How Leaders Think with Kenny Lange

Coby Dillard [00:00:00]:
There's something that every leader has that's a hobby, something that they've never thought about that figures into their leadership in some way. Fine with that thing here.

Kenny Lange [00:00:14]:
Welcome to the how leaders think podcast, the show that transforms you by renewing your mind and giving you new ways to think. I am your host, Kenny Lang, and with me today is the Kobe Dillard. I slowed down to build the drama. I felt like that was appropriate. He is the director of military and veteran affairs at the University of Texas at Tyler, my alma mater.

Coby Dillard [00:00:36]:
Oh, swoop, swoop.

Kenny Lange [00:00:37]:
They need to pay me dollar 500 every time I do that. Want to see if we can get some subtraction on that. As the director, he is responsible for the university's efforts to holistically support its population of student veterans, active reserve guard members, you name it. And the families can't leave them out. Kobe earned his associate's, bachelor's, and master's degree, and he is now, since he wrote this bio, working on the old PhD. So maybe by the time you're hearing this, he will be Doctor Dillard, which has a great ring to it, by the way, doesn't it? You just practice that in the mirror from. He received his degrees from institutions in Virginia. He holds a certification as a clinical military counselor.

Kenny Lange [00:01:21]:
He's active within his community. We both served in leadership, Tyler, together. That's how we became friends. And he is a member of the veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion and Phi Beta Sigma fraternity, Incorporated. He is also. If you are watching this, you, you know this. If you're not watching, he's got a soccer jersey on. He's a huge soccer fan.

Kenny Lange [00:01:41]:
So we bond over that. He's got his logo, I got mine in the background. But welcome to the show, Kobe.

Coby Dillard [00:01:48]:
Thanks for having me. This is probably been a long time coming. We talk soccer all the time. So let's get going.

Kenny Lange [00:01:54]:
Let's just, we're turning the cameras on this time. Let's, let's let the, let's let the public in on what's going on and our, our general brilliance, or at least yours, future doctor. I saw a meme recently that said you should start telling everyone you're an Olympic. Hopefully, you just haven't filled out the application yet, so I might consider that. Well, tell me, Coby, what is on your mind?

Coby Dillard [00:02:22]:
So I did a interview, and it's probably been about two or three weeks now. And I got asked a interesting question, was a job interview. So it worked out. Life's good, it's fine. But the question I got to ask was, what's something on your resume? Or there's something that we should know about you that is not on your resume. And at first I thought, oh, this is weird. But I started thinking, you know, I am a big soccer fan. You've seen my office.

Coby Dillard [00:02:54]:
I have like 50 soccer stars in my office. I will feed behind me and I will wear soccer jersey work sometimes. And I just started thinking, you know, being a soccer fan is one thing, but it's also how I do leadership. Just looking at different soccer coaches, watching the game, being a part of a supporters group, all of those things have influenced how I manage my team, how I work with my students. And I never really thought about it that way. And I reached out to you and said, hey, I have this weird question and I don't know what I'm going to do with it, but let's talk about it. And so that's kind of what got us here.

Kenny Lange [00:03:37]:
So I love it. And, and for those who, who don't know, obviously, beyond being a soccer enthusiast, I've played since I was four. I have a coaching license. I coached club soccer for, for a few years while I was in college. Just absolutely love the sport. Now I cheer. Two of my boys play, play club soccer. So it's, I feel like it's in my blood, but I say all that to say.

Kenny Lange [00:04:00]:
It's probably really influenced my own leadership. And I hadn't really thought about its influence until you shot me that text. And I started thinking, well, how has it crept into how I've led my companies or my teams or even just my kids and family? And I'm curious, as you've now had a few weeks to process further on that question, what specifically from the sport and those coaches that you watch? What do you observe from a leadership perspective that maybe the general public isn't picking up on? They're just seeing a fun sport being played.

Coby Dillard [00:04:48]:
Yeah. So I look at what. Happy that we just finished up propane America tournament here in the US. I look at what happened with our national team coach, Greg Berholt, just as an example.

Kenny Lange [00:05:01]:
Yeah. That he woke up this morning and chose violence, didn't you?

Coby Dillard [00:05:06]:
Right. You gotta start somewhere. So let's start with the most obvious thing. You know, good coach in Major League soccer. Did it translate to the national team? No, he had no good coach, had good results. But there's something, and I look at his whole situation, his whole tenure, what happened between what happened after the World cup with the issue with him and Giorena and his parents. Which is very youth soccer. You know, for those who don't know, there was a press conference in New York after the World cup where he got into discussion where yeah, there was a player we wanted to send home.

Coby Dillard [00:05:46]:
It was Geo Reyna who was also on the us national team. Geo Reyna's parents came back and said, well, you know, back in the game Craig Verhalter kicked his now white whole big investigation over this after his contract wearing out Us soccer saying we're going to investigate this, we may or may not hire him back. And then they hired him back. So I look at that situation, it's like, okay, there's something to be said or as I'm considering hiring staff members, was that what we needed at the time that we need to go work the stable? Do we need to go with stability? Was that our time to actually say, you know, let's break from the past, let's go chase what would be better for us in long term or do we go with what's safe is going what's safe always the best thing to do, right?

Kenny Lange [00:06:41]:
Sort of the better the devil I know than the one I don't, right? Because they know, they know what they're getting with Greg and not to ignore the allegations or anything like that. He's had his statements, there's a whole report, you can sit in that and that's not what our podcast is about. But from we know what this leader is capable of and what we're getting and maybe we just go back there because maybe the marketplace, and this was one of my takeaways during that time just from a who do we hire to lead this team forward? Because it's not just for those of you who don't know, being the head US men's soccer coach doesn't just entail leading those, those players and whittling the squad down to the, to the 23 that, that get taken to the tournaments, you influence the whole of the philosophy and approach to soccer in the country all the way down to youth level. Yeah. So you get to influence the academy. You have, there are layers stacked on layers stacked underneath the us men's national team, which is the pinnacle of playing for the country. And there's all these different leagues and all these different coaches and approaches because a lot of the players, at least here in the US and in any other country like you love playing for your club and doing those things, those are the day to day. But if you're really serious about it, you know, there, there really is no bigger honor than to represent your country in an actual competition.

Kenny Lange [00:08:27]:
Right. Like you just mentioned, we had the coppa wrap up and you see what it, how it impacted Messi when he had to leave the game. Like, and that, and there's since been some, you know, some releases of what was said between him and Emmy Martinez and like, just how seriously these players take it when they get to throw on their country's colors and what that means. So all of that to say as the US soccer federation is picking someone, it's not just this one particular area that they're responsible for. And sort of what I hear you saying then is, well, when I hire a staff member here, who all are they going to impact? Because it's not just your relationship with them as their supervisor. It's not just one other person in the office. It's the totality of, you know, as I read in the bio, right. I'm pointing over here, nobody can see it.

Kenny Lange [00:09:31]:
It's on my screen. I like to point at things no one else can see. So I can further, like, yeah, you're not seeing, if you're not seeing this, you're just, you're not living in the, in the future, but they, they impact the, the veteran population and their families. There's a ripple effect. Is that, is that sort of what's crossed your mind about your, your influence in hiring and what that does?

Coby Dillard [00:09:56]:
Absolutely. You're affecting me. You're affecting my other staff, you're affecting my work studies. My student workers are here. You're affecting the students, you're affecting the campus community. If I have to send you out in town, you're affecting the community out in town. And all of that still coming back to me because if I make the wrong hire, people are going to look at me, where did this person come from? And then I've got to live with that. So it's like there's something to be said for not just to fit within the office, not just to fit with the students, but how does this person fit overall into everything? It's one thing to hire.

Coby Dillard [00:10:32]:
You know, we can always hire another veteran, but the majority of my population being family members, sometimes I need a family member to just come in and kind of build that relationship. You know, that's something that my office without chief veterans here, the point I need that family member is to say, hey, we need that relationship. We need to focus on that when we're hiring. So.

Kenny Lange [00:10:58]:
Gotcha. So looking at how given the people that you serve and most businesses and organizations, they don't just serve, just one people, group, or Persona, you might say in marketing terms, is there's usually multiple people that you are serving or types of organizations, right. Or in your case, it's multiple people inside of a family unit. The veterans themselves, spouse, children. Right? Like that becomes like they each have distinctly different needs, but they're all part of the. Who you serve. And because of that, you try to diversify the perspectives to make sure we're never overlooking any of those. Even though the veteran may be the point of contact or that initial relationship, you need to understand what did those other people go through? Because the veterans don't exactly know what the spouse went through.

Kenny Lange [00:12:00]:
Even if they've been very open and transparent and may not understand, unless they were a child of a veteran themselves, may not know what's the impact on those kids.

Coby Dillard [00:12:11]:
Right. Especially for a lot of our children, while we have on campus a lot of their service numbers and veterans, that service ended before that child was ever born. So that child has more cognizance of what it was like. They know the after effect everywhere. They know what that transition kind of looked like. They know what the end of that transition was. But the actual service piece, a lot of my family members who are children, they struggle with coming into my center because, hey, I didn't serve. I know my mother or father was in the military, but I just know that they were.

Coby Dillard [00:12:49]:
I don't know what that experience was. So I have to have someone who can speak to that population to say, hey, even though that service came out before you were born, this is still very much yours, because I was that family member, that staff member who I've now hired can say, hey, I was that fear movement achieved.

Kenny Lange [00:13:09]:
Gotcha.

Coby Dillard [00:13:09]:
I can reroll to you on that level. So it's about stability. Yes. It's an office that supports veterans. You can always hire another veteran, but that may not be what you need. Sometimes you gotta step out and go for swimming for the Fitz, go for that big Nick, or go for that different person that's gonna bring in something different.

Kenny Lange [00:13:29]:
Right. And then all of those people in the. As a staff, work together to serve the sort of like your. You know. And I know that there's a lot of grief around using the term family in the workplace. I'm not using it as those people might, but sort of like the family that you built and composed can now serve this other family because you have those similar perspectives together. So now it's like we're not.

Coby Dillard [00:13:55]:
The.

Kenny Lange [00:13:55]:
The likelihood that we miss something, a point of care or impact is small, like, we're really not going to miss anything because of the way that you're building teams, right?

Coby Dillard [00:14:06]:
Or if you don't want to use family, you know, I've got, there's three of us who are full time staff. We usually carry eight work, we usually carry eight work study students a year. Where's your starting eleven?

Kenny Lange [00:14:19]:
So let's, so let's, let's draw it back to what, what you've, you know, been thinking about with the, the similarities between, uh, leadership from a coach, like a professional coach in the sports arena, soccer in particular, the biggest sport in the world. I have to whisper that in case somebody gets upset, but I don't, I don't care. You can email me. I have math on my side. So the, but the concept of the federation hiring somebody and what their impact is, I think we've talked a little bit about that. Can you speak a little bit about what your thoughts are in terms of the coaches leadership, how they come in, especially in a national team situation where they didn't really get to choose. Right. In a club situation, much like any other sports franchise, you get to draft and trade and really build the team based on whoever they are.

Kenny Lange [00:15:19]:
The only boundaries are the amount of money that you can or allowed to spend. But here it's sort of like you get, I don't want to say stuck, but you're handed a particular roster because of the country of origin and that they were, they've elected if they were, you know, had dual nationalities. So what insights have you come about in thinking about that coach and having people that they, you know, they have to use from this pool and then also saying what system of play, what's, what's my approach with this group versus that group? Because even, you know, if you watch the announcers, a lot of the announcers are, are from an older generation of soccer players, like A. Dempsey and A. Lawless and Kobe Jones and all these different ones? That team was very different in their style to the team that exists now. So from that head coach perspective, what insights about leadership are you picking apart?

Coby Dillard [00:16:25]:
You know, one of the, I look at our performance at Culprit American, I look at all the things that have been said after it, and one of the things I take away from me, you know, as a coach, as a leader, you can't bring everyone along with, you know, you've got a lot of talent in this nation. We pick the same players. You've got, you know, that ballistic. You've got Matt Turner, that's a dean Odess who was injured for this one, we've got Tyler Allen. We've got all these great players who all come along all the time. They're playing at their top level, pointing at the top levels in Europe. Some of them are starting, some of them are riding the bench. Matt Turner, for example.

Coby Dillard [00:17:07]:
My son is a goalkeeper, love Matt Turner to death. He's barely starting at Nottingham Forest. He barely played this year. Ethan Horvath saying, barely play this year. And boom. Number one and number two keeper on the national team. There was nobody else. We couldn't hold water alone again.

Coby Dillard [00:17:31]:
Yes, there's something to be said for stability, but at a certain point, you've got to break from that. You can't bring the people who are you're just familiar with all the time. You've got to be willing to go out and find. I might have the staff member who's really this one thing, who's really, really good at it, who I know will do a really, really good job and we'll do it well 1000% of the time. But if I've got a new staff member who's coming in who has never done that one thing that I know my one staff member is getting at, maybe it's time for that other staff member to get another look at it so I can move that staff member who I know will do really well. Hey, I've got something bigger for you to do. I've got something different for you to do because I want you to keep growing. I want you to mentor.

Coby Dillard [00:18:24]:
Yeah. If I got to make Matt Turner number three and bring in two younger guys, Gabby Slovenia, who's on the Olympic team, to make him the number one Matt Turner, bring him along to get him to the level where you're at. Me as a leader, give that junior person, hey, give. Give them the experience of doing something that my other staff member, Hank there, get them to the level where you're at.

Kenny Lange [00:18:48]:
Yeah. Which really sounds like you're speaking to the development of that talent pipeline, right? So that you don't end up with sort of like, you know, a bunch of all stars and then nobody, and then they develop and then they're all stars. Like, it's just sort of like this pendulum swing. Instead, how could we build this steady, consistent level of talent that just keeps building and the next generation benefits from the previous one until eventually, you know, maybe we can reach the places that some of these, like, larger european countries that tend to dominate, or like a Brazil that have a culture that just continuously cranks out talent after talent. I mean, look at the euros, which were, you know, playing concurrently with the Copa. You look at Spain. Oh, my gosh, it just blanked on the kid's name. But he's 17 years old.

Kenny Lange [00:19:41]:
He's like 17.

Coby Dillard [00:19:41]:
Yes.

Kenny Lange [00:19:43]:
Playing for Spain in a large, large tournament. I mean, he's playing when it mattered, but Spain, I. It seems like they almost always have this huge talent pool to keep pulling from. So you can have people that are in their thirties and then have somebody who's, you know, 17, 1819 who shows a lot of talent, but maybe doesn't have a lot of consistency or, or, you know, maybe some of the gameplay wisdom that some of these veteran players have and so that matching up can allow for that transfer. So, so if someone's in, you know, a business or leadership position, they don't need to think about just what's the top talent or the name. Right? Like somebody maybe had a reputation, I think like Matt Turner, for example, had a great reputation, still does played, you know, played for Arsenal, tried to go to Nottingham, like to get more playing time. But do we have some people who are maybe getting regular playing time? Like Matt has a great resume and he's proven himself in higher pressure situations, so nobody's doubting that. But if he can't continuously get his own development, then there is some wisdom he can pass on to.

Kenny Lange [00:20:59]:
Maybe there's someone with more skill but less wisdom. Because, you know, it takes a, I mean, my joke is always, it takes a village to raise an idiot, but I do think it takes a village to develop these players. Nobody ever grew and developed into an all star in isolation. Right. It was always the benefit of coaches, other players, older players giving wisdom, younger players giving fresh ideas and energy, things like that. Right, right.

Coby Dillard [00:21:27]:
And, you know, there's something to be said about leaving people along for the right reasons as well. Because after that World cup, after the World cup spat between Burhalter and Raina, Reina has been picked for every single team where he hasn't been injured. He barely played between Dortmund and where he, wherever he got loaned to. And I forgot where he got loaned to because he's bare been flat, but he's been on. You've been selected for every us team, not matched it at all. Great player. Don't get me wrong. But why are we bringing him along? Is it to.

Coby Dillard [00:22:05]:
Because he's not stint, he's great player because we know he's not playing? Or is it to show, yeah, everything between Greg and Geo is great. That's not why you picked someone for the national team, right.

Kenny Lange [00:22:17]:
Not be, not for political or the optics of it. And so how do you see that functioning inside of organizations when it comes to whether it's promotions or doling out projects or opportunities or responsibilities? How do you see the principles which are played out in a very public setting there? What, what should leaders be thinking about and how could they apply that into the business realm, let's say, or just organizational realm?

Coby Dillard [00:22:49]:
Who is the best person for the job? Not the biggest thing that will get you the most money of publicity. 1.3. That's what it's, you know, if I'm, again, if I'm looking at a project or even if I'm thinking about taking on a project myself in business, post leadership filing, this is something I have to think about. You know, if you're bringing me a project and you're saying, hey, Kirby, can you do this? Okay, is this because you have confidence in my abilities or because Kobe's a big guy and he's going to do well and well on this, or is it because Kobe's a veteran? You want that veteran attached to this, but if it's number three, yeah. Let's talk about your reasoning behind it. I may not be, there may be someone who's better at it. I can still help. I can still contribute.

Coby Dillard [00:23:39]:
I don't have to lead it. I don't have to be the person who's out front in charge, but I can still contribute. I just don't have to be the leader of it. For me, that's okay.

Kenny Lange [00:23:49]:
Right. And I think you had, what just came back to mind was during one of our leadership Tyler days is talking about it. I think it was during our nonprofit board training and education is talking about that very thing is, were they looking for that veteran? Like, oh, we have a veteran on the board or in this team or something like that. And, you know, that ends up feeling less like we want a diversity of opinion and more like we, we want the, the benefits that come from the optics. We want the appearance of diversification and thoughtfulness and empathy more than we want to actually be that.

Coby Dillard [00:24:35]:
And sometimes, you know, sometimes I know that's why I'm inviting to rooms. And let's just say that. Let's just be honest. We're picking geo Rayner just to say, hey, we're smoothing this spat over. Cool. Just say that. We'll all be. We'll all.

Coby Dillard [00:24:51]:
We can argue that any day of the week, but just say that.

Kenny Lange [00:24:56]:
Well, yeah, because you could do that, like you said, be upfront. And I do think that there are times when there are moves made for relational reasons. Right? Because relational, cultural reasons, conflict management, I mean, those are all things that are sort of like the invisible glue to a high performance organization. Cause I agree with you, like, just pick the best person for the job. But there are times, you know, going back to, let's say, maybe your goalkeeper situation, right? Like Matt may in fact be far more talented and capable. But if you never develop the skills, or more importantly, I would say develop the confidence of those other people, you will actually end up losing influence with that next generation, those next leaders up, and you, you narrow the focus to where this. This is how you end up with burnout. A meme.

Kenny Lange [00:25:54]:
I saw, I love memes. I think that's probably like a love language or something like that. I need to start calling myself bilingual. It's like English and memes. But it was. He goes, my work has this really interesting benefit where if you work harder than everyone else, you get their work, too, and which is a fast recipe for burnout. Now, again, they may be the best person for that job. They may have the most skills, talents, abilities, whatever it is.

Kenny Lange [00:26:24]:
But if you don't help bring those other people along, then you're never going to get a chance to really grow and scale. You'll probably be stuck at a particular level. Is that fair to say?

Coby Dillard [00:26:35]:
That is. And as a software team, if I'm a dual national, us and Mexico, and I'm a goalkeeper, and I know I'm going to be sitting behind Nat Turner for the next decade in Mexico saying, hey, you've got the chance to be the starter in two years. I'm going to Mexico.

Kenny Lange [00:26:58]:
You got to evaluate the opportunity. And that's why, you know, even though I. I want. You know, I'm a Chelsea fan, and I've seen some players leave that I thought had tremendous talent and potential and they never got the right opportunity or playing time, and so they went somewhere that they could. And I thought, I was like, man, I was like, that ticks me off. I wish they wouldn't have gone. They're doing that. But I can't ever blame them because they're always looking for the opportunity for consistency, for performance, for growth, which I think we have to keep in mind is that we can't ignore the growth path of people that are in our care as leaders, is they want to grow, they want to progress.

Kenny Lange [00:27:44]:
No different than you or I. Right? Like, you've gotten your education up to a master's, and now you're. And now you're looking at, well, I could have a PhD because I could do that, and that has to do with you. Everybody else wants to do the same thing, too, which I think draws us back to, how can we be empathetic as leaders? Right? Because when we're leaders, we get more privilege, we get more influence. We also have more responsibilities. But sometimes we forget what it's like to be in that up and coming position, and we don't think about all the favors and the air cover and stuff that generation before us gave us. You know, sometimes it was. It was unbeknownst to us, there's you, a $7 word.

Kenny Lange [00:28:37]:
Put that in your dissertation. But I think we forget about that. So, how. How do you try to either remind yourself or remind your staff? Hey, remember when we were coming up before we got to the place that we are, and some of these people are several steps behind us, and we need to empathize so that we can serve them effectively.

Coby Dillard [00:28:59]:
I talk a lot about the mistakes that I. Not necessarily just the winds. Everybody sees the winds. We've got plaques on the wall. I pop up in the newspaper every gallon bit. I pop up on tv, every nothing. I'm gonna be on this guy named Kenny's podcast. Everybody sees the wings.

Coby Dillard [00:29:21]:
I talk about the time where I held Steven, no money to the b area. Talk about a time where I couldn't do something. I talk about stuff that didn't go well, and it's a reminder to myself, you know, momentum will get you or die. You're not going to get it right all the time. As you're coming through this, something's going to go wrong. You know, it keeps me humble, keeps my staff humble minds. I tell my staff all the time, it's not a zero defect system. Human error exists.

Coby Dillard [00:29:52]:
We're not going to break anything that's so bad that we can't fix it. We'll fix it when we were born. But that's how I remind myself and the people and even the students that I support that, hey, there's a motorcycle. If you're pushing, pushing, pushing. Another coaching example, Marcelo Bielsa, Uruguay. You all saw them in Copenhagen. That style of play, aggressive, it's on the front foot. You run at you for 90 minutes, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

Coby Dillard [00:30:21]:
You socialize, united, going, going, going, going, going, going. Then eventually, you burn an entire team, prior organization out, and it doesn't work, and the decline starts and you get fired, or you end up like me at 41 with a heart attack. You can't do that all the time. So there's a reminder of, yeah, take care of yourself. We're not gonna get this right all the time focusing on all the things that are not so positive. Everybody sees the wins. Let's talk about where it didn't go. Right?

Kenny Lange [00:30:59]:
Right. Which again, I think goes back to that humanizing element. Right. Like, as you humanize yourself, too, because you need empathy from them to see how you're leading us. I saw. I don't know that you call this a meme, but I forgot exactly how it's worded. So forgive me, but the. It was about parenting.

Kenny Lange [00:31:22]:
And this person said somebody maybe was their therapist said, reminding me that it was my parents first time parenting. And he goes, and it changed how I saw them entirely. Like, I had to remember that. That they weren't just like, born doing this. They didn't. You know, there, there are parenting classes. I think more people should go through them because otherwise they end up at my house. So shout out to the foster and adoptive care system.

Kenny Lange [00:31:56]:
But there. But we have to remember in some cases, this is that person's first time being the director or the mid level manager or this is a situation that maybe they haven't crossed before. And while they do have a lot of traits in character and things that they can pull from to help them through this, it's not a zero defect system. The leader will make mistakes, and owning those, it sounds like, has been critical to your own leadership and how you've developed and developed the influence with your team. Because I was talking to somebody earlier is that positional leadership is the lowest form of leadership. And if you have to constantly remind people of your title, you're doing something wrong.

Coby Dillard [00:32:41]:
Oh, yeah. I don't want to. No. My students respect me as the director. My staff respect me as the director of the campus, respectively. As the director, I don't have to walk around with my name tab on all the time. I can walk around in an LAFC jersey and walk into a meeting and everyone's like, oh, that's cool. He still knows what he's talking about.

Coby Dillard [00:33:00]:
He is still respected. That's code. That's who he is. I can walk around with a spark on in the middle of the summer. That's bogey. That's who he is. We can still talk to him and ask a professional question, then get professional answers.

Kenny Lange [00:33:12]:
Probably bring him some water, too, because he's going to have heat stroke.

Coby Dillard [00:33:17]:
They're not that heavy.

Kenny Lange [00:33:20]:
I was going to make a joke about, like, I don't know if I still have the same level of respect with you wearing an LAFC jersey, but watch it.

Coby Dillard [00:33:28]:
We're at the top of the league right now. Watch it.

Kenny Lange [00:33:31]:
Hey.

Coby Dillard [00:33:32]:
All right.

Kenny Lange [00:33:33]:
All right. Fair. Watch it. Well, there, I think there, obviously, I think you and I could both go, go on and on with, but people are probably going to fall off at some point. But we could go on and on about soccer and leadership. But I do think that there's a lot to take in and there's probably more for us to dissect. But as, as someone is, you know, is a leader in their organization, whether they're, you know, a business owner and executive director to nonprofit or maybe they're on the, you know, the, the up and coming list, they're in that talent pipeline of leadership. What's one thing that someone could do to take their first step towards maybe leading more like that professional coach, that strategist, that person that's bringing these people along? What's their first step they could take in 24 hours with little to no money to maybe move along in this journey.

Coby Dillard [00:34:24]:
You know, I'm going to throw you a different answer to that than what you just suggested because thinking about soccer.

Kenny Lange [00:34:31]:
Is you a politician.

Coby Dillard [00:34:32]:
I know, right? I'll tell you about all that stuff later. Soccer is leadership. It's a little bit different. So, you know, I've got a bookshelf full of leadership books. I've done the leadership classes, all of that stuff. And here we are talking about something that came out of the inner. Look at something that's non traditional, that you enjoy and just say, hey, what? Why do I enjoy this? What am I getting out of? You know, it could be a movie that you like, could be avengers. Something could come out of that.

Coby Dillard [00:35:05]:
Something that you have never thought of from the standpoint, right. That, I mean, I, I can't say I could smack and people would go away because that's a whole different podcast. A whole different podcast.

Kenny Lange [00:35:20]:
That's a spinoff. We'll talk about that later.

Coby Dillard [00:35:24]:
But something, look at something that's different that you've not considered from the standpoint of leadership. I mean, I can, like I said, I can go on about, I can talk about how being in the supporters work, taking care of your people. I flew out to LA a couple weeks ago to go to a game and showed up with my backpack and suitcase because I'm staying the night. And one of the guys who's in the group is like, hey, throw it in my vans and you'll have to pay for a rocket, taking care of your people, little things like that that you don't think about that just come out of nowhere. There's something that every leader has that's a hobby or something that they never thought about that figures into their leadership in some way. Find what that thing is.

Kenny Lange [00:36:13]:
I love that. I always love pulling from unconventional domains and experiences and mining that for, okay, well, what is there to learn? That happened a lot as I've, you know, once I became a parent and then especially once I moved into, like, foster parenting and learning a lot of those techniques and different things, and I saw, man, there's so much here about communication, expectation, setting, patience, empathy, asking better questions. I was like, this stuff would work on a full grown adulthood, and it does. And when I started bringing that in and I saw, okay, well, the application's a little different, but not much. And so it was that. That same thing you're talking about of, like, pulling from something you're doing in your everyday life that wouldn't be considered traditional organizational leadership. There's something there that can influence how you lead. You don't have to lead like everyone else.

Kenny Lange [00:37:15]:
Just lead like you lead. So I think that that's a great encouragement. So I hope, if you're listening, that you sort of reflect on that. Build maybe a list, and start to pull out two to three things that you really notice and can put into practice in your next meeting, your one on ones or what have you. Now, Kobe, if people want to know more about you, more about your ideas on leadership or soccer, or maybe have questions about, you know, veterans affairs and benefits and things like that, or maybe how they could, you know, better, interactive, interact with the military families in their circle of influence. How can people get ahold of you, learn more about you, and follow you?

Coby Dillard [00:37:55]:
Usually the best way is LinkedIn. I have people reach out to reach out to me there all the time. Kobe W. Dillard. All my abbreviations at LinkedIn. Also my email through uttarler C. Dillard. Or if you just google Utterler veterans, we're the first link.

Coby Dillard [00:38:14]:
My office is the first link that pops up. Click on there, and it's got all of our information, our phone number. People reach out to me for random things all the time. I am on Facebook if you ever want to talk soccer, so pretty much anywhere. So you like supporter team? That I don't like, I'll probably talk trash. G. If you're an army person, I'll definitely talk crash. G.

Coby Dillard [00:38:35]:
So those are the only caveats.

Kenny Lange [00:38:40]:
All right. Battle lines are drawn we will link up those things in the show notes. So if you want to go in and find Kobe and go directly to his social accounts or anything else, he is a wealth of knowledge and information and a fantastic listener. And Kobe, I just appreciate the, your thoughts, your unique perspective. So I hope to have you back in the future. Maybe we'll, we'll do our own talk when the the US is hosting the World cup. Maybe, maybe we need to have our own mini series on that.

Coby Dillard [00:39:10]:
Oh, yeah, absolutely. And enjoy life. Premier League we're. And the weeds is in the championship. Still.

Kenny Lange [00:39:19]:
Still. One day.

Coby Dillard [00:39:21]:
One day.

Kenny Lange [00:39:21]:
One day.

Coby Dillard [00:39:22]:
Not this year, but one day.

Kenny Lange [00:39:24]:
One day.

Coby Dillard [00:39:25]:
One day.

Kenny Lange [00:39:26]:
All right. Well, thank you so much for being a guest. And to all of you who are listening, thank you so much for taking just a little bit of time out of your day to listen to these conversations. I really do hope that they are helpful and maybe they make you laugh a little bit, maybe cry, but you took something away that can impact and help you grow in your leadership. If you enjoyed this and if you made it this far, I'm assuming you did or somebody forced you against your will, but go ahead and leave a review rate, subscribe, whatever the button and the right verbiage is on the platform you are consuming this on, I would appreciate it. And an easy way to help your fellow leader along their journey is, is to do those things, but also share it out. You never know. Uh, a simple conversation like the one Kobe and I just had could be the key to unlocking their, their issue, their challenge, their next step and leadership.

Kenny Lange [00:40:15]:
So it's a free and easy way to pay it forward. But until next time, change the way you think you'll change the way you leave. We'll see you.