Chris Lucas is the Vice President of Lucas Engineering and Management Services. A fun fact about Chris is that he is 3 rd generation Hanford worker. His grandfather was a security guard when they were building the site, and both his mother and father worked at the Hanford site. Chris worked at the site for 40 years before retiring. His first mentor out at the area was the man that hired him for his summer employment. He sat next to a gentleman on the bus heading back into town to close-out his seasonal employment, and when he did, human resources asked him if he would be interested in an operator job. When he went into the interview, it was the same gentleman that he sat next to on the bus that was doing the interview. He learned from this experience that finding out about people personally when hiring is very important. He believes that a good boss must be a good mentor. When you move up in positions in a company and get past the supervisor level, you are no longer managing the work, you are managing the people. It can be difficult to implement that shift. A good manager needs to get to know the people he/she is leading. You must build trust. He has been a part of several teams. There are two teams that shaped him and both had a family atmosphere. Not everyone got along all time, but overall, they were a family that learned to resolve issues together. Leaders can facilitate activities that aren’t work-related to build that family atmosphere. Honesty, integrity and trust are foundational when building a team. Explaining your position when disagreeing with the team is also essential. When setting the vision with his team, he may set parameters but does not give the solution of how to achieve or create the vision. Collaborate with the team to come up with the details on how to get to the end result. By keeping the team involved in the progress of the project, they feel ownership. Chris’s ideal day is spending the day with his granddaughters! He prefers to not sit at a desk; he enjoys being out in the field, having conversations with the teams. If he could do this all day every day, he would. To recharge his batteries, he spends as much time as possible with his granddaughters. He tries hard to not look at work emails and texts while spending quality time with loved ones. If you have a manager that displays that workaholic mentality, then often times the team feels inadequate because they aren’t putting in the same amount of time. Change is inevitable and has been a huge part of Chris’s work life with projects ending, new projects starting, etc. Pay close attention to those on your team who struggle with change. From a management position the worst thing you can do when you know change is coming is to stay silent. Blame is toxic on any team; a good manager looks at how he/she may have contributed to the failure, owns it and communicates it.

The legacy he wants to continue building and leave behind is a company program of leadership that will continue on when he is ready to leave Lucas Engineering to retire fulltime. He wants to leave behind something that will be useful for the industry. Chris’s advice to new leaders is be the best you can be in the job you are in.

Isaac is the president of Wake up Nation Foundation. A fun fact about Isaac is that he eats way too many cookies and must have his cookies and milk before bedtime! Wake up Nation Foundation raises money for kids who find leadership opportunities. Wake up Nation is his speaking company. Isaac travels all over the Pacific Northwest to speak to kids in school. Isaac is spread thin as he is also VP of Marketing for a growing medical company. Isaac was raised here in Richland. He believes that pouring his heart and his message into this generation is so important because there are a lot of distractions that are trying to deter this upcoming generation from its course. He feels like it’s our responsibility as an older generation to pour into them. When putting together a team, he must know who they are as a person. He needs to know that they have integrity and a servanthood mentality. You must identify your why and align with people that share the same passion. They need to be bleeding his vision. Isaac was so eager to find a child to Empower! He and his wife found 4 girls to send to a Nike camp in San Diego. Results drive people. People connect to results! Isaac makes time to think, dream, and plan early in the morning. He believes it’s important to start your day with a “can do” mentality. He found by starting his day like this, it carries him throughout the day. It helps him to be more productive with his time. When you hesitate, you miss out on opportunities. When you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready. Isaac organizes himself with time management. He believes in lists and says if it’s not on the list, it doesn’t exist. He must prioritize his list; his calendar is his coach. A full calendar is a success guide. He next-levels his success by using the time management tools that Paul Casey sends him. He has a tool called GPS which stands for Greatness Persistent Success. It guides both work and home life goals. It gives you weekly actions that will get you to your goals. Isaac energizes himself by plugging into his mentors. Eric Thomas and TD Jakes are people he really loves to listen to and watch online. He believes in doing these things regularly. Isaac believes that consistency is the key to staying strong and to have breakthroughs. When he started Wake Up Nation Wednesdays, he wasn’t getting much response. But when he started being consistent, he started get invitations to speak. Isaac believes that one of the most difficult challenges in leadership is finding a way to fill yourself. As a leader you are pouring yourself into so many people; you can easily be depleted. Fill your cup so you can pour into others. What makes Isaac smile being a leader is hearing how others are changing their lives. Once after a speaking engagement that he had, a kid call him on a Saturday morning and told him that he had changed his life. Seeing produced fruit is so rewarding. Vulnerability gives others the opportunity to fill the holes in you.

The advice Isaac would give to leaders is follow your heart. Don’t let anything or anyone prohibit your streak. Now is the time. Go to the place where your passion was burning and reconnect to your “why”. You can reach Isaac on his FB page at Wake Up Nation, on Instagram, and www.IsaacButts.com

Something funny about them is that they once shared an office and it didn’t work out so well. Gigi likes to work in silence and Tony likes to tap his pen, listen to music or podcasts. They started a business called Contenders Boxing which was created originally to keep kids off the streets. While watching businesses in the old downtown Kennewick area come and go, they decided to capitalize on Gigi’s talents, which are marketing and social media. This is how their business Two Wicked Geese was formed. They have a passion for serving other small local businesses. While building Two Wicked Geese, an opportunity came along for them called Rock Steady Boxing, which is a non-contact program for patients with Parkinson’s. They started with a group of 7 patients and grew very quickly over a year to 25 patients. When adding members to their team they look for individuals that can follow directions, are coachable, a good listener and a communicator. They also look for someone who takes the initiative. They encourage their clients to do one Facebook Live per week. They point out client’s positives and then praise them for their actions. They ask them to stretch themselves, and then validate and encourage them. They try once a week to sit down together to talk about their goals and plans. They utilize white boards and set separate goals as well as goals as a couple. They firmly believe in seeing their goals written down and manifesting them by focusing on them. To keep them from procrastinating, they do a lot of batch work. It’s so easy to get distracted. They use Rescue Time app which helps them with work/life balance. Breaks are really important in this process. Their ideal day is getting to bed at 9:00, and because of Tony’s military background, he is ready for the day at 4:30 am. Tony is up and ready to workout, and Gigi is busy taking care of their son; her work day starts at about 7:30. She often goes for walks, that is followed by watching an inspirational training, then it’s time to work on a client’s project, lunch time, and they try to end their day by 3:00pm. They often start and end their day with something positive. To keep themselves motivated, they read books, watch a lot of Tony Robbins, Tim Ferris and Simon Sinek. Because they are business partners and also married, they work hard to plug into something that will inspire them in several areas. Tony and Gigi feel their secret weapon is continuing education in their field. They are continually learning. With social media they can easily connect with their greatest mentors. They are also a part of several mastermind groups. Staying current and relevant is very important in their business. Their greatest challenge as an entrepreneur is counting on the freelancers that they subcontract with. Delegating is one of Gigi’s hardest challenges. Rewards are very simple, when a client calls and says that they have received new leads due to an ad campaign. With Rocksteady Boxing the rewards may seem small but they are the things we take for granted (like dressing yourself). To clear her mind and take a break, Gigi Vacuums the house! As a family they really enjoy traveling whether it be big cities or third world countries. They really love meeting people from all over the world.

Their advice for other leaders is to surround yourself with other like-minded individuals. Educate yourself: podcasts, books, programs--and prioritize self-care.

Maronda is the owner of Consider it DONE! Personal Concierge, and a fun fact about her is that she and her family talk in movie lines. Maronda was raised by parents who are entrepreneurs: her father owns North East Carpet Company and her mother started Consider it DONE! 25 years ago. Consider it Done was named by Maronda’s oldest son when he was asked to color pictures for his grandmother’s refrigerator; he replied “Consider it DONE, Grammy!” Maronda started working at the age of 13 as a busgirl for her mother who was a restaurant manager. Her mother taught her how to be a servant-leader. A leader is someone who is willing to do what others are not; a leader is someone who serves. Throughout her teenage years she also did work for her mother when she started Consider it DONE! After Maronda suffered a neck injury at a manufacturing company she was approached by a friend who needed a personal assistant after his wife had passed away. That is when she decided to bring CID to the Tri-cities. Serving her community is what is most important to Maronda. What surprises her most is that she is very much like her mother. When she was a teenager she did not enjoy helping her mother with CID, but as an adult it has come full circle--now that she is in her 40’s, she is surprised at how much she enjoys it. Her sister also operates CID in Massachusetts. Her advice for leaders in the community is to serve their employees. When you do that, you are building a relationship, rapport, and trust. People really don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. Serve your employees to the best of your ability. She absolutely believes that her life’s purpose is to love people, and that can be done through the smallest acts of kindness. In 2013 Maronda experienced the toughest year of her life. She went through a divorce, her 2-year-old niece drowned in her father’s swimming pool, and 8 other people in her family and friends circle died. She experienced debilitating anxiety for the first time in her life and decided to leave the Direct Sales world to pursue a career with a brick and mortar business called Pasta Mama’s. This was a huge decision as she was used to being her own boss, while being a stay at home mother with her husband bringing in a second income. This was a huge step for her because the direct sales world is really made for her. Coming through all the difficulty, she learned that life is way too short, that every day we open our eyes is a blessing, and that she can do hard things. Having experienced anxiety in this way, coming out the other side she can be an influencer, networker, mother and business owner. This too shall pass, not this too shall stay. Life is not about how hard you can get hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. The biggest influencer in her life was her grandmother. She found something to love in everyone. She taught her that being part of a team means We over Me. Her favorite leaders in the self-improvement world are Anthony Robbins, James Arthur Ray, Brene Brown, Rachel Hollis, and of course, John C. Maxwell. Maronda is a self-proclaimed self- improvement junkie. Maronda does her best work in her home office where it is quiet. She utilizes the app called ToDoist, a paper planner and sets alerts on her phone. All her tools work seamlessly together. She schedules her days around her clients’ needs. She takes one afternoon a week to do self-pampering so that she can be filled up so that she isn’t pouring from an empty vessel. Quiet time is so important. She is a firm believer in vision boards, setting clear intentions. CID is a vehicle to get her to her dream career which is to be a Life Coach. She is pursuing that dream currently.

When casting the vision to her team when leading hundreds in direct sales, she simply lived her brand out loud. She modeled the way and people wanted to be on her team. Her biggest challenge right now is having enough hours in the day. Leveraging her time to be the most productive so she is covering all her positions in life as a mother, partner, entrepreneur. What brings her joy is the smiles on the customers faces when a task is completed. She surrounds herself with people that are better than her in the areas that she doesn’t excel in. She keeps a LOVE file to remind her that she is on the right track when she is having a hard day. She also writes gratitude lists to keep her in thankfulness. Giving back to your community is essential. Leaders are givers and it’s important to link arms, network and serve other leaders in town. She does that at the networking group The Link. She is a connector and loves referring other local businesses. She loves the Tri. When you don’t network and give to your community, you are doing your community a disservice. God only made one you, and she believes you were made to do big things. She does her best to live by the 4 agreements, which is always do your best, be impeccable with your word, don’t make assumptions and don’t take anything personally.

A fun fact about Gary is that his 10 year old doesn’t ever think he sleeps because he only sees him when he is awake and Leslie can’t go to sleep if there are dishes in the sink! Leslies journey began with working in advertisement and marketing with newspapers for 15 years right out of college. After leaving that career she took a position at a marketing innovation consultant agency where she was able to blend strategic thinking and creative thinking. When she was working on a campaign for Kellogg for new waffles she felt like her creativity and skills may be better used somewhere else. That’s when she got the call from Gary to join him at Chaplaincy. She felt right at home and was grateful to be there helping people in need and not having to come up with new versions of waffles! Gary followed the traditional path of accounting background, accounting and finance, finance analyst, all the way up to business development but there was always a feeling that something was missing. He enjoyed the work and did the work well. His paths crossed with an entrepreneur who bought and sold businesses over the years. His latest venture was hospice. At the time Gary knew nothing about hospice and that is when he was told that hospice is about bringing dignity and peace to the end of a life. They needed a finance person, so he decided to join the team. When he came on board they had 8 or 9 and before they knew it they had acquired 15-20. He moved from finance/ accounting to operations. Chaplaincy does a great job at serving the community with programs and palliative care. Leslie’s advice to listeners who are thinking about making a change or shift in their career is ask yourself what is the worse thing that can happen if I stay or if I make the change. Also, listen to your gut. Lynn Dickerson was a very influential person in Leslie’s life when she was with the Medesto Newspaper. What she loved most about her was that she was very firm but fair. She had high expectations and she help her accountable. Christopher Turner, who is no longer with us, also had a wonderful presence that impacted her about being present and in the moment. He also taught Leslie about overcoming fear. Gary’s mother has been a tremendous influence for him. She had a pretty tough road and her story shows perseverance. Growing up looking at her story has made him who he is today. Professionally, John Graham, a high-level executive asked him one day how much time he spends critically thinking. He has thought about that question many times over the course of his career. Leslie finds that in order to be productive she needs to carve out uninterrupted time and use a lot of self-talk to keep herself focused. She prioritizes her weekly projects into smaller chunks to stay on target, otherwise she can find herself getting very overwhelmed. She also learned to leave margin for the unexpected things that come up. Gary works best in increments. He gets the first 5 things done first, takes a break, then coaches his son, spends time with him, rests, works out, works more, sleeps and then starts all over again.

Chaplaincy is highly regulated, so the vision is to be sure that they are exceeding the regulations and expectations. Forward thinking as to what is going to happen on the horizon. 85% of what they do is paid for by medicare, so looking at where medicare is going for the agency reimbursement and quality standards. Making sure they are always staying one step ahead. They focus on 6 drivers and then plan their 3 to 5 year goals under those drivers. This last year they conducted a SWOT Analysis and they used that to find themes and help them generate goals. Chaplaincy programs & goals are congruent with the community. In order to keep growing as a leader, Leslie’s advice is to keep learning, growing, stretching. Gary’s advice is to be curious, ask a lot of questions, be resilient to failure and spend time critically thinking.

Heather is the founder and facilitator of Ascent Solutions. A fun fact about Heather is that she turns everything into a song in her head while people are talking. In the early 90’s Heather was working for Blue Shield/Blue Cross where a position as a trainer became available. She struggled with believing in herself but with her family’s belief in her, she applied and was offered the position. Throughout the years she has climbed the latter to bigger positions and attributes her success to other people’s belief in her. While working at Charles Schwab, she went from a training position that was full of fun dinners, networking, and personality tests to being a Broker Trainer in a small room with lots of applications and technical components. It was not at all where she wanted to be, but she knew that she had to challenge herself if she wanted to get to that senior management position. She brought her knowledge to the table and combined emotional intelligence with these processes she was training--it took her to the next level. She then advanced to the senior management position. In her difficult times in the broker position when she felt she was hitting a wall, becoming a disengaged employee, she dug deep and brought who she was to the position which resulted in bringing her back to life. A previous employer at Discount Tire, Pat Klein, taught Heather how to establish who she was when walking into a room. An example is when she would walk into Pat’s office to talk, Pat would ask her, “What role do you need me to be for you right now? An advisor, a sounding board or just a listener?” In doing this, all expectations are clear. Heather admits that she is full of energy and tends to be a squirrel! So, to manage herself and time most efficiently she uses music to ground her, and she puts her day into manageable chunks of time. By doing this she can move through her work more quickly. Having clear expectations of herself and of everyone else around her helps her manage her work/personal life balance. She believes having a personal mission statement is very important. It helps her stay in alignment with her core values. To create your personal mission statement, she suggests writing down all your values, condense them down, take your top 5 and create your mission statement. We have 4 very strong generations in the workplace who need to learn how to “play” together. By learning tolerance and personalities, the generations can leverage each other’s strengths. This has been her biggest struggle. If you are wanting to develop your team but don’t know where to start, Heather shares about “Data Dumping.” This is where she and colleagues would share images, documents and ideas into a drop box. In doing this all the data she needs to develop training is right there for her. From there she suggests categorizing into topics. What brings her the most joy about being a trainer is when she looks at the individuals and sees the a-ha moment in their eyes. She believes giving back to the community is essential. She has spent time at the Mission more recently putting beds together. When she worked for Charles Schwab, they had a whole week dedicated to volunteerism. There is so much power and purpose in serving our community.

Heather is a huge believer in networking. She encourages everyone to reach out in authenticity. One of her favorite Tri-City influencers is Ken Marsh with P2 Promotions. He is the guy that knows the guy you may need!

A couple fun facts about Michael is that he hates the sound of quitting and he’s a rock n roll drummer, being in a band since he was 15. He started working when he was 10 yrs old for his father’s family business. He was the only 10-year-old that he knew that had a paycheck and business cards. Early on in life his father instilled in him a strong work ethic and imparted to him that no one is going to hand you anything; you must go out and get it. He worked all positions in the family’s communications support company. He later went on to manage all positions and then became CEO of the company. He transitioned the company before leaving to a marketing company. He then took a position at the Tri-Cities Cancer Center that he was qualified for, but it wasn’t what he wanted to do. He requested a position be created for him on the senior leadership team, and, given his past performance, it came to fruition. His marketing background was a huge asset to TCCC, and as a result there was a 54% growth in patients in a 4-month period. His advice to the listeners is be bold, be confident, be courageous, do the work and make your way! Why not you? His advice to his 20-year-old self would be 3 things: invest early, surround yourself with influencers and network and volunteer in your community. Through his volunteerism he met Tim Doyle and Jennifer Tuttle. Both of these relationships were built through volunteerism, and when he was vetting the TCCC, he called upon Tim Doyle who was a board member and was already in his network. Jennifer had just left her position as the foundation director and Michael was able to reach out to her as well. Relationship building is a strength of his as well as vision, looking at the big picture and strategizing. He is not afraid of risk and often surrounds himself with people who challenge him. As a TC Influencer he errs on the side of action to avoid analysis paralysis. He is an early morning guy! He and his wife, Shannon, start out their day every morning at 4:00am. They have 2 boxers that they walk with every morning after having their Americanos, it’s a great time for them to pray, talk,and envision goals. He then makes another Americano, starts answering and sending emails. He will also find the most challenging thing he has for the day and does that first. He stays out of ruts by utilizing the energy God has blessed him with. In a conversation with the interim CEO of the TCCC he learned how to stay out of ruts, which is to always be innovating and creating. Michael believes his greatest challenges as a leader are finding ways to stay fresh while innovating and managing expectations. The challenge is getting staff to remember the yes’s to projects and not just hearing the no’s. Managing expectations takes good communication. Failure is just an opportunity to grow your skill set and add tools to your tool box. There are two ways he explains failure to his team: it’s either an expense that he and the team member are frustrated with, or they can look at it as an investment in their future. As a leader in the Tri Cities we are uniquely positioned in authority and in our networks. We have access to resources that other people don’t. He volunteers for the Kennewick School District, Tri-tech, church, Back the Blue law enforcement appreciation and he plugs into a lot of one on one endeavors. You can reach Michael on LinkedIn or email him at [email protected]

Brad Sawatzke is the CEO of Energy Northwest. Something funny about Brad is that he has been blessed with many things in life and being a Minnesota Vikings fan is not one of them! Prior to his current position he worked at Montecello nuclear power plant for 30 years and was going to retire. He was recruited to his current position and since his kids were grown, he thought it would be a great part of the country for him and his wife to live. In your career, be open. He was going to continue his path in operations in his earlier career when a colleague pulled him aside and said, you really need to broaden your experience base if you want to be a plant manager one day. He took that advice and switched from operations to maintenance and it was the best decision he ever made career wise. When hiring the team that will surround him, Brad looks at attitude, and what are their thoughts on leadership? How do they treat their people? With encouragement, there is lasting results. He looks for people that are willing to give feedback and “coaching up.” He surrounds himself with people who are very good with details because that is a weakness for him. He looks for people who come to him and say, Look, there is a problem, here is what I think about it, and here is a potential solution. When he has this amazing team surrounding him, he does luncheons for recognition, but what he has learned is that a simple thank-you goes a long way. People can tell when you are sincerely appreciative of something they did. There are 2 ways to get people to follow you: you can force/intimidate them, or you can care about your team--and they will go the extra mile. He actually learned a lot about leadership when he was a janitor at the nuclear plant. There were managers that acted as though he was a bother and others who actually took an interest in asking him about his weekend, wife, and his life. The person that was the nicest to him was promoted and when Brad became plant manager, that gentleman send him a card congratulating him. He believes there is a direct correlation between success and how you treat people. He does a lot of traveling and he uses that time to dream, plan, strategize. As a CEO he organizes his time by being a one-minute manager. He strongly believes in not over-thinking things. He focuses on his most time-significant situations or pushes some of the decision-making down through his team. He doesn’t have to weigh in on every decision. His energy is derived from his wife and his family. They are his greatest supporters. He enjoys historical leadership in particular: Lincoln, Churchill. He enjoyed reading the book called In Thin Air about hiking Mt. Everest and how people face challenges. His advice to leaders is, engage your people. Leadership isn’t demanded; it’s granted.

Brian is the CEO of CI (Columbia Industries) and Jeff Thompson is the Director of CI. A funny thing about Brian is that he has 3 candy dishes that he uses to lure people into his office for discussions. One of the candies always has to be Swedish fish. Jeff got the fever for derby racing when he was a kid! He raced in 3 races and is now retired.

Brian was born the youngest of 7 kids in an Irish Catholic family on the East Coast. Being the baby, he was very independent. He went to college, worked on Wall Street with Morgan Stanley, andwent back to school to get his MBA from Harvard. He went into the venture capital and the private equity world. What he learned was that he likes to operate companies. He learned how to do that the hard way by operating companies that were failing. In the process he learned how to fix problems, building teams and running the companies they bought. The approach for turning a failing company around, start-ups, and any other company is the same. He is now giving back by working in the non-profit world. Jeff was born and raised right here in the Tri-cities. He feels that his time in youth sports and activities gave him a great foundation as well as working in the restaurant industry for

years. He started in management in the retail/restaurant/hospitality industry when he was 19 yrs old. When he started at CI, he was eager to learn and grow. He surrounds himself with teammates that he can learn from. He kept on accepting new opportunities, so he could continue to learn and grow. We all have limitations on what we can do as individuals. If you want to be great, you surround yourself with a team that has different ideas, talents and strengths. Bringing a team together produces better products and results. Brian would tell his younger self to be humble and don’t be afraid to ask questions, and to have enough confidence in yourself to speak up. Jeff says, care about what you do. Take pride in your product and the people you surround yourself with. Caring avoids mediocrity. Give yourself a break: you don’t have to know it all, and you don’t have to do it all. Lead don’t push. Enjoy the ride. There are many different seasons in our life, enjoy all of them! It’s a marathon not a sprint. Their strengths are bringing in a leadership team, casting the vision or direction and gathering input from that team. Also, they excel in deeper planning into budgets and 5 year trajectory planning; by doing this, the employees are taking ownership. The impact has been immense with their managers and department heads. Morning routine is very important to Jeff. It starts out with a cup of coffee, reading, quiet time, a light workout, and

stretching. Having a morning routine allows him to have time with his family. He likes to set up his day the day before. That way he has some time in between meeting and fighting fires. He starts the day at work by greeting everyone and then looks at his calendar. Brian keeps himself out of ruts by finding new challenges and creating variety. Brian’s biggest challenge in the leadership chair is getting people to share good counsel, to speak up and challenge him as the CEO in a positive way. You can sit in the ivory tower and have the best view, but if it isn’t reality, then it’s worthless. You need to know the nuts and bolts of what your team can do. Failure is a tool for learning and being better. Brian went to a Jesuit school where the teachers were extremely tough. His Latin teacher said that if they had an 89.5% then they didn’t have to take the final. Brian had 89.5S% and the Jesuit priest made him take the test. He took the exam, got a 98 on it. He went into his teacher’s office and said, “See I told you!”, and the teacher said, “No, see, I told you!” Never accept near-success when you can have success. CI Shred started with a handtruck and quickly learned that in order to compete, they needed to get an automated truck, which they did and now serve dozens of businesses with all their shredding needs. You need to start with the right equipment.

Books they recommend: Crucial Conversations: Joseph Grenny Extreme Ownership: Jocko Willink Essential Wooden: John Wooden Good Leaders Ask Great Questions: John C. Maxwell

They give back to the community by creating partners in the community. The team serves at local soup kitchens. Jeff coaches football and youth programs to personally give back to the community. When anyone in our community does better, then we all get better. Their advice to other leaders in the community is to keep asking questions and help others succeed. Find new challenges. Like them on FB and go the website.

Matt is the managing partner of Blue Rudder. When asked what was his journey that lead him to where he is today, he says it was not a planned journey. Matt went off to college at Gonzaga where he got a couple degrees. He then went out into the business world where he bought, ran and sold a few businesses. It was then that he got an itch that he wanted to teach, so he went back to school to get his PHD in Leadership Studies. He came to teach here at Columbia Basin College for six years and went on to teach at Heritage University by Yakima where he has been there for three years. He has had a calling for leadership for the last 10-15 years. His advice about advanced degrees and education is do it while you are young. Being married now with three little kids, there are too many financial commitments and other distractions now! He would tell his 20-year-old self to find a good mentor. He has been very fortunate to have a few really great mentors. When you are 20 you feel like understand the world and that you have it all figured out, but then you fast forward another 10-15 years and you realize you were 20. You didn’t have it figured out! He has a mentor now that he met at 22 on the basketball court. His wife actually sang at his wedding and has been a great influence in his life. He is a psychologist and has been able to learn a lot from him. He has a few kids that he mentors currently and through the basketball camp he runs in the summer. He has coaching clients as well. When Matt thinks about his strengths, he thinks about the people he surrounds himself with. He has three young kids that encourage him to get out of bed and be his best self. He feels his biggest strength is having a very wide life perspective. He has a big picture all the time, which can also be considered a weakness. He asked his wife what she thought was his weakness, and she said that he isn’t very organized all the time. When you look at the big picture, you can often lose sight of the details. Find people in your life to help you stay on track. Post notes on your mirror; have your spouse remind you about something five times a day for a week until it becomes a habit. The other thing he would say that as you find your strengths, try to find an occupation that lines up with them as best you can. By doing this you will have less frustration and friction in your life. StrengthFinder is a great test you can take online. Another one was created by professor Martin Seligman who has a website called www.viacharacter.org. He has found in his studies that we should operate in our strengths instead of improving our weaknesses. Matt doesn’t really have a morning routine because his days are all so different. He tends to get up early, has coffee--and he really hasn’t had a morning routine in the last 9 years because his teaching schedule changes often between nights and mornings. When he wakes up in the morning, he plans the day and just gets stuff done. He feels fortunate that with his job there are always new students every quarter or semester and that provides a lot of change. He has a personal battle with feeling like there isn’t enough time. So, he works hard to maximize his days. He has had some friends that died young and he just doesn’t want to wake up and waste the day.

Matt’s challenge in leadership is about being intentional. As humans we are creatures of habit. Being intentional means having a lot of discipline and energy. He then needs to have mental focus and he gets that by treating himself well, which means he needs to be spiritually, mentally, and physically well. It’s really hard to be an effective leader if you aren’t taking care of yourself. Being a leader is not easy; there is a misconception that you wake up a great leader. It’s lots of ups and downs. Matt exercises a lot and is very intentional about what he and his family eat. They have never eaten fast food. They also do simple activities like hang out in the back yard, take walks, watch movies together. Since having kids, they make sure that they go on a family vacation every year. It’s a time to unplug, turn off the phones and be together. Building trust is everything. Matt talks about a certain failure in his book about when he was leading a painting company in college. He thought he was doing well. Years later a friend, an employee asked Matt why they didn’t do a certain something on a house. Matt was surprised that it had taken him 5 or 6 years to bring it up to him. The failure in that was that he must have been doing something in that leadership role that made him intimidating or not approachable. Leaders need to make time for reflection. Reflection plus experience is the best teacher. If you don’t reflect, then you don’t learn from the failures or experience. There are many ways to reflect. Talk to someone at the end of the day and journal. Bluerudder.org Mattkincaid.net