What's going on, pursuers? Welcome to the Pursuit of Calling podcast, where my goal
and purpose is to provide you with the tools needed to successfully discover and pursue
your God-given calling. I'm your host, Thomas Carney. And today, we're learning about leadership
and the importance of knowing your core values with Jesse McCullough.
All right, guys, welcome to this episode of the Pursuit of Calling podcast. I'm sitting
here with Jesse McCullough. We met through, oh, actually, I probably already said this
in the intro, but I'm going to say it again. We met through the John Maxwell certification
program team, whatever you want to call it. And I just posted in the Facebook group about
like, hey, I want to connect with people in the round of the Pittsburgh area. And he commented,
we talked on the phone for a little bit, a few weeks, about a month ago at this point.
And then we were able to set this up to have an actual interview. And it's great. I know
he's been on other podcasts before. So I am excited to get to know a little bit more about
Jesse, get to, and probably learn a little bit about leadership also. So, hey, Jesse,
how's it going?
It's going well, Thomas. Thank you so much for having me here on your podcast. I look
forward to our conversation this evening.
For sure. For sure. I, yeah, I think I already said it before. And I, this recording is supposed
to happen last week, but you were sick and then I got sick and I was down for the count.
So I'm happy we're doing it now.
I am too. Cause my voice was completely wiped out the first part of the week. And I thought
it'll probably be good by Friday, but it was probably a little questionable. So I'm glad.
I think a little bit of time probably did us both some good here.
Oh, for sure. I am in a lot better mood too. But the, but for those of you, and also probably
for myself a little bit too, I listened to a couple of the episodes that you sent me,
but there's, but for those of us who don't know you that well, who is Jesse McCullough?
Well, Thomas, I, I'm a farm kid from Northwest Pennsylvania. I live near Meadville, Pennsylvania,
and that probably doesn't mean a whole lot to so many of your listeners, but I live about
two thirds of the way from Pittsburgh to Erie. If you look at the map, it's pretty much the
middle of nowhere. My hometown is about 1100 people. We have one stoplight. There's more
livestock than people is probably a reasonable thing to say about where, where I live. And
I grew up in a family where they were all educators. And so it should come with no surprise
as I decided to go into pharmacy. I became a pharmacist and actually went to school at
the university of Pittsburgh. So just down the road from you and worked all over Northwest
Pennsylvania and then moved into a number of different roles within the corporate office
of a larger pharmacy group and had so many different experiences. And, you know, the
experiences that I would not have expected a farm kid to have by any means. And, you
know, that's, that's how my journey started. And I know we have a lot more that we're going
to talk about here, but, you know, it took going through at least that part of the journey
to get the experience and the perspective that opened up this next phase of my life,
at least, which is where you and I have now crossed paths.
Yeah. Wow. And I think this, like you said, this area of our lives that we both have crossed
paths, this has been, like, I've only been a part of the Maxwell leadership certification
program stuff for, for a short time. And the amount of things that I've learned and the
people that I've got to meet just through connection through the Facebook group, through
like some of the calls that they host and just you and the connection that you helped
me get before I left for Uganda. Honestly, it's like, it's crazy how, like the, how I
felt immediately that like, wow, the price that I paid was like, was immediately, it
was like, just felt like it was like, okay, this is definitely going to be worth it pretty
quick. But the, the value that it brings is amazing. If you have something, sorry.
It's just a completely different culture. Yeah. It's a culture unlike anything that
I have experienced before. I really had no idea what I was getting into. You know, I
thought it was one thing and it was, it was a few steps beyond what, what, what it turned
out to be. I thought it was going to be, you know, I sort of had my own ideas of what it
would be. And it just, it's turned out to be so much more. And just the caliber of people
that you meet, people like yourself, it's, I, it just, it just boggles my mind, right?
To, to, to be able to see this and, and just, you make friends from all over the world.
When I joined, I think they were saying that there were maybe 18,000 members of the team
at that point. And I, I don't know what the current number is. Last I knew, it was well
over 40, maybe 45,000 people were members of the team. I joined back in, in 2017. And,
and I think we'll talk more about that here as, as, as our conversation goes on. But you
know, it was just, there were so many eye-opening experiences going through that, that made
a positive impact on me, that I could turn around and take that and make a positive impact
on others.
Can you go into like, what was an example of one of those impacts?
Yeah, well, you know, one, it was, like I said, it was a different culture. You, you,
you went in there and there were a bunch of people, everybody loved you unconditionally
and only wanted the absolute best for you. And that was so apparent. It was so apparent.
And I mean, I've, I've, you know, I'm, like I said, I'm a pharmacist. I can't even begin
to put the number of pharmacy conferences I've, I've attended and you know, you'll be
there and you'll see people who you at least perceive to be your competitors across the
aisle. You know, they're kind of like the enemy or whatever. You know, there's, there's,
there's some level of distrust that you have towards some people. You know, and it was,
it was completely different than anything I had felt in school. It was actually completely
different than anything I ever felt in my church. It was, it was just something different.
And you know, one of the people that I introduced you to, a friend of mine, John, we were put
at the same table and it was interesting that John was originally from Kenya. He says he's
living near Philadelphia. And when you travel, you know, several hundred miles to get to
this conference and you find somebody who lives, you know, a couple hundred miles away
from you, you know, you're, you're essentially neighbors. Pennsylvania there. And it's like,
oh, you know, we're, we're, we're, we have a lot in common. We're, we're already halfway
to being best friends. And you know, he has become a lifelong friend to me since, since
that day. And so, yeah, it was just, it was just such a special place. And then, you know,
just the, the environment and how we learned together and how we encourage one another,
it was, it's, it's just been, it's been a really special group to be a part of.
Yeah. The, I think that like, whatever you said, like there, you're surrounded by people
that that love you and that, that, that want to see you succeed was prevalent to me whenever
I was on one of the, I was on one, like one of the intro calls for whatever you join.
And I don't remember his name right now, but he, he asked me for, I joined the call late.
And so eventually he asked me, he saw me, he was like, he saw me come in and he, I thought
it was just going to be a call where I said, sit in and listen. And that was it. You know,
he called, he called on me and he called out and I was like, Hey Thomas, who, how's it
going? What's your story? And I was like, Oh, I thought I was just sitting here. I said,
I didn't expect to talk. And so I told him about, about my life, about my, my struggles
with muscular dystonia and we're back and the, and I talked to him and then I talked
about my podcast and I said it really quick. I kind of like, I, sometimes I, I, I said
it so fast and I get, I get like a certain insecurity telling people about my podcast
because some people are just like, wow, they're on another podcast. And so I get like, I said
it really fast. He goes, wait, what was that? And he goes, go back. What was that? Say it
again. And he made me, he made me talk about, I actually, so that made me feel comfortable
to talk about it more and telling the vision behind it and why I'm doing it. And that in
itself was like, that was the first call was on and it was eye opening to how this is the
eye opening to how the rest of this is going to be. So now I'm pumped to see what else
this community can bring.
And you said you're actually going to the, the conference live, which from when we're
recording this is just a couple of weeks away and I can't wait to hear your take on it.
And I've only ever been to one conference before and this will be my second. I'm, I'm
so excited. The first one was great and it was been like three years ago, so I'm ready
for it. But, uh, the, I think it's interesting that, well, not, it's not surprising, but
I find it interesting.
The two podcasts episodes you sent me were both, you sent me two episodes for those who
weren't privy to our text conversations. He sent me to, um, two episodes for me to get
more familiar with who he is. And, um, and I felt like more of what he, um, really, um,
has a heart for and because they both had to do with leadership, like in the title,
that's what specifically what those podcasts were about. And I found that there was other
episodes out there that you were on on different podcasts. And, uh, but these two in particular
were strictly talking about leadership and I'm going to link to both of those, uh, in
the, in the show notes, other people who want to learn more that maybe that they'll learn
in this episode or different things that learn the other episodes. I'm going to link those
in the show notes so people can go listen to those as well. Um, and, but I wanted to
know like what it could, wait, I want you to explain from your perspective, what leadership
is and why it's important.
Well, I guess the definition that I use, uh, first of a leader, let's, let's, let's talk
first about who a leader is. The definition that I share with people is that a leader
is anyone who helps someone at some time get somewhere or do something. All right. I sort
of, I'm kind of like the way that sort of rolls off the tongue, but a leader is anyone
who helps someone at some time get somewhere or do some thing. And, and when you, when
you think about that definition, um, it applies to all of us. We are all leaders, right? And
you know, I use a bit of a, an absurd illustration, but I would ask you, you know, is a, is a
newborn baby a leader? And based on this definition, the answer is yes. Newborn baby, especially
to new parents, right? I don't know what your experiences are with that Thomas, but, uh,
you know, a newborn baby leads new parents to become competent parents, right? Through,
you know, it's, it's a pretty awkward transition, right? You know, it's, it's a bunch of crying
and you know, you realize that at some point the baby's crying because the baby is hungry
or needs a fresh diaper or needs to take a nap or go to bed or has to burp or whatever,
right? You have these, you have these things and, and over time you get to realize the,
the subtleties and, and that youngster leads you to become competent. It leads you from
one place where you were and gets you to a better place than where you started, right?
So, so that is who a leader is and that applies to all of us. It doesn't matter, um, you know,
where we are in life, each one of us is a leader, but, um, you know, the most simple
definition of leadership that I could give you is that it is all about influence. How
do you influence someone to do at some time to do something or get somewhere, right? You
know, that's, that's really what it comes down to. And, uh, you know, that has become
such, such an important thing, uh, to me in my life because I realized how much of that
was missing for far too long. It was missing for far too long. As, as I shared, I'm, I'm
a farm kid that became a pharmacist and I went on and I've done a number of things that,
you know, no farm kid probably really has a whole lot of business doing. Uh, but one
of the things, uh, that my group and I were involved with was getting pharmacists trained
to provide immunization services. And we're recording this in February of 2025 and I'm
going to tell you 20, 20 years ago, you could not get a flu shot at very many pharmacies,
right? In, in 2005, I got the phone call, Hey Jess, can you get some pharmacists trained
to provide a flu shots? And I thought pharmacists don't do that, but you know, whatever. So
we, we fumbled our way through it and we got 13 pharmacists trained that first year, uh,
to provide immunizations in Pennsylvania. Fast forward five or six years, it was, I
think it was by 2011, uh, we had 13,000 pharmacists trained to do this. And it was, I mean, there,
there's some part of that, which is very mechanical in nature. Can you get people to, uh, read
the book and attend a class and pass a test and this, that, and the other thing. Uh, but
on the other side of it, it was, it was the reality of, can I get pharmacists to actually
provide those services to the customers that come into their pharmacy? And I would see
some pharmacies that just, they just did gangbusters. Like, man, they, they, they, they would immunize
anybody that came in. They did such a good job. And there were others where it was like,
you know, dental procedures were more pleasant than seeing, you know, uh, uh, immunization
services at some of these pharmacies. Um, and you know, they just, they just struggled
and I didn't know what that was. I could not figure that out. And you know, I, I, I very
much approached it from a management perspective and it was actually, uh, just over 10 years
ago, it would have been late summer, early fall of 2014 where I, and Thomas, I could
take you to the piece of sidewalk where I was, where I was listening to a podcast where
John Maxwell was on there and he said, leadership skills can be learned. And I had never considered
that before. I had never considered that before. I, I just took that each one of us had some,
some level of leadership skill and it was, you know, not dissimilar from our shoe size
or our height, um, or our eye color or our hair color or something like that. It was
just, this is just something that you were, you were basically equipped with and some
people got a healthy amount of it and other people just didn't get as much. And you know,
as I looked at it, I just, you know, I saw a bunch of people who just didn't get a whole
lot of it and I thought, no, well, that's, that's too bad. I had never really thought
of it in those terms that leadership could be learned and that leadership would make
all the difference in the world. And that night, you know, I, I, it just, it, it sparked
something in me and I, I started, I started studying leadership and you know, it became
as, as I started to study leadership, poor leadership stood out to me everywhere. All
you had to do was turn on the TV at night and yeah, you're a politician of your choice.
I don't, I don't care who you like or who you dislike. They're on TV and you could see
poor leadership. And so that, that was, that was pretty obvious to me. I could see that
I could, I could see poor leadership in government. I could see, I could see poor leadership at
work. I could see, you know, as I learned more of what good leadership looked like,
there is not good leadership all around. And I could see that and you know, and that, that's,
that started, that, that, that started to agitate me a little bit. That, that started
to get me just to be a little bit uncomfortable or, you know, I could see the poor leadership
in, in the schools that my kids went to. I could, I could see the poor leadership in
my church. But where it really just punched me in the nose is when I looked in the mirror
and I saw the poor leadership that was happening in my own household and with myself. I was
like, Oh man, this is, this is something else. And you know, I started on that journey of,
you know, having to learn or unlearn, I had to unlearn a lot. And I will tell you that
I am a much improved, I am by no means a perfect leader now, but I am light years ahead of
where I was 10 years ago. And as I went through that, it hit me that, Oh my goodness, other
people need this too. Other people can go down this same road that, that I'm going down
and, and, and they can yield similar benefits to what I'm observing, right? This has the
potential to, to change everything. And, and you know, one of the leadership guys that,
that I listened to, I don't remember if it was John Maxwell, it may have been Craig Groeschel
who said, you know, everything rises and falls on leadership. Everything gets better when
the leader gets better. And, and so I, you know, I started doing that myself and then
I started seeing how the impact it had on my team. And it was like, it was eye-opening.
I was like, Oh my goodness, this, this is it. This is it. So I'm going to pause there.
I've been talking way too long here. So I'm going to make sure I'm, I haven't gone off,
off track where you're wanting the conversation to go, my friend.
Oh no, you're going right in the, you're go, I asked you what leadership was and why it's
important. And I think you're answering that pretty well. You're saying everything rises
and falls in leadership that I believe that is Craig Groeschel. And the, the whole thing
like the same thing I can attest to the, you're saying, sorry, I'm going to see poor leadership
everywhere that you go, because when you start studying it and I started, I started studying
it, reading John Maxwell's books years ago and I don't remember how I actually found
out about John Maxwell. I just, I don't know, I have no clue. I don't remember. And I just,
I, the more I, the more I learned about it, the more, the more I, I personally want to
implement it in my life so that others that I, others I lead or even have the opportunity
to lead. Like, I think you hear a lot that leadership has, and I think that's within
your definition has nothing to do with position and everything to do with character. And so
like there's, I think honestly, the way you were explaining it to me sounds like the reason,
yeah, the reason it's important is because where there's, where there's poor leadership,
everybody is hitting a ceiling. Everybody is, nobody's getting better in that instance
if there's poor leadership.
Exactly. You know, it's like the Bible tells us where there is no vision that people perish.
Yeah.
Right? So if you have a leader that cannot see a better tomorrow, then where are you
going? Like there's, it does not, it does not inspire progress and advancement to the
things that the group can do.
So on this like journey that you've been on, you said you would listen to, you remember
that podcast from, you think you said 2014?
I believe it was 2014 and I wish I could find it again, but if you think I could find that
one, I don't know. I've looked a couple of times, I've not been able to locate that one
again.
No worries. I think there's, there's still a ton of content out there to get the game
wisdom from, from both John Max One, Craig O'Shell and man, I can't think of anybody
else, but there are a ton of other people. But there's one thing I want to ask you and
you might have already said it, but I want to dive in, like, what is one of the most
important things that you learned while pursuing this journey of personal growth and journey
of leadership?
I would say one of the most important things, especially early on, was to become clear on
my values. What, and I'll give you a preview of what you should expect next month, but
we all have values, right? You have a, you have a set of values. I have a set of values.
Each one of our listeners here tonight has a set of values. And by and large, they're
probably somewhat similar. You know, I don't expect people with dramatically different
values from you would be listening to your podcasts for very long. But by and large,
you know, any group of people has values and they can be similar. They can be quite different,
right? You know, you're, you're outside of Pittsburgh and there, and people in Pittsburgh
have a core value of, of the Steelers, right? And not everybody has that core value, right?
You can go to different parts of the world where that value does not exist. There's,
there's actually parts of the world where the Steelers are not loved at all. As hard
as that is for any of us to be able to comprehend, right? But I was, where, you know, these dominoes
started to fall for me is I was at a conference in Washington, DC and there were about 500
people in the room and the keynote speaker came out and he asked a question. He said,
how many of you work for a company that has core values? And in that room with 500 people,
500 hands went high in the air. His next question was how many of you know what those values
are? And 500 hands in the room came down and I looked around and I thought, wow, isn't
that something? Yeah, that's wild. Isn't that something? You know, cause the fact of the
matter is we all, we all have values, but oftentimes we haven't articulated what those
values are. We would, we would say, I would say, Thomas, you know, do you have some good
values? Do you have some good personal values? You would say, of course, Jess, absolutely.
And I would believe you, right? And I thought I had good values. And when, whenever I went,
whenever I went to that first conference, that first Maxwell conference in Florida,
it was early on and John came out and he started teaching. He said, I want you to know what
our values are. And I suspect he will do something similar whenever you go down there. And he
put this on the table. He said, Hey, I want you to know these are our values. And you
know, once you know the values that it sort of explains the culture that we were talking
about a while ago. But he says, these are our values. He said, they do not have to be
yours. They do not have to be your values, but I want you to know this. If, if these
are not your values, I want to encourage you to go to the, go to the help desk, tell them
that you do not have the same values that we have. And what we'll do is we'll just give
you your money back. You go home, there's no harm. There's no foul. There's no hard
feelings, but I just want you to understand that we want you to be, you know, we, we want
you to, you know, this is, these are the values that we hold dear. And in a room of 2000 people,
3000 people, however many people were in there. And he starts going through the values. And
you know, a couple of times, as, as I will tell the story, it may not have actually been
this way. He just reminded us of these aren't your values. Do not feel obligated to stay.
And I would tell you Thomas, that they were not my values. They were fantastic. They were
actually better values than what I had, but they, they were not my values. And as I looked
around the room, no one was getting up. And I wasn't about to be the first, but maybe,
maybe I need to upgrade my values. And that's where that's, I, I, I think that was one of
the key things. One of those key moments for me in this, in this growth is that, you know,
I upgraded, I upgraded my values and you know, and, and, and I took, took a different perspective
on so many things. And you know, I, I, I now came back and I had so much more patience
and compassion for so many people that I didn't have before. And that didn't happen overnight.
And that, that took some time that I'm not going to tell you that I've never been frustrated
since that point, but I have to remind myself, you know what, I, I need to value people.
One of the values was value people and add value to people. And I didn't always do that.
I may have valued people, but I didn't add value to people. You know, that was something
that when you and I met after your Facebook post here a couple of weeks ago, I would hope
you would say, and I think I'm going to put words in your mouth. You can dispute it here.
But I think you would say that I added value to you in that conversation that you left
that conversation better than what you started it. Yeah, for sure. And that was not the way
that I thought at all. And at one point it was what this, this is the value that I have.
I got to keep all this value to myself. There's no way I'm, cause if I give my value away,
I'm somehow going to be less. I'm somehow going to be not as important. I'm somehow
going to not have the same impact on people. People will not hold me in that same regard.
And I, I, my, my, my thinking was completely backwards that I needed to add value to people.
I needed to empower people. I mean, these were leadership principles that were missing
in the organization that I was in. And perhaps that explains why the organization had some
of the challenges that it had. You know, it's just, it's just some, something, something
to consider. So I, I would say that that's probably one of the, one of the key changes,
one of those key elements that, you know, was such a, such a, an important part of,
of my, of my journey. And it happened very early on, you know, I'm in a room of people
that somehow they all love me. They've never met, they all love me. They all want the best
for me. You know, and I, I don't know that I was, I, you know, I'm a general, generally
I get along with people, but I'm not that warm and fuzzy. These folks were a little
warmer and a little fuzzier than what I was in that regard. And it was just, you know,
it was just an interesting, it was just an interesting experience and it has served to
improve so many things and, and how I engage and interact with other people.
And, well, I'm going to stop for a second to say I'm, I just got this over, this like
feeling of gratitude over myself for just now is that I'm just, I'm just, I'm just
super grateful for this conversation right now. I don't know. I just got like, you were
talking about all the people surrounding you and I talked about the values of, of the Maxwell
Corp, Maxwell Corporation. And I, I was like, my, my, I'm thinking about my values of love
God and love others. And there's, and then there's a third one that I, my, one of my
good friends, Sean, would use, would say love God, love others and teach others to love
God. And the way, the way to do that is by, is through adding value to them. And there's,
and that can be just at the grocery store to the, to the cashier. There's the, like
so many instances where I can think back to where I, I'm a, I can, I can be pretty introverted
and I just like go, I go in, stick, I go in, I know exactly what I'm going to buy, exactly
have it mapped out in my head where I'm going to walk in the grocery store. And I just get
to the cashier. We, we, they scan everything in, I say, thank you. I get my car and I leave
and I don't say a word to them. And I'm like, they were just, they were just a means to
an end. And I had to shift my mindset around that. My, like every single person deserves,
deserves to be loved and every single person deserves to have value added to them. And
that's what, that's one big reason why I joined, joined the leadership, this leadership
company, because I, having known the values, at least to the extent I can learn it from
books and podcasts and knowing that this was out there as an option, it took me a couple
of years to pull the trigger financially. But I, when I did, I, it, it took, it took
one call, like I said before, to understand that this is where I'm meant to be. And this
conversation is another indication of that because it was, it's through the, it's through
paying that large sum of money that caused me to be able to, caused me to be able to
have this conversation right now. So I just want, so again, I would say I'm super grateful
to be doing this right now. I usually don't have this much energy at 830 at night.
Well, it's, it's such a wonderful thing to connect with people that have these similar
values and perspectives and attitudes, right? So it's, it's my, my privilege and my pleasure
to be here. And you know, it's, it's worth it, right? You're, you're worth it, Thomas.
Each one of your listeners is worth it. And so, you know, I'm happy to, to share some
of my story here with them.
Wow. So one question I have left, well, actually there's two more after this, like two out,
end of the podcast questions, but I don't count those. But there's a one question I
usually ask first, and I guess I skipped over it by accident. But I actually kind of like
that this is the last question before we get into the outro. This podcast, as you know,
is called the pursuit of calling. And I want to, for however long talk specifically about
what you believe your calling is.
Wow. That's, that's an interesting question. It's a tough question. And it's a personal
question because, you know, I know so many people who have gone through life and they
do not know what type of calling that they have. And then I also know there's some young
people who believe they know their calling. And that may be, I guess I've, I've observed
that, you know, our calling can change a little bit as you go through, as you go through life.
Just for some perspective for your listeners, I think, and I need my wife to validate this,
I think I turned 50 this year. So I just want you to know where I am. And I say that because
I've lost arguments with my wife where she knows I don't. But it took me till I was about
40 to figure this out. I needed to, I needed to have certain life experiences. I need to,
I need to see my heart change and not necessarily change for the better. Right? As I went through
my pharmacy career, I, I noticed that my heart hardened towards some people, towards some
attitudes. And I'm not going to say that that's right, but I would tell you, you know, as
I think I shared earlier, and when we're done, I'll, I'll pull it up on a map. I'll share
a map on the screen. I'll take you to that place where I was, where I heard leadership
skills can be learned. And that thought hasn't left me for the last decade. It hasn't. Right?
It's like something that I think about every day. Now, I don't know about you, but there's
certain things that over the course of my life, I've been, I've been sort of, you know,
excited or hot for, right? It's like, oh, this is, this is the hot new thing. This,
I'm really excited about whatever. And a lot of times those things will burn hot and bright
for a short period of time. And then they ultimately burn out and go. This hasn't gone
anywhere. That's how, you know, I would, I would say that I believe it's my calling.
It's that, you know, oh, you know, I had a favorite sports team or I had a favorite TV
show and you know, you know, that everything was, you know, revolved around this for a
period of time. This is something that has just had a completely different type of, of
life too. And then I would also tell you this, when it, when it comes to a calling, especially
if you feel that it's God's calling on your life, and I do feel that this is God's calling
on my life, at least for this, this particular phase, you have to understand that the enemy
will not like that. And because of that, you're going to have stuff come at you. You're going
to face resistance. You're going to, you're going to face failure. It's, you know, having
a calling, I don't know that that's, at least my experience has been that it's not sunshine
and lollipops. It's hard. It is hard. It is, you know, there are some high points. There
are some, there are some challenging days, you know, so I'm afraid I'm getting off the
question that you asked, but you know, what, what it came to was that I realized that my
purpose in life was to help others help others. That's, that's what I became a pharmacist
and I am not especially gifted in the direct patient care aspect of it, but I do have some
gifting in helping others who do that. Right. That's, that's where, you know, helping pharmacists
develop these new skills around immunizations or whatever were so helpful for me to see
that, Hey, this is, this is what you need to do. You need to go out and you need to,
you know, train others who will go help others. And then, you know, well, what's next? You've
trained everybody to give immunization. What's, what's next? And it became, it's become very
clear to me that it's, you need to help them acquire and develop and nurture and mature
these skills that will impact themselves, their teams, their patients in the communities
that they serve. And you know, it, it, that didn't happen automatically. You know, I was
like, Oh, you know, at first it was like, Oh, you know, do some leadership training
for pharmacists. Surely that's, surely that can be a lucrative industry. And you know,
perhaps there was some selfishness with that in the early going. And I think because of
that, there was a lot of struggle and failure. There's a lot of struggle and fail, right.
And then I'll, I'll give you this spoiler. You join the Maxwell team because you want
to be, you want to have access to John, but you will find that he has surrounded himself
with so many fantastic people that are just of the same caliber, maybe even a notch or
two ahead. And like, I didn't expect that. Like I, you know, I was like, Oh, I want to
be able to learn from John. And then like all these other people are, you know, you
know, a few, few tiers below his caliber. And that is not the case. That is not the
case. And his CEO is a guy by the name of Mark Cole. And Mark said one day, he said,
everybody deserves to be led well. And I, that, you know, I, I, my radar goes up to
the everybody's and nobody's and, and, and like the extremes, right? You know, when my
kids come home, when they say everybody else has a cell phone, I really, they all do. But
when he says everybody deserves to be led well, I said, Hmm, is that true? Is that true?
And I actually had to look at the opposite of that. I said, well, let's make a list of
who doesn't deserve to be led well. Let's see whose name can we put on that list? Who,
who's the, who's the poor person out there that needs to have a very poor leader leading
them? And the more I thought about it, I could not come up with anybody's name to put on
that list. And I had to reason that, Hmm, everybody does deserve to be led well. Right?
And that was, those were just some, some pretty substantial shifts. And, you know, it's, as,
as I talk with folks, it's, you can find some common ground. Oh yeah, it would be good.
It would be good if people had these skills. But there's also an arrogance you have to
get through. You have to get through the arrogance that, you know, I don't know if you've ever
looked at these statistics, but I believe it's AAA has done some research. Do you happen
to know anybody, Thomas, who would describe themselves as a below average driver?
No.
It's something like 93% of people would, you know, they all believe that they're above
average drivers and they'll give you whatever reason behind there. Like, Oh, I've never
had a speeding ticket. I've never blah, blah, blah. But we know that statistically speaking,
that cannot be true. Right? We were to rank, you get everybody, line them up. Somebody's
at the top. Somebody's at the bottom. Like that's, that's just the way that it goes.
Right? The same is true for leadership. The same is so true for leadership. It's something
like 60% of people would rank themselves in the top 10% of leaders. And that's probably
not the exact statistic, but I share that with you just as a ballpark statistic because,
you know, most people say that comparatively I'm better than a lot of the other people
that are around me. And that may be true. That doesn't mean you're a good leader. That
doesn't mean you don't have room to improve. So you, you, you know, my, my, my journey
took me to, uh, become humble enough to say, Hmm, even though I have all these years of
schooling and advanced training and this, that, the other thing, maybe there's something
else that I could learn that could make a tremendous positive impact on the people around
me. And when I had the, the, the humility and the courage to go down that road, I found
up, Oh yeah, I do. And the fact is, is that if I have room for it, probably a lot of the
people that I know have room for it as well. And you need, you need to bring them along
as well. Also something that I was challenged to do is that, you know, I was challenged
that if you really want to improve your leadership skills, you need to do it in the nonprofit
space. So, you know, I serve my church, uh, in, in a couple of ways. Uh, I, um, I, I serve
on a board, uh, locally for community revitalization and perhaps the most challenging area has
been I got, um, as I was telling you before we started recording, I believe the technical
term is roped, but I, I, I'm coaching fifth and sixth grade elementary boys basketball,
right? And if you want to check your leadership, like how do you lead kids? Right. You know,
like there it's, uh, you know, it's just this volunteer position where you go out there
and you serve them and you do your best and you find out that there's, there's challenge
and there's struggle and there's failure that you go through, but you know, you keep going
through it because you have the opportunity to keep getting better. You have the opportunity
to keep making an impact on people. And if I can get better coaching elementary boys,
you know what, that's going to help me. That's going to help me lead a lot of other people,
you know, as, as we go down the road. So I've probably gone way off topic and way too long
on that, but I'll, I'll pause there.
No, no, you are, you are perfectly fine. Um, so I think we will, we will, uh, start the
wrap up sequence. Um, and with just some final questions, uh, I believe I sent these to you.
I'm not positive. Uh, but no, I want to pre I want to also say thank you. I love the,
uh, what you said about your calling thing. Uh, it's to help others, help others. Um,
I think, I think that's fantastic. I think that's, I love it whenever people actually
have that's one thing I want to help people find is if, how do you put your, how do you
put a phrase to your calling? Um, and the one thing Valley Valerie Burton says in the
training videos I'm watching, um, is she asks, um, the purpose question she asks, how do
you want people, how do you want people to improve having crossed paths with you? And,
um, and the answer to that question is generally the person believes their purposes and they
didn't really think about it until then. Um, so I'm in the listeners right now to think
on that one. Uh, how do you want people's lives to improve when they cross paths with
you? And I think you're going to, you think you're going to find your, that's going to
get you on a path towards your calling. Um, but all right, Jesse, so there is, where'd
they go? I had a couple, well, I know there, uh, I couldn't find them on my notes, but
there's, um, two questions. One, uh, when it comes to personal growth, development,
or like in leadership, what would be two of your best resources that you would usually
recommend to people? Um, two that I would start with, um, with anything that you do,
I think it's so important to know the rules of the game, right? Um, if you don't know
the rules, um, the game's not quite as fun. You know, if you, if you're playing ice hockey,
you don't know the rules to ice hockey. You don't know why the game unfolds the way that
it does. Right. To that, to that end, um, there's two resources that I, um, that are
very much foundational and that's, uh, Maxwell's 15 laws of growth and 21 laws of leadership.
Um, that those have been so helpful and by learning those principles, it becomes so obvious
when you see them violated. It becomes so obvious. Uh, like I'll hear stories and somebody
will be continuing their story and they'll say, well, then somebody did this and it's
like nails on the chalkboard for those of you old enough to remember what that, right?
It's like, oh, this is not going to go well because there is a violation, uh, happening
and um, you know, and you, you see it unfold. So like those are, uh, are, are two foundational
pieces, um, that, that, that I, um, rely on, um, just for myself and that I share with
others.
Great. Well, thank you for those. I can attest to 21 laws of leadership. I have 15 laws
sitting on my bookshelf. I haven't not, that's one I haven't picked up yet. So I need to,
I keep hearing it referenced over and over again. I need a, uh, I love reading. So I
need to get that onto my list.
Just let me throw, throw this out. Um, what really turned me on to both of those is, uh,
I heard two separate interviews in, um, in two completely different contexts. Uh, but
in both of these interviews, they referenced this book titled the richest man in Babylon.
If you've ever heard of the richest man in Babylon or not, but it's a, it was a book
that was written, I think it was written right before the depression. Um, and it's about
personal finance, right? But it's old. It's set, it's set in ancient Babylon and it tells
the story of this guy, um, who is in a place of struggle. And I believe it's at the end
of chapter two where, you know, he, he says, um, his buddy who he grew up with has gone
on to become the richest man in Babylon. And he thinks to himself, if I could just meet
my boyhood friend, maybe he could tell me how I could have wealth. By the time you get
to the end of chapter two, he's able to reunite with his, uh, with his childhood friend and
his friend tells him something to this effect. He said, the reason that you do not have great
wealth is either that you do not know or you do not obey the laws that govern wealth. And
that phrase, you don't know or you don't obey has stuck with me. Um, this is sort of a foundational
part of any teaching that I, that I do is that there's laws that govern everything around
us. Right. Right. I mean, have you ever had a day that was not 24 hours? Has the sun ever
not risen in the East and set in the West? The world operates by exact law. If you were
to hold your cell phone out at arm's length and let go, you have no doubt that it would
fall to the ground. It would not fall up. Right. There's the laws that govern these
things. Now, the fact is, is that there's laws that govern all sorts of things that
we may not be aware of. Right. You don't know the laws that govern electricity. Well, maybe
you do. I don't know the laws that govern electricity or some of these things. To me,
it's sort of like magic, right? But they, it doesn't mean that there's not principles
that you can study and learn. There's, you know, there's electrical engineers out there
that can wire your house and, you know, so that things don't explode or burn or whatever,
however that all works. That's outside of my, my expertise. But my point was this is
that there are certain principles that you can, that you can capture, that you can learn,
that you can, that you can internalize and that you can obey. That will make a tremendous
difference in how things go in your life. And that's, and that's where like the 15 laws
of growth come in. And that's where the 21 laws come in. There's, there's a number of
other, you know, any book that comes out and it has, or it has some number of laws, like
I'm there, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm just, I'm checking that out. Because that, you know, that's,
that's just what it is. You know, I'll, I'll give this tip to the readers or to, to your
listeners. Should you get these books and should you read these books? You do not read
these books the way you read other books. You read one chapter and then you sort of
soak on that chapter for days, weeks, maybe even months to learn that principle. You don't
just blow through it. You, you, you've got to, you, you, you, one of, one of our mentors
now Thomas uses the expression, learn a little bit, do a little bit, learn a little bit,
do a little bit. Right. And you need to learn those principles and you need, you need to
start exercising them. Don't just collect them all. Just, you know, learn as you go
and pick those up.
That's good. As the way you, the way you kind of brought structure to, with, to the, to
the laws. I like you brought structure to like search it to the understanding of like
what they're for. That's you said things in a way that I haven't really thought of before.
So that's pretty cool. Wow. So thank you for those. I'm going to do richest man Babylon
as a, as a Lincoln there as well. But there's a final question for the evening. Now that
you've been on the pursuit of calling, who would you recommend as a guest on the podcast?
You know, I would point you to our mutual friend, John, who came from Kenya. Okay. Yeah.
He has such an amazing story, such an amazing story. And, you know, I met him instantly.
We became best friends. I'm about twice as old as what he is if memory serves, but you
know, he, he tells the story of, of coming to America and I don't know that I would have
that type of courage to leave where I was and to go to some other part of the country.
You know, you, you, we were talking before you hit record about your trip to Uganda.
I don't know that I have that type of courage. I don't know that that's what I was equipped
with. I don't know that that's what my calling was for that, you know, my, you know, sort
of my work field is, is perhaps a little different. But, you know, some of these folks who have
done some of these different things, I think would be interesting. And, you know, I would
even point you back to Dustin and Ashley, who I introduced you to, who actually served
in Uganda for some period of time. There's, you know, I think those would be a couple
of folks that, at least at first thought would be low hanging fruit that I think would be
a tremendous people to add value to your listeners.
Wow. That's fantastic. Thank you. I'm going to reach out to all of them and well, yeah,
I appreciate it. And for those who are listening, thank you for listening to this episode of
the pursuit of calling podcast. And if you're, if you'd be so kind, if you got some value
from this episode, go ahead and share it out to on all of your social media platforms,
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keep pursuing.