Initiative, Responsibility, and Owning Your Career: Leadership Lessons From A Veteran CEO

What does it really take to build a long, successful leadership career?

In this episode, I’m joined by Barry Moline, who shares the story behind his 29-year career as a CEO and the experiences that shaped his approach to leadership.

Barry didn’t follow a conventional path. He started as a high school teacher, where he developed the foundations of clear communication and patience, before leaving the profession due to structural changes. From there, he moved into energy engineering during the 1980s energy crisis, and later joined the Peace Corps in Guatemala with his wife.

That experience became a defining moment. Building programs from scratch, navigating uncertainty, and learning resilience all played a role in shaping his leadership style and ultimately opened doors to opportunities in Washington, DC and beyond.

Throughout our conversation, one theme comes up again and again, initiative.

From unexpectedly refereeing a major hockey game as a teenager to “raising his hand” for opportunities throughout his career, Barry shares how taking responsibility and stepping forward, even when you don’t feel fully ready, can shape your trajectory in ways you don’t expect.

We talk about:
✅ How “raising your hand” creates visibility and opportunity
✅ The mindset shift from employee to leader
✅ Why persistence and ownership matter more than having a perfect plan
✅ How to run effective brainstorming sessions and encourage honest input
✅ The importance of developing future leaders and thinking beyond yourself
✅ Simple but powerful communication techniques (including better listening)
✅ Why you need to take ownership of your career, not wait for it to happen

This is a practical, experience-led conversation about leadership, responsibility, and the small decisions that shape long-term careers.

To connect with Barry:
Website: barrymoline.com 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barry-moline/

Can you also find episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@EmmaGrahamCareerCoach/videos

Your host, Emma Graham, Career Coach and ex-recruiter, is here to help you with:

 💡 Gain clarity on what’s important to you
 💡 Confidently communicate your value
 💡 Build a personal brand and a strong network
 💡 Take a strategic approach to your next move
 💡 Navigate the job market effectively
 💡 Build career confidence with a repeatable success blueprint

🌐 Explore my coaching programs and free resources:
 Website: https://www.egconsulting.au/
 LinkedIn: https://au.linkedin.com/in/emmajgraham
 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emmagrahamcareercoach/

🎁 Free Resources:
 📄 CV Development Guide: https://www.egconsulting.au/cv-advice
 📄 LinkedIn Profile Optimisation Guide: https://www.egconsulting.au/linkedin-profile-guide

📅 Book Your FREE Career Strategy Discovery Call:
 https://calendly.com/emmagrahamconsulting/discovery-call

Transcript

Initiative, Responsibility, and Owning Your Career: Leadership Lessons From A Veteran CEO - Transcript

Emma: Barry, thank you for joining me. Thanks for making the time.

Barry Moline: Emma. It's great to be with you.

Emma: Tell me a little bit about your career journey, 'cause we're gonna go on to talk about the 29, 30 years that you spent as a, as a CEO and what you learned about leadership [00:01:00] during that time. But I'm really interested in, in the kind of the, the origin bit, if you like. How did you get to that? How did you get to that bit?

Tell me, tell me the story.

Barry Moline: You know, I ended up as a CEO for 29 years, but I didn't start out thinking that I was going to lead a company or lead an industry. I really was the kind of person who just brought people together who was always looking to make whatever situation I was in a little bit better. And, and that was. The way I operated, you know, in every context, wherever I was, I, I just saw a problem.

Hey, how can we work on this together? Let's solve it and then move on to the next thing. And my own, you know, adult life, more or less, I, I started out as a teacher. I was a teacher for two years. And I will say that, [00:02:00] as a result of those. Education as a teacher and that experience teaching in high school, which is quite a challenge as it is.

Emma: I am sure. Yeah.

Barry Moline: Yeah. that I, I lived my entire life as a teacher it, it helped me in many interactions. Be more eager to explain things to people, not mansplain, but be patient with people.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: uses the same language. Not everybody has had the same experience that I've had. So if I'm working with folks and, and I may know a little bit more then. to be more patient with them to,

Emma: Hmm.

Barry Moline: them along as well as listen to them and learn. So I consider myself to be a teacher because I had that solid foundation as a teacher and as I moved along through [00:03:00] my career. It's just, it was part of my DNA, and even when I think about my family. I didn't think about this until after I became a teacher, and I don't know why I never thought about it because it was so obvious that I have two older sisters and they both were teachers. So nobody ever said, you know, Barry and Bonnie and Michelle, you all should be teachers. No one said that. We just chose the profession separately. We all were in the profession at the same time. And, and then. Suddenly, you know, when I got out and, and moved on to graduate school, realized, oh, you know what, we were all teachers, well have degrees.

How about that?

Emma: Something in the DNA there.

Barry Moline: yeah, yeah, it was weird. and, and then I left teaching I, I left because of an administrative. [00:04:00] Issue. That sounds kind of weird, but the, there was negotiations between the teachers union and the school district about salary, and they said, well, we've gotta reduce number of teachers.

And they, they sort of give a, a little head fake on saying, we're gonna fire all the teachers that don't have tenure. And when that happened. You know, it was sort of a negotiation ploy, not mine, but, you know, among the administrators. I decided to go back to graduate school because I didn't wanna be a pawn in this

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: So I went to graduate school and chose a different profession. I went to school in, engineering and, and, and we would call it traditionally mechanical engineering, but a broader perspective, I would call it. Energy engineering or the energy business. So, and there's a lot of ways to think about that.

You can think about oil or you can think about heating or air conditioning in your house. There's different ways, but bottom line is, is I was, you know, interested [00:05:00] in energy and it was at a time when it. The, you know, well this was back quite a while ago in the, in the early 1980s when there were, oil embargoes in the Middle East.

How about that?

Emma: Yeah. Yeah,

Barry Moline: is,

Emma: know.

Barry Moline: and, and prices went up really high, so there was a lot of interest in energy at the time. So I found a graduate program there, and then from that started to work in the field of energy and got experience in a variety of. Of, topics and then from there, you know, up little by little.

and, and then I did one, let's see, after, let's say at age 28. So, you know, I, I had about five years of experience with education and then working in the energy field, my wife and I. to move out of [00:06:00] the United States. We wanted to live in another country. Before we settled down to start a family we, we had three options.

One was go and live in Paris. And that was what a, what a great

Emma: That sounds like a nice option.

Barry Moline: yeah. Number two, which was not overseas, but it seemed kind of,different was to live in, in a very rural area of the United States. It was

Emma: Mm-hmm.

Barry Moline: part of Colorado, so again, not overseas. But a different experience. And then the third one was to join the Peace Corps, which is from the

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: you know, living, you know, out in the countryside in another country. And we had to. examine each of those options simultaneously. So we were looking at, at Paris and Colorado and the Peace Corps. And the Peace Corps came in first, there's kind of a rule in the Peace Corps [00:07:00] that. They're kind of a yes and group. You have to, you know, you, you go along with the flow and if you say no too much, then you're not really a good Peace Corps volunteer because a lot, life gives you a lot of lemons, so you have to make lemonade, and that's part of the Peace Corps. Experience.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: when we got the call from Peace Corps to say, would you like to go to Guatemala and live for two years? it would, if we said, no, that was our only shot, they wouldn't say, oh, well let's, we'll give you a whole menu

Emma: Will give you another option. Yeah.

Barry Moline: Right. So we said yes and, and then lived for two years and three months.

'cause there was three months of training there. And a tremendous experience because we were, after training, we were plopped down in a town with some, some colleagues, not our own colleagues, I mean colleagues from Guatemala. And, and then we were [00:08:00] there to start our own program, our own business from scratch.

So it gave me. both the experience of being a fish out of water, so just picking yourself up by your bootstraps and figuring things out, which is a phenomenal experience. Nobody's spoonfeeding you anything. then two is effectively. You know, starting your own business in another culture, I mean, to say it's a business is not quite accurate because it's, you know, we were, our salaries were covered by the US government, our, our very modest salaries. but even still, we had to sort of create something that didn't exist. And, so, so that was. There was a lot of initiative that we had to, to show, and when I ca but our families, my wife and I, our families hated this choice of ours. Hated it. They thought we were, [00:09:00] were

Emma: They were hoping for Paris.

Barry Moline: Right.

They liked Paris. That's true. Like what happened to Paris? What happened to Paris? Yeah. and they, they made a known to us. We were clearly adults. We were in our late twenties, and there was no control. We weren't accepting any money from them in any way. they just let us know that we were doing the wrong thing. So we, we went, went anyway. Yeah. and when I came back, when, I'm sorry, when we came back, the. The, job that I got that launched me on my career for the next 34 years was, I got an interview with this, with this company in Washington DC and first person I interviewed with was another returned Peace Corps volunteer.

Emma: There [00:10:00] you go.

Barry Moline: So.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: What did we talk about, but our Peace

Emma: Yeah,

Barry Moline: And he said, you know, we gotta recommend this guy. He can do anything. you know, 'cause that's what we talked about. We talked about,

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: you know, how did you figure it out from having

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: how, you know,

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: so we clicked really well and, you know, I met with a few other folks, but it was, it was clear that they needed somebody who had initiative and. you know, when it comes to the world of work, it's, there's, there's only so many majors in a university there's so many different kinds of jobs. It's impossible

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: be completely experienced, you know, be completely dovetail with a job when you're going into a job. So what's more important are your qualities, you know, the, of your personality of, of the things that you are [00:11:00] capable of doing and learning and growing and, and so on.

So that was, that's something that I. Was a touchstone for me. That experience of being hired because of effectively my initiative, was more important than knowing anything about energy. I knew stuff

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: but it wasn't a hundred percent of what they did, so I had to

Emma: Mm-hmm.

Barry Moline: The way they did it.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: to learn about it 'cause I had that experience. And then from there, I worked there for, for five years and then a job opened up as the CEO of an organization that was in Florida and I applied for it and, and got that job. There's another tie in to that. but, and then worked there for 21 years as the CEO and then got recruited to California because they saw me. Doing I did in Florida, doing it well. So, and then finished my career in California or, as the [00:12:00] young people say today, my W2 career, because now it's a gig economy. Right? So

Emma: Yeah. Yeah.

Barry Moline: all kinds of things. Yeah. So that's the, the broad umbrella of, of my

Emma: Very cool.

Barry Moline: big things I learned along the way.

Emma: Yeah, there there's a couple of things that stand out there for me. Firstly, actually, if I got my numbers right from what you said. So you would've been been about 33 when you became A-A-C-E-O, 32, 33,

a little bit later,

Barry Moline: actually 30, I, I was, it was 39 when I became a

Emma: Okay. I've missed a bit.

Barry Moline: yeah.

Emma: Still a very young CEO. 'cause that was the thing that,

Barry Moline: years at, at this company. So, so yeah, 39.

Emma: But even then, quite, quite young have, in terms of how we sort of traditionally think about that role. And I absolutely loved your point there around, that first role, which then became quite pivotal for, for what came next, that it was actually some of your, [00:13:00] I guess, innate talents, your.

Behaviors, the things that you'd learnt in a, in a non kind of traditional work setting that actually got you that job. And I think we, we gloss over that far too often and, and purely just focus on what people have done in their. Careers. And I think particularly for people who are earlier on in their careers, it can be quite challenging because you haven't done that much by that point.

And so you, you do sometimes need other things to talk about or other experiences that, that you can. Spring in.

Barry Moline: Right.

Emma: the other thing that stood out when you were talking about your experience in the, in the Peace Corps, even as just as you were saying it, I was thinking, wow, I can see why someone would, would jump at, at hiring someone who had done that.

Like it's even, you know, today I'd be like, if someone came forward and said, well, we moved to another country and yeah, there was a bit of infrastructure, but do you know what? We just kind of had to figure it out and we had to use our initiative and we had [00:14:00] to problem solve. And in my head I'm thinking like, tick, tick.

Take, these are all of the things that you would want to, to hire in someone. You want someone who can solve problems, who can think for themselves, who can take on challenges and, and be resilient in, in that sense. So yeah. Super, super interesting. I can see how that would be such a, a formative experience.

Barry Moline: Yeah.

Emma: As you, as you sort of reflect back over, over the, over the decades in, in that kind of CEO leadership role, you, you've touched on a couple of things, particularly with the Peace Corps. In terms of things that you think made you good at what you did and, and, and made you a, a good CEO, are there any other things that you sort of look back on hindsight and go?

I think that was one of the key things that, that really perhaps, you know, elevated me through my career or perhaps separated me from, from competitors. What, what were those things?[00:15:00] 

Barry Moline: There, there's a few things. The number one is taking responsibility and I can point to experiences that I had, like moments that I had. I, I raised my hand to say, I'll do that. it led to me getting noticed and a bigger responsibility and, and a better job. And actually the, the CEO job, my first CEO job was tied to But, but going back a little earlier was something I didn't mention in, in my, Curriculum vitae, which I'll tell you about, which is when, when I was, when I was 10, I started playing hockey and, and you know, I was just a, a kid playing hockey, like I'd also play softball and soccer and, [00:16:00] and. Whatever I was, you know, an active kid. but at 16 I went to hockey camp over the summer. Yeah. So it's kind of weird, you know, it's hot out. But, you know, I go to a cold, ice rink and. One of the lessons we had was from a hockey referee who came in to tell us the rules. They're like, oh, who knew there were rules?

I thought it was just, you know, put the

Emma: just skating around and hitting each other.

Barry Moline: and then hitting each other. Right. Fighting with each other. Yeah. That was it. So apparently there's rules and he, he talked to us about certain rules and then he said at the very end, and if any of you wanna get paid. And be skating around on the ice and having even more fun. talk to me when you get back to city and we'll, we can talk about you becoming a hockey referee and I, I. Followed up and became [00:17:00] a, you know, referee at age 16. Actually, I was

Emma: Right.

Barry Moline: a linesman. So when you think about a, a soccer game, or do you call it football? Football

Emma: I'm English, so Yeah, football, always football. Yeah.

Barry Moline: You have, you have the, the referee who's in the middle, and then you have on either side you have the two linesmen that have the flags and call off sides and so on. And that first year I was mostly a linesman. I did some of the, I refereed or officiated some of the little kids games, but I got a lot of good experience over my. rookie year and at the end of that rookie year, I was assigned a big game. It was a, it was a college level game, and I was assigned as a linesman. And when I arrived at the rink for the game in the locker room were two other officials that I knew, and they were also linesmen. They were sort of at my level. [00:18:00] And I said, which one of you is the referee? And they said, oh, not me. Not me. And I said, well, I'll get dressed, but you know, when the referee comes in, you guys can can work the game and. Nobody came. About 15 minutes before the game was gonna start, the official scorekeeper came in and said, Hey guys, which one of you is the referee?

And I looked at the other two guys and they were like, and I said, I am.

Emma: Yeah,

Barry Moline: he said, good, this is a really important game. These two teams are the top two and they're vying for the playoffs, so you've gotta really call this a, a tight game. Watch out for the, for the violence and you know, we want a good, clean game. And I said, I'll take care of it.

Emma: no problem. Yeah.

Barry Moline: I thought to myself, what did I just do? like I said, I had refereed, I had been [00:19:00] the official, main official for little kids games, but nothing like this before. And the other two guys were like, thank you, thank you. We'll support you.

Emma: Yeah,

Barry Moline: So I put on

Emma: from the sidelines. Yeah.

Barry Moline: Yeah. I put on the orange armbands, right. And, and went out there and, and, fortunately, you know, I was wearing a helmet so nobody could see. I was a little 16-year-old, you know, squirt I started the game, you know, with all the confidence I could muster up and about two minutes into the game there was a face off in, in the corner.

That's where one of the linesmen drops the puck He, he dropped the puck, but just before he did another player skated in too early and picked up the puck and started skating out on a breakaway down the ice. And I blew the whistle and I said number eight was in the circle too early, do the face off again. And half the people in the crowd were [00:20:00] delighted that I blew the whistle and the other half were screaming like you crazy. But it was the right call and I, and then I went into the circle and I said, if you do that again, I'll throw you out. And it just like got everybody's attention. I went back to my position and I thought. I hope that went over okay. But again, I just, was just reacting because I had showed that assertiveness the entire game. Nobody gave me any guff or anything,

Emma: the tone. Yeah.

Barry Moline: hardly any penalties. It was, it was really good. after that. People in that officiating world noticed they, they realized the screw up in the scheduling of officials, said, oh, wow, Barry worked that game.

That's pretty good. And then the next season I got bigger and bigger games and I was put in in these more responsible positions. And I felt like I [00:21:00] was being challenged quite a bit. But I had mentors, people who were. Watching me and, and giving me lots of feedback. I did it again the third year. They kept giving me bigger and bigger games.

I was finally doing these college games when I was 18, then when I was 19, they, they nominated me to go to National Hockey League, referee training camp, which I went to. I went to this camp in Ontario and, and I became a professional hockey referee.

Emma: There you go.

Barry Moline: a hockey referee, I didn't go to the pro, I didn't go to the NHL right away.

You go to the minor leagues, right? So the minor leagues are. You know, in smaller towns and a lot of driving and there was no, internet in those days, no cell phone in those days. So I was going to college while I was working two or three games a week and driving around and it was, it was quite a [00:22:00] challenge and I was.

Doing that for a while too. I didn't end up doing about five NHL games, but at one point I had to make up my mind about what I

Emma: Yeah,

Barry Moline: whether I was gonna continue to go to college or continue to try to move up in professional refereeing,

Emma: could have been a completely different career path for you.

Barry Moline: Completely different.

Emma: a fork in the.

Barry Moline: And, and my family, didn't want me to go down the professional referee, career. Not that they didn't think it was a good idea, but they just said that, what are you gonna do at age 40 when, when that's over? And

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: was, there was really no good answer. I, I had no idea what I would do. and they said it, it's, you know, it's still, that's kind of a. A risk to do that.

You'll probably make it to the pros, you know, by age 30. which I, I think I would have, I have colleagues that. That's about when they made it

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: NHL. They worked for, for seven or eight [00:23:00] years and they were doing that,

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: ultimately I chose this other path of, of teaching and then, and working up and I became a CEO anyway, so it worked out okay.

And I, I think that. The level of responsibility that I learned from that experience stayed with me throughout my career. And I, I would turn to another quick story, and that is when I was back from the Peace Corps, we had, I was working at a, at an organization in Washington, DC and we had an all hands staff meeting one day. And that meeting. the, it was just a regular boring staff meeting, lasting about an hour. And at the end of the meeting, the office manager who sat a couple doors down from me said, we wanna start planning for the holiday party. It was, I think, September timeframe and. She, she said, we need volunteers to be on the holiday planning committee, [00:24:00] nobody raised their hand

Emma: Yeah, I was gonna say silence.

Barry Moline: Right. I wasn't that interested in it, but she was a friend, and again, very close to me in proximity. there was this silence for a few seconds. Nobody raised their hand. And I thought, well, I like arsenia, you know? So I raised my hand and I said, yes, I'll do it. And, then after I did that, two other people raised their hand.

So we just formed a little holiday planning committee. We did our job and we planned a holiday event, which was, which turned out great. However, it turned out that the CEO of the company loved the holiday party, loved it, and he came to all of our planning meetings was involved in the games that we were planning.

Just loved every minute of it, just, I don't know why. He just loved it.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: right after the holiday party happened, so it, like I said, it was a success, a successful event. He came into my office one day and I [00:25:00] thought. He just like popped in I thought, uhoh. I mean, literally I thought, oh no, because he would

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: come into anybody's office.

Usually you, you get summoned to his office. And he said, Barry, do you have a minute? And I said, sure. Yeah. Yeah. He sat down and he said, you know, every summer we hold a giant meeting for 2000 people and we hire. Very,famous speakers and they're, they're, you know, national, nationally known speakers. And we pay them lots of money and we get to the q and a portion of the, the, their presentation, it's hard to get our 2000 members the first one to ask a question, but once we get one question going. Then people start stepping up to ask the question and he said, would you come to that meeting ask the first question? [00:26:00] Because it seemed like you're the kind of person that takes initiative. And I don't know how he got that, but it was just one of the things that he picked up on in our little holiday planning meetings. So I said, sure, I would love to do that. And of course, I had other responsibilities at the meeting besides just asking one question. Nevertheless. was the most important thing that I do. Everybody knew that as soon as the speaker was done in q and a, I stood up at the microphone and I was thinking during that speaker's presentation, now what can I ask them about? And they said this, and they said this, and we try to just ask a thoughtful presentation. And, so I did that for five years and the, the 2000 people in the. you know, in the, auditorium would know who I was. Hi, I'm

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: You know,

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: a job opened up in Florida as the CEO, they called me up and they said, you know, we need somebody like you who will [00:27:00] stand up before our legislature and advocate for us.

Can you do that? The reason I got that job was because they saw me doing it. So raising my hand as a hockey referee and raising my hand for the holiday party and then standing up before the, you know, the 2000 people and then well, you know, being in the audience for that. That got me noticed and that was the kind of. Of initiative that they wanted to see. So when I point to those experiences, I can say that, know, I still had to do the work,

Emma: Of course. Yeah.

Barry Moline: Yeah. When I, when I

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: and it got me noticed,

Emma: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And as you said, initiative, I was thinking a hundred percent. But the other thing I was thinking is you are, you know, for five years in a row standing up there in front of 2000 people,

Barry Moline: he had no.

Emma: an amazing level of visibility.

Barry Moline: I'm sure.[00:28:00] 

Emma: And just the reinforcement that it was you every year as well.

I think visibility is something I talk about a lot, but I think it's easy for people to forget what that can look like just in sort of every day settings. Sure. It can look like having a. You know, a an online brand, a personal brand. Sure. That's, that's part of it. But it can also look like being the person who puts their hand up in the meeting and always asks a really thoughtful question.

And does that time and time again, like that's a level of visibility. I was gonna say that you can't buy, but it, it's just reinforcing in people's minds that. Oh, there's Barry again. Oh, he's always, he's always here and he's always the first one, and he always asks such a thoughtful question and I, I think sometimes we can jump to these really grandiose ideas of what visibility can look like, but actually sometimes it's.

These very simple day-to-day [00:29:00] interactions that we're having with the people that we work with, our peers, and, and, and also the people who are, are senior to us as well, that can actually be pivotal. and I think sometimes that can get a bit lost in the, in translation perhaps.

Barry Moline: Yeah, I definitely agree. And, and, and it wasn't about dominating the

Emma: No, no,

Barry Moline: It was

Emma: no. Hmm.

Barry Moline: know, trying to make things happen.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: lesson that I learned. I, I would say sort of in between the raising of the hands, which was, you know, grit and persistence, know, doing what you were talking about, which is. doing the work, if you're gonna raise your

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: then it's, it's one step in front of the other and getting the project done. And something that, I, I maintained a lot. I, when I got that first CEO job, my boss, the head of the organization said to me. [00:30:00] You know, all those ideas that you have, Barry and I would, you know, throw out lots of ideas, brainstorm ideas here, and they said, be careful what you say out loud,

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: now you've got to do them

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: you wanna be more cautious about them. And

Emma: Mm.

much, and it was like, don't be creative. It was just, if you're gonna brainstorm, say, hey, well let's brainstorm and then we'll decide on something and then we'll all agree. Let's go do that and try it out. However, if you just say, Hey, let's run over here and run over here and run over here, that is sort of a recipe for spreading yourself too thin, but make sure that people know we're all brainstorming together, and then we'll choose something, and now let's put our initiative into that topic. So having that persistence, you know, once you've decided is something that, that I think has been, you know, a, When people are ready to give up, know, somebody has [00:31:00] to say, okay, we're, we're doing good here, we're halfway done. We're three quarters of the way done. And and that's part of the job of a manager, part of a job, of a leader to go down that road. a really interesting observation from, sorry to interrupt you. Just a really interesting observation from, from that, gentleman who said, oh, you know, be careful what you, be careful what you say.

Barry Moline: Right.

Emma: it reminded me, actually, I had a sort of a, a picture in my mind of, of someone that I used to work with who was incredibly creative and, and would, you know, throw out these ideas all the time.

And, and I think, 'cause I was used to it, I would just be like, okay, yeah. You know, maybe we could do that. And I, I took it in the spirit in which he said it. But then other people found it really destabilizing 'cause they were like, oh, are we, are we going off over here? I, I thought we were doing this thing and now you're talking about, and they, they actually found it quite overwhelming.

Barry Moline: Yeah,

Emma: so to your earlier point, actually as being a teacher and understanding how different people think and how [00:32:00] different people communicate. That point kind of ties in of you think you're just, you know, oh, these ideas. But unless you've kind of, telegraphed them as I am now brainstorming, these are, these are just ideas.

I'm not saying this is what we are doing. They can easily be, be misinterpreted by, by other people.

Barry Moline: Yeah, and I had to learn to say, Hey, I'm just brainstorming here.

Emma: hmm.

Barry Moline: together on this.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: I have a crazy idea. I want to hear your feedback. What's good, what's bad, and oftentimes. In a brainstorming exercise, crazy idea leads to another idea and another idea, and then you say, oh, wait, but there is a nugget of something we can do here and, and we can do that one easily and, and try it out and see how it works.

It does, it's not going to involve a significant investment, but we can get some experience with it. So maybe we can see and, and that way, People know, at least at the [00:33:00] outset, like you said, it's important to, to let them know that we're just brainstorming right now

Emma: Yeah. Yeah.

Barry Moline: know, let's just, let's work on something together.

Emma: Yeah. And to your point there about, here's my crazy idea, I'd love your feedback. Like what's good about it? What, what's not? I think there's always that danger, particularly when you are the most senior person in the room. If it's your idea, no one wants to criticize it. They're all gonna and go, oh, Barry, that's a great idea.

When it might be the worst thing they've ever heard. But just that, again, just that little half sentence before of. This might be crazy. Would love your feedback. Tell me what's wrong with it. You know, tell me what's right with it. Just gives people that permission to say, actually, I, I, I'm not sure that's, you know, the direction we should be going in, or, I don't think it would work for X, Y, and z reason.

Barry Moline: Yeah, exactly, and, and sometimes. would pitch something and say, let's talk about the pros and the cons, and people would say, well, we could do it this way, or we [00:34:00] could do it that way. And then I would come up with some reason why it's not a great idea, just so people could feel comfortable saying something negative about it.

I would. Pitch the negative, you know, concept first. So people could say, oh yeah, that could go wrong and this also could go wrong, you know, but I just wanted people to feel comfortable because

cause they might not. 

Emma: when you think about the people that, that you worked with that were perhaps in, in either in your leadership team or, or people that you saw within the organizations that you were leaving, that kind of were able to fast track themselves quite, I was gonna say quite quickly, it doesn't necessarily have to be quickly, but what were the things that you observed in, in them?

Were there things. In addition to the things that you've already mentioned that you saw in other people, and you think, oh, that's, that person's doing that thing really well, I, I can see how that's gonna stand them in, in good stead. 

Barry Moline: Yeah, the, I take pride [00:35:00] in my career that I developed, people under me so that they could take over, they could rise in the organization as well as take over my position to the two people that took over as CEOs when I left. both were deputies in the organization and. It wasn't chance that that happened. I saw that they had skills, and I would tell you this, that in both cases, both of those particular cases, that's just the development of the deputy to the CEO. But there's been many others sort of along the way. I went to them and I said, I see you as a senior leader here, and I want. To take you down this road.

Do you wanna do this? And, and they, they thought about it. and you know, wanted to make sure that they. Felt the [00:36:00] responsibility that they, they, it's not just about more money or telling more

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: what to do. the responsibility is immense. I worked in the electric utility industry and we, you know, managed a multi-billion dollar portfolio and it's, it wasn't my money.

It was, you know, the collective organization's money. We made decisions as I wouldn't always say as a group, but we consulted together as a

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: then wherever we needed to, we made decisions, either, you know, two people together or, or in some cases myself, but still

Emma: Still.

Barry Moline: something that they had to decide, do I want that level of responsibility? And, and they, they said yes, and they had already exhibited. the, the level of responsibility that was required, what they needed to do was to be able to make sure that they could bring it out of [00:37:00] others when you are. You know, when you're in a silo and you are working in one particular part of an organization, you sometimes want your silo to win over the other silos. And when you're, when you have a growth mindset, when you have a, when you know we're gonna learn, we're gonna, we're better off. we work together, you have to be able to go to other silos and say, we want you to win too. We all win when, you know, our entire company wins. When our various silos work

Emma: Silence.

Barry Moline: and. That was the true

Emma: That was true

Barry Moline: to, to me, is not only wanting your department to do well, but also

Emma: also.

Barry Moline: out and to wanting other departments to do well. And once somebody exhibited that behavior on their own, it wasn't, they never felt like it was a competition, but they felt like. You know, let me, let me give information to others. Then they were ready for [00:38:00] that C-suite job and, and sort of that, that giving mindset. I don't know. That's what I, that's what I live for. I mean, as a, as somebody who, I wrote a book on teamwork and one of the things that I, that I identified as a key characteristic the ability to reach out to others and want the best in others. And. so if you've got that skill, then that may, and those people did have that skill, then they were ready for a higher level.

Emma: I think there's such an important point and there is a couple of things that that really stood out for me there. That initial part of, so I went to them and I asked them if they wanted to do it. 'cause I think so often there's this kind of almost default that, well, you should want the next job you, you should want the promotion.

You should want to be, you know, you should want to climb as high as you can. You should want to be the, the [00:39:00] CEO.

Barry Moline: Alrighty.

Emma: And that's not necessarily true for everyone. And as you said, there's an enormous amount of responsibility and stress and sleepless nights and you know, all of the things that come along with that.

And that's not for everybody. And that's okay. Like it shouldn't, it shouldn't have to be. so I love that you started that by actually saying, I, I asked them if they wanted to do it rather than just assuming that they should want to and that they would want to. and also it was just really nice to hear you talk about leadership from that.

Perspective of, you know, we are better together, we are stronger together. That that idea, if, if we all win, we will get further in the long run than if we try and individually win. I think so often, maybe I shouldn't say so often, often again, I think that can get lost in translation. and I can imagine.

As a, as a leadership team, if you are able to exhibit that the, the sort [00:40:00] of the, the markers you are setting for culture within the organization, that this is how we do things. That this is what, you know, leadership actually looks like, has an enormous kind of trickle down effect to, to everyone, in the organization.

And I kind of wish that more organizations operated like that. I think we might be better off if they did.

Barry Moline: yeah, I, I agree. And, and so much of what I did early in my career was based more on, equation. There was a, a process that we're following to something or put, put together a computer model or whatever it might be, something physical or, or something related to software. then. As I grew into leadership, what I found was the majority of the things that I did involved dealing with people and not always people that agreed with me and trying to bring them [00:41:00] to my side or, you know, advocate for what we were trying to do. So I didn't know if I would be successful with the, you know, on the people side. And, and nobody ev nobody ever said to me, well, this is a people job. You know, they,

Emma: Yeah. Yeah,

Barry Moline: of said, oh, it's sort of just management and it's just getting stuff done. Like, you know, when you reflect on it, it's all about dealing with people and a

Emma: yeah.

Barry Moline: listening. Is spending the time to, I mean, it's just shutting up and listening to people.

And you know what I, what I

Emma: Want to

Barry Moline: was one of the. One of the key ways to actually myself up to, you know, listen, like we're having a conversation here. I talk. You listen, you talk, I listen. And I haven't

Emma: while I [00:42:00] have it.

Barry Moline: it's, nevertheless, I, I would use this constantly and that is this say to somebody after they've just told me something. Are you saying? And then repeat back to them my interpretation of what they

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: and reason why that's important is because. I'm filtering words in my mind and trying to imagine what it is that they're saying, and I want them to know that I actually understand it. So we have to have this, you know, this sort of meetings of the mind.

The only way to do that is to ask them, is this what you

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: And and that technique you know, got me far.

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: it, it allowed me in many situations with, with many individuals sort of one-on-one connect better with them

Emma: [00:43:00] Mm-hmm.

Barry Moline: I, I think that asking follow up questions and, and seeking understanding, was, was one of the things that people found that I was sort of better at, and as a

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: said, I'd like to work with you, you know, that kind of a thing. And, and I, sort of point them to that. Technique. You know, it's what I

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: described is, is, you know, something that you do really well is, you know, you're listening to, to somebody and saying, and then you're reflecting on that, and then you're saying, you know, that's an interesting point you made. Let's talk about this a little bit further so that you're, you're demonstrating what that leadership quality looks like.

Emma: I think in in the Thank you. Gold star to me, and I think in the context of a work situation as well as you were saying that I was thinking. To your point about it's your perception. You are [00:44:00] filtering the information. Yes, you are, you are demonstrating to the person that you've heard them, but you are also checking that you've understood them correctly, so that where if there is some misunderstanding, if they, if you, if you have misinterpreted or, or they didn't say it clearly or whatever.

You can deal with it then and there. Not in three months time when we're, we're way down the road in a project and you know, we've based the whole thing on some assumption that actually wasn't, actually, wasn't correct. there's a, there's a few benefits rolled up. Exactly. Hang on. Yeah.

Barry Moline: Yeah,

Emma: Exactly.

Barry Moline: Yeah.

Emma: final question, Barry, and it's, it's always the final question here, and that is what do you know now that you wish you knew then?

Barry Moline: that I wish I knew earlier in my career to. Take charge of my career that no one else is gonna be looking out for me that I needed to. It's not so much decide [00:45:00] where I wanted to go or what I wanted to do, to continue to look for opportunities and. Everything evolves. think we wanna be on this track, and then something happens.

Or you see something in that, that, know, you learn a new technique or, or you learn a new area from a course that you take and you say, I'd really like to move into that area. that's okay. okay to do. No one else is gonna do that for you. You have

Emma: Absolutely.

Barry Moline: and, and no one explained that to me, either

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: but if I knew that earlier, I would've been, think, more active in that space.

I always. a growth mindset. I still do have a growth mindset that I don't know everything, and that it's really important to continue to have an open mind to continue learning. So there's no question about that. But alongside that now. What I'm [00:46:00] here in my career, what else could I be doing from this place? Where are my interests? And do I wanna continue in this career or do I wanna follow a particular interest for a little while and try that? So, but, but being, intentional about, about your career is really important. They say. That spend more time planning a vacation than we do our career.

Emma: Yeah, I can believe that.

Barry Moline: I know that we do spend time planning vacations.

We, we think about

Emma: I love to spend time vacations.

Barry Moline: Yeah,

Emma: favorite things to do.

Barry Moline: Right? And, and we get down into all kinds of interesting details. And when we think about, now let's talk about your career, it's like, oh, wow. Hmm. That's a big issue.

Emma: yeah,

Barry Moline: I don't know. Well,

Emma: Absolutely.

Barry Moline: it's okay to do the same kind of brainstorming on your own career [00:47:00] as well, because again, no one else is gonna do it for you.

So it, it's, it's valuable to, to look at the kind of things that you're interested in and take opportunities when they come your way because no one's gonna do it for you.

Emma: No, I totally agree. And, I would go further actually to say, I think it's the single biggest thing you can do that will have the most impact on your career. It's to, to take ownership of it, to, the phrase I often use is, I, I am the captain of my own ship. I am, I am going to be in charge of it. I'm going to advocate for myself.

As you said, no one is gonna do it for you. And I think so often, perhaps like. Slightly un subconsciously, or because as you said, no one ever told me that that's how I should think about it. I think often people sort of default to, well, it's, it, you know, it's the organization's, responsibility to, to tell me what my development path is, or it's my [00:48:00] manager's responsibility.

Barry Moline: And like sure, they're, they're there to help you and support you, but it's not their, not their responsibility, it's yours. Right.

Emma: And I think the, the more people who, understand that, accept that and act accordingly, the, the better off, the better off they'll be actually in, in terms of, of where their careers go.

So I like your answer to that question.

Barry Moline: yeah, I mean, I know what, what I'm about to say is gonna sound like self-serving, or maybe that's not right the right word, but whatever. A little, a little, you know, complimentary of you. Listening to podcasts, listening to my leadership journey

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: finding a, a, you know, a little tidbit of information or knowledge from every guest.

You never know what you're gonna find, and ser serendipity is so important in your life. So just continuing on with that learning mindset, that growth mindset [00:49:00] is going to, you know, let a thousand flowers bloom

Emma: Yeah.

Barry Moline: and then lead you in a place where you know, you, you may find that you're happier than where you are now.

Emma: Yeah. And to your point on serendipity, the other thing I, I think it gives you is I think it enables you to spot opportunity. I, I think people see two people can see the same scenario and one person can see the opportunity and, and the other person can't. And I think those things are really interlinked.

so as you look back and think, oh, that was, you know. Very serendipitous that the guy who interviewed me had also been to the Peace Corps and I, I'm sure there's lots of instances like that through your career. There's, there's lots in mine. If you think about it that way, you see it as an opportunity.

You see that, oh, okay, here's, here's a door opening. I can step through that. There's, there's, you know, X, Y, and Z on the other side. I think it changes the way that [00:50:00] you think about things. It certainly does, does for me. Thank you, Barry. I've really enjoyed chatting to you and to be fair, could have talked to you for hours more.

I, I was conscious of the, of the time and, and not wanting to, to make the episode too long, but there's a lot more that we, that we could have said. So, thank you. I, I really appreciate you taking the time and sharing your experience and, and your insights.

Barry Moline: thank you Emma. It was a great conversation.