.jpg)
LeaderImpact Podcast
LeaderImpact Podcast
Ep. 85 - David Smith - Pivots and Purpose
Dave Smith, an award-winning executive coach with decades of organizational leadership experience, shares his journey through multiple career pivots and how they shaped his understanding of success and leadership impact. He explores how his faith and personal values transformed his approach to leadership, helping him move from fear-driven decisions to purpose-driven impact.
Thanks for listening!
Click here to take the LeaderImpact Assessment and to receive the first chapter of Becoming a Leader of Impact by Braden Douglas.
Remember, impact starts with you!
Welcome to the Leader Impact Podcast. We are a community of leaders with a network in over 350 cities around the world dedicated to optimizing our personal, professional and spiritual lives to have impact. This show is where we have a chance to listen and engage with leaders who are living this out. We love talking with leaders, so if you have any questions, comments or suggestions to make this show even better, please let us know. Best way to stay connected in Canada is through our newsletter at leaderimpactca or on social at Leader Impact. If you're listening from outside of Canada, check out our website at leaderimpactcom.
Speaker 2:I'm your host, lisa Peters, and our guest today is Dave Smith. Dave has decades of experience as an organizational leader and 15 plus years as an international award-winning executive coach and team facilitator. He has served on corporate C-suites, including as CEO and an SME business owner, building visions, strategies and delivering successes that grow values, cultures and ROI. Dave has a special passion for greenfield business launches and igniting cultural transformation. In 2010, he co-founded Logia Consulting Incorporated and in 2020, co-founded Virtual Leadership Matters, incorporated. Prior to that, he was on the founding leadership team of two Canadian financial services companies and on numerous boards. He's been very active in innovation and training, development in general and most notably in financial products and payment card technology. David has led and coached teams spread across Canada for over 20 years, including one of Canada's 50 best managed companies. He takes special joy in being with his wife, children and grandchildren as they grow in this world, active at almost everything under the sun, including their faith community. Welcome to the show, dave. It is nice to meet you.
Speaker 1:It's great to meet you, Lisa.
Speaker 2:So when I'm reading your pod, so I'm reading your intro. It said I want to make sure that people know what an SME business owner, which is Small Medium Enterprise.
Speaker 1:Correct, yes.
Speaker 2:Okay, and I don't think I've heard of Logia. Tell us a little bit about that before we begin.
Speaker 1:Logia. Well, it's actually a Greek word and, as we were discerning our business about 15 years ago which is one of the pivot points in my career and that of my wife we were looking to name our little enterprise and, through just some imagination and some search, we stumbled onto the word Logia, which means the maxims, utterances, sayings of a leader.
Speaker 1:Okay, I love it and we are leadership consultants and coaches, so it fit really well in the URL and everything that was required to access. It was free and open, so it was just jammed up for us.
Speaker 2:More importantly, it was free and open All right.
Speaker 2:Well, I think it's a good name. People probably ask you what is Logia? And it starts a great conversation. So thanks for starting there. So we do want to hear a little bit more about you. That's what we do here on our podcast, so a little bit about your professional story, but really I want to hear about those pivotal turning points that got you from, got you from where you are or where you were to where you are on your journey lots of pivots in in my journey story if we go pre-work uh, moving across the country with my father who was in the RCMP, so I've seen lots of different locations.
Speaker 1:Landed in the prairies, which has been home pretty well since then. The first major pivot was university leaving small town North Battleford to move to big city of Saskatoon and trying to decide what to be. My first pivot was realizing that my dream of law school was probably not going to work because I didn't like it. I ended up taking a business law class and I hated it. Irony being I would later on in a future career do a lot of work reading legal contracts and stuck in that for many, many hours. But anyways, I chose business and it was great. I love studying it. I took a generalist approach to it with a couple of different majors and then my second pivot arrived, which was the recession in and around 1982. And you'll hear the theme recession a couple of times in my narrative here. But that recession kind of dried up all the job opportunities. There were only a few offers and thankfully I got one that I loved.
Speaker 1:It required a move and I worked in the petroleum industry for five years and it was wonderful. I had some more responsibility than I deserved or earned. I learned a lot in those first few years that I deserved or earned learned a lot in those first few years. Then I pivoted from financial or from from that into financial services, which was a big deal for me. I had lots of opportunity in the petroleum world, but I decided that I wanted to do something that was maybe a little less tangible but more important for people, thinking about mortgages and loans and all of the things that support people. I was more attracted to that product line than the petroleum product line. So I made a jump and it was wonderful. I enjoyed it. I worked and saw a lot of success, moved from marketing into finance, and then my next pivot was working as a corporate banking CEO within a division within the company that I had been serving within, to move from a mid-management position to a CEO. I was a startup at that and situated across Western Canada. That was a big step for me and in my career. It led me to some great results, some great confidence and the desire and ability to bid into another pivot, which was a national company, a wealth management company that I served on the leadership team for five years.
Speaker 1:Then the next really big pivot and this is where Logia comes into the scene During the recession of 2008, 2009,. I had sort of looked over and stewarded three downsizing in my national team and it was my turn to have a look in the mirror to see if I was providing value there and whether or not I stay, and it ended up in a severance. So I was given the opportunity to like after high school or after university, what do I want to do next? And that led to a pretty strong discernment process where I looked at redoing my values and my mission, what I really wanted to do, and ultimately I decided to take the narrow path, the narrow road, and do consulting and coaching, which is the most difficult and it's proven to be. However, we're 15 years into Logia.
Speaker 1:I've worked personally with over 450 leaders and their teams in Saskatchewan, but also in other parts of Canada, and had just a wonderful, wonderful time. The most recent pivot, which is more of an intellectual one, is learning about neuroscience and positive psychology the last four or five years and integrating that into our toolkit for coaching and training. It's been very helpful personally going through things like COVID, some mental or some physical challenges and then even some next pivot challenges. About two weeks ago we became empty nesters. Is that a good thing? Figuring all of that out? A big pivot where we have a lot more time for ourselves, and what do we do next? So that's kind of the career in a nutshell A lot of different opportunities, lots of pivoting, lots of risk taken and the need for some enduring faith, as we've gone through a lot of those journeys.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have loved listening to this and I wonder if, in the time that you're doing these pivots and you've used the word opportunities, so you know you pivoted, it was an opportunity. Pivot did you when you were in it, did you see it as an opportunity? Was there ever any fear? Because I think people, we don't want to make change, we fear change. So I just wonder, when you were in those pivots, were you excited?
Speaker 1:I mean, once one was a severance package. But Wonderful, insightful question. I would have to say personally I was probably driven for the early part of my career more by fear than by opportunity. So fear was probably a prevalent thing and unfortunately, many of the leaders I work with work with fear. And how to define it, how to identify it, probably came more apparent to me as I started to study neuroscience and some of the tools and systems that we use there. As people are, we're actually able to measure our amount of negative thinking. Yeah, and there can be a lot.
Speaker 2:So would you say it was the fear of failure? Or you've like what was the fear? Yeah, like what is dry, you say it's dry, probably failure.
Speaker 1:I remember the day where I sold a board on the capital requirements to build a new company and bring in technology and hire people from all the banks. And, yeah, knowing that there was a need for a return and accountability along with it, like every other business owner, just finishing seasonal inventory and sending a you know, making commitments there was there was certainly a lot of fear around that.
Speaker 2:It worked. Yeah, clearly you're doing well.
Speaker 1:However, the level of happiness can be found more if we're using other parts of our brain and perhaps looking into our faith as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of the comments you made was about going to law school and you realized, oh, you didn't like law, I wanted to be a scientist. And then I went. I don't even like science, so didn't go there. So I laughed when you said that. All right, a lot of great comments. I have so many good. I've written notes here and I think of the recession it definitely teaches a lot about business. It teaches you made a comment. I think it teaches us a lot about ourselves.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I think that sometimes, during recession, we get lulled into the sense of success and it's a false success. People around me with a lot of experience, as I've navigated as a business owner, a leader, as an employer during recessions what do we do with this? And I always heard don't waste a good recession and if there are things that you need to do, take advantage of the opportunity. Don't lie back and think about the prosperity that we've had and squander it.
Speaker 2:Okay, good, great advice, to which I can't even imagine my next question when I ask you your best principle of success, if you have one, and a story that illustrates that.
Speaker 1:I have several, and usually they're from the school of hard knocks but or else greater learning later on. The one that I would point to mostly is trying to know what success is from a personal perspective and really defining it and aspire for it. And success, it and success. We can look to power, we can look to prestige. We could look to position or our job rules. We can look to pleasure, when we think about vacations and and cruises and all sorts of things, and we can think about prosperity and the size of our bank account or our investment portfolio. Now, all of those are are okay and they're good, but in themselves they're not very fulfilling. For one to get to a sense of success and what is it? We're all teleological people. When we have a sense of what success is or a goal, we'll go to it. We'll somehow we'll go in that direction. It's so ensuring that it's not only one of those or a blend of those Most successful people that I've run into and I've worked with a lot of other leadership coaches that have had really great experiences and long, long histories.
Speaker 1:They find that the people that are successful typically aren't idle, they're busy. They don't worry about spending. You know, spending amount of time or effort they give of themselves. But they are also involved in family. They're involved in their faith, they're involved in their finances. They have fun, they have friends, they look at their physical self, spiritual self. They do all of those things. Those typically are the most successful people and those that go beyond a sense of self and wanting to give and share and support other people. That's where you're going to get success. To get on that route, we do need to know what our values are. I've coached 450 people and then more when I've worked within their individual teams, and I would say a couple of dozen of them came loaded with what they would say their life values are Very few and values are so important in the decisions that we make in our lives. So, in addition to knowing what success is so that we can aspire to it, and then getting our values in place, yeah, I think you said this.
Speaker 2:But when you coach, did you say, like how many people come loaded with the definition of success is to personal, is to personal. What did you say? It's a personal thing. Success versus success on the ladder.
Speaker 1:Would you say you see all types. I do and I would say most people that I end up interacting with have a lot of formation to do around mission, vision and values. We live in a world where our institutions haven't been as focused on that, I believe, and we're technically and academically astute. However, there are parts of our own personal development, our own personal leadership, that can use some enhancement, some growth.
Speaker 2:Yeah, say that, um, uh, I have changed over, and maybe this is a common thing. But over the past many years, when I was young, it was success meant up the ladder right, and then, as I got older, I went wait a minute. Success is my, my personal values, my goals. You know, being happy is is more success, but it's an age for me.
Speaker 1:For me a personal story. I guess I was driven by by the prestige or the position as a, as a young, a young person. I was a CEO by 35.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Leading a company with a market value that was like $40 million when we transitioned it to another organization which I was also involved in leadership. But it was important to me then, not important to me now, but there was an identity loss going from senior corporate executive to working in a small to medium-sized enterprise. Your identity is different small to medium-sized enterprise.
Speaker 2:Your identity is different. Yes, I have felt that the identity is different and fabulous as well, so I'm sure you have something here as well. We're going to talk about fears and failures because I think we both know and you from coaching even more we learn more from our failures and mistakes than our own successes, so wondering if you have a story that you could share and what you learned from it.
Speaker 1:Only one, lisa only one, only one, dave.
Speaker 1:I can say I learned humility very quickly. But one of the things that perhaps is more widely relevant for others is looking at the composition of teams and having the difficult decision to remove someone from a team, to take someone and give them another place to be where they'll be successful if they're not being successful on your team. De-hiring, firing, if you will that word we hear. From my perspective, I haven't had a lot of it. I've been fortunate to work with wonderful, wonderful people. However, on a few cases I have had to and some of them have been my hires as opposed to people that have been grandfathered into the teams I was leading and that hurt.
Speaker 1:And I would say that I let it go too long and allowed other weird things to be going on in the organization and other people hurt by it. For people who are by, people who were performing and seeing others that weren't still being allowed, you know, welcomed into their, into their area, just disappointed people by not making changes and I know that is often a fear of leaders removing somebody from their team. It requires a lot of thought, a lot of prayer, research and then support to the individual as they go, but also to the leaders that have to make those tough decisions. It's not easy to let someone go.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I don't know where I was and we reframed that. We're going to give you a different. We think there's a different opportunity out there for you. We want you to grow and it's not here Just the language of we have to. That person isn't doing anything for you, I mean, or it's not working, it can work somewhere else for them.
Speaker 1:I'm working with clients that are going through that decision right now, yeah, and I can quite honestly say that everyone that I've I've let go um has has landed and are doing well, and they're probably in a better place than they, than they were before. So, um, so it's probably the right thing to do when something doesn't go well. I always think there's three things that I can find. I can learn something. I don't know what it is, but something will be learned. There's a likelihood that a new skill will be gained of some sort, and, you know, it might be something really inspiring that comes out of this. There might be something, rather and it can be from even tragic losses. Mothers Against Drug Drivers started with a mother who lost it was her daughter, I believe, and that's a horrific loss. However, from that there was change, and change at a global level, change in good. So, even how terrible these errors or mistakes or tragedies are, we can find at least three things some knowledge, some skills and perhaps some new inspiration to do something different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, our group is just reading the Difference Maker by John Maxwell and this morning the conversation was on our attitude and when something bad happens, what is your attitude about it? And it starts there, because you know it can be bad and you can, you know, dwell on it, or maybe it is an opportunity, which is really hard. Let's just have a 24 hour pity party just saying and then, but then you got to move forward, so it's a great book.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's something wonderful about leader impact groups and I've been a part of them for many years and we journey together, it's ups and downs and we pray together. We support each other. That's wonderful.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, what a nice segue into, obviously, leader impact, because if people don't know, we want people in our groups, our leaders, to grow personally, professionally and spiritually for increasing impact. So would you be willing to share a story, share an example and a story of how the spiritual makes a practical difference in your life as a leader?
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh. Well, I had a faith relive. My faith was reinvigorated. It was March 10th 2001, and an alpha program and it led me to kind of a different way of living, different way of being, and I was interested in so many things and driven, and one of the things was trying to figure out about this space of work and it's so tough and grueling and people really toil there. Is there something about my faith, my spirituality that can be done there and that led me to leader impact? It was, and I've, I've been involved in groups most of the time since. So I, I to to go there. It's, it's, it's a wonderful experience.
Speaker 1:You, you, you learn humility because you're working with people that have similar experiences to you or something new that's really interesting to you. People communicate and it's real communication. When you are working with people that are also on a faith journey, they'll be honest so quickly. The path to trust is almost immediate and that's really helpful. We also there's a great sense of empathy.
Speaker 1:As we understand the principles for our faith and who we are faithful to and who has created us. We can understand the empathy, particular in different seasons of the year, and this we happen to be talking around Easter time and it's right around the passion of Jesus Christ. So you know we understand what we're doing this for and why. So it's very helpful for us people. It's probably not for the success that I spoke of earlier, the power and the prestige. These are people wanting to perhaps, you know, maintain what they have, but also use it for good, make good things happen as part of their mission in life. And so those are the experiences that I've had, some wonderful friendships that you know I've well, so many of them, and it's been a wonderful journey.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would everything you say. We talked this morning about just how this is one of the best groups that we have surrounded ourselves with. When you think of people that you surround yourself with and the groups that maybe you shouldn't hang out with, and this was one group that the vulnerability of our stories that are shared is. Well, I'm on the A team. I just feel like I'm just part of an amazing team, so I appreciate you sharing your own story of your own groups and what you take from there.
Speaker 1:So I appreciate that I'm happy for you, Lisa, that you've got that opportunity. It's great.
Speaker 2:And I do two online groups, so our groups we have a Regina-in-area and a Saskatoon-in-area, and we're online Tuesdays and Wednesdays morning and people just log on and log off. So it's a good thing. So we'll talk a little bit more about Leader Impact, because we are dedicated to leaders having a lasting impact. So I'm just wondering, as you journey, as you continue to journey, throughout your amazing pivoting and in your whole life, have you wondered what you want your faith legacy to be when you leave this world?
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, I as a person, my goals initially were around the success and the very tangible components of it, and it wasn't until my probably 30s that I started thinking about components of it. And it wasn't until my probably 30s that I started thinking about things like, like Bob Buford's book, halftime. You know, you lead a life that first part of your life you're working on success and then the second part of your life if you do have a halftime, like in a football game analogy you're focused on significance to that success, on significance to that success. It was wonderful. I have another book. I love to read this book Clayton Christensen. He's a professor at Harvard. Harvard talks about how you measure your life thinking about that.
Speaker 1:So I got into thinking about this and doing more about it in my 30s and I've been walking with a mission to plant little seeds to help people grow to know God. Plant little seeds to help people grow to know God that's my mission and so if I'm successful in that, I will see fruits and that's really how I'm measuring my success. And as an individual. Our company we're about empowering leaders and their teams. We want to empower leaders and their teams and we want to see that. So we're there Like a mission statement. They all have a lot of meaning in each word Plant.
Speaker 1:Well, plant means to start. That means I'm not likely going to be around for the harvest. I'm planting seeds. The little seeds might be like the mustard seed that will start from nothing and grow into something big. And I can speak of clients that I've worked with, that we've gone through the alpha program together in coaching mode. I speak of clients that have had major life conversions and have moved on to different lives, in fact involved with clergy or other things, all kinds of wonderful things. But I'm prepared just to be planting the seeds to help people grow to know God. We work in a secular world and the idea of knowing their God may be irrelevant to some, but it's still relevant to us and we're still supporting people on the spiritual journey, advocates for the spiritual journey, to help people grow to the point where perhaps they are able to embrace faith from a sincere perspective. Faith from a sincere perspective.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was our last podcast, or I think it was our last one with Adam, and he talked about that one person that changed his way and he then found faith. But we talked about there's. You know, you just talked about planting little seeds. We may be just a seed in someone's life. I call it a drip, Just a drip a little. You know, we're not always the big one that they make the big decision, but leading a good life and having them look at you and say you know, what do you have? Why are you so successful? What is it? What is your answer to success, Is just lovely and I just appreciate you sharing your stories. I do want to ask you about the alpha program because I have been looking into it. But for anyone listening, is this just something you did? You just Google alpha or did you see it in a church? Or how did you get involved in the alpha?
Speaker 1:program. There's a much more intimate connection my wife, who's also a coach. She works predominantly with women that are looking at re-entering the workforce or taking on new responsibilities in the workforce. I actually work with a lot of women too. Over half of my portfolio are women in the corporates that I work with. But she and a friend brought the Alpha program into our church in Regina years ago and I was told that I needed to come. I got a summons and I had just taken over as CEO for this organization and we had a young daughter. We have two adopted daughters from China. We just had an adoption. I said you know, I'm really busy, I'm traveling, I've got all these things going on and I'll try to. I'll make it out to the first meeting. There was an epiphany in that first meeting and I did not miss any of them. After that and for about five years I was working with my wife as a leader or co-leader in the Alpha program there and then have been involved in it more in small groups since then. It's a terrific program.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all right, thanks. Thanks for saying that. I will continue to look into it. I don't have anyone in the house that's gonna say show up, so maybe I'll be that person. Our last question for you is what brings you the greatest joy?
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh. Well, it's nothing material and I have to admit, lisa, thinking about joy gets me rather introspective. I like to understand what words mean and we hear an awful lot about happiness now, people looking for happiness everywhere. You need to be happy. I have all kinds of books on how to be happy from a psychological perspective, from an everyday sense perspective, but not as much from the philosophical or theological perspective.
Speaker 1:And when we start to look at it from a faith perspective, it's something that transcends more mere happiness, where we're having more positive thoughts and negative thoughts. It's something that's it's tied to our purpose, it's tied to who we are, it's tied to inner peace. Um, it's, it's a tough and you know, and joy is actually one of the fruits of the holy spirit. So it's, it's there, it's endearing, it's a, an abiding sense of well-being. So we're rooted in our relationship with our God. So that's what it is. So joy.
Speaker 1:Where do I find joy? Things that endure. It's not in stuff, it's in people, usually my wife, my children, my grandchildren, the relationships, people that are close to me. I find a lot of joy in those endearing long-term relationships. I get a lot of joy in witnessing people grow, take steps and move forward, and if it's towards a faith journey, even more joy in that. And I have to find that I find as much or maybe more joy in the intimacy and quietness and peace and stillness Prayer, retreats, silent retreats, adoration, just adoring our creator. That's where I get more joy than anything else. And to round it all off, a game of golf every once in a while, right.
Speaker 2:That's lovely you just reminded me of. There is an Alzheimer's Society of Saskatchewan put out a video by Dr Holly Bardutz and she talked about brain health and what we need to do and to stay healthy in our brains. And the one thing you said is just the people who we are surrounding ourselves with. We must be in community with people, and even Harvard did the longest lasting I think they called it a happiness study, but it was it's people. But also, she noted, is just yes, we love to be with people and we need our alone time too. So acknowledge that you know we need that too. Pure joy. Is there anything? I feel like we could go on with the stories. Dave, I want to thank you for joining us. Is there anything else? Is it just you know? Have I said anything? Or you just want to share another story, because I feel like you would be the guy that has them all?
Speaker 1:Well, I just I want to say how grateful I am to having had Leader Impact on my journey as 15, 20 years ago. It was a lot of newness and it was wonderful to meet friends then that I retain today, that have been there for me, praying for me, and I'm praying for them or supporting each other. It's been just a wonderful journey. So I'm grateful to the Hildebrands and the others that were pioneers in this particular group to all the great work that they've done in planting seeds for the future, getting ready for the harvest. I'm grateful to be a part of that and I'm very happy to be here with you today, lisa.
Speaker 2:Oh see, I knew there was something more. That was a great pitch for Leader Impact, because it is a great place to be and I know our team loves it. Sounds you do too. Now this ends our podcast, but if anyone wants to engage with you, reach out to you. Where's the best place to find?
Speaker 1:perhaps on our website um logiacom logiaca logiaca that's l-o-g-i-a consultingca all right, uh again.
Speaker 2:Thank you, dave, for just spending this last half hour with us it's been a joy, all right all right.
Speaker 2:Well, if you're part of leader impact, you can always discuss or share this podcast with your group. And if you're not yet part of leader impact and would like to find out more and grow your leadership, find our podcast page on our website at leaderimpactca, and you can even check out our free leadership assessment. You can also check out groups available in canada at leaderimpactca or, if you're listening from anywhere else in the world, check out leaderimpactcom or get in touch with us by email. Info at leaderimpactca and we will connect you. And if you like this podcast, please leave us a comment, give us a rating or review. This will help other global leaders find our podcast. Thank you for engaging with us and remember impact starts with you.
