Think Outside the Box with Clinton "Brooks" Herman | #LeadwithLegacy | Episode 36

How do great leaders build trust, develop people, and solve problems others don't even see?

In Episode 36 of the Lead with Legacy™ Podcast, Amanda Chambers and Sloane Lott welcome Clinton "Brooks" Herman, an experienced project management leader in the healthcare construction industry. Brooks shares practical leadership lessons from overseeing complex infrastructure projects while discussing what it means to think outside the box, prioritize people over tasks, embrace innovation, and build a legacy that lasts.

Throughout this conversation, Brooks offers valuable insights on leadership, project management, servant leadership, AI, communication, customer relationships, and raising up the next generation of leaders.

In this episode, you'll discover:

Why thinking outside the box creates better leaders
The unique role of an owner's representative
Leading project managers instead of simply managing projects
How communication builds trust during complex projects
Why efficiency should never replace integrity
Using AI as a leadership tool—not a replacement for people
Developing teams that grow beyond your leadership
Leaving a legacy your family and colleagues will remember

Whether you're leading projects, teams, organizations, or your own family, this conversation offers practical wisdom grounded in faith, service, and intentional leadership.

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

🌐 Learn more about IOL Global:
www.iolglobal.com

🔗 Connect with Clinton "Brooks" Herman

LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/clintonbrooksherman/

Website:
https://www.cbherman.com

Blogs:
https://www.cbherman.com/blogs.html#/

Support the Lead with Legacy™ Podcast:
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

#LeadWithLegacy #IOLGlobal #ServeGod #ServePeople #FaithBasedLeadership #ChristianLeadership #LeadershipDevelopment #LegacyLeadership #KingdomLeadership #ServantLeadership #LeadershipPodcast #AmandaChambers #PublicServiceLeadership #LeadershipWithPurpose

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.com. Hello, welcome back to the Lead with Legacy Podcast. So blessed and honored today to have Mr. Clinton Brooks Herman, who's going to explain a little bit about more about himself and who he is. But before we get into that, also we have Sloane Lott, the Director of Operations for IOL Global here as well. And such an honor to have her here and a part of these podcasts. Before we get going, I'm just going to give the regular spiel like, subscribe on your favorite platform. We are on Buzz Sprout, YouTube, iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music. And so go there and like and subscribe and comment if you're on YouTube because it really, really helps us to get more reach. And if you like us, and or even if you don't like us, you can still comment. We'll take it. We can take it. So I call you Brooks, uh, but you and we've known each other um virtually um for a couple years now. You are and your beautiful wife and your two beautiful children are down in Houston, Texas. And so we met um a it's been gosh, is it been two years in August? I think two years. It's been two years.

SPEAKER_00 1:26

Sure, even longer than that if you go back to the PM Mastery podcast. You're right. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 1:31

So we've known each other for quite some time between a couple of different affiliations and projects and things like that. And I've been anxiously awaiting having you on the show. And so thank you for your time. I know you're very, very busy. We're gonna talk about that, but you go ahead, tell us who you are, what you do, and then we'll kind of just grill you with some questions.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Sure, sounds good. Appreciate y'all inviting me on. So nice and confusing. My name is uh in there in the box that says Clinton Brooks Herman. Amanda called me Brooks. I have three first names. It's real confusing for everybody, but I do go by Brooks, but don't ever I I respond to all three, so it's okay. I am a leader of project managers and have been in that role for about two and a half years now. And I work for a major healthcare institution in the Houston Metroplex, and we particularly work on the MEP infrastructure projects. I've been a project manager prior to that. Oh goodness, 15, 17, 18 years. I I've lost count. Um, I feel like I still do project management from day to day. It's more of how to build my team members versus how to build a construction project. So all right.

SPEAKER_01 2:51

So for backups a little bit for people who don't know, which would be me, what is the MEP? I uh I have a goal. Say it again.

SPEAKER_00 2:59

Oh, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing. So all the things, if you think about your house, I handle all the things that nobody cares about until they break.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Correct. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:10

I don't get to do the fancy painting on the walls when you want to change it from green to blue or red or whatever. Uh it's all the things that you don't care about until it gets really, really hot or it's really dark because you don't have electricity.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

So but you're doing this on a massive scale, right? And in yeah, like not a house, like a mass scale. But you guys just did move. Yes, and so that was exciting too, except for that we were talking off-air that your air conditioner went off, and in Houston in the summer, that's not exciting.

SPEAKER_00 3:39

It's a little toasty, it's a little human in part of the house.

SPEAKER_01 3:43

Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Well, it's such an honor, truly, uh, to have you on again. I've been anxiously awaiting it. We've had some other conversations on some other platforms. Um, you're brilliant. It's I was kind of um, I'm not making fun of you. I'm laughing at the industry in itself because I've been on a couple of recordings lately, you know, and a lot with project managers, and it's all the acronyms, and I just don't know them all. And I don't know that anyone knows them all. And I was joking the other day on another recording that I think I'm gonna make a quiz. Um, and maybe you can help me with this because you're really brilliant at things like this. And we would make an acronym quiz for project managers and see how many that that are actually like we all know. You know, there's some we know and there's others we don't know. And I was on this other recording the other day, and I'm like, I have no idea what y'all are saying. Like, nothing. Y'all just went totally down an acronym, like highway that I've never. So we had to stop and we had to we had to uh explain all of those. And I just think it's funny because every time I think I have a grasp on it, then I turn around and I have no idea. Like, and maybe I would had no clue.

SPEAKER_00 4:44

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 4:44

I'm like, is that a certification? Is that some new thing that I don't know about?

SPEAKER_00 4:49

Our department alone has a three-page acronym thing, and I've already I've got a new PM and he's already pinged me, like, hey, what's that mean? You said something, I'm like, it's not on your list, and he said, Nope. So it's a new one.

SPEAKER_01 5:03

I'm telling you, there's a new one every day. There's a new one.

SPEAKER_00 5:06

Yeah. And we're only 1% of the uh population of our uh where I work, so it's it's uh wow. There's a lot of other acronyms that are out there.

SPEAKER_01 5:15

So it's it's crazy, yeah. So we're I I'm in my head, I have like this cog going. I probably just put it in your head now of like, well, you already have a spreadsheet of it. So you're so that's one of the things that I I really admire about you is like you are a spreadsheet guy, you are crazy organized. Like, I mean, two, I I feel like I'm a planner and organizer, but you absolutely take it to the next level, and I just admire that so much because that just is like a total nerd out, and I love it. And and so when on some of the other stuff we worked on, I mean, you are on it, you are ahead of time, you are everything is just so, it is perfect. And so what keeps that driving you? Is it just intrinsic, like that's just how you are, or do you work hard at it?

SPEAKER_00 5:59

So it's a mixture of both. I mean, it's definitely in the blood, but I've always been, I don't want you never know what's coming up next. Something else is gonna hit and it's gonna cause another issue that you weren't planning as we talked this week. The AC went out. I thought I was gonna have no hiccups and be good to go with the uh the podcast, but nope, there's the hiccup. But I mean we're still good. The it's you kind of have to roll with the punches as they come. But if you plan ahead or start taking care of the tasks before the task is supposed to be done, you're not sitting there rushing around and then if anyone decides that, hey, we need to make a slight adjustment here, and uh you you can hit the ground running and and alter with that adjustment, if you will.

SPEAKER_01 6:52

So yeah, so true. I feel the same way. We can't plan everything, right? It's it's impossible for us to plan, but if we plan well, hopefully ahead of time, especially on the bigger things, then um we're better equipped to deal when something happens. So I'm gonna let Sloane take us away a little bit and ask some questions back and forth and get to know you a little bit because she you guys have been talking virtually, but you guys haven't had a chance to talk yet. And so she's been excited too about this.

SPEAKER_02 7:19

So yeah, Brooks, I feel like I know you. Amanda has spoken so highly of you. I I feel like I've known you for as long as she has. So I am excited uh to jump right in. I also I'm a middle name person. I go by my middle name. So I understand that. I've had the awkward, they called the first name in a waiting room, and I'm like, why won't that person get up and go? And that person is me. So, you know, and then they think, well, we probably should check her brain while she's here too. But you know, it's just that's just the way it is.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Sometimes that's worthwhile checking.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

Yeah, that's right. You never know. I just proof that I have one would be nice from from day to day. But what first drew you into construction and project management?

SPEAKER_00 7:58

Sure. So this actually goes back to even preschool. Um, apparently I received uh my parents, I did not. My parents received a call to have me come up there before they did their parents showing. I I forget what they call it, but it's just a show off of the school of what we are teaching your kids and so on and so forth. And they called me up and they're like, hey, do you mind bringing your son here early to go mess with the big blocks? I think they're like big two by two blocks or three by threes. I mean, just big grand scale. And they're like, we want him to put it together. So that kind of started my I didn't know but goal to get into construction. But my parents uh kind of, yeah, you should go into architecture and uh look at that. And then I went through an architecture internship, and that's not for me. More power to the people that can do it. I love playing in AutoCAD, but that was not it. But then I ended up applying to Texas AM, got accepted, and uh got into what is called construction science at Texas AM. And when I was going through the reviews beforehand, I think it's Parents Week in there, where you can kind of hear about each of the degrees. I was like, oh no, I'm in the wrong degree. Well, sir, sorry, you can't change anything until uh your first year's up, and both most your classes are the same. So I was like, man, that's gonna be fun. Hopefully I like this. So ended up going through the first year and uh didn't change anything. And I've been in project management, if you will, since I graduated from college. But I had a time in there where I changed over to the owner's rep role, which is what I'm in now. So it's all it's always been there in the blood to answer your question. I've always had a desire to be in project management. Doing team projects with uh different team members, I kind of always took the lead and just was like, okay, let's go, let's do this. You're working on this, let's get this project done and be able to turn it in early. So then the teacher might be able to tell us, hey, make this adjustment, you'll be looking at five points more.

SPEAKER_02 10:16

So you were the classmate everybody wanted for the group project. Everybody was fingers crossed for Brooks. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:25

A lot of the times. And uh I I had envy though, and was like, I want to be on that person's team too. So it goes all ways, even if you're the one because I didn't think I was the one, but I look back and I'm like, I guess I was.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

So you were the one. So, real quick, I'm gonna interject. Sorry, Sloan. I could because I've I had it had slipped my mind that you were an owner's rep. And so for people who are listening who do not know what that is, I want to talk about that because it's a really unique and a really specialized role. It's very cool. And I don't know why I don't know why it slipped my mind. But, anyways, when you said that, it kind of piqued my interest because I want to talk about that. I want you, if you will, to explain to all of us what that role is. Because I had to learn that um back when we were working together before, okay, what is an owner's rep? So some people who are pretty deep in project management probably know that, um, but others may not. And it's such a specialized, such a very cool role. So tell us a little bit about that. What does that mean? An owner's rep.

SPEAKER_00 11:17

Sure. So uh in perspective, if you think that you're wanting to go build a home, then you end up going to the local home builder and you reach out to them and say, Hey, I want to build this. But I act as you as the owner wanting to go build that home. So I I don't have direct control of the general contractors. I can I hire them, I make sure that they're guided towards our uh typical specs and drawings that were put for the particular project or that we might have if we didn't go get them. Our master specs, if you will. And uh we just make sure that the project at the end of the day is staying within budget schedule and turning over to the institution that I work for in a timely manner. And I've done this on the small box retail, large box retail, ground up tilt walls. I've been in higher ed, now I'm in uh healthcare facilities, so and research. Uh I've kind of been there, done that. They they all have their similarities and nuances and differences for each of them. But at the end of the day, we're making sure that the owner's interests are understood.

SPEAKER_02 12:40

So I think that's really great because I can you're in the middle of two groups that are speaking totally different languages. If you were representing me, you know, I would be really technical, like that gray thingy, and you've got to know, you've got to be able, you know, because I don't know, but I know I know what I want. But then you go to the people who make it happen and you don't say she wants that gray thingy. You tell them exactly what it is and you make sure it's done properly and well. And and I think that's really important because I'm doing a small project here where I live, and it's difficult. And this is much, a much smaller scale than what you're doing. So I know people are very happy to have you represent them.

SPEAKER_00 13:30

Yeah, it it's uh it's a unique skill to be able to translate, if you will, even though you're speaking the exact same language.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

And it's a specialized position too, because you have to be an incredibly trustworthy person. Because if if you're working for me as an owner's rep, then you have you have to know my my interest. Um, you have to understand my best interest, you have to understand different things, such as like what what my choices are of things, also what kind of financial like you're you have some power in that.

SPEAKER_03 14:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

And so you have to understand, like, okay, here's the thresholds of of what we have. And I don't want you to go over that. And I want you to do the best to, you know, stay within budget. And so somebody who is a good owner's rep is hopefully working very, very hard to get the job done the way that it's been explained to get done, but do it under budget, uh, within, you know, the right time frames, not going over in time and things. So it's it's a massive role. It's very unique, very specialized. Um, and it takes a very, very special kind of person to be able to do that. Um, because again, like Sloan was saying, you're translating between different languages, really, and making sure everyone's on the same page and understanding and making sure that we get the blue tile and not the pink tile or whatever, you know, what or the correct pipes that are gonna last longer or whatever. And so, and you're doing this on a mass scale right now, which is really, really incredible. So sorry to veer off on that, but I just thought I I thought that was so interesting. And I remembered when you said that that that was your role, and I always thought that was just a fascinating role because it is not one uh you in I I know that there are a lot, I'm sure, in in project management, a lot of owner rep, but you don't hear about it a lot. A lot of people don't talk about it, it's not something that we discuss. I know like when you're going through um your your training for PMI certifications, they touch on it for like a half a second, you know. It's not on the test.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

It's very limited. It's not in school either.

SPEAKER_01 15:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:24

And to be perfectly honest, I landed in it similar to my degree. I wasn't expecting it. I uh was laid off due to the downturn when the company that I was, the general contractor I was with, didn't have any more work. And then I just started applying to anything I could, and uh it was really weird. I saw for months something that came up with Francesca's. They're no longer around anymore, but I kept seeing Francesca. So I was like, I don't know, it could be an Italian restaurant, it could be even reading the description and where I found the role. Like I told my manager once I ended up there, I was like, I don't know how the heck you found the place to post this, but there's maybe five people that look at it, and I was just getting I was draining the barrel and trying to find anything I could. Because it was hard during it was uh like 2010, so 08 had hit, all the bonds were drying up, so it was just it was dead.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:23

And uh I finally just said, forget it. I'm gonna throw my name in the hat. I have absolutely no clue what I'm doing. I went in there, got to interview, and ended up getting the role. And five days after I started, I was already in San Francisco, which goes into the part where I think Amanda, you and I've talked about before, but when I started as an owner's rep, I'd been to maybe eight states.

SPEAKER_01 16:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:47

And I have eight to go.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Yeah, you've done like you've almost done the entire thing. So yeah, you're you're getting there. And you guys took you were telling us before you took a big trip this summer, right?

SPEAKER_00 16:59

We did.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:00

We took our uh five-year-old to uh Switzerland and stayed with some friends there, and then we did some gallivanting a little bit with them as well, and went and saw Liechtenstein, which is basically a city-state.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:14

Got to hang out in Austria and the ski slopes a little bit. We didn't ski, a little toasty for that. Then we went down to uh what was that, northern Italy and eastern France we stayed a night in.

SPEAKER_02 17:28

So I really hate that for you, Brooks. I really hate that for you.

SPEAKER_00 17:32

Rough.

SPEAKER_01 17:33

So yeah, I have I have a contact. Um, we did some stuff. Gosh, it's been a long time. But he is from Australia, but he lives currently in Switzerland and works there on a contract. And he was so surprised because we were on an interview. It's been it's been probably a year or so, but we were doing an interview, and he was talking about how hot it was that day. And I guess that they don't have in air conditioners. He was telling us, like, there's no air conditioner because it's not anticipated, but they were getting like into the 80s, and he's like, We're just dying over here. Like he's like, it's so miserable. And I was like, Never ever in a million years did I think about Switzerland and think hot, hot.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

It it Switzerland's probably not as bad. And and where I was in Zurich, you could go hop in the lake. If it was 60 degrees, it was really cold. But it if you stay in that for a little bit, it was able to uh make it where it wasn't so bad for the other when you're dealing with no AC. So uh but it was funny because my friends preparing you for getting home their room.

SPEAKER_02 18:37

So now as a southerner, I think we all we all need to comment on the humidity in Switzerland. Is it is the humidity anything like what we deal with?

SPEAKER_00 18:46

So it is humid there. It it is humid there. I I don't oh man, what was it floating around? Probably 60%. So not as bad as what we see like here in Houston. I mean, we float around 150 to 200.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

I was gonna say Arkansas's like 1,000%. It's yeah, it is especially this summer too. We've had a very um different summer than we've had for the last four or five years, and it is just I mean, not complaining about the rain because we needed it, we were in a drought, but the humidity is just off the chart. We have like we've just been melting. The gardens are happy, but we are happy, yes. Yeah, we it's it's already hard to breathe.

SPEAKER_00 19:28

Yeah, we were thrown for a loop over there. I mean, it we originally thought it was gonna be in the 60s and 70s, and then we get over there, it was perfect the first morning, and then after that, it was gosh, it was toasty.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

So that maybe someone listening needed to know that if you're on your way to Switzerland, you might pack two different kinds of sets of clothes because it might be really hot there.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

Well, apparently you have to watch the local weather. It it's because it because of the mountains that they're literally sitting in the middle of, the weather changes, the wind can change directions instantaneously. So my assumption is it's probably more like Denver if you've ever been there, where it can literally rain, snow, and uh drop temperatures, then go back up to 100 degrees in a matter of like 10 minutes.

SPEAKER_01 20:18

So well, as far as I know, we're not going to Switzerland anytime soon, unfortunately. However, if we are, I'm glad we have that tidbit of information so that we know better and we can pack appropriately. But I'm really glad you guys got to do it. It's really interesting. Lots of fun.

SPEAKER_03 20:30

It was fun.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

Yeah. Sloane, you got what do you have next first? We got off topic. It's fine.

SPEAKER_02 20:35

No, it's fine. So I do want to talk about the healthcare infrastructure projects and what makes them unique. You mentioned that your you and your crew make up one percent of this. So that's that's not a lot of people. But but w it it ha it has to be a fairly specialized group of people with with specialized knowledge. So what besides that makes it unique?

SPEAKER_00 20:57

Sure. So healthcare in general, if we're working with patients next door to us, if you will, throws in a lot of infection control that we have to be prepared for. Uh what you might hear from others is ICRA or ILSM, which ICRA is the infection control risk assessment, and then ILSM's interior life safety. And these are types of permits that we can get inside of a healthcare institution. Um, and they're things that we have to do in order to make sure uh not only the health of our patients, but it's uh part of the requirements for healthcare in general. But we end up putting up usually hard barriers uh depending on the type of project. If I'm painting a room or whatever, then I put up a hard barrier that uh no nothing dust otherwise can pass through, hopefully no odors. We usually have to run negative air machines that basically uh keep they would rather pull stuff from out. In the hallway and pull into that space versus it being positive and pushing it out into the space where patients are walking past us. So that those are just some of the minor nuances. I get lucky being that my MEP projects, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing projects, are usually behind the scenes.

SPEAKER_03 22:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:21

So if our mechanical door gets closed or is able to close for the work that we're doing, then usually we don't end up having to do those types of containments. But we still have instances where there might be a box that's above ceiling, I'm out in the middle of a corridor that we have to do, or uh we have a boatload of elevator projects that are going on right now, and we have to shut those down and make sure that if we do any dust, that we're we're reducing that. And there's different containment carts that we'll have, which are basically cubes, if you will, that are probably two foot wide by three foot long, and they have uh walls that can raise up to the ceiling so that you can keep the dust in there and you can turn a fan on or actually keep the dust from getting out of the space. So if you open up the ceiling, sometimes you just need to pop a ceiling tile and just look in that two foot by two foot area, and then you can get all the information you need or do what you need to do for the work. So that's some of the nuances on the healthcare side.

SPEAKER_01 23:28

Yeah, it's it's incredibly interesting because you don't think about that side of it a lot in like what all must have to well, true. You know, we don't know.

SPEAKER_00 23:37

We don't want you to know about all that stuff whenever you're a if if you're a patient or a visitor of a patient. We don't want you to know about all that going on.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

So very cool. And so I'm I'm gonna still I'm gonna still the next question just because it got me thinking about it because you were talking about the box. So you talk a lot, your your slogan you're saying is think outside the box. Is that where that comes from? Is think outside that box or a different one? Or all of them.

SPEAKER_00 24:00

I've always kind of had that uh slogan for myself. So gr growing into the PM world and all that, I I would always sit there and watch people. Well, this is what the textbook says. The textbooks doesn't always work for everybody. It doesn't necessarily you have steps A through Z, and I know that I need to complete steps A through Z, but it doesn't matter as long as I'm following the rules and guidelines, then I should be able to get there however I can. And my goal personally is always to figure out can I skip? And it's not really a skip, if you will, but skips D through F and basically hop skip over them. They get done, but they're done quicker, more efficiently. And I want ideas to go outside and to think outside the normal box, if you will. You mentioned your Australian friend. So when I was at Francesca's, I got tasked with how do we start doing punch lists remotely? How do we start doing FaceTime? How do we reduce? Because it was $1,500 to $2,000 every single trip we took the to get out there. And so they're like, well, let's see what we can do to reduce cost. Maybe we can add in other locations. Well, I said, well, what about the FaceTime punches? And FaceTime being an iPhone thing, but any type Skype, Zoom, if you will. And this is all before COVID. So none of this stuff is really out there to an extent. I was racking my brain looking for punch list, and just nothing's coming up. Then I came across the word audit. It's not an unusual word, but it's it's that's what in Australia they call punch list, or at least when I found it. And uh I was literally scrolling on tech websites just trying to find different things and see. It could have been me looking for new speakers for my house or something, who knows? And I've scrolled across the word audit, and that made me trigger something. So I went to the Apple App Store and typed in audit, and then it just gave me a whole world of things.

SPEAKER_03 26:10

Very nice.

SPEAKER_00 26:10

Uh there was an app that I was able to find, and that app allowed me to create a punch list, digital punch list, that not only could I do it from FaceTime, I happened to do it from let's see, I was in Houston and my contractor was at Fargo, North Dakota. And it was three foot of snow, so I was happy that I wasn't there because I mean snow don't get along. Me and Colby.

SPEAKER_01 26:33

I lived there until I was eight, so in my nine.

SPEAKER_00 26:36

More power to you.

SPEAKER_01 26:38

We obviously moved, so yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:41

Well, then there was another one. I personally am not a big wine drinker. Everyone has their thing, but I wasn't a big wine drinker. I had a store out in Napa that I needed to do. So I handed off the digital punch list to somebody that had never done a punch list. They've walked stores because they were on the real estate side of things, and they took that punch list. They only missed one item from that punch list. It's kind of big, but it wasn't in the punch list or the audit, if you will. But that's where it really triggered to me. You've got to think outside the box of the norm. Don't stay in your confines, figure out some step outside that box and think of it differently. Go look at a different industry, go change your brain thought process and see if there's another way of doing it. And uh, I always work with my new PMs as they come in and tell them go follow everybody, watch how they do it. No one person is doing it right or wrong. The way you get it done and you get the project done under budget and on schedule is how it's the right way to do project management.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

So yeah, it's it's such a great concept and a and a way to really just kind of live through things. If my high school math teachers would have taken that approach, I would have done really well. I could always do the math, right? I could always get the result, but I couldn't do it how they wanted me to. And we would just, it was so frustrating to me. And I'm like, I got the right answer. And they're like, well, but you didn't do it the right way. And I'm like, oh, and it was just a forever battle. But in all, in all truth, and and not joking, um, I've thought about that a lot over the last couple of years, that you know, that that kind of way of thinking, of thinking outside the box, and it's something I'm certainly in favor of. And, you know, it there's there's more than one in Arkansas, they say there's more than one way to skin a cat. It's really weird. I don't know. Um, but there's more than one way to do things, and so we can all kind of, you know, add to that or take away from that. And I love that you were able to find what you were looking for. Um, and I'm gonna let Sloan uh keep us on track a little bit here, but also I'm just curious, we can talk about it a little bit later, but I'm just curious because right when we had first met, AI was just like a very, very new thing and you were already using it. So I imagine I've been wanting to ask you, I imagine you're totally geeking out at this point at all the opportunities. And I'm sure that you know you have to do that on a personal side because I know you guys have some regulations and things like that, but interested to know your take. This, the for all the people that we talk to that are in the AI world and they they use the AI things. My question is, what's your favorite AI right now?

SPEAKER_00 29:21

So I I'm still kind of stuck with Chat GPT. Are you so it would be open AI? I do use Copilot at work, but it's not connected to the internet. They do a once-a-month download to update it, but it doesn't ever connect, if you will, to the open internet because of what you're talking about would be PHI, private health information. We don't ever want that to possibly get out and uh cause any uh disservices to anybody, whether it be an employee or a patient. So but I've I use Chat GPT, I use it to help me build Excel documents that I could only dream of. I've as of it's been just over a year now. I'd never built a Power BI dashboard, and I've probably built five.

SPEAKER_03 30:14

I don't even know what that is.

SPEAKER_00 30:16

Power BI is uh it think of Excel on steroids and access done easier. Um but you're connecting a bunch of data sources and you can link them together and then very interesting. Okay, again on steroids.

SPEAKER_01 30:35

Very nice. Yeah, I could imagine that you would very much enjoy that. So yeah, that's very cool. Claude does a pretty good job with um, you know, Excel spreadsheets and stuff too. I've been working on some course development and you know, things like that that I would typically like do manually. It's just done. I can just tell it what I want and it's done. And so it's been brilliant as far as that's concerned, and like such a time saver.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

And um you still have to go back and look at everything. It's not that you're getting out of doing anything, but you're taking your thoughts, putting it into a system, and then you go back and you alter what you need to alter, but it takes what you were gonna take five days to do, and you can get it done in five minutes.

SPEAKER_01 31:15

Yes, and so my favorite feature is that I can talk to them. And so Sloan's Sloan will typically be in the same office, we're in the same office together, and she's on the other side of the room, and I'm like, don't mind me, I'm just talking to Chow GBT or Claude or Jim and I or whoever, and some over here just telling it. And I love that feature so much because um it helps me get my thoughts out the way that it would be harder for me to sit there, not that I couldn't do it, but to sit there and type those thoughts. I can just tell it, like, this is what I'm thinking. Can we work on this? And we adjust it this way or that. And so it's yeah, it's it's been brilliantly fun for me. I've had a lot of a lot of fun with it. So has Sloan. We've been very, very honored to have a unique position that we are in in the weeds with several like uh people who are very, very intelligent in that space and who've taught us and mentored us, and and so it's been great. And I I agree with you 100%. Like, I I don't think uh, and we've talked about this on other shows, like the human, the humanistic part of it's not going away. It's more getting on board and learning how to do those things. Um that you know, that's the part that's more important. It's just we've talked before, like, you know, there was a time when the computer was overwhelming, right? We didn't know, we never thought we were gonna have this thing sitting on our desk everywhere or or we could carry it around everywhere we go or whatever. And so it, you know, the AI is another tool that we can use, and there's more things coming, I believe. And so, anyways, I just I was interested to hear your take on that. So I'll let Sloan have it back.

SPEAKER_00 32:44

Well, there's only two things that I do call out as you're using AI, and this is uh for everybody out there too, is double check if you're just gonna copy and paste um that you're not pulling some of the notes that AI is telling you, hey, do you want me to make this more professional or so on and so forth? I have seen that from uh some high-up parties, uh internal and external. And then uh recently I I'm in the midst of reviewing uh change order and trying to figure out why we're even getting hit with it, but neither here nor there, I immediately could tell because of the length of the email that it was AI generated, and then it's it causes a lot of frustration because I'm sitting there having to read through all this stuff. So take into account sometimes you don't need all those details, and you need to remember it should talk like you if you're going to utilize it.

SPEAKER_01 33:40

So yeah, you really need to work with if you're you need well first and foremost, people need to get educated, like you said, on on the nuances of it. And and it's cool. And yeah, I can write an email for you, but did you read the email before you sent it, number one? Um, it probably only needs to say a third of what you sent. I mean, nobody's gonna read it because it's five pages long. And and if there's certain nuances that a lot of us that have been in into this know, like, okay, that wasn't you. And that's fine for certain things if we're just quick, quick back and forth or whatever, but there is a humanistic portion of it that like I need to be relaying what my thoughts really are in my voice and how it should be. I'm not as big on using it for, especially I don't use it at all for automated emails. I might help it gather my thoughts for me. Um, but I'm very big, like you said, I'm making sure that it's your own voice and things like that. I think that's really important. Otherwise, you know, like it we would be lying if we didn't say, like, okay, that was so impersonal. Like they obviously didn't even write that. They didn't put any thought into that. And although that's not really true, right? Because there had to be some thought process going into creating whatever it was, but we definitely don't want to you like lose that human element that, oh, that really was Amanda talking to me, or that really was Sloan saying what she meant to say and not some computer saying what it thought she wanted to say.

SPEAKER_00 34:59

So it's a tool, not a replacement. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:01

So absolutely right. You know, um, I would just like to gripe for a second if the AI is a pattern matcher, right? And that's we know that's what it is. It's going in, finding those patterns, and it's replicating. I don't know who is using that many M dashes that you are throwing off the AI algorithm. You think that all people talk like that or write like that with 500 dashes? We don't. Whoever's doing that, quit it. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 35:26

Just quit with the that's probably one of my biggest gripes about it. Is like, please stop, stop, stop, stop. Drives me crazy, but I'm also the grammar police. And like, I look, I I have no problem with the proper use of an M-dash at all. I know that they've been used for uh eons and eons. However, every other sentence is not appropriate. So also that you can tell that you did not review your work before you sent it.

SPEAKER_02 35:51

Amanda uses grammarly on her texting. I do. Yeah. Yes, yes, even on her, even on her text. Everything. Yes. Brooks, you you say think outside the box, you also say prioritize people over task. And what does that look like day to day?

SPEAKER_00 36:09

So I always try to stop if one of my PMs comes up to me, unless I'm literally in the midst of a meeting, and I try to give them my undivided attention. So taking the time instead of the task that is the meeting, if I need to put myself on mute because okay, it's it's something that's I'm just there as a face, if you will, then I can focus on the PM. Or if I tell them, hey, I can't come up, I can't talk right now, I immediately go back to them the minute I have an opportunity, or I text them if I don't see them and say, hey, I have time, let's go. So I'm always trying to be there for my people. Is at the end of the day, my role is to make sure that they have the best possibilities of being successful in their roles. If they're not successful, then I'm not successful either.

SPEAKER_01 36:58

So yeah, that's powerful. Yeah, it is great advice. Yeah, I think that takes into another question about building trust and communicating well. It's important that we do that with our teams, especially with what you're doing, because it's really, really complex stuff. So I I think you had a question about that, Son, or maybe that was the question.

SPEAKER_02 37:18

Well, and I do want to talk about too you lead leaders, you don't just lead a project or manage a project. What have you learned about leading project managers, not just managing projects?

SPEAKER_00 37:31

Sure. So it it's a different aspect of looking at it because people aren't projects, but at the same time, I try to still use that as an understanding that I want to build them up. I want to raise them on a platform and I want them to get showcased in the best light possible when they're doing absolutely amazing. And then I tried to hide them when hiccups happen. Things happen no matter what. I mean, I I've always and I try to tell my PMs, start the project off when you do the kickoff meeting. Hey, we're gonna have an issue. I don't like calling them problems. We're gonna have an issue. How we work together as a team is how we end up having a successful project. So taking the time that way and uh getting them in the front end just to kind of get the it's not gonna go perfect. There will be some type of a glitch of whatever it could be just the wrong color. And then we have to talk about the color, and we'll work on that, but it it could be minor as that, or it could be as major as you name it. Hiccup h the hiccups happen. I mean, it's just a part of life. At the end of the day, we're all humans. Heck, even the non-human eye, as we were just discussing, has hiccups. This is very or indexes.

SPEAKER_02 38:54

What I like to remember about we're all just humans, I also like to say it's all our first time on earth. This we're it's the first time I've been here, it's the first time you've been here, right? And so uh grace goes a long way. And uh we practice that a lot in this office. Well, Miss Amanda practices showing me grace. It it really is a one-way street, and I I am so appreciative of it. Another thing I want to talk to you about is building trust and communication. You're working with projects that are complex, they can be disruptive, and they can be highly visible. But how do you build that trust and that communication with your people?

SPEAKER_00 39:32

So I have to work with my team to make sure that they're communicating out as much as possible. And sometimes, I mean, it may take us 12 months before we finally get approved to be able to do that particular outage because one of them came up recently. We had an inpatient tower that we had to shut down the domestic water for the whole building. So there was no toilets, no drinking water, no ice, no, and we had active patients in this building.

SPEAKER_01 40:03

But you had a lot of happy people.

SPEAKER_00 40:07

We had a lot of nurses that were real happy with us because it meant they had additional workload. And we never want that to happen, but it's what we had to do in order to complete our project. So we ended up having to make sure that there was water, drinking water, hand washing water, and toilet flushing water on 20 plus floors.

SPEAKER_03 40:30

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 40:31

And we couldn't bring it out there sooner because we happened to be going through uh joint commission review too the week before or the week of the outage document. Yeah. Yeah. So again, we talked about it earlier. You have to roll with the punches. But being communicative communicative with the team and the clients and advising and having those discussions with them of of what's gonna happen, how we're gonna do it. Uh I mean, at the end of the day, we we had some issues that came up on that project. It it's gonna happen. No patrons noticed, they were fine.

SPEAKER_01 41:06

Right.

SPEAKER_00 41:06

But there were other issues while we were getting materials delivered, but we couldn't shut off the water until we were able to move forward.

SPEAKER_01 41:13

So yeah, that sounds like just absolutely overwhelming to me. Um, so do you remind me, do you I know you work on site, but do you work hybrid or are you always on site?

SPEAKER_00 41:25

Sure. So we're hybrid. I have opportunities today, is one of those where I get to be remote. Uh sure. Mondays and Fridays typically are remote. Tuesday through Thursday, we're in office, but we do have an understanding with our project managers and ourselves. The projects dictate what we have to do. Sure. If I can only shut it off at midnight and I'm shutting off a whole building's power, I'm probably going to be there at midnight too.

SPEAKER_01 41:51

Right.

SPEAKER_00 41:52

Probably two to three hours before to make sure that we're able to start at midnight. So there's things that happen and we we all have to adjust accordingly. And thankfully have a graceful wife and uh usually the children asleep at that point in time. It just makes for a bright and early morning the next day.

SPEAKER_01 42:08

I uh no doubt, no doubt. Yeah, because you have two little ones. So yeah, that's exciting for sure. It makes it hopefully that doesn't happen too often, but I can understand how that would be, you know, doing some of that stuff later in the night would um be more beneficial to the whole of everyone, um, especially, you know, in the position that you're in. So all right, Sloan, where are we at?

SPEAKER_02 42:32

We are at those two questions that we asked our guests. Yeah. So these are our two questions we ask every guest. We've never gotten the same answer, and it is probably our favorite part. So I am I'm gonna ask the first one, and Miss Amanda, uh, if you wouldn't mind to ask the second one. All right. Brooks, name a leader you admire and share briefly why they've influenced you.

SPEAKER_00 42:56

Oh goodness. So th this one's difficult. Uh I'd probably say my father is a leader that I look up to. But going with the general that everybody would know, um, there is a quote, um, and I'm gonna butcher it, but uh quote by Bill Gates, and I know Amanda's heard me say it, but I'll hire the lazy person because they'll figure out how to get me from step A to Z quicker. So that's the general gist of the quote. There's some things that I'm not a fan of, Bill Gates, but there's things that with everybody, I mean it's that quote that's built Microsoft. That is how he built Microsoft, and he wouldn't be where he is today to be able to put his word out there without having had that idea. So, and it and it's not that the person's lazy, it's just they figure out how to be more efficient with their time and more efficient with processes. So in this case, use AI so you're not spending five days trying to do something. They figure out how to code something that. So that they're not having to go press press the left click on the mouse fifty times.

SPEAKER_02 44:05

So work smarter, not harder.

SPEAKER_01 44:09

I mean by that. And I I think it's brilliant. I w I I also would like for my uh team to employ that as well. Just just get us again, it goes back to thinking outside the box, right? I think about my math teachers in high school. It's like I don't need to write five pages of it if I can get the answer. And I do look, I do understand the value in some of that. Not uh I'm not completely lost on that, but I think sometimes, yeah, it is just like we just need to get from point A to point B. And however you best feel like we can get there most effectively and most efficiently, let's do that. And and I'm a huge proponent of that. So especially if we don't have to write out five pages of math problems. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 44:49

Agreed. And that's the reason why I don't like the word problems. You said it. Math problem. Yeah. That's what everybody thinks of. It's a negative connotation. Nobody enjoyed math. They might have been good at math, but nobody enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_01 45:01

So well, I think there's some people, you know, my brother's really he he actually really quite enjoys math.

SPEAKER_00 45:09

I took six years of high school math throughout high school in the four years.

SPEAKER_01 45:13

I mean, I I did a lot of math, but I I took six years of it, Brooks, because I couldn't pass it.

unknown 45:19

So no.

SPEAKER_01 45:20

But put me in English language arts. So I had I in all truth, I had a friend who was really great at math, and I was really great at language arts, and we were opposites, and so we would like do each other's work for them. It worked out brilliantly. So that's how I made it through like at least one year of high school. But yeah, I mean, if you need if you need me to write a paper or prove something for you, I'm your lady, but I am not the one for math. No, do not call me for that. But they also this is the this is an age because I'm this old that they told us we wouldn't have calculators, and here we do. So, and I know you know that's that's a pretty common saying now, but we really were told you're not gonna have a calculator. Yes, I do actually.

SPEAKER_00 45:58

Yeah. So I I lived in different states growing up, and it was funny because I had the exact same math book when I moved from Florida to Texas, and absolutely the same math book, but in Florida, I was required to not use a calculator. So we'd only gotten through two or three chapters at that point in time in the school year. I get over to uh Texas, exact same math book, but they were allowed a calculator, and they were already through like 10 chapters of the textbook. So I had to catch up on the other seven because we were learning it by hand. Yeah, and they were doing it by calculator.

SPEAKER_01 46:36

Probably not necessarily a negative thing.

SPEAKER_00 46:39

Um it wasn't, but I had to catch up on all that math.

SPEAKER_01 46:42

So that's where well they probably let you use the calculator because isn't the c isn't it like Texas instruments or something? They had to supply those to everybody in Texas.

SPEAKER_02 46:54

Okay, well, Texas is making the calculator, everybody gets one. We gotta use them. No, I use a calculator and I am in fact uh paid to talk all day. I would like for my teachers to realize that. Both of those things that they said, you won't have a calculator everywhere and nobody's paying you to talk. Wait correction. Here I see it. So let's talk about that.

SPEAKER_00 47:14

Yeah. No, I I had a I had a recruiter one time tell me I'll never be able to run a business. Uh she's like, What do you want to do? And I said, I want to be the CEO of a company or start up a company. And uh she's like, Well, you'll never do that without going to get your MBA. And I said, Okay. So I went and started my own company. It was it was short-lived. It lasted for about two years, but but you did it. I did it.

SPEAKER_01 47:39

Yeah. So I didn't know that that was a requirement of becoming a CEO because I will not be able to hold that title anymore. I mean, I did have somebody tell me, how how did you just how did you just become a CEO? I'm like, well, I do what I want. I opened up a company and I put CEO because that's my title. And then I I try very hard to do the job that goes along with it. So that's how that's how you do that. That's how you do it. If anybody was wondering, that's how you do it. Also, but let me just put the caveat that you also have to pay the taxes, which come along with that. So, and you do not want that. So, well, I want to respect your time. I'm so I'm so grateful for you being on. It's always so great to talk to you. Our last question is this when you think about your legacy, what lasting impact do you hope to have?

SPEAKER_00 48:26

So I hope that I leave behind something that my children can be proud of. And then I I know y'all are looking too at at the people. I I want them to look at me that I made them think outside the box. I made them think differently and help them to become a better person for not only themselves, but personally but also professionally too.

SPEAKER_03 48:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:56

Because there there's things that we all could do just a little bit better and hope hopefully that I get to pass that along to them when they are when I'm working with them, whether directly or indirectly.

SPEAKER_01 49:08

So that's a beautiful answer. Yeah. I love that. I think I think that's uh definitely a hope that we all can, you know, that that whoever is under our charge, whether it's our family or um the people that we're working with, that we can hopefully leave that kind of lasting impact. Like that person really treated me differently or did things differently, or didn't jump down my throat when something went wrong, or um, you know, things like that, or or allowed us to think outside the box. I know um we've talked about before too, like one of the best ways I have found to learn is to fail. Those things stick with me. And so we have to allow our teams and our family, uh, our family members to fail sometimes so that we can learn those things um that we need to to become the better version of ourselves. And so well, thank you so much, Clinton Brooks Herman, for coming on our podcast, our little our little podcast that we started. So we started this back in January. It's Sloan's fault that we started it now.

SPEAKER_00 50:05

Yeah, made sure she can talk all day and tell the teachers that.

SPEAKER_02 50:08

Yeah, that's right. I mean, she didn't know that she was hiring somebody that was really had a vendetta to well, I would have jumped on board with the math.

SPEAKER_01 50:17

No, no, no hate to math teachers. My math teachers were grace, most of them were gracious with me, but um, it was just it's just not how my brain works. So very grateful for calculators and AI. So there you go. Uh, but thank you for being on with us. Um congratulations to you and your beautiful wife and and your beautiful children on your on your recent move and hope things you know continue to settle in and the air conditioning gets fixed and all is well there in your home. And um, just again, thank you. Thank you for staying in touch and and for just you know being a an a great asset and a a great contact. Um, you're just brilliant. And again, I I envy your planning and just organization of everything. Um you're fabulous at that. So shout out to them.

SPEAKER_00 51:02

I I think what y'all are doing is a great thing too. So keep it up and don't stop.

SPEAKER_01 51:06

Thank you. It's it's been a it's been a wild ride.

SPEAKER_03 51:09

So I think we're kind of appreciate y'all. Thanks, Brooks.