Latest / The Action Catalyst / Forward to Better, with Dan Moore (Education, Inspiration, Leadership, Personal Development)

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Forward to Better, with Dan Moore (Education, Inspiration, Leadership, Personal Development) · The Action Catalyst

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Adam Outland: Today we're joined by the one and only Dan Moore, who's no stranger to listeners
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here on the Action Catalyst, having hosted the show for the last five years. In addition to his
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duties here, Dan has served as the longtime President of Southwestern Advantage, a role from
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which he has recently retired, which frees him up to chat with us today.
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Dan Moore: Hey, Adam. Hey, similar jackets on today, buddy. From the waist down. I'm wearing gym
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shorts.
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Adam Outland: That's the secret. It's your pant. Well, Dan, it's super good to see you. Again. It's
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a role reversal for what you're used to, which is typically the person doing the interviewing on the
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Action Catalyst. And today, we have the opportunity to grill you with the same questions
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used to grill everybody else with.
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Dan Moore: Well, I'm going to start by saying I'm totally guilty, so we can save the trial and save
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Adam Outland: Perfect. Perfect. We have a lot to talk about. And Dan, you and I have have a long
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the cross ex.
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history of working together compared to people from the outside world were long and today's
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tenure of working with someone in the company is about three years, we've known each other for
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about 17. I can probably speak for you can say you've probably known people that you've worked
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with for 25, 30 years, maybe more. So is it safe to say you keep up with someone?
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Dan Moore: Absolutely true. I actually talked to the person that got me into the business world two
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weeks ago. So we keep in touch. He interviewed me in January of 1974, when I was a freshman in
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college. And then also Dave causer, who's the president of southwestern advantage was in many
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ways, my first mentor, somebody I sought out for advice at the end of my very first summer. So
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we've been colleagues and friends for nearly just shy of a half a century. So keeping up with these
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great relationships so important. My own district sales leader, keep in touch with him, the former
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president of the company, Jerry Hafele, we stay in regular contact, in addition to people like Henry
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Bedford, the chairman of our board, I've known Henry since 1978. So we're going to continue to
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stay in contact. I have such respect and admiration for Henry. So there's no quarter no way
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in the world, I'm gonna lose that contact.
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Adam Outland: Yeah, it's really amazing. I mean, in any part of history, I think being in one
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organization for half a century. Like to put it that way, is a feat. I mean, it's it's something
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that's simply not done often. You know, so many people probably would have questions listening to
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this podcast about that. But what kept you around?
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Dan Moore: I could finally tell you the truth, Adam. I never had enough confidence go through
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job interviews.
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Adam Outland: Didn't want to put yourself out there, right? Just it's safer here to stay. I'm
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sure that's the truth.
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Dan Moore: Well, it's interesting, because I never even created a resume. When I was in college, I
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was encouraged to do one. So I remember getting out my old typewriter. People go to the museum and
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see typewriters. I started typing. And I read back the first word I wrote, which was resume, but I
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misread it and thought I said, resume, so I just went back to work. Wow. Anyway, in more
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seriousness, I think what made such a difference in my tenure here is deep, deep conviction to the
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mission that we have. You know, when I got into the program, as an 18 year old, I was kind of
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shiny on the outside and pretty messed up on the inside, I was going to Harvard evidently had
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everything in the world going for me. But inside was a massive insecurities, no real anchors in my
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life. And I desperately needed some path that I could get on that could restore my self confidence
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and self image, and be around people that would really bring out the best in me. But when I met my
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student manager, and then my district sales leader, there's just something about those
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gentlemen and the other student leaders in the program. And then I get to know the first year is
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a similar striving to be the best that we could possibly be. And so the program was massively
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important to me that first summer got me really back on track back feeling good about myself, I
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got back to college and immediately forgot every lesson of the summer, it took less than 24 hours
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for me to feel like I just lost it all. So I needed a second dose for sure, which was the next
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summer. And with the guidance of the district sales leader and other people, I came back and
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began to build a team build an organization began to really fulfill these habits. So in many ways,
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because the program was such a massive impact on me, I felt if this could be for me, it could work
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for somebody else. And partly because my own upbringing was you we should make the world better
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when we leave it than we found it. I said, I could spend an awful lot of years trying to find the
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best way to help the world. Or I could find that focus on what I've got going right now and help
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the world from right here. So that deep, deep conviction to the mission, first of all,
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personally experiencing the benefits second, seeing so many other people grow, and then having
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the opportunity to develop other skills within the company. There was there was no need to think
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about doing anything else. That said I was distracted a fair amount of my 20s as many people
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are by something that looks cooler and better and more lucrative. But each time with great guidance
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from my most important life advisor That's my wife Maria. She would constantly say but what drives
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you what moves you what motivates you in the mornings? What gets you out of bed, what makes you
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feel good about your work, and always came back to the same thing seeing young people grow and
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develop than before? I'm slightly older them become leaders in their own right, and live good,
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productive, happy lives. That's what drives me. And she said, can you accomplish that here? And I
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said, Of course, if you're like I am right now she said, the why would you even think about going
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into warehouse? If he's like, Well, that really makes sense to me, honey. So she's always been
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really good at grounding me, telling me what to deal with asking the right questions so that I
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could come to that conclusion. So I guess it's a combination of external influences and internal
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conviction. And at some point, I just finally said, Who am I kidding, this is what I'm supposed
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to be doing. This is what this is what I am meant to do. And I quit looking right, quit looking left
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and just focus on looking forward.
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Adam Outland: Such a good answer. I think in passing, we've talked a little bit about you
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growing up in New Mexico, right?
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Dan Moore: That's right, Los Alamos, my hometown.
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Adam Outland: And if I remember right, you said your dad was a engineer of some type.
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Dan Moore: My dad was a mathematical statistician. He had a PhD in that subject, and was one of the
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early guys working on computer programming at the lab. They're at Los Alamos National Laboratory. So
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he started working there in 1953, when a computer would fill, basically an auditorium or a
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gymnasium, and would run almost as fast as a hand calculator will run now. So he was very involved
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in that and Los Alamos National Lab at that time was primarily in nuclear weapons development,
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making weapons of mass destruction provided the living for our family. And my dad, very principled
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man kind of made the decision after roughly 20 years, that that's not how he wanted his whole
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life to be spent. So he reengineered himself and found other work still in the public sector, he
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always was a public sector employee, that decision to leave what was very steady, secure, safe work,
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to follow a principle definitely had an impact on me. Seattle, Los Alamos is really important part
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of my upbringing, it's there that a friend got me into the speech and debate team, which was a funny
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story in its own right. Because at the time I was playing basketball, now you're tall fell out, um,
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I'm not very tall. But I was the same height when I was 12. So I was a pretty good basketball player
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and, and my buddy said, he had to join the speech team. And I said, Why don't I want to do that? He
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said, there's two reasons. First of all, there's twice as many girls as there are guys on the team.
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And second, I think you could learn a lot be good at it. So I went to the first meeting. And sure
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enough, it was a great experience. So we started getting involved in competitive speaking and
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debating. The girl I was dating at the time, got me into choir and got me into theater. And so in
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my career, the benefits of being exposed to public speaking, and theatrical performance, have had a
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huge, huge impact. So the NBA lost a real star. But those upbringings experiences in Los Angeles
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were super, super helpful to me, mild speech teacher, Paul black, probably is gonna listen to
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this episode, he's still living at the age of 90, something that's incredible. And a number of us
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have been fundraising for renaming part of the auditorium for Ross and Lola Ramsey, who are our
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drama teachers. So these impacts from way back have definitely paid forward and hopefully helping
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other people too.
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Adam Outland: So your dad is this mathematician that's obviously brilliant enough to be hired to
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work on these things. And typically, one doesn't think deep mathematical labor for a career as
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being correlative to high level communication skills, which is a stereotype. But I'm thinking in
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my head, how did Dan not end up being Bill Gates and computer whiz or mathematician versus public
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speaking and personal development? Similar your dad different than your dad? What was it that
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drove you kind of a more of a, I guess, kind of a liberal arts direction.
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Dan Moore: You know, gene pools are not circular, nor are they a uniform depth. So not all those
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mathematical genes passed on to me, they skipped me and got to my son instead, I couldn't do math,
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but it was kicking and screaming. So it's not not a natural attribute of my own. But my dad started
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off as a journalism major and had an amazing sense of humor. He could really spin a story, he could
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write brilliantly. So that part did stick with me the writing skills, being able to be as good
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storyteller, making people laugh. These are things that I'm sure got from him. My mother as well, who
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is an artist. So these impacts from our parents hit us in different ways. So Bill Gates was
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actually a classmate of mine, although we never met. And I've always admired what he accomplished
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out of his dorm room. At the same time, I was trying to accomplish something else out of my dorm
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room.
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Adam Outland: How incredible is that? You guys were the same class.
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Dan Moore: Well he never actually graduated, he was little bit busy building his small enterprise
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called Microsoft.
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Adam Outland: And you just couldn't manage to recruit him to our company.
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Dan Moore: I don't think we ever met. I doubt we ever crossed paths.
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Adam Outland: But had he, it could have even changed his future too.
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Dan Moore: Might have done well.
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Adam Outland: So you came to Southwestern Advantage. And over the course of your career, you
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ended up taking over the role eventually as president and so 2007 to today, what are some ways
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that you feel like you've really shaped the company for the future or some of the changes that
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you feel like have occurred inside Southwestern Advantage since your your tenure as President?
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Dan Moore: Well, as president of the company, I was privileged to work with Henry Bedford. He was
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chairman and CEO, and he was my direct boss for a number of years in there. And Henry is a real
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visionary, he can take a look at where we are in the business and forecast something around the
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corner that nobody else can even see to the corner. And he quickly identified that we need to
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be in the online sphere, as well as selling hardcover print books. And then we need to have a
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recurring revenue model to benefit everybody, not only the company, but the students and the
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consumers, because this recurring online revenue can be updated regularly, so they're getting
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better and better product all the time. And so a big part of my role is to help facilitate that
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mission. And help make sure that those things happened in a really good way than I've often
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said. And I believe this, that Henry may have saved the company by developing this model and
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being willing to invest and put that energy into it. So I felt like a big part of my role as
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President was to help facilitate the mission. And that means being a great link between what the
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students do and what the sales leaders do, and what the overall corporate philosophy and
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structure is about in the old Hippocratic Oath, the first thing that doctors pledge is do no harm.
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And I became president, the company, one of my great concerns was, can I even do this thing? This
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is a legacy of more than 100 years. And it was a really scary thought. So I said, if I just stay
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true to the mission, and stay focused on doing what's right for young people, I want to do any
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harm. And then I want to make it better by continuing to amplify the notion of doing the
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right thing. So our values, our focus, doing the right thing, staying true to our mission had been
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things that I've tried my very, very best to maintain and help other people see that as well.
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You know, soon after I became President, we had the major housing crash in 2008 2009. Whole
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country was in recession, it was it was not a fun time to be in any kind of business. And I remember
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giving a presentation at our great recruiters seminar theme basically was if there's going to be
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a recession, we're just not going to participate. And here's why we're not. And it was a lot of our
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background, our history, our theme, and feel like that may have been a moment when I when I stepped
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up to say, Let's lean into our values, let's lean into what's always made us successful. Let's don't
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worry about externalities. Let's focus on who we are, where we've been, and carry that forward.
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Over the years, I've developed a presentation that I do for young people that I call life one on one,
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and live one on one is basically, if you're going to choose a paid lifetime partner, how do you go
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about doing that? So through the course of that, I felt like it was not dictating who to who to
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marry, or who to spend your time with. But instead learn to ask the right questions. Everybody wants
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to find the answers. But I really think if we ask the right questions, the answers ultimately reveal
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themselves. So I feel like that's been a presentation that hopefully is continued to be
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impactful and make a difference. When I've traveled campuses, both in Europe, and in the US,
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the whole focus is to be a spokesperson of our mission, which is developing young people. So the
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presentations that I give are generally not at all about selling generally not at all about
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recruiting, but more about understanding how our brains work, how our minds work, how our hearts
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work, so that we can pull together a statement for ourselves, we want to move forward in life. I've
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been blessed with a tremendous team of people in the office, they'll tell you that I'm definitely
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not the best best manager because I'm generally not a present manager usually gone someplace. But
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they've carried on just brilliantly making sure that the backbone and the infrastructure of the
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company continue to grow, regardless of the obstacles, and I can't give them enough credit.
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For what happened during the pandemic years, when we had to really retool, when we face the very
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real prospect, we weren't going to be able to sell anything door to door, we really stepped up to
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innovate in such good ways, and to really figure out how we could sell if we couldn't go door to
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door for so we were able to do that. But that's been a permanent change. It's implemented well,
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we've impacted what we've done our company, with our European people unable to come due to the
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travel ban, we had to get really creative there. So I was very involved in reopening the UK so that
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they'd have a place that they could knock and sell books retain that group of people for the future.
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If we believe anything that we try to teach about overcoming obstacles, developing themselves
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through persevering through getting through every possible setback, and we'd have been very
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hypocritical, we hadn't found a way to make it happen. In fact, a big part of our whole motto as
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a company is find a way anybody can find an excuse, but it takes a personal real character to
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find a way over around under right through any obstacle that stands in their path. So finding a
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way was such an important theme. So getting through those adversities is a matter of of
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character. And it's a matter of belief. And it's a matter of teamwork, because nobody can do that
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stuff alone. There's an old saying that what's hardest about our businesses, what's best about
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it, don't take it personally be the best person you can be that there's certain things in life,
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they can control, they should really control those other things they should influence, but there's a
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huge number of things they just need to accept for now. It's what we call the CIA fn philosophy,
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control what you can influence it you can accept what you need to for now, and just roll forward.
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So I guess it's been an activist role in certain ways. It's been a passing of the baton role in
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other ways, is trying to make sure that our mission is first and foremost and people's hearts
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and minds and the legacy of the past and the responsibility feature have always weighed
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strongly on me.
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Adam Outland: Yeah, well, I think you've done a wonderful job. I think, in particular, what a lot
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of people would say. And just in conversations with a lot of my peers, when your name comes up,
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there's always a warmth to it, because what you've done such a wonderful job of is representing a lot
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of those values that we stand for as a company. And we've made a tremendous impact on gosh,
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probably 50 to 100,000 young people, which is really incredible. What would you say you hope the
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point is that they remember the principle that they remember most?
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Dan Moore: I would say that one thing is to develop a strong set of values. And to live those
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values focused on making the world a little bit better than then you found it, that it's pretty
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easy to be an accumulator. It's pretty easy to be a taker, especially if you have a lot of talent
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and you're persuasive. But can a person be an accumulator, and then a giver at the same time,
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making the world a better place, not just financially, but in terms of impact. That's always
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what I would encourage people to do. Probably a second lesson is don't neglect the acres of
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diamonds that are around you. You may be familiar with that story. For those listeners that don't
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know that that's told by Russell Conwell, who was the founder of Temple University that a very poor
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hardscrabble farmer in South Africa was finally fed up with farming, and he said, I want to find
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riches, this is never going to work for me. So he sold his farm and went on questing for diamonds,
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and ended up panelists and passed away totally broke, whoever it bought his farm was one day
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working down by the stream and noticed something shiny in the water and pulled it out. And it was
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an immense, uncut, almost perfectly developed diamond. And that led to finding other diamonds
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and how the diamonds and other diamonds it became one of the most prosperous, successful diamond
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mines in the entire world. And so the person that gave it up literally gave him acres of diamonds
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that were in his backyard in pursuit of something somewhere else. And I've always felt like if we
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can concentrate on what we have at hand, if a couple of things are in place, if the opportunity
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is a fair one, if it's honest, if it's decent, if it's fair, to the people we're surrounded with
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have good values, then why look elsewhere? Let's develop the acres of diamonds that are right here
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with us. Those would be a couple of lessons have the right values, and don't spend all your time
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diverting attention and diffusing your energies. Look around, or the acres of diamonds around you
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right now. Can you bloom where you're planted? That's a big one.
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Adam Outland: Yeah, that cliche of the pasture is always greener on the other side is kind of a
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similar story, right?
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Dan Moore: That just reminded me one of my dad's favorite quotes, he had a sign in his office
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walls. It says the grass is brown on both sides of the fence.
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Adam Outland: Well, you know, just a quick transition from this; with you as the host of The
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Action Catalyst, you've learned a lot from having interviews with other people. And I'm curious, in
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all the interviews that you've had since taking on the host role in 2018, what's one that really
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stands out to you as most memorable or something that you gained as an insight?
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Dan Moore: Well, there's been a number of specific insights. But if you don't mind, I'm gonna try to
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generalize it a little bit. Sure. I developed over time as Cisco using basically the same five
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questions in my interviews. And one of the questions is, what do you do when you hit a brick
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wall? And the other one is, what do you do and if you have some of these cars, so completely
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discouraged, they don't know where to turn. And it's amazing how similar the responses were.
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Almost everybody, when they hit a brick wall, said, Well, the first thing you got to do is
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realize you've hit a brick wall, just acknowledge it. But don't make it a big thing. Just say, Okay,
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so I'm temporarily have a setback, this isn't going the way I wanted it to. But it doesn't mean
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it can't eventually in a different way. And to be creative, step back, breathe, and think and go at
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it again. Because nobody ever says when you hit a brick wall, give up. Never had a single guest say
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that. Every one of them said it's normal part, if you weren't experiencing those, then you wouldn't
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be doing anything remarkable. So that was immensely encouraging, that whenever we hit this
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unexpected stuff, giving up is the only option that makes no sense at all, keeping on does if we
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think use our brains. Yeah, the huge inspiration that I remember getting was with the question,
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what would you say to a person that is so discouraged? And they look at the hand they've
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been dealt? They don't have any face cards, let alone any aces? What would you say to that person.
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And it's amazing how many of them said I would encourage them to dig into their life and find one
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or two things, they feel great about themselves. And then second, lean into people around them that
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can remind them of their capabilities. And third, do something, do something successful. It doesn't
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matter how big it is just do one thing successful, feel better about yourself and get into motion?
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Matt Ross often says motivation is a myth. Momentum is what makes the difference. And so when
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people have lost their momentum, getting started again, can take a lot of effort. But when they do
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that, and just take that next positive step, great things, in fact, can occur.
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Adam Outland: Really well said and I know we're almost on time, but I did want to ask you, I guess
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one last thing, which is you also have the question of asking about pivot points. But I'm
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kind of curious if you've had to isolate maybe one major pivot point in your professional career, a
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challenging moment, a pivot point that you've encountered that that made all the difference?
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What do you think it would be?
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Dan Moore: There have been a number of madams From really early on, realizing the impact that a sales
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manager can have on a young person in the sales managers have an awesome responsibility to be the
20:07
right kind of leader. Really, really important. So that's that's a principle there. When I was asked
20:13
to become a district sales manager, and I didn't think I was qualified or capable of doing it, the
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sales director nodded and said, Yeah, you can do this, you can do this, we'll help you get through
20:20
it. He also said, it's important to make a long term commitment. Because somewhere along the line,
20:25
you're going to have a really tough year. And if you're not committed, you're going to want to
20:27
leave. And I said, Well, I'm never going to have a tough year, that the very next year, I had my
20:31
worst year ever. So his wisdom came through. Then when he became president of the company in 1980.
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He asked me if I would join him as sort of a head of projects didn't really have a title that made
20:42
any sense. I was called manager marketing development, I still don't know what that even
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means. And he just said, I think you can do this.
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Adam Outland: That's a beautiful one, as a tenured and seasoned and assaulted beard, individual that
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you are today, what advice might you give to a 20 year 21 year old and more, if you sat down with
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him knowing everything that you know about your life and all the wisdom that you have now, what
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would be one, one little bit of advice, you might share your your 21 year old self?
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Dan Moore: I would say put the correct kind of emotional blinders on. So that we stay focused on
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what's ahead and not get too distracted by naysayers not get too distracted by alternative
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ways of doing things, because there's always going to be a million alternatives. And I see so many
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people fritter away their energy pursuing all those instead of concentrating on the one right in
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front of them. Stay the course stay focused, again, if the people you work with are honest, if
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the mission is noble, if it's pure, if it has value to the world, those are not easy things to
21:44
find. In fact, my successor, Dave causer, used to say, you know, there must be a million ways to
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make a million dollars, but I only know of a couple of them. And they usually involve building
21:54
value within the company you're in. And so that's what I'm focused on. So there's there's a lot to
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that just everybody's chasing the next shiny thing. Instead of saying, wait a minute, what can
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I create out of what I have right here?
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Adam Outland: Yeah, acres of diamonds. Way to circle back to that point. Well, Dan, it's been a
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pleasure. You've made an incredible impact. Appreciate your time as the Action Catalyst host
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and appreciate you giving me massive giant shoes to try and fill with my small feet.
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Dan Moore: Adam, you're very kind. It's fun to have a role reversal in this process. I appreciate
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it. I'll have PTSD after this thinking about what I should have said.