Episode 31: Education, Business and Community: Brian Tomamichel on Navigating Change

In this episode of Luminate: Navigating the Unknown Through Creative Leadership, host Sarah Hempstead speaks with Brian Tomamichel, assistant superintendent for business and operations at Westfield Washington Schools. 

Tomamichel shares his unconventional path to education leadership, his passion for the outdoors, and his approach to managing growth in one of Indiana’s fastest-growing school districts. From fostering collaboration to balancing a $150 million budget, he provides insights on adaptability, resilience and the power of lifelong learning.

Key highlights:

• The power of hard work and community
  Growing up in Beech Grove, Indiana, Tomamichel learned the value of resilience and teamwork—lessons that continue to guide his leadership style.
• A passion for the outdoors and leadership parallels
  Tomamichel’s love for hiking and national parks has taught him patience, problem-solving and the importance of taking one step at a time—wisdom that applies directly to his role in education leadership.
• Leading through change and growth
  Westfield Washington Schools has grown by 1,700 students in the past four years—essentially adding an entire elementary school’s worth of students annually. Tomamichel discusses the challenges and strategies involved in maintaining excellence amid rapid expansion.
• Balancing family, leadership and personal growth
  With three children, a full-time working spouse and a Ph.D. in progress, Tomamichel reflects on the importance of time management and teamwork at home and at work.
• The business of education
  Tomamichel explores why school districts must operate with a business mindset, ensuring efficiency and sustainability while delivering high-quality education.
• A commitment to early learning
  Westfield Washington Schools is expanding its early childhood education offerings, reinforcing the critical role of preschool in student success.
• Advice for aspiring leaders
  Tomamichel’s key takeaway: Be honest, be adaptable and recognize that true leadership means making the right decisions—even when they aren’t easy.

Book recommendation: You Can’t Send a Duck to Eagle School – A leadership book emphasizing the importance of attitude in success.

This episode is filled with actionable insights and inspiring stories for educators, leaders and anyone looking to grow both personally and professionally. Tune in to hear how Tomamichel navigates the complexities of education, community service and leadership with clarity and purpose.

Subscribe to Luminate: Navigating the Unknown Through Creative Leadership to stay inspired and informed!

Transcript

Sarah Hempstead: [00:00:00] Welcome to Luminate, navigating the unknown through creative leadership. I'm Sarah Hempstead, a leader in creative problem solving and principal in charge at Schmidt Associates. And today we're thrilled to be joined by Brian Tomamichel, Assistant Superintendent for Business and Operations at Westfield Washington Schools.

Sarah Hempstead: Brian has mastered the art of navigating both the uncharted and the unpredictable, whether it's leading the charge in one of Indiana's fastest growing communities or exploring the rugged terrains of America's national parks.

Sarah Hempstead: Today we'll uncover how Brian's love for nature inspires his innovative approach to building trust, fostering collaboration, and thriving in the face of rapid change. Brian, welcome to the show. Thanks. 

Brian Tomamichel: Thanks for having me. 

Sarah Hempstead: We're so glad that you're here. So let's, Boucher, born and bred, yes? 

Brian Tomamichel: I am. Grew up in Meacher, Indiana.

Sarah Hempstead: All right. So how did those experiences start to form who you are today? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, so growing up in Beech Grove my, my parents still live in the same [00:01:00] house that I grew up in. They've lived there their entire lives. But it grew up, it's traditional small town USA. I had both grandparents lived within walking distance as a kid, had an aunt and uncle that lived close.

Brian Tomamichel: Grew up with three older brothers that lived with us as well. So four boys, which then made us a lot super competitive. And when they're eight and six years older than you, you're always striving to beat them at stuff that you're not even supposed to be doing yet. Makes it interesting growing up but I think, we grew up the traditional small town, USA, blue collar America, you work hard to get what you need and, instills a certain work ethic in you as well that just, you got to work hard to get what you want.

Brian Tomamichel: So yeah but growing up there actually did a leadership thing the other day to talk about your background, having older siblings, like I had a very tight core group of friends growing up as well. There's about 10 of us that. Still talk today. We all grew up together, all stay close together, still communicate and, share Christmas cards this time of year and everything else.

Brian Tomamichel: It just made us really tight in the community, but also taught you what you needed to do to get where you wanted to go in life. 

Sarah Hempstead: As you're growing up in Beech Grove What drew you to [00:02:00] education? Is there a teacher, a coach, a mentor? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, no, actually not really. I'm a non traditional education person.

Brian Tomamichel: My background's accounting, finance, minor in econ, I got an MBA, I've never sat in a classroom. However, my grandparents were teachers, had some aunts that were teachers, my wife is actually a special ed teacher as well, so I've been surrounded by education for a long time, but that is not at all what I thought I was going to go into when I went into college at all.

Brian Tomamichel: It's not what I thought I was going to do. Really until after I got out of school and had my first kind of real job after that. 

Sarah Hempstead: Let's go back to college for a minute because I think that's, that is interesting. I know when you started college, you weren't at all headed in this direction.

Sarah Hempstead: And there's so much pressure on kids starting college who know exactly what they're gonna be and what they're gonna do. Tell me a little bit about that. 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, so actually even before college, so literally if you knew me up until probably I was applying for schools, The only thing I wanted to be since like fourth grade was a meteorologist.

Brian Tomamichel: That's all I wanted to do in life. I still love weather to this day. I bet when my son loves weather, I'm like, [00:03:00] we'll drive around and watch storms still. But then ended up staying close to Indiana and just, I don't know what changed, but decided I didn't want to do that anymore. But actually ended up going to IUPUI, and through IUPUI, I was originally drafted and met into Purdue's engineering program.

Brian Tomamichel: I spent about a semester in that and realized I'm a pretty introverted person, but that was a whole nother level. So I ended up changing from that. But I loved math, so then I went to Actuarial Science for about a year. Realized I could not computer program except my life, which was a requirement.

Brian Tomamichel: And then took a step back for a little bit and just thought What did I want to do? What did I like? And when I was a kid, my dad and I used to flip through the newspaper and look at like stocks as kids and think about how we would invest money and do that. So we decided to go into Kelly.

Brian Tomamichel: Since I was at IUPUI, I was able to switch back and forth pretty easy. And I ended up going to accounting and finance, really like the finance side of the world, but the joke was accountants can get jobs. So I got the accounting degree and ended up doing that and actually straight out of school I ended up working at Steak and Shake's Corporate Accounting downtown Indy for, about a six month temp [00:04:00] job after college and kind of back up a little bit during college.

Brian Tomamichel: I also worked on grounds custodial crews for TRO city schools all during college. It was kinda my summer college job Sure. Bled over a little bit, so I knew a lot of those people and it just happened to be really luck timing, looking back that their corporation treasurer was retiring about the time, about a year after I graduated and they ended up reaching out.

Brian Tomamichel: Kinda Hey, have you ever thought about working in schools? We need a tre. At that point, I had no idea what a corporation treasurer did in the school corporation at all. I had no idea what that job entailed, but I knew I did not like what I was doing, so I decided to make that change then. And that's really how I got in schools.

Sarah Hempstead: Oh my gosh. And so that's been 20 years of working in schools? 

Brian Tomamichel: About 14 now. 

Sarah Hempstead: 14. I guess that rounded up. Yeah. Long enough. Yes. Excellent. I think it's interesting that you worked outside in the summertime, like many kids do. That's hard work. Yeah. But I know that it links to another passion of yours, which is being outside.

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. 

Sarah Hempstead: Yeah. 

Brian Tomamichel: Awesome. 

Sarah Hempstead: Tell me about that. what do you get from that helps you in the rest of your? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. Growing up, like my grandpa was an avid outdoors [00:05:00] person. Being the youngest, really one of the youngest in our family, like my grandparents retired when I was still pretty young. A lot of my summers were spent with my grandparents.

Brian Tomamichel: And my grandpa, growing up, we'd go shoot a gun, go fishing, go hunting. It was just whatever grandpa wanted to do. You were tagging along because otherwise you're getting a babysitter and nobody wanted that either. So we just, we spent a ton of time outside and he always took us fishing or, we'd go.

Brian Tomamichel: He had some friends that owned property down in Johnson County. So we'd go down there a lot and just hang out around the ponds, hike through the woods. But it was just, it became the quiet, happy place. Especially, several years back, a lot of those places didn't get cell phone signals. So it's really nice for a long time.

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, it's even more quiet and it's probably a little safer now that they get cell phone signals, but it's a good place to go relax and just, clear your mind. 

Sarah Hempstead: So you still do that with your family? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. So we still get out. My parents actually own a lake house down in Johnson County area as well.

Brian Tomamichel: So we still get out some there and then we still, my, my dad and some of my brothers and I, and some other family, we still go hunting every year as well. So there's. [00:06:00] Especially November is sacred to us of you're going to go out in the woods for sure. And then my oldest brother and I, about every other year or so we take a trip of just him and I, and we'll go usually grab a national park or go do something just that we probably shouldn't do.

Brian Tomamichel: And we'll regret it from hurting and not being in shape. We're trying to do something we used to do in our twenties. 

Sarah Hempstead: So what do you get from that, that you bring back to your rather indoor financial life? 

Brian Tomamichel: I think a couple things, one is just I think everybody needs to have their place to relax and separate and just move away regardless of what your job is.

Brian Tomamichel: You just got to find that time to disconnect. There's always something else to do at work. There's always something else that could be done. There's always a phone call or an email and it's okay to separate for a little bit. And then I think the other thing is, especially when I look at like the trip my brother and I take.

Brian Tomamichel: Something can look really challenging on paper and sound really hard, but it's always, it's a hike is a couple steps away, just keep going. You're going to get there. You're closer than when you were a few steps ago. And, when you stand at the base of a giant [00:07:00] hill, it looks giant, but as you just keep going, and if you have somebody along the ride with you, it, step by step, you get there and goes a little faster too.

Sarah Hempstead: I love that. I love that. Particularly when you think about applying it to school leadership, it's been a. It's been an interesting transitional time, the last decade or so, in, in schools. So you always get a team that you work with, and as, I hate to keep bringing up COVID and shutdown but what a transformational time for school systems everywhere.

Sarah Hempstead: And on top of which, you're growing so quickly. So how do you keep your team inspired and motivated, able to handle that kind of change? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. For a lot of us, I'm a big believer that adults as a whole. They want to do a good job, but they also need their family time and their other time.

Brian Tomamichel: So I am probably one of the least rigid kind of supervisors or boss or whatever you want to call it at that point of just if you have a family function going on, then I would rather you be at that and rejuvenate yourself. And then we all know that work has to get done. Like we know when it needs to be [00:08:00] done.

Brian Tomamichel: We know what our timelines are. So that may mean you work a little bit on a Saturday because you wanted to leave on Wednesday and go watch a kid event. Perfectly fine with that and I think that flexibility just treating adults like adults I think helps a lot there's again the works always gonna be there So let's work around that and make sure that you can also have that balance at home that you need as well 

Sarah Hempstead: What do you do to help them with goal say?

Brian Tomamichel: A lot of conversation I think for a lot of people it's where you want to go in the future and you need to know that I Would say part of our team honestly is very happy with where they're at and what they're doing and they don't necessarily They just won't support it and then half of our team definitely has those goals and Aspirations where they want to go and it's making sure that we set up a process for them to be able to attain that The last thing I want is for somebody to be stagnant and stay with us forever and not be happy I would much rather lose somebody who's able to progress themselves and grow and You know bringing somebody new then to have them unhappy and then be with us still 

Sarah Hempstead: That's such a healthy way to look at it.

Sarah Hempstead: Sometimes I joke that all [00:09:00] roads lead to Schmidt, and some of them lead through Schmidt, and that has to be okay. And if you figure out that your personal mission is something else, then that's great. I also like that you can double down on technical expertise. If someone's very happy being the best at whatever they're doing.

Sarah Hempstead: Because you're growing so quickly, what kind of unique challenges does that bring to your job and to your team? 

Brian Tomamichel: For, very school specific is when we look at just how the state funds public education. The state loves to legislate, and really the legislation as a whole, it is legislation for all.

Brian Tomamichel: Which, if you're average or below, is great. Because you can grow a little bit faster, or you can grow at least where you're at. When you are on the opposite end of that and you're the outlier being the fastest growing in the state, it hurts tremendously. Our growth rate when a set of state averages three to four percent and our growth rate as a city is been currently anywhere from ten to fifteen percent.

Brian Tomamichel: So for us, it's really we [00:10:00] every year we have to be more efficient, right? And it's not a fun conversation because sometimes that means we need to reduce staffing in certain areas or we need to do other things. But at the same time, we're growing so rapidly, so trying to explain that to people, or just trying to get the community, or even your own staff to understand it, can be very challenging.

Sarah Hempstead: Can you put that in context of numbers of students a year? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. So right now we're, so the last four years, we've grown almost 1, 700 kids. And to put that in context, Over 

Sarah Hempstead: four years? 

Brian Tomamichel: Over four years. So we're, we've grown anywhere from four to five hundred kids a year, each year for the last four years.

Brian Tomamichel: To put that in context, four to six hundred kids is going to be your average elementary size in the state. So basically, we have grown a brand new elementary school every year for the last four years. 

Sarah Hempstead: And it's a credit to the school system that you've been able to keep up with that. And also a credit to Westfield.

Sarah Hempstead: It's a nice place to live or it wouldn't be happening. 

Brian Tomamichel: It is. Yeah. Yeah, it is. And and then I think it's interesting as well. It's just, when you look at the socionomics of Westfield, the average house price is about 500, 000 for the most part. So we're not getting [00:11:00] starter families that move in.

Brian Tomamichel: A lot of our families that move in have that kind of middle school, high school kid, which then creates its own unique challenges of your growth is really skewed to more of a secondary middle school, high school model. So when it's skewed like that, you're just compounding where that growth is really compounding where your challenges are of spaces and all those other issues.

Sarah Hempstead: So how do you think about the relationship between the school system and this and the city writ large But also the school system in that and the parents and citizens 

Brian Tomamichel: really it needs to be cohesive across the board our school city Relationship. So when I first showed up in West Linden 2017 was probably not the best We didn't talk as much as we should have it was very much, you know The city approves the houses.

Brian Tomamichel: We deal with the aftermath and not to say, at the end of the day, that kind of is their role. They approve the growth and we handled it back in. But I think the behind the scenes conversations of knowing what's coming, knowing where it's going to come has definitely changed [00:12:00] to the point that, I'm actually a voting number on RDC now.

Brian Tomamichel: So I know a lot of what's coming down pipeline. We've had a sign on disclosure agreements. We know where a lot of the Communities and what lands under contract and places and where the growth is going to come It makes it really challenging of when you look at every national trend of what should drive growth in a community We are as westfield are almost like a little outlier unicorn Rates go up, housing should go down.

Brian Tomamichel: Rates went up and actually we still grew. Housing market expanded and prices went up, so less people bought. We just built more expensive homes and people still bought them. And so it's been unique of, we work with demographers, we work with other people to really try to capture where do we think growth is going to go.

Brian Tomamichel: But we also know it's a balance of we know that number is very conservative just because it's a national model trend and we're not falling national model data on a lot of pieces. So it makes it challenging as well. But if you look through history, everything has a hard stop [00:13:00] point of when did that growth start and stop and it's the balance of, I was joking in public.

Brian Tomamichel: Public area all together and public money sure is we look terrible if we build too soon in the building sits empty We look terrible if we build too late and too late to the road how do we hit that nice happy point of we built it right when it was needed and a lot of times you're buying You're building stuff before the average Members community realizes it's needed so it's trying to balance all that and then at the state level.

Brian Tomamichel: That's a whole nother monster it's You know, you really start getting into the politics of everything at the state house of who's the decision maker, but where, what you do, they really represent. And then how do you get them to see your need? I think often there is a disconnect in belief that Hamilton County is a super affluent area and they don't need money.

Brian Tomamichel: And really it's, yes, we are affluent compared to the rest of the state. However, we're in such a rapid growth phase that the funds lag the growth. And it creates a lot of challenges. [00:14:00] 

Sarah Hempstead: That is community service, really. How do you think about, personally community service as part of your own leadership?

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah especially when it comes to schools, and really I've been in schools long enough, I think it's developed into my own personal belief of just, I think you need to dive head first into your community and be a part of it. There are many different opportunities depending on how somebody wants to get connected and get involved, but anybody can be as involved as they want to be in the community and have that voice.

Brian Tomamichel: But I'm also a big fan of if you want to complain about what's happening around you, but you had nothing to do with any of it, then don't complain. Just sit to the side and understand it's going to happen or participate in the process and, have your voice heard and be a part of that decision as we go through it.

Brian Tomamichel: And you're not always going to get what you want out of the process, but if you're not going to participate, then don't talk about what the outcome was. 

Sarah Hempstead: If nothing else, you earn the right to complain. Who's tried and 

Brian Tomamichel: found it. It's like voting. You either vote or you don't, understand how the process works.

Sarah Hempstead: [00:15:00] So I know your budget is a hordes of 150 million dollars. Yep. This is a big, this is a big job. I know you've got three kids who have big busy lives. How do you balance all that? How do you even start to think about balancing all that? 

Brian Tomamichel: By being married to an amazing lady. 

Sarah Hempstead: Let's say greenies.

Brian Tomamichel: What would 

Sarah Hempstead: be the most honest answer? Yeah. I'm never onto that question. 

Brian Tomamichel: It is a lot of balance across the board. It is a lot of Sundays sitting at a, because my wife has a full time job as special ed director as well. It's a lot of Sundays sitting there going all I got a late meeting on Tuesday.

Brian Tomamichel: You picking up the kids I got a late one Wednesday. Okay, you know planning out our dinners to make sure it's not like drive thru McDonald's every night or something as well But it's it I would already use the family balance first I mean we both have to participate in and then she definitely gives up a lot more than I do on that and Make it work as we go through it all 

Sarah Hempstead: What do you hope your kids are learning about leadership and family wise, you're watching the two of you navigate?

Brian Tomamichel: A, hard work, I think is the biggest piece and I think hard work, being involved, giving back, we try to bring our kids to as [00:16:00] many functions as we can that are more nonprofit focused that we're a part of just to show that, Hey we do a lot of stuff we don't get paid for. We participate in a lot of things and it's not about, are you getting paid to be here?

Brian Tomamichel: It's about, are you participating in being a part of the community? But I hope they also see there's definitely sacrifice that we both definitely have missed things, but we're also both sacrificing a lot of time to make sure we're at things. And I grew up with two working parents as well and it was hit and miss of whether they were at certain things, but one of them always managed to be there.

Brian Tomamichel: So I hope they see that as well. 

Sarah Hempstead: So what do you learn about leadership from them? 

Brian Tomamichel: Patience. So my daughter is 11 and my wife and I often joke, she is the one, one of the most strong little girls I've ever met in my life. And some days it can push you to the edge, but we also talk, tell ourselves all the time of these are quality sheeds as she gets older.

Brian Tomamichel: And we can't punish them out of her today as we go through it because, man, she's gonna be [00:17:00] such a strong woman when she grows up and she needs to have all that. But it is definitely patience and just, anybody who's been a parent knows that and it's patience when you have three kids. 

Sarah Hempstead: Those things that serve them well later are not always pleasant to deal with right now.

Brian Tomamichel: Yes. 

Sarah Hempstead: Yes. 

Brian Tomamichel: I don't always need that ten year old. daughter of 

Sarah Hempstead: myself. That's correct. That's right. That's right. That's right. Talk a little bit about as you reflect 14 years doing education. If you look to the next 14 years What do you think will change and what's required of educational leadership and education in general?

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah So we might my personal belief with education as a whole the more as you just look at Statehouse and really nationally and locally and every which way in between as Schools really need to understand in my belief that we are a business. As you mentioned, we have 150 million budget. We're doing about 600 million projects right now.

Brian Tomamichel: We are a multimillion dollar business. We have over 1300 employees. The difference is we can't go produce another widget [00:18:00] tomorrow. However, we were just in the business of educating kids. So our output is different. And the fact of our inputs based on who lives there, who's moving in and that's changing.

Brian Tomamichel: As well as we look at kind of the makeup of our kids across the country of who's coming into our schools. At the end of the day we, we need to focus on efficiencies of how do we do what's expected of us more efficient and better the same way a business would. And I think for a long time schools have just operated of this is what we've always done.

Brian Tomamichel: And put ourselves sometimes in the crosshairs where we don't need to be on conversations by doing it. And then I think on the other end of that. As well, though, from the outsider's look in is people need to understand right now schools are expected to be everything to everyone, but we are not funded that way.

Brian Tomamichel: So there needs to be a balance on both sides. I think schools need to learn to function a little bit more like a business and what we do and understand that we're in the business of educating. And I think the outside community needs to understand either a [00:19:00] funding needs to change if you want us to be everything to everyone.

Brian Tomamichel: Or B, we need to understand if, where does those other layers of support come to make sure that a student's showing up ready to go to school if we're not going to be funded in that manner. 

Sarah Hempstead: There doesn't seem to be anybody else stepping into those spaces. No. What's one project or initiative, and I know it's like picking a favorite child, what's one project or initiative that you're working on right now at Westfield that is, that you're really proud of?

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, so I honestly think overall, and this is more of an expansion of something that started earlier, but then 20, it was 2019, we officially opened our early learning center. And through that, I was fortunate enough, my youngest actually went there for a year once it opened. But we took, we always had the infant through pre k program.

Brian Tomamichel: And the district put it spread out in all the elementary buildings. Some buildings had certain classes, some had others, and we condensed it all into one building. And when we opened it was for about 300 kids, it has all our developmental pre k, all of our students are in there, [00:20:00] and day one we had a wait list.

Brian Tomamichel: So with that, we ended up expanding that, currently under construction right now, should open for next school year, but when it's done, we're gonna get a developmental preschool and for pre k we'll have about a 550 kid capacity in it. And we expect honestly to probably have a wait list pretty quick after that.

Brian Tomamichel: We've already started conversations of where does, early learning center number two go. But I think through that I am very proud all the time to say that, we by far offer the lowest cost, licensed, full curriculum, preschool type programming in Westfield. There are another, plenty of other great opportunities for people to send their kids, but it is A, fantastic for us when it comes to staff retention and attraction.

Brian Tomamichel: Sure. But then B, also when we have those community open spots, like they just do amazing things there. And it's always fun to see those little kids with our offices connected to them. 

Sarah Hempstead: That first dollar spending if you get those kiddos started off right, you're ready for kindergarten you're ready for first grade.

Sarah Hempstead: No that's so exciting and it is very difficult to find those high quality seats, really anywhere on this site. [00:21:00] We would say Indiana's a great place to have a family, but it seemed to be a little bit of a tough place to start a family. 

Brian Tomamichel: Yes. 

Sarah Hempstead: That's awesome. Brian, before we wrap up, what is a piece of advice you would give to somebody trying to lead with integrity and with balance?

Sarah Hempstead: I think you've done a good job speaking about try to do all the things, but not maybe all of it at the same time. 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, I think the biggest piece is be honest with yourself, as you go through and be honest with others, I think in leadership a lot of times, and people look at me weird when I say it, but There are plenty of decisions that we will make in our life that people won't agree with and there's plenty of decisions Sometimes I say that I don't even agree with however, it's the right thing to do But it may have consequences that you know, aren't great for you personally or aren't great for somebody else But I think if we can be honest and truthful with those around us yeah, I used to say especially you know, we do a lot of like insurance committees and other pieces of just like You may not like it, but I hope you understand the process we've gone through to get here.

Brian Tomamichel: If people can [00:22:00] understand that I think it it helps build those relationships across the board because there are going to be plenty of unpleasant conversations we have to have in leadership, but if we can have that level of understanding, I think it helps. 

Sarah Hempstead: That's awesome. Alright, now I'm going to ask you the question I ask everybody.

Sarah Hempstead: What's a book you'd recommend? 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, so I had to think about this because I'll be honest, I am not a huge reader with three kids or anything. So I'm doing my doctorate right now and then I've had to do a lot of leadership books and one leadership book that kind of sticks out that I've had to read three different things is you can't take a duck to Eagle School and it's really, it's into just the facts of I can't teach you to be a nice person, but I can teach you everything else about the job.

Brian Tomamichel: So just, it really gets into, your personality. And the way you behave and the way you are just really sets you up for life of how you're going to be. Like having a good attitude can't necessarily be taught, I didn't teach you how to do anything else that we do every day, but just bringing a good attitude to the table can, start you in a great direction.

Sarah Hempstead: That is a new one and a great title. So I just, I have to nap to segue because I didn't know you were doing your [00:23:00] PhD at the same time. 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah. 

Sarah Hempstead: How are you possibly doing that right? 

Brian Tomamichel: So my wife and I have always traded off, you made a comment of it's not easy to have kids anywhere. So when we first got pregnant with our daughter, my wife was a teacher in the classroom and we did the math.

Brian Tomamichel: And the cost of sending our kid to daycare was going to net her about 3, 000 in income. So it immediately was like, you got to go get your master's. So she started her master's when she was done. Then I went back, we did Saturday programs to where literally we just didn't see each other for three years.

Brian Tomamichel: And when we were done with that, then she went back for her doctor, she actually just finished her doctorate in July, so then I'm starting back on mine now, so we've traded off as we go through, it gets, back to that sacrifice piece of, we know we both can't do it at the same time, so we just trade back and forth as we go through.

Sarah Hempstead: That's so impressive, and then when you see each other, eventually you can be like doctor. 

Brian Tomamichel: Yeah, 

Sarah Hempstead: best of both worlds. Brian, thank you so much for joining us today. I really appreciate the insights. I appreciate the conversation on balance That's I think that's really helpful and just a constant distributor [00:24:00] for our most southern leadership polls and for our listeners if you're as inspired as I am be sure to follow us on Facebook Instagram and LinkedIn at Schmitt Associates and if you haven't already subscribe on Luminate navigating the unknown to creative leadership, so you never miss an episode Thanks, Brian.

Brian Tomamichel: Tha