Time & Energy
Driven by a deep fascination with how top performers prioritize their time and manage their Emotional Energy, Time & Energy is my endeavor to learn, grow, and share ways in which we all can be at our best when our best is required.
Time & Energy
Ep. 2: Dirt on the Shovel w/ Dave Schultz
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Dave Schultz's remarkable journey from professional golfer to family man and General Manager of Fargo Country Club offers profound insights on finding purpose beyond our initial dreams. Growing up as the son of well-known TV personalities Ed Schultz and Maureen Hintz, Dave's path was shaped by a unique childhood where the game of golf entered his life through his father's negotiated country club membership.
After choosing golf over promising football opportunities, Dave's professional career took him around the world—from New Zealand to Panama to the UK. But despite playing in two PGA Tour events and spending years on what is now the Korn Ferry Tour, he found himself questioning the nomadic lifestyle as he watched friends settle down and start families.
"I had an entire identity in this game of golf, and it wasn't happening," Dave reflects, describing the slow-burning realization that perhaps his future lay elsewhere. Meeting his wife Kelsey, became a turning point, prompting him to find "something more important than myself." This led to a career pivot into hotel management, where he discovered transferable skills and a new passion for improvement and leadership.
Today, Dave has masterfully blended his golf expertise with business acumen as GM and Head Golf Professional at Fargo Country Club, while simultaneously reviving and expanding the beloved "Hole-in-One Show" television program. His leadership philosophy centers on empowering team members with autonomy while providing necessary support—a perspective shaped by his own experiences as both athlete and businessman.
Perhaps most powerfully, Dave's definition of success has evolved to focus on family: "Raising three girls who are confident, happy, and are really good people." This north star guides his decisions, from his sleep schedule to his daily mantra with his daughters: "What are we going to be? Mentally tough. What are we going to have? Positive energy."
Whether you're facing a career transition, questioning your path, or seeking to balance professional ambitions with family priorities, Dave's story offers valuable wisdom about persistence, adaptation, and finding fulfillment by living according to your deepest values.
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Meeting Dave Schultz
Speaker 1Hello and welcome everybody to the Time and Energy podcast, nick Lackaduck here excited to be with you on Wednesday, march 26, 2025. And we are getting ready to have a conversation with David Schultz. David is a longtime friend of mine, roughly 25 years and going. We grew up playing golf together in high school and Dave has quite a story and I'm really interested to learn more about being raised by parents that were very well known in the Fargo-Moorhead area, carving out an incredible name for himself from a golf perspective, and now carving out a heck of a name for himself as a father, as a husband and currently the general manager and head golf professional at Fargo Country Club. I am super excited to welcome Dave Schultz to the Time and Energy podcast.
Speaker 2David, good morning. Good morning, hot coffee.
Speaker 1Hot coffee Hot coffee and you like this Is Starbucks your jam, I mix it up.
Speaker 2I go Muddy Boots and Mapleton Beans on the way to work or Starbucks. Mostly I get out of Mapleton and then the truck just turns left right into Beans. I can't help it.
Speaker 1Now did I hear beans was closing or they they.
Speaker 2They closed a store in West Fargo.
Speaker 1West Fargo.
Speaker 2Yeah, I know we're, we're, we're keeping the one next to the FCC alive.
Speaker 1Somebody has to, somebody has to. Uh well, thanks for being here.
Speaker 2Absolutely Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1This is going to be a lot of fun. Well, that's the idea. That's absolutely the idea. Welcoming David Schultz into the Time and Energy podcast here this morning. Dave and I go back. I had an opportunity to visit with our friend Josh a couple weeks ago and we were visiting about how long some of these friendships have gone. And I think back to you know, I remember playing golf with you in high school, so that's, you know, 25 plus years, which is which was pretty wild to think about.
Speaker 2It is. It is a lot of gratitude that we've made it this far.
Speaker 1Amen, right, yeah, you know your journey is what I'm interested about. You grew up in Fargo, south Fargo. I did, okay, yep, talk a little bit about kind of what that was like. I mean, you know just how you know. I know you played football, you played hockey, you played golf. You know you got into those types of things. What were sort of the things that got you into? You know sports, competition and whatnot.
Speaker 2I would say the biggest thing, that uh thanks for having me on by the way this is great.
Speaker 2The biggest thing was my life really revolved around my parents career. Sure, they had a very unique career in that, uh, they'd go to work at 2 pm. They do the six o'clock news on wdy, they do the 10 o'clock news on wdy that we wouldn't get home till 11 o'clock, and in many nights they may be pulled into peppers and got home even later. So we actually had a live-in nanny when I was a little kid, but they were very. My mom, maureen, and my dad, ed, were very good at what they did. But that really not only shaped the day-to-day structure of our lives, but also the fact that they were just out in front of the town and they were good at what they did and there was a spotlight on them. The town, right, and they were good at what they did, and it was, there was a spotlight on them.
Speaker 2Um, as far as the sports background, uh, the story goes my dad got the job at wday and as he was walking out the door, um, he turned around and said, hey, doesn't the guy before me have a membership to the fcc? And they're like, yeah, he did, he goes. Well, I don't play golf, but I want that. And so it was like off. Uh, a reminder. You know, just he was walking up the derby, turned around and said, yeah, I'd like that part of my comp package, and so that was actually how we were members of the fcc.
Speaker 2It wasn't. I didn't know that it was through, it was through his work and had no interest in golf. But you know, we were living on the fcc or close to it, and, uh, that that really started the love affair with the game of golf. I just kind of walked over there, starting at six, seven years old and and took it from there. But uh, no, I mean there's a lot of different things that you could, you know, can dive into on the background, but I think the the biggest thing, that probably the thing that shaped the most, was really just the career that my parents were in and specifically the um, the human interaction with other folks based on what they did for a living. It was really unique.
Speaker 1Um.
Growing Up with TV Personality Parents
Speaker 2I mean when your mom and dad are talking to each other on the news at night, it's a little different, it's just a little different. And then you know your dad has a lot of opinions and he's he's a loud voice and you know a lot of fun growing up with NDSU men's and women's basketball and football. I mean the the memories as a, as as a kid, were just outstanding. I remember I was a university of Alabama fan because NDSU kept going to the national division two national championship in Florence, alabama.
Speaker 2So I kept going to Florence, alabama and I wanted to go play golf at Alabama when I got to high school, so it was just a good goal. Those things shape, you know, shaped me at an early age, for sure.
Speaker 1Yeah, so a lot of exposure obviously is what I'm hearing you say to sports and kind of the machine that is journalism, as it were, between both your mom and your dad. And so did they meet at WDOI.
Speaker 2I think they met at. Dad was playing football at Moritz State and she interviewed him Funny Funny. Yeah, all right, they're both MSU grads, so and Ed Schultz.
Speaker 1He grew up in Virginia, is that right?
Speaker 2Yeah, he did, he did, and how he got here was Ross Forchy, who was a head football coach at Morehead State, and so that's what got him to this area. He didn't have any money and he was just self-confident and believed in himself. Um and and, as he would tell me later in life, he was his uh, and a lesson to me is and not taking this the wrong way, but just you know, you show up with 10 cents in your pocket, more in minnesota from virginia. You got to have a little bit of this in you, but he was his own biggest fan and you know he, he had a chance. He got a chance before he actually graduated college. Jim Adelson gave him a chance to do some TV sports and he got hooked on it. He got hooked on it.
Speaker 1That's another name I haven't thought of in a really long time is Jim Adelson, and we'll certainly get to some of the connections that exist today from from him. So came to Moorhead from Virginia played football Yep, um quarterback.
Speaker 2Yep Quarterback finished up football and wanted to play in the NFL. Got a couple of looks with like the jets and the Raiders Um. And then ended up spending a little bit of time in the Canadian football league Winnipeg blue bombers and Um. And then ended up spending a little bit of time in the Canadian football league Winnipeg blue bombers, and uh. But then eventually came back to Fargo and uh, you know, got into TV.
Speaker 1Yeah, so what year was this about?
Speaker 2Oh gosh, uh, it's gotta be early eighties. I mean, he finished in 77. So it's gotta be late seventies, early 80s. Okay, what ended up actually kind of a fun story is my mom was the one that was talented.
Speaker 1My mom was the one that was real, real talented, which is no surprising to me, maureen. Yeah, right, right.
Speaker 2So she had an opportunity down in Houston, texas, okay, and you know they were in love right, and I think it was Jim Adelson that gave my dad the the nudge Like if you're going to marry this, you got to go to Houston. So they went down to Houston. My mom was. My mom interviewed president Carter on air force one. My dad was covering, you know, astros, the Oilers at the time. I mean he was in the big city doing sports, he was loving it and he wasn't afraid of that limelight and mom was doing what she does. I mean much more humble mom was, but she was. I mean, when you're on air force one interviewing the president, things are going pretty good.
Speaker 1I would say so.
Speaker 2Uh, but at the end of the day she wanted to raise a family and didn't want to raise a family in Houston. No offense to Houston, but she wanted her. They came back as a package deal and they worked together for many years. Where did she grow up? Family was military, so all over, but Jamestown, north Dakota is where they landed. That's where she graduated high school Yep, yep. So, kind of an interesting background for both my parents, and they chose Fargo to raise a family as we have.
Speaker 1The magnet that sucks you back.
Speaker 2It is, I know you spent some time away from Fargo. I spent 10 years in Fort Worth, texas, which I love. I love it down there and I still do. Yeah, it is a magnet, you see it, even for folks who aren't here that come into town. It's tough to leave. It's a great place to raise a family.
Speaker 1If, if you, if you have any exposure at all to cold weather, you know what I mean it's. It's been tough, I would say, and some, some people that I know that have moved up here that have never either seen snow or never experienced any sort of winter, you know, like Southern California, even, you know, but even like in Texas, dallas, I mean you can get the 30 degree day, you can get the, you know, the sleet or whatever it is. I mean it's not that often, but at least there's an exposure to it. Right, you bring somebody up from San Diego that expects it to be 68 degrees to 73 degrees every day. Yeah, that's a big ask, that first winter.
Speaker 2Right, it is, it is.
Speaker 1But what I love about it is, you know I mean the people that have left, myself included, yourself included in others that I know, that that we know collectively, generally you just realize that the grass isn't necessarily any greener and when it comes to raising a family and, just you know, finding a great place to live, schools and all this stuff that becomes important to you as you get a little bit older, right? Yeah, I can't think of a better spot.
Speaker 2Right, and it's. You can still do business all over the country, all over the world.
Speaker 1Totally.
Speaker 2You can base anywhere especially this day and age airplanes or taxi cabs and get to anywhere you want. You can fly to San Diego and play golf same day if you want. That's the goal. That's the goal, man.
Speaker 1Well, yeah, just quick story on that. I spent a lot of time in Southern California for my work with Discovery Benefits and then now WEX. And again you get down there to San Diego and they're like, oh, fargo man, I can't believe, why would anyone live up there? And it's just like, well, how much time do you have?
Speaker 2Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1Because my commute is 20 minutes and that's driving the entire way. It's not going three exits. You know to go two miles or three miles in an hour. State taxes are significantly better. The weather certainly isn't, but I mean the people. And then the one thing I think that again matters more and more as you get and becomes more and more clear, is that it's home, yeah for sure, and you know when, when you're looking to raise a family and when you're looking to figure it out, what you have to offer the world, I mean to have that bed to lay on of a community that you know that you have support right.
Speaker 2To me that's a great place to start. Yeah, I didn't go to college, uh, in ndsu, but it's kind of the same thing if you're going to college in ndsu, you're, you're, you're home. Yep, so you know, we went out in tcu iowa, you know we, but it is still home when you come back. Uh, you just come home every summer and you know, when I was playing full-time, it just felt like home. It's playing at the FCC, practicing and playing with the FCC, the guys you know, and staying at home. It's a very comfortable place.
Speaker 1No doubt We'll get to some FCC stories in a minute, if that's all right with you. But just kind of working through the timeline a little bit, I got to tell you something.
Speaker 2I have the worst. I don't have a great memory. That's why Kelsey, my wife, she's an elephant. She remembers everything. I'm always looking forward and she always remembers everything that happens in the past and I'm like okay, honey, I, I, I. This is great, you know, it's very helpful.
Speaker 1Well, you just make stuff up, that's fine.
Speaker 2You say with confidence yeah, Everyone, everyone everyone.
Choosing Golf Over Football
Speaker 1No, I'm not looking for specifics, but it's more more like okay. So so mom and dad moved back from Houston, decided they want to start a family, and then Dave comes along in 82.
Speaker 282, got it.
Speaker 1Yeah, 42 now yep 42, unbelievable, so Fargo.
Speaker 2South. Yeah, I finished there, so Lincoln Elementary and then Agassiz Middle School, and football was a huge part of our life. Dad was obviously, it was his background. He was my Little League football coach and just a great, great dad, very involved and supportive, and I mean we'd have perfect spiral contests throwing back and forth, you know, front of the yard and just fond, fond memories. And so the whole point was to start at quarterback in high school and he's like, well, you're not going to start at fargo south as a sophomore.
Speaker 2He's like we should probably think about going to shanley, and so this was all sports related we went to transfer to shanley, went to shanley my eighth grade year saint anthony's at the time eighth grade year, which was the flood 97 um and then I went to shanley my freshman year, played freshman ball and then I did start as a sophomore at shanley, my sophomore year and I I captained.
Speaker 2I captained and was quarterback of the worst Shanley football team in the entire history of their existence. We went oh and nine and it was a rough year. I got beat up and uh, I've I feel terrible. Coach Tom Eldred got let go right after the season like it was a bad situation. We didn didn't win a game and I you know I wear a lot of that but uh, so that was the first. You know, it was quarters back then, I don't know, yeah, and so that was the first quarter of the school year. And so I think on Thursday in the second quarter, I transferred to South.
Speaker 1I was, yes, I knew you had. I knew there was a transfer in there but, I, wasn't sure kind of the reason behind it.
Speaker 2It was the first quarter of sophomore year, and so I played JV hockey sophomore year at Fargo South Coach Dean Wilson. And then golf was a sport. I was already playing varsity as well.
Speaker 2And it went in state high school tournament as an individual sophomore year as well as the team for Fargo South under Coach Kennedy, and then we had a lot of fun with, you know, high school golf, the rest of the way. But that was yeah, that was an internet. I mean it was all football, all football related. I mean we're Catholics but it was all football related and my girls are going to in the JP2 schools now, but it was. There was one reason and it was to start as a sophomore under center.
Speaker 1So your, your old man was ahead of the game as it relates. So, like you think about NIL today, like what did Shanley offer you to come as?
Speaker 2an eighth grader Nothing.
Speaker 1They said, you know, they did say it'd be it'd be an open competition.
Speaker 2That's what they said, which was all I needed to hear.
Speaker 1That's fantastic. I didn't know that part of the story. That's great. So golf obviously became a focal point of your life growing up I mean just from a friendship perspective, competition perspective and you started at Shanley. You had some good success there as a young player when I say young, I mean 7th, 8th, um grade and then and then you played your sophomore year at south and then freshman year at shanley, sophomore year at south, yep, golf got it okay. So, uh, early in your career at shanley, you know guys like andy doden, paul keller, uh, mark sanders, mark sanders, trying to think of who else was on that team.
Speaker 2Chris Schwenden.
Speaker 1Yep, yep, john Deutsch, yeah, yeah, god dang.
Speaker 2We won state as my freshman year, andy's senior year. He shot, I think, 10 under at Grand Forks Country Club and beat everybody by 15. That's right. So, yeah, we won state. The freshman year largely attributed to him and it was a fun time. You know, a fun, uh, fun time. You know, I it was always uh, you know, when you're young or you're new and it's it's, there's low expectations and so it's really, really a fun game to play. It's like early in the year of the golf season, you have no expectations, you're gonna play pretty well, you haven't practiced, you're rusty, but oh boy, that ain't iron actually at the green, you know it's, it's the low expectations and jumping over that is just so enjoyable. Yeah, and that was, that was that's what I remember, both first starting playing high school golf but then also college golf and then also professional golf. So it was kind of that first few years of low expectations. You know, maybe outwardly was, it was fun to go and try and overachieve.
Speaker 1That's such a good point that you bring up. I mean this area, the golf window is obviously very small or smaller than other areas. For sure I maintain and I want to get your thoughts on this, but I mean being a multi-sport athlete. Did you find that helpful as far as your golf career in hindsight went? I mean just having your toes. You know toes in different things.
Speaker 2It left a lot of unanswered questions coming out of high school. Because you didn't, I only played four months with you know. Hockey was four months, football was four months, golf was four months. In fact, I didn't play in the Pine to Palm until I was in college, because two-a-days started August 13th or 15th and so football started before the Pine to Palm. So there was an unanswered question of okay, how, how, where are we at here? How could could we get? So coming out of high school was I'm kind of the same. Football and golf I'm kind of at the same level right now. Uh, football had an offer ndsu and und and und is they had a passing offense at the time and my dad was doing the games on the radio, so that would have been a lot of fun. And then Colorado State was my best offer for college golf, which it's Colorado I mean, it still snows, right, it's not necessarily TCU or UNLV or somewhere south, and that was so at that time. The unanswered question was well, I know, I'm 5'11". I'm probably going to be 5'11".
Speaker 2I'm going to write six foot on the roster, but I'm 5'11 1⁄2" okay, so I'm not going to get taller. So this is D2 football. And Dad said you're going to have the best time of your life for five years. If you decide you'll redshirt, then you'll probably get a chance to start three years, maybe get some playing time freshman year. You have the best, you have the best shape of your life, you have the best time in your life for five years and you'll make relationships that will, uh, bonds that will never, never fade over time. Because you know he had that experience and I said but dad, I I don't know what the ceiling could be with golf, I just don't know. And so, reluctantly, actually he wanted me to play football, but I was like I'm gonna go to Colorado State. So now I'm at Colorado State my freshman year.
Speaker 2I play every event in the fall, actually finished pretty good in the last event in the fall, but it's December 9th, my birthday, and I'm watching UND win the national championship on ESPN and I look out my window in my college dorm at Colorado State and it's snowing. So I didn't go do that. You know, I wouldn't have been on the team at a red shirt, but I would have been part of the team, absolutely. Uh, they're beat, I think, grand Valley state and the national championship. And I'm watching snow fall down and I'm like, well, how am I going to get better? I'm like, what am I doing? Like I kind of felt like I was half one foot in, one foot out, like I got to go all in one way or the other. And so after freshman year I was like, look, I am either going to transfer and go back and play football or I need to get down somewhere South and it was only TCU, because Andy had gone to TCU.
Speaker 1Oh sure.
Speaker 2Yeah, and you know, he's who I practiced with and looked up to, and I just I I got up next to him on the putting green one day at the FCC in June. I said, hey, I got to talk to you. Do you think Coach Monigal would ever have me as a walk-on Golf coach at TCU Yep? Is he still the coach there? No, he was for 40 years, but no, a couple years ago he moved on. So yeah, I don't know what the rules were, but long story short, coach Monigal caught wind that I was interested in transferring and so then I was able to move down to TCU.
Speaker 1Well then, you're off and running. It was great.
Speaker 2I was able to answer that question what's the ceiling here? Because I was able to play 12 months a year. So your point. So, circling back to your point, sorry, I'm long-winded.
Speaker 1No, no, I'm long-winded.
Speaker 2No, no Circling back to your point on the three-sport piece. There were kids that were whipping my rear end in AJGA at 17 years old. They were all in golf. By the time I was a sophomore year at TCU I felt like stock was rising. I was actually practicing 12 months a year and these guys, sophomore year at college, already hated the game. They were sick and tired of the game. They'd they'd finished top five. You can just tell there was no joy. It was like a relief when they played well, because it was all. It was their identity, it was everything they had ever done. So that was. I think it's very, very important to have other at least hobbies coming through high school and growing up than just that game.
The Grind of Professional Golf
Speaker 1Well, one of the questions that's been asked a lot of all the successful individuals that have come out of here from a golf perspective, I mean, you know, I think for all practical purposes we could say it probably started with Andy at that level, right, mcmanamy and McManamy, that's right. He went down to Arizona State, that's right, he was 98.
Speaker 2He won the Junior Am. That was a big one. And he won the Junior Am, which was interesting because he went to win the Junior. Am, we're like well, he's not even the best guy up here, it's Andy Oden.
Speaker 1It's like wow we're deep, yeah, but he played hockey, right. He played a few other sports, yeah. So yeah, then it was you, it was Andy, it was. You know. I know Askew was a heck of a junior player.
Speaker 2Unreal Went to UNLV Unreal junior player.
Speaker 1Josh, obviously Persons went over to Kansas State, then ended up at U of M, you know, so you can go really down the line, and all of you guys were multi-sport athletes. I mean I know you know Andy kind of let go of a few sports as he got a little bit older, but you bring up a great point because you know there's the, there's the passion, there's the expectation. You know, and, and how does a person, especially at that age between you know, let's say 16 and 22, sounds like you had a pretty defined way to look at what was possible for golf. Are you able to recall at all just kind of your thought process on making that decision around focusing on golf, and how you knew that the ceiling was higher perhaps for golf than than anything else besides your height?
Speaker 2Yeah, so I put my energy towards being on the PGA tour. I wanted to play on the PGA tour and my point was look, I can't play on the PGA Tour if I go play college football. Now, I don't know if I'm going to make the PGA Tour and at the end of the day I had a cup of coffee there. I played in two PGA Tour events, but I know that I wasn't going to make it if I made that decision at 18 years old On the going to make it. If I made that decision at 18 years old, right, you know, on the phone with Casey Bradley at North Dakota state and Bubba Schweiger at at, uh, und, like, those were the two guys I was communicating with, um, but I, you know, pro golf was off the table. If I made that decision, yeah, um, so it's. It was an unanswered question and just, uh, you know, the desire to play a sport for a living was the whole North star of that decision at that time.
Speaker 1Any regrets?
Speaker 2No, no, no, not at all, actually it's. It's led to so many things. I've been able to travel the world playing golf, right, and maybe in that moment you don't realize, oh, this is kind of cool, I'm going on Auckland, new Zealand, and Christ church to Queenstown to play a golf tournament. Then, oh, after this week we're going up to Melbourne. I mean, I did that twice. I'm playing on the nationwide tour. It's pretty cool, playing Columbia, panama, obviously in the UK, and then just a ton of bouncing around the states, so seeing places that you know I wouldn't have seen if I played college football. So, no, no regrets at all.
Speaker 1Were you able to appreciate it at the time?
Speaker 2Yeah, I did the travel, what you were experiencing just from a life perspective, while on the grind trying to make birdies Initially, yes, you know, when I had status, when I was 25, 26, 27, eight, nine and 10, 2008, 9, and 10, I had status on the Corn Fairy Tour and the first couple of years very, very aware of how great this is, you know you get a chance. Mid-20s, you got a piece of a card. There's nothing between you and your dreams other than playing a little bit of good golf. You know there's no politics. It is you go, you get that ball in the hole. You are the one deciding your future, which was really really fantastic when I got to start playing. That's so great. I was 27, my third year on the Nationwide Tour, and I started to not as much not to your question, not as much appreciate it. I started to think about the things that I wasn't getting to experience.
Speaker 1For example.
Speaker 2Well, I had friends who were married right Friends married maybe in an apartment or buying their first home, or you know I'll hey, my wife's pregnant and it's just like I'm in the same small town, Laquita and Dothan, alabama, or you know it's. There were times where it's like, wow, this is super lonely. This is great that I'm my own boss and that I can dictate the success of this career. But I fell in, I fell out of love with the lifestyle. I really did, and I think that you've got to love the lifestyle. You've got to love being on the road. You've got to almost in a way, feel a little bit more uncomfortable at home than on the road, and I think the best players, first of all the best players, are traveling different and it's not the same deal, but you've got to feel like home on the road.
Speaker 1But the majority of those players, that's such good perspective. I mean the majority of those players, though, that you referenced, that are flying private and stuff like that maybe majority isn't the right word. Some of those worked their butts off to get there. Oh yeah, some of them grew up in that environment, which, hey, nobody needs to apologize for, that, right?
Speaker 1I think that's one thing that, um, I find very interesting is that some people that were are born with advantages have to work through that, that mental, perhaps perhaps you know that idea that maybe I, you know, don't deserve some of these advantages or need to apologize for some of these advantages because, you know, I'm maybe not having to. It's almost like a survivor's remorse in a way, in a weird way, right, but I've never felt like that's something that's going to hold somebody back if they can allow themselves to get through that, right. So the folks that were born into that type of lifestyle, right, I mean, there's obviously certain advantages of that, but I wonder if those individuals are able to enjoy the fruits of that labor as much as some that you hear the stories of. You know, just, you know, lee Trevino always comes to mind. It's like, you know, you don't know what pressure is or stress is, unless you're, you know, playing for 20 bucks and you got $7 in your pocket right.
Speaker 1You know like and so how did you, you know, and it's not that you weren't not successful in your golf career at Fargo, I mean you won the state golf tournament when you were a sophomore in high school. You know you had you know success. I know you had some success on the you know AGA tour. But from my perspective and if I look back, I mean you and you touched on it on it, I mean your career really didn't, or your your. Your golf career didn't really start taking off, probably till you got to tcu playing more often right and then and then off and running.
Speaker 2um, yeah, I think, uh, I think a huge thing that 42, looking back on it is adversity, and so maybe what you're, what you're alluding to is there are folks who grew up in a certain situation where there's not a whole heck of a lot of adversity to overcome. Right, I think adversity is my gosh. Is that beneficial? You know what I've, what I've learned now and I tell myself every day, is you know, you don't have to be the most talented, but you need to be persistent. You need to be very, very persistent.
Speaker 2A lot of grit and you know when do you, when do you build that scar tissue of persistence and grit? Well, you do it when you have adversity. You know I'm trying to grow this hole in one show down in Arizona and whenever you know that I get, I gonna get better. You know I've been getting no's on some certain certain things but, and I've had a couple trips down there where I'm flying home and I'm just, you know, looking out the window thinking nothing, nothing, nothing came with this trip, but I don't care. Well, you know like, but I don't have that perspective unless I spend four years getting my teeth kicked in and in a bad place playing pro golf and not giving it up, maybe earlier. So I didn't live through that deep personal emotional adversity until you're in your late 20s and you realize my entire identity is this game of golf and it is not happening.
Speaker 1So was there a definitive moment where that sort of slapped you across the face, or was it kind of a slow realization? Or talk me through that.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's just a slow burn. It's a slow burn, I mean, because you'll have, you know, have good practice sessions, You'll have tough practice sessions, You'll shoot 67. You'll shoot 77. The thing in the back of my mind was, though and I'll come back to this is the lifestyle was something that I truly had fallen out of love with. Two things, two diverting things. I love the fact that you could control your own destiny, but I wasn't really thrilled. Well, if I control my own destiny and check this box and make it work, am I going to, am I going to even be happy? Oh, you know so that it's tough to pull the trigger on a driver when you're kind of second guessing it Like I would miss a company.
Speaker 2Why am I here? Yeah, yeah, Instead of the guys who I played with and traveled around with, they're still. They're still banging away Like I play college golf a Kisner, Brendan Todd, Brendan steel Like these guys are still playing. They were, they were persistent, right, they live on the road. It's just that's what they knew.
Falling Out of Love with the Lifestyle
Speaker 1That's what it was going to be and I knew that going in is just you don't know it till you live it for a few years. How would you right? How would you right and I I think what? Yeah, there's a lot of different um tangents we could go off on that, on that idea. What I'm interested in learning from you today specifically is in that moment when you kind of had that fork in the road right Of enjoying being your own boss, enjoying being, you know, truly eat what you kill, type mentality, right, but sounds like you know there's a few of those other ancillary things about life that was sort of creeping in around you mentioned. You know those other ancillary things about life that was sort of creeping in around you mentioned you know, friends having babies and getting married, I guess, maybe in opposite order getting married, having babies not always, I suppose, but you know and I remember, you know our friend Josh person saying he's like I got to 31.
Speaker 1He's like I didn't have an address.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's, true Right.
Speaker 1It's like I literally didn't have an address. I mean, if I needed to send mail somewhere, I was, you know. Send it to mom's house in fargo and I'll pick it up when I get there, whenever that's going to be, you know. So, yeah, um, but hindsight, you know the benefit we all have at our ages I'm, you know, 45, you're 42 you have that benefit of hindsight to look back and be like, well, what if right? I mean what, what if I didn't do this? What if I took the other routes and never knew how good at this game I was going to get? Yeah, I mean, it's, it's tough to know. So, from your perspective, I mean, as, as those thoughts of you know, am I going to be happy, you know, sort of start entering your, your purview a little bit. How did you, if you can recall, how did you process that and how did you come to terms with that?
Speaker 2Maybe this was a short lived future as a professional golfer.
Speaker 2I kept doing it. Yeah, you know, even though I knew that, you know, if you succeed, I, I always, I always kept playing because I'm like, well, yeah, if I'm traveling every week and self-sufficient, I'm at least on the nationwide tour or I'm at least progressing towards, you know, being on the pga tour, which was still a dream, and I'm like, well, if I'm up there, I can live, live with the lifestyle and figure it out. But there was also I just wasn't, I wasn't all in right. There's a little bit of voice in the back of your head. That's a little bit of self-doubt, right, uh, and it, at the end of day, it just produced results that weren't good enough. So, if the results aren't good enough, at some point you got to pull the plug and I did meet Kelsey and my wife in 2013 and started thinking about something more than just myself and, you know, started thinking about something more than just myself, and we met in the middle of the summer of 2013.
Speaker 2I think I missed first getting out of first stage, by one shot, I think, in that fall, and so I came home at the end of that year, you know, looking for something to do, and ended up an opportunity with Kyle Newman at the element hotel in West Fargo and, and he gave me an opportunity that, um, you know only could have been through golf, right, I knew his family through golf and, and you know, he, he, he bet on me that well, if you're a professional athlete, you're doing this full time. You're probably going to be all in on whatever your next thing is, and so sure was, and and that's where to answer your question that's, that was the turning point, was something more important than myself, and that was this new relationship with this. You know the woman who I'm going to marry, and we ended up getting married at the end of 2014. So that was, that was the off ramp. Yeah, yeah, and so that was the off-ramp.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, again, in hindsight, would you have done anything different there and we'll get to the element thing here in a second but did you feel like he had enough closure? And I might know the answer to this because he ended up giving it a bit of another shot a little bit later down the road, because you ended up giving it a bit of another shot a little bit later down the road. But any regrets in the moment for pulling the plug when you did.
Speaker 2No, no, in fact, I don't know if this is probably a little-known fact. This is helping me just remember all of these things at different points. Like I said, I'm always just trying to look forward. But looking back in in the year of 2014, I was all in helping develop the element hotel in West Fargo and I don't think I touched my clubs, so you go from everything you know so I was.
Speaker 2I mean, they're all in, I'm all out. And I found something that I could be all in on. You know so I was. I mean, they're all in, I'm all out. And I found something that I could be all in on you know, okay, I don't have to travel to do this.
Speaker 2I'm living down the street. In fact, my wife was. We lived on the fourth floor apartment and I could see the hotel from my. She's like this is your little two club, mike. Well, I just want to be able to see it. It makes no sense, but I was. Yet it makes no sense, but I was, I was so all in, I didn't even. I think I think the put the clubs in the closet and didn't touch them for a year, at least a year, almost been more than a year, if I'm not playing in the wind, you know. Yeah, a year and a half. Yeah, it's. Uh, it was truly a let go, um which I needed to do?
Speaker 2yeah, because I had about. It was about an 18 month master's class that I had to go through. I had to catch up. I mean, I'm in my early 30s and all I've known is traveling and playing golf. That was my job. That was my job through high school. It paid for my college. I graduated college with no debt because of golf, so it wasn't like there wasn't fruits from the effort of golf. And then I was able to be self-sufficient.
Speaker 1I would say, for you know, probably five of those eight years playing full time which is for those listening that maybe not aren't as familiar with the light golf lifestyle. I mean, that's, that's pretty damn good.
Speaker 2Not bad. I mean, it's not a good business model. You know you pay to, you pay to work. So yeah, self-sufficient for more than half of those years I would say I don't know where I was going with that. I lost my train.
Speaker 1No, what I was going to ask you, which might loop back, is so you made that decision in 2013. You joined Kyle and the Element Hotel in 2013, 2014,. Around the time you met Kelsey. So obviously a lot of big changes, moving from being on the road totally self-sufficient, very I'll use the term selfish in a healthy way because I think, at least in my experience very tangential to the professional golf lifestyle. But I mean, there's an element of that that's required to be somewhat selfish, if not completely selfish, and how that manifests obviously can be different for others. But so now, jumping into that master's class that you were talking about, what transferable skills were you able to draw from as a professional golfer and just kind of how that process worked, to your now new role, helping build up the Almond Hotel in West Fargo.
Speaker 2I would say at the beginning of something so how fast can I learn this? Low expectations. Oh wait, I'm going to be in this construction meeting, yeah, and participate, not just be an owner's rep and listening. No, we actually. The ffne is being delivered this day. This is who we're having unboxing. This is this is the. I mean really being in part of the entire development and becoming a trusted, needed, reliable source on the development of that hotel quicker than maybe expected, and so I'm okay with being. I was motivated by that opportunity to provide value and learn, and so I would say that's how a court like, just, it's like the short game. You're sitting on the Intel dark, you can't see the ball anymore and you're still hitting those wedges.
Speaker 1What, what do you think instilled that motivation, competition? I mean, we could probably inject a few different words here that I'll sort of mean the same thing around. You know, drive, desire, tenacity, where'd?
Speaker 2that come from Just a competitive, competitive background for sure, always, always a game. There's always a game to play, to win or to lose. And what I liked about the business world as opposed to golf is you're not owning anything. You're not owed anything anywhere. Okay, but you're really not owed anything. In golf that you could practice, you have the greatest practice sessions for three weeks and go miss a cut by five. You're not owed anything.
Speaker 2But if I'm going to learn something on this development project at the element, well, I'm that I'll have that knowledge. Yeah, I'll have that knowledge. Yeah, I'll have that knowledge. We'll have these, this scar tissue from the good and the bad of this project, and we'll move on and be better. And so it's. I felt like one thing that's tough about pro golf is you, I didn't feel the compounding aspect of the improvement. Uh, and when that was really tough in the late 20s, when I don't feel like I'm getting better, I'm still at the same mini tour event. I'm paying 1100 to try and win 1200. You know, it's just. It felt it, it didn't feel like I was.
Speaker 1You wonder why anyone would do that ever.
Speaker 2Yeah well, it's, it's a lot of fun early on when you're playing well. When you're playing well and you're making money playing golf and like you're, you feel like you're compounding right, you're getting better.
Speaker 1Oh my gosh did you have mile markers in place? Did you said you set like pre-season goals or expectations or anything like that?
Speaker 2yeah, my third year on the nationwide tour. I've worked my coach down in fort worth, mike right, do you remember what they were? Yeah, I go because I had almost won a couple times in 19, or in 2009.
Speaker 2And I asked him what are you thinking? Because I think you should probably have a couple wins this year. I'm like, dang, okay, and it didn't go that way. But there was there, you go, there was that expectation and it felt I'm not putting that on him, it's just it was already there. I'm like, yeah, of course I should. I had three chances at it this year. You know I'm going to be more comfortable near the lead, you know, so you go into the season waiting to get into contention.
Speaker 1Well, for some people, you know that conversation with, was it Mike? Did you say Mike Wright?
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Okay, and he was like a swing coach kind of just a mentor.
Transition to Business and Hotel Management
Speaker 2He's the guy at Shady Oaks in Fort Worth.
Speaker 1Oh, right on, Okay. So at the moment, if you can recall and I know it's been a minute, but did you feel like he was giving you permission to win in a weird way, or like an expectation to win? Because sometimes that fear of success is a very real thing and I I believe to be true, it's sometimes more subconscious than it is conscious idea being, if I give it my all and I give it everything I've got and I still don't win, or I still don't succeed, perhaps the the negative feelings and thoughts that exist from that quote unquote, failure would be larger than maybe any sort of success or victory that could exist. So sometimes you know, and I think there's different ways to look at that in all different walks of life, but when I look at what Mike said to you, it was like hey, go win.
Speaker 1Was there any part of you that's like yeah, yeah, hell, yeah, I'm going to go win, or was it more like oh, okay, got it, I guess I should go win now.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Do you recall at all?
Speaker 2Yeah, I, I just remember the validation cause we had worked together for a couple of years and you know I really respected his opinion, and for him to say that it was, I was motivated by it, um, but I do think there's something. There's definitely that's, that's a, that's a deep thought and there's something to that. For sure, um, it's a fear of if you don't you know that's your expectation, if you don't. I had mentioned earlier, you know, maybe, low expectations and going exceeding those was so much. There was joy in that right, there was joy in that verse. Okay, here's the expectation. Oh, now, now, I'm one of those kids who grew up in the south and I'm a sophomore in college and that one time in three months that I hit that expectation, it's not there's no, it's not joy, it's relief, you know.
Speaker 1So, yeah, there's got to be, got to be something to that I think of guys like well, david devolves the one that always comes to my mind right where he was a massively decorated junior I mean massively decorated you know, college golfer at georgia tech. It was georgia tech, right? I think that sound right. Yeah, you know, arguably came up at the wrong time. You know competing against Tiger Woods forever, you know, and you know Phil Mickelson and all and all and all those others.
Speaker 1But you know, when he finally got to number one in the world, I mean it was really short lived. I mean in in in some of his quotes. After the fact, it was just like man, I put in all this work to get to the top of the mountain and didn't have that joy that I thought I was going to have. From a mindset perspective, it was a huge letdown. And now, all of a sudden, you know you've made it to the top of your game and it's not what you thought it was going to be. He was relatively unheard of. After that, yeah, I mean, for all purposes, within two or three years he was done.
Speaker 2That's why it's so hard to be number one forever.
Speaker 1Why is that.
Speaker 2Just to continue that improvement. I love the day-to-day improvement, whether it's at the FCC or trying to drill the hole in one show. If you're there, you're number one, so it takes a special person to be that person, to have that motivation.
Speaker 1I'm glad you said that.
Speaker 2I think improvement is just the zest of life.
Speaker 1How do you know where to improve, though, like granularly? You're number one, you're everyone's chasing you. Now, how do you, how do you or or how would you suggest individuals process that to be able to say, okay, well now. Now the whiteboard material, the bullet, bulletin board material, is a little different.
Speaker 2Yeah, it is, it's, it's consistent. Yeah, consistency.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2You know how consistent can you be. You're there, You're close to. Especially in the game of golf, there's always more potential. That is the beauty about the game. Maintaining that consistency becomes your new challenge. You've seen a lot of I mean golf. There's a steep cliff for a lot of players. I had it for a while. I had the driver yips for a long time where it was literally a stop at impact. The brain was getting in the way. I mean it was the fear of what could happen and then I'd go three rounds without missing one block one to the right, then I block one to the right and I'm just devastated and my right oblique hurts.
Speaker 1How much of that was mental.
Speaker 2All of it, all of it, every bit of it.
Speaker 1And do you suppose now let's unpack this a little bit Was this in the middle? Well, maybe let's go back even further. When were you, when were you at your best playing golf? What years.
Speaker 2Uh, 2000, and so sophomore year, college and essentially sophomore year second year on the nationwide tour. It was always sophomore year, got it, and then sophomore year in high school as well. Yeah, it was always sophomore year.
Speaker 1Got it, and then sophomore year in high school as well. That's when you went to state.
Speaker 2Yeah it was always sophomore year.
Speaker 1Interesting.
Speaker 2Yeah, I kind of got a taste of it. Okay, now we know what to expect. Let's see if we can beat YOY. Let's beat last year and you've at least proven a little bit year one. Now let's go jump over, jump over.
Speaker 1So I and you know, you kind of know what the routine is, you kind of know the like. You say you had a cup of coffee and of course, your sophomore year would have been your first year at TCU. Right, that's correct, yeah, yeah yeah, so you rolled in there and just started.
Speaker 2Won the first tournament. Yeah, yeah, so I've tied with uh, bill haas, actually. Oh yeah, um, first, first turn. We have 15 guys on the tca team and went in there and the great thing about coach monagel is he's like hey, score lowest five scores are gonna go. I don't pick anybody, I'm like I love this place, just go compete, tee the ball up and go. We had adam rubinson who was a walker cupper on the team and he was a stud.
Speaker 2so he actually was was one and I was. I was two through qualifying, and so the only thing coach Monaco said is hey, low five scores will go, but I'm going to give you so many rounds of golf the cream's going to rise to the top, and so that that's kind of. It was fun to have that opportunity at a top 10 school.
Speaker 1Yeah. Um, but again sophomore year, for some reason.
Speaker 2Yeah, okay, so you're you're, and so that's what. 2000, 2004? Three or four, okay, three got it 2003, um.
Speaker 1And then your sophomore year on the nationwide, or now, what's now?
Speaker 2corn fairy, um was what year uh?
Speaker 22009, 2009 yeah 2008, I finished 85th on the money list so that gave me conditional status the next year and so I was like a horse waiting for the gates to come out because I didn't get into tournaments early and uh I I scratched my way status wise, scratched my way into some tournaments mid-year and then, once I got my shot second, you know I was ready to go and I had to catch up but it had a had a nice back half of the second year. Yeah, and you know, had a chance it. You know, one round there's always every pro golfer has a story, but there's, it was one round away from from making the dream come true. Like Monday, qualifying to two PGA tour events is not the dream coming true, you know, having a tour card, it was at the time, at the time the dream coming true and you know you're every, every pro golfer if you get close.
Speaker 1There's a story so well, I want to hear that story in a little bit more detail.
Speaker 1I also want to just stay on this a little bit. Just around that, that competitive edge of the competitive fire you talked about, how do you sort of climb that mountain right? When I think of people that are massively successful, whether it's in business or golf or whatever it might be, you'll hear a lot of those individuals talk about the process and getting getting lost in the process and that victory is almost a, uh, just a product of the process playing out. And you know guys like tom brady and others that have that have talked a lot about this have said that that really helps mitigate the risk of having that david devol type syndrome where, if you're just focused on the process and very objective steps to get from point a to point b understanding it's not a straight line, but you have your north star out there. It's whether it's pj2 or card or whatever it might be comes down to really, you know three things. Number one, identifying what it is that that you want to be right where you want to go what that north star is.
Speaker 1Yes, you know what's the first step to be right when you want to go, what that North Star is. You know what's the first step to get there right. What is the first thing? And then it's in my humble opinion, it's accountability, it's feedback, it's somebody or something that is holding you accountable to that. Some people it's their faith, some people it's their wife, some people it's a buddy or a caddy or a coach, right? So when you look back on that period of time and you're ascending, let's just start at your sophomore year, your first year at TCU. If you look back on that, I mean, what were the behaviors that you were exhibiting that got you to that point of massive success that first year, if you can recall you to that point of massive success.
Speaker 2That first year, if you can recall uh, just extremely dedicated, yeah, extremely dedicated had a chance to do something great and didn't want to, didn't want to, didn't want to miss that opportunity. Um, probably one of the biggest things is my sophomore year at TCU was I was living with this guy who was a fifth year senior, no longer on the golf team. I was living with Andy Dota.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, so I roomed with Andy for that year and, um, and he's a wonderful guy Right, and he had, uh, really started on a new path right around that time, and so I saw a great example every single day. Now I'm a sophomore in college. I'm not like a perfect person, but I'm saying that I had a great role model and that was definitely part of it. And also just really wanting to compete and be, I wanted to play for TCU.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2You know I wanted to say that. You know I wanted to be a TCU Horned Frog and represent the, represent the school travel around the country playing, and so it was just a lot of practice and just a lot of dedication. In that Persistence I would say yeah.
Speaker 1Well, and that sort of feedback loop from Andy to be able to, you know, come back to the apartment and just kind of, I would imagine, run things by him or like, talk to me about this, talk to me about that. You know his experience as a former you know player and a member of the team.
Speaker 2I mean what a luxury that is. We've written chip shots into the couch over and over. Try bounce a chip shot on the back of the couch, have a bounce up in the air and land in the garbage. Can I? I for hours?
Speaker 1I mean hope you didn't have any downstairs, neighbors no, but we were on the first floor.
Speaker 2For sure, we were on the first floor.
Family as North Star
Speaker 1That's funny well, good man, so let's fast forward. Now we're married, right? We're rocking and rolling at the Element Hotel, if you had to boil that experience down you know into two or three things. I mean, what was it and what did you learn?
Speaker 2I came out of the, just the nuts and bolts of w2 um, hiring people, you know, a pro forma, planning things, organizing things. What I learned there? No offense to anybody, but I just learned that the motor was high and it's going to serve you well If you're willing to work, if anybody's willing to work and be proactive, they're going to be successful, no matter what you decide to do. So I came out of that process with confidence in okay, yeah, I'm not a golfer, but we'll be all right, we're going to figure it out. And ultimately, the passion for the game was still there and opportunity came up at Maple river, which was GM and head pro and I was. You know it. It was. It was a passion project. Like I, I want to get back to golf and now I'm kind of marrying these two things right. I've had decades of golf and I've had 18 months of this experience. Let's see what we can do with these two experiences together. I love the place. I was already playing there. It's where I had met my wife.
Speaker 2So there's a full circle piece. All my buddies from high school were members there at one time, and so that's where that was. It was like a perfect timing of 2016 to start at Maple River February 1st of 2016. And then we opened the golf course March 11th, so it wasn't really this awesome onboarding piece.
Speaker 1It was like okay, here we go, baptism by fire. It was, it was.
Speaker 2And the Maple River piece is four years of 40 corporate events. Each year it is just ladies league, men's day, and then an event that the public, that the public's you know welcome to every other week. Maple river, that, that that is. That was such a um, paying your dues experience. You know it's just go, wake up, go, wake up, go. And could do it. It probably it just wasn't sustainable along. Uh, honestly, long-term it was, it was a tough, it was a tough, it's a tough job, it really is a tough job and I really respect anybody that has that position, because everything comes across one desk.
Speaker 1How did so competitive guy many different sports, a lot of you know, golf et cetera how did you scratch that competitive itch moving from again performing at a golf perspective into, let's just say, whether it's Element, or then into Maple River? And I know you dust them off once in a while and go play, maybe certainly not as much as you were, but like, how did you scratch that itch professionally, outside of golf to compete on a day-to-day basis?
Speaker 2Improvement, improvement, like when, any day that we laid asphalt at Maple River, I was just, oh man, I was so excited. You know whether it be new carts.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Any improvement that we made to the club that improved everyone's experience. For me that was winning man, that was winning. When there's dirt on the shovel, we're winning and we're improving. That's great. And I love when there's a lot of input. If there's a lot of input and opinions, that means there's something going on good, because when there's no money to spend, there's nothing going good. Nobody wants to have any opinions. Oh god, I don't want to be around that. That's not going well. I don't want to be part of that situation.
Speaker 2But when you're doing well and you have some, you know, you have some opportunity to improve some things. All of a sudden, all these opinions come out. Oh, that's how you want to spend the money. Oh, that's what you want to do. Okay, fine. So the improvement piece has always been literally the hotel element. When I started, we were shoveling the second floor. That's a four-story building. We were still developing it. So every single day there was improvement because you're building the place.
Speaker 1So you are able to sort of scratch the edge and sort of see that those mile markers kind of hit themselves and spin it forward to, you know, maple river.
Speaker 2We saw improvements each day, which was great.
Speaker 2And then there was just real buy-in and and I mean even though even the my favorite story is there was it was very polarizing to asphalt the cart paths at Maple River and I told Josh Stenjum, who was my right-hand guy at Maple River.
Speaker 2I said, josh, this asphalt's going to be good for a lot of different reasons, but the great thing is I can't take it out Like it's going to be a tangible improvement forever. And what we did is we put the entire property on a big sheet and we sectioned off like 11 different sections of cart path and we let the members vote where they think the most important section of cart path and the big push was there were some walkers, some people who walk that weren't necessarily in favor of the project. As soon as I saw the Walker's names on that board, I knew I had full buy-in. We had full buy-in and we're going to have, we're going to come together as a family, as a club, to to move, to move forward. So that was a really fun thing to process, to to go through. But I think improvements.
Speaker 1Did you come up with that? Did you come up with that on your own? I Did you come up with that? Did you come up with that on your own? The voting aspect of it.
Speaker 2Yeah, I was just kind of gaming out, like how can we get everybody on board? Well, let's get their input. Same thing to do with the leaders at the FCC. Like what do you think? Let them come up with the great ideas that they have, and now it's theirs. Now let's go execute your idea. Let's go execute your vision and have them own that vision. And it's going to be. They're going to feel good about it. It's going to be done at a high level and there's going to be buy-in from everyone if they're the one leading it.
Speaker 1You mentioned something in passing there that I want to dive into a little bit. You mentioned your. Your time at Maple river is as a family. Yeah, yeah, that, that's tell me more about that.
Speaker 2Just be. That was real close to home. I have a lot of buddies who are members out there and, um, that might not be the best word always to to call a business, but um, I, it's a but we live out there right now and it was a special place. That's where I met Kelsey, that's where I proposed to her. So there's Maple River and Mapleton has a special place personally, as does FCC. But families are different dynamics. Right, the families have a lot of different dynamics and, trust me, so do organizations like that, and so when everybody can come together, yeah, when things are coming together, it feels a little bit more hey, we're a little bit more family.
Speaker 1You know I I asked the question because I love it. I actually use that word a lot with my team over at WEX and have for a long time Now. It's not for everybody and we're very clear about that. That. You know, the expectation isn't that you feel like it's a family, but I want you to know that I do right. It's sort of the bed that I try to lay on of you know, love, trust, respect, and that you know, when you think of the Venn diagrams of life he's got you've got your personal, you've got your professional. And for me, what's most comfortable for me is when those those circles sort of overlap a little bit more than most right when I've always believed that you know, the more that I can lean into somebody from a personal perspective and show that I care and respect what they have going on personally, whether it's their kiddos, their family and the stuff that actually matters in this world that I'm there for that, and so if they're willing to lean into that type of relationship, I'm there for all of it.
Speaker 1And again, it's not for everybody.
Speaker 1I'm not saying that that is the preferred leadership way or what have you, but for me, hearing you say that resonated really well, because I think there's something to that, if it's not lip service.
Speaker 1Right, if a person is actually living by that type of mentality where no, this is a family. Now, the flip side of that and this is where my question comes in is, if a person chooses to operate in that vein, where professional individuals begin becoming part of the family, as it were, you're opening a person, is opening oneself up to perhaps more pain or disappointment if that family member quote unquote doesn't deliver or maybe doesn't do what's expected. So did you have any of those types of experiences as you were working your way through improving Maple River, by the way, incredibly, over your tenure there? And it's not just the car pass, but it was just the entire vibe of the of of that spot, with that consistency that you provided. But do you still view Maple river as kind of a family, even though you're not maybe employed there anymore and maybe talk through a little bit about how that thought process came to.
Speaker 2came to mind yeah, it does it a special, it's a special spot. Um, there's uh, it's just the. The people are, the people are great. Um, yeah, no, it would you get close to your team members, right, and whether they go off to grad school or if you know, hopefully doesn't happen if they're not performing, and then you know we need to move in a different direction. It take that extremely tough, right, you really do.
Speaker 2Um, you'd think that those who are really on your core team you should be able to sense when it's they're moving on to something else, because everybody has a growth path, everybody's trying to improve. And what I share with people when they come on board at fcc like, hey, I understand that you're here going to ndsu, you're gonna this is going to be in the summer or or, um, you know you're getting married and moving away. Let's just make sure, before you onboard here, that this fcc is going to fit into your life plan. How does fcc fit in your life plan? Because it fits into 120 team members a lot differently yeah right, every you know.
Speaker 2For Dave Lorenz, he's been there two decades. For Jeff Christensen, he's been there two decades. For, you know, the gal we hired yesterday, she's got to go. For the football player we hired yesterday, he's got to go back to two days starting August 1st so that the job fits in people's lives. Yeah, I think that's a big. It's very transitory.
Speaker 1The golf I would say just understanding. That is a huge advantage for you as a leader, right? Because many leaders unfortunately don't even understand or are willing to have that sort of conversation with an employee to suggest that there is life outside of the organization Sure, right, and I feel like some folks want to want to keep that so separated that in. Again, my humble opinion, that makes it even more difficult to lead, because if you're not admitting or even acknowledging that the other individuals have different desires and needs and lives and people that they're surrounding themselves with, how can you truly lead that individual as well as you possibly can if you're not learning about what really motivates them outside of a professional setting? Right?
Speaker 2For sure. I'll give you an example. It's happening right now. We have a supervisor. She does a great job and she's getting married and she's going to move back to New York. Okay, well, if I don't have a relationship with her, I don't know. Okay, how's the house search going? Because if they find a house, she'd be gone three weeks, or if they don't, it's going to be gone at the end of August. It's a big difference, and so you need to know, you need to meet everybody where they're at. When we're full go in the summer, when you have 120, like I said, team members, it's tough to be on that level with everybody. I say Memorial Day to Labor Day, you grab the trailer, hitch as tight as you can and just get drug down the road.
Speaker 2It is you try and you try and increase as many controllables as possible, but there's just so much action on property that you you just try and maximize every single day, Try and have, first of all, staffing and people in the right place at the right time to be able to provide a service. And there are so many different things going on that inevitably it's not going to be a perfect day, maybe from every single member's perspective, but if you have your team in place, you just got to make the most of every single day, because it's a three-month run.
Managing Fargo Country Club
Speaker 1Yeah, man, that is a meat grinder. You've done such a nice job over there, buddy. I just want to say that out loud. Having the opportunity to work with you, you know, not only from a friendship perspective, but spending a couple of years on the board while you you know were first moving into the role as as GM and head goal, or, I guess, starting as head goal professional for country club and then moving into the GM role. Boy, what you've done over there has been just incredible, so I want to say that out loud.
Speaker 2Well, no, I appreciate it and really it's. It's yourself, it's the board, right, it's members who are joining and it's the team, so it's, it's really I'm not just saying that it's everybody like we don't have people to serve unless they're joining, and so we're very fortunate to have a full membership and a waiting list. We're fortunate to have demand and and and the ability to do what Improve. Nick, this is not the job for me. If I'm walking around making sure your steak is cooked to the right temperature, that's not me. What is me is I get to go to the club today and see if they have the first coat of paint on the foyer in the back because we're improving the backspace. That's what I give a crap about. You know. That's really because overall, that's going to.
Speaker 2You know, splash pad wasn't for every single member but for holistically for the club. It was a huge win. Like we have little kids have a safe thing to do at the pool, that's huge for everybody. And so, and again, it's really fun to see the reaction when there's dirt on the shovel, there's improvements being made. That's. It's really fun to see the reaction when there's dirt on the shovel there's improvements being made. That's, that's exciting and everybody gets behind it. So that's, that's the that's the driving force.
Speaker 1I love it, I love it, man, I. It's such a great atmosphere, it's very special to to me. You know, over there now transitioning a bit over to the Fargo Country Club, time so 2022,. Is that right?
Speaker 1Yeah 22 came on board, so working our way through COVID, um, I was, uh, you know we we spent some time connecting, you know, early on in that, in that process, as I was on the board at that time and you were coming on board, and you know there was a lot going on. You think about COVID, you think about turnover from a golf professional perspective you think about, um irrigation project, irrigation project, irrigation project.
Speaker 1My goodness, there was a lot, a lot going on, some pretty evident transferable skills, I would imagine from you know the element to maple river, then into fcc. In hindsight, was it what you expected? Moving back to fargo country club, because, as you mentioned earlier, you know a very important part of your life was Fargo Country Club. Going back to how your father was negotiating his contract right.
Speaker 1So maybe talk about that sort of coming full circle from a place where you started your golf career, you started learning the game, you've met a lot of the people that you know today from a membership perspective. Now, all of a sudden you're back there as a quote unquote employee, kind of running the show alongside your wife and your three girls, and you know, just maybe talk me through that kind of your thought process, your feelings and how that, how that worked Well the first.
Speaker 2The first step was keep your eyes open and ears open and just listen and see what we have going on here.
Speaker 2You know you need to assess before you can really do anything and as a golf pro, you're not. You know you're not in a really a position to influence the club on a on a super large scale. You definitely overseeing a department. That's big part of the reason why the club is even there, right, so you gotta make sure you elevate the golf experience. But really it was just eyes and ears open and seeing where the improvements lie where the finances look like where we're at.
Speaker 2How do we get past this irrigation project, which is a once in 50 year thing? Just try and win each day, right? And so I didn't go into it at all with the intention of being the GM. In fact, I went into it. He asked my wife. I said I think I'm going to be home for dinner. I think I could be home for dinner, yeah, yeah, and you know, as opposed to maple river right now, I'll see you at 10,. You know I, and there were some nights where I was. I was home, for I was home for dinner, and you pick your spots, obviously, but at the end of the day, in 2023, he came to me and said, hey, can you oversee the pool from the golf shop? I'm like sure.
Speaker 2And then it just morphed into 2023, august 1, 2023, being a dual role, and it's taken. It takes a while, right. It takes some time to get the leaders in place that can really be better than you, quite frankly. Right that you want to hire people who are better than you, that want to take ownership of each department and run with it, and that's ideal. And so my goal every day now is to come to work with not much on the calendar but be able to be open. Hey, I don't know when someone is going to walk into the office in need time and need to address something In the middle of the summer. We have eight leaders that report to me and I've got to be ready, no matter what they need, and maybe nudge along the way like hey, don't forget about this or create ways for them to find ideas to improve.
Speaker 2You know, yesterday in our manager meeting I love tuesday morning's manager meeting um, you know, let's level up, let's level up. And let's go around the table and say, how are you, how can you level up in your department? And everybody was jacked up. I mean everybody's excited, like, okay, well, we can do this. And then they got around to me and they said, well, what's your level up? I said, well, quite frankly, I have high-performers, leaders, in every department now, and so you've just shared with me what your level up is.
Speaker 2My level up is just to make sure you follow through on it. It's your team, your team that you're hiring, your department, that you're running your pnl, that you're overseeing. Let's, let's do it. Yeah and uh, you know, my level up for the membership is to remind the membership, the membership at the fcc is generational, it's not transactional, it's a very special place. Uh, nobody's nobody was alive when uh far country Club came into existence in 1898. And it will outlive the institution, will outlive all of us. So nobody's more important than the club no manager, no department leader, no offense members, but no member is more important than the club. We are here to continue the legacy and I think the greatest thing is to create memories for our kids. And when you have a turnover, a membership, a lot of young kids, that's, that's just awesome. Lifeblood of the club, right?
Speaker 1I believe that I mean you're going to get different perspectives from different people on on that and what makes a healthy club. But I maintain that you go to any club in the country you know. Of course that is a family club. Now you've got your golf-only clubs and that's great, correct? I mean that's totally fine. I mean, do that all day long. But for me, I mean a healthy club is when you see kids running around.
Speaker 2The FCC is where you learn the game. Okay, the FCC is not where you play 18 holes and you don't see anybody, right? No, this is the game. This is the spot where they're playing on ground that the club has owned since 1916, on that par three, because that was the original nine. Yeah, okay, so you're playing. Your youngest generation, is is learning the game on the oldest piece of property in the in the place, and they're trying to get their games to a point where they can graduate to go play the big course. Yep, yep, it's a special spot, you know, and um, it's. Obviously the game is is wonderful and and just it's a great place. It's a great way to create lifelong memories and that's what I think our legacy should be is a special spot that it is to us, right? So when you we have a junior golf meeting last night, you're looking all these young eyes looking up at you talking about junior golf. That's a big responsibility. Let's go.
Speaker 1Let's go, maximize it yeah, and their dads are guys that you'd compete with on the green back in the day, right or on the par three yourself. You know, it's just like man I. I would imagine that there is knowing you as well as I do, which you know it's like. I have an obligation and an opportunity to provide an experience for my buddy's kids the the way in which that that opportunity was provided to me, right. What sort of pressures are involved with that for you?
Speaker 2Well, the fun thing is, the nice synergy in that is, I was able to stand up last night and be like, okay, we have all these new options for junior golf. Let me talk to you as a parent. I have an eight-year-old. I've got her in junior league and I've got her in the FCC camp. This is why I have an eight-year-old. I've got her in junior league and I've got her in the FCC camp. This is why I have a six-year-old. I have her in the group junior lessons. This is why I have a five-year-old. She's in group junior lessons. This is why. So the responsibility that I have on the home front, it rolls right in. I'm not an empty nester. I'm living through growing three uh little girls and kids, just like everybody else in that room. So, uh, it's, it's a nice time.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2It's a nice, the timing is really really good. And then I've got studs in the golf shop who are younger, they're in their twenties and they can go all day long and they're really good at what they do. Let them run, let them run and, uh, put them in a position to be successful in doing so, in your mind, what makes the best leaders?
Speaker 2Oh, good question. I um, I think you need to recognize that the right team in place. They they want autonomy. Like they want autonomy, they want the ability to control their own destiny. Just like I did with professional golf. They want the and just like the board probably looks at me and says, like Dave kind of wants to, dave wants to run with this right, okay. So I want every one of our leaders to have the ability to formulate a plan, put together the team that needs to execute that plan, execute it and feel good about it, like that's what I think being a good, being a good leader is is recognizing that your leaders want that ability to have that control in their daily.
Speaker 1No question, yeah, no, I sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off there. I I get excited hearing about that type of stuff because I think that is a huge portion of what we have to offer the world when it comes to individuals like, like you, that have a desire to want to see improvements, not just in yourself, obviously, that you were, you know, shooting for and achieved at a, at a, at a very, very good scale from a golf perspective. But you know, we talked a little bit about scratching that itch and moving now into sort of a different level of competition that allows you to to scratch some of that competitive itch, which is identifying and creating and building leaders. Right, and a lot of what we do in leadership is simply removing barriers so that other people can succeed. Right, try to create clear paths for others, personally and professionally, so that they can be successful.
Speaker 2Yeah, go ahead. So I look at like an Andy Carroll who's extremely gifted. He's going to be a wonderful golf business for he can do whatever he wants to do, but he's I can't expect him to hire schedule run payroll if I don't have Tom Porton coming back into the fold to do lessons.
Speaker 1Okay, I didn't know that Awesome.
Speaker 2I need. Tom is really good at what he does in teaching golf. Right, let him run with that. Provide cover for Andy so Andy's not inundated with lessons and he can run the, you know, run the business, because if he can't, it's on my desk. So we need those layers of, we need those layers of uh support. You know, with Dave Lorenz he's got he has two assistants for the first time ever on the grounds crew, so he has that support, um, and and really it's, it's kind of, you know, on the food and beverage side we got to make sure we get another supervisor in before we open the golf course. So we've been actively uh searching for another supervisor from outside the organization. So it's, you know, we have providing that support to put these folks in a position to be successful.
Speaker 1You feel like you're able to do that as often as you'd like. Um do you have?
Speaker 2the resources to do that.
Speaker 1I mean and this isn't necessarily a fcc question, it's more of a, a personal energy, emotional energy, perspective being a father of three, being a husband, right, having a and we'll get to the one show here, uh, very quickly. You know got about 10 minutes left, if that's okay with you, but do you feel, like you, you have the tools you need to be successful personally and professionally to to remove barriers for others right now?
Speaker 2I, I, I do, yeah, I do. Actually, this is I'm really looking forward to this year, this golf season, because the leaders are strong, right and they have their support in place. So that's on the work side. On the home front, it does go together. I mean, if things aren't going well, if things are going well at W2, I'm going to be there. So if I'm taking care of that, if that's going well, um, you know, I have the support of my wife and kids and the nice thing is they can be at the club and I can see them. So there's, that's really looking forward to this year. Now, my, my north star is is the freedom of time. So time and energy, the freedom of time. I want to have the freedom of time. So time and energy, the freedom of time. I want to have the freedom of time to be able to walk the par 3 and be relaxed in doing so with my daughters. I want the hey, who knows? Hey, shanley, anybody listen? Maybe I'll be their high school golf coach one day.
Speaker 1There you go.
Speaker 2Or be at least an assistant. They've got to get into golf first, but I want to be able to have that time to be able to do that. So that freedom. What do I need to do to create that freedom? Well, when it comes to FCC, I need great leaders and they need to be supported. When it comes to the hole in one show, I need the support on the home front and also the support from the FCC, to be able to, to chase those dreams.
Speaker 1All right, let's dive into this now. Buddy, I'm excited to hear more about your experience here at the Hole-in-One Show. So what is the Hole-in-One Show? How did it start? How did it get revived? Like, just give us the whole history of it.
Speaker 2Yeah, so I'm sure you're the same. It was my favorite TV show growing up. Jim Adelson did it from the mid-60s to the early 90s. Did he really start in the mid-60s, 26 years Back then? It was about a 16-17 minute program. I think they had one commercial and they'd go to different clubs.
Speaker 2It was a pretty quick production with one camera. Before my dad passed in 2017, I think it was the golf season of 2017, I was at Maple river, obviously managing the club. You know, have ability to access, to talk to the board. Hey, what, if you know, did this hole in one show? I talked to my dad about it. He's like that'd be great. You got to do it. How can I help? Then he passed away in middle of 2018 and it became a well, I got to do this right this 2018. And it became a well, I got to do this right. This last kind of thing we talked about. I'm going to want to bring this back. No real expectation, Just wanted to do it for a year and see what happened. And then, just, I have a ton of fun doing it right.
Speaker 2It's a golf game show, six contestants, amateur golfers, so it's you know. The viewer becomes the contestant. It's reality TV. They're nervous, but then, if they make a hole in one, they win a new car. Uh, and then we've you know, we've added a charitable aspect to it, which is the mission statement of charitable giving through the, through the game of golf. So we've almost raised a hundred thousand over the first six seasons of the show, which is fun, that's awesome and it's it's just the slow drip of a thousand bucks this episode.
Speaker 212, 50 this episode. You know it's, it's just the slow drip of $1,000 this episode. $1,250 this episode. You don't earn it for the charity unless you earn it on the show. Absolutely so, right out of the gates. I just wanted to see, just in case I'm trying to file a trademark on it, get it protected, and it took four and a half years to do so.
Speaker 1Really.
Speaker 2And I didn't even know if I was still going to be doing the show that long. Um, as it as it was last january got the official word on that so so started scouting. Hey, how can we grow this show?
Speaker 2and yeah the show up here is on kfyr out west and kvly over here, a great television station. So that allowed me to talk to a great television station in arizona, cbf, arizona's family cbs5. So spoke with the, pitched it to the station manager down there and she really liked the idea and it fit their brand. It's a fun show, you know.
Speaker 2Grand grandma, grandpa can watch with grandkids there you go it's good content, yeah, and so, yeah, we're we're expanding to arizona really, really excited about that. We're going to be filming season one of Desert Series. Okay, november 2nd of 2025 at Grass Clippings, the par three course in Tempe. That's under the lights.
Speaker 1Oh, awesome.
Speaker 2Yeah, this will be on the ninth hole at Grass Clippings on November 2nd and then it's going to air. It'll be a tight turn. It's going to air on Arizona's Family Sports, their sports station across the state of Arizona in January and February of next year.
Speaker 1Congratulations. Thank you, that's fantastic. Thanks Got you, buddy.
Speaker 2It's really been fun growing. But I've learned a lot about myself and growing personally. And it's those flights home from Arizona on a two-day trip to try and get some try and get some action. And it took me three trips down there to lock in grass clippings. You know, just getting together with these guys. Hey, this is what the show is, this is the background, you know, getting them to buy into it and excited about it.
Speaker 1What was their hesitation?
Speaker 2there wasn't, it was just. They're so busy growing this thing, they have this grass league. They're. They're really, they're. They're really. They're just at the start of they haven't. They're about to open their restaurant, so it was just being in there. You know, being face to face, walking in the door, instead of being a phone call or an email. It's just different. You gotta be in person. Amen. But my, where I'm trying to go with this is I've learned a lot about, you know, persistence and just stick with it. You know, just because someone says no, it doesn't mean that there's not a lot of value and it's going to be a lot of fun. You just keep going. You know something that one course might not want to participate in, the next one might say yes before you even send them the proposal. So just keep grinding.
Speaker 1Well, I tell you what, man, I mean. If I've learned anything, certainly in my experience, it's that, you know, passion sells. And people, that's infectious, right. People, people want to do business with people, want to be around, people that have that that layer of of um energy right around, whatever it is that they're passionate about At least I know I do and and to me that's that's fascinating, right. I mean, just what is it about people? And it's a lot of.
The Hole-in-One Show
Speaker 1You know what we've talked about today, obviously, which is, you know, what drives people to be so passionate about certain things. And I, the way I also look at it, is that, you know, we're really a product of our reactions to various stimuli that we receive, I mean, some of which we can control, some of which we can't. And so if we're able to take the time to reflect on how we responded to various stimuli that we've received, right, that's going to consciously and subconsciously allow us to ideally shorten the line between stimulus and response, to elicit those responses more often, more favorably, because you're continuously getting that feedback loop of positive things right.
Speaker 1So you had a few years of very positive results from the Dakota series of the whole-in-one show and correct me if I'm wrong here I'm sort of paraphrasing a little bit what I think I just heard. Which is all right, try something new, some good responses to what you're able to accomplish up here. Take it on the road, experience a situation where it's just like man, these people don't have a history of the hole in one show that you do or that I do or some of the many of the community.
Speaker 1Community, it's like you know. We're able to visualize it. They're not right. They're looking at, probably, the bottom of a spreadsheet, or they're looking at the what's this going to cost us and what are we going to get for it. How do you, how did you specifically deliver that layer of passion and vision?
Speaker 2to them. If you recall any of those specific conversations, it's gotta be in person. Yeah, it's gotta be in person and focus on the passion that I currently I personally have for it. So I want that to come through and it comes through better in person.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2And then also distinguishing it from all the other golf content out there, which there's plenty. There's plenty. This is not me playing golf with a celebrity for 18 holes and having some fun. That's good content too, but this is literally the viewer becoming the contestant and having a chance to play for something bigger than themselves. And you know, you get, I, I. Whether there's a viral moment or not, the bottom line is these are like real checks that are going out. I mean yeah.
Speaker 2Shields is writing ten thousand dollars worth of checks to these charities from season six, the hole-in-one show. Good on shields. I love those guys, they're awesome. Thank you for the title sponsorship, thank you to bell bank. But these are real checks that are that are going out and, yeah, you know, having influence.
Speaker 2So it's, it's, um, that's what it's easy to be passionate about, something like that. And back to the personal piece, that freedom to be able to spend, you know, be with family and spend time the show allows. The fun aspect of it is I grew up with a dad on TV, so the show allows for the kids to to be able to see that in. And I want my kids to be proud of me, right. I want my wife to be proud of me, uh, and my family, um it, it does check that box, right. But also, you know, maybe one day it'll allow freedom, even more freedom.
Speaker 2Who knows, we'll see. There's no expectation. I love my position where I'm at at the FCC. I have no expectations of leaving it, but let's open up opportunities. See where it goes. See where it goes. I mean, the entire state of Arizona is pretty big. If the show's airing down there, who knows? And then the next market. I'd love to be in Minneapolis and so start that conversation. And how are they going to react to a guy pitching them who has a show up here in North Dakota but and in Arizona? So maybe there's a little bit, maybe there's a lower barrier of entry in Minneapolis, perhaps I don't you know, we'll just see how this plays out.
Speaker 1Yeah, we'll see how this plays out. I mean, you've always been a hustler. You're obviously my guy. That is going to try to identify that pretty quick. And what I've really respected and enjoyed about about you is is always been an all in type of guy. Right, you know, and and I there, there's a lot of different ways that a person could unpack that. Right, you know, like anything else, there's positives and there's, you know, opportunities for, for growth in that area, but it won't be without a lack of trying and effort and and and making the best decision possible with the information you have at hand, which I've always appreciated about.
Speaker 2I massively respect you, nick. You know you've shared a couple books with me, that, um, that I've been going through. And then also, you know, on the personal front on, you know, big thing for me is the all-in piece can be great, yeah, it can be not so great. You know, I, I'm, I'm not like I, I just go right. So if I have a couple of beers with the fellas, it's probably going to be eight and I'm not going to feel great the next day and I'm going to be mad at myself for it.
Speaker 2And so you know, I've come to the realization. It's like it's just got to be cut out. It's got to be done and and I, I appreciate your, you know your, your leadership and mentorship in that man for sure, and and now I feel like I'm I have an opportunity.
Speaker 2If anybody's interested, I'd love to be what you were for me the sounding board you know, and because there's just so many it's's only been, you know so many good things are going to come from it, because every single day you're improving. Yeah, every single day there's. There's just, you're not in your own way. You're not in your own way. You're thinking clearly, you're you're, you're motivated, you're energized and you can bring it. Every single day, you got to bring it.
Speaker 1You, you, you get to bring. It is how I would perhaps, if it's okay with you, maybe, change that statement a little bit. It gives you an opportunity to be as successful as you possibly can in that, in that day, and whether it's, whether it's cocktails, whether it's whatever it is, I mean, everybody's got their thing that they will utilize to kick that can down the road to perhaps maybe not see what's right in front of them, that they want to and or potentially need to change to be able to achieve the massive success that I believe everybody has available to them. And that's really what we're trying to expose here in these types of conversations. And again, thank you for your time today, which is, you know what, not necessarily to dive into this at a deep level, but, you know, identifying what are those types of barriers or what are those types of things that we look at on an individual basis through the period of life. Right, that you know, man, I was able to overcome that, or I'm still working through that.
Speaker 1And so, as we transition here to a few kind of quick hit questions, if it's, if it's okay with you, I'd like to just get get some of your thoughts on a couple of these items, and the number one would be is you know what is your definition of success?
Speaker 2Yeah, my definition of success is raising three girls who are confident, happy and are just really good people. That's my definition of success is as a father, I mean, and then also with that in line, is being the best husband I can possibly be and, you know, working as a team to raise these three girls. So that's the North Star on what success is. How do you get there? Well, I think time. I think you've got to have time, especially right now. You've got to have time with them, time, okay. So now, fine, that's what I need to be able to do that. So how do I create time?
Speaker 2Well, I if I'm going to do this whole one show, I have to be I have to be a really good GM at the FCC.
Speaker 1Well, I mean, look, I mean the, the tenant of time and energy that you know exists, that this podcast exists from, is, is, is the overall concept that everyone gets 24 hours in a day, Right, and it's? It's the juxtaposition of, of that 24 hours, which is static, that everybody gets, and the elastic nature of the emotional energy, right? The things that fill our bucket, the things that deplete our bucket. How do we know what they are? First and foremost, how does that align with the value systems in which we've we've identified it and created and live? And then, how does that also, and lastly, identify the steps required to get to that North star, and and and and spot that we want to be from a, from a success perspective?
Speaker 1You're juggling a lot, man. I mean, you got a lot of things going on, which is certainly your, your personality, and nothing wrong with it by any stretch of the imagination. One thing that I read the other day that scared the heck out of me, having having two little kids myself, is um, what was it? 85% of the time that you spend with your kids is before the age of 12.
Speaker 1Oh, yeah, yeah you know, and so I mean I'm sure that creeps in from time to time, and so I think about that as like man you know, if I'm going to try to juxtapose time and energy and my true North star is happiness, right, confidence, things like that Some things have to give. So next question would be is what is it that you've given up? You mentioned, you know, cocktails with the boys, I mean, that's a, that's a good, tangible example. But anything else that you've given up that you either recognize at the time that you've sort of given up, or anything that you yeah, maybe I'll just, I'll just, I'll end it, end it right there. Anything you've you've given up, that's conscious yeah, that's conscious.
Speaker 2Yeah, it depends on what night it is. But so a cheat code that I've found is sleep when your kids sleep, oh, that's good. So I go to bed at 8, 8, 30 and I'm up at. I'm up at four, wow, and I don't need to set alarm. I just wake up at four, wow, and I, I don't need to set an alarm, I just wake up at four, you know, and um, I guess that I guess I'm giving up anything that happens after eight 30.
Speaker 1That's good.
Speaker 2Right, yeah, there's, cause there's a lot that they can have. You know there's a good game on TV, or you know the guys are out, or um, you know one more nine holes when the sun goes down at 10 o'clock at night. You know, and I, you know I got to protect this time I'm, I'm going to bed. I go to bed when the kids are sleeping, so I usually get them, then I usually get them before they go to bed, and then we have nice mornings together, and so that's the, that's the personal cheat code, but things have given up. Uh, you already shared the tangible one, um, well, you shared on x yesterday.
Speaker 1Yeah, what you tell your, what you talked to your daughters about before they go off?
Speaker 2are you willing to share that? Yeah, yeah. So every I don't know where it came from, I just um, I just they were, you know, low. One day I'm like, okay, girls, what are we going to be and what are we going to have? They're like what, what are we going to be and what are we going to have? They're like what, what are we going to be and what are we going to have. And so I said we're going to be mentally tough and we're going to have positive energy. Those are both what Controllables. You can control those in any situation and I need to say it to myself every single day.
Speaker 2So I would imagine an eight six and five-year-old who are in second grade, kindergarten, pre-k or going through all these things, and they're going to go just through more things as they grow up. Girls in this society is, hey, let's be, let's. What are we going to be and what are we going to have? I love that. You know we're going to be mentally tough and positive energy. And so actually, before I came over here this morning, yeah, it was. Um, the big problem right now is scotty. She's not really good with her r's, or so she's, she kind of mumbles it, and Kelsey's like no, you need to say mentally tough and positive energies pronounced. So now we're, we're pronouncing, which is good.
Speaker 1Hey, absolutely, that's, that's great. Well, look, repetition is what is what creates action over time.
Speaker 1Right and and and and what happens in our subconscious is, uh, from a scary perspective, you know, really drives the bus in what we're doing right. So talk about osmosis. You know you'll find people on YouTube that'll say someone. One of the some of the most beneficial things that you can do is, you know, put your AirPods in at night and put on a, whether it's a meditation or whether it's, you know, you know something that is of interest to you to try to. You know, learn something, or what have you interest to you to try to. You know, learn something or what have you. That? That's a really cool way.
Speaker 1So, starting this type of behavior right, I, I, I do something similar with Will. Every morning, I'll drop him off at daycare and um, or school, as we call it, and it's just like all right, buddy, you know, make somebody smile today and it's like cool. You know, the more you give yourself um, at least in my experience, you know the more you give to others, the more you get back, and that's just, that's just evident. That's awesome for me. One area of growth for you as a leader or and or a father.
Speaker 2I feel like I'm in the middle of attacking a few of those things at the moment. You know, um, I appreciate you having me on this, this, this podcast, for sure, and and the mentorship over the last you know year or so, you know, I I think that those things are, uh, being addressed. I mean just realizing that or just wanting to make a few steps forward each day. Like let's just start to compound each day. So Bill Ackman, the investor, like he saw this thing on the other day and he was just going through divorce, lost a bunch of money and he's like I just don't look at where you were, don't look at what you, what you have. Just just start to compound the days.
Speaker 2Start day stacking is what I like to call it. Get a little bit better each day. Every day there's a new challenge. That's the fun thing about managing the FCC. Every day there's a new challenge and there's a new way that I can get better. In fact, I tell the leaders I say look, I'm going to let you down, I want you to know this I'm going to let you down.
Speaker 1I want you to know this.
Speaker 2I'm going to let you down. That's the only guarantee that you have reporting and coming to me on these questions. I'm going to need help. I'm going to need some grace, because it's unique each day.
Speaker 1Well, there's effort. We call it the give a shit right. It's like you care, and, and you, you, and, or a person takes the steps to move towards learning right and and not with the oh, I know everything. Philosophy, yeah, and. And. If, if we, as leaders, continue to seek feedback from those that are all around us from a 360 degree perspective, good things will happen.
Speaker 1And I can tell you confidently that one of the best pieces of feedback I've received as a leader is just, uh, just being human, you know, and being fallible and talking about things that I struggle with, whether it's you know, personally or professionally or or or what have you, and that creates an environment, I think, where, at least for me, it's a little bit easier when you have to have that difficult conversation or when you have to have sort of that business conversation that you know it's fallible human with fallible human, trying to move each other across the continuum towards getting 1% better every day.
Leadership Philosophy and Life Lessons
Speaker 1Right, it's not that I have all the answers and you don't, and I'm going to extol all my virtuous learnings and teachings upon you. It's like no dude, like we're just trying to get better, both of us. I happen to be in a position where my job is literally to hold you accountable to this. Do you believe that I have your best interest at heart? And to me, that's one of the best questions that we can ask ourselves and each other is do you believe that I have your best interest at heart? It could be a spouse, it could be a child, it could be a someone that's reporting to you, and if the answer is yes, it's like now we've got a place to jump off.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1Now we've got a place to jump off. Yeah, who's the best golfer you've ever played with?
Speaker 2uh, sorry for the pause, I'm thinking not at all um the best golfer I've ever played with.
Speaker 2The great story is played with esper parnovic in final stage of q school. Really, obviously great player. Yeah, I mean, I watched the man cold shank it on eight iron. It was a great. No, it was a great lesson. Though he shanked it, it was an adjacent fairway, so you had he's fine. He had a full sandwich and second shot on this par three, knocked it up there 12 feet and made it anyway. I don't know why that he's. He's a decently big name right that I've played with.
Speaker 2Um, I think I think the best. The guy I was most impressed with was and in competition was I played, uh, first two rounds of an event in 2009, southern california, with ricky fowler. Yeah, and he was the. He was like the first guy that I've played with in competition that it felt a little golden t-ish, because if the pin was on the back right, he'd hit a cut. If the pin was back left, he'd hit a draw. If the pin was front left, he'd hit a high draw. If the pin was front right, he'd hit a high cut. I'm like, dude, you're a video game. It's good work if you can get it.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2It's like, mike, are you just showing off, are you I mean, literally hitting every shot exactly how you know you would? If it was a video game, um, I would say that that was a. That was a really impressive yeah, um, and you know, the great thing is you play long enough and you play with enough good golfers. You catch golfers on their on really great days, and that's the thing about pro golf is everybody, everybody's, real, real good when they're at their best. And I'm talking about guys that we play with every day, guys I play with in college, those guys who have played for a living. Their best is good enough for sure.
Speaker 1Well, for the lay golfer that maybe watches on the weekends, watches TV on the weekends, I've always thought it's fascinating. I mean, yeah, those are the guys you're. Those are the guys that are playing well that week.
Speaker 2Yeah. There's a ton of guys miscut.
Speaker 1There's a ton of guys that miscut, a ton of guys that maybe aren't playing that well, and you're seeing all the best shots of all the best players in that moment. And that doesn't disparage the lack of the amount of talent that exists in the PGA tour. That's not the point. The point is is that I think it's possible for individuals to maybe sometimes have a unrealistic view of what great looks like, Cause you're seeing the best of the best all the time and that's, I think, the way it should be right, Because it's more entertaining that way. But what generally people aren't seeing is the grind of the guy who's just made the Monday, who's just missed by one, who's got his wife and two little girls in a. You know what I mean, Like you know. So I mean there's a.
Speaker 2There's a lot to that's why I like really good golf courses, like this last week, the Valspar. I like really good golf courses because you see some struggle even from the guys near the lead, struggle even from the guys near the lead. Yeah, that's what. That's. That Cause, that's a little bit more reality. Yeah.
Speaker 1I think for me, as we, as we, as we begin to wrap it up here, that is the most relatable thing about golf for the masses, which is you can see a guy hit a horrible golf shot live on television, and that's relatable to certainly me. Yeah, it's like how does that guy hit that golf shot? And it's like huh.
Speaker 1And then I can go out on a Sunday morning and I can hit a shot from 150 yards to a foot and be like, well, yeah, you know, there aren't a lot of guys doing that today and you know at the bell spar and it's like it's, it's almost um paralyzing.
Speaker 2Yeah, it, it, it you know what it makes you do. It makes you come out of retirement four different times playing pro golf.
Speaker 1It's like keep going.
Speaker 2Well, I mean, it's just gonna take one good q school well, that's the thing there's so much of.
Speaker 1It is timing right, yeah, and and I know that you've you've experienced that um, what advice would you have for your younger self?
Speaker 2Advice I would have for my younger self would be to be a little more persistent I'm thinking golf right Back in the day. A little more persistent, I'm thinking golf right Back in the day. Be a little bit more persistent, don't worry. Don't worry, don't worry. I would worry. What am I going to do if I don't play golf? It would affect my play, it would affect my mood.
Speaker 2It would affect my energy, don't worry. My dad used to tell me this. He used to say you, my energy. Yeah, you know, don't, don't worry. My dad used to tell me this. He said you got your whole life to make money, don't worry about it.
Speaker 1It's so much easier to say that than actually live it.
Speaker 2That's such a wisdom comment that in the moment you're just like whatever dad Exactly A hundred percent it is and with that said, he would always be the one encouraging me, even though I wouldn't play college football. He would always be the one encouraging me, even though I wouldn't play college football. He would encourage me to keep going. He's like you're not even 30 and who cares if you're 30, keep going. You know you got all your life to me so I I would share.
Speaker 2I would share that with anybody listening to this that is maybe worried about their future. Um, don't just worry about tomorrow. Get up and make a little bit of progress, no matter what you're doing. No matter what you're doing, just make a little bit of progress and don't do something stupid. To where now you've taken two steps back, you know? Just focus, get a little bit better at what you're doing, one day at a time. The future will take care of itself. If you're doing the right things, you'll be in the position to be. You'll put yourself in the position to be successful. So that's what I would say.
Speaker 2I would say don't worry, don't worry about happy yeah well, I mean I, because I've did it. You know I've lived the worry playing pro golf.
Speaker 1Wonder what the heck am I going to do if this doesn't work out and and the worry came from just not knowing what's what comes next, should you not succeed at the level that you wanted to a little bit of self-doubt right.
Speaker 2A little bit of self-doubt of like what I'm like, what am I prepared to do?
Speaker 1um, even though you're mad, I mean you had to believe in your heart of hearts. I mean you had a great degree. You've had a great, you had a great upbringing. I mean you knew how to talk to people. You had a network of things I mean in the moment you're probably. What I'm hearing you say is you weren't maybe thinking that level of logic.
Speaker 2I was not thinking that level of logic. It was playing pro golf and not realizing the joy that I could have been near the end. At what point did you?
Speaker 1remove your identity as Dave Schultz professional golfer or have you?
Speaker 2Oh, I have for sure, yeah, no, I'm, I'm, you know, husband, dad number one. And then, um, you know, husband, dad number one. And then, you know, I think having an influence on people's lives via whatever position you're at, is a really big responsibility. And then also, you know, at 42, you know, time is not forever. You know, I want to make sure that capitalize on any, any potential ability that there is. I don't want to waste it. I want to go. I want to go get it now. I want to go get it now. So that's the responsibility that I feel today. But the professional, the professional golfer piece was really the transition when I left the game. You know it was. That was the, when I didn't touch a club for 18 months. That was putting it away. That was it, yeah.
Speaker 1Well, you've talked a lot about progress today.
Speaker 1You talked about a lot about getting better, you know, in small increments, every day, and I believe deeply that that's a just an incredible philosophy to have.
Speaker 1I mean, earl Nightingale would say his definition of success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal, right?
Speaker 1So you're, you're progressing towards that North star and you have very specific, um, tangible mile markers, as it were, that one is able to, you know, check out the list or meet as you're reaching towards that goal, all the while subconsciously focusing on, consciously and subconsciously focusing on, you know, that energy, that wavelength, you know the positivity that's associated with that surrounding yourselves with, with, with people that are pushing you towards that goal and not, perhaps, you know, drawing you away from those, that goal and all of the tangential things that go with that. But I would also say, you know, when one of the things I've most been fascinated about you is that you know, you talk about the progressive day to day improvements, all the while having that desire to want it all and to want to, you know, have that tenacity around high achievement, right, around high achievement, right. I think that juxtaposition to me has just been really fascinating, to get to learn a little bit more about today. I sincerely appreciate your time. I sincerely appreciate your friendship.
Speaker 2And.
Speaker 1I look forward to potentially doing this again in the future, and thanks for being with us today.
Speaker 2Thanks, buddy, appreciate you.
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