forward to.
23:14
Maria Granados: And then when I knowing that there would be a gift, you know, that
23:16
Maria Granados: I have to get that month, it made me think about Matt when I
23:19
Maria Granados: was out and about or I was browsing my phone or, like, you know,
23:22
Maria Granados: what can I do to,
23:25
Maria Granados: to think of him and to honor him?
23:27
Maria Granados: So being really intentional about our relationship, our dating life
23:31
Maria Granados: no matter what.
23:32
Matt Granados: Yeah.
23:32
Maria Granados: And I think that that kind of at first, it was like, you know,
23:36
Maria Granados: okay.
23:36
Maria Granados: But it became a norm for us so much so that when, like, the
23:39
Maria Granados: couple months, like, I think even during COVID, we had to get creative.
23:42
Maria Granados: Like, you know, because we had our kids home, all this kind of stuff.
23:44
Maria Granados: Do we have a date night in?
23:45
Maria Granados: We'll order in.
23:46
Maria Granados: We'll make sure the kids are asleep.
23:47
Maria Granados: We wanna have a full blown date, though.
23:48
Maria Granados: Like so I think it's just that idea of we are so intentional about
23:52
Maria Granados: work.
23:52
Maria Granados: We're so intentional about fitness.
23:54
Maria Granados: We're so intentional about all these other things that we ought to give the
23:57
Maria Granados: intention to the the most important relationship in our life.
24:00
Matt Granados: I think the other Right.
24:01
Matt Granados: Structure that we put if you haven't learned by yet now, we experience stuff.
24:05
Matt Granados: We build a structure.
24:06
Matt Granados: We test it against our family to make sure it works, then we offer
24:09
Matt Granados: it to our clients.
24:10
Matt Granados: But we call this the structure of success, and it's daily action, weekly planning,
24:14
Matt Granados: monthly review, quarterly reset, annual retreat.
24:17
Matt Granados: So we do that in our business, but we also do it in our
24:19
Matt Granados: marriage.
24:19
Matt Granados: So what Maria talked about was our monthly, review.
24:22
Matt Granados: That's our life plan or our life date.
24:25
Matt Granados: But every single year, we do an annual retreat.
24:28
Matt Granados: Yeah.
24:28
Matt Granados: Two of us get together and we go and plan out our year and
24:31
Matt Granados: make sure we're on the same page.
24:32
Matt Granados: Every quarter, we reset our goals both professionally and personally.
24:36
Matt Granados: Every month, we meet for that life date.
24:38
Matt Granados: Every week, we actually plan our weeks out together.
24:40
Matt Granados: Right?
24:41
Matt Granados: She uses her planner.
24:42
Matt Granados: I use my planner.
24:42
Matt Granados: We come together.
24:43
Matt Granados: And then every single day, we have to make the intentional action of her
24:48
Matt Granados: knowing that I love her and me knowing that she loves me.
24:52
Lisa Nichols: Our final clip of part one features Dr.
24:54
Lisa Nichols: Kendall Brune and Dr.
24:56
Lisa Nichols: Ryan Rogers sharing key leadership lessons related to humility,
25:00
Lisa Nichols: managing expectations, and surrounding yourself with smart people.
25:04
Lisa Nichols: Well, Kendall, let me ask you this one.
25:06
Lisa Nichols: What surprised you the most about being a leader?
25:11
Kendall Brune: People expect you to have all the answers.
25:16
Lisa Nichols: But you're Obi-Wan Kenobi.
25:18
Dr. Brune: I know.
25:19
Dr. Brune: Yeah.
25:20
Dr. Brune: I think really this, humility is trying to have that
25:24
Dr. Brune: humility in the right example.
25:26
Dr. Brune: You know?
25:27
Dr. Brune: So you you you've got to, really,
25:31
Dr. Brune: you know, show that, hey.
25:33
Dr. Brune: I grew up in the same way you did.
25:35
Dr. Brune: At least I do.
25:37
Dr. Brune: I don't like to to have a, be on a high horse, so to
25:40
Dr. Brune: speak,
25:42
Dr. Brune: and and just really kind of, and I'm on I'm from the service industry.
25:47
Dr. Brune: So, you know, from health care, I don't wanna they always call it the
25:51
Dr. Brune: white coat issue and come in, the doctor's got a white coat, and and
25:55
Dr. Brune: and all of a sudden, patients are like, oh, you gotta give me the
25:58
Dr. Brune: answers.
26:00
Dr. Brune: I don't.
26:00
Dr. Brune: I'm I'm investigating.
26:02
Dr. Brune: I'm a scientist, so so I'm just trying to figure out what's going on.
26:05
Dr. Brune: You know?
26:06
Dr. Brune: And so, you know, for us, I was I always just kinda say, well,
26:10
Dr. Brune: we're gonna yes.
26:11
Dr. Brune: I have a lot of experience.
26:13
Dr. Brune: You know?
26:13
Dr. Brune: I've had a lot of water under this bridge, so maybe I can share
26:16
Dr. Brune: some of that.
26:17
Dr. Brune: But I kinda do it not as a dictatorial.
26:20
Dr. Brune: It's just sharing.
26:21
Dr. Brune: You know?
26:22
Dr. Brune: When we did this, this is what happened.
26:24
Dr. Brune: Is it gonna work when I apply it?
26:27
Dr. Brune: Let's measure it.
26:28
Dr. Brune: And that's kinda where we're always chicken and tacking, you know,
26:32
Dr. Brune: kinda like sailing.
26:33
Dr. Brune: We're always kinda going back and forth, making adjustments.
26:37
Dr. Brune: And and I that's for me my style has been very
26:41
Dr. Brune: successful.
26:43
Lisa Nichols: I would say that's the I would say that that is the truth.
26:46
Lisa Nichols: What about doctor Rogers, I'll ask you this one.
26:49
Lisa Nichols: Is there a piece of leadership advice?
26:51
Lisa Nichols: It could even be from Obi Wan over here
26:55
Lisa Nichols: that you have received over the years, that, you know, you carry
26:59
Lisa Nichols: with you?
27:01
Lisa Nichols: Piece of leadership advice.
27:03
Dr. Rogers: Perseverance.
27:06
Dr. Rogers: Perseverance along with, you know, if you don't know the answer,
27:11
Dr. Rogers: find it.
27:12
Dr. Rogers: Like, search for it.
27:14
Dr. Rogers: Surround yourself with individuals who are smarter than you,
27:19
Dr. Rogers: and who are going places that you want
27:23
Dr. Rogers: to be and you want to eventually obtain.
27:27
Announcer: Thank you for listening to today's show.
27:29
Announcer: Something extra with Lisa Nichols is a Technology Partners production.
27:33
Announcer: Copyright Technology Partners Inc two thousand and nineteen.
27:36
Announcer: For show notes or to reach Lisa, visit tpi dot co
27:40
Announcer: slash podcast.
27:42
Announcer: Don't forget to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or wherever
27:46
Announcer: you listen.