I'm tearing up thinking about
it, that, Hey, I want to be that leader that's always here first
and is always last to leave. Because you'll never question my work
ethic and that I'm here with you. But I have a challenge. My challenge is I want to be a
mom too and not lead you astray I can't wait to talk about today's topic
because I keep thinking about who I was as a, uh, an early leader in my life, right? You get the title, which
means now you've made it. And unfortunately, most people in
the world believe the word manager or leader, uh, gives you status. And in fact, it does in the sense that
you have influence, but oh my gosh, who I am today and who I was at the
beginning, I'm radically different. And for anybody that's been with me
a period of time, and I have some employees who have been with me from the
beginning, would say, I really like this leader way better than the early ones. What was wrong with the early one? Well, I got the title. I got the position. I got the influence, but I
didn't get the instructions. I didn't inherently get the power
of the title has implications to influence people's lives. through all the way down to their Children
and their babies to their grandchildren. Because if you think about it today as
a leader, you can either make someone's day or you can break someone's day by
the power of your words and your actions. And so when I keep thinking about
leading by example, and I say it often, we must lead by example. What does that mean? What does it mean to say, Hey,
when you're working, I want you to look at me as your model. Think about that for a moment. If you're listening in right
now as a leader going, do you want to replicate you? If you're a jerk, then everybody
around you is going to be a jerk. And, and if you're not inherently
loving, caring, and value your people, they're not going to love, care, and
value the customers or each other. And so we have to model the
behavior more than anyone else. So when you get that privilege of
title, leader, executive leader, CEO, president, whatever it might
be, uh, those leaders who lead by example are literally visibly setting
the standards of the entire company. We're standing, we're setting
the standards for integrity. What does it mean for the
ethics that you want to provide? We're setting the standards
for the values that we have. So I'm going to take you back to when I
was a brand new leader, and then I'm going to take you to the leader I am today. And I'm going to be a little transparent
with you, a little vulnerable because I'm really, when I look back at the Casey Jr. leader. I'm going to call it junior. Uh, it wasn't that pretty. I came in and listen, I grew up with an
amazing mother who told me, be number one, be the best at whatever you do. And I attacked every role
with passion and conviction. And I still do today. But when I got that role as a
leader, I didn't understand. And so here I am, I'm a brand new leader. I show up, I expect everybody
to do what I tell them to do. Now that is the leader of yesterday. So if you're telling people what to
do, and you're the jerk that I was, where I'm telling everybody what to
do and then finding quickly that they either don't do it halfway or they
don't do it at all because they didn't understand it, um, you gotta shift,
you gotta shift and change and think about the power of bringing people with
you, not pushing them off the boat, but where they wanna, want you to lead. And you'll know by the way that if you
leave the company right now, whoever's listening in as a leader, if you leave
right now, how many people would follow? Or how many people would applaud. That you're gone. And I think back at those days where I'm
dogmatic, I walk in, I'm telling everybody what to do, and they must, I say they must
have thought it, I'm going to assume they did, to think what a jerk, or whatever
the words they were using to describe me, and I was so unaware of myself. I still am the same person. I'm still passionate, caring, and
loving, and I value them, but I didn't know how to communicate that. See, I don't have to tell somebody what
to do I can help lead and guide them as to their responsibilities, but I hired them
so that they would inherently know how to get the job done once I cast the vision. Well, on early leadership, man, I'm just,
I'm telling the vision and telling them how we're going to do it and telling
each person what they need to do. And I can tell you that the majority
of the employees would push back. They wouldn't do it verbally,
but I can promise you this. They would do it in a manner that Uh,
that you didn't get the best out of them. And when you don't get the best out of
them, you're not going to retain them long term and you're certainly not going
to hit your financial goals because you want everybody to feel a sense of
ownership and a sense of responsibility and a sense of pride for what they do. And you take that away when you're
dogmatic and you're pushing at them. And I've done a lot of study, looked at a
lot of studies on leadership and modeling behavior and what that looks like. And so I'll go back to, um, um,
The early days on another venture. So the first thing is in the old days,
I tell everybody what to do today. I guide them. And I provide the vision and let them
help shape how we're going to get there. So they're inclusive and they're
included in the conversation of the process, which gives them that ownership. All right. So I'll take you back to another time
early on in my career where I wasn't modeling and I thought I was, uh,
because I, again, I take everything. I'm going to go at it. So I wanted to be the first one in and
the last one to leave because I felt like that needed, I needed to model
the behavior of a work ethic, right? I'll do as much as you will do. So I'd show up first thing in
the morning, man, I'm there at six o'clock in the morning. I got to be the first and
I'd be the last to leave. So I'd wait for everybody to make
sure they knew what my commitment was absolutely for them and with them. I had a great deal of respect
among the employees that I was, I had a hard work ethic. But what I didn't know is that I was
modeling that they needed to sacrifice their families and they needed to
make the same sacrifices I was making. But I'm the owner, I'm the leader,
I'm the executive, and I didn't communicate to them that I did not have
expectations for them to come in at 6 a. m. and to leave at 10 o'clock at night. But there was this impression
that if they didn't do it, I didn't have respect for them. Well, there was a pivot for me as
a leader that hopefully many of you are going through, and if you're not,
maybe this is that moment that you can. The pivot was, um, taking my work home
and there was this moment where I was blessed to have two little girls and I
really, really wanted to be that leader at the office, as well as I wanted to
be present at home and I was conflicted. And so I couldn't start coming
in first thing in the morning. I wanted to take my children to school. It was a high priority for
me as a leader at my home. And I told my husband, I'm like, I
want to spend the time in the car. And I had been told by my best
friend, my sister, who said, never put your child on a bus. And I'm like, why? She goes, first of all,
there's older kids on the bus. That's a whole different lesson. What's happening on buses, et cetera. But she said, you're never going to get
the time that you have them captured in the car, driving them to school,
and you get to help set their day. So I decided to make that a high priority
for me in my home, that I wanted to take my kids to school every morning. Well, you've heard the challenge many
have about having balance in life. And I'm going to tell you, this was
that moment going, man, I really want to take my kids to school. I want to take my babies to school,
but I need to be at the office first. Well, you know, if, as what I can
communicate now to my employees, which we call associates, by the
way, I'm communicating to them, Hey, Xenix is going to be around. Uh, you will not sacrifice your
families on behalf of the company. Your families are more
important than the company. And I have verbally said that, by the
way, I never said that in the old days. Well, here was this moment
I had to make a decision. Am I going to lead by
example by showing up first? Or am I going to be the mom
that I wanted to be with my kids by just taking them to school? It sounds like a big decision,
but quite frankly, it was a huge decision for me at the time. And so here's what I did. I brought the team together and
shared with them my heart and I told them, and I'm tearing up thinking
about it, that, Hey, I want to be that leader that's always here
first and is always last to leave. Because you'll never question my work
ethic and that I'm here with you. But I have a challenge. My challenge is I want to be a
mom too and not lead you astray. But I need to take my kids to
school every morning, which means I won't be the first one in anymore. And I leave my house at 730, take
my kids to school, get them at 8, and I'll be at the office by 830. And I just want you to
know that's what I'm doing. Not because I'm anything less
than, I've got, I'm still all in. I had no idea that pivotal moment, the
respect I gained from my employees. Because see, what they all said to
me was, Oh my God, she's putting family, she's modeling the behavior
that I want, that she cares more for her family, and it's okay for me
to love my family more than my job. So when you think about leading by
example, everything you do, They are watching and they are quite
frankly making decisions about their personal careers with you. I didn't say professional. I said personal because you're
impacting them personally. See, I set the standard
that your family is first. I communicated in the manner
that I came in, in the mornings. Um, I started letting go instead
of saying there's the business Casey is the executive to being the
transparent, Hey, I'm a mom too. And so if you're listening as. I tell you, you're, you're
everybody that works for you. The retention's higher when
they understand that you care for them and their families. You build trust from it. You're inspiring them as a result of it. You're impacting the culture
as a whole because they now understand your priorities. who you are and what it means when
you say, I want to inspire you. And I'm going to share with you,
inspire them by leading by example and knowing that your words
matter and your actions matter. Hope that helps everybody
have an amazing day. And that is what it's
called leading by example. Take care.