Podcast appearances and mentions of linda livingstone

[00:00:30] Deneé Barracato: Kelly Watts was a former assistant coach at several different institutions before she ended up at Hofstra. And she was a woman of color that was just so vibrant. She loved sports. She loved people. She loved the Lord. And every time I was around her, I just felt this spirit of joy. And she was just always so fun to be around, and she put things in perspective for me at a very impressionable age in my life as a young adult, where she always reminded me to keep the Lord first. Trials and tribulations are going to come, and adversity is going to come, but you need to stay focused and centered, and she really poured her optimism into me and I appreciated that. And then she was actually great at basketball. So, she taught me as a guard the skills that I needed to be successful on the next level. ++++++++++++ [00:01:19] Tommy Thomas: Our guest today is Deneé Barracato. She's the Deputy Director of Athletics for Operations and Capital Projects at Northwestern University. Her career path to Northwestern has taken her to leadership roles at York College, Queens College, and Adelphi University. She did a stint in Indianapolis with NCAA as the Associate Director of Division I Women's Basketball, and she even did a stint at Madison Square Garden's Company as Director of Strategy, where she worked with the Knicks, the Rangers, and the New York Liberty teams to further advance the marketing and business objective of the Madison Square Garden business partners. [00:02:00] Tommy Thomas: She took her undergraduate degree from Hofstra University, where she was a four-year basketball letter winner. As a student athlete at Hofstra, she led the nation in steals for women's Division I basketball and earned America East All Conference honors. Following graduation, she played professionally in the Women's Professional League in Puerto Rico for the Saints of St. Juan, as well as with the National Women's Basketball League as a member of the Atlanta Justice. In addition to her undergraduate degree from Hofstra, she earned a master's degree in exercise science and sports management from Adelphi. She's married to Michael, and they have three children, Grace, MJ, and Mia. [00:02:41] Tommy Thomas: Deneé, welcome to NextGen Nonprofit Leadership. [00:02:45] Deneé Barracato: Thank you for having me, Tommy. I'm humbled. It's a pleasure to be here with you all just to talk about sports and my journey thus far. [00:02:54] Tommy Thomas: Thank you. My guests sometimes want to know where I find all these people. Ty Brown has a podcast on leadership, and I listened to it. And I heard Deneé about maybe two months ago, three months ago. And I thought this is somebody I would love to have as a guest. You're so gracious to carve out some time for us in the midst of what I know is a busy prelude to your intercollegiate athletics this year. [00:03:19] Tommy Thomas: But before we dive too deep into sports or your current role, take me back to your childhood and tell me what was it like growing up?  [00:03:29] Deneé Barracato: Oh, wow.  Growing up, I had a very active childhood. I was a tomboy at heart. I loved activity. I loved sports. I wouldn't say competitively, but just out in the park, a city kid originally from the Bronx, and my parents are from the city as well. First generation here in the United States, although Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States, but they were born there and moved here at a young age, and then raised us in New York city. And later we moved out to Hempstead, Long Island where I went undergrad near Hofstra. I was a very active kid, loved life, and loved sports. And when I was in middle school, I was introduced to women's basketball or just basketball in general, from an organized standpoint. And I remember I just fell in love with it. I fell in love with the idea of playing something that was pretty cool at the time. And then I realized that I was actually decent at it. [00:04:32] Deneé Barracato: And it was interesting because I have two sisters, two older sisters. I'm the youngest of three. And my father ended up coaching the middle school team, and we were all on it. And I remember my older sister, Damaris, she was actually pretty good. She played at a junior college. And then my older sister, she just wanted nothing to do with it. She didn't like the physical interaction. And as I mentioned, I embraced it. My father encouraged me to continue to play, and the rest is history. I then transitioned to a public school and started getting engaged in summer basketball, AAU later in my high school career and ended up at Hofstra university. [00:05:17] Deneé Barracato: So, I would say my family, certainly my parents both being educators, but both being Hispanics growing up in the city, tried to instill in us work ethic, education, and just avenues to further my educational career. And basketball was one of those endeavors that helped me do that. And so now in my career, I can say that I will be forever indebted to basketball, but also this industry for giving me so much. And so that's why I do what I do to give back to potential student athletes and young adults that one day want to take advantage of that opportunity to do something very similar to myself. Yeah, so that's my childhood in a nutshell but one that I'm very proud of. [00:06:01] Tommy Thomas: So, when you were in high school, what kind of career aspirations did a young 15-year-old have? [00:06:08] Deneé Barracato: I have to be honest with you. I was so enamored with the sport of basketball. I was so tunnel visioned. I was determined to play Division I Women's Basketball. I didn't even know what that meant at the time. I just wanted to play at the highest level, wherever it was. And I worked tirelessly to ensure that happened, whether that was working out two days on my own as a 15, 16-year-old doing whatever I had to do, because I really came on to the AAU summer league basketball scene pretty late. [00:06:39] Deneé Barracato: My parents really didn't know the first thing about college scholarships and what sports can actually bring to an aspiring, young individual like me wanting to play on the next level. I don't know that they fully understood that there could be possibilities to getting a full scholarship that would allow me to be educated at no cost. And so once my parents learned that, then we fast forward through everything. So, my main focus was maintaining my grades so that way I can then play Division I Women's Basketball.  And then from there, obviously, the sky's the limit with potentially playing overseas. [00:07:16] Deneé Barracato: At the time when I first started, I think it was my freshman year. I don't know that the WNBA was even a thing. I don't know that it became a thing until my senior year. Back when I was 15, 16, that was my focus and I'm a bit taken back because if that is my daughter's focus at 15, 16, then I think we're going to have a different conversation. But certainly, it was one that I was really enamored with. And I had to be honest with you, even my relationship with the Lord probably wasn't first and foremost, the way it probably should have been back then. And it's later in life that I realized that there's more to life than just basketball, sports, and my own personal ambitions. And we could talk about that a little bit more, but that was what was going through my mind back then. ++++++++++++++++ [00:08:00] Tommy Thomas:   What is something that people are usually surprised to learn about you? [00:08:06] Deneé Barracato: Oh, that I actually have three children. Every time I share with them that I'm married with three children and I'm closer to 50 than I am to 40 they really get surprised. And I guess that's a compliment in a lot of ways, but one that hopefully I balance really well. At work, I work really hard and I'm hoping that my children will see that work ethic in me, but at the same time sometimes that comes back to impact the amount of time that I do spend at home. [00:08:33] Deneé Barracato: Because they see me so often, whether it's at work or at conferences which is where you heard Ty Brown's podcast, because I was at the NACDA conference and convention. Sometimes they don't realize that I actually have a family at home that's waiting for me, that depends on me. Obviously along with my husband, but yeah, I think that's something that they're surprised about. And even then, I even played professionally at the next level beyond just Hofstra University. And that was a wonderful experience too. And I think the last thing that might surprise them that I probably don't talk about as often as I should is my father is a pastor. And so, I was raised in the Word and although I didn't always walk in faith, it was instilled in me and that verse that talks about raising your children in the ways of the Lord and they shall not depart and those teachings. I think my life is evidence of that. And I'm hoping that I can certainly do the same with my children. [00:09:25] Tommy Thomas: Part of this sub theme I've got going here is the coaches in my life. And I've interviewed six or seven people like you who played intercollegiate sports. And we talked about things they learn from sports and things they learn from the coaches in their lives. So, thinking back, which coach do you think got the most out of you? [00:09:46] Deneé Barracato: Yeah, I've often talked about her. Her name is Kelly Watts, and she was a former assistant coach at several different institutions, Temple, I think she was at Rutgers for a little bit before she ended up at Hofstra. And she was just a woman of color that was just so vibrant. She loves sports. She loved people. She loved the Lord. And every time I was around her, I just felt this spirit of joy. And she was just always so fun to be around, and she put things in perspective for me at a very impressionable age in my life as a young adult, where she always reminded me to keep the Lord first. Trials and tribulations are going to come, and adversity is going to come, but you need to stay focused and centered, and she really poured her optimism into me, and I appreciated that. And so, she was one. And then she was actually great at basketball. So, she taught me as a guard the skills that I needed to be successful on the next level. [00:10:44] Deneé Barracato: And we still stay in touch to this day. I've been around her parents, or her mom and her sister. And she's always someone that I admire and that I often seek advice from, and, again, she was probably the most impactful person that was from a women's basketball perspective, but also Jay Wright, who was the men's basketball coach. She's a hall of fame coach, many people remember him from his days at Villanova and now CBS, but he was actually the head men's basketball coach at Hofstra university, my entire four-year career there. And we've just stayed in touch since then. He's been a mentor as well. [00:11:21] Deneé Barracato: Someone that I can pick up the phone and call. And we talk about different things going on in the industry right now. And I often pick his brain, but also brag about him and, back when I was at Hofstra on my off days, when the men's basketball team was traveling and we were home, I would help babysit his children. And I knew Patty, his wife, and now his children are grown. They're adults and so very successful, but he's someone else that I admired just the way he carried himself, how he invoked a championship mindset with his players and how he carried himself was just top notch and bar. [00:11:56] Tommy Thomas: Tell me about the best athletic team you were ever on and what made it the best athletic team. [00:12:05] Deneé Barracato: That's a good question. I would say my experience with the National Women's Basketball League. I was drafted in the fifth round and that was a league that started when the ABL folded. And so, the WMU was there. The ABL had just folded. That would be the CBA to the NBA. And they started this league because there were certain WNBA players that maybe didn't want to go back overseas during their off season, but still wanted to maintain their conditioning and just play competitively. So, they started this league, and I got drafted in the fifth round to the Atlanta Justice team. And I moved over there to play for a season and I just met incredible athletes, incredible humans: friends that I have to this day, friends that helped me through my wedding and playing at that top level, playing with some of the best players in the country. And Rebecca Lobo, the Miller twins. And I think maybe Tina Thompson also played in that league. There were just so many that I admired as a basketball player leading up. And obviously now they're household names, when we talk about women's basketball. I really enjoyed my time playing at that level and playing here in the States, in Atlanta. And so, I would say that would be my most impactful team. [00:13:25] Tommy Thomas: So how did basketball change for you between high school, college and the pros? What were the transitions? [00:13:37] Deneé Barracato: I think for me, it was maturity. When I was younger, I was still tunnel visioned, very selfish and my thought process, having this ambition to play and do well for me. That I forgot the team component. I forgot the humanity component. I forgot, that, hey, I know as a woman of color, I have to fight to really get the positioning that I need, really prove myself beyond many other individuals that were in front of me. Through maturity and through grace and patience, learning how to be a great teammate was something that I saw grow in me, and I can say that now as an adult, as a mother raising my children from high school to then college and then collegiate or professional sports just understanding that being a great teammate should be your first focus. [00:14:31] Deneé Barracato: Because if you can support your teammate, if you can have a like mindset, if you can be supportive of your coaches if you can understand what it is to go through adversity with your team, but go through positive moments with your team, like winning and doing it together as a collective unit, you're going to go that much further than if you're doing it on your own. And, I think over the years, I learned that it is so critical in any environment, not only playing on a sports team, but also in the office environment or in society or in your home, right? Instilling those things into your family members and your teachers, and even as a spouse. Knowing that we have to be one unit, and we have to be a team. And sometimes that takes compromise and all those things. And so, over the years, I think that I learned that through tough experiences and teachable moments that helped me be a better person, teammate, and partner to all those that are in my life. [00:15:31] Tommy Thomas: You referenced the lady that was such a strong influence in your college career, at what point did you realize that she might be teaching you something other than basketball? [00:15:42] Deneé Barracato: Oh, that's a good question. She had such an infectious personality that it is a good question because you can see the light and the energy in her, but it wasn't until one day we were talking about her time in Long Island.  At some point she lived in Long Island and we were just talking and I think I may have shared with her that I had family out in some part of Suffolk County in Long Island and she mentioned to me that the church she was going to was Upper Room and she really loved that part of Long Island and that kind of led me into a different conversation with her about that part of her life. [00:16:19] Deneé Barracato: And then seeing how she was able to marry the two. Her love for basketball and her love for the Lord. And there was nothing to be ashamed about, but there was a balance that you can have with both and do it so very well. And to see her do it at such a high level really intrigued me and really brought me back to things that I was taught and instilled as a young little girl with my parents. I think it happened organically through just conversation as any coach and player should have that dialogue, not just transactional on the basketball court, but really developing that relationship off the court. And I think through that interaction, we just started talking about life and it just made it all the more special to me in terms of that relationship. [00:17:08] Tommy Thomas: No matter how hard and dedicated you are to something; failure is always an option.  So, what did you learn from team sports about failure that you brought into your career? [00:17:20] Deneé Barracato: Oh, wow. I learned to again, be patient and know that growth is critical in life. Some of the student athletes that I speak to now are just curious or, if I have a moment to spend with them, they learn that as a senior, I actually ended up waiting for four games because I was going through, now we talk about mental health and that being such a critical component to student athletes. [00:17:48] Deneé Barracato: And back then we didn't know what that was. We were thinking maybe that was depression or whatever the case may be. But my senior year, coming off of a very successful junior year, I ended up getting injured in my junior year and ended up having surgery that delayed my recovery leading into my senior year, which was for me supposed to be the pinnacle because that's when the WNBA was coming out and, to be quite honest with you, was I good enough to be in the WNBA? I don't know, it's still a college girl's dream to play on the next level. And some nuances happened within that year because of my surgery, and I didn't end up starting and that kind of impacted my psyche going into that season. And I just, for whatever reason, just didn't recover. [00:18:32] Deneé Barracato: And I couldn't get over the fact that I wasn't starting, and I wasn't going to be, in my mind, as impactful. And I couldn't just sit back and say, you know what, some of my other teammates were sitting behind me for three years when I was starting. And now it's my opportunity to sit behind them and cheer them on and encourage them and give them an opportunity to play. And so throughout that time just learning how to overcome adversity, and I mentioned before, just maturing through that process, being a great teammate, thinking of others before thinking of myself and understanding that you can still be successful. Perhaps not in the way that you envisioned, but you can still find a way back while still being supportive of teammates, while still being supportive of those around you, and improving yourself and getting back to what you believe you can actually accomplish. [00:19:28] Deneé Barracato: And so, for me, that maturity in that moment of time led me to then come back to the team, apologize and really find my way back to a team and a sport that had given me so much. And was I really going to give all that up because of my own selfish thoughts? And maybe there was some validity at that time in my life, but I think now I would have approached it very differently and taken the time to take a step back and be reflective and be a great teammate and really find ways to fill that void with support, with encouragement, with cheering, and all the things that we teach our young adults now to do. And so I use that story to share with some of our student athletes when they're in a slump or when their things aren't going their way, just to share with them that there is light at the end of the tunnel, but there's also a component of patience and of taking a step back and looking at the situation and seeing what part of that situation is in your control and how could make the best of a tough situation. ++++++++++++= [00:20:38] Tommy Thomas: So, what did you learn about trust and communication from team sports? [00:20:45] Deneé Barracato: Trust and communication in team sports is so critical. We talk about this kind of team environment, team impact, and nothing that happens with a group of people is successful unless you have great communication, unless you have a great relationship, unless there's authenticity, intentionality, and all that you put into a relationship. Just understanding the different dynamics of individuals that make up a team or a group is really important. Understanding that different people bring different attributes, bring different skills, bring different gifts that would help propel a team to success. And just knowing that it all starts with intentionality, communication, and embracing people's differences. [00:21:29] Deneé Barracato: And so those things are really critical to the team environment that I've again grown to understand over my period of time as a young adult, but even into the professional realm as an administrator is learning that people have so many different attributes. People have so many different leadership qualities, but it's embracing all those and then in that group setting, just encouraging people to talk about those different things through communication. And putting those things into action for success as a group of individuals may be different. So that way there's a common goal and then, that can hopefully blossom into something beautiful. And in our line of business, that is championships. Just embracing the group setting, knowing that people have different gifts and talents that they can bring to a group. And then, really emphasizing the communication and the embracing of those different skills for success. [00:22:28] Tommy Thomas: Things get tough in someone's career. You get hurt. You don't always win. What motivated you to keep pushing yourself even when things weren't as good as you might have wanted them to be? [00:22:40] Deneé Barracato: I never want to be a quitter, right? Though sometimes things didn't go your way, I was always taught to believe the Lord calls us to be our best selves. And he equips you with the things that you would need to overcome adversity. And I know I didn't always understand that. But I just have this innate thing in me where I always just want to work really hard. I always want to represent my family to the highest extent. I always saw my mother and father working really hard and they provided me with an example of work ethic and being good and great, despite their circumstances. And I always wanted to ensure that I was doing the same thing and that I was making them proud. I was really pushing myself to be the best version of myself, despite my circumstances. Now, did I always follow through on that? No, I think I'm human and I've grown through that. [00:23:37] Deneé Barracato: But I always wanted to ensure that I was making my family proud that I was really taking advantage of all the things that God gave me and provided me and blessed me with. And so, I never wanted to squander that, although there were many times as they mentioned, even my senior year, but I came back and I had this realization that no Deneé, you cannot quit. You have to move forward and overcome the adversity and really tune out the noise. And I would certainly say, my parents, all the things that they instilled in me as a young girl, and then just my personal endeavor to be my best self and the best version of myself was really important to me. [00:24:20] Tommy Thomas: So as a person of faith, how do you deal with competition in athletics? [00:24:26] Deneé Barracato: One, I don't think there's anything wrong with competition. You just can't take it to the next level, right? You have to be gracious. And I have to say I wasn't always gracious on the basketball court. I was a tenacious competitor and sometimes I would have to curtail my competitiveness so that way, people could see the light through me. And, as I mentioned before, I grew into that. And even now I play a mean game of monopoly. I am competitive with my kiddos and my kiddos are competitive with me. But it's all in good fun. I think just coming away with it, knowing that you can be competitive, you can have aspirations to win and there's nothing wrong with that. [00:25:11] Deneé Barracato: As the Lord calls us to be great and he expects that from us. And so just embracing that while also loving your neighbor, while also being gracious, while also having a good attitude and being a good sportsman and really saving some of the things that may not be appropriate in that moment. Allowing the Lord to watch that under the blood, Tommy, we just allow the Lord to take the wheel and go. But certainly, throughout my time in undergrad and just through my life just asking the Lord to guide me and direct me and give me grace when I'm not a reflection of Him, but also reminding myself that it's really important that when people see me, whether it's in a competitive environment or a non-competitive environment, that they see the Lord through me. [00:25:59] Sometimes I fall short of that, but I always ask the Lord for guidance and for favor. And he gives that to me often. And hopefully throughout my life and my career, people have seen that through me. And if they haven't, that means I have more work to do. +++++++++++ [00:26:14] Tommy Thomas: I interviewed Dr. Linda Livingstone, the President at Baylor, and she had played ball at Oklahoma State, and she said that the game of women's basketball has just changed so much since she was a student athlete. [00:26:32] Tommy Thomas: How have you seen it change at the Division I level? [00:26:36] Deneé Barracato: I would agree with her, and I have met her. She's phenomenal. We visited there a couple of years ago not once but twice and she was such a gracious host. I would say, yes, the game of women's basketball has grown to success. We saw that this past year with the women's final four and the viewership and broadcast ratings and all the personalities are certainly Caitlin Clark, Angel Reese and all those that continue to play and will be excited about women's basketball on the collegiate level again, as we're excited about the WNBA happening right now. And I think that the skill level has certainly enhanced since I was playing. The things that these women are doing are incredible, logo threes and the passes and the work ethic and the fitness and the dedication that they put into it is just at a different level. And I think that's attributed to just administrators and the industry putting more into and supporting women's sports and women's athletics. [00:27:31] Deneé Barracato: And showing people that know that they're great too. And they deserve to have a platform so people can see how wonderful and how great they are. Certainly, a lot of the banter that you see, I think, I believe is synonymous with just sports in general. But it's how you carry yourself and, how you correct, having those teachable moments on the court, I think we've all had those moments where you're just like, man, I could have probably handled that better. And I think sometimes you may see that on the basketball court. [00:28:08] Deneé Barracato: But I would say that the level of talent has enhanced because the focus and the dedication, and the resources have really been poured into the game of women's basketball in a very unique way. And so we've seen that be evident and what has happened over the last five years. And I've seen it more intimately because I serve on the Division I National Women's Basketball Committee, and we started back in San Antonio during kind of COVID days. And now to see it progress the way it has over the last four years. Now I'm going into my fifth and final year on the committee and just seeing the explosion on TV, the interest from so many different viewers. And we're talking about the demographics of viewers are just from young children to older men and women that are just so interested in what's happening with women's basketball. It has just been incredible to see. ++++++++++ [00:29:00] Tommy Thomas: Next week we'll continue this conversation with Deneé Barracato. She shares her journey from professional basketball to higher education administration. She reflects on the importance of team dynamics and the need for authenticity and leadership. Deneé also discusses how she balances her leadership role with family life, emphasizing the importance of flexibility and patience and managing multiple responsibilities. Her insights offer valuable lessons on resilience, teamwork, and leading through change, making this episode a must listen for anyone in or aspiring to leadership roles.   Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website NextGen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas The Perfect Search - What every board needs to know about hiring their next CEO Deneé Barracato Bio Barracato named to NCAA Women's Basketball Committee Women of Live 2023 – Deneé Barracato   Connect tthomas@jobfitmatters.com  Follow Tommy on LinkedIn Follow Deneé on LinkedIn     Listen to NextGen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas on: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

Anticipation abounds at the start of a new school year, and the Baylor Family has much to celebrate. In this Baylor Connections, President Linda A. Livingstone, Ph.D., takes listeners inside the Fall Semester at Baylor. From the launch of a new strategic plan to a focus on Baylor's global impact as a Christian university, President Livingstone highlights a number of themes key to the year ahead at Baylor.

[00:00:00] Vonna Laue: One of the indicators for nonprofits that anyone who hears me speak knows that I'm always going to harp on a little bit, and that is available cash. Not just cash, because you can look at the balance sheet and see, wow, we've got $700,000 in cash. If that's what the board looks at and starts making decisions based on, you could find yourself in trouble because the available cash that I'm talking about takes that cash number, but then it subtracts two things out of there. [00:00:33] Vonna Laue: It subtracts the things that we're going to pay this week. So maybe we've got payroll coming up this week and we've got a bunch of accounts we're going to pay. I'm going to take that out of there. And I'm also going to take out any temporarily restricted funds that have been given by donors for a specific purpose. If those amounts are held in that cash number, I'm going to back those out. If you back out those two things, that $700,000 might be $200,000. And that board and those leaders are going to make significantly different decisions based on $700,000 versus $200,000.  Right? That's a financial metric. ++++++++++++++++ [00:01:10] Tommy Thomas: You and I have a mutual friend, Alec Hill, former President of InterVarsity. And he wrote of some of the pain and suffering he experienced while being the President of Intervarsity. And he writes, if we pause and reflect long enough, pain is a great teacher. Our character can be transformed more through a day of suffering than a month of study. As I think about your book that's coming out here in a couple of weeks, I would imagine that played into the writing of the book. [00:01:39] Vonna Laue: You are absolutely correct. So, the book is Glad I Didn't Know, and then it's subtitled Lessons Learned Through Life's Challenges and Unexpected Blessings, so it absolutely does play into that. The premise of the book is that there are a lot of difficult things that we go through that if we'd known in advance, we would have done everything we could to avoid those, but if we had avoided those, we'd have missed out on what God had planned for us and the lessons that we learned as a result of it. [00:02:12] Vonna Laue: The flip side of that is also the unexpected blessings. And when I look at things like serving on the World Vision Board, if someone had told me in advance, you're going to be on the World Vision Board. I'd have thought, okay, I need this education and I need this experience and I need to network with this person, and I'd have totally messed it up. But I just faithfully follow one thing to the next. And so would totally agree with Alec there. And I'm glad I don't know a lot of the things that I'm going to go through. And each time we go through something, it makes it a little bit easier the next time to look back on the faithfulness of God and realize, okay, we're going to come out the other side of this and there will be blessings as a result of it, even though it's a challenge at the time. [00:03:01] Tommy Thomas: What lesson did you learn from writing this book? A real practical question. [00:03:07] Vonna Laue: Yeah. One of the things that just in the process that I learned initially, I had chapters for the whole book, and I was just going to write their life stories. And then in some discussions and some just careful consideration, I realized if I did that, it would be really easy for a reader to say, oh, that's nice for that person and dismiss it. And the applicability that it had to their lives. And so, within the book, there are 16 other contributors that all contributed a story of their life that they were glad they didn't know. And so, the encouragement there and just the lesson was if we're willing to be honest with ourselves and honest with those around us, we've all got those stories and in sharing them, there is a blessing to be had both by the giver and the receiver. [00:04:09] Vonna Laue: Tommy, I had a number of people that wrote chapters that when they submitted them said something like, I needed to do that. Or it was a blessing to me to go through this, and there were a few people that I had ideas of the stories that they would contribute because I knew specific things about their life. But all of them, I just asked them to do a story. And many of the ones that I thought the story they would do was not the story. They actually contributed. And so fun to see, just how God's orchestrated that. [00:04:45] Tommy Thomas: What's the most dangerous behavior trait that you've seen that can derail a leader's career? [00:04:54] Vonna Laue: I'm going to look at, especially those who have been leading for a long time. A few years ago, I was pondering a few of the leaders that had not finished well. And, you get, I think you use the word distinguished when you introduced me and I translated that to experienced or old, one of the two, some length of time and so as I think about that, it really hit home. Partially because of the people and the disappointment that I had in the situation, but partially because I realized I'm not in the first half of my career. And so, I want to make sure that I do what I can to finish well. And so back to your question. One of the things that really came out to me was the idea of having people speak truth into your life. The more experience we gain in leadership, the scarcer it becomes to have people who will candidly share the truth with us. With time, leaders tend to surround themselves with fewer people who are ready to speak honestly and openly with them. [00:05:51] Vonna Laue: And the longer we lead, the fewer people I find that leaders have around them that are willing to speak truth into them. We talk about being put on a pedestal. That can happen in a number of different ways. It doesn't mean we're famous. Doesn't mean we have all the glory that some of the people you would think of might have. It can happen to any leader, but we rise up far enough in our career or our organization that we just don't have as many close confidants around us that will challenge us. That will speak truth. And I think that when that happens is when people are more likely to not finish well. [00:06:38] Tommy Thomas: I'm sure. Ross Hoskins at One Hope, he says, surround yourself with people who know you better than yourself and will tell you the truth out of love.  This is how we grow. [00:06:49] Vonna Laue: Amen. He just perfectly summarized what I would agree with. Perfectly. [00:06:57] Tommy Thomas: So, if you were going to write another book and this book was going to be about the burdens of leadership that only the president or the CEO can bear, what would be some of your chapter headings? [00:07:10] Vonna Laue: Have to think about that one a little bit……Chapter headings? [00:07:18] Tommy Thomas: Or topics that you think have to be talked about. [00:07:22] Vonna Laue: Yep. I think the topics definitely are similar to what was just said, choosing people that are extremely accomplished to be around you. We talk about having smarter people than you. I'm a big fan of that. I would also say working in a team. We are not as good by ourselves as we are with a team around us. And so, when you're looking at that key leadership position, you're only as good as the team that is around you. I think also you've got to have that personal and spiritual aspect to it. So encouraging leaders, I often find, and as I speak on personal leadership, when I'm at my busiest, the two things that are easiest for me to give up are my workout and my devotion time. The two things I need most when I'm busiest are my workout and my devotion time [00:08:19] Vonna Laue: The two things I need most when I'm busiest are my workout and my devotion time. And so reminding leaders that you're only as good as you are healthy. That's really important and that's, in a number of different way,s that health spiritually that health physically and the health relationally, you know that you don't sacrifice those relationships that are closest to you because you don't get the time back. We often say I'll do that when this project is over. I'll do that when this season is over. And I think all of the people listening to this podcast probably realize there is no normal, right? We used to say when things get back to normal, I'll do this. And that hectic life that we live as Americans, I think is just normal. And so those are a few of the keys that I think are so crucial for leaders. [00:09:18] Tommy Thomas: I remember when I interviewed Rich Stearns and I'm not going to remember the person's name, but he was talking about his career at Parker Brothers, and he said that there was one of the people in the family that didn't know anything at all about toys, but he knew how to hire a team and that was what made the success of Parker Brothers was this man's ability to bring people onto the team that could lead. [00:09:41] Vonna Laue: I would fully agree with that. I mentioned that I usually am doing a lot of different things. So right now, I'm serving as the COO and CFO of an organization and director of internal audit for another one and doing some audit and advisory with a third and some projects, all of that. But the way that works is the teams that are established in each of those places. Within the team, the mission's organization where I serve, the director of global services role that I have, that's like the COO role, that has operations and finance and personnel and IT and security, that's a lot just in and of itself, but I have four phenomenal directors. That they need encouragement. [00:10:31] Vonna Laue: They need a champion, and they need a sounding board. And as long as I can provide those things, they will do their roles far better than I ever could. In fact, I often say when you hire, you better keep them happy and keep them around because you probably can't do their job. +++++++++++++++ [00:10:50] Tommy Thomas:  If you were creating a dashboard to get at a nonprofit organization's health, what would be some of your dials? [00:10:57] Vonna Laue: Oh, I love dashboards. You just spoke one of my love languages there. So, one of the things that I think is key to a dashboard is that I'm a CPA, so it has to have some financial indicators on it, right? [00:11:11] Tommy Thomas: Absolutely. [00:11:13] Vonna Laue: You have to have those. And the basic ones, you're going to have some things like where you are versus, actual. And you're gonna do some trend analysis in that a little bit, I say, this way in a church. Everybody knows it's December. What season of the year is the lowest attendance and the lowest giving season? Always summer, right? And how do we know that? It's because of trends. And so, trend information can be really helpful.  So, I think that a dashboard should include trends. One of the indicators for nonprofits that anyone who hears me speak knows that I'm always going to harp on a little bit, and that is available cash. [00:12:08] Vonna Laue: So not just cash, because you can look at the balance sheet and see, wow, we've got $700,000 cash. If that's what the board looks at and starts making decisions based on, you could find yourself in trouble because the available cash that I'm talking about takes that cash number, but then it subtracts two things out of there. It subtracts the things that we're going to pay this week. So maybe we've got payroll coming up this week and we've got a bunch of accounts we're going to pay. I'm going to take that out of there. And I'm also going to take out any temporarily restricted funds that have been given by donors for a specific purpose. [00:12:46] Vonna Laue: If those amounts are held in that cash number, I'm going to back those out. If you back out those two things, that $700,000 might be $200,000. And that board and those leaders are going to make significantly different decisions based on $700,000 versus $200,000. Right? That's a financial metric. But as far as dashboards as a whole, my real encouragement there is to look at what your key drivers are. So, look at the financial pieces that you need to monitor, but also look at your non-financial and make sure that they are included in that dashboard as well. Maybe it's your turnover percentage. Maybe it's your involvement in X program. How many meals are we feeding? How many beds have we provided depending on what your program is, but that dashboard report ought to tie to whatever your strategic plan is, so the strategic things that you're looking at. Those are the guideposts of that dashboard that you're going to be monitoring to make sure that your strategic plan is being fulfilled. [00:14:00] Tommy Thomas: On a little bit lighter note, but still probably following the same track. If you were a judge on a non-profit version of the Shark Tank and people were coming to you for early-stage investments, what questions would you need solid answers to before you would open your checkbook? [00:14:18] Vonna Laue: I'm always going to want to know what their budgeting process is. Again, you're asking an accountant. I want to understand that. I want to understand who they've vetted this with. What are the focus groups that you've talked to? Who are the mentors or coaches that have processed this with you? What are your strengths? And where you don't have strengths, who are the people that you have identified and already discussed with that are going to come around you to shore up those weaknesses, if you will. So those are a few of the things that I want to make sure that this is well thought out and it's not just the flavor of the week. [00:15:00] Tommy Thomas: Let's go to board service for a few minutes. So, you're now the chairman of the World Vision Board, or the chairperson, I guess I should say. Give us some highlights of what you've learned about the Chairman's role. I know you watched Joan for several years and watched her successes, and I'm sure lack of on some days. What have you learned there?  [00:15:22] Vonna Laue: I will tell you, Tommy, when they asked me if I would consider taking the chair role, the first thing I said was, did you ask this individual? And I named someone from the Board, and they said, yes. And he serves on a couple of large for-profit boards and doesn't have the time and capacity. And I said, okay, as long as you've shown the discernment that you asked him first, we're good. But then I actually went to that individual and I said, if I do this, will you coach me? Would you be willing to debrief with me after the meetings? [00:16:01] Vonna Laue: And honestly, we just finished up meetings on Tuesday this week. And he and I have a call scheduled for Monday. And he said I'd love to do that. He graciously agreed. And so that, to me, was important. Because I didn't know the role. I had served on the board, but that role is different. And so, the relationship between the Board Chair and the CEO is obviously the most critical. We have a pretty, no, we have a very sophisticated board. I'm odd by who God has assembled in that room. And so, when I first came into it, I would say I was just trying not to embarrass myself, but they are such a gracious group of people. "To run an effective Board Meeting, I review agendas and pre-reads in advance, addressing my questions beforehand so meeting time is focused on others' concerns." [00:16:51] Vonna Laue: And it's important to me that the meetings are well run. And that means I want to see the agendas in advance and speak into those. I want to see the pre reads in advance and have gone through all of those so that if I have questions, I can answer them. I'm not asking those questions during the meeting that's reserved for others, and that those may be questions that others would have. So, let's get those addressed in the pre reads or be prepared. So, I think that the preparation that goes into the time before the meetings is critical. ++++++++++++++= [00:17:26] Tommy Thomas: So, here's a couple of quotes about boards and board chairs. And one is the Chair and the CEO must learn to dance together. And neither can stray very far from each other's gaze or proceed independently. [00:17:42] Vonna Laue: Yeah, I would agree with that. Those are two key roles in the organization. And you have to, I'll use the same analogy I used before. You better be pulling in the same direction. The Board Chair has a responsibility to be the voice on behalf of the Board, and so I feel like that's an important responsibility that it's not Vonna's opinion that I take into there. I seek wise counsel from my board and want to make sure that when I'm having conversations with my CEO, that either the board is informed about those things or that, I'm able to speak on their behalf. But on the day-to-day interactions, if you will, or week to week, those two leaders better be aligned. [00:18:30] Tommy Thomas: Another one, Dr. Rebecca Basinger. Governing boards are charged with safeguarding an institution's ability to fulfill its mission with economic vitality. To this I add, responsibility for tending to the soul of the institution. [00:18:50] Vonna Laue: In an institution like World Vision, the soul of that organization to me is very critical. And it's interesting. I chair the World Vision U. S. Board. I have the privilege of also sitting on the World Vision International Board because we are a federated model and there are World Vision offices around the world  and Christ at the center is one of them. It's our foremost principle by which we operate. And, if that's not lived out in the board, the tone at the top is critical for everything. And so, I would agree that the soul of the organization starts with tone at the top. [00:19:32] Tommy Thomas: So, it's been my experience that the good news about having successful executives on the board is they're used to getting things done. The flip side is that they might have a hard time taking off their CEO hat and putting on their board member hat at a board meeting. Have you experienced that? [00:19:53] Vonna Laue:  To the credit of the current board that I have at World Vision US, I would say I don't struggle with that there. There is a spirit of collaboration by God's grace that exists within there. And so, people are willing to share their experiences and their opinions, but they're not sold on them. They're very open. Have I experienced it in other boards? Absolutely. And one of the challenges that I see in the nonprofit sector, Tommy, is that there are experienced board members that come in with for profit expertise. [00:20:32] Vonna Laue: Which, 90 percent of the time, is fantastic. 10 percent of the time can be challenging because there are unique things. I say if you don't believe there are uniquenesses, go ask the local Ford dealership how many contributions they've received this month. You know what I mean? They don't get any of those, right. There are some unique things. There are some unique laws and regulations that either do apply specifically or specifically don't apply. And so in some board settings, I've seen where for profit leaders have a hard time taking off that hat and being able to understand the nuances that are involved in a nonprofit organization, but really, it comes down to the spirit of humility and service. [00:21:21] Vonna Laue: And one of the things that when you contacted me first, I believe that you couched it this way and said, would you be willing to be considered for board service at World Vision? And I tell people that I responded to you, I'm willing to be considered, let me pray about it. And that I said, that's not trying to buy time or push you off. I legitimately meant that because I think that you have to be passionate about a ministry or a nonprofit board that you're going to serve on. And if you don't have that passion for that particular organization, then you find another one that you can be, because I think that passion is really important in the boardroom. [00:22:07] Tommy Thomas: You and I are old enough to remember the Enron crisis and of course much has been written about it. One writer said that certainly part of the problem was that the board didn't dig deep enough into the financial situation at Enron. How do you ensure that your board members are asking the right questions? Of course, you've been a CPA, that might be an easier thing than another board chair, but I think that is critical. [00:22:35] Vonna Laue: It is, and there are so many things that we have to balance in board member selection. We want to balance Equity and Diversity. We want to balance, within that age. I just encouraged us earlier to consider younger board members and what they can contribute. One of the considerations is what is the expertise that they bring to the board and what skill sets do we need on the board? And the reason for that is to ask those right questions. If I've got an audit committee and I don't have anyone that understands audit and finance, that's problematic. And there may be some that just said, of course I can tell you I have presented to a number of audit and finance committees in my career. [00:23:27] Vonna Laue: That they didn't have an auditor finance expert in that entire committee. In this day and age, we're looking at who has digital experience, who has cybersecurity, or IT experience, and it changes over time. The needs of the board today are different from the needs of the board 10 or 20 years ago. So that's a challenge to us individually as board members to continue growing and learning. But it's also a challenge to us to make sure that we're recruiting the right board members. So, to your point, you've got people in there that can ask the questions of, is this a good investment? Is there a legal liability associated with this? [00:24:10] Vonna Laue: Have we got the right protections in place? What's the end result of this potentially going to be? We don't make a short-sighted decision that we're looking at the long-term impact. What are the reputational impacts of these? We have two roles on the World Vision U. S. board that are assigned at every board meeting. And one of those is the keeper of the core documents. So that person is responsible throughout the discussions to be considering how that discussion or that particular agenda item is tied to our core documents, if there's any implications, and one of them is the responsible skeptic, and that is a formal role that person is assigned in those board meetings, and as we're having discussion, we want somebody to be identified that will challenge and say, wait a minute, back up. [00:25:01] Vonna Laue: Let's not get into group think here. What about, and that they know that they're not just putting their opinion in their hat that they've got this particular role. So, I think those two roles have been really helpful in our setting for our board. [00:25:15] Tommy Thomas: I spoke to Dr. Linda Livingstone at Baylor.  I was asking her about this. I didn't use the word responsible skeptic. I guess I had another phrase, but she said, they usually show up. You don't have to appoint them. [00:25:28] Vonna Laue: I heard that. I heard it when she said that. And I laughed and I thought, that's a healthy board actually, for the most part, because Proverbs talks about iron sharpens iron, and that is really helpful if people are willing to speak up. Oftentimes, we're Christian nice and we don't want to challenge each other and we need to be able to speak up and make sure that all of the facts, all of the considerations are on the table. [00:25:58] Tommy Thomas: I sense that probably the role or the function of risk management has increased for a board over the last decade or two. Am I making a good observation or not? [00:26:13] Vonna Laue: The only thing I would say is that might be the understatement of the year, potentially. Absolutely. The risks that we face and maybe I'm going to oversimplify this, but I think, they used to be known, right? You've got trip hazards. That's a physical risk. You've got the risk of fraud. You put controls in place. Those were known risks. What we face now, to me, are a lot of the unknown risks. What's happening in the cyber world? What's happening with opinions? Reputational risk has increased so significantly, and because it's so easy, and I'll be careful to say this is Vonna's opinion, so please don't ascribe this to any organization that I represent, but, because it's so easy on social media and other media, avenues to state an opinion, and it becomes a perceived fact. [00:27:12] Vonna Laue: Thank you. And for an organization to then have to battle something, that's a reputational risk that we have to consider. And yet we can't control, which is a difficult place to be. [00:27:26] Tommy Thomas: Do y'all have a time in each board meeting where you talk about external threats or is that relegated to your CEO to bring those to the board?  How does that work? [00:27:38] Vonna Laue: Practically? Many of the organizations that I'm associated with have an enterprise risk management or a risk assessment process, and there are people within the organization that are specifically identified that are responsible for that. Not that they're responsible for the risks, but they're responsible to make sure that it's updated. The way that I tend to do it with some organizations is, brainstorm across the organization, pulling together leaders from the board. Leaders from different ministries or departments, people in different functional departments, IT, HR, finance, and just let them brainstorm. What are all the risks? [00:28:23] Vonna Laue: I've done this a few times and it's pretty common that you end up with 600-700 risks that are identified and then categorizing those into whatever categories are helpful for you. But things like regulatory, legal, physical, financial, reputational, operational risks. And then once you do that, you can identify what's the likelihood this would happen. And if it did happen, what would the impact be? So low, moderate and high. And that helps you distinguish, like, how significant are these risks? And when you've got them categorized like that, it stands out, like who the owner of that is, right? Those legal risks are either an in-house or an outsourced general counsel, your physical risks might be the facilities people, whoever, but having an owner for those. High and moderate risks should be mitigated through measures such as insurance, internal controls, or policies. High risks, in particular, should be continuously monitored by leaders and the board, to ensure they are well understood and managed effectively. [00:29:16] Vonna Laue: The high and moderate risks ought to have some mitigating measures in place, whether it's insurance or internal controls or policies. And to me, the high risks should always be in front of the leaders and the board. Usually that's an annual process that they would be taking a look at that to make sure that we understand these risks. We're aware of them because we're responsible for them and we also are aware of the mitigating controls that management has put in place and those seem reasonable. So, I don't necessarily feel like at every meeting, sometimes there are committees. World Vision International, I serve on the audit and risk committee. [00:29:59] Vonna Laue: We have it as a specific component of that committee. So every one of our committee meetings, there is a risk component to that we are looking at. But definitely on an annual basis, that ought to be a discussion that boards are having regardless of the size of the organization. +++++++++++++++++ [00:30:15] Tommy Thomas: This could probably be a whole podcast, but maybe we'll probably limit it. But I would be remiss if I didn't ask an artificial intelligence question. I guess that could fall under risk. It could fall under opportunity. Your thoughts as you sit at 50,000 feet looking down on the nonprofit sector, what's going to happen in the coming years that we need to be aware of? [00:30:41] Vonna Laue: I think it's all of the above. It's opportunity. It's risk. I mentioned earlier that boards are encountering different things now than they did 10 years ago, and they have to be learning individually. And as a board, this is a perfect example of that. We, as board members, have to be learning. We have to adjust to and understand this new technology. Actually, our board had the privilege of sitting in an hour-long session this past week with an AI expert. I think we all walked out of there a little terrified and a little concerned about what this looks like. And that's a great place to be, right? [00:31:25] Vonna Laue: Because it means we know that we've got to lean in. I remember a number of years ago, I think it was about 2006, Walt Wilson, who started Global Media Outreach, he had been one of the initial executives at Apple, and I remember sitting with Walt at that time, and he said, the day will come where you just use apps for everything. And I was like, what's an app? And he's like oh, you'll just push a button. And then it'll bring up all the information for that company. And you'll do everything on this app. And I don't know Walt's age exactly, but I would say he was probably in his early seventies at that time. And I was like, that's crazy. [00:32:10] Vonna Laue: And then I realized, now, he was absolutely correct. And he had the foresight to see that. And I tend to believe that's where we will be with AI. This is here. We better figure out how to harness it. We better figure out how to use it well.  Organizations are just starting to formulate AI policies, what they will allow, what they won't allow. I fully believe that we'll look back on those initial policies five years from now and laugh at ourselves. But we've got to start somewhere and the ability that it will give us and the doors that it opens. I don't think we should be scared of it. But I think that we have a responsibility to do it. Worry less about being supplanted by a chatbot and more about being outpaced by someone adept at using AI to drive corporate success. [00:32:51] Tommy Thomas: I read an article recently and the guy was talking and he said people shouldn't be worried about being replaced by a chat box or something.  They should be more worried about being replaced by somebody who knows how to use artificial intelligence to the advantage of the corporation. [00:33:09] Vonna Laue: Oh, I think that's a great line because the functions that it will be able to take the place of you probably don't need to worry about those, but yeah, the technology that goes along with it, make sure that you're one that knows that. And I'm getting articles from fellow board members on a pretty consistent basis. Some of our staff liaisons in the organizations I serve, there is a lot of information that's out there and I would just encourage any of the board members don't be overwhelmed by it. We all have other responsibilities, right? [00:33:46] Vonna Laue: None of us are going to go get a PhD in AI. But as we start to gain an awareness, I think we'll understand better what our responsibility might be as board members. [00:33:59] Tommy Thomas: Let's try to bring this thing to a close. I've taken probably more of your time than you had allocated for me today and I'm grateful.  If you could get a do over in life, what would that be? [00:34:12] Vonna Laue: I mentioned earlier, there were probably a couple of meetings, partner meetings that I wish had gone differently. Quite honestly, Tommy, that's the only do over I might take, but I am very thankful to have lived my life without regrets. And that, to your point about failures and everything else, there's value to be had in the experiences that we have encountered, and to lose out on those. I'd probably just mess something else up. So, I think maybe I'll keep the ones that I have. [00:34:50] Tommy Thomas: Do you have an “I wish I had started this earlier moment in your life?” [00:34:57] Vonna Laue: Oh, I would say the one that I've done often on, that I wish that I was more consistent about, is just memorizing scripture. So I know a lot of people that are good at that. I have gone back to that, incorporating that on a daily basis. And if that's where the foundation of my decision making is coming from, I wish that I had a little bit more of that ingrained. [00:35:25] Tommy Thomas: Final question. If you could give a younger version of yourself a piece of advice, what would it be? [00:35:32] Vonna Laue: I learned this a little bit later. It wasn't too late in life, but one of the most important leadership principles that I feel like I've learned over the years, I'd love to just close with for your group, for your audience. And I think it applies that I would have wanted to know this. As soon as I could, and that is when we have a person in a position that they're not succeeding in, we often in the Christian ministry world feel like we're Christians, we can't let somebody go and I believe that when God calls us to something, he doesn't call us to be miserable or ill equipped for it. [00:36:18] Vonna Laue: And so, when we keep somebody in a position that they are not competent or capable of, we're doing a disservice to them. To two people in two organizations, at least we're doing a disservice to that person because we're keeping them where they can't thrive. And it's very hard to make a change. When I stepped away from the managing partner role, that was incredibly difficult. Most of us don't like change. And so even if we're not happy, and fulfilled in a position, it's still comfortable. So, we're doing a disservice to them. We're doing a disservice to our organization because we don't have the right person in the job. We're doing a disservice to whoever ought to be in that position because we haven't opened it up for them to be there. [00:37:03] Vonna Laue: And we're doing a disservice to whatever organization this person is supposed to work for because we haven't released them to go do that. And so I guess I'd come full circle with something I said earlier, and that is people are the key to what we do, throughout life, in personal matters and professional matters. And so, stewarding the people in our life well is something that I think we all need to do. And it would have been great if I'd have learned that earlier on as well.   Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website NextGen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas The Perfect Search - What every board needs to know about hiring their next CEO Glad I Didn't Know: Lessons Learned Through Life's Challenges and Unexpected Blessings   Connect tthomas@jobfitmatters.com Follow Tommy on LinkedIn Follow Vonna on LinkedIn   Listen to NextGen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas on: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

In this episode of the Just Schools Podcast, Jill Anderson and Dr. Jon Eckert engage in conversation about the profound impact of educators and the importance of recognizing their contributions. Jon tells us inspiring anecdotes of teachers who have made a lasting difference in students' lives, reflecting on the transformative power of kindness and support in education. Jon recounts a personal experience from his own schooling, to emphasize the enduring influence of a compassionate teacher. They explore the crucial role of validation and collaboration between educators and parents in nurturing children's well-being and development. While acknowledging the challenges educators face, such as burnout and high expectations, they also highlight the resilience and hope inherent in the teaching profession. The dialogue focuses on the significance of prioritizing joy, growth, and meaningful connections in education, beyond mere academic success. Ultimately, the conversation stands as a heartfelt tribute to educators, celebrating their tireless dedication and profound impact on shaping young lives. To learn more, order Jon's book, Just Teaching: Feedback, Engagement, and Well-Being for Each Student.   The Just Schools Podcast is brought to you by the Baylor Center for School Leadership. Each week, we'll talk to catalytic educators who are doing amazing work.   Be encouraged. Connect with us: Baylor MA in School Leadership Baylor Doctorate in Education Jon Eckert: @eckertjon Center for School Leadership at Baylor University: @baylorcsl Mentioned: The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren't Growing Up by Abigail Shrier    Transcription: Jill: Hi, my name is Jill Anderson and I'm the director of the Center for School Leadership. Jon is with me here, and we're going to flip the script today, and I will be asking the questions. Jon has heard and experienced so many incredible stories from educators across the world. And so to celebrate the Teacher Appreciation Week, we wanted to share some of those stories to encourage and to inspire the good work that each of the educators out there are doing to help each student flourish. So we'll go ahead and get started with the first question. Can you share a story or two of an inspiring teacher? Jon: Yeah. So as we always talk about, we have the best job in education because this is what we do. We just go all over the world and find good things that are happening and try to highlight those, elevate those, and spread those ideas. And they're always built around human beings. And so these stories of cool things happening, I have a ton of those and we'll share them throughout the episode today. But I have to go all the way back to my first grade because that's now I guess about 43 years ago, that would be, that I was in first grade, and this is still as memorable as something that happened yesterday to me. And that's where the power of an educator comes in into the life of a student, where that educator comes alongside and helps that kid become more of who they're created to be. So this happened. The first part of it, it's not such a great teaching example, the second part is good, so stick with me. So I'm in art class. I love art. It's one of my favorite parts of the day. We're getting ready for Halloween, so we're making witches and so we're having to cut out the circle part of the head. And Mrs. Fleshy, the art teacher who've been doing it for quite a while and was a little grumpy, but she's been managing elementary kids in art for probably 30 years, so that could wear anybody down. But she's going around and passing out the scissors. And I don't know if people that are listening, if you're old enough to remember this, but left-handed scissors were always green-handled scissors. And so I knew I was left-handed, but I'd also been diagnosed with dyslexia. And so I had a really hard time knowing which hand was which. I had a hard time reversing words, you could put was and saw on top of each other. And I knew they were different, I couldn't tell you how. Six and nine, B and D they felt like they were invented by Satan just to confuse me. And so I get the scissors and she's watching me because I think she didn't believe I was left-handed. And I put them on my right hand. She's like, she snatched them from me. She's like, "Oh, you're not left-handed." And she gave me the silver-handled scissors. Jill: So sad. Jon: And I was like, "Ah, but I..." And she's moved on to the next person. And so then we're trying to cut out these circles. And if you remember the old scissors at least, if you had them on the wrong hand they did not cut. And so I'm sitting there so frustrated because I cannot get the scissors to cut the paper with my right hand, which I know I'm supposed to have on my right hand and I can't cut with my right. So I try on my left and then they really don't work. And so I start to cry because I'm that frustrated. And Mrs. Fleshy from the front of the room, she says to me, and I can still hear her, I can still smell her too actually, "Jon, if you're going to be disruptive, you need to just get out of class." I'm like, oh. So I go out of the class, I sit in the hallway and just tears are pouring down. And fifth graders are walking by me and sixth graders, and I'm just completely mortified but I can't stop. My first grade teacher, Ms. Thayer comes walking by and she's also been teaching for 30 years. I always say the best teachers in a building and the worst teachers in the building are typically the most veteran teachers, because they're either amazing and they have all that expertise or they're kind of just waiting for retirement. So you have that. So Ms. Thayer comes by and she sees me and she grabs me by my hand. And she takes me back to the room and we sit knee-to-knee in those little first grade chairs. And she asked me to tell her what happened. And so through those halting sobby breaths, I get out what happened? And she just looks at me and she says, "Mrs. Frischi shouldn't have done that to you." And then she gives me this big hug. And from then on I would run through a wall for that woman. And 43 years later, I still get chills thinking about the way she saw me, knew me and loved me in that moment just by breaking adult code saying, "Hey, that was wrong. And I know you weren't trying to be disruptive." And she gave me that hug and I was like, "Hey, I am forever loyal to you, Mrs. Thayer." So many other stories we see all around the world but I just thought I'd start with that one, because I don't think I've ever told that story very publicly. And so I was like, hey, Ms. Thayer needs to get honored wherever she's at now. I'm sure she's up in heaven at this point listening to this podcast. Jill: Yeah, I definitely had not heard that story, but that's such an amazing story to share it because of the validation, it's all it took. It was just to sit at your level and understand what you were going through and that was it. So it's not very hard to do, but it takes some time and thought to say, "Okay, I need to take a minute and see what this kid's going through." Jon: Exactly. Jill: So how can we celebrate teachers? Jon: So I think at the center, you're the director. It's great by the way having somebody else ask the questions because that's usually my role. So thank you for doing that. I think what we do is we just keep elevating the good work that's happening all over the place. There are amazing things happening that we see in the US. I've been to Australia, to England, I go to New Zealand this summer, and we're seeing amazing things happening with educators in public schools and private schools. And so just honoring the work of the profession and taking the time to listen and observe. I'll give you two quick examples where there's this reinforcing cycle of this relational component. That's where the hope always is, is in relationship. Teaching's one of the most human things we do. And so, I was in South Carolina last year. I was in a rural school and was in an early childhood classroom for at-risk kids and walked into this room and in the corner there's this tiny little wheelchair, which there's not much more depressing than a tiny wheelchair. And then a little guy who's less than 30 pounds laying on this mat, and he was just recovering from a seizure. And so he was really exhausted. He's trying to make eye contact with this teacher and he's making this noise. He's not verbal and he's making this noise, and you can tell he just wants the teacher's attention. And she's working with a small group of kids in the other corner. And she notices and she goes over and she just scoops him up, gives him a big hug, his head is on her shoulder and he's looking at me and he is so happy. And so the teacher just kind of offhandedly looks at me and she said, "Hey, sometimes we just need some snuggles." And that kid in that moment was seen, known and loved in that really simple way. And so I've given you a first grade example. I've given you an early childhood example. I want to jump ahead to validating what a high school teacher did. So she's got seniors, I'm not sure, I think she was either an English or a history teacher. And she was sharing this story at one of our professional learning sessions that we were doing last year. And she was recounting the fact that the office had called down to her room to let her know that her father had fallen and had a brain bleed they thought. And she needed to get to him as soon as possible. And so her students that were with her, they heard this because it came through. And before they would let her go, they all got around her and put hands on her and prayed for her before they would let her leave to go be with her father. Jill: That's so amazing. Jon: So that loving relationship, that part that we do it's not just a one way street. That comes back to us. It's not why we love kids so that they will love us back and it's not our job to be their friends, but when we see them, know them and love them, that gets reciprocated for us in a way that's just truly life-giving. So I think anytime we can find those life-giving things and lean into those and then elevate those to let people know all the amazing things that are happening in schools. We hear all the negative stuff because media has a negativity bias to it. But there are amazing things happening in classrooms all over the place. And so how do we see those relationships and the way kids are becoming more of who they're created to be because of the work that's going on in the classroom? Jill: Yeah, absolutely. Those are great stories to be able to share. So on that note, how do we bring more joy to the profession? Jon: So I think part of it is celebrating the right things. So when we think about joy or wellbeing or flourishing, sometimes people think of that as meaning freedom from struggle. And that's not what it is. To me, joy isn't circumstantial. Joy is in this deep abiding hope that there is more. And that joy isn't freedom from struggle but it's the freedom to struggle well. So how do we help educators see what they're doing in the lives of students that allows them to have the energy and fuel to do more? What does that look like for them? And then how do we celebrate that, because I think we've oversold wellbeing over the last few years that like, "Okay, that's really hard for you. You don't have to do that right now." And when we do that, that robs kids of the joy that comes from doing something that they didn't think they could do. And then they do it and they do it well, and there's great joy in that. So if we rob kids the opportunity to struggle, we also rob them of the opportunity to have joy. And so if we think about happiness as being something that we want kids to always feel happy, they're not going to grow very much. And we know all the way back to Vygotsky's own approximate development, the distance between what you can do on your own and what you can do with assistants where you push and stretch is where learning is. So learning is productive struggle. So how do we build that in without making it be a burnout thing? And we don't avoid burnout by getting Jeans day on Friday. That's nice. But where we really find meaning and joy is in celebrating the growth that we see. So if you want an educator to stay in education, help them see what's happening in my view as a Christian that the Lord is doing through them in the lives of a student. That's what gets you up in the morning, how do we keep seeing that and keep building on that. Jill: Absolutely. So you've talked a lot about using the phrase just a teacher. Can you talk a little bit about that, how we avoid using it as just a teacher and how we can switch that around to just teaching? Jon: Yeah. So the book Just Teaching, Feedback, Inclusion and Well-being for Each Student, plays on that phrase that, oh, I'm just a teacher, or, oh, they're just a teacher. And as educators we 100% have to stop referring to ourselves as just a teacher. Education is the profession that makes all others possible. There is great power in that role, and everyone has experienced this. If they've had a good teacher or their child has had a good teacher, the difference that makes. There is huge power in that. And we steal ourselves, we rob ourselves of that when we refer to ourselves as just a teacher. And so when we talk about just teachers, we're talking about teachers that teach for justice and flourishing by making sure each kid is seen, known and loved. And you do that by making sure they're well, that they're engaged and they get feedback. That we give them the opportunity to stretch. It's not to work ourselves into oblivion. It's not just continuing to add more and more to our plates. I think in some places burnout has become a badge of honor and educators think everything requires the extra mile. That's not it. How do we put the work on students that allows them to do the work that will allow them to flourish? And we take the work that's ours, but our job is to coach them through that, not do it for them. Jill: Exactly. Yeah, and even as a parent, I'm not a teacher, I haven't been a teacher, but as a parent I can see that in my own kids. And it's so hard to watch them go through that struggle, but once they get to the other side you're like, okay, this is a good thing that I did to help them grow in that area. Jon: Yeah. Well, we all know nobody wants to be stretched. It's no fun to be, but we all appreciate the benefit of the stretching on the back end. Jill: Yeah, absolutely. So speaking of being a parent, how as a parent can we support teachers in the best way? Jon: Well, I think we need to view our role as teachers, I'll start there, as being a partner of the parent and helping that kid flourish because regardless, in my view there are parents that do bad things for kids. But no parent wants to do things that harm their kid. They care about that kid more than anything else on earth. And sometimes as a teacher you sometimes scratch your head, well, I don't know why we're doing that. And parent-teacher conferences are always this eye-opening moment of, I can't believe that kid gets to school every day because of some of the stuff that goes on. But 95% of parents want what's best for kids. And I would say teachers are there too, nobody really goes into teaching because they want to harm kids. That's not a thing. So if we can keep our child the focus of the interaction and not get on the defensive as teachers or parents about hey... Because it's sometimes hard, especially if parents didn't have great experiences in schools, it's hard for them to come back into school and hear feedback that feels critical because it feels like they're being judged as a parent. And nobody wants to be judged or evaluated, we all want to get better. So how do we make getting better for the kid be our joint mission as parents and educators? And I think I'll go back to the joy piece, if we want our kids to experience joy and be the kind of human beings we want them to be, then we have to give them opportunity to struggle well. How can they stretch? And so that's where parents and educators can be great partners in that, what's the extracurricular activity that you need to really shine? You're not great in math, great, work harder at math. You can't just not do that. You're going go- Jill: Not do it, yeah. Jon: But then, oh, you really love art. Well, lean into art. What can you do there? You don't do art instead of math. You want to be a well-rounded human being that does it. The other thing I would encourage parents to do and this'll come into, I think you'll probably ask me for a book recommendation at some point, but as you think about who your kid's becoming, don't try to parent and engineer all of the pain out of their lives. You can't do it. Jill: That's good. Jon: You can't do it. And so how do you put those guardrails on where they know you're safe, they know that they are loved and nothing they do will change that love. However, some things they do may change how much they please you. So it's not like everything you do is fine. We just love you. You're all great. No, you can make some bad decisions that I am not going to be pleased about and I'm going to tell you. And here is wisdom from an adult who's been through all these things too, and here are some thoughts. And so the one place when I said that I was like, we really have to be smart with smartphones and social media. That is an introduced thing that didn't affect us as parents, and I'm so grateful I didn't have it. That world that's introduced there, the more as parents we can partner with schools to figure out the best ways to use technology. And how to create some freedom from it because it is oppressive. And no matter how much we think we're training them how to use it, adults aren't good at using their smartphones. Jill: I definitely am not either. I have to use the focus feature to be able to avoid it when I'm trying to do work. Jon: Right. If you've caught yourself, and I know I've done it when you and I have been talking, if you catch yourself talking to someone who's an embodied human being right in front of you and you get a buzz on your phone and you're paying attention to that, what are we doing? We're saying that's more important than this human being. So if adults are doing that, we really need to think through what that's like for people with underdeveloped frontal cortexes that allow them to discipline themselves with it. And so I think we really need to be thoughtful about that as parents, how can we do that in a way that allow our kids to really enjoy being with each other and figure out how to navigate life with other people? Jill: Yeah, absolutely. And I was going to ask you about book recommendations. I feel like you're leading into Anxious Generation. Is that the one that you were going to talk about? Jon: Well, we've been talking about... I just read that book last week by Jonathan Haidt, and I've been citing his article in the Atlantic from last summer about schools should ban smartphones, like hard stop ban smartphones. He also has the recommendation that anybody under the age that's not in high school should not have a smartphone, flip phones. Other ways to communicate fine, but no smartphones till high school and no social media until you're 16. And it's really hard to disagree with that. From what I've seen, I feel like kids are so much freer when they have that. And he gives an example in his book about his six-year-old daughter who's on her iPad, and she can't figure out what's going on that there are engineers in a multi-billion dollar industry whose job is to keep her paying attention to the iPad no matter what, because the kid is the product. That's what they're selling to advertisers, that's what they're selling. And she says to her dad, "Dad, can you take this away from me? I can't get my eyes off of it." Jill: Wow, that's really powerful. Jon: Yeah, and so I think that's really where we're. So The Anxious Generation, he has a lot of reasons why we're anxious. It's not just smartphone's bad, it's smartphones disrupt and stunt development for kids because we're not having the human interactions, everything's mediated through social media which is not real. So instead of looking, when I grew up in the '70s and '80s, especially for girls, you walk by the checkout at the grocery store and you see these models that are airbrushed and they look perfect and all this. Now, girls go on and they see that and these are their competition at school, and it's not real but it feels real. And so they curate their lives to look like something they're not, which just breeds all kinds of anxiety because it's not an embodied interaction. They're saying, "Oh yeah, I know that person. That person's like this. They're not like they're real or what it looks like on Instagram." So it's devastating. And then for boys, it's less the social media, it's more the gaming and the pornography that kids are finding at ages 10 and 11 where it's just wide open for them. Jill: So young, yeah. Jon: And again, there are features that are meant to try to limit it but if you can put in a fake birthday, you can get to just about anything. And so there's a lot of responsibility in technology, but I don't see them making a change because the incentives aren't there for them to change. I think as parents, we have to be the parents and say, "Hey, collectively, we're not going to do this." Because if you're the only parent doing it, that's really hard. And in the book, he suggests that get 10 families together that are going to commit to this, that we're not going to jump on this boat of social media, early smartphones all the time. And I think as schools, we have to make the hard decision to say, "Hey, for eight hours a day we're giving you a break from these" and not just don't have them out, because that becomes really hard to enforce in schools. It's these get turned into a pouch that's locked for the day, or these go into a smartphone locker for the day and then you get them at the end of the day. And parents, I would just encourage you to support your schools if they do that. A lot of parents are fighting it because you want immediate access to your kids. You have it, call the office. There are adults charged with taking care of your kid. Trust them to do that. If you trust them for eight hours a day, you can trust them to get an important message to your kid. Jill: Right. I've seen the attitude change just with my own kids. I have an 11-year-old, and so she recently got in trouble and got her phone taken away for a week. And she was an amazing kid. She's creative, she was drawing, she was involved in conversations, engaging, and then she got her phone back and we're like, Where did Bella go? Look, we haven't seen her." So it totally changes who they are. So yeah, I've seen it myself. So what advice would you give educators out there? Jon: So you've already picked up on some of it, so I'll just try to sum it up into a sound bite. Lean into joy, but don't think of joy as being lacking struggle. Where are you seeing growth in yourself as an educator? Where are you seeing growth in your classroom? Lean into that, celebrate that, that's where joy is. And so even when you talk about smartphones, it's not banning something. It's inviting kids into deeper engagement, into that human... When kids get to a camp and they don't have phones for a week and they get to try new things and get to be with other people like, oh, this is great. It's like the veil has come off, the haze that they're in is gone. It's like, oh, they look around there's this amazing world and these amazing people. And so I think we need the same thing for our classrooms. We need to lean into really why we got into teaching in the first place, and that's to help other people grow and become more of who they're created to be. Jill: Yeah, absolutely. So on the flip side, what would be the worst advice that you've heard? Jon: This is hard to say. I got an article out called The Wellbeing Myth, and I think we have oversold wellbeing. And I think it's bad advice to say that kids can't learn if you don't make sure everything's okay. I think we need to focus less on some of those, even the SEL stuff, social emotional learning pieces have been oversold. It's like do hard things together, that works. There was another line, this again goes back to Haidt's book, it maybe Haidt's book or it may be Bad Therapy. I've got two books now coming together in my head. But that parents, adults, or whatever, can help kids learn how to make friends. The way you learn how to make friends is you try to make friends. And it's great to have somebody that you can talk to, "Hey, I tried this and this didn't work very well and whatever." But there's not a recipe for making friends. Okay, be kind, do unto others as you want them doing to you. There's some basic principles. But you know how kids learn those? By trying to do it. So I think teachers and parents, I think sometimes we need to step back a little bit and let kids play more and try stuff more. The average kid in elementary school in the US right now gets 27 minutes a day of recess. That is tragic. That was the height of my day. I would go home with my basketball and kickball stats every day for my three recesses. I look back and I was like, recess was the greatest thing ever. And I might've learned more at recess than I did in the classroom about how to interact with human beings. So like, hey, step back. Give them some space. That's wellbeing. So worry more about the virtual world and worry less about the real world. Let the kids... Haidt has this great line, let them get bruises, not scars. Jill: I love that. That's really great. So what would you say is one of the biggest challenges that you see for educators in the year ahead? Jon: We have a really hard job as educators because so much is expected of educators. Every policy decision, every government action is like, we'll do this through schools because there are schools in every community. So more and more it gets layered on top of educators all the time. And it makes sense from a policy perspective. It's like you have a beach head into every neighborhood, but educators can't do everything. And when we try, we don't do any of it very well and we end up burned out. And so we are seeing amazing educators leave the profession and other people not wanting to go into the profession because teachers aren't making education look like a very appealing job, even though it's the greatest job ever. It doesn't look like that to students. And so that's a challenge and it's a vicious cycle that's continuing. So much is asked, I burn out, it doesn't look like an appealing profession and that's a challenge. Jill: Absolutely. So I want to end on a positive note, what's the thing that makes you the most optimistic as you look ahead? Jon: So our whole deal at the center is to focus on adaptive challenges and improvement that we can make. And so these are short cycle data collections, what can you do in 90 days that makes a difference for kids? And we're seeing teams of educators in schools literally all over the world, we're in 45 plus countries and all 50 states. And we're seeing people make improvement. Now, I don't like talking about solutions because I think solutions are often too pat and too oversimplified where improvement is, well, if you've got a dumpster fire, put the fire out first. You're not building the Taj Mahal while the fire is burning. So it's how do we make those gains and then that builds momentum, especially when you see teachers and students doing together. So I'll end with this really encouraging note that I saw last week. Well, I'll give you a specific example of something that just was super inspiring to me and then a system example. Is that okay? Jill: Okay. Yeah, that sounds great. Jon: All right. So the system example was in South Carolina, we've been working with these schools that are doing collective leadership all over the state for eight years. I'm the program evaluator and researcher so I've been studying this high school, Blythewood High School. And this year when they had their showcase of the progress they've made each year, they brought the students to do it. So I was in a session where juniors and seniors in high school were talking about the collective leadership of their educators, and the way that was affecting their system as students. And the way they were leading alongside educators. I was like, Oh- Jill: That's really cool. Jon: This is the dream. The kids own it. It's not buy-in, they own it. The other story I'll give, and this was maybe my favorite classroom visit from the last year where this makes me optimistic. Brad Livingstone, who's our first gent, he's the husband of our president, Linda Livingstone and I was in his history classroom. And he's an amazing history teacher. He teaches World War II history and Vietnam War history at a local school. And the teaching's amazing, I was there for the Do-little raids. It was amazing World War II, so I enjoyed that. But at the beginning of the class, he's having students report out how many veterans they thanked the past week. So every Monday morning they report in how many veterans they thanked for what they did. And he got them doing this, and he's done this for years in all the different schools he's been in. He drives a van full of them to HEB in the middle of the day at the beginning of the semester. And he said, "Go out and find people that are my age or older and ask them if they served in the military. And if they do, introduce yourself, thank them for their service." Jill: That's awesome. Jon: And so they go out in teams and do that, and then he's like, "Now it's on you. You got to do this." And you got to get 50 this semester. And if you get 50, the goal is to get 1000 thank-yous in the course of the semester. That fundamentally changes the community. It doesn't just change the classroom. It doesn't just change the kids, that changes the community. Once you get to 50, you get a vial of sand from Normandy that he's collected. The kid who has the most thank-yous in a semester gets a vial of sand from Iwo Jima, which is in his way of saying it is the most difficult soil to get in the world because the only way you're allowed to go to Iwo Jima is if you are connected to Japan or you're a military liaison to Japan for the United States. That's the only way you get on that island. And so a veteran brought him back some sand from Iwo Jima. So one kid each semester gets that sand. And I'm sitting in there and this kid has thanked 75 veterans that past week. I was like, "How did you do it?" And he said, "Well, I go to football games and I watch for how people stand up and salute the flag during the national anthem. And then I go find them." I was like- Jill: That's awesome. Jon: ...how amazing is that? So those kinds of small changes are the kinds of things that change our community in a society that feels like it's super broken and polarized, that changes people. And so that's the hope. Jill: That is such a cool story. Thanks for sharing that. Thanks for sharing all the other stories, and I really hope that it was an encouragement to all the educators out there. We are so grateful for the work that you do on a daily basis and making a difference in the lives of each student. Jon: Yeah, thanks for all you do, Jill. It's great. We have a great job. Jill: Yeah, we do.

In this episode of “Todd Talks,” Dean Still visits with Linda A. Livingstone, PhD, president of Baylor University. With so many significant achievements having taken place at the University in the recent past and all of the exciting developments to come, this is a “Todd Talks” you do not want to miss!

Hello and welcome to the Women Leaders Podcast. I'm your host, Patti Phillips…    Today I am thrilled joined by the President of Baylor University, Dr. Linda Livingstone! President Livingstone, a former Division I Women's Basketball player and the current chair of the NCAA Board of Governors, has led Baylor through an impressive transformation during her tenure that started in 2017.     Throughout our conversation, she breaks down her leadership style and the importance of creating a culture that works. Hear straight from the President on what qualities she looks for when hiring and tactical leadership skills women can improve on to land the next role.     We also talk candidly about the slow pace of women elevating into the Athletic Director level, and she provides ideas and strategies on how to change that.     Lots of great nuggets here, let's dive into this important conversation…and remember, We Are Women Leaders. 

(0:17:00) Jason Scheer, WildcatAuthority.com (0:40:00) Dave "Softy" Mahler, KJR Radio, Seattle (1:31:00) Dennis Dodd, CBS Sports (1:48:00) Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President/Big 12 Board of Governors Chair (2:12:00) Brett McMurphy, Action Network HQ (2:40:00) Jake Plummer, Former NFL/ASU Quarterback (2:58:00) Paul Catalina's "Top 5" Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Linda Livingstone 08-04-2023

[00:00:00] Christin McClave: The boards that I've been on that have been very well-functioning from a nonprofit standpoint, really do have a nice balance of people who are still in industry. People who are very well versed in audit and finance and can pick out what might not look right on the financials or where things are, could potentially go wrong in the future if they're not managed properly. [00:00:27] Tommy Thomas: This week we're continuing the conversation with Christin McClave that we began in Episode 81. In that conversation, Christin shared her leadership journey from Johnson and Johnson to Cardona Industries, an aftermarket business and the automotive sector that her father and grandfather started. Christen has a lot of board governance experience in both the private and nonprofit sectors.  Let's pick up on that conversation.  +++++++++++++++++++ Let's go to board service. You are a busy lady, with a family and a business. When did your first nonprofit board show up? Or maybe, how did it show up?  [00:01:08] Christin McClave: My first nonprofit board experience actually came from an organization I was a part of in my high school years. I was a part of a teen missions organization. I went on a couple missions trips with this organization and then, eventually, I stayed in loose communication with them. And then it was, a friend of a friend. And they really wanted to find someone who had actually participated in some of their programs. And it's just, it's really a word-of-mouth thing at that point, and that was a much smaller nonprofit. And it was a really wonderful organization. I learned a ton and I was able to actually have a few mentors on that board helping me through the process and learning about governance and what needs to be in place, maybe what wasn't in place there. And how to see things in, as a non-profit board member. That was a really awesome learning experience for me. And then subsequently, one of my mentors on that board eventually left, and then he asked me to put my name in the process for the next nonprofit board, which was much larger at that point. And I ended up joining that board. So, it's a cycle and a follow on. If you're doing good things and bringing good value to the board you're on and providing feedback and good support and connections, it'll pay off to the next one and the next one.  [00:02:48] Tommy Thomas:   Peter Drucker has been attributed to have said a lot of things. I'm not sure if we could have talked to Dr. Drucker about what all he did say, but one person said that Dr. Drucker said there's one thing all boards have in common. They do not function. Based on your experience what might make that truth, if it's true?  [00:03:05] Christin McClave: I think it goes back to what we were talking about earlier, these systems that we try to put in place and we expect perfection from them. We're all imperfect people coming to the table. And we're all human and those structures are very rigid and there's a lot of, I'll say literature, books, there's magazines, everything out there. I was just reading the Director and Boards magazine. There's all of these best practices that we're supposed to have in place. And the reality is there's cultural things that happen. There's crises that come into play. There are unforeseen circumstances, if you're working with a global nonprofit board, you have all kinds of economic and cultural factors that you have no control over. And you have these great board agendas and these wonderful committees and you're just constantly trying to make it easy. And at the end of the day there's always something. We live in an imperfect world and we're all imperfect people. And the human dynamics of coming together with a lot and especially now we're also wanting more diversity of, thought and diversity of, race and gender and background coming to the table together. It's going to get even more and more complicated because we're having to come from different perspectives. The discourse has to be more robust about challenging what the agenda is or what's on the table, or what things are important. And then, layer on top of that, you have a management team, right? And you've got these two disparate systems coming together in a collision, at a board meeting, right? And as much as you'd like to think we're partners with the management team and at the same time, that's not always your role. Your role is also to be an oversight to what's happening in the organization. And there is some tension between, if there's tension on the management team, how do they function together?   It's great to have a highly functioning, highly performing executive team, but we all know that doesn't always happen and they're coming into the room and then you have this board who have varying degrees of, you're always rolling people on and off a board. So, it's big. A wonderful and a challenging collision of personalities. And then we have this, like I said, this system and this equation of what, the best practices of boards should and, shouldn't be. I think I agree with Peter Drucker there and that, it'll never be perfect and we'll always have our dysfunction. But we can all come to the table with some type of growth mindset and openness and humility. Then I think we can get a lot of things done.  [00:06:03] Tommy Thomas: I've been in this business a long time and I've worked with probably 300-400 boards, over the last 30 years. And if I look at them, I will say a lot of the time they're, they'd be males a lot of the time.  They might be closer to my age than your age.  And now things are changing. So, what are you seeing, or maybe what are you doing to lower the mean age on a board and to maybe bring more gender and ethnic diversity?  [00:06:32] Christin McClave: So, I think we see a lot of changes in the general demographics, right?  As our society and culture are changing. The positive thing is there's so much more diversity coming up through the leadership ranks. And I think, the traditional way that we've, I'll say we, because I've done it myself as well, when we've needed a new board member on a board I'm on, I instantly think about who have I worked with before? Who's like me, who thinks like me, who would be easy to plug and play into this board that I'm on? And so that's been our traditional way of pipelining onto boards. Let's find people who we know and who we know could be very quickly successful and contribute value to this board. I think what we've learned over the last couple years is that it doesn't necessarily bring diversity to these boards that we are trying to diversify. And we've seen the pressure coming from the public sector the SEC, not quite regulations, but suggestions that we need more, a certain percentage of diversity on the public boards. And there's a lot of pressure in the market for that. And then that has trickled down its way to nonprofits and to the private sector. So, everyone is looking to diversify their boards at this point. And I think, a key piece of the job requirements that we have in the past always assumed on larger boards, I'll say. And most boards in general, everybody's wanted, okay you need to have a CEO or CFO or a C level executive. But preferably a CEO or CFO who's been in the chair before. And I've had people say that to me as well, that's what they're looking for. And I think we know just from sheer data that a lot of women and diverse candidates in general haven't had those opportunities. And in the past, and we are trying, we are definitely developing that pipeline now and being very much more intentional. But I think like through the past few years and now looking at the talent market being as hot as it is and the demand for diverse talent we have, we are at the place we need to take a look at those very narrow criteria that we've, we've said, oh, you have to be a C-level executive to be on a board and to be able to contribute value. And I think, now I've seen a lot more being written, a lot more being talked about a lot more, diversity coming onto boards where I'm reading someone's background and I'm like, wow, that is so cool. Maybe 10 years ago that person wouldn't have been chosen for that very significant board seat. So I think it's really just that we've opened up our criteria and have opened up our thought process and how we see people's experiences. We're looking at people's resumes really differently these days. We even, from an HR perspective internally, when we're screening candidates. We took the requirement of having a college degree off of our requirements, probably, about 10 years ago, which was a little bit ahead of our time, but it just opened up our talent pool and we realized there's a lot of people out there that may not have a bachelor's degree but are way more experienced with their life and work experience that we were not being able to tap into because we had that very strict requirement. So I think we're seeing that across the board at all levels, including at the board level. +++++++++++++++++   [00:10:23] Tommy Thomas: A few episodes back a guy emailed me after the episode and he talked about that he was on a startup nonprofit, and he had some questions. He said, maybe you could do a whole episode on startup nonprofits. And I hadn't done that yet, but I have asked people like you the question. If you were approached by a friend about doing a startup on a nonprofit, what are some questions you would ask? What kind of counsel are you giving that person?  And this may go over to the board piece too, because I think boards are so critical. [00:10:56] Christin McClave: Yeah. That is one of the key questions I would be asking. And maybe it's, at a startup stage, it's not a super formal board. That word board we'll put in air quotes because, it's you're not paying anybody. You're not, and in a nonprofit, you're not paying anybody to be on the board anyway. And you really need maybe more, something more like a sounding board and an advisory, an informal advisory council, if you will, that is able to bring some experience, some strategy, help you see what's down the road. The challenges, help you figure out, really the funding model and you know how you're going to approach that because that is your primary driver in any type of startup nonprofit. You really have to have the ability to raise money in a different sort of a way. It's not the traditional, you get a pitch deck with the in and you go into a Shark Tank environment and you present to all kinds of funding sources. This is a whole different thing because you have this passion, this problem you want to solve, and you're trying to engage people in that mission with you. And then hopefully they're going to commit some donations and fundraising into that process. So I think having that advisory function in some way is really important.  And in more established nonprofits, they're meeting quarterly, but I think in this case you'd probably want to have someone on speed dial for different things, who's your mentor, your coach, and then having some type of advisory, council or loose board that you meet, like probably monthly to help you stay on track, build out your strategy, and support you, even from a, like I said, mentorship and coaching standpoint. [00:12:56] Tommy Thomas: You're probably not old enough to remember the Enron scandal, but I certainly would be and certainly the private sector took a lot of heat and justifiably how do you get your fellow board members to ask tough financial questions? [00:13:07] Christin McClave: Yeah. That is a challenge. In the nonprofit space, it's more of a challenge on those boards because people do come to those boards because of the mission, because of the passion they have for the mission. And if you're on certain boards that you know are, have a Christian focus or some type of religious focus, you want to have some percentage of the board coming from either ministry, and then the other part of the board is coming from the business perspective. That seems to be a really nice balance actually. I've enjoyed being on nonprofit boards who have a good balance of those two things. Everybody needs to be passionate about the mission, but then on the for-profit board side, you tend to get people who are heavily weighted to the financial side. You spend a lot of time with your audit committee chair. You spend time with the auditors, you're spending a higher percentage of time on the financials and the strategy and the metrics and much less time on the culture and the people strategy and which, we can talk another time, about how that's probably, an imbalance and needs to be more balanced on the for-profit side. I think it's really key to have the right balance of people coming from the for-profit sector and also people with good finance background who know how to dig into the numbers and know how to highlight things that could be potential issues going down the road. And the boards that I've been on that have been very well-functioning from a nonprofit standpoint, really do have a nice balance of people who are still in industry. People who are very well versed in audit and finance and can pick out what might not look right on the financials or where things are, could potentially go wrong in the future if they're not managed properly. The for-profit sector doesn't really have, as I haven't experienced that. They tend to have a much deeper focus on the financials and really, that diversity that we talked about earlier is also important, to make sure you don't have a bunch of, a bunch of the same type of people on your board who are not willing to bring up the financial issues that they see and they're willing to speak up and challenge. You want to make sure that diversity of thought is there and the ability to bring things up and not just go into group think on how things are moving.  [00:15:59] Tommy Thomas: I'd like you to respond to this quote: “You need a director on the board who will be a pleasant irritant - someone who will force people to think a little differently.  That's what a good board does”.  [00:16:10] Christin McClave: Yes. Wow. A pleasant irritant. I really like that a lot. And I will aspire to that title because I think sometimes with my age, and I'll say I'm 46, but on a lot of the boards that I'm on, I tend to be on the younger side. It's something that I can fall into, okay, I'm here and I don't have as much to bring to the table that everybody else does, but I really do need to speak up and be that pleasant irritant on the board and ask the questions. They asked me to be on the board because I'm coming from a different perspective. So, I think it's really important. We actually had a role on one of our nonprofit boards. And this came to be after we had experienced a crisis together as a board and got through it and we realized we had gone into that group to the point where we let something occur and we didn't challenge it. We didn't challenge the management team like we should have as a board. So, after that crisis subsided, we came together and said,  Hey, we need a loyal skeptic. Every single board meeting we have, someone who is going to be given the hat of loyal skeptic and, which sounds like, similar words, you said pleasant irritant. So yeah, and that really was an interesting experience. When I had to take on that role you really put that hat on, and it changes your thinking. And we had moments in the board agenda where we would say, okay what does the skeptic have to say about this? And we wanted to make sure we were getting the alternative position to what we were all agreeing to. [00:18:03] Tommy Thomas: I asked Dr. Linda Livingstone, the President at Baylor that question, and I asked her, did you need to appoint one? And she says, probably not. They generally show up.  [00:18:13] Christin McClave: Yeah. I think if you start calling attention to the fact that we want and we celebrate and we need to have some skeptics and some different points of view, we celebrate that. I don't think you necessarily have to put the hat on someone. You just have to keep on a regular basis saying, are we getting, what's the alternative point of view here? What's the skeptic going to say? And I think we can all do that in our board context.  ++++++++++++++++++++   [00:18:42] Tommy Thomas: Let's close out with maybe a couple of comments about the board chair because that's a critical role in nonprofits. So give me some words and phrases that would describe the best board chair or chairs that you've observed in nonprofits.  [00:18:57] Christin McClave: So, composed, I'm thinking of all the board chairs that I've been a part of, I've been a part of composed, professional, empathetic, and humble yet still very organized. And they're the ones that keep us going and keep us on track. And at the same time, they're very savvy with understanding the dynamics of the management team, the CEO, the relationship with the CEO and the relationship to the board. And they are really integral to that working well. They spend time with the CEO offline. They potentially spend time with the leadership team and the CEO. It's an incredibly dedicated role that the chairs that I've been blessed to be under as a board member have been just remarkable in their ability to balance all the stakeholders. The stakeholders in the room balance all of those very complicated systems that we talked about earlier. Bringing them all into one room and being even, you could say it, a conductor of an orchestra in a way. I've seen them and at the same time, the chairs of nonprofits, like I said, really must be committed, passionate about the work that's being done in that nonprofit. I have experienced one board where the chair was really doing it out of, I don't want to say obligation, but it was like, okay I'm trying to help this organization. I'm trying to help this CEO. But maybe that person's personal commitment wasn't really so passionate about the actual work that we were doing and that's needed at some points like that, we needed some structure and some discipline on that board. So that was a good thing for a short time or an interim time. But the ones that I've seen to be very effective have been passionate about the work, really passionate about supporting the CEO and the management team, and giving them the support from the board they need. And then at the same time, like I said, bringing that skeptic voice and making sure that voice is heard in the meetings is really important. So there's a level of humility and then a level of organization and professionalism that has just been really important to see, especially when you have large nonprofit boards. These boards tend to get over 15 people and they get to 20-25, and that's a whole other level of orchestration that a chair has to have to be involved in.  And it's a definite skill. It's really amazing when you see it working.  +++++++++++++++++++++ Our guest next week will be Lisa Trevino Cummings. Lisa started her career with Bank of America and spent 12 years there before leaving to head Hispanic outreach efforts for The White House Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives. In 2003, she started Urban Strategies – a social enterprise with a mission to connect and resource community and faith-based organizations in hard-to-reach communities.  [00:22:26] Lisa Cummings: I grew up in a culture where there were no boundaries in terms of work life, that sort of thing. Partly because we were in poverty, so you've got to do whatever you got to do to make ends meet, right? And many people are still in that situation. However, I would say that as folks have a more of a mixture of cultures, the young folks that we've been hiring, they are very intentional about drawing boundaries so that their work doesn't end up being, seven days a week, 24 hours a day.   Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website Next Gen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas   Connect Tommy Thomas - tthomas@jobfitmatters.com Tommy's LinkedIn Profile Christin McClave's LinkedIn Profile  

[00:00:00] Lindy Black: Through the encouragement of several different people, I learned to be a student of people. And in doing that, they often don't realize that you are studying everything about them. You're looking at their facial expressions, their non-verbal body language. You're looking at their tone or listening to their tone and more than all of those is that you're listening to the words they're saying and, in a sense, becoming a student of who they are. When you do that, you can remain in a posture of a learner.  ++++++++++++++++++++++ Tommy Thomas: Our guest today is Lindy Black. Lindy is transitioning into her leadership role with The Navigators. She stepped off the National Leadership Team after the tenure of 12 years at the end of 2022. Her new role is walking alongside men and women serving in the background as a coach and developer of existing and new national leaders.  I first met Lindy when I was conducting the Vice-President of Development search for The Navigator several years ago. When we conduct a search, we typically interview members of the senior staff as part of our due diligence. Lindy was an easy person to interview. And as I remember, she gave us a lot of valuable input for the search.  Another thing we have in common is our love for Auburn University. Lindy spent several years serving on The Navigator staff at Auburn. And I took my electrical engineering degree from Auburn and came to be a Christ follower doing my sophomore year. Let's pick up on my conversation with Lindy Black.  [00:01:44] Tommy Thomas: Before we go too deep into your professional career, let's go back to your childhood. I'm always curious as to how people got their start.  What's your most memorable experience from childhood?  [00:01:54] Lindy Black: I don't know if I would be able to just say one, because our family moved about every two years, and in that process, my dad, who is still living at 93, was a football coach.   His goal was to be a head professional football coach. And so consequently we moved a great deal and in that, there was every single place we lived, there was always the reality that there was something new and fresh there. I didn't always think it would be, but every time God came through and put a new situation that was very…  I don't know if I'd use the word developmental, but it just helped me be more of the person I have become today. So, all that moving around and having a football coach for a dad produced some things in me for sure.  [00:02:52] Tommy Thomas:  Staying on that theme for a minute, what would you say was the greatest gift that you got from your parents in your childhood? [00:03:01] Lindy Black: I would say they were so different. My mom was so merciful and kind and listening and caring, always seeing the one who may not be seen. And my dad was driven. He was a Vince Lombardi fan to the max.  His motto was, winning isn't everything, it's the only thing. The blend of those two things that's their gift. To me, they were so different. And on a good day, I like to believe I have the best of both of them, at least at work inside of me.  I'm not exclusively one or the other. But that was their blending of themselves definitely was the greatest gift.  [00:03:43] Tommy Thomas:  What's something that people are surprised to find out about? [00:03:46] Lindy Black: If they haven't been around me much, I think they will be surprised at how competitive I am. I guess that comes from being the daughter of a football coach, Tommy. But once they're around me a little bit, then they'll understand that oh yeah, they're not surprised then. So, I would love to think that being competitive, can have a real negative connotation for sure. But for me, I think it was a push to excel. Tommy Thomas: Yeah, sticking with that for a minute, I interviewed Dr. Linda Livingstone at Baylor recently.  She was an All-American basketball player at Oklahoma State.   I asked her about the competitive nature and how a Christian either resolves or lives in the center of the tension of that. So, I would pose that question to you. How, as a Christian, do you live in the center of the tension of being competitive?  [00:04:39] Lindy Black: I think there's a competitive spirit where you want to be all that you can be and that can be very healthy. I think when it becomes unhealthy, at least in my own experiences, when by being competitive you put down others. Now on a ball field, you want to win on a basketball court, on a track meet you want to win, being the best you can be and somebody will lose. However, in real life, that same spirit, which is what I'm describing in me, I think it's healthy when it provokes you to excel. Still, the unhealthy part comes in when it is to the detriment or the putting down, the oppressing, the powering up over someone else. ++++++++++++++++++ [00:05:28] Tommy Thomas: When you joined The Navigators did you think it would be a career? [00:05:33] Lindy Black: In a sense, I had my original career first, which was being a secondary math teacher.   And so, when God called myself and Vic, my husband out, he was a systems analyst working in a computer company, and I was a school teacher when he called us out of that, I think there was a deep sense that we were all in for a lifetime if he wanted to change the path that was up to him.  We saw it as a lifelong calling, but we were a little older when that step took place.  [00:06:08] Tommy Thomas: So how long had you been in public education?  [00:06:10] Lindy Black: About seven years at that time. [00:06:11] Tommy Thomas:  So you were probably in your early thirties when God called you. [00:06:14] Lindy Black: Yeah, I was in my late twenties. Vic was in his early thirties.  [00:06:18] Tommy Thomas: Go back to your first management role when you actually had people reporting to you. What do you remember about that?  [00:06:27] Lindy Black:  My first team that I led had four men on it, and they were all older than me and they had more experience than me.  The first tangible emotion that came to mind is I was nervous, and I felt insecure. Now, many years later, I read the best article on leading people who know more than you do. What I was learning in that early first management was that I needed to lean into the expertise and actually the greater knowledge of my teammates. And in doing that, not only was I learning, but it gave me an opportunity to affirm and encourage their development in what they were bringing. But I don't think I could have articulated that in the first couple times we met together. So, leaning into people who know more. There's an art to that and I think I was early on in learning how to draw others out, how to affirm them, and how to bring their best because then the team is at its best and I get to grow.  So that was my first memory.  [00:07:43] Tommy Thomas: So fast forward to your most recent assignment before you began to go into this next season of life, if I could have been present at a team meeting and we dismissed you and I asked them what would be the most challenging thing about working for Lindy? What would they say?  [00:07:58] Lindy Black: The most challenging, they would say sometimes she drives too hard to get to closure. And because of that, she can push us faster than maybe we want to be pushed. That would be one thing. I think they would, that's probably in the team context.  That would've been the thing they would say. [00:08:20] Tommy Thomas: So can you think of, without naming the names of the guilty or the innocent, can you think of a time when you did that and looking back how that went down?  [00:08:29] Lindy Black: I think what happened is that the decisions, the endpoint of the discussion, that we didn't get to the best landing point, because I pushed for closure there. In a sense, we truncated some of the creative thinking and the deeper thinking because I was more concerned that we had an end to it versus the depth of the discussion. I'm picturing a particular situation and I think that was the case. We didn't get to the best conclusion and then we had to come back to it and it's always harder to come back. So that was a hard balance for me to learn because I'm a closure person and I want to see a process finish and not just stay up in the realm of ideas and in the clouds, but actually get to a point where we can move forward together as a team. [00:09:26] Tommy Thomas:  If we flip that question, what would they say was the most rewarding part of working for Lindy?  [00:09:33] Lindy Black: They would say, if I know Lindy's leading the meeting, we're gonna be okay. She will draw out people, she will listen. But she has an intuitive sense of when to stop the discussion most times and when to let it go a little bit longer.  [00:09:51] Tommy Thomas:  Successful people are always asked, what makes you successful?  I want to maybe frame that question a little differently and maybe the question would read what is a factor that helped you succeed that people on the outside probably wouldn't realize? [00:10:08] Lindy Black: I don't know if they would be able to observe this, Tommy, or not. But I think through the encouragement of several different people, I learned to be a student of people. And in doing that, they often don't realize that you are studying everything about them. You're looking at their facial expressions, their non-verbal body language. You're looking at their tone or listening to their tone, and more than all of those is that you're listening to the words they're saying and, in a sense, becoming a student of who they are. When you do that, you can remain in a posture of a learner, which is a high value for me, is to stay in the posture of a learner. So I don't think people know how much I'm absorbing about their outward look as well as their thoughts that they're communicating and the emotion that I perceive. So perhaps they don't realize that everything they're doing is helping me to understand either how to draw the best of them out, how to posture them for their next assignment, or a variety of other things. [00:11:25] Tommy Thomas: Did a mentor teach you that, or do you learn by reading and how did that come to pass?  [00:11:30] Lindy Black: I have to give my mom first credit on this one.  Especially as a teenager, I had words. I really had lots of thoughts and my mom was the best listener because she would be fully present to me. And what I've wound up realizing later, not initially, is that as she listened to me and continued to pull out more from me, I actually worked my way to a good place, a place of security, or I talked myself to the right decision, or I was able in processing friendships to be able to realize, oh, okay, that friendship probably isn't the best. But it was rarely because she told me. She gave me enough time and space to be able to be to process that out that. That was the foundation of being a learner an observer and a learner of people. And then realizing if people are given long enough, very often with good questions and a very present listening posture, they actually can come to some of the best solutions all by themselves. Now, that's in a one-on-one situation. So, I think also, though probably the negative has influenced me just as much. And when I say the negative, I mean watching what happens when people don't listen well, the implications are, they usually lead to a very unhealthy team or an unhealthy working environment. So some of that is by watching the opposite of what you want to see and learning from that.   +++++++++++++++++++++++ [00:13:14] Tommy Thomas: Were you a trailblazer in The Navigators relative to women in senior leadership?  [00:13:19] Lindy Black: I am not the only one, but I would say yes.  [00:13:22] Tommy Thomas: My early reflections were when I was in my early twenties, that it was probably a pretty male-dominated, is probably the stronger word, but The Navigators I knew were, were men.  How did you break into that?  [00:13:37] Lindy Black: If I were being honest, Tommy, back in our early years on staff, we joined navigator staff in 1981, and in from then until probably for at least 10 years, maybe longer, maybe closer to 15.  If you had told me that one day I would be a Senior Vice President and Associate US Director of The Navigators, I would've said in your dreams, that will never happen for me or probably any other woman. It was going to take too long to see women being able to have the opportunity to contribute who they are and their gifting and strengths. So when I was, it was 1994, and the man leading the campus ministry at the time c called the house and it was in the days when the phone was connected, you couldn't walk around. It was connected. And he called and I said, hello and we chit chatted. And I said let me go get Vic. And he goes Lin, I don't want to talk to Vic. I want to talk to you. And I said, okay. And he goes, I want to invite you to, it was a Campus Net event going on in London, England a number of months later. And I said, I remember saying, you want me to go? And he said, yes. And he went on to say some reasons why. And it was not just for my benefit, it was for me to benefit the people around the world from around the world that would be there. Honestly, Tommy, I would've said, I didn't think anybody saw who I was, I didn't, I just thought, I'm doing my wonderful campus ministry with my husband here in Auburn, Alabama. I loved what we were doing, but actually somebody else. There were others watching and I didn't know that. So that opportunity was my first of being invited to bring something that I didn't actually know I could bring. They asked me to stand in front of the group, and I don't remember the subject, but it was absolutely terrifying to do this. But I began to see, wait, I do have something to offer. So then fast forward about five years my kids were finishing high school and a door opened for me to be engaged with staff training in The Navigators. And I realized, oh, I'm a people developer. I love this. And by that time, we had a staff team of about nine men and women and seeing them become more of who they were or who God created them to be. Then that became a niche, and I realized if, especially as a woman, I'm, it's probably true for men too, but to you, you need to find where you can excel and then do it with all your might, because bringing excellence actually opens doors, and that is what happened to me. So that was an initial place of contribution. Now, as I began to excel in training, then I had I think it was three other doors open up to be an associate director of a particular team. And that was actually new ground for The Navigators at that time. This was in the early 2000s and up until my current role. So I think in that there were places where I was able to excel and people realized I could bring a contribution that was broader than just the local or just among women, but it would bless the whole of the work.  [00:17:21] Tommy Thomas: Let's stay with this team thing and leading people. What's the most important quality you're looking for when you bring somebody onto your team? [00:17:29] Lindy Black: I think, and foremost is they don't think they know everything that, that when you see that quality in someone that they think they know a lot or perhaps they know quite a bit, or even everything about the area that your team is focused on, that would be someone I would not want to invite onto a team because that prevents learning from others, learning from God, learning together as a team, because it can often be paired with a strong sense of independence and  People who are going to serve well on a team have to be strong in interdependence. So that would be one thing I would not want to see. On the positive side, EQ in emotional intelligence, if that is strong, which the beginnings of emotional intelligence, the foundational piece is self-awareness. If a man or woman has a high degree of self-awareness knowing where they have strength, where they have vulnerability, that person will be much more likely to be an excellent team member because they're not independent, but their emotional intelligence brings that deep level of self-awareness, then that can lead to being a good student of other people. [00:18:50] Tommy Thomas: But say you do make a mistake along the way, and somebody has to leave their job.  What have you found to be the best way to terminate somebody? [00:18:58] Lindy Black: For one thing, I would have asked someone to step out of a role, that should never come as a surprise to them. By the time you get to the point you're saying you can't be in this role any longer, you're done. If that is a surprise to them, then you have definitely failed as a leader. When you fire someone, if it comes as a surprise to them, you have definitely failed as a leader. Definitely. So there has to be periodic evaluations and I found being able to have thoughts in writing ahead of time notes to go back to, that's life or death. Because if you're a busy leader, you can't remember all the conversations. And giving people opportunities, whether it's formally in a performance improvement plan or informally just in coaching them to give them the opportunity, every opportunity possible to be able to overcome weaknesses that could potentially remove them from their job.  ++++++++++++++++++++++ [00:19:55] Tommy Thomas: What's the most effective team-building exercise you've ever used? [00:20:03] Lindy Black: Boy, that is a tough one. I think what I would say is when people tell their stories, let's say you've got a fairly new team, engaged. But when a team begins to hear one another's stories, their background growing up, the realities in their home, and things they've had to overcome as team members begin to do the listening to what shaped this person? It has a high degree of beginning to sow the seeds of being compassionate toward one another to realize what I see today is a product of other things that have happened in their lives. If you start there, you begin with a deeper understanding and potentially respect for one another. If you start there, it's gonna be easier to go deeper and to build trust in the future. So, telling their stories is probably one of the, that's probably the most effective beginning point.  [00:21:09] Tommy Thomas:   Have The Navigators noticed any difference in maybe you as being a leader in training the generation of people that are coming through your early ranks now than say 15, 20 years ago when you broke into leadership? [00:21:23] Lindy Black: Our millennial staff they, those men and women, I believe were forerunners of changing a number of things, be moving more toward community engagement, community learning, not just me and one other person, or me and Jesus, but that they ushered in a much more partnering mode into where we currently are now. That is a good setup for Gen Z who are now graduating from college and beginning to enter the workforce. And some are entering our staff. The place where I believe we are really struggling. And how much of this is the result of the Covid years, and how much is it, would it have been this way regardless of Covid and that? I'll just call it a healthy relationship, lack of skill. When you think about The Navigators, which is a ministry life to life, if you can't carry on a conversation or initiate with a new person or have the confidence to initiate activities, those types of things,you're going to be in big trouble. So, the relational aspect and having confidence in knowing how to relate to other people, seem to be one of the biggest challenges today for sure. Now interestingly, I was just recently with a younger group of women, and as we were interacting, I found that their longing to have practical skills in life, in ministry, in all areas, practical skills, learning practical know-how was much higher than I'd noticed for the last two decades in groups of people. It seems as though they were avid learners and wanted to understand how they could better engage and become more effective in the roles they were filling.  ++++++++++++++++++++++ [00:23:31] Tommy Thomas: If we learn from our mistakes, why are we always so afraid to make a mistake?  [00:23:38] Lindy Black: Oh, my goodness. I might be at the top of that list. I don't know how much you're familiar with the Enneagram, but that has been a significant help to me, both in understanding my strengths, but also in under also in understanding the places where I need to continue to grow and mature. In Enneagram one of the words they use for that is a perfectionist.  I have a very high level of inner critic in my person of telling me things I've done wrong.  I have a twofold answer to your question.  I am always thinking how I could have done something better, how you could have done something better, how a process could be improved, and God has really used that and bless that. Now, sometimes it just gets into a gear. People are just like, couldn't we just do good? Does it always have to be changing and becoming better and better? I put that on myself, and that can be very debilitating. So that's more on the inside of me. On the outside, I think as someone is facing the reality of failure, if you think you have failed and you just press on, you take application from that, apply it to the next situation, you will more than likely miss the meat or the good part of what God would want to teach you. I'm a very firm believer that experience is not the best teacher, but an evaluated process experience is the best teacher. I think you can do that by yourself. But if I were to wave my magic wand in this arena of failure and say, what is the most needed situation, tool, or experience, and that is to have someone sit with you, ask you several just basic questions to help you understand what did you intend to do, what went well, what went poorly, what did you learn from it, and that process has helped me not be so afraid of failing because I know nobody's going to do everything perfectly, but when you do assess, evaluate what went on, oftentimes you are the richer for it, and that failure becomes far less debilitating in your own soul. [00:26:16] Tommy Thomas: Where does that come from?  [00:26:17] Lindy Black: Actually, it was a man, a staff person in The Navigators. His name is Jim, and I happened to be at a workshop he was giving on giving and receiving feedback, and because of my hunger, both to learn personally, and to help other people be learners. It was a skillset or, he just had a basic process where he could walk someone through, and they were able to answer questions. If he was present, then he could actually give them feedback. But this could be, you could walk with someone, and you didn't even have to be there when they had the experience. Just the question asking and helping them dig deeper and understand what may have been under that. I was so led up, Tommy I thought, that's been probably 25 years ago, and I have been able to both equip others but practice that where people don't even know you're actually helping them in a feedback experience or an evaluated experience. [00:27:27] Tommy Thomas: What's the most dangerous behavior or trait that you've observed that derails leaders' careers?  [00:27:33] Lindy Black: From my own vantage point, it's people who, their vulnerabilities or their weaknesses. A leader whose vulnerabilities and weaknesses have been overlooked because their strengths are so strong, they're needed, they're valued, and they can be esteemed, platformed, and pushed further on because what they're bringing is of value and ignoring their weaknesses and vulnerabilities because someone didn't have the courage to talk to them and say to them, this is my observation. Or this is how I'm perceiving you and their weaknesses are overlooked. There are a number of my peers who I believe have not been able to excel to the degree God longed for them because no one was able, it may be other people's choices or their choice to come alongside and say, this is how I experience you. I believe this is a real vulnerability. So I think weaknesses unlooked at, unchallenged, those things in their character will be the things that will be at the top of the list of derailing them.  Join us next week as we continue this conversation with Lindy Black. One of the topics we will discuss is how she got into journaling and how journaling has impacted her life.  Until then, keep doing the good work you're doing to help make the nonprofit sector more effective, sustainable, and scalable.    Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website Next Gen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas The Navigators TrueFace - Lindy Black   Connect Tommy Thomas - tthomas@jobfitmatters.com Tommy's LinkedIn Profile Lindy Black's LinkedIn Profile  

[00:00:00] Bill Hendricks: Ralph was just an amazing person. Any rate I went through the process and when I got to the feedback session, which is like the reveal okay here's your giftedness. It was as if I'd been in a pitch-black room my whole life, bumping into the wall, falling over, furniture getting hurt, and somebody just reached over and flipped the light switch on.  And very quickly I began to see all kinds of things that I'm like, oh my gosh, now I understand what it is I'm trying to do. [00:00:28] Tommy Thomas: My guests today are my good friends, Bev Hendricks Godby, and her brother Bill Hendricks. They work together at The Giftedness Center in Dallas. Bill holds degrees from Harvard University, Boston University, and Dallas Theological Seminary. He's the author or the co-author of 22 books, including The Person Called You, Why You're Here, Why You Matter, and What You Should Do with Your Life, and his most recent book, which he co-authored with Bev - So How do I Parent this Child - Discovering the Wisdom and Wonder of Who Your Child was Meant To Be? Bev has degrees from Wheaton College and the University of Texas at Dallas, a former educator and audiologist. She's particularly attuned to how the giftedness of her clients expresses itself in the whole of their life, narrative, and relationships. [00:01:24] Tommy Thomas: Bill and Bev have made a great impact on the corporate and nonprofit sectors as they've advised people, ranging from high school and college students to corporate and nonprofit executives on how to be their best by understanding their individual giftedness, and as Max Lucado put it on his book on giftedness, How to Live in Your Sweet Spot. I've known Bill and Bev for many years. A trip to the Dallas Metroplex isn't complete without sharing a meal. We've shared meals at Papa Do's Seafood Kitchen and Papasitas Cantina, and we've also had a couple of memorable meals at Bev and her husband, Dale's home. So Bev and Bill, welcome the NextGen Nonprofit Leadership [00:02:06] Bill Hendricks: Thank you, Tommy. Great to be with you. [00:02:08] Bev Godby: It's wonderful to be here. [00:02:11] Tommy Thomas: Bev, when I was undergraduate at Auburn, I was well known to the students at speech therapy and audiology. I have a conduction loss in my right ear. And once word got out that I was a will and Guinea pig, I was a regular guest at the Speech and Hearing Lab, I guess it didn't hurt too much that most of the students were attractive co-eds back then, [00:02:33] Bev Godby: I love hearing that. [00:02:34] Tommy Thomas: Before we jump too deep into this discussion about giftedness, I'd like to go a little bit to your childhood we'll ask both of you these questions and you can respond, you can figure who goes first. But yeah, going back to some experiences that that you think contributed to helping you become the person you are today. [00:02:51] Bev Godby: One I'll go first on that one. I found a through line that kind of has gone through my whole story from the very beginning that I remember up until now, and it all began to come together. At Wheaton College. So I would say making a decision to go to Wheaton was probably an inflection point that just really took my life forward. I had always wanted to be a teacher, so I knew that just probably who knows, maybe wanting to do what my dad did as much as I understood it. But he was the one that always said, Bev, you should go to Wheaton. And he said it as my dad only could. That's not a suggestion, but you really need to chase that one down. When I got into Wheaton, which I was thrilled. I made that decision to go there. And I think that now when I look at it back at it, I think of that verse in second Timothy that says, guard the good deposit that was entrusted to you. And I just think that was a place where so much good deposit I was the beneficiary of. And I just see so much that flows out of, again, just. Opportunity to be in that place with the professors that I had. And the real, the thing that really stands out to me is that I think it unleashed for me, or at least introduced to me the power of story. So this is very interesting to me that this is what I'm doing with my life. it was about the content I was giving them, but it was being more immersed in the whole idea of who this person is Because from, again, from early years, I always wanted to be a teacher, but the teaching part was really about the story of each person for me. Yes, it was about the content I was giving them, but it was being more immersed in the whole idea of who this person is. So that's been all through my life, but I feel like that at Wheaton, I really got some tools to do that well. And the rest, was just man plans this way. God directs his steps. [00:05:03] Tommy Thomas: What about you, Bill? [00:05:03] Bill Hendricks: Tommy, I was smart enough to be born last. And that made all the difference because when you're the youngest you have the benefit of watching your older siblings make mistakes and then learn from them and not have to make those same mistakes in many cases. I made plenty of mistakes nonetheless, but there's also, I guess what I'd say now, I'm a I'm a parent of three grown daughters when you're the youngest of four, it's like your older siblings wear down your parents over time so that things go a little easier for you, if I could put it that way. And I think the other thing about being the youngest was by the time I was getting up into my middle school years obviously as Bev has mentioned, our dad was an educator, so he put a huge emphasis on education. And in fact, all four of us children have at least one master's degree and some more than one. Education was always a big deal, but they didn't have a lot of money, so it's not everybody went to private schools until my seventh-grade year, a family in our church had their son in a private boys school in Dallas, and they really encouraged my folks to consider putting me in this school. And of course we thought there's no way we're gonna be able to afford that. But nonetheless, I went over, took some tests one day. found out that this school wanted me, and next thing we know, there's scholarships. And so if Wheaton was a turning point for Bev St. Mark's, which was the name of that school, was a turning point for me. St. Marks was the best educational experience of my life. And it opened  the door, ultimately to the Ivy League and many other opportunities. [00:06:32] Bill Hendricks: That was the best educational experience of my life. And it opened up the door, ultimately to the Ivy League and many other opportunities. And and so I've been richly blessed by having lots and lots of teachers, mentors, people pour into me. And that's why right next to Giftedness is of a life message right there. [00:06:53] Bill Hendricks: Next to it is mentoring believes so much in the importance of mentors. [00:06:58] Tommy Thomas: So you've both mentioned your dad and your mom. what was the most valuable life lesson you learned from your parents? [00:07:06] Bev Godby: I would say that, For sure. My dad always said, be a person of your word. And I always believed watching him that those were his words, but just being able to watch the man all the time. It was even more fleshed out as character matters. Who you are when no one's watching you will determine the arc of your story. And I saw him actually do that in real life. And so that's always been really important to me to be a person of my word. , feel that he really displayed humility. He was a man that certain groups of people would get real excited about and always, they'd meet me, they'd always go, oh, you're dad. And they'd say amazing things about him. But he, when I would tell him that, he would go bezels, they just don't know me like you and I know me. . And it was just so forever humility has been such a key trait that I look for in people and really tr treasure for myself. Not that I think I can claim that, but I'd look for that. [00:08:19] Bev Godby: And I think that's at the heart of everything that I wanna be. [00:08:23] Bill Hendricks: I like to think that we're literally standing on our dead's shoulders and building on his legacy in this whole giftedness. Work that we do not least of which, because our dad was in a perfect fit with his giftedness. Our dad was in a perfect fit with his giftedness.  The man was born to teach, and he became a legendary teacher, an iconic figure as a teacher. The man was born to teach and he became a legendary teacher, an iconic figure as a teacher. I happen to work at the school that he, I have a role at the school that he taught at for 60 years. And by the day I get people mention his name and hallowed voice and but they all have memories of him. And he used to say, I love to teach. I lived to teach why I'd teach, whether or not they paid me to teach. And it was really true because we watched him teach even when he didn't get paid for it. And I think Bec and he, as part of that, he had a gift for seeing the giftedness of other people. And he would call it out. He would affirm what their strengths were and challenge them to lean into and live into those strengths and do something with them. And so now we do a very formalized form of giftedness discovery. But it's really continuing on that legacy that that he had of identifying people's strengths and we just love what we do. [00:09:39] Tommy Thomas: I interviewed Dr. Linda Livingstone, the president down at Baylor a couple weeks ago, and her dad was a prominent basketball coach in the state of Oklahoma. And so I asked her, did you know your dad was was famous? And she said probably not really, not in the early days anyway. I didn't know your dad personally, but I've sat under his teaching a lot. What was it like to grow up in the household of somebody that at least some of us thought was famous? [00:10:04] Bev Godby: There was always good and bad of course, in that, right? The weird part was that in certain circles you'd go particularly church related kind of things, and he was the rockstar. Like honestly, people would talk about him like. But then you'd go to school or you'd go just wherever else and no one's ever heard of them. So there was that disconnect a little bit. We, I feel, especially as a girl because I didn't get to go to the seminary seminaries in those days, Dallas Seminary in particular was only for men. I didn't really ever see him teach. The only time that we would really watch him do what he did was when we would go to Fort Worth. He had a church there that he used to pastor, and they'd invite him back all the time and we'd, and it was like watching someone on stage that is not your father. Like it was a not me kind of experience, but I loved it. And we saw what people enjoyed about him. But there was a lot of the, son of daughter of thing that went on. . What was great, one of the great things about Wheaton was almost everybody. There was the son or daughter of somebody, Billy Graham, the real luminaries in the Christian world. So no one cared about that. And I loved that I could just be me, be who I was. But it def it definitely was a mixed bag. Tommy I'll, I'll not lie about that, but in the end, I think it opened a lot of doors for me going forward, and I'll always be so grateful to him. On the 20th is gonna be the 10th year since he's passed away. And I think more and more I appreciate that legacy that I was handed. [00:11:48] Tommy Thomas: What about you, bill, as being the baby brother? [00:11:50] Bill Hendricks: It's a tremendous advantage to have a father that people just naturally think well of. I can't imagine what people do. And I know there's too many of them, who, whose father does not have a good reputation and then they have to live that down. Yeah, there's been pressure and expectations at times to live up to our dad's reputation. But, and as I get older, I realize that's not all, not altogether bad. It can be if you let it overwhelm your life and your identity. But, I after enough years of therapy, I think I of worked that one through. But it's a tremendous honor to, as I say, to have people mention one's father's name and see in their eyes the respect, the admiration, the love that they have had for him and. . All in all it's a privilege. It's it then just wants me to do and be the best I can be in what God's called me to in my twenties. [00:12:48] Tommy Thomas:  I had every tape that your dad ever did on communications, and I would listen to those tapes on communication and. There are just have such great memories of Dr. Hendricks. Bill you mentioned about teaching when they didn't pay him I'm sure he said this in a lot of his tapes, but he says, “they pay me to do this They don't pay me much, but they pay me to do this” . Just, great memories there. When I was in my early thirties, I was struggling with my career, and I read an article by RC Sproul where he talked about this thing called giftedness or understanding one's uniqueness.  I got some career counseling, and it literally changed my life. Fast forward to 1996 and our firm had been asked to submit a proposal to conduct the search for Bob Sieple'ssuccessor at World Vision US.   I remember my colleague Robert Stevenson and I, we flew up to Chicago at O'Hare to meet with the search committee and one of the members of the search committee she says are you the guys that work with Arthur Miller? And we said, yeah we, yeah, we do. And so she went on to say about, she had read his book, the Truth About You, and told the story of how she and two of colleagues had gotten together to do business together because they were all very good at what they did in the field of communications. When they got together, it was a train wreck. They just didn't work together well. And so one of 'em had read the book The Truth About You, and they called Mr. Miller in, and he gave them a session and told 'em he could have told them in the beginning they weren't gonna work well together because they were all so different. And they were bound to clash. And so they busted up their company, went back to their other jobs and remained fast friends.  They were thankful for Mr. Miller's counsel. So my guess my question is, when did the two of you first become aware of this thing called giftedness? And how did you begin to talk about it as such? When did the two of you first become aware of this thing called giftedness? And how did you begin to talk about it as such? [00:14:34] Bill Hendricks: guess I, I should begin that story. When I was 30 years old, I had finished my second master's degree and about a week after graduation, my wife said to me, in no uncertain terms, listen I'm tired of putting you through school. I wanna start a family and stay home with children.  You need to get out there and make some money. And in parliamentary terms we call that calling the question like, you gotta make a decision. And the problem is, I didn't really know what I should do. And I was scared about it and people are saying to me, oh, but Bill you went to Harvard, you have two master's degrees, you can do anything you want. And I'm like they may be, but I don't know what I want to do. And it was about that time that somebody introduced me to Ralph Matson, who was a colleague of Art Miller's. And I was very skeptical of the process because I'd been through a career guidance clinic in Boston and spent three and a half days and had a lot of test results back. But I still didn't know what to do with my life. But this was different because this was story-based. And also Ralph was just a amazing person. Any rate I went through the process and when I got to the feedback session, which is like the reveal okay here's your giftedness. It was as if I'd been in a pitch-black room my whole life, bumping into the wall, falling over, furniture getting hurt, and somebody just reached over and flipped the light switch on. And very quickly I began to see all kinds of things that I'm like, oh my gosh, now I understand what it is I'm trying to do. And I began to make choices on the basis of that career-wise that led me to better and better fit. And about 10 years into it I, a lot of that was writing projects, Tommy, and you mentioned Art Miller in his book, the Truth About You, he wanted to get another book on giftedness done. Art was a very brilliant man, but he was not a writer. And so he finally let me help him put a manuscript together on this other book, and it was working on that project that I realized. How taken I was with this whole phenomenon of giftedness and just decided to reinvent my consulting practice around it. So that's what I've been doing for the last 25, going on 30 years and about I don't know maybe five years into it, something like that. I was actually looking to add some people to the team and I'll let Bev pick it up from there cuz that's about the time she came aboard. [00:16:57] Bev Godby:  Maybe 23 years or whatever ago he was looking to add bandwidth. He had a particular application he wanted to do and so he said he was put out a call, like he was gonna hire some people. There must have been 20 people in the room that came for that informational meeting. And he decided, I guess he looked at a lot of factors, but of course, before he was gonna hire anybody, they were gonna go through giftedness.  You have to drink the Kool-Aid if you're gonna talk about it. So it was then that I got to go through the process myself. And this is honestly true. I just happened to be very uncommonly. Gifted to do the work that Bill had done, and I don't think I had any real clue about what he did before, except that I was interested when he had put out this call for people to work for him. I thought - that sounds really interesting to me. Now I know why. But it was a very, it's been a privilege. There were about five people at that time that was working for Bill, and I always think I'm the one that stayed, so now it's me and Bill, bill and I, and it works great because we each have a very different kind of giftedness, but we both share one piece, and that's something that we call impact. So we're trying to make a difference.  We have that shared vision for what this work is. We both have our own practice, but we get together for projects. Right now we're doing a couple putting giftedness in the, in two schools that are interested in, in, making this into a curriculum for their students and their teachers and parents. So that's been really fun. I can't think of anything that I have enjoyed more in my life. It just feels like I was always meant to do this work. Sometimes people ask me, don't you ever get tired of interviewing people and listening to their stories? And I'm about as incredulous as my father was when I was asked to speak to a faculty for a back-to-school retreat. And they said, the title of the retreat was going to be, how do we keep from making this just another year? And I thought I think I'll ask my dad about that because, , he's been doing this now for 57 years at the seminary. So if anyone, is just going through the motions, it would be him. But I knew he wasn't. So I went and talked to him about that and he just looked incredulous when I said, even posed that question to him, and he goes, how in the world could that be just the same? Nothing's the same. You got all new people in the room, and you just got so energized. And he goes and they got new questions, and they interact with the material so differently. And it just excites me to go and do every year because it could never be like the year before. And so it's, that is really what this work is like for me is every ti every day is a new person. So it couldn't better.   [00:20:11] Tommy Thomas: Let me give you a quote by Warren Bennis and I'm gonna date myself here cause Warren Bennis was writing back when I was in graduate school. This is an older quote, but I think it rings true. Too many companies believe people are interchangeable, truly gifted people, never are. They have unique talents. Such people cannot be forced into roles they're not suited for, nor should they be. Effective leaders allow great people to do the work they were born to do. [00:20:39] Bill Hendricks:  I agree with that a thousand percent. He didn't use the word giftedness, but when he uses the word doing what they were born to do, that's about the simplest definition of giftedness I'm aware of. Giftedness is basically what you're born to do. Everybody's born to do something for one person. They're born to solve a problem, never met a problem they didn't wanna solve somebody else. They're born to understand something at a very deep level. Somebody else, they're born to get people to respond to them and influence their behavior. We could go on and on all day about all the different forms of giftedness. There are, there's actually as many forms of giftedness as there are people, because every person really is unique. And if you put a person in a slot where they do what they're born to do, they work with tremendous energy and motivation, they need a whole lot less management. They just simply thrive and they're usually highly productive. And Bennis spot on there, in his assessment. [00:21:40] Tommy Thomas: Bev, do you have anything to add there? Bev Godby: I think that whenever you are talking to a person that is talking about their giftedness, a light goes on in their eyes. They just get excited telling you about it. And one, one of the reasons that makes the way that we get to get our data, because people come to us because something's not working in their life, usually it's work related. And so what we do is go back to their highlights tape. I call it, we have a, we're watching them in real life, doing what they've done all their life. They get about eight stories to us, tell us the details of it. And this very discreet pattern shows up. It is how they do what they do every time they're motivated. And we're, we are living in a time right now where there's a lot of emphasis on motivation.  There's all kinds of tests out there. Myers Briggs. Strength Finders, the new one now that's pretty popular with young people is Enneagram.. And these are all ways to use that same information, but they're first of all getting their information from the person. What do they like, what do they prefer? So that the test is as good as the person knows themselves. First of all, could they give that information? But secondly it's about comparing you to other people and putting you in a group and giving you a type. And The way that we do it, ours is not by asking people to tell us what they love to do, if they knew that they'd probably be doing a job where they did what they love to do. But we turn it on its head a little bit and we just capture them in the act of enjoying life. So we get to quote, watch them through their words, telling us about a time that they did something they really loved and did well. And what is really great about story is that it reveals us for who we are. So when they would tell eight stories, This very discreet pattern shows up, and there's a lot of pieces in there that the person could not tell us that's true about them. But when we hold up the mirror to them and say this is what you're, the data is telling us they see it a hundred percent. So it has a lot of power, maybe a lot more power than some of those other assessments out there, because it comes right out of their story. They know that we're telling them the truth, and moreover, we're telling them a truth that no one else really knows about them because they live inside their skin. So, they know what we're saying is a hundred percent true. So it gives us a lot of permission to help guide them. I think that's one of the reasons why this job is so satisfying for me, because this is still being a teacher. It's just a different classroom teacher. It's not that, but it's coming alongside of a person and really, Tommy, you're standing on holy ground. They're telling you something that is, they not be. So it's not only true about them, it has power. And I want them to see that, that it has value and that they are made this way on purpose, for purpose. So that's really the joy of the. . [00:25:10] Tommy Thomas: I tell people when we're talking about interviewing them, I, I tell them - as they're asking questions, look for the fire in somebody's eyes. Because when they're talking about something that that really plays into who they are and their strengths, their eyes will light up and they'll be an animation and that part of the interview that, that may not be present if they're just talking about something that they had to do. Next week, we'll pick up this conversation with Bill and Bev again. If you like what you're hearing, let me assure you, it gets better. If this conversation has piqued your interest in this thing called giftedness, visit thegiftednesscenter.com to learn more. That's thegiftednesscenter.com. In the transcript of this episode we'll have links to several books written by Bill Hendricks, as well as other writers on this thing called giftedness. Until next week, keep doing what you're doing to make the non-profit sector more effective and sustainable.   Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website Next Gen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas The Giftedness Center The Person Called You: Why You're Here, Why You Matter & What You Should Do With Your Life The Power of Uniqueness So How Do I Parent THIS Child? Discovering the Wisdom and the Wonder of Who Your Child Was Meant to Be   Connect Tommy Thomas - tthomas@jobfitmatters.com Tommy's LinkedIn Profile

Andy Katz talks with Linda Livingstone, president of Baylor University and the chair of the NCAA Board of Governors.

[00:00:00] Linda Livingstone: My dad passed away a number of years ago and at his funeral, many of his former players who played for him really in the 1950s and sixties and early seventies shared about the impact he had on their lives. And it was never about the basketball. It was always about the way they taught them to be, quality young men and to work hard and to have an impact beyond basketball. I think coaches that I've had that were the most impactful for ones that it wasn't all about the sport or about the basketball. It was about those life lessons that you learned maybe through sport, but that make you just a better person and better at whatever you're going to end up doing in life. Our guests today are Dr. Linda Livingstone, President of Baylor University and her daughter, Shelby Livingstone, Assistant Volleyball Coach at Liberty University.  Prior to establishing themselves on their respective career paths, both women excelled in intercollegiate athletics. Linda Livingstone was a four-year letter basketball player for Oklahoma State University. Shelby Livingstone was a fire-year letter volleyball player for Rice University. Join us today for a discussion with these two women about the role that intercollegiate athletics and the coaches in their lives help mold them into the leaders they are today. [00:00:46] Tommy Thomas: I am a firm believer that nonprofit leadership lessons can be learned from a lot of people in places. One of these is intercollegiate athletics.  Coaches can have a significant impact on a student athlete's life. Our guests today are living proof of that. Dr. Linda Livingstone is the President at Baylor University Before establishing herself as an academic leader, she was a four-year letter winner while playing basketball at Oklahoma State. Additionally, she is the first N C A female basketball letter winner to serve as president of a major division one university. Shelby Living Stone is the assistant volleyball coach at Liberty University. Before getting into coaching, Shelby established herself as a leader on the Rice University Al Volleyball team, where she totaled over 400 kills and 900 digs as an outside hitter. During her five-year career, academically, she was named the Conference USA Commissioner's Honor and earn Rice's Conference USA Spirit of Service Winter Award, and Scholar Athlete Volleyball Award. What a treat it is for me to have this mother-daughter duo with me today. Shelby and Linda, welcome to Next Gen Nonprofit Leadership [00:01:59] Linda Livingstone: We're glad to be with you. Thanks for having us, Tommy. [00:02:03] Tommy Thomas: Linda, you grew up in a home where your dad had played a prominent role in Oklahoma basketball. What was that like? [00:02:10] Linda Livingstone: He was a college basketball coach in Oklahoma as I was growing up. I don't know that as a child you really realize how prominent your parents are.  I didn't really realize how prominent he was in college basketball in Oklahoma, but I do know we grew up in the gym at Oklahoma State watching practices and playing in Gallagher, what was Gallagher Hall then. And so it was a great way to grow up and loved being in an athletic family with brothers that I got to play with as well as a dad that would take us to the gym at OSU. [00:02:35] Tommy Thomas: I guess it should be noted before we get too much further, there's another basketball star in the family. Brad, Linda's husband and Shelby's dad, was a three-year letter winner at Oklahoma State and then toured Europe with Athletes in Action. Shelby, what was it like being raised by two parents who had excelled as division one athletics? [00:02:54] Shelby Livingstone: It was really cool. Like my mom said, you don't really realize how cool your parents are until you get older and you're reminded of all the awesome things that they accomplished during their college basketball days. But yeah, it was normal. Like my parents played basketball, my grandparents played basketball, so similar to my mom. We were always in a gym, always playing sports. But they were great role models to look up to as I continued on in my athletic career, to see that my parents played college basketball, like that's something that I can accomplish as well. [00:03:29] Tommy Thomas: Did you feel any pressure to play basketball?  How did you get to volleyball? [00:03:35] Shelby Livingstone: That is a great question. I played basketball. I played pretty much every sport growing up, but my dad was my basketball coach. He's gonna hate that I'm saying this, but my dad was my middle school basketball coach, and I think that is what pushed me to play volleyball. It was a new sport that my parents didn't know a lot about. So I could come home and they wouldn't try to coach me on every little thing. I'm not sure that you did try, but it didn't [00:04:04] Linda Livingstone: I'm sure we tried, but it didn't really work very well. [00:04:05] Shelby Livingstone: Volleyball has less conditioning. There's not as much running, and so that was a very good plus as well.  But I think I wanted to try something new and branch out. [00:04:32] Tommy Thomas I read an article that said the role of a coach could be many and varied, from instructor to assessor to friend, mentor, facilitator, chauffer, demonstrator, advisor, supporter, fact finder, motivator, counselor, organizer, planner, and the fountain of all knowledge. When you two ladies, think about the coaches that got the most out of you Shelby, maybe just take me into that first. [00:04:40] Shelby Livingstone: As I finished my first kind of semester season of coaching, that those are so true. You really have to wear so many different hats.  I'm not sure I'm the fountain of all knowledge, but you definitely have to wear many different hats as a coach. And I think that being a coach now and having this be my full-time job has allowed me to look back on my coaches that I've had that have really. Me and pushed me to be the best version of myself. And I'm so much more grateful now than maybe I was as a student athlete. But when I look back on my college volleyball career at Rice University my head coach Jenny Volpe, looking back and in the moment, she stepped into those roles for me as just, she's a mother, she's a coach, she's a former athlete. And I'm just so grateful for the ways that she pushed me and she pushed. In ways that I didn't even know I could be pushed or wanted to be pushed to then allow me to achieve more than I ever thought was possible. And so I'm just really, I'm grateful for her and many coaches in my life to wear these hats and push me and love me so well. [00:05:54] Tommy Thomas: What about you, Linda? What do you remember? [00:05:56] Linda Livingstone: When I reflect on what Shelby just shared, and I look and I think about this list of qualities that you read to us, I really think that we expect a lot more of coaches now than we did probably when I played. I think we expect them to be more of supporters and advisors and friends. I don't think when I played that's necessarily how you thought about your coaches. I think you really thought about them much more of just what they did for you on the court and related to basketball. But I do know when I think about coaches that I've had, and my dad was a coach as well as you noted, and my dad passed away a number of years ago and at his funeral, many of his former players who played for him really in the 1950s and sixties and early seventies shared about the impact he had on their lives. And it was never about the basketball. It was always about the way they taught them to be, quality young men and to work hard and to have an impact beyond basketball. So I think coaches that I've had that were the most impactful for ones that it wasn't all about the sport or about the basketball. It was about those life lessons that you learned maybe through sport, but that make you just a better person and better at whatever you're going to end up doing in life. [00:07:09] Tommy Thomas: I read an article, it said that I was talking about the coaches process for providing feedback is a critical part to the success of the athlete.  I think proper feedback probably is an art form. and we see sometimes on TV and I guess this age of everything being captured that maybe we sometimes don't see the best of the art form. And maybe sometimes we do. But maybe to both of you, what do you remember about feedback that that you got from a respected coach?  What did that look like? [00:07:36] Linda Livingstone: Go ahead, Shelby. Okay. You had this experience much more recently than I have. [00:07:43] Shelby Livingstone: When I think about athletes, I think it's almost like having kids. Like I feel like I am 26 and I had 19 daughters. This year that I had to take care of. And you have to know each athlete in order to know the best way that they will receive feedback. Because the way that I talk to one athlete versus the way that I talk to another athlete is very different. And I think as a coach you can't. Give the, you can give really great feedback, but if they're not receiving it, and if you don't know who they are and how they'll best receive that feedback, then you'll never make any progress. They'll never really quite understand what you're saying to them. And so as I like enter my coaching career, I obviously look back on the coaches that have impacted me the most and I just look back on them and I see how much they knew me. Shelby living stone off of the volleyball court, and I see how much they knew me as Shelby outside of the weight room and outside of the track that we would condition on. And as soon as I understood and knew that my coaches knew me as more than just a student-athlete, but as a person, as a daughter, as a friend, as a student, then those are the moments that the feedback really takes root, and you can start to make really great change and progress within athletes. But that's, you have to take the time outside of the core, outside of the gym to get to know athletes and for them to know that you care about them, to then understand the proper routes. Feedback and to grow and to learn. , [00:09:26] Linda Livingstone: I was thinking about what Shelby said and it reminded me of an experience I had when I was in college at Oklahoma State playing basketball. And I think one of the other things, coaches that are good at providing feedback understand is when they make a mistake and don't provide feedback in the right way to the. to the student athlete. They acknowledge that and yeah, speak to that. I remember we were scrimmaging preseason and we were not playing well. And one of our assistant coaches just jumped on a couple of us really hard, and it was devastating because we were the kind of kids that just worked hard and always tried to do our best no matter what. And he later came back to both of us and apologized. He says, when I'm dealing with this other player, I know that I can say that to her and I can be on her like that and that's what's gonna get her to respond. But for you guys, I really should have approached you in a different way and used a different way of giving you the feedback that you needed. So while it was hard in that moment, I think the fact that assistant coach acknowledged that they'd given feedback in the wrong way and acknowledged how they should have done it was actually a really. Positive experience with that coach and their willingness to admit that they had made a mistake and could have done it better, I think was really impactful. And it's a great leadership lesson. We sometimes do make bad decisions as a leader, and we need to acknowledge that and be willing to let people know that and then move on. [00:10:46] Tommy Thomas: Take me to the best athletic team you were a part of and what made it so. [00:10:53] Shelby Livingstone: you can go first on this one. Mom. [00:10:55] Linda Livingstone: Oh gosh. I'm just trying to think back to some good teams I was on and my high school basketball team, we had a good teams in college as well, but my high school basketball team was really quite successful and we never quite made it to the state tournament, but we had some really good teams and, I think it was because, We liked each other. I actually went to a pretty small high school, so we were all really good friends besides being on the basketball team together, we liked each other. We respected each other. We had a coach that really brought us together as a team and motivated us, and he was really good about knowing. What each person's talent was and how to use them in the game properly to get the, to make the team the best they could be. Sometimes it's not always about the individual player and what you think is best, it's about what, how using that player is best for the team. And he was really good at that. And so I think because of that we had some really successful teams along the way and enjoyed being together as a team as well, which I think is really important. [00:11:56] Shelby Livingstone: I feel really lucky because I can look back on. Every single team that I've been on, and I could just talk for hours about how special those teams were, whether we won a championship or lost all of our matches that year. So I feel really lucky with the people that I've been able to play volleyball with. I got to go to the Final four with Baylor volleyball as a volunteer assistant coach, and that's an experience that as an athlete, I never thought I would be able to, sit on the sidelines of a game like that. But I'd have to say that my fifth year when I was at Rice, I. tore my ACL spring of my junior year going into what would've been my true senior year. So I had to red shirt my senior year. And honestly, that year was really hard and I never, I thought I might never see the volleyball chord again. Whether I got cleared to play or just wasn't gonna be the same volleyball player I was before my injury. And we, that was a hard year for our team. The year that I redshirted, we. Had a lot of drama and a lot of really hard conversations that year, and I thought that maybe our team wouldn't ever recover from that. And so coming back from my fifth year was really special because I earned the opportunity to be a sixth rotation outside hitter, which for volleyball is a really big deal and really awesome. And our team went through a lot of self-reflection to get to a place that honestly I didn't think we would be able to get back to as a loving, supportive community for one another. And that year we had 11 girls on our team, which for a volleyball team is really small. And so we just bonded together and whatever this season looks like, it's gonna be fun and we're gonna play with a lot of joy and we're gonna support each other through all of it. And I think with that attitude and. Just relieving, releasing everything that we had experienced the year before. We played with a lot of freedom, and we ended up winning our conference regular season tournament or championship, and our conference tournament, and we made it to the NCAA Tournament, and it was just the perfect bow on top of my college volleyball career. And I got to do it with my best friends. And I got to do it in a year that I wasn't promised and didn't think I would. Get when I started at Rice. And so I'll forever be grateful for those 11 girls on that team and for our coaching staff and just the way that we could have lost every match that year and I think it would've still been a really special year, but we ended up winning a championship, so that was a great memory to think back on. [00:14:28] Tommy Thomas: Both of you are women of faith and have an abiding faith. I'm always curious, and I asked myself that question a lot, how does faith and competition mix? [00:14:38] Linda Livingstone: When I think about that because I know a lot of people struggle with that, and Shelby's the one with the port Ministry Master of Divinity and Sport Ministry, so she can talk about it probably from a much deeper theological perspective than I can. But what I think about is that as Christians, we are really called to be good stewards of the talents and gifts that God has given us. And if those happen to be athletic gifts, then we really should strive to be the best we can be athletically, and then to use that athletic talent to have an impact for Christ in the world. I think would mean playing your best, being as competitive as you can, being the best team member that you can. Being the best example you can be to those that are watching you . And so I think that does feed into being a great competitor but doing it in the right way, in a way that's honoring to Christ. And so I think about it as a stewardship aspect of being a Christian. But Shelby probably has other thoughts beyond. No, [00:15:37] Shelby Livingstone: I love that. And I would add I would just add to that as a Christian, I would say that my motivation in all things that I do comes from love, and it comes from the example of love that Jesus sets for us in the gospel. So, whether I'm playing my sport or I'm talking to my friends, or I'm driving down the road, all that I do. Should be coming from a place of love, and I fail at this every single day, but that's the goal that I enter into each day with. And so as an athlete, as a competitor, I want my motivation to be from love. If I'm competing through the love of Jesus, then. I think that's a great way to share the gospel with other people. I think the court, the field, the pool is a great way to share the gospel through using our talents, using the gifts that God has given us to spread his joy and his love through everyone that we come into contact with. I think if we're going into competition with, This base of love with this motivation of love, then it can be used so well to further the Kingdom of God here. [00:16:49] Tommy Thomas: It's often said that a game is won or lost in the locker room before the game starts. Do either one of you have any memories of a good pre-game speech? [00:17:02] Shelby Livingstone: There are some good ones. Yeah, I think that for the most part, my coaches and when I was at Rice and when I was at Baylor and now at Liberty, the locker room pre-game talks are like your last second chance to remind the players of your 3, 4, 5 most important things. It's like your last refresh before you take the big test that is the match. And so I definitely remember some like big rah-rah locker room moments before a big conference rival match before we would play Western Kentucky at Rice or Texas at Baylor. But I think the locker room, the pre-game locker room talks are really just like your last moment to go over a couple last things to remind your players of what they'll be seeing on the other side of the court. And my favorite thing about pre-game locker room talks at Baylor and Liberty is the time that we get to pray before we go out onto the court. I think it's just a great way to, for our girls to recenter themselves to be reminded why they're playing, what motivates them. And so honestly, that's what gets me fired up about matches is the times that we get to sit together and just pray for joy before our matches. [00:18:16] Linda Livingstone: Here at Baylor, there's a famous story of Grant Teaff, our football coach for years. He's retired now. And he gave a motivational talk and I don't remember if it was pre-game or at halftime and he ate a worm and it's this legendary motivational story. So I have to say, I never had any coaches do anything quite like that when I was pre-game or at to get us inspired. But I think Shelby's right, that it's really whatever it takes for that particular game or match or competition. Given who you're playing to get the team focused on the things they have to do in that event to do their best, to have the best opportunity to win. And I think really good coaches know what you need in the moment prior to a particular game or match to get the most out of their players. And it may be something different each game, depending on who you're playing and what you've gotta do to beat that team. [00:19:06] Tommy Thomas: Linda you've had a few more years of experience than Shelby and you've moved up through the ranks of Dean of three business schools.  Now you're a university president. What skills or competencies do you think you use most as a president? [00:19:22] Linda Livingstone: Yeah. There's a lot that go, goes into being a president and I think first and foremost, you really have to approach a job like this that has the scope and breadth and depth that a university presidency has from a very mission centered perspective, and I think this is with any type of organization, you have to really say, okay, what's the mission of our institution and what do I have to do as the president to help ensure that everything we do is consistent with our mission? And in my view, what really is important there is alignment. Alignment from our Board of Regents to me, to my leadership team, to our deans and on down through the faculty and staff. And so hiring the right people is critical to me. I, everybody always asks me, what's the most important thing as a president? I said, you've gotta put the right team there with you to help lead the organization. I can't do everything. There's some things I'm good at, there's some things I'm not so good at, and I've gotta put together a team because this is a complex organization, it's a large organization, and I need a team with diverse skills that all care deeply about the mission to make sure that we get it done and do it well, and then that we have alignment with our board and with our faculty and so on. And so I think hiring the right people and then helping them to be successful. If my team is successful, then our institution is going to be successful. So, my job is to make sure that they have the resources and the support that they need to do their job well so that Baylor can be success. [00:20:55] Tommy Thomas: If I came to staff meeting week after next and we excused, you and I got a chance to talk with your cabinet, what do you think they would say would be the most challenging aspect of working for Dr. Livingstone? [00:21:06] Linda Livingstone: You're always welcome to come, Tommy. I'd be happy to let you have some time with my team. They're a wonderful group of people. It's an interesting question. I would say I'm. a pretty resilient person, and I have a really positive attitude and I love what I do.  I love the work that I do. So there's not a lot that kind of gets me down even in really difficult situations. I really seek to have a positive attitude and look for the good in things. And I think there's a lot of good in that, but I also think that it can sometimes cause me to maybe miss when somebody on my team, experiencing a lot of stress or some difficulty in the work that they're doing. And because sometimes that's not how I would react to something. So I have to really pay attention and frankly, have people, remind me occasionally that this vice president maybe needs a little bit of encouragement, or they're really struggling with something right now, so we might need to provide them with some additional support. So I think it's a conscientiousness on my part that I may miss sometimes of the struggles they're going through and what they're finding hard and maybe even that they don't always want me to know because they think I might not have that same reaction and I don't want that at all. I want to know when they need my support and my help. [00:22:19] Tommy Thomas: On the flip side of, what do you think that would say is the most rewarding aspect? [00:22:23] Linda Livingstone: I hope they would say the flip side of that last question is that they feel like I support them, that I've got their backs and that I'm doing everything I can to help them and their teams to be successful. And that frankly we build a good culture within my leadership of support and care for one another. Again, all in service to the mission. [00:22:45] Tommy Thomas: Shelby, if I came to volleyball practice when you returned to campus in a couple weeks, and what words and phrases do you think your team would say that would best describe you as an assistant coach? [00:22:57] Shelby Livingstone: Oh, man. I I hope that they would say that they know that I love them and that I care about them and that my door is always open. Whether they're experiencing joy or sadness or hardship, that Shelby is a coach that we can always go to and she will listen. I feel like a lot of my job is listening, which I love. I love listening to people's stories. I love hearing about people's successes, but also sitting with people and their hardships and moments of loss. And so I feel as if I'm super lucky that these girls. really invited me into deep pieces of their lives, and I've only been there for a little over five or six months. And so I hope that they can see how much I care about them because as an athlete, I didn't realize how much my coaches cared about me until I graduated and got to know them on a different level than my coaches.  I wish that I had experienced my coaches like that because I know that they cared about us in that way. And so I hope that when my athletes and my girls see me, that's what they feel and experience as their assistant coach. . [00:24:13] Linda Livingstone: And I can actually tell you that I know that's how they feel, Tommy, because we've got to go to several of Shelby's tournaments and games this year, and the girls would come up to us and just tell us how much they loved Shelby, how happy they were that she was there. Parents would come up to us and. Say the same thing. So we were very proud parents because they just couldn't say enough about the impact Shelby had, not just on the team, but on the girls or the their daughters personally. So it was very affirming and consistent with what I think she hopes they say, because that's what they're actually saying about her. [00:24:54] Tommy Thomas: Shelby, how close is the reality of the job, to which you might have thought it was going to be? [00:24:59] Shelby Livingstone: That's a great question because I think as an athlete you don't realize all that your coaches do. You see them at practice and you think that's all that goes in to their day is just being at a two or three hour practice. It's definitely been a huge learning curve. Just knowing with recruiting. With scouting other teams, planning practices, all the travel that's involved with recruiting.  There's definitely a steep learning curve. But I'm super grateful that I have great people around me to help me learn. But I think the most surprising piece of being a coach is I am thoroughly convinced after my first semester of coaching, Every coach needs some sort of counseling or seminary ministry degree, because I felt like most, more than maybe 50% of my job this past semester was like I talked about earlier, just sitting with the girls, just listening to them, hearing their hearts, getting to know them, helping them through tough times, and honestly, that's what draws me to coaching. That is really what gets me excited is just living life with these young women. And I really think that my seminary degree, I used it a lot. My counseling classes that I was able to take and honestly not to know the answers, not to these girls' problems, but more so just to listen, to know when to be silent, to know when they just need someone to talk to. And so that was probably the most, the thing that I didn't realize was such a big part of coaching is the relational piece of it, the counseling piece of it to just. And listen to the girls and be there for them in hard times because being a college student is hard. Being a college student athlete is hard. And so I am just grateful for that piece as well. But it was definitely an more unexpected piece of my first coaching experience. [00:27:10] Tommy Thomas: Linda, what's the most maybe the hardest, the most difficult decision you've had to make in your career, and how did you come out of it? [00:27:17] Linda Livingstone: I'm going to mention two things, Tommy, because they're very different.  I think one of the hardest things you have to do and that I've had to do several times is of remove people from jobs. People that I knew well and liked well, and maybe even that I'd put in that job at one point or another but recognize that their time in that role needed to end and we needed to move on to somebody else. And that's extremely difficult to do particularly when you love people a lot but it's the right thing to do for the best of the organization. So that's, some of the hardest decisions I've ever made. The other one is one that so many and so many organizations had to deal with during Covid in Spring of 2020, March of 2020, we had to make the decision to go fully online to shut down our campus as we went into Covid we were at the Big 12 basketball tournament.  We had to make the decision to shut down that tournament. So many organizations had to make such hard decisions with limited information during Covid and that decision. And then many decisions that followed that over the next year and a half or so. We're just really hard ones. And we've tried to focus as a team on some overarching values. The health and safety and wellbeing of our students, faculty and staff had to be the highest priority. The ongoing sustainability of our educational efforts and mission through all of that had to be a high priority, and so every decision we made, We tried to tie it back to some of those overarching goals and values, and it was hard when you had limited information, but when you've got a great team that are all committed to the same thing and trying to make it work it turned out well for us. But those were really, those were hard and difficult decisions that had huge life impact on so many people. [00:28:57] Tommy Thomas: What about you, Shelby? [00:29:00] Shelby Livingstone: Yeah. I would say that the hardest decision was going to Liberty.  I had been living in Waco for the past three years. I had been living in Texas since I started at Rice, and I wasn't looking to leave the state of Texas. And I had, I just felt like I had it all in Waco. I had great friends, great community but once the job at Liberty came to my attention and I started learning more about it, and I met the head coach, and I met this other assistant coach and I met some of the girls. It was one of those things that, yes, like taking the step out and moving to Virginia and leaving everything that you know is going to be really hard and it's going to be challenging, and I really didn't wanna do it at first, but I knew that. I was just really excited about the growth that I knew was going to come from this challenging new opportunity that was placed in front of me. And I never wanted to look back and think, man, I just stayed with something that was so safe instead of going out and trying something new. I never wanted to regret and look back and wish that I had gone out. [00:30:15] Shelby Livingstone: Cause I think of any time in my life to do something and to go out and try something new right now in my mid-twenties is the time to do that. And so definitely taking the step of faith to go to Liberty was really challenging and hard. But I think in the end, and so far it's turned. So and has just pushed me and allowed me to grow in new ways that I never expected. Maybe ways that I didn't want to be pushed and to grow, but that I look back and I'm so grateful for, and I'm so excited to see how my time at Liberty and in Lynchburg continues to not only push me, but how then I can help and push my athlete. [00:31:02] Tommy Thomas: I listen to Alan Alda's podcast, Clear and Vivid quite a bit, and he always closes by getting people to respond to quotes. [00:31:10] Tommy Thomas: And his quotes are usually about communication since that's his business. Maybe mine are a little different. So I like to throw these two quotes at the two of you and respond from the chair in which you sit. The first one, Thomas Edison famously said, genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. [00:31:32] Shelby Livingstone: Okay. I really, I like this quote because I think especially in athletics you got to work hard. You have to put in the time in the gym, in the weight room, on the track to achieve the goals, achieve the championships, do the things that you want to be doing. And I've known athletes who are just super athletic, but they don't put that time in. They have all these goals, but they think they can just cruise by and achieve all the things that they want to without the perspiration, without the hard moments, without the hours and hours of extra time in the gym. And I wasn't one of those athletes. I had to put in all the extra work to achieve the things athletically that I wanted to achieve, and. I think it's just this idea of grit, and I think grit is really something that can separate an athlete from an athlete and a team from a team and a championship level team, from a not championship level team. And so when I look at our team at Liberty, when I look at the teams I've been on, it's. The teams that achieved more than maybe was expected are the teams that had a goal, had this idea of what they wanted their season to look like, but it didn't just stop there. [00:32:49] Shelby Livingstone: They went out and they did the extra reps and they took the extra time in the weight room. And then those were the teams that were able to achieve all that they wanted to, not because of the 1%, but because of the 99% that they pushed themselves farther than other people. [00:33:08] Tommy Thomas: Frederick Wilcox said, progress always involves risk. You can't steal second base by keeping your foot on first. [00:33:18] Linda Livingstone: So I think about my job as a leader. An awful lot of what I do is calculate that risk, reward, trade off, right? Because almost every decision you make, there's risk involved in it, and you have to determine whether that risk is worth the potential reward. Using the analogy that Wilcox used, the first base coach does not always send that player to second base. They make a calculated decision about how important it is it that we get to second base right now. Who's the runner that's on first base? Who's the pitcher? Who's the catcher?  What are the chances they're going to get there? How important is it right now, at this particular time, that they actually get to second base? Is that going to really help us win this game? I think those are the kind of calculations you make every single day as a leader is you have to take risk to make progress, but you have to be smart about when to take the risk and how to take it to give you the best opportunity for success in that particular moment, given the circumstances. It's a great quote and it's really important and it's one that as a leader, we spend a lot of time working on is that risk reward calculation. ********************* Thanks to Shelby and Linda Livingstone for taking time from their holiday schedule to be with us today. As you can see from their lives, the coaches they have had have played a big role in helping them become the leaders they are today. If you're new to the podcast and enjoy the theme, the coaches in my life, you might enjoy the conversation I had with Brody Croyle the former quarterback for the University of Alabama and Kansas City Chiefs and Dr. Terry Franson, prominent track and field coach who coached 123 NAIA, All Americans, 81 national championships and eight Olympians. In an upcoming episode we'll be talking with Jimmy Mellado, the President & CEO of Compassion International.  In addition to discussing leadership and board service we'll discuss jimmy's life as an Olympic athlete.   Links and Resources JobfitMatters Website Next Gen Nonprofit Leadership with Tommy Thomas Baylor University Liberty University   Connect Tommy Thomas - tthomas@jobfitmatters.com Tommy's LinkedIn Profile Tommy's Twitter Profile

#Baylor President @LindaLivings joins the show to discuss why she believes congress needs to be involved in taming NIL, what's the realistic timeline to hear from congress, how the #NCAA's failures have led to this moment, & more.

Today, we're continuing the conversation with mark McQueen, City Manager, Panama City, Florida. Last week we discussed Mark's leadership journey from 2nd Lieutenant to Two Star General in the United States Army.  This week Mark is talking to us about Hurricane Michael.  He had been on the job less than two weeks when Hurricane Michael came ashore in Panama City. [00:00:09] Tommy Thomas: On October the 10th, 2018, Mark's life along with countless thousands of lives on the Florida Panhandle was changed forever. Hurricane Michael made landfall! [00:00:21] Tommy Thomas: Rather than get in the way with too many questions, I'm going to let Mark walk us through Michael's approach, landfall and recovery. [00:00:29] Mark McQueen: Thank you Tommy. That certainly was a a fateful time in this community October 10th, 2018. And what was interesting about that on that day is Nobody really saw it coming. [00:00:39] Mark McQueen: It the formulation of the storm happened exceptionally rapidly. I can remember it was coming back from Auburn on Sunday afternoon after attending my niece's wedding on Saturday, on Sunday afternoon, my wife and I were driving back home in on the radio as we were coming through Dothan. We heard, hey, there's a little tropical wave down in off the coast of the Yucatan. I was like, okay, that's interesting. No big deal. Tropical depression, excuse me. Down off the coast of the Yucatan, no big deal. Nothing to really think of. By Monday there was of a little bit of scuttlebutt. It might turn into a hurricane category one. didn't think anything much of that because, this community's gone through storms after storm, just like most of Florida has. [00:01:20] Mark McQueen: Then by Tuesday it was like, okay, this is going to be a hurricane, might be a two, could grow to a three. And so that starts getting folks attention. And I can remember it was that Tuesday morning we had a a commission meeting. It was my very first commission meeting and there it was. Very few people there. By that morning, . Sure enough, it was growing very rapidly. And the county our county government had declared a state of emergency and evacuation. So it, it had gone from this little tropical depression on a Sunday afternoon by Tuesday morning. It was mandatory evacuations and multiple places within the city and Bay County here in the panhandle of Florida. Sure enough the next day we had Hurricane Michael hit us and hit us pretty hard. And it was it was mostly a wind event, although there was a significant tropical or excuse me, significant rain and storm surge that took place particularly to the east of the eye of the storm hitting our dear sister, city of Mexico Beach very hard with about. 17- or 18-foot storm surge and wiped off the face of the earth that entire city. And they're having a, they're doing a phenomenal job of rebuilding. But the point I guess I'm trying to make is that for, it was like an F five tornado that sat on top of the city for about four hours and we lost all water, all sewer, all power, all communications. It was total blackout and that lasted for at least two weeks before we got power restored. In the interim what was interesting Verizon is the. Predominant cellular carrier in the area. I think they had it somewhere between 85-87%  of the market share for this area.  And they took it on the chin because they're a fiber based type of communication system. And we found out that there was a. At and t and some of the others sprint and T-Mobile had some ability to continue to operate, but very few people had those phones. So communicating with citizens, communicating with staff, communicating with each other, and other governments other city governments and county governments was very difficult. [00:03:29] Mark McQueen: Extremely difficult. And like I said, it was just pitch black at night and no water, no sewer, no nothing. And a as we emerged from that storm we had about a million trees that were da uprooted and all over the city. And we're talking large trees, a hundred, 150, 2000-year-old pine trees that were here and a hundred year old Oak Century Oaks all over the place. [00:03:53] Mark McQueen: And we had trains that were laying on their side, railroad trains that were laying on their sides. It was just massive destruction to. . And as I shared earlier that it felt like for me being on another deployment, in a war-torn country, and that was okay.  We've gotta get on with this. We've got to find a way. First and foremost is meet the needs of our citizens. Safety and security, getting them food and water helping them in their current condition because their homes were decimated. Their lives were totally. Different than they were just four hours earlier. And that became the focus of what we did to meet the immediate needs. But as you're meeting the immediate needs of your citizens, the same thing as you've got to start charting simultaneously and unparallel, where are you going? What is your future direction for how you're going to recover the city? [00:04:45] Mark McQueen: And working out of a very grateful to Verizon that gave us a a emergency trailer that we could work out of. The mayor and I and a couple of the staff, we started banging out what our vision would be for the city is we wanted to emerge from the storm. And so eventually the whole point was to create this strategic campaign strategy for how we were going to rebuild the city while simultaneously meeting the immediate needs of our citizens. That was very difficult. Very difficult because our city employees were. also harmed by the storm. And so for the city employees that are essential workers, you depend on all of your city employees. Doesn't matter what your municipality is, but for your water lines, your sewer lines, your police, your fire all of the functions that city government does. All of those employees were, their homes were destroyed and uprooted and lives were forever changed. And so helping them, To get in temporary lodging so that they could help the citizens was so important so that we could start the recovery efforts and clearly very fortunate Governor Scott at the time. And then within a few weeks we had a statewide election and Governor DeSantis, who is just in a phenomenal job of helping us in recovery from Hurricane Michael. There was an enormous commitment from the state to bring in outside resources to help. So please fire emergency services and then the benevolence of nonprofits organizations, faith-based organizations that would pour it into this community. [00:06:17] Mark McQueen: To help us in our great time of needs. It was classic neighbors helping neighbors and doing it for the absolute right reasons. Not for attention, not for any notoriety, not for any game. It was just people coming from all over the United States coming to this community to help us in our darkest hour. And so as a result of that, it was just a, it was really. Transformative time for the city and forever changed the direction that the city was going on going in pre-storm to post storm. Coming out of the storm we had the desire to become the premier city in the Panhandle of Florida. [00:06:56] Mark McQueen: That's our stated objective. And why not? We're the largest city between Tallahassee and Pensacola. We have attributes going for us in terms of the industrial base, the intercoastal waterway, the medical capacity, financial institutions, education institutions commerce corridors, and nonetheless are citizens, the great asset of this community and And so from that we focused on four things, and this is very akin to a lot of the campaign strategy that we used in the military. So, number one, priority, safety and security of our people, their property and the environment.  We worked really hard to maintain that safety and security, and we continue to do to. [00:07:33] Mark McQueen: So to this day, the second thing we focused on is the infrastructure, the key and vital infrastructure, the water, the sewer, storm drain systems, the roadway networks all of those things that are vital to create the connective tissue and support of the essential services in support of our citizens and businesses. The third thing we're focusing on is the economy. Making, rebuilding an economy to make it more robust and resilient, to be that creating that irreversible momentum of the economy to continue to grow in. The fourth is gonna be quality of life that which knits people together, enriches people's lives and all the dimensions of that, whether it's parks and recreation to marinas, to walkability, bikeability, the arts, the history, the culture houses of worship, all of those things are necessary to set the conditions for becoming the premier city in the panhandle. [00:08:22] Tommy Thomas: As you think you had to deal with FEMA and the federal and state government drawing back on your military experience what was the lessons that you brought forward as you had to go make your appeal for the funding and probably face rejection?  I'm sure two or three times along the way before you begin to get it. [00:08:42] Mark McQueen: Yeah. The US Congress established through the Stafford Act, the funding mechanism for FEMA to be able to exist, and I will tell you that FEMA is full of great Americans that are committed to helping rebuild communities after an emergency declaration. What's interesting, I did learn is that there, there are roughly about 50 to 60 federally declared disasters across the United States and all of its territories every single year. And so, it's a massive effort that FEMA has to deal with. Every year to support the citizens of this great nation, and they are great citizens. I think that over time the bureaucracy has just grown to become such a behemoth that it's not very efficient or effective in getting things done nimbly. and with agility. You asked what was the difference between this experience and my military experience? And in many cases, you could rebuild foreign countries faster than you can build, rebuild your own community in the United States of America. And it's not because of anything else other than the massive amount of bureaucracy and review and process that has to be employed by FEMA to ensure that. correctly and appropriately being good stewards of the federal taxpayer's dollars. I'm not throwing a rock at them, it's just, it's massively bureaucratic, which, here we are four, four years post storm and we're clearly still in recovery and will be for probably four or five more years to be able to rebuild our city. [00:10:22] Mark McQueen: And it's, wildly expensive. But with, again, if the people have no vision, they will perish. And we had to strike that vision. That's why we're gonna be the premier city in the Panhandle Florida. And the four lines of efforts of everything we're doing is pouring into rebuilding our city to be that premier. [00:10:42] Tommy Thomas: What was the nearest thing in your military experience that, that approximated Michael? [00:10:47] Mark McQueen: Just been in three areas. Certainly Bosnia. After to implement the Dayton Peace Accords. So you had the warring factions there. Been over to Afghanistan, certainly Iraq very much very akin, very different environment. But nonetheless, when you have communities that have been destroyed through war. or through natural disasters, the end result is chaos and disruption of life. And there's a lot of parallels there.  Fortunately, bullets aren't flying here in the United States and certainly not in Panama City. What we're doing is we're fundamentally rebuilding, and that's a very akin to what I experienced being in those deployments Additionally, I shared earlier about one of the things we were involved in was humanitarian assistance operations. And that was very formative in my military career and certainly coming out of Hurricane Michael. Certainly, in the initial months it was about humanitarian assistance. How do you meet the immediate needs of people in their greatest time of need? And how do you help? International organizations now non-profit organizations, private volunteer organizations, faith-based organizations to help them to get resources to people in their time of need. It's it was challenging to be sure but clearly the experience in the, my journey, my walk, my experience in the United States Army certainly helped me personally to be aware of some of the issues that may come up and how you can help better meet the needs of your citizens, not only their immediate needs. [00:12:17] Mark McQueen: Their long-term needs, which would be having a society in a city that would be able to help them to get their kids back in school, help them to be able to get their businesses back up and running. Help them to be able to get their homes reestablished, getting their lives back to a sense of new normal that they would be experiencing. [00:12:38] Tommy Thomas: So, is there a playbook now or anything that y'all have developed post mihael that that you would turn to? the next time [00:12:46] Mark McQueen: around.  It's it is funny you asked that, Tommy, because just about five or six weeks ago, our dear neighbors to this in South Florida were hit by Hurricane Ian, an incredible storm that had catastrophic damage to the peninsula of the southern p southwest corner of the state of Florida and certainly the peninsula. And went on up into the car, Georgia and the Carolinas. And the mayor and I were asked to go down to Fort Myers Beach and help that community. That got hit pretty hard because of Hurricane Ian. And that's exactly what we did, Tommy, is we took our playbook and said here are lessons that we've learned. Here are things that we're recommending that you look at doing that worked well for us that will help you to set the conditions for your success in recovery. And we spent a lot of time helping them in those initial weeks and have continued to do so in the in. Lee County area. In fact there was a team from my police department that here we are, like I said, six weeks after the storm, I think it may be seven weeks. And we're still sending folks down there. We sent a team of our law enforcement teammates to go on down to Sanibel Island to help them as they opened up the island to allow citizens to start getting on with recovery on of their homes and their businesses. Yeah, there is a playbook and it establishes a framework for how to rebuild after a catastrophic event such as a hurricane. And not that it's a cookie cutter, but it sure gives you a framework and some general guidelines of how you may want to consider recovering. And we absolutely wanted to share that with our dear neighbors to the South that suffered so badly from Hurricane Ian. [00:14:23] Tommy Thomas: I can relate to Mark's comments about have we, we're not expecting a huge hurricane. My wife, Nancy and I had moved to the beach a couple of weeks before. For hurricane Michael hit. I remember Nancy coming in one afternoon saying we should evacuate. At first, I didn't take her very seriously, but as we listened to the radio and talk to people in the area, we decided that was best. The nearest pet friendly accommodations were at the Hampton Inn in Auburn. So we packed up a few clothes. But Bella and snowball into the truck and drove north. Words can't describe what we returned to. The Florida Panhandle is four years into rebuilding from Hurricane Michael. There are still scars from the damage that Michael inflicted on the area, but we are recovering. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to Mark and the other government and civic leaders who stepped up big time in the aftermath of Michael. Next week we continue the subsidiaries. The Coaches in my Life our guests are Dr. Linda Livingstone, the president of Baylor university and Shelby Livingstone (her daughter) who is the Assistant Volleyball Coach at Liberty University. Both women excelled in intercollegiate athletics in their undergraduate days, they will be sharing with us some of the life and leadership lessons they learned from The Coaches in Their Lives.

3:05pm-Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President3:45pm-Grayson Grundhoefer, SicEm365 Recruiting Coordinator4:30pm-Jared Nuness, Baylor Men's Basketball Asst. Coach5:05pm-Phil Bennett, North Texas Interim Football Coach5:55pm-Paul Catalina's "Top 5"

#Baylor President @LindaLlivings joins the show to preview the Armed Forces Bowl against Air Force, the NCAA naming Charlie Baker its new President, the importance of getting a leader with a background in politics, & more.

Andy Katz talks with Dr. Linda Livingstone, president of Baylor and the newly named chair of the NCAA Board of Governors, about what the Board is focusing on for the academic year and the process for hiring a new president of the NCAA.

Linda Livingstone 08-08-2022

Kurt returns to recap Big 12 Media Days, especially new commissioner Brett Yormark's introductory press conference in Arlington. Plus, 1-on-1's with Baylor president Linda Livingstone and CBS Sports national writer Shehan Jeyarajah. Twitter: @KurtsKorner_ | @KurtisQuillin Facebook: Kurt's Korner | Kurtis Quillin New Big 12 commissioner: "I'm actively engaged in realignment." Understanding why the Big 12 opted for Yormark as commissioner

Linda Livingstone 07-13-2022

#Baylor President @LindaLlivings joins the show to discuss the hire of new #Big12 Commissioner Brett Yormark, the future of the conference, navigating NIL, & more. #SicEm

3:20pm-Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President4:45pm-Ahman Dixon, Philadelphia Stars Safety5:05pm-Phil Bennett, North Texas Defensive Coordinator5:30pm-Jon Machota, TheAthletic.com (Cowboys/NFL)5:55pm-Paul Catalina's "Top 5"

3:30pm-Max Olson The Athletic4:00pm-Mitch Thompson, MCC Head Baseball Coach5:00pm-Linda Livingstone, Baylor University President (replay)

#Baylor President Linda Livingstone (@LindaLlivings) joined the show to discuss her roles with the NCAA and the Big 12, plus how Baylor is moving forward with construction projects and in other ways

3:30pm-Greg Shaheen, Former NCAA Senior Vice President4:00pm-Vann McElroy, All-Pro and All-American Safety (Uvalde Native)4:30pm-Nicole Auerbach, TheAthletic.com5:00pm-Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President5:55pm-Paul Catalina's "Top 5"

Linda Livingstone 05-25-2022

Joe Mogila joins Game Time to discuss his proposal for a 48hr recruituing plan, Super League prospal, the job of Mack Rhoades and Linda Livingstone at #Baylor, the current state of college athletics, will he try to replace Mark Emmert & more.

Brittney Griner, former Baylor women's basketball player under KIm Mulkey, has been detained in Russia since the middle of February. The former All-American and best player in the nation, Griner was held by Russian officials after a vape was found in her luggage at the airport that contained illegal substances. How did she end up in Russian prison, where is she now and why aren't we really talking about it? President Linda Livingstone may not be at Baylor much longer. She is on the NCAA's shortlist of replacements for Mark Emmert as the organization's next president. Not only that, she is also in murmurs for the Big 12 commissionership as well. What qualifies Dr. Livingstone for these gigs and what are the odds she ends up leaving the university to accept a larger national or regional role? And jerseys. The Baylor football uniforms are already due for an upgrade. Yes, Nike just released a rebranding for the university, but it is time to get those gold uniforms out of town. Did I say gold? Drake makes the case that yellow, or even highlighter-yellow, would be a better description for those monstrosities. Something needs to be done. Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Built Bar Built Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you'll get 15% off your next order. BetOnline BetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts! Rock Auto Amazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Brittney Griner, former Baylor women's basketball player under KIm Mulkey, has been detained in Russia since the middle of February. The former All-American and best player in the nation, Griner was held by Russian officials after a vape was found in her luggage at the airport that contained illegal substances. How did she end up in Russian prison, where is she now and why aren't we really talking about it?President Linda Livingstone may not be at Baylor much longer. She is on the NCAA's shortlist of replacements for Mark Emmert as the organization's next president. Not only that, she is also in murmurs for the Big 12 commissionership as well. What qualifies Dr. Livingstone for these gigs and what are the odds she ends up leaving the university to accept a larger national or regional role?And jerseys. The Baylor football uniforms are already due for an upgrade. Yes, Nike just released a rebranding for the university, but it is time to get those gold uniforms out of town. Did I say gold? Drake makes the case that yellow, or even highlighter-yellow, would be a better description for those monstrosities. Something needs to be done.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you'll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

With the thrill of March Madness in full swing, the dotEDU hosts are focusing their policy talk on all things sports. Linda Livingstone, president of basketball powerhouse Baylor University, joins the podcast to break down how the NCAA is working to change with the times, its recent shift on issues such as name, image and likeness (NIL), and how the recently adopted NCAA constitution will affect student-athletes moving forward. Jon, Sarah, and Mushtaq also discuss how institutions are helping Ukrainian students studying in the U.S., as well as the FY 2022 appropriations bill recently signed by President Biden and what that means for higher ed. **Tweet suggestions, links, and questions to @ACEducation or podcast@acenet.edu.   Here are some of the links and references from this week's show: Letter to State and DHS Requesting Support for Ukrainian Students and Scholars https://www.acenet.edu/Documents/Letter-State-Ukrainian-students-022822.pdf   Biden Signs Major Spending Bill That Includes $400 Increase for Pell Grants https://www.acenet.edu/News-Room/Pages/Biden-Signs-Major-Spending-Bill.aspx   NCAA adopts interim name, image and likeness policy https://www.ncaa.org/news/2021/6/30/ncaa-adopts-interim-name-image-and-likeness-policy.aspx   NCAA members approve new constitution https://www.ncaa.org/news/2022/1/20/media-center-ncaa-members-approve-new-constitution.aspx   President Livingstone's Congressional Testimony: “A Level Playing Field: College Athletes' Rights to Their Name, Image, and Likeness” https://energycommerce.house.gov/committee-activity/hearings/hearing-on-a-level-playing-field-college-athletes-rights-to-their-name   President Livingstone's Written Testimony: https://energycommerce.house.gov/sites/democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/files/documents/Witness%20Testimony_Livingstone_CPC_2021.09.30.pdf

3:15pm-Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President3:45pm-Grayson Grundhoefer, SicEm365 Recruiting Analyst4:05pm-C.J. Moore, TheAthletic.com College Basketball Writer4:20pm-Mitch Sherman, TheAthletic.com College Football Writer5:00pm-Alvin Brooks III, Baylor Men's Basketball Asst. Coach5:55pm-Paul Catalina's "Top 5"

.@LindaLlivings discusses the new NCAA constitution presented at the NCAA convention yesterday and breaks down what the new governance will mean for everyone involved

Linda Livingstone 09-14-2021

.@Baylor President @LindaLlivings discusses the decision for the @Big12Conference to expand and how it will affect @BaylorAthletics

Months of preparations for an in-person fall semester have led to the arrival of Baylor students on campus for the start of classes Monday, August 24. In this Baylor Connections, President Linda Livingstone goes deep inside the process of welcoming students back to campus safely, preparing meaningful modes of class instruction both virtually and in-person, readying Baylor's physical spaces for students and more.

3:10pm-Ron Roberts, Baylor D.C., Terrel Bernard, Baylor Linebacker (Sound Bites3:45pm-Grayson Grundhoefer, SicEm365.com4:15pm-Dr. Linda Livingstone, Baylor President4:30pm-Ryan Black, The Manhattan Mercury Sports Editor 4:45pm-Roger Masters, Hubbard High Football Coach5:30 PM-Shelia Henderson, Marlin ISD Athletic Director.

.@Baylor President Dr. Linda Livingstone (@lindalivings) joins @SicEm365Radio to discuss the chaotic week for Baylor and the Big 12 regarding college athletics, what went into the decision-making process, and much more.

Baylor president Linda Livingstone joined Matt Mosley to discuss students coming back to campus the Big 12 presidents deciding to move forward with the football season, and more on the "Matt Mosley Show".

Baylor University President Dr. Linda Livingstone joins @SicEm365Radio to discuss how the university has responded to the COVid-19 situation, the challenges facing academia, and what the plans are for the future.

Today we are joined by Baylor MBB HC Scott Drew, The Atheltic's Max Olson, Dallas Cowboys.com's Mickey Spagnola, World Golf HOFer/9-time Major Champ Gary Player, & Baylor University President Dr. Linda Livingstone.

Hosts John Morris and Brooke Bednarz chat with Baylor University President Linda Livingstone on a variety of topics including why she chose Baylor and the personal impact of COVID-19 on students plus much more. President Livingstone's daughter, Shelby also joins the conversation to discuss what the Livingstone family has been up to during the last couple of weeks. 

Baylor President Linda Livingstone joined @mattmosley on the "Matt Mosley Show" this afternoon.

Baylor University recently partnered with Texas Business Journals for a survey highlighting the insights of Texas business leaders into the state's economy and attitudes towards industry-university research partnerships. In this Baylor Connections, President Linda A. Livingstone, Ph.D., and Jason Cook, Vice President for Marketing and Communications and Chief Marketing officer, analyze the results and share how Baylor's research focus drives innovation, uncovers solutions and prepares leaders for the future workforce.

2019 was an exciting year at Baylor University, providing many successes on which to build in the new year. In this Baylor Connections, President Linda A. Livingstone looks back at successes in areas like athletics, fundraising, hiring and more, and examines how Baylor is poised to build on those superlatives in 2020 as the University celebrates its 175th birthday.

Baylor's 2019-20 Conversation Series will focus on civil discourse, with a variety of speakers and roundtables available to students, faculty and the community to consider this important topic. In this Baylor Connections, Baylor University President Dr. Linda A. Livingstone reflects on the university as a marketplace of ideas, ways to help students grow in the ability to respectfully engage others even in disagreement, and the need for civil discourse more broadly.

It's the start of a new school year, and Baylor University President Linda Livingstone looks ahead to 2019-20 on this Baylor Connections. President Livingstone shares on topics like university priorities, Baylor's R1/Tier 1 aspirations, the incoming freshman class, a new athletic season and more.