Communicate to Lead with Kyle Bowen | #LeadWithLegacy | Episode 30

Great leadership isn't just about having the right answers—it's about having the right conversations.

In Episode 30 of the Lead with Legacy™ Podcast, Amanda Chambers sits down with leadership consultant and founder of Hourglass Leadership, Kyle Bowen, to discuss the power of communication, mentorship, organizational culture, and developing leaders who create lasting impact.

Drawing from his experience in leadership development and organizational coaching, Kyle shares practical insights on building healthy teams, creating accountability with care, navigating difficult conversations, and helping organizations grow from the inside out.

Whether you're leading a business, a ministry, a nonprofit, or simply investing in those around you, this conversation offers practical wisdom that will help you become a more intentional leader.

🔔 Subscribe for leadership insights, honest conversations, and practical wisdom you can apply immediately.

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www.iolglobal.com

🔗Connect with Kyle Bowen:

LinkedIn:
https://linkedin.com/in/kyle-bowen-

Learn more at:
https://www.hourglass-leadership.com/

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https://www.buzzsprout.com/2600300/support

Contact our team to book a time to be on the Lead with Legacy™ Podcast:
https://iolglobal.com/podcast

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Lead with Legacy, the official podcast of IOL Global. Here we will explore leadership that outlives titles and trends. Through conversations with faith-based and marketplace leaders, we will discuss integrity, conviction, and purpose. To learn more about us, visit us at IOL Global dot com. Hello, welcome to another episode of the Lead with Legacy Podcast. I am so honored and so blessed to have with us today Mr. Kyle Bowen. Kyle's going to introduce himself a little bit before he does that. We would just ask that you, um, if you like the content that we're talking about, if you would like and subscribe. Um we are on Bus Route, YouTube, iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music. So just pick your favorite and you can find us there. Um just look for Lead with Legacy. Um and we would love for you to listen in more, to like, to share with your friends and your family. And just to to give us some love there to help the reach of of what we're talking about with different people. The purpose of this podcast is just have good organic conversation with people, leaders in the industry that they're in. And what that's what makes it so special to have Kyle here today. Kyle, you're quite something. I had to do a little research on you. You found us through one of our strategic partners, Mr. Chris McClure. And so, and you reached out to us and we said, Hey, why don't you come on the podcast? Let's talk about what you're doing. And so you have now a company. We're gonna talk a little bit about where you how you got to there, but you have a company called Hourglass Leadership. So tell us who you are, where you at, and tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Hey, everybody. Well, first, Amanda, thank you so much for having me on. Super excited to be here, and that just kind of a random spark, like I saw Chris was featured on a podcast and started reaching out, like, hey, this is cool. Let me listen to this, let me see who people are. And uh, it's cool how great people can connect uh when they're connected to great people like Chris.

SPEAKER_01 1:59

So that's right, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 2:01

And it's as for me, um, my name's Kyle Bowen. I'm the president of Hourglass Leadership. We're a leadership development company here in New Bromfels, Texas, kind of halfway between Austin and San Antonio. So we typically work with small and medium-sized businesses and then a few larger companies as well, but really coming in, I call it fractional leadership development. So not sitting outside like a coach or consultant, but really coming into your team, learning your culture and figuring out how to grow your team, grow your leaders, and create a winning culture for you. So I know IOL and Hourglass are doing a lot of the same things, and so it's always fun connecting with people doing great work. I'm sure you think the same thing. Because I what I hear is people are always like, why would you connect with them? They're your competition. And I'm like, Because we have a lot in common. Yeah, no, it's a lot of a lot in common. Let's do it.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

Yeah, there's a lot of commonalities, and I I can tell you, I do not do fractional leadership. Um, I do some executive coaching um only by proxy because God just pushes me in that way sometimes. But I actually I'm glad that you said that because I want to talk about what fractional coaching, fractional leadership training is, um, because a lot of people will not know. There's a lot of people who go, oh, I know what that is. It's just a common thing. Um, but there's a lot of people who really won't know what that is, and there's a difference in that. Um so I want you to speak a little bit about that, Kyle. What does fractional mean in that process in in layman's terms for somebody who may not understand it?

SPEAKER_00 3:42

Yeah. Right off the bat, I mean, obviously, it basically means that no one company is paying me for 40 hours of my time and that full-time salary, right? So that's uh, I think one important distinction to help just keep it cost afforded. Uh, because coming from Chick-fil-A, my background, we could afford to pay me full-time and expect me to do that 100% of the time. And a lot of large corporate companies can do that as well. But one small business owner that I'm actually doing a training with and thinking about going full-time with her in a few weeks, or not full-time, but bringing me in more on a regular basis in a fractional way. She worked at a large bank here in the area, really known for their commitment to employees, and she was lamenting, she was like, Kyle, I received so much training and development when I was in the corporate world, but now as a business owner, I've got a small team. I don't have the budget for a HR person, I don't have the budget for an LD person. What can I do? And so we were friends, and I was like, Well, that's actually what I do is I come in to small and medium-sized businesses that can't afford somebody full-time or don't don't really have that same need. And I say, okay, how do I come in, figure out the specific challenges that your team is facing and help them overcome that through leadership training, through workshops, through coaching, whatever we need. But I like to think of myself not as just an outside advisor, but as part of the team, helping set strategy, review PLs if need be, figure out what exactly does this organization need to succeed in its people strategy, whether that's hiring, whether that's training, whether that's coaching and development, and kind of unleashing my full self just in a limited number of hours to do that. And so that's been really rewarding to be able to help out smaller companies that are amazing in doing great things, but don't always get the same attention as larger companies.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

It's really beautiful. I, you know, I guess a lot of times we forget about that, right? Because it's always like a lot of times it's like reaching for the stars. Oh, you want the big client, you want to land the big one. Um, but I think there's so much value and and and the the lady that you're working with is so right. Um, I know when I've been in bigger organizations, you know, uh learning and development is kind of at your hands. It's kind of in fact, it kind of gets exhausting sometimes because you're just always, always in the thick of it. And and now being the CEO of IOL and it it's we're a smaller company working with uh medium, large companies, doing something completely different. But I can see the value in that because what we create a lot of learning and development behind the scenes. And so I can see the value that small companies I know like I couldn't it wouldn't be feasible at this stage, right, to bring in somebody full-time just to to help us learn how to lead and and function. And there's value in that, right? There's value in somebody coaching me to tell me, hey, we need to do this differently or that differently. And so I love that you're bringing an opportunity to smaller companies by doing that fractional work. And so, so to wrap that up, fractional work means one, it's affordable, hopefully, and um it's is accessible to to everyone versus we're we're not talking just the big, you know, fortune, fortune 500 companies or or you know, like big corporations like Chick-fil-A, although we're gonna talk about Chick-fil-A because I love Chick-fil-A. So we'll we'll kind of pivot over to that a little bit. So you worked with Chick-fil-A for a long time. I am actually in Arkansas now, but I was um I grew up in just north of Atlanta in Marietta, so huge Chick-fil-A fan. We had a Chick-fil-A across from our high school that we were allowed to go to for lunch. And so in Arkansas, though, I'm gonna give a shout out to Chick-fil-A. We're missing out on Chick-fil-A in Arkansas. There are a few here and there. We have like the closest one I think we have is about 45-50 minutes away. Um, and I was talking I was actually talking to somebody else about that yesterday. Um, this kind of crazy. So, Chick-fil-A, if you ever want to send us some sandwiches, uh, we'll take that, nuggets, um, because we're out here in the middle of nowhere. But I I wanted to kind of segue into that because I am a huge Chick-fil-a fan for a lot of reasons. Um, one, because I love their food. And um, I don't know that you can get better than Polynesian sauce, but that's just my personal preference. But also their business model and what they do. And so um, you know, they look, I don't Christian, non-Christian, you may not like their food, but their business model and the way that they run their teams is exceptional. And so you've been able to be an integral part of that. And so let's talk about that a little bit. Um, and and we don't have to specifically talk about uh Chick-fil-A, but just the work that you do there and how you are able to help teams um that might be struggling.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Yeah, so uh it was really fun. So I did how I wound up at Chick-fil-A was I did about five years of church ministry, both in college ministry and youth ministry, and then kind of quit my job. I had hit some burnout, was trying to get another college ministry job, weirdly ended up at Chick-fil-A uh through some circumstances where it was like basically I got I was young, dumb, and 24, stopped applying because I thought I was going to land a job in Virginia. After four months, they told me I was their second favorite candidate via voicemail. No. So I'm you know calling up friends and went and been like, hey, uh, come work at Chick-fil-A. So ended up, they were just getting a second store at the time, so I came in to be the director of HR. So hiring talent, discipline, that sort of thing. And very quickly realized that we had a huge turnover and culture problem. We had streaming matches from front of house to back of house. We had a chick believe. I know people can never believe it, but we did. No. But we had also the opposite problem where people weren't holding accountability conversations because they were trying to be nice, but instead they were just allowing problems to fester. And so I can see that was a toxic culture where people kept leaving. And as the guy who was responsible for staffing and hiring, I was like, hey, we can't have good people that I know are good because I just hired them six weeks ago leaving because of this, and I realized that we were promoting leaders because they were good at making chicken sandwiches, not because they were good at leading and developing people.

SPEAKER_01 11:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

And not really through a fault of their own. They had just never been taught these skills.

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:25

And so I said, okay, I've read some leadership books, I've taught extensively. Can I create something that helps our leaders? So started out as a six-week course, and over the years it kind of grew to a speak leadership course, really focused around communication, accountability, really helping people grow. And so that gradually became my full-time job was trying to figure out how do I develop our leaders, how do I develop our team. So we created leadership courses, finance courses teaching people about money and budgeting and stuff. And then a few years on into my role, we actually created a mentorship program. So everybody on our team, even the 16-year-old taking your order in the drive-thru, had a one-on-one mentor who was helping give them quarterly feedbacks and monthly goals with them, really helping develop every person on our team. Uh, and so it was really fun, engaging work of trying to say, okay, how do we?

SPEAKER_01 12:39

That's really incredible. I mean, that's that's a massive feat that you did. And um, so we can just attribute it Chick-fil-A's amazing leadership to Kyle. Yeah, I mean, that's a that's a big uh load that you took on in at a very young age. Um, very impressive. Uh yeah, I'm like, I'm I'm kind of like uh starstruck a little bit there. That's very cool. You did very well. I think a lot of times, large and small, uh, we run into that, right? Is like we just really haven't trained the teams well. And then you end up having this culture within the organization that's just like you said, very toxic. And toxic, you know, we think of that and we think of the yelling and screaming, but that's not always um what it is. You know, it can very much be that, like you said, like if you think of Chick-fil-A Christian organization, and everybody's trying to be nice and kind, but they're not really saying this is an issue or that's an issue. So that can be just as toxic. And so I'm really glad you brought that up. What a very valid point. So you have accomplished a lot because you're still very young. I'm very old. You're um, but you you have definitely accomplished a lot. You are married, and you guys have a baby coming in September, a little boy, is that right?

SPEAKER_00 13:52

Yes, we're super excited.

SPEAKER_01 13:55

That is excredi. My son was born in September, so uh I saw that and I was like, oh, that's very exciting. So, congratulations to you and your wife Ashlyn on that. That is super exciting. And um, so you also have you have a dog named Pickles, and so I gotta ask, is that a Chick-fil-A thing or a pickleball thing?

SPEAKER_00 14:13

Probably more of a pickleball thing. My wife I play a lot of pickleball. I'm trying to get my wife more into it. Obviously, we can't be playing right now when she's six months pregnant, yeah. Yeah, but uh I was like, it's healthy right in. She's like the bending down no, like this is not the right kind of yeah, it's healthy when you're not six months pregnant, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

Yeah, I I can I can feel that with her. Uh so I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna side with her on that right now. After maybe. Then you'll have to teach the baby how to play pickleball too. So no, that's great. You you're very well-rounded and a lot of fun. And you love Jesus too, and I love Jesus, and so that works out. And just super honored to have you on. Um, all right. So we've talked a little bit about your professional journey, what led you into leadership. So, what's one of the biggest leadership lessons that you've learned through working with teams and navigating those those environments that you've been in? Because you've been in a lot of different kinds of environments.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

Yeah, I think one of the biggest lessons that I've learned is that we have to talk to each other. And the way we talk to each other matters far more than I think we want to admit, right? Like I where I see a lot of teams struggling and where I do most of my work is just figuring out how do we have hard conversations that we'd probably rather avoid, and then how do we bring both clarity and care to that conversation? So I pull a lot from crucial conversations, pull a lot from radical candor, uh by Kim Scott. But there's just a lot of issues that I see where teams are either afraid to have the conversations because they're uncomfortable, or because honestly, a lot of people just have never been trained on how to do this. And what are the steps? How do I monitor my tone? How do I monitor my emotions? How do I start? How do I end? There's a lot of this that people just were never taught how to do. But I also see organizations where unfortunately they love to be the one with the hammer playing whack-a-mole, but they aren't good when they happen to be the mole. And so it's like, okay, how do we instead of playing whack-a-mole and just bringing out our anger and uh inflicting some pain with hard conversations, how do we have those in a more respectful conversation and a way that's true?

SPEAKER_01 16:49

Yeah, what a great answer too. Um, because I think that's applicable to all of life. As soon as you said that answer, I was thinking, yeah, it that is truly something in in a confession state that I struggle with, I think, because when we get, and the reason is this is because when we get busy or we get overwhelmed or life just seems like it's throwing a million things at us, we are more apt from a human nature standpoint to not employ those those practices of stopping and slowing down and thinking about the other person's feelings, not reacting right away, kind of sitting in it for a little bit. Um and so I think that applies not only to our work in organizations where we're working per se, um, but it also applies so much to our lives in general, to our relationships with others, whether it be at work or at home, with in our families, in our marriages, with our children. You'll you'll get to learn that they have very, very big personalities very, very quickly. And so yeah, I think it's I think it's so important to remember that when you're inside an organization, but it's also so important to remember that every day all the time. And it and other people's feelings matter. If you, if we're working together and you come to me and you say, Hey, what you said to me, you know, how you said it really kind of hurt my feelings. It's important that I stop and go, hmm, you know what, let me think about that. Maybe it was. And I maybe I didn't mean it, maybe I was just really busy at the time, or maybe I did mean it and I need to apologize for it. So I think it's two ways. I think it's one having the um the comfort zone to speak what you need to when you need to, but also to do it it kindly and to react and not react. So that's a really, really important what a what a important lesson learned that I think even at my age in mid 40s, still it's it's a struggle sometimes to to always do that. Um, so that that's my little confession of the day. I do try, I'm better than I used to be. Um, but I think when when the day catches up with you and things have gotten a little overwhelming, and then it's just like, oh, I just I'm done, you know. And so we have to be careful how we act and react to other people. So it's a really, really important lesson. Um all right, so along those lines, um, how important do you believe that communication and relationship building are when it comes to effective leadership?

SPEAKER_00 19:17

I think that's the key. I think that's the linchpin to all good leadership because most of the leaders I know rarely struggle with the technical skills. That rarely struggle with doing the work itself. Like every now and then I come across people where I'm like, okay, we we have to figure out how to, you know, move the drive-thru faster, or we have to figure out how to generate more revenue, or whatever that is. But typically what I see people struggling with and even holding them back from increased revenue or moving the drive-thru fast is that inability to communicate effectively and figuring out, okay, how do I drive results while still showing people I care? How do I hold an accountability conversation that strengthens the relationship instead of driving that person away or shutting them down, right? Or how do I make sure that I'm figuring out uh the best way to actually approach a conversation where people are seeing that I'm vulnerable and that I'm not saying I have it all figured out, but I'm saying, hey, I don't know this, but that also doesn't excuse you from all wrong. And so I'm coaching a guy who works for a large cement quarry which is like okay. And at first I was like, I don't I don't know what in the world, you know, like can I help? Right? I want to help, but can I help, right? Is always the question as you're looking at different industries and all the problems that they're facing are related to communication and people. And it was funny because we're talking about they're running into an issue where they were needing to get higher production out of a certain tower plant like crushes rock into smaller rock and they ship it off to make concrete or something. I I'm still not 100% sure on a I I'm still learning, right? But it was funny because you can look at that and go, oh, that's a very technical problem, right? The plant is not getting is not able to fill up enough railroad course. Here's the thing. And so we're talking about okay, well, like as you're approaching this situation and you're talking to this operator, what's going on? How's how are you having that conversation? And so we talk. through that conversational approach of not just getting the answer of hey be better I'll be better boss but like hey what what are you actually going to do like who does what by when and follow up on that and let's get you and them some clarity on what needs to change and it was funny they he had that conversation that night and the next time he met he was like hey we set a record that night and it was crazy because it was one of those things where we changed like we didn't focus on the technical we just got clearer in our communication of not just this vague I'll be better which nobody knows what that means but hey here's what we need you to do how can I help with this let's get super specific on what needs to change and boom now they're shipping out literally thousands of more tons of product because of one simple well handled conversation.

SPEAKER_01 23:05

Very nice yeah what a great lesson for all of us to learn though because sometimes it really is just not what can you do better but when can you do it better? When can you you know and having those targeted kind of questions and if you don't have good communication with your team if you can't you know I mean I honestly I'm gonna tell you I've been doing a a lot of a lot of work for a long time and I oh I see pickles in the background. And I don't know that that's a question that we regularly answer. And so what a what an incredible way to just kind of simplify it down to the kind of brass tacks of it like hey you know um you can tell me they can do better but when are you going to do better? How are you going to do better? What is the deliverable date on that? And instead of pushing pushing pushing I like how you allowed them to kind of think through that and then come back and then see the results of that what a valuable lesson. You are you are definitely wise beyond your years for sure and and you have a lot of a lot of really great insights that I think when I think what happens and I and you can kind of either agree or disagree which is fine either way but I think what happens is a lot of us as leaders get in the thick of things and we don't think about the the the simplicity of it. It's not little it's just simple, right? What a simple thing to to go to your tomb and say like hey I I know that you can do this and I know you can probably do it better than you're doing it. However when can you do it and how can you do it and and and what's that going to look like and just kind of simplifying it down.

SPEAKER_00 24:36

Yeah no I I I agree with that and I feel at Chick fil A my old boss always said go slow to go fast. Like a lot of times when we want to move faster we start acting almost erratically and trying to do more and more and more instead of simplify and slow it down and figure out okay what process do we need to improve right so at Chick-fil-A it's not that everybody is running around like this. Yeah like I'll tick on Dairy Queen for a bit like at Dairy Queen that one employee typically wears like eight hats they're taking your order they're accepting your money they're making your shake they're like grabbing your fries and doing everything they're working incredibly hard and so the line doesn't move right and you're right a hundred percent let's hire eight people each one of you breaks it down and does one simple job and I think that's where we as leaders when we feel that pressure to go okay hey we want to move forward we want to move faster go okay that's the temptation how do I lean against that and say okay let me slow down let me spend some time reflecting what what do I do to be better how can I communicate more effectively to my team how do I ask good questions how do I before I walk in and start speaking which is my preference of just let me walk in and try to solve it and start talking and let's go let's do things but going okay let me slow down let me really understand what's going on let me figure out what they need from me and then let's move forward but just taking the time to fight against that societal pressure to do more and more and more and to make your teams and your people do more right just like you said with that example with Dairy Queen.

SPEAKER_01 26:37

No shame to Dairy Queen we liked it we we don't have Chick fil A here but we do have Dairy Queen but I will tell you the line is always long. It's not that they their product isn't good right the pri and I think that's a huge lesson learned and a great example the product is good um and and serves a purpose. I mean I look I don't hate it but I think that when you're looking at that as as a comparison it's a good comparison because when we and any team we pour too much on our team members they cannot be successful and then therefore our organization is not successful. And then we're over here scratching our head well why why are we not making the numbers or why are we not bringing in the clients or why are we not serving people well I'm a huge proponent of serve serving people well one of the one of the other reasons truly um no cliche that I really do love the model of Chick-fil-A because they really do work very, very hard to serve the client well. And so whatever organization you're in big, small you know whether you're serving people to get to market, it's important that our teams are not so heavy laden and so heavy burden with so many things that they can't function well and they can't do well and that they don't have the autonomy to say I can't do one more thing. It's really important that you have a culture of allowing your team to say I one, I'm not good at this. I I shouldn't do it. And and we've talked a little on some other episodes like there's things you're gonna have to do regardless, right? We all have that that thing that we have to do in our job that we really don't love and that's okay. But I think giving your teams the autonomy to say this is not my expertise. I am not good at this I'm not learning it well because we all have different talents we're all created differently we have different um ideas and and ways of working and so that communication with your teams and leaning into that and letting them say like I can't do one more thing. I can't do another thing. If I do another thing everything else is going to fall apart. And I think a lot of times we we've gotten into a culture especially here in the United States where it's like just do everything you can do everything and you can do it for one person's pay whatever that is whether it's you know $15 an hour or $200 an hour you should be able to do it all. And that's not fair. And it really destroys the culture of the company or good culture. And it also destroys the numbers like you said. You could you could have eight people doing a really really good job or one person just struggling and then hating it and you can't keep them who wants to do that you know not me so very valid point. What advice which you've already given a lot of really good advice what uh advice would you give to younger professionals who are emerging leaders that are trying to grow their confidence like and and talk about things and communicate well with their superiors regardless of what the industry is right um because we could take a lesson away from that across industry. What would your advice be there?

SPEAKER_00 29:53

I think there are two pieces of advice one is that the only way to get better is to be bad first you're you're not going to be great at handling hard conversations well off the bat you aren't going to magically succeed at everything right off the bat right and so it's like okay hey be bad and what what is that kind of question of if you knew it took a hundred no's to get to a yes what would you do? You'd start asking everybody you know right and so that's the same way with okay how long will it take you to get good well the more times you try and go out on your own and spend some time reflecting afterwards the more likely you are to succeed in that. And then the second bit of advice I'd give to any young professional is everybody has overplayed how awesome your first or second job will be like everybody from your parents to your professors has lied to you and it's on it's almost another because I keep running into early you know because I did lots of college ministry even after leaving formally and everybody's built up this amazing idea of I'm going to get that dream job that I've always had and I'm going to find so much fulfillment and purpose in it. And then they get there and they get to be 24 and they're like Kyle what's going on I still have this hole in my life this pursuing this job didn't fill it I'm I'm not paid as much as I thought I'd be the work's kind of cool but it's not as great as I like I'm not saving the world like I was promised I would be what's going on and the answer is that like no one job can like fill you and that with my faith background and your faith background obviously we go okay that hole can only be filled through Jesus and align our aligning our purpose and calling with his kingdom but it's just a bigger thing that I see of like hey just tone down your expectations for those jobs and there's a lot of us doing incredibly satisfying work that I think you would say that. I think I would say that and I'd also say that neither one of us are going, you know, every day's amazing and I feel like I'm saving the world every day but we build up young people to say that's what you're going to do and it's a completely wrong expectation of what work in early young adulthood or like that mid young adulthood is like yeah those both very good and valid points and not ones that I think that we think about on the regular one.

SPEAKER_01 32:48

Yeah I think we build it up like oh well you can do anything you want to do and be anything you want to be well no you can't you cannot do anything you cannot be anything you can be I think and I I'm gonna come back to what you said about the faith here's what I have learned later in my life and it it's it's been an ebb and flow right but I have very much learned that when I am following God's purpose for my life when I'm doing what he is asking me to do one it's not gonna be easy it's not always gonna be you know you're sitting on a beach in in Maui or whatever very rarely but the fulfillment that comes because you're following his purpose is so much greater than the dollar value one and that sounds that sounds like oh that can't be true. It is true additionally when you are following God's purpose and your work and in other things but we're since we're talking about work at this point you will see dividends you will see things if you if you're in God's purpose if you're following Christ if you are um working through um what God's design is for for your life for your marriage for your family before you have a family um you need to be working on how does this work what does this look like what is what is God's plan and when you do that there's this incredible way that things just tend to align and and you're like I don't know how I'm doing it but I'm doing it and I don't know how the bills are getting paid because it it's not logical right but God will provide in ways that you never imagined that he will provide he will make a way where like quote the song where you didn't think there was and it's true it really is when you align your values well with what God's plan is versus what your plan I mean you might have had the idea that oh I'm gonna go run a Fortune 500 company and I'm gonna be the best at it. Well God might want you out in ministry he might want you serving people in a completely different way and but he'll still provide it may not be what you thought in your head it was going to look like additionally real quick um I want to say it's it is important that you can fail, right? Like you said, you can mess it up you can do a bad job because that for me in my life that is how I've learned more than anything is failing. I think it's important as leaders we allow our team members to fail. It's okay let's get back up let's learn the lesson and let's move on you know there's a there's a saying called failing fast and I was I was very blessed and honored to learn about that a very long time ago and learn that and and have great leadership that let me fail and but but also helped me pick back up and say hey that didn't work that's okay let's figure out what will work so great advice Kyle you're you're very wise in that your answers are are fantastic. So um I want to be respectful of your time and everybody's time um and so on this podcast I don't know how many episodes you've listened to but we always ask everybody the same two questions. And so I'm I'm getting ready to ask you those two pivotal questions and we'll see what your answers are. I'm always excited to hear what everybody's answers are to them. It's kind of just like a fun little thing. But before we do that I want you to talk a little bit about um the name of your company Hourglass leadership tell us how did you come across that what what is the what is the behind the scenes on that?

SPEAKER_00 36:19

Yeah so we came up with it because a big focus of our company is mentorship and leaders investing into employees or other leaders and so we came up with this idea as we threw up 50 names on a whiteboard and we were like hourglass and then I was like thinking about it and I was like oh that's how our approach is is that as a leader is investing into a team member we think of that as sand flowing from one side of the hourglass to the other as they're communicating skills and purpose and belonging the hourglass gradually fills up but what we realized as we did this more and more was that the hourglass flips over and as the leader is meeting with the team member that team member is also finding a greater sense of fulfillment and purpose. They're feeling more like they truly belong they're finding their place in the world and so their side of the hourglass is filling up as well and so through mentorship through development both sides are constantly flipping back and forth empowering and engaging each other and so we thought the hourglass name was fitting.

SPEAKER_01 37:38

That is so beautiful I love that very well done very intentional very thought out um and so I have really really enjoyed getting to know you better today um a lot of fascinating stuff and and just really intelligent and wise information and so so yeah kudos to you on all that's very cool. All right so here's the two questions start with the first one who is the most influential person or persons you can say more than one in your life that's left a lasting legacy on the way that you lead and mentor and serve others that's a good one.

SPEAKER_00 38:15

There's so many people in my life who I could I could talk about that for an hour. But I'll go back to my early college days there was an elder at our church named Jeff Errington who he and his wife Linda uh poured a ton into our college ministry and so how I got my start in college ministry is my our college minister kind of left unexpectedly and they asked myself and another friend to be interns and that led to me gradually moving up the ranks to be like the college minister where the whole time I was doing the same work but my title changed even though my paid in it but that's another that happens a lot it does. Get used to it happens a lot take advantage of young people but whole nother but just the Errington's willingness to just spend so much time with us investing in us valuing us and showing us what a loving marriage looks like but also just what following God looks like in your career in your personal life what does it look like to not be you know in your 50s or 60s and say hey I have all the answers but to walk alongside college students and say hey I want to learn about following Jesus from you and we're like but I want to learn from you but I think that humility and willingness to say yes I have wisdom but I don't know all the answers and let's walk humbly together to follow Jesus together was always beneficial. And I think carrying that wisdom and curiosity of saying hey even as a leader I don't know everything. We're in this together let's partner together because we're stronger when we're willing to admit that hey we can be vulnerable with one another and we don't have it all figured out I think that was really impactful for my leadership.

SPEAKER_01 40:24

Very nice very good answer. I like that a lot too that's that's very biblical based on uh well multiple places in the Bible but Titus too as well um which is really really near and dear to my heart. I think it's so important um like you said that we learn from the younger and the older in that when we're older we remember um that we need to one still learn um and we need to be open to learning new things. I think a lot of times we get kind of stuck in a rut the older that we get um and we don't really think we think like and I'm old enough to kind of like get to that point like oh these young kids they're just crazy they don't know you know but they do they know so much and they're wise beyond their years and they have a lot of information. They they know things that we don't know. They see things that we don't see and so it's important that we listen it's also so very important that at any age that we are mentoring. I think you kind of hit the nail on the head there. Like if we're not mentoring, if we're not pouring into people you know it it's not about the notoriety of it, right? But who's ever going to say your name if you're never pouring into people and and it's really not about saying the name but it's it's that you know I look back and I have people in my life that really poured into me, invested in me you know mentally, physically spiritually pouring into me teaching me training me and and helping me to learn how to be a better person, um, a better leader and so if we're not being that person to someone at least on a fairly regular basis we should be we should be reaching out to people and and and saying hey how are you? I I noticed either this was going on or that was going on what you know how how can I help? Can I help? Can I talk with you? Can I pray with you? Um or sometimes you just need to sit in the quiet with somebody you know and just and and just be there for them. Sometimes that's the best mentorship that you can do is that they just need somebody to sit with them. That was a great answer and and I'm glad that you were able to have good mentorship in that and good training in that with people who who love the Lord and cared enough to kind of walk you through some of that and it's clearly paying off so all right let's let's give you the last question. Uh when people reflect on your life Kyle and your leadership what do you hope that your legacy will be that's a hard one isn't a big question. It is a big question.

SPEAKER_00 42:52

I think that I would love um people to pass on the ability to communicate with care and clarity after I'm not in the room of going okay how do how do I communicate differently and how do I teach my team to communicate differently because of what Kyle taught me and seeing that it works. Uh and that you can still drive amazing results while still being a human and you can still be a kind thoughtful person while making things happen, right? And so I think F in every organization that I work with and you know at Chick-fil-A and in churches where it's going, okay how do I want people to thinking about you know Jesus and love and what that looks like on a practical basis the free Of the spirit, kindness, patience, love, gentleness, a lot of them express themselves through communication. And so it's like, okay, how do I help people work on themselves so that people experience the fruits of the spirit and the love of Jesus more consistently because they are communicating in more effective ways where Jesus can shine through us.

SPEAKER_01 44:32

Perfect Dan. You win. You win the answer that really, really, really good answer. Kyle, I am so glad that you found us. Um, what an honor it has been to just talk to you. And I've learned a lot from you today. I've been reminded of a lot of things that I think that we're we're easy to forget, right? We're easy to kind of push to the side because life is busy or we're doing this or we're doing that, and we got to get this done and got to get that done. But I think just the stopping, the slowing down, and remembering that we need to communicate well. We need to allow other people to communicate to us and receive it well, um, and and kind of take that inventory when we need to. Um, I love the the premise behind the hourglass in in the name and in all that you're doing. Uh what what a very cool uh connection. So we were connected by Chris. So shout out to Chris McClure. Um so you guys are kind of in the same space too, but you guys kind of mentor with each other back and forth, which is really, really nice. Um, I love your openness to work with other people, even in the same space, like you said. I think that's one integral way that we we learn and grow together. Like you can you can learn things from Chris, and he can learn things from you as we move forward. And I I love that idea. It's it's that old school biblical idea of you know just mentoring one another, and it's so important. And so you really, really taught me a lot today, and I appreciate that so much. So tell people how can they find you? You're on LinkedIn, and you got a web, you there's a website.

SPEAKER_00 46:05

Yes, so uh we've got a website, hourglass dash leadership.com. That dash saved us like three thousand dollars, so we value the dashboards. But then uh you can also reach me on LinkedIn. I'm very active there. Uh, you can email me. My email is Kyle at hourglass-leadership.com. I'd love to talk to you if you're interested. If you just want to talk about more of what I can do or if I could help your team uh what that would look like. I'd love to talk to you and just figure that out. Um however works best for you.

SPEAKER_01 46:43

Yeah. Well, I'm so grateful for you for coming on today. Um, it's been a really, really good conversation and and um it's funny, not funny, how God works and how he just brings the right people at the right time with the right conversations, just put things in perspective and in and kind of just align where where things are. And so I I appreciate you. I appreciate your wisdom. I appreciate your kindness and your good communication and just being on here and having a good conversation with us. I think that a lot of people who listen to this will be able to take a lot of insights away from this. And and I'm really, really grateful to you. I hope maybe we can have you back one day and and we can have another talk. And yeah, I just really appreciate you being on. Thank you so much. Everybody go check uh Kyle out and and see what he's doing and and maybe you can gain some more insights from him. I think that would be important. So awesome.

SPEAKER_00 47:36

Well, thank you so much for having me.