November 25, 2020

01:04:55

Episode 16 – Tying Our Values to Leadership with Bill Hudson (1)

Episode 16 – Tying Our Values to Leadership with Bill Hudson (1)
The Leadership Window
Episode 16 – Tying Our Values to Leadership with Bill Hudson (1)

Nov 25 2020 | 01:04:55

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Show Notes

Leadership is much more than management. It is more than strategy, models, and supervision. Great leaders live out worthy values. We must know who we are as leaders. In this episode, Bill Hudson shares the values that have made him a successful organizational leader and consultant. Bill Hudson is the founder and CEO of Family Child Care Associates (FCCA), a consultancy focused on supporting the expansion of high-quality family child care businesses. Before founding FCCA, he served as the Chief Executive Officer for the National Association for Family Child Care. In that role, he was a member of the core task force for NAEYC’s Power to the Profession initiative. He also served as a member of the National Academy of Medicine’s Birth to Age 8 Workforce committee, and their Early Care and Education Innovation Collaborative. Prior to assuming the leadership role at NAFCC, Hudson had a twenty-year career within public libraries in Pennsylvania. He finished his library career as the executive director for one of Pennsylvania’s largest public library systems and helped lead a statewide initiative to standardize a core technology platform for Pennsylvania libraries. Bill has nearly twenty-five years of nonprofit leadership at both the executive and board levels. He is currently serving on the advisory board for Wonderschool, as well as on the board of directors for the Virginia Family Child Care Alliance, the Family Child Care Alliance of Maryland, and the shared services organization, Infant Toddler Family Day Care. www.fcc-associates.com
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Episode Transcript

[00:00:06] Speaker A: Welcome to the Leadership Window podcast with Patrick Jinks. Each week, through a social sector lens, Patrick interviews leaders and experts and puts us in touch with trends and tips for leading effectively. Patrick is an LSI certified leadership coach, a member of the Forbes Coaches Council, a best selling author, award winning photographer, and professional speaker. Here's Patrick. Happy thanksgiving, everyone, and welcome to the Leadership Window podcast. I'm Patrick Jinks, leadership and strategy coach and president of the Jinks perspective. I was going to go solo this week and I was on the phone with a longtime friend and colleague last week, Bill Hudson, who's on our Jinkx perspective advisory board. And we catch up about once a month and have these wonderful conversations about leadership. We've been doing that, I guess, for a number of years now. And I thought we just said, you know, these conversations we have would make a great podcast episode. Let's just let people listen into our stream of consciousness as we continue to learn what leadership is all about. So I appreciate Bill coming on. Bill helps nonprofit associations and boards in the childcare industry, and he is the founder and CEO of Family Childcare Associates. That's a consultancy focused on supporting the expansion of high quality family childcare businesses. And before he founded that, he served as the CEO for the National association for Family Childcare and was on just a number of national task forces. And he continues to serve on a number of alliances, boards, task forces in this industry. Somewhere along the line, Bill just fell in love with this concept. And this is about family childcare. So not the big commercial childcare centers or head start or things like that, but family based business businesses that support childcare in a community. And not only as a business, but as a success strategy for preparing kids for school and life. There is a high quality component that comes with caring for children and educating children in a family childcare business. And so maybe Bill will tell us a little bit more about that. But before that world, Bill had a 20 year career within public libraries in the state of Pennsylvania and finished his career there as the executive director for one of Pennsylvania's largest public library systems, built the Lancaster county. I'm trying to remember the number of municipalities in that county. Like 64, I think was the number of municipalities in that county. Does that sound right? [00:02:58] Speaker B: It was a lot. [00:02:59] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a big county, both in area and in people and just in municipalities. It was a complex system to lead, let's put it that way. But so, you know, all combined, Bill's got about 25 years of nonprofit leadership at both the executive and board levels. And like I mentioned, he's already, he's currently serving on the advisory board for Wonder school and the board of directors for Virginia Family Childcare alliance, the Family Child Care alliance of Maryland, and just a number of other things. And more importantly than that, Bill and I go back to when we were both in executive leadership in Pennsylvania and met and just had an affinity for one another and kindred spirit, I suppose, on a lot of different things, and we've just kept up. And Bill, I've been looking forward to this conversation, to be able to share you and share some of our conversations with our listeners. So welcome to the show and happy thanksgiving. [00:03:58] Speaker B: Happy thanksgiving, you, sir. And it's a pleasure always. I mean, we do this on a regular basis, so now we're just recording it. [00:04:05] Speaker A: Yeah, that's right. That's right. Well, we'll have fun. You know, when I think about, we've talked a lot about on this program already about servant leadership and steward leadership, and one of the people that comes to mind first for me is you. I just, I see you as very much of a servant leader, and I'd like to maybe talk about that a little bit and your viewpoint on that. But let's start with just, let's let our listeners get to know you a little bit. And this is a show about leadership. So tell us about your leadership journey. Maybe, maybe through that lens, just kind of. How did you get to this point? You're now running your own consultancy firm and already, you know, you've taken on some big projects and contracts. Already this thing is taken off and you're in a whole different world. Tell us about that journey for you. How would you summarize it? [00:04:58] Speaker B: A surprise. [00:05:01] Speaker A: That's how it works a lot. Yeah. [00:05:04] Speaker B: You know, I grew up in a very rural part of North Carolina, southeastern corner, actually, in the largest county in the state, believe it or not, but it only had about 50,000 people. [00:05:16] Speaker A: What county? What county is that? [00:05:18] Speaker B: Sampson? It's about an hour and a half northwest of Wilmington and about an hour and a half southeast of Raleigh. [00:05:27] Speaker A: Okay. [00:05:28] Speaker B: So when I was about twelve years old, my father, who was a tv repairman, when they actually did that kind of thing, was working for probably one of the largest businesses in the small town in which we live, decided to go out on his own and start his own business. So from a very early age, I got a introduction into somebody deciding to go out on their own and do something for themselves and their family. And while at twelve years old, I wasn't crazy about the work ethic that my father had, which was six days a week, generally twelve hour days, it was a good lesson in that, you know, what it takes to succeed. You know, he had some successes, he had some failures, and that was also instructive. I was kind of the average high school student, you know, didn't do sports. You know, I worked, you know, every day after school and half days, sometimes full days on Saturdays. So, you know, high school was just something I had to bear through. Nobody in my family had gone to college. There wasn't an expectation in my family that I would go to college or anybody else, I guess, in the family. I were four kids at that time. And so when I got to be after I graduated from high school, worked for my father for a little while and just recognized that I needed something different and actually figured out a way to go to college. You know, I had a lot of friends who went to college, and I was kind of left behind. You know, they all went away and didn't really have a lot of expectations. You know, there weren't a lot of external expectations on me about college, but for some reason, I wanted something different. You know, I was more interested in ideas than fixing tvs and crawling around on tops of houses, installing antennas when they still use those. Wound up going to a small college for the first two years and then went to the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill for the next two years, thought I was going to be a scientist, and then spent about a year and a half working in the lab and realized that was not going to work. I actually did some work with a postdoc who was doing work on alcoholism for the National Institutes of Health, which was interesting, but the laboratory work just convinced me, you know, this is not it. Got married, had, you know, had a child, still hadn't figured out what I was going to do in my life and bounce around a little bit of that. And then probably by my early thirties, really took a hard look and said, okay, you got to figure this out. You know, you got a wife, you got a child, it's. It's time. And so at that point in time, did a skills inventory and interest inventory and wound up following into falling into libraries. Libraries were about a life of the mind, and that really intrigued me. And so went to library school at the university or catholic university in Washington. We had moved to Richmond, Virginia, at that time and fell in love with the work. And then my spouse at the time got a job, Millersville University, and so we moved to Pennsylvania, and that's where I got my first library job, and surprisingly, you know, I just got out of library school, and my first job was the director of a small library. You know, I didn't start at the ground level. I didn't start an administrative role or anything like that. I went straight to director. And what's kind of surprising about that is I had no qualms about that. You know, I was going from zero to 60 in terms of leadership, and I didn't have any reservations, which I think has really helped me throughout my career, in that, you know, we all step in the roles that generally, if you're. If you're lucky, you step in the roles that are bigger than you are. And I realized. I realize, excuse me, that creates a lot of stress, and everybody deals with the imposter syndrome and things like that. But every time that role has come up and I've been able to take it, I always felt like, okay, I'll figure it out. [00:10:04] Speaker A: Let me pause there and ask you a question I'm curious about, and that is, and don't be modest. What do you think it was that led? I mean, they looked at you and said, you're going to be the director. I mean, how do you go from zero to 60? What was. What was the leadership quality? Do you believe that? Just. I mean, there must have been something natural. I'm thinking, as you were talking about your. Your interest in science off the bat and then moving into libraries, I see a real connection there. It's about learning and the mind and inquiry and all that, but that. That doesn't necessarily say leadership. And I was kind of waiting, as you were telling the story. I'm like, okay, this was about leadership journey. And then, boom, I'm the director of, like, zero to 60, as you said. So what was that? What was it in you that somebody else saw you can do this, and that you believed in yourself you could do it? [00:10:57] Speaker B: Well, those are two questions. I'll start with what somebody else saw. The director of the board was a retired executive from Armstrong World Industries and was an engineer. And so for those who don't know, Armstrong was based in, I think they had a major facility in Lancaster. [00:11:20] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, their headquarters is there. [00:11:23] Speaker B: Yeah. Is that right? I can't remember that. Yeah, I was thinking that. Wasn't sure about that. Anyway, he had, you know, he was an engineer, so he had that. Engineers, that very left brain, and I think we just hit it off, you know, me from a science background, him from an engineering background, and we sat down and had some good conversations, and I think he just felt very comfortable that I could step into the role and do the work. In terms of my confidence, you know, I don't know if it was confidence or whether it's okay I have to have a job and this is a role that puts me in a position that I can be successful. But again, you know, and I don't really know the answer to that. I just, I guess I have a fair amount of confidence in my ability based on being a science background. You know, you do the research, you apply the work, and you can figure a lot of things out if you're willing to do those two things. [00:12:27] Speaker A: Well, that's true, but leadership is, is pretty different. I mean, you can learn about leadership. Obviously, I'm still doing it. You're still doing it. I think you're, you're born with some things and then a lot of it you can learn. But maybe if I get a little bit more specific, what were you good at in terms of leadership? So to be a director, I mean, you're directing, you had a staff or you had a strategy, you had to lead. What were you good at without ever having that kind of formal leadership experience? [00:13:05] Speaker B: I would say probably two things. First off, and we've talked a bit about this, and I'm sure we will later today, is you have to have a vision for what success looks like. And that's one of the things that I've been called a dreamer, daydreamer, couple of things. So I definitely spend a lot of time thinking about what could be as opposed to what is. [00:13:33] Speaker A: That's a big one. [00:13:35] Speaker B: And I came in and this was a small town in Pennsylvania. And for those who don't know, Pennsylvania can be a. What's the correct word? I mean, it takes a lot to bring it, break into communities there. I talked to one person who'd been there for 20 years and she said she still felt like an outsider. And I went into a very small town, it was like 8000 people and was able to build relationships. And I think what stood me well there in terms of leadership, and still does, I think, is, you know, I cared about the people. I cared about the people that came into the building. I cared about the people who worked in the building. And when you care, that shows and people recognize that. I was concerned about their success as library users and I was concerned about the success of the people that worked for me. Well, that has stood me well. [00:14:40] Speaker A: That is one of the things that struck me about you early on. Once I got to know your work a little bit is the care of the people, particularly the people that are the employees. They're the ones in the trenches every day making it work. We know organizations are all about the people, and they're only going to be as successful as the people, because in the end, organizations are people, sets of people. So that's one of the things I've always appreciated about you, and we've talked about this before. I think what our listeners might want to know is how do you know where to draw the line between relationship and leadership? [00:15:29] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:15:29] Speaker A: Because, you know, there's times when. Well, or when leadership moves into management, and you, you know, you. There is, there are accountabilities, and there are times when you have to have the tough conversations and maybe even make some tough decisions. And those, I think they're harder to do when you have a relationship bent like you do. [00:15:50] Speaker B: Yep. Yep. Boy, that was. You're absolutely right. And those were some of the toughest lessons I had to learn. The first time I had to let a staff member go was excruciating. And you can. I've yet to meet a person in my life that you couldn't find something to admire, to appreciate. And so when you have a staff member who you know is a full person and you can find wonderful things about that individual, but they're just not performing the job, or they don't have the capability to perform the job, and you have to let them go, that's. That is, and I, I've heard other people say this, that's, that's one of the hardest parts of the job. And the first, and I had to do that several times, and I came to some peace with that when I recognized two things. One is that, as in a leadership position, your duty is to the mission. [00:16:57] Speaker A: Right. [00:17:00] Speaker B: And so you cannot be true to the mission and allow folks to stay on who aren't helping move that mission forward. [00:17:10] Speaker A: Well, very, very well said. I've done some study on the difference between steward leadership and servant leadership, and much of what I've researched shows that servant leadership is one component of steward leadership. It almost fits like in their concentric circles, with servant leadership in the middle, steward leadership being the broader picture. And stewardship means I am stewarding an owner's assets, and the owner, when you're a nonprofit, is the community. So you're stewarding community assets. They're expecting you to grow those assets. It's not just to protect them and bury them as the parable and the talents, you know, in the Bible like we've talked about, but it's about growing those assets and doing something with them. And when you've got, when, when people get in the way of that, whether it's, you know, malicious or just incompetence, then the, then the assets are, you know, you're jeopardizing the potential for the assets to grow. So you are, I would say, tell me if I'm wrong, but you're a servant leader inside a steward leadership mindset. Meaning, yes, I'm serving the people, but in the end, my stewardship responsibility falls to the community and the mission of this organization. [00:18:30] Speaker B: And you have to do both. You can't be so focused on the mission that you're not taking care of the people, because I just, I think we're put on this earth to do good. And for the folks that I had to let go. All right? What I had to do there was in service of the mission, but in service of those people, I had to figure out a way to make that as easy for them as possible and to position them as much as I could for their success once they left. [00:19:07] Speaker A: Yeah, well, and sometimes you're serving them by dismissing them, you know? [00:19:13] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:19:14] Speaker A: I mean, I'm sure they opened me. [00:19:15] Speaker B: That way, but, yeah, you're absolutely right. [00:19:17] Speaker A: Well, it's happened to me, and I'm think. I'm thinking of a time when I was applying for a job that I really wanted, and I think I had a misunderstanding of what the job really was. It was a director position for a national organization. But this is the case where director didn't really mean what it sounds like. It was actually a fairly low level job, but it was a strategy position. And I thought, man, I really want this. And at the time, I was needing work, and I went and did the interview, and I had this resume, and, man, they were like, oh, my gosh, you got all the chops, man. You would be amazing at blah, blah. And I'm thinking, I got this. I got this. I got, I just knew I was going to get a phone call with a job offer, and he called me and he said, listen, the honest truth here is that we don't want to cage a bird, and you're overqualified for this. And you, and you will do, you would do it amazingly, but you'd be gone in a year, and we need. And because you just. And I, at the time, I was, I was mad. I was like, don't give me that jump. Let me decide that. Right? Figure out. But they knew. They saw what I couldn't see in myself. Because I had a blind spot, because I was desperate for work, and the title sounded good to me and all of that. But he did me the greatest favor. He served me by saying, I would be doing you a disservice if I hired you. So there's times when you're serving people, and it doesn't feel like it at the time to them especially. [00:20:50] Speaker B: Well, it's kind of interesting because that first library job, that first director job, I got, the board president went back and told the board that he had found a new director and said, but just let you know, we won't keep him. He'll be here for a while, and then he'll be gone. And I, you know, that wasn't. I wasn't thinking beyond six months, but he saw something in me and let not even. I guess it was just about two years later I got recruited to take. To go down to the main library in the, in the city. So he. He saw something that I wasn't even cognizant of at that time. [00:21:26] Speaker A: Hmm. Wow. Well, full circle now. You've led. You've led teams of people now a number of times in sort of the quasi governmental land as well as in the nonprofit world. And now, like me, you are a solopreneur. You have launched your own consultant firm now. And so what. How is that transition from a leadership perspective? I have a point of view. I've been doing this now for about five years full time, and, and finding that leading yourself is a little different than leading other people. How are you. How are you finding that transition? [00:22:11] Speaker B: I would say mixed. It would probably be a lot easier if we weren't in the middle of a pandemic, but because, you know, one of the things I enjoy absolutely the absolute most is working with others to help them figure out their strategies and moving forward, and sitting in a room with people and feeling that energy and seeing the light bulbs come on as you do, and that opportunity isn't so much there right now. I mean, we can do some things over Zoom, and we've done some stuff over Zoom, but it's just not the same. So that has. Has dimmed my enthusiasm just a tad. But I know this is all temporary. You know, hopefully by, you know, next summer, we'll be moving around the country and sitting down and talking to people and helping them move their organizations forward. But it is a challenge. I mean, there's no doubt about it that there is. There's. You're only accountable to yourself, and if you're not holding yourself accountable, you don't get very far. [00:23:18] Speaker A: Well, yeah, and you and I, so what you just described is when we're working with others, we're working what I call in the business. And that's fulfilling to us because we are able to bring leadership to the table by helping coalesce people around an idea and a vision and a strategy. But then there's working on the business, which is you got to lead yourself, pandemic or no pandemic, you have to be the one that figures out what's the vision for this business. What are my strategies? How am I going to hold myself when you're in, for example, I remember we would have resource development who are responsible for going out and making a certain number of connections each week or each month, like a sales position. Well, how do, how do you hold yourself for that? Because we have to do that if we're going to stay in business. We have to market, we have to network, we have to, again, pandemic or no pandemic, the accounting has to be accurate, the marketing has to be good, the strategy, we have to build quality content. We have to continue to hone our skill, and we have only ourselves, really to lead on that. [00:24:30] Speaker B: Yeah, and I'm still figuring some of that out. [00:24:32] Speaker A: Yeah, me too. [00:24:34] Speaker B: You know, that sole proprietorship, at least for now, I hope it doesn't stay that way forever. I mean, I'm really looking forward to the point where it gets big enough. I can bring on a team to do some of the work. But for now, you know, it's, you know, you have to get up every day and sort of set your priorities. And particularly now when you're working from home, the distractions are always there. So it's been, it's been interesting. But, you know, it gets better every day. [00:25:10] Speaker A: Yeah. And a lot of people are working from home right now. And at first thought, oh, this is great. Wow, I get to work from home and they're hating. [00:25:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:25:18] Speaker A: They're learning that, no, it's not all that it's cracked up to be. Now, some people are doing it, but I'm coaching a lot of people who say, this is, I don't know how you do it. I don't know how you work from home, like in a business, because, you know, my home is sacred. And, you know, I like to separate home from work life. Or I got the cat, the dog, the kids, the, you know, whatever going on the laundry, the ups guys ringing the doorbell, you know, like, how do you do that? Not to mention the self discipline it takes because you don't have someone that knows what time you came in the office, what time you leave and all that. You just have to get the job done. And I think that's one reason I've been successful is I always figured that my performance was more important than my time clock. Am I getting the job done? I always knew if I could get the job done well, nobody would care what time I came in and what time I left. And now I don't have a choice. Now I have to perform. [00:26:18] Speaker B: Yeah, well, you're my inspiration, you know. [00:26:21] Speaker A: Well, likewise. I mean, we're in this together, no doubt about it. Now, another thing you and I share is we've had to navigate political waters in our leadership lives. And I don't mean, you know, like the, you know, Republican Democrat necessarily kind of politics. I just mean community politics, board politics, donors, you know, and, yeah, a little bit of politics politics to try to make sure that we're, we are inclusive and, and careful about how we're going, going about things. What have been some of your lessons or what would be some of your tips? A lot of our listeners are nonprofit leaders who deal in this political world. They report to boards. They have to manage the high wealth individuals that might get upset with them if they do something wrong or they've got, some of them are in advocacy work and they're directly tied into politics. What would be some of your tips of things that you learned along the way in terms of leading when you're having to navigate these political waters? [00:27:22] Speaker B: Well, the first thing I can say if you're a servant leadership. Servant leader, or if you're hopefully highly empathetic as a leader, it can be challenging because as someone who's highly empathetic, your success sitting across a table is important to me. And if you have a dozen people in the room now, you've got a dozen different sets of expectations and needs that you're now trying to navigate and to coalesce around getting this group moving forward. I think the, you know, the lesson I've learned, the couple lessons I've learned is one, is it was a surprise to me that you can be in a nonprofit world and still deal with sometimes some pretty acrimonious politics, and there's probably not as much of it as there are some other sectors, but it's still there because the competition for funding can be so intense, and every executive director out there is feeling the pressure to get money for her organization. And so that creates scenarios where we might be great partners under normal circumstances, but when there's limited funds available, and I've got to pay my staff. You got to pay your staff. It's some competition in situations, I think, you know, the biggest lesson I've learned is that you're not going to win them all, but to maximize your chances of success, it still all comes back to the vision. You've got to find a way to create a vision that everybody around the table buys into. That doesn't guarantee your success, but it certainly helps to increase the chances that you'll be successful and that you can still accomplish the major goals. You may not get them all done, but if you can get everybody to buy into that vision, then you can move mountains. [00:29:45] Speaker A: So I wish we could get that little speech on the floor of Congress. [00:29:52] Speaker B: Yeah, don't we all? [00:29:53] Speaker A: You know, because you're right, because you don't win them all. I mean, that's really the nature of politics. It is about compromise. It's like we're not. So, you know, we've got a different set of expectations. We all want what's good for the country, but you, you have a different idea about the best way to go about it than I do. So let's figure out where we have common ground. And I guess that's part of the problem is right now they're just, it doesn't seem to be any common ground, but, but that really is, the nature of politics is you said it. You said you're not going to win them all. And what came to my mind when you said that was the importance of knowing how to choose your battles. [00:30:34] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:30:35] Speaker A: And a lot of times leaders, you know, particularly arrogant leaders, do want to win them, and it is all about winning. We have in South Carolina, you probably heard of him because he's a pretty, he was a pretty prolific, invisible politician when he was in Congress. Trey Gowdy is an attorney here in Spartanburg, South Carolina, and he got in and he's known for being this real tough prosecutor, and he served on, I forget which committees, but I think either intel or, I don't think it was judiciary. I think it was the intel committee or oversight committee, and he would just grill you. He would just really dig in. But it was in the spirit of holding people accountable and asking the tough questions. And when he served a term, then he left. And the state here was like, what are you doing, Trey? You can be in the house as long as you want. We'll keep re electing you. South Carolina is a red state. Trey Gowdy's a Republican, pretty strong conservative. And he said, nope, I'm out. I am out of this. I hate this. This is horrible. And people say, what's wrong? It's all about winning. It's not about accomplishing. It's not about what is right and what can we do for the country. It's about red winning or blue winning at any cost. And it's just not the life I want to live. I'll never go back. I'll never run again. I'm going back into private practice where I can actually do something with prosecution. And I thought, that's a sad state of affairs when you really do have a no win situation. So back to our world in. In leadership was we're not at that place in our organizations where there's no winning. There is common ground. But I think you really nailed it when you said you don't win them all. So. So vision is where you point everybody and remind them, this is the vision. [00:32:26] Speaker B: Yeah. If you're. If you're the personality, that, boy, winning is number one. Nonprofit world is not the place for you. [00:32:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:32:36] Speaker B: Yeah. You're. Eventually, that House of cards is going to fall apart. You're going to alienate people around you. Yeah. It might be fun for a while, you know, but that's. This is not the sector for you. [00:32:48] Speaker A: Well, I struggled with that, Bill. I mean, I'm a competitive person by nature, anyway. You know, just growing up, sports, anything. You know, I. I like the competition. I like. I like winning. You know, winning is fun. [00:32:59] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:59] Speaker A: Everybody likes when you want to win for your organization. I. Maybe. Maybe it depends on how you define winning. [00:33:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:06] Speaker A: And maybe you gotta. Maybe it comes down to, if you define it as, I always get my way. [00:33:13] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:14] Speaker A: Then, okay, you're gonna lose. [00:33:16] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:17] Speaker A: Your organization's gonna lose. [00:33:19] Speaker B: Yeah. You certainly want that competitive spirit. I mean, and that's. There's fun there. But I think what I'm really referring to is that, is the mission isn't so important as me winning. [00:33:33] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:33:33] Speaker B: And you put that above everything else. And when you put that above everything else, although I can't say that I live that way, but I certainly can believe that when you put winning above everything else, then the mission is going to suffer. [00:33:48] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:33:49] Speaker B: Because you're going to alienate people along the way. [00:33:52] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:33:52] Speaker B: Because. [00:33:52] Speaker A: Yeah. Is their definition of winning is different. [00:33:56] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:33:56] Speaker A: Yeah. So we've already covered a little bit of this. Share with us, just kind of, what are the basic tenants of leadership for you, you know, as you formed your leadership philosophy, what are some of the, you know, I imagine you've got some kind of a framework. You know, it's, you know, these three things above all others or whatever it is, I don't know. But how do you go about thinking about and framing your philosophy of leadership? [00:34:24] Speaker B: Wow, framework. You know, that's where I admire what you've done because you can articulate that very well and you've got it in the book and you've got it in all your materials and it really guides your work. For me, it's probably a little more the seat of the pants, but there are some things that truly guide what I do. When I look at the things I'm engaged in now is it gets back to something I said earlier I think is I want to help people succeed. I mean, that's job one. One of the things I didn't mention earlier is we talked about this is when I had that 20 year career in public libraries, enjoyed it very much and was fortunate enough that, you know, after I got recruited to go to the downtown library, I started out as fairly mid manager, and then successively every three or four years, I got a promotion of some sort and gradually worked my way up to be the head of the system. And when I left, you know, I decided I wanted to do something different, you know, 20 years, 20 plus years, long time in a career, and I wanted to do something that would help change the world. You know, again, you and I have talked about this a number of times. You can find 10,000 great things out there to do to help improve society. But if you want to change the world for the better, you have to start with the kids, particularly one year olds, two year olds, three year olds, babies. And so that's what led me to move down to DC, get the job with the National association of Family Child Care, and still guides me to this day because I want to be in a position where I can use my talents to the maximum advantage to help the most people improve their lives. And so that is like the core guiding principle. Everything else builds on top of that. And then when you get into leadership, it really is about helping an organization or in some cases, what I'm doing right now, helping a group of people clarify the vision that binds them together and then figure out a way to make that happen. And I recognize with leadership, as I said earlier, leadership was a surprise for me. And I think, you know, we've talked about this as well, is I think most people can rise to a leadership position if they're willing to make the commitment to it, recognizing that it's not about them. It's about the people they're serving. It's the people they're helping. And so I don't have a clear framework. I just have some very strong beliefs, and those are what guide me. You know, I'm not going to be in a position to write a book someday about Bill's leadership philosophy because it really, it really comes from my soul about how my leadership manifests itself. [00:37:41] Speaker A: Well, I'll beg to differ. I think it'd make a fantastic book. I do. Because you're describing something deep down. Any of us could say, oh, my tenants of leadership. You got to be a good communicator and you got to be a good strategist, and yet we can come up with that stuff you're talking about. [00:37:56] Speaker B: I mean, it's all down. Yeah, yeah. [00:37:58] Speaker A: You're talking about soul leadership, though. So here's what I've heard in this conversation. Tell me if I've heard this right. Vision. [00:38:06] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:07] Speaker A: The crit. You know, I'm hearing you say that maybe you might even be saying that vision is paramount. Relationships. [00:38:16] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:17] Speaker A: Purpose. I mean, those are the three things I'm hearing the loudest from you. [00:38:22] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:23] Speaker A: And those are leadership things. [00:38:25] Speaker B: Well, you know, and when we talked a little bit about this last week, I think I would have to say there are two key components here. One is vision. Without vision, leadership doesn't exist at that point. It's management. You've got to have vision, and it doesn't have to be your vision. You can buy into somebody else's vision and help them move forward. So it has to be vision and it has to be care. You have to care. Those of us who are fortunate to be in leadership positions, sure, there's a little ego boost that goes along with that, and there's certainly some economic reward that goes along with that, but that can't be your motivation. You've got to truly care about what you're trying to help achieve and the people you're trying to work with to make that happen. [00:39:16] Speaker A: I have a lawn company that. And I'll plug them, actually, because I'm. Because I'm about to say something really good about them. Trifecta. Lawn care here in Columbia. I think they're in Irma or maybe Lexington, South Carolina, here in the Columbia area. And the reason I continue to go back to them is because they care about the work they do. And I don't know what any of your experience is if you're listening to this podcast with lawn care, but you could associate this with anything. You could associate with banking or your doctor or your auto mechanic. But in lawn care, it works like this. I'm on an app called Nextdoor. It's a social media app for neighborhoods, and it's really great because you can talk about your neighborhood watch communities and your things going on in that particular neighborhood, and it's really cool. And so it's where people turn to a lot when they look for, you know, hey, does anybody know a good fence repair guy, you know, that I can call? And so people just say, oh, we, here's who we used. And they're fantastic. So I asked about lawn care, and just usually I take care of my own lawn, but sometimes I have to have it just, it gets too much, and I have to have people come clean it, prune, prune the trees, and take care of the shrubs and trim and all this stuff. And I put out an ask, and I had probably ten different companies. We'll call them companies. I don't know how big their companies are, but they had names. They had company names, and they got on the line and they said, well, we can help you or we can help you. And, oh, I can do this, that. And, boy, I thought, oh, this is great. I've got all these companies needs to choose from. And I reached out to one and said, you know, what does it take? How can we get a quote? Nothing. Two, three days. I email them again, two, three. So I went through about five of them and I couldn't get a response back from them. And so I finally got a couple of them to agree and to set up appointments, and they didn't show to their appointments. [00:41:20] Speaker B: Wow. [00:41:21] Speaker A: And then the first person that showed, he came. He came late, he did a kind of job, and he left. And like, I'm like, okay, are you gonna email me an invoice? What's gonna happen here? And it, like, just, you can tell when there's just no care. And then along comes this trifecta and they show up with the team and they, they knock on the door and say, hey, we're here. Just wanna let you know. And by the way, they were on time and gave me a, you know, a decent quote for what, what I needed done. They worked super fast, super clean. You can tell it's a professional job. It's not. I didn't go out and mow and trim. You can tell it's really done, right? And when they were done, they came and knocked on the door again and said, hey, you want to come walk around with us, make sure, we got everything. See if it's up to you. See if it's up to your standard. And it was just the whole difference. When you care about what you're doing and care doesn't. Care is not limited to high level leaders. We all ought to care about everything we do, whether we're serving at a restaurant. You know, the ones who care and the ones who just don't care, their shift ends in 20 minutes, and that's, they don't care about you or the quality of work that they do or being fulfilled in what they do. So I love that. I'm agreeing with you. I'm saying that care, you have to care about everything. You have to care about the people and you have to care about your work. And no matter what it is, like, do it the best you can. And there's an amazing feeling that comes with that. I think people miss out when they don't care. [00:42:57] Speaker B: Well, it's true. And I, you know, I think it gets back to the, you know, the statistics. What is it? 60, 70% of Americans are underemployed and it's because they haven't found that place in which they care and they're just sort of going through the day. I, you know, it would be lovely if there was enough of an impetus and everybody to, regardless what I'm doing, I'm going to care about that. But I don't see that rampant at this point. [00:43:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I don't either. I think it's a rare thing these days when you find true care in a workplace or in, particularly just in customer service and the day to day interactions we have with people in our lives, it's when you see someone who cares, it like, it gets your attention. It's like, whoa, wow. It shows somebody who, look what I found. I found somebody who cares about what they're doing. It's just, yeah, I don't, I don't, I can't relate to the not caring piece of the. [00:43:54] Speaker B: Well, and that's, you know, that's one of the things that, once I got into the social sector and libraries, I would consider part of the social sector, and loosely is, is one of the things that's kept me here, is because you do see a preponderance of people who care well, and, you know, because otherwise they wouldn't do the work. You know, you can get better pay, usually in the private sector, but people get into this business, particularly in, you know, the childcare businesses, because they do care. They care deeply. [00:44:26] Speaker A: Yeah, well, and we're back to the downsides of that. The downsides of that is if you don't balance that with accountability. [00:44:34] Speaker B: Yeah, right. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And that's certainly. That is certainly a challenge. And I think that is, I think it's gotten better, you know, in the time that I've been in the sector, you know, from the early nineties to today, that sense of accountability and the need for accountability. And, you know, it's just nice. It's not enough to nice that you're just doing something for society or for the community. You have to be effective and efficient at that. [00:45:02] Speaker A: Where did you get. [00:45:02] Speaker B: I think that's gotten a lot better. [00:45:04] Speaker A: Where did you get your leadership philosophy? Who were the early leaders in your life or what were the influences that have brought you to this place of vision, purpose, care, you know, mixed with your love of learning and inquiry and opening the mind and your love of children? Where does this come from? [00:45:26] Speaker B: I guess like a lot of people, it starts with my family. You know, my father graduated from high school. My mother finished 10th grade, but they raised four kids successfully. And my father, I always remember, you know, even I can't for how far back it was, but certainly when I got to work with him basically every day, he was very much a southern gentleman. And, you know, you have to treat people with respect. I mean, that's a core value that he had. You know, even in the south and the sixties and seventies with some of the racial tensions are going. He treated everybody well. He treated everybody the same. [00:46:13] Speaker A: Well, I also heard you say earlier his work ethic was off the charts. And my dad, too. I guess that's a generational thing. [00:46:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:46:22] Speaker A: Sometimes, I don't know, it's not as prevalent today, or maybe we just don't see it. But, man, these guys were hard work. I mean, they just. They were dedicated. [00:46:30] Speaker B: Yeah. Leisure was not part of his makeup, which, you know, it was a great model in terms of being, you know, hard working. It was not exactly the thing you want as a 16 year old. [00:46:42] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:46:44] Speaker B: Other things on your mind. [00:46:45] Speaker A: Yep. [00:46:46] Speaker B: But, you know, his idea of leisure was reading two or three newspapers a day, watching the news, and then spending time with his family. That was leisure for him. I don't think he ever watched a sports game. I never, ever saw him watch any kind of sports. So it was. It was work and family and keeping up with moral affairs, even in small town Samson county. [00:47:14] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:47:15] Speaker B: But I, you know, I would say it was a lot to do with my parents. You know, I had a few good college professors that really impressed me. And one in particular who was a political science professor, and I did not grow up interested in politics like most people my age at that time. And he had a way of taking an idea and helping you find the excitement in the idea, even if it was something you weren't particularly interested in the beginning of. And I was fortunate to work with some really good people over the years, either at my level or actually worked for me. That just impressed me by the way in which they cared themselves, in which they treated people, and the way in which they addressed their work. [00:48:11] Speaker A: I agree. I've had people that reported to me that I learned as much time as anyone, because leadership is not about authority or position. And you see people who know how to lead and who live out their personal values in a special way and. [00:48:25] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh, yeah, yeah. One in particular I hired was a technologist in Lancaster who. Just extraordinary individual. And just watching him, listening to how he thought about his work and about the people that worked for him, he was an extraordinary individual. And I learned a lot from him, even as his direct report. [00:48:50] Speaker A: So all of this being said, if you had one major piece of advice or, you know, one sort of major concept of leadership that you think all leaders should, all leaders ought to, ought to pay attention to, what is that? What is the, what is the Bill Hudson, you know, paramount lesson or concept of leadership? What would you say that is? [00:49:18] Speaker B: Patrick? I have to say, it's got to start with vision. It's got to start with creating an aspiration for a better future. Again, we can talk about all the things that go into leadership. And you've written books out. I know you coach on leadership. There's so many things that go into making up a good, great, competent leader. But without vision, I don't see how you can do the job. [00:49:51] Speaker A: I can't come up with anything better than that. I mean, I think you're right. It's. People are not going to follow. Well, you know, we've talked about John Maxwell a lot on the podcast and his five levels of leadership. And the first level is, yeah, people will follow you to a degree because you, because you have a position of authority over them, right? You sign the check. But then there's the level where they follow you because they like you, they admire you, or they follow you because you have a success track record or you've done something for them. And then in the end, it's, they follow you because of the person you are and what you represent. So when, when you can not only come up with a vision. But cast a vision, as you say, it might not even be your vision, but if you can cast vision and help people see it, they'll. They'll follow you. Yeah. And without that, all the other stuff kind of might not matter. Because even if, even then, what you have is a group, you have a club, but a vision means you have leadership because you're going somewhere. There's a purpose to that. [00:50:58] Speaker B: Ideally, success for me would be that at the end of the day or at a certain point in time in the sort of life cycle of your role as a leader, that your role isn't all that important anymore, because everybody around you now sees the vision and they're working towards that vision. You're there as a cheerleader at that point and to help remove the obstacles that allow them to achieve that vision. I mean, to me, that's success. [00:51:38] Speaker A: I agree. And you said something similar to that when we were on the phone last week, and you might remember this, structured it something similar to that. And as you were talking, I thought, wow, that's, like, perfectly aligned with our definition of leadership, which is where the name of the show comes from, the leadership window. Because our definition of leadership is that it's a window of opportunity. Leadership happens in moments. We either seize the opportunity when it comes up or we don't. But leadership is a window of opportunity during which vision, inspiration, and empowerment converge to propel people toward a shared goal. [00:52:15] Speaker B: So you say that so well, it's. [00:52:17] Speaker A: A. I mean, it's a framework I had to create a long time ago because I realized I had. I had memorized everybody else's definition of leadership, and I had never thought about what my own was. And for me, it's that leadership is more. It's not just a concept. It's a state of being. Meaning. It is. It is. Again, it's in moments. Leadership happens in moments. And so there are moments when you have the ability to help somebody see something in front of them that they couldn't see without you. There are moments when you can equip, enable, support, empower others, lift them to a place where they've got some autonomy and mastery to do something meaningful that they might not have known they had without you. And it's moments when you inspire people who might otherwise be uninspired or not even in touch with their own personal motivations. So when we seize those moments, we're leading. And as you talk about your framework, and again, I would argue, I don't think it is just seed of the pan. You've got a framework, obviously. You've obviously thought about this, and you've obviously lived it, and it is a meaningful framework, and I think it aligns well with my philosophy also. And if I were to add another piece into it, maybe because it's timely. I think gratitude and setting an example of gratitude for others is key in leadership. This is Thanksgiving week, and not that it's the only week that we should be grateful. I tend to believe that gratitude should be the center of our entire day every day. It should be our mindset because it advances us forward. Talk a little bit about gratitude, maybe the role that gratitude plays in your leadership journey and some of the things for which you're grateful. [00:54:18] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. I feel extraordinarily blessed, I guess back to why I love leadership so much is I have in my world people who care about me, and I care about, I don't know of anything more valuable than that. You could be fabulously wealthy, but if you're not surrounded or have access to people that you care about and care about you, you're very poor. And so I think that's the key thing I'm most grateful for. But when you sit down and think about it, I mean, gosh, you know, it's just such an endless list of things to be grateful for. I have work that I enjoy. I have the opportunity to help other people. And one of the things that I didn't mention earlier that you sort of reminded me of when I got into this work around family childcare, I recognized that if you want to affect a child's life, you have to start at the very beginning. And if you do that job well, you impact not only that child, but you impact that child and the relationship she or he has with others as they grow up, the children that they bring into the world. So now it's successive generations that you're impacting through the work you do today. But beyond that, what I also found so rewarding about this work is the people who do this work in their homes, a lot of times where people do not have a chance to really expand as individuals who maybe graduate from high school, maybe immigrants, and you're helping them find their own agency so that they can expand as individuals and they can enrich their own lives. So I'm grateful for that. You know, I, you know, I live in a wonderful country, as much of a mess as it is right now. [00:56:33] Speaker A: Beautiful mess, right? [00:56:35] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a mess right now. But you don't have to look too far outside our borders to see that, oh my gosh, there are people who would, in spite of all the challenges we have in this country, literally die trying to get here because of their realities. So I'm deeply grateful for so many things in my life and I recognize it is so easy to go down that rabbit hole and do the, oh, I wish this was different. I wish that was different. But it truly is a rabbit hole. You have to pull yourself back out of that and start looking at the bigger picture and see just how fortunate you are because we take so much for granted. [00:57:17] Speaker A: We really do. And I'm a big believer in the law of attraction and I believe that if we spend our mindset complaining, worrying, fretting, regretting, we attract more of that stuff to ourselves. That's just because our brains are what make us tick. And so I try to spend as much time as I can can or creating a mindset that, that is based on gratitude. I don't know about you, but when, when I launched this business, like full time, full time, like, this is true, this is it. And it's not a side hustle, you know, it's a scary thing. And there are times early on when you start to worry and, oh, is, am I going to get enough business? And this, that and the other. And I learned pretty quickly that is not the mindset to have going into this. You've got to be. So what finally got me over the hump in terms of being just relaxed and moving forward into my own future and my company's future is when I looked at my wife and I said, you know what? If this dries up in six months and I have to go back to work in a workplace somewhere, you know, wherever it is, I will forever be grateful that I got to do this for whatever period of time it was. If it was a year and now I'm going into five years now, and I just have to say that every time, if for some reason, you know, this business just like flopped and I, or I had to go do something or I became disabled, couldn't do this, I would forever say how thankful I am that at some point in my life I got to do this. And the more I let that be my true authentic mindset, the more business comes my way, the more productive, the more fulfilling it really is for me. And you're a little bit younger in the solopreneur journey than I am and so maybe I'm saying something that could help you, but I think you tend to think that way as well. [00:59:25] Speaker B: Well, I've certainly, I have a lot of things I'm confident that I can do well. It's sort of the back end mechanics that I don't enjoy, and that's when I have to get into those types of things. I was like, you know, it would be nice if I was in a job where I had a staff person who could do my accounting. It's those moments. But then when you actually look at the bigger picture and say, wow, what an opportunity I have to have impact to help people move forward in their personal journey. Gosh, you know, that's, that's, that's an incredible gift that I'm so grateful for. [01:00:11] Speaker A: Yeah. And you're one of those for me, Bill. You're one of the things that I'm grateful for. I, you know, first of all, our, just our friendship and our ability to connect in this way and work together. We've worked together a lot on some different projects. And, you know, when I called and asked you to serve on our advisory board, you were obviously very quick and without hesitation said, of course. And I'm grateful for that because this is a team of people that I count on who bring something to the table. And you make us stronger, which makes our clients stronger. And you're right. It's people that care about you and that you care about. Those are things to be thankful for. So I appreciate you, you and for carving out time for this as well. [01:01:01] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, for those, for our listeners, Patrick and I have known each other since what, 2000? [01:01:08] Speaker A: 2012, maybe. [01:01:09] Speaker B: 2012, yeah. And we have kept these monthly meetings going through moves, career changes, new business, startups. [01:01:20] Speaker A: It has been a great grandchildren. [01:01:22] Speaker B: Enjoyed it deeply. [01:01:23] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, me too. [01:01:25] Speaker B: Pandemics. [01:01:27] Speaker A: You know, I'm coaching a leader who I'm coaching a leader who had a scary medical emergency this weekend with a family member. That turned out okay. I got an email from her and it turns out, you know, it's gonna be okay. But it was scary, and it reminds me, and I think it reminds all of us to be grateful for what we have. And what occurred to me this morning when I read her email is that being grateful means more than just saying thanks and saying, oh, yeah, I'm grateful for this. When you give somebody a gift and you see them just using that gift over and over and over for years, you know they're grateful. Right? They didn't just say thank you for it. They're actually using it. And I think we should embrace the things for which we're grateful. And that means our friends, our team, certainly our families, and not take them for granted this week or any other week in our lives. And so I want to share, you. [01:02:36] Speaker B: Know, a real world example of, you were talking about the law of attraction and how that, how that changes your mindset is, you know, a lot of times when you buy a car, you buy a particular car, and when you get in that car and start driving down the road, you realize, oh, my gosh, there's another car just like mine. And next thing you know, you see your exact car all over the place. [01:03:03] Speaker A: Yeah. You've never seen it before, but now suddenly everybody has one. [01:03:06] Speaker B: That's exactly right. And that's the way the mind works. So if you're attracted to the things that are negative in your life, well, that's what you're going to see. [01:03:13] Speaker A: That's a good analogy. That's a good analogy. [01:03:16] Speaker B: Trained your mind to look for the positives and be grateful for those things with, those are the things you see. And there's plenty of science out there, how that affects your mind, your body and etcetera. [01:03:26] Speaker A: Yeah. And you and I share another thing in common. We've both had career doors close on us that led us to a better place, and here we are. So, Bill, thanks a million. I knew this would be a great episode. It was. It was a lot of fun. We'll do it again. And, and thank you for what you're doing for our listeners. If you have any interest in maybe starting a family child care business, or you're in one and you don't know where to turn, Bill is in touch with all the networks and associations and boards and different things that can, you know, keep us in contact with the resources. And so we're gonna point you on our podcast page to his website, which is fcc associates.com. Fcc associates.com. That's family childcareassociates.com or family Childcare associates. [01:04:23] Speaker B: At FCC. [01:04:26] Speaker A: Go to our podcast page. Just click the link and learn more about that there, and we'll see you here next week. And in the meantime, time, folks, lead on.

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