- ABOUT
- VIDEOS
- TOPICS
- JOBS & TALENT
- TESTIMONIALS
- COMMUNITY
- EVENTS
- NOMINATIONS & LISTS
- SPONSORSHIP
- ABOUT
- VIDEOS
- TOPICS
- JOBS & TALENT
- TESTIMONIALS
- COMMUNITY
- EVENTS
- NOMINATIONS & LISTS
- SPONSORSHIP
Check out our interviews with the honorees by clicking on the slideshow to the right or by clicking on their names below. We will be adding more throughout the week!
Lead Cincinnati is proud to announce the honorees of its 2015 C-Suite Awards presented by Venue and Lead Magazine.
The C-Suite Award honors our region’s leading chief executive, chief operating, information, marketing, and financial officers, board level leaders, and other C-level executives. The individuals were selected based on their invaluable contributions to their organization and our region as well as their personal leadership characteristics.
The 2015 C-Suite Awards Luncheon is on Tuesday, May 12, 2015 from 11am-1:30pm at The Westin Hotel in downtown Cincinnati. To attend the event, register here.
The Awards Luncheon will feature Sandy Berlin Walker, president and CEO of The YMCA of Greater Cincinnati, as the lead speaker.
Check out our interviews with the honorees by clicking on the slideshow to the right or by clicking on their names below. We will be adding more throughout the week!
The 2015 C-Suite Awards honorees:
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect of being a leader is working with a diverse group of people. I’m in a rapidly changing business so we have to change with the times, and we have had a lot of regulatory changes in our industry and have had to change our business model a number of times so that has been a real challenge for us, but we've worked it out pretty well because we're good at adapting.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I had an uncle who was a mentor of mine who told me that if I wanted to be successful there were two things to avoid in life, employees and trucks. Well, I took it to heart for a long time, but then I realized it was hard to have a company without employees. So I've learned to disregard that advice. Now I surround myself with great people and give them a platform on which they can succeed, then get out of their way and listen to them.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
Perseverance. I've been an early riser since my teenage years and I continue to do that. I work what I call 'first shift' from 4:30-7am. The early bird gets the worm. That has been my motto and it's worked for me.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I hope they would describe me as a listener. I am a big believer in open-door policies and I always my door open and encourage people to come in and talk to me at any time.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Well, the craziest thing I’ve ever done that I can tell you about is probably jumping out of an airplane. When my oldest daughter was 18 she convinced her grandfather to jump our of an airplane with her. However, his doctor advised him that that was a foolish thing to do at his age. So I guess I was next in line, and next thing I knew I was jumping out of an airplane at 13,000 ft.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect of being a leader is creating balance in the organization as we move from where we are to where we are going. I try to read the organization’s capabilities and our people and then also read the market, or where we are trying to go. It’s about maintaining that elasticity so nothing breaks. We try to honor what we do really well, but at the same time move people ahead and keep everyone on board. Maintaining that balance and that passion is challenging.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received is to trust your heart.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I am insanely curious about how things work. When I find something I’m interested in, I give myself over to it and I’m very passionate about it. I’m quite driven, and that helps. But I also see systems, and that might not be a personality type when it starts but when I look at organizations I cannot not see systems, and then I want to figure out how they work and make them better.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I ask my employees how they would describe me and they say that I am a passionate individual who sees systems, who leads from a business mind but also leads from his heart. They say I care about everybody on the team, sometimes to a fault because you take care of us more than you take care of myself. When I ask them what they would like to see me change about my leadership style, they say it would be helpful if you would be a little more patient with how quickly we achieve results.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am exceedingly passionate about the gift we have been given to help students transform their lives, to transform how they think, what they know and how they act on the world. It’s the best job in the world, to help young people develop into wonderful people.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I was out with some friends on these two sailboats off the coast of Prince Edward’s Island in Canada and I decided to swim from one to the other, about 500 yards in between. I got part way across and I realized that both boats had changed courses and both boats had lost sight of me, and there’s that moment in time when you get to decide, am I going to panic or am I going to trust that I’m going to be ok and that my friends are going to come back for me. They came back for me but what I learned in the process is that I’m really good at treading water.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
My biggest challenge as a leader is staying focused on a results-oriented work environment. By nature I like to get into the weeds and the details, so staying out of the day-to-day nuances of our company is my biggest challenge.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I've ever received was that any fool can learn from his own mistakes, but it takes a wise man to learn from the mistakes of others.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I am really not a very talented person. So my chief two talents seem to be the ability to communicate and what our staff would say is a rage-like hatred for the status quo.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
Our staff would describe me as a maverick leader who is fueled by purpose and passion.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I have the great fortune of being able to work for a company whose entire purpose is changing the lives of people in need, so it’s not really hard for me to get up in the morning.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing I ever did was quitting a really good job when was 30-years old with a wife, kids and a mortgage to start this business.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
Having the confidence and resolve to be your authentic self in a leadership role.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
People always know when you’re faking it—so the best advice is to ensure you have an unrelenting commitment to your identity whether its yourself as a leader or the brand that you represent.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
As a conservatory-trained musician I quickly learned tenacity and persistence are required for success. Having developed the ability to persevere through thick and thin has paid off for my career.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
An enthusiastic champion of our mission and a passionate advocate for the legacy of the Sisters of Mercy. An empathetic leader who cares about the team, their families, and our collective work.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
First and foremost, I am most passionate about the incredible care that our professionals provide every day at Mercy Health. Knowing that the poor, working poor and under-served are never turned away; and also receive the same expert care for which any of us in this room would pay—that is a source of tremendous pride.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
While studying music in Florence, Italy, I traveled alone to Southern Italy and Sicily—places I never been before—which was really audacious for me, and it was something that my friends and family thought was completely ridiculous, but it taught the value of taking calculated risks—and it was great time.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
Trying to do so many things in terms of managing people, managing your resources, managing your time, talent and expectations. That is the hardest thing.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
Listen, seek out expert advice, but also follow your gut.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
My passion and enthusiasm and my drive to succeed and be the best I can be, and to do good in the world.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would say I’m driven but that I try to include everyone and be protective of everyone and their interests, I don’t let anything get in my way in terms of going after what we want, if it’s what I think is the right thing to do. But I also am involved in making sure their interests are protected at the same time. I’m very protective of the people I work with and work for and work on behalf of.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Our kids, for sure! And their families and our patients and their siblings and how they are functioning and getting along. You know, when you have cancer your whole life is turned upside down and while all the attention seems to be on the patient, the siblings are suffering just as much, as is the family as a whole. Any time you can make everyone smile, the siblings, the parents, the caregivers, it’s a great thing and that’s what we try to do.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Gosh, it probably involved getting my dog. We had lost a couple of dogs due to old age and illness and my husband said, No more dogs, we’ll never have another dog. And it turned out on our anniversary I set about to getting him completely drunk on bourbon and did that quite well and took a video of him saying, Yes we can get a dog. We were on vacation at the time, and the next morning he woke to find our bags packed and we cut our vacation short to drive to North Carolina to go get a dog and he wasn’t quite sure what was happening until I showed him the video of him saying that yes, we could get a dog! And he’s turned out to be the best dog we’ve ever had.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
What I find most challenging as it regards leadership is staying out of the operational aspect of our business, staying out front and leading and staying ahead of trends in the market, and being able to equip our sales team and our management and our support staff.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I have ever received is to do what only I can do within our organization and let others do their job.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I would say that the thing that has contributed to my success as a leader would be the fact that I am driven. In life I had a rough upbringing, and I have never had anyone give me a handout. I’ve had to earn everything that I have by working hard. We live in a great country with wonderful opportunities and I would say that that drive to pursue the American dream has made me what I am today.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
My employees would describe me as a visionary.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Accounting of course! The bottom line, right? But, really, I’m most passionate about the interaction as it relates to our clients, the people that we represent, as well as our sales associates, being able to help steward people with the largest investment that most people will make in their lives — a home. Being able to talk them through that process and support them brings fulfillment to me.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing I have ever done is that I was privileged with the opportunity to visit a classified military site in Israel with the IDF on the Golan Heights, and I would tell you all about it but I can’t!
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
Many leaders don’t give their teammates the freedom to do what they’re good at, and that’s set goals, and then fulfill those goals on their own. Some leaders like getting in the way. Me, I like letting my team do what they’re good at.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
Think before your make a critical decision. My mother taught me that at a young age, and I used that advice throughout my career. A lot of times it’s easy to make a snap judgment but I’ve learned to take a breath and think before you make a decision.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I’m goal driven. I can see the end of the task, and I like having that vision and seeing where do we need to go, because then I can build a plan to get to that end result.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
That’s a great question. I have heard I am a great motivator, which is very humbling to me. But also I like a comment that I heard not too long ago that I keep morale up and I am always in a good mood. That means more to me than anything because I want my team to be happy.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Our customers. Without our customers we wouldn’t be here. So I am obsessed every day with giving the best customer experience that my team and I can provide our customers.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Dancing for the Stars last year here in Cincinnati. The biggest challenge with that is that I don’t dance, so I had to learn how to dance first before I could get to competition level. The good news is I didn’t trip and I didn’t fall. It was a great learning experience for me and most important we raised a lot of money for charity too.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I think it’s having the courage to separate yourself from others, and by that I mean when things are tough and people are worried or scared about the future, it’s up to the leader to offer hope and to paint a path of, you know, we can get through this and we can get forward together. And just the opposite too. When things are going well and everyone is congratulating themselves it’s up to the leader to say that while it’s great what we’ve accomplished, we can do better. I think that is the role of a leader.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I’ve gotten lots of advice, but what sticks out is some advice I got when I was working at Procter and Gamble. Some folks convinced me to stay at Procter and Gamble instead of going back to graduate school, and I essentially got my MBA at Procter in brand management, and that turned out to be a great decision that really helped me throughout the rest of my career.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I am very competitive by nature and I’d say the trait that I hear a lot is that I am very determined. I get a goal and I am very committed and determined to accomplishing that goal.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
Certainly determined, but I’ve also heard that at the end of the day people trust me. That is an important part of leadership, the people in your organization need to trust that you are going to do the right thing for them.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am passionate about everything with Education at Work! I founded the organization and it’s committed to helping college students get through school more affordably and also get some job skills along the way so that they can be more employable once they get their degree. I’m passionate about everything about that, helping these college students get through, get their degree and then get on to the next phase of their life.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Probably starting a company from scratch at age 55, which was Education at Work. Starting companies tends to be for young people and I am a bit older but despite that it’s been a lot of fun and it’s taken a lot of energy and time but it’s certainly worth it.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
There’s two things that I’ve found. One, it always starts with communication. Good and bad situations all start with communication. I’ve found that over time you cannot over-communicate anything to anyone. The second aspect is being consistent in every aspect of my life. I think the business world wants you to behave by a different set of rules sometimes, to become a different individual because there are tough things that can happen in the world, but I think being just as consistent with your family and friends as you are at work is important. You see leaders fail all the time because they fail to live their lives with that integrity. I find that at the end of the day, if I can look at myself in the mirror and say that I lived myself with that consistency then that is a good day.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I used to be a hothead. Back in New York, I was much younger in an advertising agency. When I tried to defend my ideas and concepts I felt that I was justified in losing my temper if I felt that I was being mistreated. One day my copywriter partner sat me down and told me to stop. And he explained to me that anger is a secondary emotion, and that what I was really feeling was either anxiety or stress, but that there was a first emotion that I needed to get in touch with. And that really changed everything for me. I realized that I had to win those battles with my brain and not my temper and it really helped me in my career become much more calm in those situations and become a better listener.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I really care about people and relationships, and I think I’ve discovered that if I take care of those two things that good things follow and you don’t have to worry about too much else. I think for me, those things help. I would also probably want to throw in being a good listener, but I think my wife of 32 years would find that amusing, so I’ll stick with relationships and people.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
Well I hope they would say I’m curious but I also think they would see me as adventurous. I think I am very competitive but I try not to show that side of myself a lot. I think I would be pleased if they said I was a good teacher and a good mentor, because that matters to me. On the embarrassing side of things, I read a lot of books and I have been known to start a phrase with, “Hey I just finished this book and...” and when I see eyes rolling I know it’s time for me to shut up.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I love strategy and I love the creative process but I think what I am most excited about and what I really love is the culture aspect of it. When we stated Curiosity five years ago, I was a little naive that culture just grows naturally out of whatever the situation is and my business partner learned very quickly that culture really is about deliberate choices. So we spend a lot of our time talking about our culture and how to make it reflect our values and the way we like to do business. I really find that to be one of the most satisfying aspects of building a place where people love to work.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I’ve done a lot of foolish things, but I would say the craziest thing was starting an advertising agency in the bottom of the worst recession in history, but if I had to do it all over again I would.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging part of being a leader is managing people effectively. People are different. They are diverse in how they like to be managed. Having said that, if they are not managed well and if you are not meeting their needs, the challenge you run into is they are not able to meet the needs of your organization. So it takes a good leader to understand the values and the needs of those staffs and really be able to deliver that back to the organization.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
Probably the best advice I’ve ever received is when I started at UPIC Solutions. It’s a saying that they have in nonprofits, which is, Always keep a volunteer between you and trouble. A volunteer to a nonprofit border committee essentially is someone who is a respected opinion and a leader in that organization, and when you face a difficult or controversial decision it’s always great to have someone in a leadership role to be able to go in there on that decision with you. It helps you find any pitfalls that you may not have realized prior to that, and it helps you understand better what you’re facing, and quite frankly it helps you with the political aspect of things to have a champion standing behind you.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
The two biggest personality traits that I would attribute to my success are my passion for the organization and helping people and my determination to succeed, not necessarily my own success but the success of the team. It really comes down to the fact that anything really worth doing is worth doing as a team, so that determination within the team is what makes everything count.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would describe me as dedicated, passionate, honest and respectful.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am most passionate about helping people. I genuinely care and want to help people succeed in life. And what I’ve found about the social mission of my organization is that although I can get involved in terms of swinging a hammer and helping out at a soup kitchen as an individual contributor, I found my greatest impact is as a technologist. I enable others to do that great work by helping work with them through that technology initiative. I am very proud to be a part of this organization and a part of helping others around those local communities, and I’m humbled every day to find that our organization is able to provide enabling technologies to raise more than $1 billion for communities across America.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect of being a leader is being able to satisfy all of your stakeholders. You can’t satisfy all of them to the direction that they want, but you’ve got to strike that right balance to get each one a sense that you’re working with them and you’re satisfying them.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
You finish where you start. That is so important to any project that you do, any hiring of individuals, any jobs that you take. It is at the beginning that you look at that quality, and if you don’t have quality in the beginning you’re not going to get quality at the end. You finish where you start.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
The number one personality trait that has contributed to my success is hard work. I am not afraid to put the hours in, I’m not afraid to multitask. I had my first job when I was eight-years old and I’ve been working since then. So I am willing to put the time, the effort and the sweat in.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
Hopefully my employees would describe me as a person with vision, hardworking and very passionate about what I do.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am the most passionate about our students, being able to give people that second, third or forth chance is the American dream. Our age range at Cincinnati State is 18-60, so people who didn’t do well the first time around in high school or college can come to Cincinnati, turn their life around, become a productive citizen and provide more for their family.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing I think I’ve ever done is I went to Africa as a student. I spent my third year of college in Uganda, and Uganda was a very new country, only about four years old. I went there not understanding how volatile it could be, how still primitive it was in certain aspects of the country. But I had a great year and came back home with a lot of great stories as well.
The craziest one is, when I was there I played on the basketball team for the university, and I was a very good basketball player, so I was the star. That year we didn’t lose. In fact, we beat the American embassy and that was a big deal, because obviously everyone there grew up playing basketball. Basketball in Africa is only as old as the Peace Corps, which brought basketball to Africa. So we beat everyone, including the American embassy, and at that time the general in the army called the school and said, I want to play your university team in basketball with my soldiers. I said, Hey, bring them on. That night, the American embassy called me up and said, If you play, that may be a problem. I said, Why? They said, The general has a reputation for being very mean. I said, I’m playing. Later on, a friend in the embassy called me up and said, O'dell, you play, you win, you’re dead and there’s nothing we can do. So I sprained my ankle that night and didn’t play and my teammates, who were all Africans, dogged it because they knew. And he wasn’t a particularly good player, the general, he was just big and he left with his soldiers and he was happy.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect of being a leader is the ability to say no. As a leader you want to take that extra step and go that extra mile for folks to help them out, but time is our most valuable commodity. With a family at home and coaching and also of course running the business, being able to say no at times is very challenging.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received came from a football coach in high school, and he gave all of us the winner’s creed. The last line is: Don’t ever say ‘can’t’ because ‘can’t’ doesn’t exist. So I live my life by never saying ‘can’t’. Everything can be done. Now you might not be able to do it by yourself, you may need help. But the word ‘can’t’ has stuck with me as a word that just isn’t in my vocabulary.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
There are a couple. I’ve been blessed to have grown up in a military family, so moving around quite frequently you learn to adapt to several types of cultures and personalities. I find myself being able to adapt well to situations and to adapt well to others and to see others’ points of views. I’ve lived in all parts of the country and I’ve lived in other countries as well, and you learn very quickly that when you have a short period of time in one place you get to know people very well and you learn how to get along. So adaptation and the ability to make friends quickly have contributed to my success.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
It depends on the day. Most days I would say that they’d say I am passionate about what I do. We are a service industry and they know that our clients come above everything. Without our client we have no business. So I am very passionate and driven to make sure that we are always providing top notch service for those clients.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I’ve done a lot of crazy things and some of them I can’t share, but one that always gets folks at a cocktail party is that I used the urinal next to John Elway. We were skiing in Colorado and we walked into the lodge after a day of skiing and Mr. Elway was at the bar and coincidentally he and I walked into the bathroom at the same time.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect is also the most exciting. It is to create an environment where bright people can thrive and live and work in an exciting environment where they can utilize their individual talent and bring them together so that when we put all the talent together the value is so much greater. It is creating a living, working entity that changes every day because people change every day and the work you do changes every day. But there is a constant in terms of you beliefs as a company and the things you stand for. So it is maintaining those fundamental beliefs within a living, breathing, working and exciting environment that changes every day.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
A long time ago someone told me to never forget where you came from. I have tried to follow that. I’ve been very fortunate enough to have achieved a lot of great things in my life and have fantastic friends but I try to think that I am still the same person that I was because I have never forgotten where I’ve come from and I’ve never made others forget where they’ve come from. So I think it’s that old tried and true wisdom, but it’s so true and so important.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
Probably a sense of humor would be one that is probably at the bottom line of everything. I think my personality trait is I am a believer. I am just fundamentally someone who lives with their glass half full. I have been so blessed to be in situations with great people, great partners, great companies to work with and individuals to create things with that help our community and our city be better. The thing that I think is my most unusual trait is that I believe we can make a difference, and I believe that through hard work and commitment, things will get better and we will be successful and those people whose lives we touch will also get better.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
If you ask them, they’d probably get a smile on their face with tight lips. But I think they would probably say I’m passionate about what we do and I believe in what we do.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
To me the most important thing that we do, the thing I am most passionate about, is the creation of new products. In our case it is the creation of new homes and new communities to meet the lifestyles of not only today’s families but tomorrow’s families and families of all shapes and sizes, so it is very exciting to be on the front end of thinking where will people want to live in the future, what type of residences and communities will they want to live in. Our business is actually quite sophisticated to put all those pieces together with the demographics and to evaluate where we should be and what type of community we should create. That’s my passion. I’ve been doing it for forty years and I’ve loved every minute of it.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
There’s a long list. But the one that I can talk about would be, for my fortieth birthday, my wife gave me a trip to the Reds Dream Week. The opportunity to get out there and follow your lifelong dream of playing for a week with the Reds was great. I was playing third base in the championship game and the leadoff batter was Pete Rose and pitching against us was Joe Nuxhall. It was like I’d died and gone to heaven. It was really the greatest week of my life.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging thing is teaching and perfection. One of the things I’ve learned over the years is that you learn from your mistakes, so the greatest lessons are learned and I have an A+ in perfection.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
Always be yourself and others will never be disappointed in you.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
No one ever told me that I was supposed to be intimidated by people that have experience, expertise and community stature. So I was never afraid to go up and introduce myself and have great conversations with people, and they were always very willing to talk and very generous with their time. I think that in terms of personality traits, you can call it confidence or curiosity or stupidity – you take your pick.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think my associates at HORAN would describe me as an out-of-the-box thinker. The fortunate thing is I am surrounded by great people who are more in-the-box thinkers that make my ideas come to life.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I’m really passionate about the people and the team that we have built. I have been there for 18 years and I continue to see us grow and expand in the talent that we bring into our company. We are all very dedicated to delivering services to our clients and very focused on improving the health in our community.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
To me, one of the most challenging aspects is to understand your own strengths and weaknesses. Then, knowing how to leverage your strengths and manage your weaknesses as opposed to trying to fix them. Another challenging aspect is just knowing when to get out of the way and let your people do their jobs - recognizing that they may not do it the way you would, but recognizing that they’re going to do well and get the job done. I also think it’s challenging as a leader, particularly if you’ve built a business, when things don’t always go as fast as you want them to go. There are times when you just have to take a deep breath and understand that everything is working the way it’s supposed to be working. Even though you want things to go faster, that’s not always for the best.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I’ve received a lot of advice over the years. I’m 50 years old and I’ve been receiving advice all my life! Some of the best advice was in my first job when I was doing more talking than listening during a meeting. Afterward, one of the leaders took me out for a walk and said, “Robert, you have two ears and one mouth, so what should you do more of?” That was a very good lesson and one that I’ve been working hard to follow for a long time.
If I think more recently, even in the last 10 years of building LeanCor, you have highs and lows. In one particular case a few years back, we were facing a challenging time in the business and I was feeling discouraged. The Chairman of LeanCor offered me some advice. He said, “Face harsh realities, then fix and repair.” I took those words to heart and have used that advice a lot since. Sometimes events in both our personal and professional lives cause us to face harsh realities; then we need to fix and repair. This idea is much like the idea of continuous improvement – which is a foundational principle of LeanCor.
Just the other day, I was talking to a friend about how hard everyone is working these days and it seems there is little time for anything else. He said that “we work to buy time.” I thought that was an interesting statement. He then said, “So the trick is to make sure at some point you stop and cash in some of that time you’ve banked from all of your hard work.”
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I am extremely enthusiastic. At times I have an overabundance of productive enthusiasm and at other times I’m probably guilty of having unproductive enthusiasm. I strive to live by enthusiasm, drive, and making a difference in the world. Most of the team members at LeanCor share these traits. We want to make a difference. We want to add value to our customers and we are willing to work hard with enthusiasm and passion.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
They would likely say that I’m a pacesetter. I would hope that they see me living the values we believe in. Those values are: safety, integrity, respect, teamwork, accountability and drive.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
LeanCor started from the ground up, and we just celebrated our 10 year anniversary! I’m very passionate about all things LeanCor, but there are three particular areas that I’m most passionate about. The first is our purpose. Our mission and vision is to advance the world’s supply chains. We truly believe that by supporting and adding value to our customers, we will in turn make the world a better place by eliminating waste in today’s global supply chains. It may sound altruistic and a little ‘pie in the sky,’ but it’s true and we believe in it. A wise man once said that a business that only exists to make money is not a valuable business. We are in business to add value for our customers and to make the world a better place, and I am extremely passionate about that.
Second, I am passionate about our processes. I think that our three divisions – LeanCor Training and Education, LeanCor Consulting, and LeanCor Logistics – are designed in such a way that we can make that difference in the world. We are teachers on the training and education side, and I am personally very passionate about teaching. On the consulting side, we are helping to eliminate waste, fix broken processes, and improve organizations. And on the third-party logistics side, we are actual operators. We operate logistics for companies that want to stick to their core competencies. The value these integrated services create is something truly unique in the market place.
Last but certainly not least, I am passionate about people. LeanCor is people. I believe that LeanCor has provided a place for people to develop. When I think back to the last ten years, I think of all the valuable relationships that have started at LeanCor. Both tenured and new, our employees are building highly rewarding careers. I’ll even say that we have people who have left LeanCor and are doing amazing things in other areas. I would like to think that their success is partly because of things they’ve learned at LeanCor.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I would have to plead the fifth on that for the most part! If my 16-year-old were here, she would say it was the time I blew myself up on a ten-foot brush pile trying to light it with a can of gas in my hand. Hopefully, the crazy days have reduced since then. But if I reword the question to: “What is one of the boldest things I have ever done?” I would say it was the day I left my corporate role and started LeanCor without really understanding what that meant with a wife and two children.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
For us it would be personnel. Organizations are people and one of the most challenging things is finding the right people to be on your team, people that have the same values and the same understanding and the same compassion and empathy to serve the people that we serve. So, for me it’s definitely finding the right people to come on board and help us do what we do.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
When it comes to my career it’s more of a way of thinking rather than any particular advice. For me, it’s about being decisive and taking action. I really believe that you make a decision and you act upon it and you stick by it. Action is the way to move forward.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I believe that I’m tenacious. I’m intelligent. I know, when it comes to our business, what is the right thing or the right decision to make. I have no problem taking a calculated risk and acting upon it. Tenacity is definitely one of my key traits.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
They feel like I am honest, sometimes brutally honest. Intelligent, strategic, I can see the big picture. Again, I’m very competitive and ready to take action.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Definitely the people that we serve and the way in which we serve those people. Everyone that comes through our door has a different story and their expense is unique. Just being exposed to that, meeting people and sharing their story is what is so great about our organization.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Recently, we went hot air ballooning in Colorado. That was pretty cool. It was not something I’d ever done before but it was lots of fun!
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I think the most challenging aspect of being a leader is making sure that your team works as a team, is invested in what they are doing and, frankly, is excited about what they are doing. Sometimes that is challenging because you have to bring different personalities together, different approaches together. That can definitely be challenging, but if it works it is a beautiful thing.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best I believe I’ve ever received is to have fun and be passionate about what you’re doing.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I think I’m pretty tenacious. I don’t take ‘no’ for an answer if it is something I feel pretty strongly about. And I think when you have that kind of emotion it just helps you navigate through a very difficult and challenging world. But I think if you just keep at it, it’s really important to success.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
Actually, I posed that question to my team and I think what came back made me feel really good! They viewed me as being innovative and a thought leader, which is important in my role. They also said that I cared a lot about their success in the team.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I think what I am most passionate about is bringing a great experience to our customers no matter what the product is, and bringing a great experience across all product lines.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing is I decided to take my team to Chicago for a team outing. This was a few years ago. And we decided we would have a sort of different experience, so we took the Megabus to Chicago. And the bus broke down. It was probably 100 degrees in the shade. And I decided to take on the persona of Norma Ray, and I got free meals, refunds on their tickets, tickets to anywhere that Megabus went. Everyone was chanting my name by the time we got back on the road and we were all friends by the time we got into Chicago.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I think the most challenging aspect is time, finding the time to do everything that you want to do and to be the person that you can truly be.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received is to not take on too much at once, and to not bear the burden of everything on your shoulders. It think that is something that I still do a lot as a mom and as a leader of a foundation. But we all do that.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
One of my best personality traits is being honest and open about things and not being afraid to fail. Sometimes I don’t have the answer and I’m not afraid to say that.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would describe me as being honest and trustworthy and not being afraid to take a risk with things.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am most passionate about the kids with cancer and families of those kids through the The Dragonfly Foundation foundation. Four-and-a-half years ago my son was diagnosed with stage three Hodgkin’s lymphoma. That moment changed our lives forever. So to be able to help other families that are going through the cancer journey and the kids and young adults that are facing this challenge – helping them is what makes my day.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing I’ve ever done – that I can talk about publicly – has been starting this nonprofit, and starting it with my friend Ria Davidson. Who would’ve thought five years ago that we would be running a nonprofit and helping all these families. But it is the best and the craziest thing I’ve ever done.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The difficult challenge of being a leader is that the amount of hours in a day doesn’t give a leader enough time to spend the time one-on-one with all the individuals that he or she would want to send time with.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received in my entire career was when I was in healthcare. It was that if you take care of the patients, if you take care of the associates and if you take care of your physicians the rest of it will fall into place without any trouble.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
A good sense of humor.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
They would think I’m not as funny as I think I am. But they would consider me a leader who leads by example.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am most passionate about the high quality of care we deliver to our patients. Our associates and our physicians are dedicated to taking care of each and every patient and family that walks through our door and I am passionate about seeing that level of care that takes place every day.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
The craziest thing I’ve ever done is, once we were in the middle of a dispute and it took us about a year to get this dispute settled. At the end of the dispute we had to pay a settlement and this settlement was about seven figures. Given that we were holding this patient for probably a year or more, I asked for a prop pay discount and received a $50,000 prop pay discount.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
It’s always being on stage. Everyone looks to what you do and how you do things each day. You have to be mindful of being on stage and the fact that everything you do, people pay attention to.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I have two pieces of advice that I felt have been pretty useful. First, think ten years out what you would like to be doing and then work back from that to achieve it. And then my dad once told me, don’t do anything you’d be embarrassed to tell me.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
Passion, and I have a pretty good sense of humor. I like to work hard, too. Those three things stand out to me.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would say I am fair, hardworking, passionate, energetic. I get in early and stay late. I like to be at work.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Serving our clients. It sounds trite but it’s true. You want to wake up each day anxious to get to work and do a great job for your clients, to be a zealous advocate for them. I think we focus on that and we do a pretty good job of it.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I would guess the most challenging aspect of being a leader is the fact that you’ve got to be very careful not to wear your emotions on your sleeves. You’re always being watched and even when things are going wrong or not as you’d like, you have to keep enthusiastic and positive and make certain that everyone else in your organization feels the same way and acts the same way.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received – actually there’s two pieces. First, the harder you work the luckier you get. Then the more serious one is, back in college a professor of mine shared with me how important it is to be a good writer. I believe that being able to write well is important regardless of what business or profession you’re in. I see some brilliant and very qualified people who simply cannot write and it’s mind boggling sometimes, because these are great people from great schools and they just can’t write. It’s too bad.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I would like to think that I’m honest, high character and I like to have fun. There’s obviously a time and a place for everything but I enjoy having a good laugh and it really helps you through the day.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
That’s always difficult because how you are perceived is sometimes different from how you think you are perceived. But I would like to think that they view me as hardworking, dedicated, focused, fair, and also someone who likes to have some fun, because when you’re in the workplace there’s nothing wrong with having some fun as long as you understand that there is a time and a place for everything.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am most passionate about two things. First, the people in our organization. I spent a number of years with Procter & Gamble and I was told early on that the most important aspect of your organization is your people. Second, doing things efficiently. In this day and age if you can’t do things efficiently you aren’t going to be in business very long. So, having great people and being efficient.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Probably it was just a couple months ago. I was in Antartica. I jumped in the ocean and it was very cold and very crazy.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I think it’s creating a friendly, challenging atmosphere for work so that people can work as a team and everyone respects each other and provides production to the company.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
I went to my nephew’s graduation and the speaker there was going to deliver his message so he got up in front of the graduating class and he quoted Winston Churchill. He said, ‘Never, never, never quit.’ The speaker then excused himself and sat down. I think that was great advice for the graduating class and it’s certainly good advice for me.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
Respect for others, patience and a can-do attitude.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think you would have to ask them that to get the whole truth. But I was told recently that they like the way include everybody in the corporation no matter what position they might hold. We work as a team, and the receptionist is just as important to the organization as the executives are.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Mentoring all the young individuals. I’ve been around for a while so I get a lot of satisfaction in helping other people to establish their goals and be successful. The more successful they become the more productive they are and the more profit we make for the company.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I had a friend who had a vineyard in Sonoma County, California. He talked me into buying a goat farm that was adjacent to his vineyard. I have now planted a vineyard in Sonoma County and I think that is the craziest, most risky thing I’ve ever done.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect of being a leader is probably also the most fun part, and that is finding the right people to work with. We’ve been very lucky, we’ve got a great team and great colleagues, both peers of mine and people that are part of our growing staff and we are proud to be able to offer our services to other folks.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I’ve ever received is to believe in myself and believe in what we can do and to go out and actually create this entity, have faith in it. It’s worked and it’s been really fun.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I think the personality trait that has contributed the most is that I’m an optimist. I’m generally happy at work and outside of work and it makes it more fun for people to work with me and to be able to provide services to other folks. It helps me get through every day.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would describe me as manic, driven, engaged, interested and, hopefully, caring.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
I am most passionate about helping to grow our company. Our company helps our clients grow, it frees them up to do the things they enjoy doing the most. I am passionate about helping our team grow, both on an individual level and in terms of their ability to provide services and become leaders themselves.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I dropped out of college and moved from Los Angeles to Ohio with very little money. I worked full time and got my residency because I wanted to go to Ohio State and this is where I wanted to live my life and it’s worked out well.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
The most challenging aspect is gaining the trust of the people you work with, either those that work for you or your peers. Then marinating that trust throughout your relationship with the company or wherever you are as a leader.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
Best advice would be, when you’re dealing with someone, to attempt to view things from their perspective as you’re dealing with them. Now, that’s not always easy to do but it gives you insights into better decision making.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I think people would say I am fair and trustworthy.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I think they would describe me as knowledgeable in what I do and, as I said earlier, fair but demanding on certain things.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Our company is very customer focused, like many companies are, but we emphasize that and that is the thing that always sticks out.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
I actually used to work as a roughneck on oil rigs in East Texas and Oklahoma, so while that’s not really a thing, let’s just say it’s a part of my career that is unique and entailed its own set of interesting aspects.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
I would say making strategic relationships. It’s challenging but it’s not too hard to do and I enjoy it.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
From my father, remember the values you came from. And from my mother, think of others.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I think I am a listener. I listen to other people and determine from their words how I can best lead.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I hesitate to respond to that (laughs). But I would hope they say that I lead, that I’m fair and that I’m fun.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
Definitely my staff. I think if I’m anything I’m good at hiring the right people, and once I do that, since we have the best staff in the city and the region if not the nation, I would empower those staff to move forward because they are very passionate for the women and children that we serve at Cincinnati Union Bethel.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
When I got in a hot air balloon, it didn’t seem crazy at the time. Until I found that I was going to be cooped up in a little basket with a guy that really seemed to have control but we were never really sure where we were going to come down and land, so that was crazy for me.
What is the most challenging aspect of being leader?
Being a leader is very challenging. First and foremost, the challenge is to make sure you have a correct vision and then you can get your people to follow you. I am in the people business and it’s not an exact science. After you get the people on board to follow you, you hope that they can execute the plan that you’ve laid out.
What is the best advice you’ve ever received?
As a young man I didn’t take advice very well. Like most of the Millenials these days, I thought that I knew everything. I remember working for Uncle Teddy – he wasn’t my real uncle but I used to work with him and I called him Uncle Teddy – and he used to work us very hard and he paid us very little. I used to ask him, Uncle Teddy, why do you work us so hard and pay us so little? And he used to laugh and laugh and say that he was building character and that one day I would thank him. So somewhere I linked up that hard work is what makes you successful.
What aspects of your personality have contributed to your success?
I think all leaders need to be somewhat humble, they need to be determined, they need to have confidence. So certainly, I hope that I have those traits. I think it is more than just having personality traits, I think it is how you conduct yourself on a daily basis. I think it’s an attitude that has served me well over the years, that if something goes right with my company I typically give the credit to the team members or the individuals and if something goes wrong I typically take responsibility and try and fix it.
How do you think your employees would describe you?
I hope my employees would describe me as passionate about what I do and as caring about them. I know some of my employees would tease me about my hair – they still do that! – or about what they think is my obsession with the thermostat in our office.
What aspect of your company are you most passionate about?
At the heart of Lang Financial we are a personal services company, so I am most proud of our associates and our clients. It has been a real pleasure for me and it has been very rewarding to see the growth of my associates over the years. We have many long-tenured associates and to see their professional development and growth and to see their families grow up and to see them do everything in the community that they want to do has been really good for me.
On the other hand, the clients. We have had some clients for ten, fifteen, twenty years. We’ve had some clients that started with one person and now are over a hundred employees. I am very proud of the fact that they put their trust in us and I am proud that we are able to deliver them good advice.
What is the craziest thing you have ever done?
Well I am an accountant by education and accountants typically do not do crazy things. So I started thinking about some crazy things I’ve done and if we rephrase the question and said, What are some of the dumbest things I’ve done? Well, there are a number of those! Then I started thinking about the really dumb things I did and you think back to when you were a kid. One time I swam across the Ohio River.