Episode 35: Leading Where You’re Planted—The Story of Dan Robison

In this inspiring episode of Luminate: Navigating the Unknown Through Creative Leadership, guest host Audra Blasdel speaks with Dan Robison, director of the Jackson County Chamber, about returning home, building ecosystems, and leading rural transformation through connection and creativity.

After nearly two decades in Florida, Robison made the bold decision to return to Seymour, Indiana—just days before the pandemic hit. What followed was a reimagining of community leadership rooted in servant leadership, entrepreneurship, and a relentless belief in the power of people.

Listeners will hear about:

• The journey from big-box retail to rural innovation
• Rebuilding trust and energy in a hometown community
• Why “being a connector” is a leadership superpower
• The bold vision behind the Spark Shop and rural entrepreneurship
• Turning perceived disadvantages into strategic advantages
• Leading through uncertainty—and staying grounded in purpose

With humor, honesty, and a deep sense of mission, Robison shares how returning home became his greatest act of leadership—and how building supportive ecosystems can unlock opportunity for generations to come.

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Transcript

Audra Blasdel: Welcome to Luminate, navigating The Unknown Through Creative Leadership. I'm Audra Blasdel, division Lead for Waypoint Strategies, a division of Schmidt Associates, and I'm filling in today for Sarah Hempstead, principal in charge, and CEO at Schmidt Associates, who's also a longtime advocate for innovative community building.

Audra Blasdel: Today's episode is a special one. I'm really excited to talk with Dan Robison, director of Jackson County Chamber about coming home both literally and figuratively. Dan is the director of the Jackson County Chamber and a powerful voice in rural economic development. After years spent living and working in Florida, he made the decision to return to Jackson County, Indiana to lead the community that raised him.

Audra Blasdel: Today we'll explore Dan's leadership journey, his passion for rural entrepreneurship and the community ecosystem behind a big idea called the Spark Shop. Dan, welcome to the show. We're really glad to have you. 

Dan Robison: Thanks, Audra. It's great to be here today. 

Audra Blasdel: Alright, so let's start with the beginning here. Let's dig in.

Audra Blasdel: Let's do it. Uh, let's do, here we go. Here we go. So in all fairness to everybody listening, we work together quite a bit right now. Yeah, we do. And so if, you know, if our banter gets to be a little much, we apologize to all our listeners. 

Dan Robison: Yeah, we've gotten pretty familiar with each other over the past few months, which is a great thing.

Dan Robison: Great. 

Audra Blasdel: So you born and raised in Jackson County, 

Dan Robison: correct. 

Audra Blasdel: And you decide to make a big jump down to Florida. 

Dan Robison: Yeah. 

Audra Blasdel: What was the big reason for that? 

Dan Robison: Yeah. You know, I born and raised in Seymour there in Jackson County. Went to college, kind of moved around, obviously Kentucky for a little bit in the Evansville, Indiana area for a couple years.

Dan Robison: Had the opportunity to move to the Tampa Bay, Florida area back in 2001, I guess, and spent almost 19 years down the Tampa Bay area. And then in 2020 made the bold move to move from actually Clearwater, Florida back to Seymour, Indiana. I mean, who doesn't do that? Right? 

Audra Blasdel: It's a mind boggling question of the day.

Audra Blasdel: Yeah. And in the middle of a pandemic? Yeah. Or was it just like, just 

Dan Robison: at the start? We actually started at the chamber on March 2nd, and I think like on the 10th was when really things started to come off the rails from a COVID perspective in Southern Indiana. So yeah, my first year in role, I didn't even look at my job description at the Chamber because it was basically like, who can we help?

Dan Robison: Who can we resource? Who can we connect? It wasn't until like halfway through 2021, I was like, I should probably look and see what I'm actually supposed to be doing according to our bylaws of the chamber. But yeah, it was an interesting time to, to move back for sure. 

Audra Blasdel: I think everybody threw a job description out the window during COD and then revisiting, and it was like, oh, that's what this is supposed to be.

Audra Blasdel: But I know that coming back to your community had to also be not only during a pandemic, but then a lot's changed. You're gone for 19 years, probably more by the time you've done college and moved around a little bit and you come back and what was that like to kind of say, oh, this is what I remember as a kid and this is how it's evolved and, or, this is what's different than I expected?

Dan Robison: Yeah, it's, that was a wild ride, honestly. It, and it was. Great in some ways, and it was a struggle in some ways too. It was interesting. There were ways that Seymour hadn't changed at all in all those years, which was fascinating to me that some things in, you know, rural Indiana do become sort of frozen in time, but there were also a lot of things that had changed, and obviously it had changed.

Dan Robison: I lived in a different environment. The environment of Florida when I first got there, was a lot more culturally diverse than the culture that I left in Seymour at that time. Much like a lot of rural Indiana. But then coming back realized that Seymour had become very culturally diverse. But the community was maybe struggling a little bit to understand that, get our arms around it.

Dan Robison: So I did feel kind of uniquely equipped to have a unique perspective around that. But it was very interesting. The things that had stayed the same and the things that had drastically changed was quite an adjustment that first year. So, 

Audra Blasdel: yeah, and learn, trying to figure all that out over Zoom 

Dan Robison: actually.

Dan Robison: Right? Yeah, a hundred percent. 

Audra Blasdel: With that being in the middle of the pandemic. When you came back, obviously Allah was upended, but as you took on that role with the chamber, did you have a clear vision for what you wanted it to be or, or what transpired within the community that really brought you around to this is this is why I wanna do this and this is a vision I wanna set out?

Dan Robison: Yeah, and you kind of said it, the intro statement there too, that my mission in coming back. I worked for Walmart in Florida, was a big box retail manager, and had tried to come back to Indiana a couple times with Walmart. It just hadn't, the timing wasn't right with my kids in school and stuff like that.

Dan Robison: So this provided an opportunity, but my mission to coming back was I wanted to come back and serve the community that had served me well as a young person. Seymour was a great place to grow up as a young person in Jackson County. Just the neighbors that we had in our, on our street there on West fourth Street.

Dan Robison: The teachers that I had that, that cared and invested in me, the people at our church that kind of claim me as their own and just all those great things. So it, for me, it was a mission to come back and serve the community that has served me well. So when I arrived and everything was. Upended basically in the community.

Dan Robison: That just motivated me even more. I'm like, I just believe that I was there for a reason at that time, and it's not a timing that I would've planned, but I just felt for whatever reason, I'm here now for this reason and in this role, and. Just went after it and just went after that vision and mission to, to serve the community.

Dan Robison: It's not that hard. It's really not. When your mission is that simple, you just go out and try to do good stuff and connect people. That's one of my superpowers is being a connector and convener and that's what the community needed then in a lot of ways. So it, it was actually an easy transition to come back.

Audra Blasdel: That's really amazing to hear, and I can personally testament to you not only watching you be a great connector within your community, but you're a great connector for those you work with and you've really, I think, provided a lot of, even your team with a lot of great leadership and mentorship, be getting, there is a journey.

Audra Blasdel: And so if we take a step back before we dive into Sparks Shop, which is your and mind's favorite topic. Before we dive in, what did leadership and that journey into leadership look like for you? 

Dan Robison: Yeah, I don't know. Like a beginning point, I guess. I've always had an interest in leadership, like even in middle school and high school, you know, student council, things like that.

Dan Robison: Taking on those opportunities. I don't know if I ever had a clear understanding of what my motivation was in that, but I see leadership connected to service and I, I have a servant's heart at the core, and then throw in a few leadership ability, and then a few hacks I've figured out along the way and just my, my passion for service has morphed into leadership roles in a lot of ways.

Dan Robison: But being a convener. Is easy for me. 'cause one of the things that I've believed and said for years that if I'm the smartest person in a room, I'm in the wrong room. I love being around people that are smarter than me, that are more focused than me, that are gonna challenge me because I'm good at listening to all of them and synthesizing what they're saying and putting it into action.

Dan Robison: And so, I love being a convener. I love being around. I'm not threatened by people that, you know, have more degrees than me or a higher IQ than me. You know, I could take all that in and put it into an actionable plan, and that's what I love to do. 

Audra Blasdel: Yeah. It's kind of a, it's a superpower in essence to be able to do that and it, and a key quality for being as effective of a chamber leader as you are.

Dan Robison: It's a blessing. I look at it as a gift and I've just, over time, trial and error kind of figured out how to sharpen that. And use it and know when to put it in the holster and leave it there too. You know? It's kind of understanding that, that balance of things, but good. A fun ride. 

Audra Blasdel: A hundred percent. Were there any mentors or pieces of advice that stuck with you?

Dan Robison: Yeah, I mean, obviously all those people I mentioned before growing up that were just, maybe not mentors, but they modeled just being a good human to me being a good neighbor and stuff like that in my professional life. You know, I had lots of people over me as a store manager, I would have market managers and regional managers, and Karen Coop in particular really stood out when I opened the Walmart neighborhood market store in Dunedin, Florida, which is just north of Clearwater as a new store.

Dan Robison: She was my market manager not long after we opened that store. And I know I gave her headaches and she probably has some gray hairs with my name on it during that time. But. I don't know that I realized it so much at the time, but I catch myself even today, and that was 10 years ago, 12, maybe even catching myself thinking about things that, that Karen instilled in me about leadership.

Dan Robison: And one thing is she talked to me about. You gotta be the pilot of the plane. And the anecdote that she would provide is, you know, how cool would it be to be on a commercial airliner? And you're sitting there and you've taken off, you're just kind of chilling and the at attendants bring the beverage cart out and then you see the pilot come outta the cockpit, and then you see the copilot come out and they start serving coffee and pretzels and cookies to everybody.

Dan Robison: You're like, wow, that's great customer service. Like they're, they, you know, they're the pilots, but like they humbled themselves to come out here and serve. Well, then you crashed into a mountain and yes, they were demonstrating servant leadership. You're making me nervous. Weren't 

Audra Blasdel: to tie again, Dan. Yeah, 

Dan Robison: but they weren't doing their number one job and so.

Dan Robison: I catch myself all the time 'cause I am a servant leader. I think that's important that it is good for leaders to roll up their sleeves and do the work of the people they're leading, but not at the expense of me doing what only I can do in whatever role I'm in. Like, I I, like I said with Karen, like it was years ago, she told me that and I, I catch myself, you know, reminding myself of that today, she taught me a lot about the tempo of leadership too.

Dan Robison: Knowing when to go fast, knowing when to slow down, and being able to understand that and lead that in a group so you're able to bring everybody along, not leave anybody behind, you know, just those things. Obviously Karen Coop in a lot of ways, uh. Was a predominant mentor for me in leadership. 

Audra Blasdel: That's amazing.

Audra Blasdel: And I, I'm gonna remember the pilot analogy 'cause I think all of us sometimes who are inherently service oriented want to roll up our sleeves and do the things we're asking the people who work for us and around us Sure. To do. And there's, like you said, there's lessons to be learned, but there comes a point where there's some things that only.

Audra Blasdel: The pilot can do and only you as the leader can do. And I'm gonna remember that. That's a good, that's a good takeaway. So thanks. I got it. Stuck 

Dan Robison: with me for a long time, so it is a good one. 

Audra Blasdel: Okay. I can't hold off any longer. We're gonna talk about Spark Shop. Here we go. Here we go. And I have just thoroughly enjoyed getting to work on Spark Shop.

Audra Blasdel: Not only 'cause it's a really cool project, but because every time we get with a group or we need to work with a set of subcontractors. Or we're throwing hammers at a wall because we're really excited to get started. I get to hear you talk about the vision for this, and I think that in here, I wanna be sure you have an opportunity to convey why Spark Shop is more than a building Yeah.

Audra Blasdel: And kind of what it's about and what the focus of this is going to be. 

Dan Robison: Yeah. The tagline is basically to, to create. A supportive ecosystem for entrepreneurs and innovators in rural Jackson County. To unpack that a little bit is about three years ago, had one of our business leaders, he's a corporate guy, invited me to coffee and anytime you want to have a conversation with me, invite me for coffee.

Dan Robison: I'll be there. You know, I'm drinking a coffee right now. And I was like, okay, I don't know what this is about. We'd never really connected on that level before, but he started to there at Moxie Coffee started to unpack for me, you know, that he had identified a gap in our community, that we have so many people doing so many great things in Jackson County.

Dan Robison: But he felt like there was a gap around entrepreneurship and helping people that, that wanted to start businesses. And he talked specifically about, uh, a program we have called the Maverick Challenge, uh, in Jackson County, which is a high school entrepreneurship program. We have, uh, at all the high schools in Jackson County at one time of another or another have participated in it.

Dan Robison: So it has broad reach throughout the county, and we have so many. Professionals in the county that step up to be mentors and coaches and judges and all these different things. So it really is a great community thing. And some of the students do it for a grade, you know, I mean, let's just be honest, and that's the reality of it.

Dan Robison: But some of the kids, honestly, are inspired by that opportunity to create a business. Idea and you know, and put some legs under it, put a slide deck together and pitch that in front of an audience. And some of them have come up with some really doable business ideas. I've sit there and watch those competitions and be like, they could actually go do this.

Dan Robison: If this is something they wanted to do, they could go do this and this could be their livelihood for the rest of their lives, you know? But what happens is with that program, we select the winners, we hand out the checks, we do a Facebook post, and then it's over. And there's no support system for those students after that.

Dan Robison: And it's not just students. There's other. Entrepreneurs in Jackson County, we're very heavily industry, manufacturing and agriculture. That's the basis of our economy in Jackson County, but those are areas that are just ripe with innovation. Like the innovation that's taken place in agriculture in the last 10 years is mind blowing.

Dan Robison: We're using AI and drones and. All these crazy, like all these high tech things to grow corn and soybeans in Indiana every single day. So there's all kinds of innovation in these spaces. So like, how do we come around these people and inspire them and support them and help them enjoy community together?

Dan Robison: So that's what our Spark Initiative is about. It's creating that ecosystem. And then pretty quickly we, we realized we need a hub. We need a place for all this to happen. And that's where Sparks Shop was mourn. You know, we've, we're taking a. An old tire shop, as you know, emphasis on old, old, you know, oil soaked into the concrete old building.

Dan Robison: And we're gonna create an A, an entrepreneurship and innovation hub there. And our goal, and it's a bold statement, you know, Forbes came out a couple years ago and said that Indiana was the best state in the country to start a new business. And our mission is to make Jackson County the number one place in rural Indiana to start a new business.

Dan Robison: And that's a big, bold statement, but we stand behind it and that's what we're going for. That's the center of the target for us, and Spark Shop is just one part of seeing that vision come to life. 

Audra Blasdel: It's always exciting to hear. You talk about that and to think about how it plays into that larger ecosystem, but also is taking something where we have these high schoolers who do not have the inhibitions of all.

Audra Blasdel: Of life's failures, basically their naivete is probably their greatest power in creating these and then launching them further. And you know, you touched on like rural entrepreneurship and the things that are happening there. Mm-hmm. That might be unexpected. Yeah. And are there other components of that rural entrepreneurship piece that are, that you think is just makes it different or even more powerful as you've begun exploring this more?

Dan Robison: Yeah, I just think in a lot of ways it's just an. Untapped source of innovation out there. You know, Indiana as a whole does a great job of supporting startups and innovators, but we see a lot of that work concentrated in more of the urban centers. You know, here in Indy, the donut counties, Fort Wayne Evansville, you know, which makes sense.

Dan Robison: That's the natural tendency of things, right? That's where things tend to land, which actually helps us. We looked at that as a disadvantage at first, but now we actually see it as a, as an advantage because. We don't have to do a whole lot at the local level. Like I don't have to duplicate all these resources because they do exist in those urban centers around us.

Dan Robison: So a lot of the work that we're doing is just building community with our local people, but then creating what we call on-ramps for them to easily access those resources that are around us in the larger urban centers. So I don't have to create and duplicate. All the same things that you guys are doing up here in Indianapolis that Elevate Ventures and IEDC and all these different great people in this entrepreneurship space are doing.

Dan Robison: We just have to create some on-ramps to make it easier for people in Jackson County to connect to those things. So we've actually looked, you know, we, what we saw as a We hindrance, we're actually like, we, we leverage that, right? That's actually an advantage that we can use. So it's. I think there's just so much potential in rural Indiana, and that's what we're curious about.

Dan Robison: We're fascinated about that, and it's interesting now we talk to the folks in the urban areas and now they're curious about what we're doing because it just, it looks and feels a little different, but it's familiar to 'em as well, so. Right. It's just, it's just a cool, it's just a cool thing to experience.

Audra Blasdel: Yeah. I love hearing you talk about that kind of flip. Let's take the thing that. We think is our disadvantage and let's make it the piece that we leverage the most. How do we take that and use it to our advantage to build these on-ramps? And so far, just to be clear, gonna recap this conversation real quick.

Audra Blasdel: We've talked about planes and we've now talked about on-ramps. So I do think you might have missed a Colleen as a civil engineer. I'd be remiss to not point that out. 

Dan Robison: I doubt that, 

Audra Blasdel: but I also think your. It's just really shining through. You kind of have this mindset that has been developed where it, it is a constant, we're gonna make these things work.

Audra Blasdel: It's a drive, it's a push. And do you think that there are portions of your upbringing within Jackson County, Indiana that play to that mentality? 

Dan Robison: Yeah, probably. I never really paused to think about that, so that's an interesting question. Just thinking about my parents, you know, my mom was a nurse. My dad worked on the oil pan line at Cummins forever.

Dan Robison: Retired from there as an electrician. You know, just their drive commitment, determination, like they modeled that in front of me every single day. You know, I'll never forget my dad got laid off, you know, for a year. Actually, he got laid off on his birthday and called back on his birthday a year later. And just seeing that.

Dan Robison: There was that moment where, yeah, that happened, but dad, dad went out and he did odd jobs and made it work. You know, like, that wasn't the end of our family. We didn't, you know, go in the poor house or anything, you know, we tightened the belt and moved on and I, I, so that, that's an interesting question. I really thought about that, but I would say really my parents probably instilled that in me and modeled that in front of me and like with what we're doing with Sparks.

Dan Robison: We started very early on and we had a launch manager that's also from Jackson County. His name is Joe Rust. Great guy. Yeah. Has a deep history in Jackson County, but we just kind of determined early on, uh, we're well aware that in rural Indiana, like probably most rural areas. There's a way things are.

Dan Robison: There's just a way you do things, and I'm giving air quotes right now. Yes. You know, there's just the way you do things and there's a hierarchy you go through to get things done. We just decided we just weren't gonna do that. We're just opting outta that process. Eh, well, we're just gonna act like we don't know that exists.

Dan Robison: And if anyone wants to stop what we're doing, they can, but they're gonna have to catch us first. And that's not like a, it's not like a snotty No. Like, like we can do whatever. That's not like a flex, but that's just. We're doing good stuff here. We're just gonna go do it. We don't need your fake rubber stamp on what we're doing.

Dan Robison: Like we're gonna validate what we're doing. Like we ask tons of questions. We look over other people's shoulders that are doing things like we're doing, like for the coworking space. I visited 20 coworking spaces in the state of Indiana and went in there and asked them questions until they asked me to leave.

Dan Robison: That's like, we're doing our homework. We're not just out here flippantly, you know, just doing things right. We're not gonna sit here and wait for everyone in the room to agree with every little step that we're taking. So we do respect processes and things like that when we need to, but some of those things are honestly, and I think they get really ingrained in rural communities.

Dan Robison: Like they're not real, right? But yet we kind of bow down to those things and act like they're real sometimes. And we've just chosen just to move forward and just, and just do good things in the community. And I think it served us pretty well so far. 

Audra Blasdel: Oh, I, I would say so. I see it every time we pull a group of people together, how respected you are and how energized they are about what is happening.

Audra Blasdel: Not just with Spark Chop, spark Shop, but the Chamber overall and the momentum. You all have created the intentional ways your. Either cultivating, growing, or whatever word we wanna use, a real ecosystem of businesses down there. Talk about like, this is the convergence of your superpowers here, but. I get your monthly, weekly emails from the chamber and there is so much happening.

Audra Blasdel: Talk about how that has come together and how you're building this ecosystem that is at a support, not only Spark shop, but all of Jackson County. 

Dan Robison: Yeah. Spark is about more than just startups. Like we need established businesses to come in and advise and support and provide services for these startups.

Dan Robison: So really Spark is about the entire business community in Jackson County. But to answer your question, I, I really have an easy job. I mean, I probably shouldn't reveal that, but I have an easy job because my job is not to pick businesses that are gonna win or lose. I just go out and try to help everybody win, and that's a pretty easy job.

Dan Robison: But you know, it's more than just picking up pom bombs and cheering for everybody. We try to find real tangible ways to support businesses, you know, as a chamber. We have members that are literally a sole proprietorship. Then the largest employers in Jackson County are also members of the Chamber. And then everything in between.

Dan Robison: And the example I give on kind of how we look at our work on a monthly and annual basis, our program work that we're gonna do for the year is if Dr. Eric Fish, the CEO of Schneck Medical Center, if he walks into his office one day and just sits there and is like, I wonder what the chamber's gonna do for Schneck today.

Dan Robison: Like that's a problem. That's probably for us at Jackson County. Yeah. He clearly has a team and a board staff that they're all the time just, just calculating vision and steps and how to get there, all that kind of stuff. They look at us as a way to serve the broader community in the work that we do. So a lot of the, a lot of the things we do from a programming standpoint or for small businesses, and it's really easy to learn like what they need.

Dan Robison: You go out and talk to them and you ask them questions and you build relationships with them. And once you kind of see a common thread like, Hey, we're kind of hearing this. Then we go out in our network and we find someone that has resources or has experience or could come in and do a workshop or any of those types of things to just help meet that need.

Dan Robison: So it really comes down to just connecting and serving people. It's really. That simple. I wish it were more elaborate, but it's really just that simple. 

Audra Blasdel: I think you're, you've made it sound simple, but as someone who has to help owners convene and find all the right resources and people to get projects done and to help them forge those paths to make it happen, i, I, I wanna give you due credit that it's not, it's not as easy as you make it sound, but I think what we often find is that when we're passionate about what we're doing, which you referenced earlier, those pieces come together.

Audra Blasdel: A lot easier and it feels less like work and more, yeah, more like fun. 

Dan Robison: Yeah, that's true. 

Audra Blasdel: And to meet you with things that I probably shouldn't admit on a reported courted podcast, if every owner was as researched as you were on the project that they wanna do and had talked as many people as you had about the things that they need, there are a lot of projects that would go a lot smoother.

Audra Blasdel: So. I'm gonna start building the Dan Robison model for how we deliver projects and start sharing that with all of our owners. 

Dan Robison: Well, that just simply started with us not knowing what we were doing. So we had to go out and talk to people that had done it, and it's 

Audra Blasdel: just a bold statement to a admit and figure it out from 

Dan Robison: them.

Dan Robison: Again, not being the smartest person in the room, I'm the guy that'll show up and ask questions, and I wanna know how you did it, and that will help us determine how we're gonna do it. You know, I don't wanna make your mistakes over. I wanna make my own maybe, but you know, if I can avoid making your mistakes again.

Dan Robison: Yeah, I'm gonna do that. 

Audra Blasdel: That's great. So I wanna take a break from the work thing for a minute. You and I talk enough work. Let's talk about balance. 

Audra Blasdel: Okay? 

Audra Blasdel: Yeah. And recharging and kind of the things that as servant leaders can be really easy to ignore. So you've got a big job. You might think it's simple, but it's still a big job.

Audra Blasdel: How do you find balance? What are the things you do to help recharge? 

Dan Robison: Yeah, honestly, going back to my time at Walmart, and obviously they invest a lot. In their store leadership, you know, on helping you develop as a leader. And in the eight years that I was in the store manager role, saw that conversation change a lot.

Dan Robison: It used to be about worked slash life balance and that they were like two columns, but later on it became more about you can't really separate all the time. How do you synthesize that? So for me, work life balance isn't, it's just that it's just synthesizing all the priorities in my life, and that's where it starts, is.

Dan Robison: What gets to be a priority and what doesn't. And the older I get, it's easier to like just let the things shed off. That shouldn't be the priorities for me. And you understand too, there's always things we could be doing, right? There's other boards we can serve on. There's other volunteer op and they're all good things, but at the end of the day, like we get just stretched so thin or of no value to anyone.

Dan Robison: And again, going back to the pilot with the coffee, like I have to serve my first roles first, you know, to my faith, to my family, and then my career at the chamber. Everything else is extra, basically, right? So just, that's how I kind of find it. It's not a scale that's one side or the other. It's more just kinda like, how do, how does this all get blended?

Dan Robison: And that blending help happens on a daily basis, a weekly basis, monthly and an annual basis. It's just kind of finding those times throughout the day to make time for me. And to keep my focus. And sometimes during the week, you know, like I started playing on a Thursday night golf league. You know, I played some golf when I was in Florida.

Dan Robison: I haven't really played for five or six years, but with this project going on, and I'm like, I just, I know Audra's gonna wear me out on this pro. I'm just kidding. Probably. We just got a lot of work to do and there's gonna be like the stress levels is gonna be higher. I need a release. Yeah. And so I've just decided, hey, Thursday nights I'm on the golf course in Brownstown.

Dan Robison: I'm the Hickory Hills Golf course. We've got a group of three guys there that I play with. We play nine holes and I just, I've committed to that. Unless I'm out of town. I'm gonna be there on Thursday night to play golf and no one's gonna stop me because I need that. That's how I synthesize my time now.

Dan Robison: So it's just being aware of yourself, being honest with yourself, not trying. To believe that you're more powerful than you actually are. Take care of yourself physically. Mm-hmm. Is important. I get out unless it's raining, I get out, walk every morning. That's just my alone time. Just start my day. I just do that 'cause that's what's best for me and that's okay.

Dan Robison: Yeah. It's okay to be a little selfish sometimes and carve, carve time out for yourself. So for everybody, I think it's just kind of find that, that balance and how to synthesize those things in life. 

Audra Blasdel: This is a little bit of a vulnerable question. Okay. So 

Dan Robison: unprepared. 

Audra Blasdel: But is there. A moment in life where you just felt like, okay, what I'm doing isn't working.

Audra Blasdel: I've gotta change. 

Audra Blasdel: Yeah. Something. 

Audra Blasdel: Oh, yeah. It came to that balance, I think. I think we've all had that, you know, and just what clicked for you that this is where the change has to come. Oh, this thing isn't working. I mean, we've all had those moments. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. So is there, is, was there a moment where you kind of realized that this is what you need?

Audra Blasdel: Because I think we all try to be everything for at first, right? Mm-hmm. I think it's, that's part of what's in us and. 

Dan Robison: I mean, for those of us who are, those of us who are doers, that's what we try to do. Right? And then sometimes we don't know how to stop doing or how to shift what we're doing to keep those priorities lined out.

Dan Robison: But yeah, leaving retail for me was huge. I went from a Fortune one company to the director of a nonprofit. You know that that was, you talk about a 90 degree turn. But honestly, you know, I had, I expected to retire from Walmart. That was just kind of my career path. Mm-hmm. It's funny when you look back and see how things were unfolding that you didn't even know why they were unfolding.

Dan Robison: But when I opened the store in Dunedin, Florida, like the first week I was there, I met the chamber director, Lynn Wargo and. I, this is kind of sad to admit, but I really didn't even know what a chamber was or what they, I just knew it was like a service organization. I thought maybe it was like Lions Club or Kiwanis or I, I really didn't know.

Audra Blasdel: Right. 

Dan Robison: But Lynn taught me what. The Chamber was, and what Chambers can do in a community, and because I'm a doer as well, got pulled in pretty quickly, of course, to serve on the board, serve, you know, as the chair of the board there in Dunedin, Florida on the chamber board for a year. But honestly just fell in love with what.

Dan Robison: Chambers can do in a community. You know, we're not elected. Like sometimes on Facebook, if I make a decision that someone doesn't like, they talk about not voting for me, next time I'll be like, okay, don't vote for me. That's fine. I'm not even on the ballot, but that's fine, whatever. But we're not government and, and we're not private, but we're like, we're just kind of in the middle there where we can just do good things and bring people along and bring people to the middle of decision making processes.

Dan Robison: And so I just fell in love with that while I was. Continuing my career in retail and then when it just got to the point where I was just like, no, I just, I, this is not gonna be for me. I need a change. And you know, made a big change. And 10 days after that they, they opened the position at the Greater Seymour Chamber and I'm like, here we go.

Dan Robison: You know, this is the opportunity for me to come back, serve the community. That served me well. And so that eight years I served on the board there, I didn't even know that was preparing me for what I'm doing now, but it's just letting things play out sometimes and understanding those types of things in life are more art than science, I think.

Dan Robison: A 

Audra Blasdel: hundred percent. 

Dan Robison: I love the opportunity to go out and get things like just make them happen. But sometimes it's okay to let things come to you in life too. And if you're out there just hustling all the time, you're gonna miss the things that are over here that are coming to you that are good things.

Dan Robison: And so I. Again, balance. Probably a key word here in everything is just, you know, having that tenacious spirit to go get things, but also the humility to just step back and be present and see what's around you in your life now, and enjoy every day. Sees every moment 

Audra Blasdel: a hundred percent. Couldn't possibly agree more.

Audra Blasdel: So we're kind of gonna wrap this up. I'm gonna give you a break. I'm not gonna worry out too bad on this podcast, but there is a question that is always asked to everybody on this podcast, and it's, what are you reading right now? Or what books would you recommend to our listeners? 

Dan Robison: Yeah, there's a lot of great books out there.

Dan Robison: I'm a history guy. I mean, I read leadership books and things like that. I, I'm in scripture every day. I'm in the book of James right now. That's an important way for me to start my day and my faith journey. And James is offering me a lot of just great practical, here's how you live life, you know, in pursuit of Christ type stuff right now.

Dan Robison: But reading for, you know, more fun actually being a history guy, I, I kind of, I. Merge history and leadership together. I love the people. I don't read about battles and things like, no, I wanna know about the people involved. I wanna read about Churchill. I wanna read about William Wilberforce and how he ended the West Indies slave trade, like through Parliament and Britain.

Dan Robison: Like I wanna know about the people and how they led and got things done. But what I'm reading right now is team of rivals. It's about Abraham Lincoln and the fact that when he was elected in 1860. That he. Actually brought on his cabinet, three of the people that had ran against him for that seat. These were people that were staunchly opposed to him being the president, but yet he brought them into the inner ring of his leadership circle, and that came with tons of tension and all these things.

Dan Robison: But he knew, again, how to leverage that tension and that level of disagreement. To make some great leadership decisions and some bold decisions that if he had a bunch of people in the room that were just yes people and sit there and nodded like Bobbleheads at everything, he said, we probably wouldn't have had the strong leadership that he offered that really brought back together a completely severed nation.

Dan Robison: That's just fascinating to me that he would do that. You know, Seward and others were there to be a part of that. I don't know that I would've been bold enough to do that necessarily. And then you translate that into modern times and just how divisive we are politically, that if you don't agree with me, then we have to hate each other and all.

Dan Robison: Like it's just complete nonsense. We all kind of know that. But to see that Lincoln really put that into practice and, you know, brought those people along, he brought him into the conversation into leadership roles to make decisions alongside of him. It's just, it's a fascinating leadership experiment. In my opinion.

Dan Robison: So I love reading about it and that's what's got my attention right now. 

Audra Blasdel: Oh, that's great. That's great. And I think that'll be a new one for our listeners. I've been trying to catch up on all of the podcasts. Mm-hmm. And I, I haven't heard that one mentioned yet, so I think that's gonna be a new one. It was, it's a good one.

Audra Blasdel: It was, I've 

Dan Robison: written in the mid two thousands, I think actually 2005 or six, somewhere in there. So it's a not hot off the press or anything, but it's a fascinating read if you're interested in history and leadership. 

Audra Blasdel: That's great. Great. Well, thank you so much for joining us today. No, thank you. Your story has been a really great reminder that leadership doesn't always mean going somewhere new.

Audra Blasdel: Although for you, it's meant some really big changes. It can also mean that your returning home with a purpose. I have been really honored and Waypoint Strategies has been really honored to work alongside you on Spark Shop and even more honored to call you a partner in community transformation. 

Dan Robison: The pleasure's been all mine.

Audra Blasdel: For our listeners, thank you for tuning in to Luminate Navigating the Unknown through Creative Leadership. If you haven't already, be sure to subscribe and follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn at Waypoint Strategies and at Schmidt Associates. Until next time, keep navigating the unknown with creativity and confidence.