July 16, 2025 • 45 mins
"It's not who you are when the badge is on. It's who you become when the badge comes off that really shows your leadership."
Notable Moments
04:52 – Chip reflects on being recognized from “Kansas City SWAT”
13:25 – How insecurity and hardship shaped Chip’s family’s drive
18:33 – Why law enforcement became Chip’s path to service
23:05 – Transitioning leadership experience beyond law enforcement
30:07 – How defensive tactics teach problem solving under stress
35:09 – Practical advice for journaling, reflection, and staying curious
40:49 – Arbinger’s podcast “Leading Outward”
Chip Huth, retired Kansas City Police Major and current Arbinger Institute consultant, joins Jody Maberry to share how 30 years of real-world leadership became the foundation for a new chapter of service. From growing up in adversity to becoming a trusted voice in organizational leadership, Chip offers wisdom on turning insecurity into strength, journaling for self-awareness, and how solving problems under pressure becomes a superpower in any field.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Foreign.
Welcome to the Jody Mayberry Show. This
time we're going to have a wonderful conversation with.
I'm going to go on a limb and say perhaps my favorite
person from Kansas City, Missouri, Chip Hu.
It's so good to have you, Jody. It's great to be with you. It's great
(00:22):
to see you again, my friend. A lot of fond memories of times we've had
a chance to collaborate and just hang out together and I really appreciate that.
There's a lot of people in Kansas City, so knowing that, that I'm up there,
at least in the top few in terms of your preference, makes
me feel great. Well, I'll tell
you, two things put you top of the list. One, you're a heck
(00:45):
of a guy. Two, you took me out for barbecue.
Anybody that takes me out for barbecue automatically moves
up seven notches on my list. Wow, seven. How did
you, how did you arrive at that number? That's a pretty specific number.
Prior to being a park ranger, I was a financial
analyst at a commercial bank. So I'm really good with
(01:07):
spreadsheets. There it is. All right, well, look, I'll tell you what,
brother. The next time that you're down this way, as we say,
we'll just go ahead and recreate that barbecue experience. Oh, yeah,
we're going to do it. We're going to have barbecue. And there is a
spot in Kansas City I wanted to visit for years. Maybe we can
go together. And you have a world
(01:29):
renowned World War I museum in Kansas City. I've always wanted to
visit. That is an incredible museum. We're very proud of that.
A lot of people don't really realize that's there. It's kind of like
a really well kept secret. Of course, you with your background would have a, would
have more insight, but yeah, no, it's an amazing
monument and museum, Liberty Memorial
(01:51):
there in that whole park area. They do a lot of events and
things like that throughout the years there as well. But no. What a tribute
to the veterans of World War I. Now, I'm just, I'm talking kind of
out the side of my head here. I don't know if this is true, but
my understanding was that was the only World War I monument
in the nation at one time. I don't know if that's still true. I'm
(02:13):
not certain. I didn't know I would end up talking about that or I would
have done my research. This is going off topic of where I thought we would
go, but that museum actually worked with
a really great podcaster. Dan Carlin
to develop the audio experience of that museum because
he has a podcast called Hardcore History and does
(02:35):
a phenomenal job. They worked with him to develop part of
that. Yeah, I not. I did not know that. And I've actually heard of
Dan Carlin, which surprises me because it's hard for me to remember people's
names and I'm clearly not, not an expert on
podcaster and, and that talent base. But I would say that
being history for me, I mean, I don't know how it is for you, but
(02:56):
for me, I always feel I'm a little weak in that area.
Like, I should be better, I should know more. I feel
like the teachers in school put a lot of time into
teaching me these things. It wasn't unimportant. But
for me, for whatever reason, you know, being a poor student at the time, maybe
I feel like I haven't retained a lot. So going back and when I visit
(03:18):
museums like that, I will spend like people don't like to go with
me, Jody, because I will spend so much time on like the first 10 minutes.
You know, when people will walk in, they'll spend like 10 minutes in the first
little spot. I'll be there for two hours. You know, I think when I went
to the Museum of Natural History in Chicago, I didn't make it much out of
the Native American exhibit. You know, I spent hours there. And then I went to
(03:39):
the American, the African American Museum of natural history
in D.C. i thought, well, I've got time. I'm going to knock out this museum.
Then I'm going to go down to the Holocaust Museum. I've got like, you know,
like I can day here to do that. I didn't make it through a third
of the African American Museum of Natural History. I like
I was there. It was so fascinating. I get so, like,
(04:01):
it's so much to learn. But saying that, to say I
am sure that this, that Dan Carlin probably is quite
schooled. He'd be somebody that would be a great tour guide through
something like that. Yeah, well, I have more I could add
there, but I just realized I mentioned you live in Kansas City
and I've said nothing else about you other than you're my
(04:22):
pal. So I should mention what more is there.
Yeah, that's all the qualification you need. Chip
retired with the Kansas City Police Department as a
major. We'll get in more into the work he does now. But as
a major, that is quite a role to have
in a major police department in a big city.
(04:45):
Also tied in with that, he. Chip was a local celebrity
for a while because he was on Kansas City swat. I
went out with when Chip and I went out to have barbecue in Kansas
City. Just a regular citizen actually
recognized him from being on TV in Kansas City swat. That was kind
of fun to see a fan recognize you, Chip. Yeah, Well, I was just
(05:07):
glad he was a fan. Those reality shows. And of course, this was back
in the day. It was a long time ago now, you know, you're going back
20 years almost, Jody, to get back to the point where we
filmed that show. And I don't. And this is not taking anything away from
people who watch reality TV or people that produce it. I've got good friends
that produce it. But a lot of it's contrived, and people
(05:29):
don't really realize that. They feel like, well, they're watching this life unfold
or these people's lives unfold in real time, and that's just not accurate.
There's a storyline. They shape it. They'll script
some of it. They'll have a theme that they want to pursue, and they'll
edit it selectively to ensure that that goal is met.
Saying all that to say that people might get a sense of watching the show,
(05:51):
like, oh, I understand your work, or, oh, I understand who you are, or, oh,
I understand the dynamic in your team. And the reality of it is, no, it's
a bit of fiction, It's a bit of theater. So some people might see me
out and not particularly be fans
of what we. The kind of work we did or the way we showed up.
But that one turned out okay. Yeah. Have you had that happen? Have you had
(06:12):
people approach you that did not like you from the show? Mostly like, what do
they call it? Trolls? Is that a thing where people get on and is that
the right thing? I'm not a very. I'm not very good with technology or
technology lingo, but on the interwebs, you know, when people get on there and.
And they. They kind of snipe you. That stuff has happened, of course, but you're
going to have that. You could spend your entire life helping old ladies across the
(06:34):
street, and there's still going to be somebody that wants you dead. I mean, it.
You know, that's just the nature of people. Right. For the most part, though, I
would say people that I've interacted with have been supportive. There's so many people out
there that really appreciate the job that's done generally by law
enforcement. They certainly appreciate the function. Even if they had a Bad interaction. They
understand the necessity for a republic to have good quality law
(06:54):
enforcement. So most of my interactions, honestly, Jody, even people. It's
so cool, too. Even people that I've arrested, a couple people I've taken to,
arrested and gone to prison that I've bumped into, have actually been very,
very pleasant. You know, I think that goes back to the way that we were
able to interact with them in that particular context or situation.
Just being able to maintain some respect for them and to honor their
(07:17):
dignity as best you can in a situation where you might be. You know, I
mean, you're depriving somebody of their freedom, quite frankly. But it's a long answer to
say that most of my interactions with clientele have been positive,
and most of the critics that I've experienced have been anonymous
or they really had no sense of the work we did.
They really didn't understand it so much. They understood it maybe colloquially
(07:40):
from maybe fictional depictions of it on television, like, hey, I
watched, you know, Blue Bloods or something. And therefore, I have an idea
of. Of what law enforcement does. And I think some
of those shows have elements of truth in them, clearly. Right. But then they're also
fictionalized because you want drama, you want effect, you want. I mean,
if you follow me around for 24 hours and watched everything I
(08:03):
did, you'd probably get pretty bored for most of it. You'd just be like,
okay, there, There. There he goes. Okay, he's. Yeah. Driving to
the store to get another monster. Got it. Oh, man. Well, Chip
and I had the chance to be together for
several days in Kansas City a few years ago. I don't even
remember how long it was ago, Chip. But you put on a
(08:25):
conference with Tanner Brock. That was just
delightful. I met people there that I still keep in touch with. And. And before
we get into your work, I want to share two stories. One that is
not related to you, one that is related to you. That when you hear
this, you'll get an understanding of a little more of who Chip is. The
first is about your brother. Who. Chip's brother is one
(08:47):
cool guy. And you see Chip. And Chip is a big guy,
but his brother, my goodness, if
you walk into a room and say, I want to mess with
somebody, you would not pick his brother. You would probably go the
other way. He is a big fellow, and he is also a
very nice guy. You just a lot of fun. Enjoy talking to
(09:10):
him. Well, we're at this conference, and Dan Cockrell is there, and Chip, I don't
even know if you saw this happen. But Dan and your brother
had a really good rapport going and Dan really
curious about law enforcement and Chip's brother is a
trainer and all that. So Dan and him talked a lot
about training law enforcement. So one time Dan
(09:32):
sneaks your brother sitting at the table. Dan sneaks up
behind him and puts him in a chokehold. And I, there was that
brief moment. I thought it was the last time I would ever see Dan
Cockrell. Because you just don't do
things like that to a law enforcement officer who, especially as big as
he is, especially with his training now, he was gentle
(09:54):
on Dan and never took Dan straight to the ground. But I
always joke about that because I just had that brief moment where I thought, this
is it for Dan. It's over. Dan had a near death experience.
Well, and Jody, you, you met Mike. So you know, you. I've got several
brothers and most of them are in law enforcement, right. Either active
or retired. And they're all really in really good shape. My
(10:16):
biggest brother is Mark. He's. He's a big guy. He just retired recently from
law enforcement, but he's, he's a really big fella. He was on the, he was
an Olympic alternate in the 1984 Olympics for boxing. He
boxed in the army. Big guy. And you find this hard to believe. I'm actually
20 pounds heavier than Mike. I'm bigger than he is. But he's so
damn muscular that, you know, he has that presence, right? And, and
(10:39):
height wise we're pretty much the same, I think. But he, the just his conditioning,
right? The way that he carries himself, he does look like a much bigger guy.
People say that all the time, like, oh, your brother's huge. And it's like, it's
the way he, it's his composition and the way he carries himself. He's got a
good presence. You didn't get to meet my brother Vern. World class
detective. He's a sergeant now working in violent
(11:00):
crimes. He's coming up on toward the end of his career as well. But
another great jiu jitsu player, great shape.
You know, I mean that all of them take themselves, you know, they take that
really seriously. That's like part of our, you know, part of the family culture.
Even my sister, I'll just say this dude, this is my sister is amazing dude.
My sister. I don't talk about my family a lot, by the way. I think
(11:20):
this is the first podcast I've ever been on where I. You got me going
on my family. And the reason I don't is. I think their reputations speak for
themselves. They're amazing people. But my sister, like,
she's, like, an inspiration to me. She. Number one, how she came up and
all the things she had to contend with and the way she helped hold our
family together. But she's like, my mom passes away, and my
sister's, like, already 50, I think, and
(11:44):
my mom and her best friends and. And my mom got this rare blood cancer,
and it didn't take her long from the time she was diagnosed until she had
passed. And, you know, my mom was my sister's best friend. So my sister's kind
of a little bit listless. Like, she's like, you know, what do I do with
myself? She was over there every day. My mom would make her breakfast. They would
spend time together. She'd take her shopping. And so my sister's like. You know,
(12:05):
she had been athletic as a child, but she had fallen out of that, you
know, in her professional life, being so busy, didn't really work out or anything. And
she's like. Calls me up and she's like, I think I'm gonna. I think I
want to start running. And I was like, oh, so, okay. Well, I
mean, that sounds like a good hobby. And so she goes,
what advice do you have? I said, well, sis, I'm not. I'm not a runner,
(12:26):
per se. I'm a guy who runs. I go, but, you know, I would get
on a couple of these websites. I certainly would buy some good shoes, and I
would probably start out walking. You know, that's what I would do. And so she
calls me back two days later, Jody. And she's crying. Never forget this phone call.
And she's, like, breathing hard and crying and trying to catch her breath.
She goes, I just. I went out and I tried, and I only made it
(12:47):
down the path. I was only a half a mile. And I just.
I just couldn't. I can't do it. She's crying, you know, and I'm in. And
I'm thinking, oh, this poor girl, like. And I couldn't think of anything to say.
So I said, well, sis, maybe running's not
for you, right? That was my right. I'm just trying to make.
I'm just trying to calm the situation. Maybe she can pick up pickleball or something,
(13:11):
right? Okay, Jody. That's what I said. Eighteen
months later, she had ran a marathon in every state in the
Union and ran a couple of those.
Whatever they call it when it's farther than a marathon, right? Like. Like. And so
and she literally. She got invited to do seven marathons
in seven days on seven continents. And she's raised. Trying to raise some money to
(13:33):
get that done. That's like a big, you know, you got to pay for your
own. Your own freight. But that's my family. Like, you know, tell her you
can't do something, and next thing you know, she's this
ultra marathoner. I mean, it's fascinating to me to watch that happen
and to do. Look, I won't keep going down this road, but to do a
marathon in every state in 18 months or
(13:54):
less than 18 months, are you kidding me? Like, I mean,
so saying that to say, you just. You barely got the
tip of the iceberg with Mike. He's awesome and amazing in
all his own right, but, man, you. You really got to meet the rest of
the clan, brother. Where did that come from? How did
all of your siblings end up with such a powerful
(14:15):
drive? A lot of it's insecurity, if I'm honest with
you. A lot of it's insecurity. A lot of it's like, you know, you're running
from your own shadow now. Look, I hate to speak for them, but I think
they're, at this point, they're probably over it. I've done it enough. But, you know,
we. We grew up rough, man. You know, we were homeless at different times, abused
in all kinds of ways. And, you know, we. I think there was a sense
(14:36):
in which we felt, you know, perpetually victimized. And there came a point where, you
know, you respond to that in a couple of different ways. You know, one maybe
might be to curl up in a ball and withdraw, and another
might just to over be. To overcompensate and just. Just tried to
become so formidable that no one can ever take
advantage of you. I think that's where it starts, right? It starts like, I'm going
(14:57):
to become so powerful, personally powerful, that no one's ever going to be able
to victimize me again. And it manifests physically, it manifests
mentally. It manifests, you know, in a lot of different ways. My family.
Look, I love you all if you're listening to this, but we're a little overbearing.
We're a little overbearing sometimes, right? Yeah, we are. No, we're getting better as
we age, but I feel like a lot of people. We've alienated a lot of
(15:18):
people because, you know, our attitude can sometimes be, you know, put up or shut
up. Like, you know, what are you whining about? Let's Just get on with it
and let's get the mission done. And, you know, that's not fair.
You know, struggles. It's relevant. Right. You and I have talked about this offline.
What constitutes trauma for people. That's pretty subjective.
And, you know, I might be able to handle a lot more in terms
(15:40):
of frequency or intensity than another person, but the
feeling of being traumatized, you know, it's. No matter what the
triggering mechanism is, it's. It impacts people differently. And I think for us,
we just became overachievers in so many ways. In so many
ways. And I think now we're all struggling still to find balance.
It's like, you know, you always want to. You. You want to be number one.
(16:02):
You don't want to compare yourself to other people. You want to compare yourself to
your former self. Right. That's who you're racing against. Just a little bit better, a
little bit more refined, a little bit more polished, a little bit more able to
serve other people as you move forward, as you progress.
And I think for my family, though, what lit the fire? Look, they may
say it differently, brother, but if I. From a. Hey, I can. As objective as
(16:24):
I can be. I think what lit the fire was insecurity, Jody, which is not
a good motivator. It's really interesting. I do. You know
Chip. I do a lot of work with Lee Cockrell and have for years.
He grew up with his mother, married five
times. He's adopted twice, didn't finish college, and somehow ended up
running Walt Disney World for a decade. And he cites
(16:46):
insecurity quite often as his biggest driver. Oh,
wow. Now, it's funny. You know, you introduced me to Lee. Great, great
guy. But I did not know that. That is news to me. That is
so interesting. Now, what does he think, though? Does he think, like, in
retrospect, does he think that was necessary
as a primer? Does he think it was. What is his take on that? I
(17:08):
don't know. I'd. I would have to ask him. He's open to talking
about it. He doesn't mind telling people. So maybe that can be an
episode of a show with Lee someday. You gotta ask him, because
he's a guy who's got so much perspective in depth, so much
experience. Right. And he's had an opportunity to. Well, I think he's more
reflective than I am, so I'd be interested to know what he would think of
(17:30):
about that, looking back. Yeah. All right. One more question
about your family. Yeah. Which will transition us into the next part.
So Many of you ended up in law enforcement. Why is that? Yeah,
that answer is easy, and I think I am on the same page with my
brothers and sisters here, is that, you know, when we were
kids, we were often in pretty dire circumstances,
(17:52):
maybe without something to eat, maybe in danger of being harmed and hurt,
maybe actually be, you know, in a situation where you are harmed, we need help.
And the cops were always showing up. And in our experience, this
isn't everybody's experience, Jody, with the police, by the way. This isn't representative
of everybody's experience, but our experience back in the 70s
was, you know, the cops were kind of like saviors. Like, they would
(18:14):
come and they would protect us and they would get us help and they would
get us food, and they would, you know, make an arrest if they had to,
to keep us safe. You know, my dad went to jail a lot for violence,
and it was just like this. You know, I immediately
associated them with protecting. And
I thought, man, I really want. I wish I could do that. Like,
(18:35):
I want to be able to do that. I don't want to be the kid
hiding under the bed, you know, I want to be the person who stands up
for people that, that feel like they need to hide under the bed, metaphorically or
otherwise, and that's it, right? And I think that's true for my
siblings. I think that drove them, in large part, all
of them serve in some capacity, but the law enforcement piece
(18:55):
particularly, I think it was just that impression that those
officers made on us, you know, back when we were children.
When you were a child, you saw a law enforcement officer as
a protector, someone that was watching out for you, making your life better,
keeping you safe. All your years with the Kansas City
Police Department, do you feel like you
(19:16):
fulfilled that in your role as an officer?
Yeah, for most of it, I would say. I think I could say most of
it. I think there was probably a period of my career, I did 30 years,
right? I think there's a period of my career where I was a little self
centered, a little cynical, little disengaged. You know, it
kind of peaks and valleys there. But, you know, I came in like, you know,
(19:36):
Superman with a cape, you know, in the boots and the whole nine yards, thinking,
now that I've got a badge, I can save everybody and I can make everything
right. And once I, you know, it settled on
me that, no, actually I'm one cog in this very complex
machine and my ability to affect
people's lives in a dramatic way is pretty limited. You
(19:58):
know, in the Aggregate, I'm not going to make a huge difference in somebody's
life day to day to day. And I kind of felt like I was
on this 911 hamster wheel where it's like there's a problem, we
come, put a band aid on it, we leave, we go to the next problem,
that problem then ends up popping up again and we're back and. And
I just got. This is something you've heard. Many of you, you know, as you
(20:20):
and I both worked in law enforcement, we've heard our brethren kind of vent about
this, you know, feeling like you're on this, this treadmill. So there was a
time, I think, where I, I just got to the point where I just objectified
my clientele. Like I was just like, look, these people, you know, look at
them, look at them. You know, we going to do with people like this. And
I just kind of write them off, right? There's very black and white orientation,
(20:41):
like there's good and evil, right? There's bad and good. Right.
No real gray for me for a period of time. I think that
was. I was at my least effective then. I don't think I stayed there
forever. But I burnt some bridges that'll never be rebuilt by having
that attitude. People that'll never let me live that down. And I don't know if
they should, by the way. I'm not asking for them to. I respect where they're
(21:02):
at, but for the most part, for the most part, especially
the last 15 plus years, oh my.
Yeah. I feel I walked away from that profession. A lot of people grieve it.
You and I've talked about that too. A lot of people grieve it, and I
think sometimes they feel like there's unfinished business there for them. I don't feel that
way. I feel like when I walked away, I could look back on my service
(21:24):
and feel. Feel good about it. Feel good about it. Not in a prideful way,
but in a way that, that I fulfilled my obligation. Right. I
fulfilled my oath. I did what I said I was gonna do. I
sacrificed where I needed to. And I feel looking back on it, I don't
feel a deep longing like, oh my goodness, I wish I was back
there doing that every day. I feel like that was a chapter that was really
(21:45):
important to me and I closed it out in the right way, in an
honorable way. I could feel good about it. I mean, thank goodness that
I was able to shift my attitude. You know, if I'd have done
a whole career with that cynical attitude, I Adopted for a while.
I don't know where I would be, quite frankly, Jody. Like, I don't know what
that would have done to me. I have no idea. Well, this is a good
(22:07):
transition into the reason I asked Chip to come on the
show, because many people that I know put in
decades in law enforcement and then when it's over, either
they just retire and then they go fishing or play golf, or
if they feel like they have something left, they become an
instructor or a consultant within law enforcement. And
(22:29):
Chip did not do that. Chip took 30 years
of experience working with people, being a leader,
solving problems, and he is now a senior
consultant with the Arbinger Institute. And this
fascinates me, Chip, for a couple of reasons. One, you didn't take the
path, 95% of law enforcement officers take
(22:51):
it into their career. And so I want to talk about that. But then
also, this is what I found for a lot of law
enforcement officers is they think I spent
30 years in law enforcement. It's all I know. And they
don't connect how amazing their job
was and what it taught them about leadership and problem solving and
(23:13):
dealing with people and dealing with stress and, and that goes
over into business as well. And you, you're one who
knew what you did was such invaluable experience
that you can help other people and then moved over to the Arbinger Institute
as a consultant. And I applaud that so much because
you do not have to have 30 years of a corporate experience
(23:36):
to be able to consult for corporations.
And I love that you did this. And so I want to talk about that
transition in particular, how you were able
to pull from a 30 year career in law enforcement to
now help organizations deal with problems.
Yeah, there's so much there to unpack. Well, I would
(23:59):
say first off that, and you know this from
being a law enforcement officer, I think if you can be effective
as a, as a law enforcement officer, you could do anything. Like, I really believe
that. I mean, the, the personality traits and the attributes that are necessary to be
really good in the law enforcement profession, they translate
into darn near any context right now. Look, I mean,
(24:21):
there's upper limits relative to, you know, like,
for me personally, my iq, like I'm never going to be a chemical engineer
or neurosurgeon. Right. I don't know the attributes for that. But in terms of most
of the jobs that are out there, the professions that are out there that require
working with people, if you're really good, like, you take your job
seriously in law enforcement, and you learn all there is to learn. You meet people
(24:43):
from every strata of society in all kinds of
contexts, and most of them are tense and
uncertain. Right. Those contexts. And you learn to
deal with these complex situations. And if you could do
that. Oh, my. Like, you can add, that absolutely translates into
the quote. I'm doing air quotes. The pressure
(25:05):
of a corporate environment. Right. Like I often thought people in the corporate
space, like, they throw that word around. They'll use a lot of kind
of trite, you know, colloquialisms or analogies where they'll
say things like, we're at war, or, you know, those are really bad,
in my opinion, bad analogies, because, you
know, there are people who have been in situations like that where literally, life and
(25:28):
death, that's what you're contending with. So I'm saying that to say the same
thing with people in the military, by the way, if you're really good at that
profession, it translates over into a lot of other things.
So the lessons learned there, in answer to your first part of your question, I
think the lessons learned there in law enforcement about people becoming
a student of people, that prepares you in
(25:49):
so many ways. If you're willing to expand your mind
and continue to learn and grow and not feel like you got it all
figured out or that you've got people compartmentalized
into these certain categories, like, you're open to new experiences, new
learning, you can take that foundation you get from law enforcement and you can
apply that in so many different professions,
(26:12):
different occupations. I have often said in business, all
problems reduce to people problems. In the final analysis, it's
people that don't show up to work on time, people that don't meet
expectations, people that don't get along well. It's all people.
And once you become an expert in that people space, you're definitely
primed to be effective in other professions. So,
(26:34):
yeah, I mean, I think that. Is that fair? Is that a fair answer to
your question? Yeah, it is. I find it
encouraging to hear you say that. Look, if you were
good as a law enforcement officer, you'll be good at other things. My
wife is a schoolteacher, and I see that in school teachers as well, that school
teachers think, I'm a teacher. That's all I can do. And I'm like, no, if
(26:55):
you can manage a classroom, there's nothing you can't do. Yeah, but
Jodi, your wife, should know this, too. I mean, she might know this
intellectually, but it's hard to know this, you know, from a point
of Self reflection. It's hard to know this, but being a teacher is something she
does well. It's not who she is. Who she is,
that's what she's bringing to the teaching profession that helps her excel.
(27:17):
But who she is is something much more important than what she does. Is
that fair? That is fair. That's a. Those are great words
there. I want to get back to the work you do now and the
Harbinger Institute, but there's one more thing I want to touch on. This
didn't quite come up, but I'm going to bring it up. Therefore, it will be
part of the conversation. As a park ranger, we
(27:38):
trained a lot in fighting and defensive tactics. I know you did. Most law
enforcement officers do. I will tell you one of the things
that looking back, I really like about training
in defensive tactics and learning how to fight is that
now I see what it really was was
training how to solve problems in real time. Training
(28:01):
how to solve problems when you're potentially hurting, when you're
tired, when you're under stress, when there's risk
and you have to still solve those problems. I didn't get it at the
time when I was a park ranger, but looking back, I
realized that's what it taught me. Yeah, there's no doubt about it
in that space. It's unforgiving, too. When you make a mistake, you get immediate
(28:24):
feedback and there's no hiding it. Right. You know you're doing technique
wrong or you know you're not applying leverage in the right way, you're
going to get immediate feedback. And the other thing is, you're always contending with people
who are. They have an advantage over you. Like even, you know, even
though you're well trained, you're wearing a lot of restrictive equipment, you've got a
firearm you've got to protect. You know, there's limitations on what you can do.
(28:46):
You're also bound by the law. You know, the Constitution was
written to protect people from the government, not the other way around.
So, like, the Constitution was written to limit us in what we're allowed to
do in terms of seizing and controlling people. And I think people forget that. Right.
Cops have rules. And when you're going up against someone
who doesn't have to play by the rules and they're desperate often to get
(29:09):
away or to evade capture, man, they've got a whole
labyrinth worth of options they could leverage. And you, you
again, you're bound by your training and being able to process in that
moment. As you said, I love how you Said problem solve because it's
like a complex problem and you're just, you're solving it from
moment to moment and adjusting, taking the feedback, you
(29:31):
know, judging the impact you're having on the impact of the technique you're using,
evaluating and then readjusting and reapplying other technique. I mean, it's constant
chess game, really, and the more you practice, the better you get. But at the
end of the day, I like the analogy you're making there, too. When you take
that capacity that you develop in that particular
domain and then you transfer that into any situation in
(29:53):
which there's problems, any situation that's kinetic, that requires fast decision
making. You've been preparing for that your entire life. On the mat, on the
range, in critical incidents. Another advantage for
anybody out there in law enforcement, listening. I know there, I know you're out
there. Just another advantage that you're gaining every day as
you're going about doing your job, training and preparing for the worst. You've got
(30:15):
opportunity there to be able to find a way to transfer that into
other endeavors. Okay, so you had 30
years of this unique, incredible experience. You
retire, move to the Arbinger Institute as a
consultant. During that transition, did you
take any time to evaluate your career,
(30:37):
reflect on it, write down your stories, what you learned, how
it applies to the work you do now? Yeah, I wish I would have
written down more. Jody. So funny. When you're living it out, you're like, this is.
No one's going to find this interesting. And I'm glad some people wrote some
stuff down. I'm glad we were able to capture some of my experience in a
couple of different books, you know, that I think have been helpful to people.
(31:00):
I would definitely say they've been helpful to people in my mind. Like, I had
thought about writing a different book. But
honestly, and I mean this sincerely,
everything that I've learned, I've learned from people like you, from
books, from trainers. Like, I don't feel like I have a lot of
original, original thinking. Like, I feel like it would be if
(31:22):
I'm. There's a lot of books out there that are just kind of recycled knowledge.
I feel like that's where I'm at in my life. I've got some original thoughts,
but I haven't worked them out enough to make them coherent. I think most of
what I know has been said better by people, better positioned to say
it. So I didn't go down that road. And as far
as my, Like, I didn't take much time between retiring from the
(31:43):
police department and taking the full time position with
Arbinger. So I'd been working with Arbinger as a consultant for years
before I retired, using my vacation time to travel
and do that type of thing and to learn and grow. So it was kind
of, for me, it was like I had a plan of kind of
transitioning away from my career with the
(32:03):
Kansas City pd And then it was like this fork in the road.
Am I going to pursue a police chief opportunity
so that I can scale my leadership philosophy within an organization, or
am I going to do something else? And I really didn't know what that something
else was until one of my colleagues from Arbinger actually sat down
with me and kind of painted a different picture for me
(32:26):
of what my potential might be. But I knew this.
So to answer your question, what I was sure of was
I had more capacity in me to serve. And I wanted to spend
the rest of my life serving people. That for me,
like serving people for me, that's my thing. Like, everybody has a thing,
right? That's my thing. Being of service. Now, look, part of that
(32:49):
could be driven initially by that insecurity we talked about. But I think it's
evolved to the point that I feel like I am strong
and capable. And I feel like that is a gift for which I am eternally
grateful. I can't take full credit for it. I've worked to develop some
attributes that I have, but I didn't earn those attributes. And
I feel like that and this is kind of a spiritual thing for me,
(33:11):
Jody. I don't talk about this stuff really ever, but I feel like for me,
because that capacity was gifted to me, I have an obligation that
I feel to use that in service of other people.
Now, say it out loud. It sounds so romantic, right? It sounds like I'm romanticizing
it, but I do feel like that's true. I feel like I. I'm at my
best when I am working in behalf of other people. I just,
(33:34):
I get in a flow state. I feel like, oh, yeah, this is what I'm
supposed to be doing. And I'm at my worst when I'm selfish and
self concerned and self absorbed. Like, I don't like that version of me. It happens.
He shows up. But I'm definitely at my worst. I can't think as clearly,
I can't function as effectively. But once I turn outward, as
we say in arbitrary. Once I turn outward and I start working on
(33:56):
behalf of other people and sincerely focusing on how I can
get what I Need in a way that helps them get what they need. Oh,
man, I feel alive. I feel. I mean, it's crazy, right? I feel
like I could do this forever. I don't feel like. People talk about riding off
into the sunset and, you know, retiring and going fishing and maybe sitting on
a beach and that's a vacation poster. To me, that's not a life. Like, I.
(34:16):
I feel like I want to be engaged so much.
So, you know. Yeah, man, I went off the rails there, brother. That's where the
best conversations are at when we go off trail, find the good stuff.
Now that you have, you're able to look back. You've been
retired from the police department for a little while now. Been doing great work
with the Arbinger Institute. If someone else were to come to
(34:39):
you and say, look, I'm an executive, because a major in a police
department is an executive. I know it has a different name, it's rank
based on. But it is an executive position. So someone comes
to you and says, look, I'm. I'm finishing up my executive career.
I also want to be a consultant like you.
What counsel do you have for them? You said you wish you would have wrote
(35:02):
more down. You wish you would have collected more stories. Well, now you've got the
chance to tell someone else how to prepare for it. What are the steps?
Yeah, well, look, first of all, I'd say journal, and I mean that. Again, that
sounds trite because everybody's talking about journaling like they're rediscovering it, right?
Last decade or so, people have been talking about, like, the re. You know, the
resurgence of stoicism and that type of thinking, and
(35:23):
journaling has been a big thing. We want to talk about that, like, not just
from a therapeutic perspective, but also from just being able
to help you kind of fortify who you are. I would commend that to
anybody. You're having experiences right now. Now I'm talking to this person,
this hypothetical person. You're having experiences right now that you can't
fully appreciate the significance of. You know, but
(35:45):
keep track. As you learn something, Note it down.
You know, when you find an interesting story or an interesting
success, write it down, capture it, memorialize it. You're never
going to remember it like it happened. And people are constantly bringing up things to
me that I forgot. Like, pretty neat stuff that we did as a team. I'm
like, oh, my goodness, I didn't even remember doing that. Like, that had slipped off
(36:07):
my. Or out of my memory. So that's One also
understand that every single person you meet, you can learn something
from that person and you should have that orientation with them. Like,
it gets crazy curious. So when I find successful people,
you know, the Alamolally's of the world, the Stan, the Crystals of the world, the
people that have led things and have really accomplished some
(36:28):
amazing stuff, when I'm in their orbit, like when I can have
time with them, I get so curious. I want to learn from them. I want
to get like, what are lessons that you've learned as you've gone along
your journey? What were the things that contributed to your success? Were the most
difficult things that you came up against? What kind of impediments did you face? How
did you maneuver over and around them? Like, how did you transform those into
(36:50):
opportunities for growth? Just get like, you're a student, right?
Constantly, lifelong learning. I'm wanting to know as much as I can.
You're in a laboratory right now. You, you hypothetical person that Jody's talking about,
you're in a laboratory right now. You got to treat it that way. Just approach
it with the curiosity of a five year old and you're going to learn so
much. But every conversation you have is significant beyond your ability
(37:12):
to appreciate the significance. And if you treat every person you
meet, if you treat that interaction as sacred, it doesn't mean you're going to spend
an hour with them necessarily. But if you walk past a person in a hallway,
you can regard them as a person, as a human
being in that five seconds it takes you to walk past them. And, and that
can become transformative as that becomes, you know, kind of
(37:33):
characteristic of who you are. You have genuine respect and regard for people,
it changes your entire outlook. You know, we don't see the world as it
is, we see the world as we are. And as you change your mindset, your
attitude, your perspective, opportunities will just pop up, Jody, in all
kinds of ways. Like where you're like, oh my goodness, there's an opportunity right here
for me to learn something so valuable? I've learned things from my stepson, I've learned
(37:55):
things from. Even when he was growing up, I learned things from him, right? By
just simply opening my mind up. So you're preparing every day.
Keep a bit of a journal, keep track, build a network. You're
really good at this, Jody. Build a network of people who
have varied expertise and varied perspective
and diverse ways of thinking about things. Build a network, go outside of your
(38:17):
comfort zone and have people you can lean on and go to that can
help guide you, that's huge, I think. And then don't
be afraid to experiment and iterate. You know, you've got to try things out.
Life's about iteration and, you know, you've got to experiment a little
bit, Come back to the lab, make some adjustments, go back out and experiment.
You know, you're not going to get it. It's funny, I was with a group
(38:38):
yesterday doing strategic planning session and you know, the
hardest thing for them is thinking we're going to solve this problem today. It's like,
no, we're not going to solve this problem. We're going to come close to solving
this problem day. We're going to frame it up. We're going to frame it up
in a way that we'll be able to contend with it more effectively. That's what
we're doing here today. So, yeah, that's kind of. I'm not an
advice giver. You could tell by the way that I just shotgunned that. But. But
(39:01):
I mean, that's kind of in my mind, things that I think about as being
important as you prepare for that next chapter. Well, now that we went
through your career and the transition into the
Arbinger Institute full time, tell us about the work that you do there.
Yeah. So arbitrary. Kind of saved my life in a way. You know,
just their way of explaining what was missing in my
(39:23):
life in terms of leadership and connection. I could not, not work
with them. Right. And so to have the opportunity now to do this full time
is amazing. And what I do. So I have four main
responsibilities. Content creation, executive coaching,
facilitation and delivery of workshops and leadership
sessions and then keynote speaking. I'll do speeches every once in a while as well.
(39:45):
Those are my main areas of focus. And it's just,
I hate saying this, especially when I'm saying it on the record, but
I don't really feel like I have a job, Jody. I feel like it's like,
I mean, don't let my boss know, but, you know, I feel like this is
like, right. So meaningful to me and I just enjoy
it. I enjoy every aspect of it. But day to day, a lot of travel,
(40:07):
a lot of being with, with different clients, different spaces, helping them
to focus on challenges that they're having in their organizations,
working across all, all different verticals, from nonprofit to
government to education, you name it, healthcare. So I'm
constantly. And we are an institute, so we are constantly learning. And
it's like I'm constantly learning from all the people that I'm working with
(40:29):
and the Latest thing that we've been doing, it's new to me.
I've really been enjoying it actually is I'm a contributor to our new
podcast. We. It's titled Leading Outward and Leading Outward launched
a couple of weeks ago and I think we're up to like
550 five star reviews on Apple. I don't track
Spotify as much. I'm not on that platform as much, but I guess,
(40:52):
I guess it's doing well there too. And YouTube and anywhere you listen to podcasts.
But I'm involved in some of the creation for that content. That's
because that's a new task I've taken on here in the last year. A new
role that's really, really fun. But yeah, day to day it's all
about trying to help turn the world outward, to help people connect and to
bring humanity to the workplace. All the technology we have going on,
(41:14):
all the outsourcing of our thinking that's being done by AI and
different platforms, we want to make sure that people have to be able to
function and work well together. At the end of the day, there's people behind all
of these technologies and so we want to make sure that we
help people reconnect to that fundamental truth about others and
the idea that we could work together when we have unconditional regard
(41:36):
for the personhood of the people we we work with and we're considerate
about the impact we have on them and their ability to accomplish their
objectives. So that's a mouthful, but that's where I'm at today
with Arbinger's work. Well, there's it. You're just doing
great work with Arbinger. They do. It's fantastic. This has been
a such a good conversation about using
(41:59):
your experience that you get through your career to build a unique
perspective because Chip brings such a unique
perspective because of the work he's done in leadership in
communities that not many consultants that an
organization would bring in have that type of experience. So I
appreciate this, Chip. I'm glad you mentioned Leading
(42:21):
Outward, the podcast. You all do a great job on that. I said there was
going to be two stories about Chip. I never got to the second one.
But the good news is Chip is going to going to join us
next episode and I will tell that story
next episode when Chip comes back. But for now, Chip,
I'm so glad that you joined us for an
(42:42):
episode. This is such a good talk. Jody, you're so
gracious and I love, you know, the questions you ask and I love the way
you force me to think more clearly. You know,
I. It just, it's a pleasure to spend time with you, my friend. I look
forward to the. The next time we get the chat, which sounds like it's going
to be pretty soon. Pretty soon. Well, where can we either find out
(43:03):
more about you or just find out about the work with the Harbinger
Institute? Yeah. So we're on LinkedIn, obviously. I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm fairly active on there. I check that once a day at a minimum. And
then arbinger's website, arbinger.com. you know,
that's an easy way for people to learn
so much about our work. We got the three international best selling books that are
(43:25):
out there, Leadership and Self Deception, the Anatomy of Peace and the Outward
Mindset. That's another great intro into Arbiter's work, the podcast. Honestly,
like, I'm finding. I'm surprised at the response from the podcast. I'm finding
this to be a really good entree into Arbinger and what we
do. Because a lot of people don't have time, Jody, as you know, to maybe
sit down and read a book. They don't feel like they do and it's hard
(43:47):
to. You can't really. I don't like this word. This is the wrong word. You'll
probably have a better word. But you can't really multitask when you're reading
a book, right? You gotta, you're setting still, you're focused, you're reading what it, whatever
it is. With a podcast, oh my. You could be folding the laundry. You know,
you could be taking a walk with the dogs or strolling through the
Smoky Mountains. I like that. As you know, I'm rather fond of the
(44:09):
Smokies and listen to a podcast. So this podcast, and it's also
digestible. It's like it's chunked up in a way that the episodes are short
enough where, you know, it doesn't require a huge time commitment. So I'm gonna. This
is my last shameless plug for the podcast, is that. I think that
is a great way to learn a bit about Arbinger's work in the second
episode. This is unique. In the second episode, I coach a
(44:30):
construction executive live. So we are coaching through a
real problem that he's struggling with. And, and we're recording it.
And just for him to be able to. Of course, we anonymized him. We
anonymize anybody we do this with. He ended up outing himself on LinkedIn
after the episode came out, which I thought was amazing. But that is like you
being a fly on the wall for a coaching session where you can just take
(44:52):
it in and maybe you could be helped as well. I know I'm helped when
I coach. It's reciprocal. But that's kind of a neat. I
haven't seen that on a lot of podcasts. That's an experiment we're running. So
website, books, podcast, LinkedIn to get a
hold of me Easy day. I'd love to connect with you on LinkedIn. And
yeah, that's it. All right. Thank you so much, Chip.
(45:15):
And thank you for listening to the Jody Mayberry Show.
I wish you'd stop being such a sook. Sugar J.
Foreign.
Welcome to the Jody Mayberry Show. This
time we're going to have a wonderful conversation with.
I'm going to go on a limb and say perhaps my favorite
person from Kansas City, Missouri, Chip Hu.
It's so good to have you, Jody. It's great to be with you. It's great
(00:22):
to see you again, my friend. A lot of fond memories of times we've had
a chance to collaborate and just hang out together and I really appreciate that.
There's a lot of people in Kansas City, so knowing that, that I'm up there,
at least in the top few in terms of your preference, makes
me feel great. Well, I'll tell
you, two things put you top of the list. One, you're a heck
(00:45):
of a guy. Two, you took me out for barbecue.
Anybody that takes me out for barbecue automatically moves
up seven notches on my list. Wow, seven. How did
you, how did you arrive at that number? That's a pretty specific number.
Prior to being a park ranger, I was a financial
analyst at a commercial bank. So I'm really good with
(01:07):
spreadsheets. There it is. All right, well, look, I'll tell you what,
brother. The next time that you're down this way, as we say,
we'll just go ahead and recreate that barbecue experience. Oh, yeah,
we're going to do it. We're going to have barbecue. And there is a
spot in Kansas City I wanted to visit for years. Maybe we can
go together. And you have a world
(01:29):
renowned World War I museum in Kansas City. I've always wanted to
visit. That is an incredible museum. We're very proud of that.
A lot of people don't really realize that's there. It's kind of like
a really well kept secret. Of course, you with your background would have a, would
have more insight, but yeah, no, it's an amazing
monument and museum, Liberty Memorial
(01:51):
there in that whole park area. They do a lot of events and
things like that throughout the years there as well. But no. What a tribute
to the veterans of World War I. Now, I'm just, I'm talking kind of
out the side of my head here. I don't know if this is true, but
my understanding was that was the only World War I monument
in the nation at one time. I don't know if that's still true. I'm
(02:13):
not certain. I didn't know I would end up talking about that or I would
have done my research. This is going off topic of where I thought we would
go, but that museum actually worked with
a really great podcaster. Dan Carlin
to develop the audio experience of that museum because
he has a podcast called Hardcore History and does
(02:35):
a phenomenal job. They worked with him to develop part of
that. Yeah, I not. I did not know that. And I've actually heard of
Dan Carlin, which surprises me because it's hard for me to remember people's
names and I'm clearly not, not an expert on
podcaster and, and that talent base. But I would say that
being history for me, I mean, I don't know how it is for you, but
(02:56):
for me, I always feel I'm a little weak in that area.
Like, I should be better, I should know more. I feel
like the teachers in school put a lot of time into
teaching me these things. It wasn't unimportant. But
for me, for whatever reason, you know, being a poor student at the time, maybe
I feel like I haven't retained a lot. So going back and when I visit
(03:18):
museums like that, I will spend like people don't like to go with
me, Jody, because I will spend so much time on like the first 10 minutes.
You know, when people will walk in, they'll spend like 10 minutes in the first
little spot. I'll be there for two hours. You know, I think when I went
to the Museum of Natural History in Chicago, I didn't make it much out of
the Native American exhibit. You know, I spent hours there. And then I went to
(03:39):
the American, the African American Museum of natural history
in D.C. i thought, well, I've got time. I'm going to knock out this museum.
Then I'm going to go down to the Holocaust Museum. I've got like, you know,
like I can day here to do that. I didn't make it through a third
of the African American Museum of Natural History. I like
I was there. It was so fascinating. I get so, like,
(04:01):
it's so much to learn. But saying that, to say I
am sure that this, that Dan Carlin probably is quite
schooled. He'd be somebody that would be a great tour guide through
something like that. Yeah, well, I have more I could add
there, but I just realized I mentioned you live in Kansas City
and I've said nothing else about you other than you're my
(04:22):
pal. So I should mention what more is there.
Yeah, that's all the qualification you need. Chip
retired with the Kansas City Police Department as a
major. We'll get in more into the work he does now. But as
a major, that is quite a role to have
in a major police department in a big city.
(04:45):
Also tied in with that, he. Chip was a local celebrity
for a while because he was on Kansas City swat. I
went out with when Chip and I went out to have barbecue in Kansas
City. Just a regular citizen actually
recognized him from being on TV in Kansas City swat. That was kind
of fun to see a fan recognize you, Chip. Yeah, Well, I was just
(05:07):
glad he was a fan. Those reality shows. And of course, this was back
in the day. It was a long time ago now, you know, you're going back
20 years almost, Jody, to get back to the point where we
filmed that show. And I don't. And this is not taking anything away from
people who watch reality TV or people that produce it. I've got good friends
that produce it. But a lot of it's contrived, and people
(05:29):
don't really realize that. They feel like, well, they're watching this life unfold
or these people's lives unfold in real time, and that's just not accurate.
There's a storyline. They shape it. They'll script
some of it. They'll have a theme that they want to pursue, and they'll
edit it selectively to ensure that that goal is met.
Saying all that to say that people might get a sense of watching the show,
(05:51):
like, oh, I understand your work, or, oh, I understand who you are, or, oh,
I understand the dynamic in your team. And the reality of it is, no, it's
a bit of fiction, It's a bit of theater. So some people might see me
out and not particularly be fans
of what we. The kind of work we did or the way we showed up.
But that one turned out okay. Yeah. Have you had that happen? Have you had
(06:12):
people approach you that did not like you from the show? Mostly like, what do
they call it? Trolls? Is that a thing where people get on and is that
the right thing? I'm not a very. I'm not very good with technology or
technology lingo, but on the interwebs, you know, when people get on there and.
And they. They kind of snipe you. That stuff has happened, of course, but you're
going to have that. You could spend your entire life helping old ladies across the
(06:34):
street, and there's still going to be somebody that wants you dead. I mean, it.
You know, that's just the nature of people. Right. For the most part, though, I
would say people that I've interacted with have been supportive. There's so many people out
there that really appreciate the job that's done generally by law
enforcement. They certainly appreciate the function. Even if they had a Bad interaction. They
understand the necessity for a republic to have good quality law
(06:54):
enforcement. So most of my interactions, honestly, Jody, even people. It's
so cool, too. Even people that I've arrested, a couple people I've taken to,
arrested and gone to prison that I've bumped into, have actually been very,
very pleasant. You know, I think that goes back to the way that we were
able to interact with them in that particular context or situation.
Just being able to maintain some respect for them and to honor their
(07:17):
dignity as best you can in a situation where you might be. You know, I
mean, you're depriving somebody of their freedom, quite frankly. But it's a long answer to
say that most of my interactions with clientele have been positive,
and most of the critics that I've experienced have been anonymous
or they really had no sense of the work we did.
They really didn't understand it so much. They understood it maybe colloquially
(07:40):
from maybe fictional depictions of it on television, like, hey, I
watched, you know, Blue Bloods or something. And therefore, I have an idea
of. Of what law enforcement does. And I think some
of those shows have elements of truth in them, clearly. Right. But then they're also
fictionalized because you want drama, you want effect, you want. I mean,
if you follow me around for 24 hours and watched everything I
(08:03):
did, you'd probably get pretty bored for most of it. You'd just be like,
okay, there, There. There he goes. Okay, he's. Yeah. Driving to
the store to get another monster. Got it. Oh, man. Well, Chip
and I had the chance to be together for
several days in Kansas City a few years ago. I don't even
remember how long it was ago, Chip. But you put on a
(08:25):
conference with Tanner Brock. That was just
delightful. I met people there that I still keep in touch with. And. And before
we get into your work, I want to share two stories. One that is
not related to you, one that is related to you. That when you hear
this, you'll get an understanding of a little more of who Chip is. The
first is about your brother. Who. Chip's brother is one
(08:47):
cool guy. And you see Chip. And Chip is a big guy,
but his brother, my goodness, if
you walk into a room and say, I want to mess with
somebody, you would not pick his brother. You would probably go the
other way. He is a big fellow, and he is also a
very nice guy. You just a lot of fun. Enjoy talking to
(09:10):
him. Well, we're at this conference, and Dan Cockrell is there, and Chip, I don't
even know if you saw this happen. But Dan and your brother
had a really good rapport going and Dan really
curious about law enforcement and Chip's brother is a
trainer and all that. So Dan and him talked a lot
about training law enforcement. So one time Dan
(09:32):
sneaks your brother sitting at the table. Dan sneaks up
behind him and puts him in a chokehold. And I, there was that
brief moment. I thought it was the last time I would ever see Dan
Cockrell. Because you just don't do
things like that to a law enforcement officer who, especially as big as
he is, especially with his training now, he was gentle
(09:54):
on Dan and never took Dan straight to the ground. But I
always joke about that because I just had that brief moment where I thought, this
is it for Dan. It's over. Dan had a near death experience.
Well, and Jody, you, you met Mike. So you know, you. I've got several
brothers and most of them are in law enforcement, right. Either active
or retired. And they're all really in really good shape. My
(10:16):
biggest brother is Mark. He's. He's a big guy. He just retired recently from
law enforcement, but he's, he's a really big fella. He was on the, he was
an Olympic alternate in the 1984 Olympics for boxing. He
boxed in the army. Big guy. And you find this hard to believe. I'm actually
20 pounds heavier than Mike. I'm bigger than he is. But he's so
damn muscular that, you know, he has that presence, right? And, and
(10:39):
height wise we're pretty much the same, I think. But he, the just his conditioning,
right? The way that he carries himself, he does look like a much bigger guy.
People say that all the time, like, oh, your brother's huge. And it's like, it's
the way he, it's his composition and the way he carries himself. He's got a
good presence. You didn't get to meet my brother Vern. World class
detective. He's a sergeant now working in violent
(11:00):
crimes. He's coming up on toward the end of his career as well. But
another great jiu jitsu player, great shape.
You know, I mean that all of them take themselves, you know, they take that
really seriously. That's like part of our, you know, part of the family culture.
Even my sister, I'll just say this dude, this is my sister is amazing dude.
My sister. I don't talk about my family a lot, by the way. I think
(11:20):
this is the first podcast I've ever been on where I. You got me going
on my family. And the reason I don't is. I think their reputations speak for
themselves. They're amazing people. But my sister, like,
she's, like, an inspiration to me. She. Number one, how she came up and
all the things she had to contend with and the way she helped hold our
family together. But she's like, my mom passes away, and my
sister's, like, already 50, I think, and
(11:44):
my mom and her best friends and. And my mom got this rare blood cancer,
and it didn't take her long from the time she was diagnosed until she had
passed. And, you know, my mom was my sister's best friend. So my sister's kind
of a little bit listless. Like, she's like, you know, what do I do with
myself? She was over there every day. My mom would make her breakfast. They would
spend time together. She'd take her shopping. And so my sister's like. You know,
(12:05):
she had been athletic as a child, but she had fallen out of that, you
know, in her professional life, being so busy, didn't really work out or anything. And
she's like. Calls me up and she's like, I think I'm gonna. I think I
want to start running. And I was like, oh, so, okay. Well, I
mean, that sounds like a good hobby. And so she goes,
what advice do you have? I said, well, sis, I'm not. I'm not a runner,
(12:26):
per se. I'm a guy who runs. I go, but, you know, I would get
on a couple of these websites. I certainly would buy some good shoes, and I
would probably start out walking. You know, that's what I would do. And so she
calls me back two days later, Jody. And she's crying. Never forget this phone call.
And she's, like, breathing hard and crying and trying to catch her breath.
She goes, I just. I went out and I tried, and I only made it
(12:47):
down the path. I was only a half a mile. And I just.
I just couldn't. I can't do it. She's crying, you know, and I'm in. And
I'm thinking, oh, this poor girl, like. And I couldn't think of anything to say.
So I said, well, sis, maybe running's not
for you, right? That was my right. I'm just trying to make.
I'm just trying to calm the situation. Maybe she can pick up pickleball or something,
(13:11):
right? Okay, Jody. That's what I said. Eighteen
months later, she had ran a marathon in every state in the
Union and ran a couple of those.
Whatever they call it when it's farther than a marathon, right? Like. Like. And so
and she literally. She got invited to do seven marathons
in seven days on seven continents. And she's raised. Trying to raise some money to
(13:33):
get that done. That's like a big, you know, you got to pay for your
own. Your own freight. But that's my family. Like, you know, tell her you
can't do something, and next thing you know, she's this
ultra marathoner. I mean, it's fascinating to me to watch that happen
and to do. Look, I won't keep going down this road, but to do a
marathon in every state in 18 months or
(13:54):
less than 18 months, are you kidding me? Like, I mean,
so saying that to say, you just. You barely got the
tip of the iceberg with Mike. He's awesome and amazing in
all his own right, but, man, you. You really got to meet the rest of
the clan, brother. Where did that come from? How did
all of your siblings end up with such a powerful
(14:15):
drive? A lot of it's insecurity, if I'm honest with
you. A lot of it's insecurity. A lot of it's like, you know, you're running
from your own shadow now. Look, I hate to speak for them, but I think
they're, at this point, they're probably over it. I've done it enough. But, you know,
we. We grew up rough, man. You know, we were homeless at different times, abused
in all kinds of ways. And, you know, we. I think there was a sense
(14:36):
in which we felt, you know, perpetually victimized. And there came a point where, you
know, you respond to that in a couple of different ways. You know, one maybe
might be to curl up in a ball and withdraw, and another
might just to over be. To overcompensate and just. Just tried to
become so formidable that no one can ever take
advantage of you. I think that's where it starts, right? It starts like, I'm going
(14:57):
to become so powerful, personally powerful, that no one's ever going to be able
to victimize me again. And it manifests physically, it manifests
mentally. It manifests, you know, in a lot of different ways. My family.
Look, I love you all if you're listening to this, but we're a little overbearing.
We're a little overbearing sometimes, right? Yeah, we are. No, we're getting better as
we age, but I feel like a lot of people. We've alienated a lot of
(15:18):
people because, you know, our attitude can sometimes be, you know, put up or shut
up. Like, you know, what are you whining about? Let's Just get on with it
and let's get the mission done. And, you know, that's not fair.
You know, struggles. It's relevant. Right. You and I have talked about this offline.
What constitutes trauma for people. That's pretty subjective.
And, you know, I might be able to handle a lot more in terms
(15:40):
of frequency or intensity than another person, but the
feeling of being traumatized, you know, it's. No matter what the
triggering mechanism is, it's. It impacts people differently. And I think for us,
we just became overachievers in so many ways. In so many
ways. And I think now we're all struggling still to find balance.
It's like, you know, you always want to. You. You want to be number one.
(16:02):
You don't want to compare yourself to other people. You want to compare yourself to
your former self. Right. That's who you're racing against. Just a little bit better, a
little bit more refined, a little bit more polished, a little bit more able to
serve other people as you move forward, as you progress.
And I think for my family, though, what lit the fire? Look, they may
say it differently, brother, but if I. From a. Hey, I can. As objective as
(16:24):
I can be. I think what lit the fire was insecurity, Jody, which is not
a good motivator. It's really interesting. I do. You know
Chip. I do a lot of work with Lee Cockrell and have for years.
He grew up with his mother, married five
times. He's adopted twice, didn't finish college, and somehow ended up
running Walt Disney World for a decade. And he cites
(16:46):
insecurity quite often as his biggest driver. Oh,
wow. Now, it's funny. You know, you introduced me to Lee. Great, great
guy. But I did not know that. That is news to me. That is
so interesting. Now, what does he think, though? Does he think, like, in
retrospect, does he think that was necessary
as a primer? Does he think it was. What is his take on that? I
(17:08):
don't know. I'd. I would have to ask him. He's open to talking
about it. He doesn't mind telling people. So maybe that can be an
episode of a show with Lee someday. You gotta ask him, because
he's a guy who's got so much perspective in depth, so much
experience. Right. And he's had an opportunity to. Well, I think he's more
reflective than I am, so I'd be interested to know what he would think of
(17:30):
about that, looking back. Yeah. All right. One more question
about your family. Yeah. Which will transition us into the next part.
So Many of you ended up in law enforcement. Why is that? Yeah,
that answer is easy, and I think I am on the same page with my
brothers and sisters here, is that, you know, when we were
kids, we were often in pretty dire circumstances,
(17:52):
maybe without something to eat, maybe in danger of being harmed and hurt,
maybe actually be, you know, in a situation where you are harmed, we need help.
And the cops were always showing up. And in our experience, this
isn't everybody's experience, Jody, with the police, by the way. This isn't representative
of everybody's experience, but our experience back in the 70s
was, you know, the cops were kind of like saviors. Like, they would
(18:14):
come and they would protect us and they would get us help and they would
get us food, and they would, you know, make an arrest if they had to,
to keep us safe. You know, my dad went to jail a lot for violence,
and it was just like this. You know, I immediately
associated them with protecting. And
I thought, man, I really want. I wish I could do that. Like,
(18:35):
I want to be able to do that. I don't want to be the kid
hiding under the bed, you know, I want to be the person who stands up
for people that, that feel like they need to hide under the bed, metaphorically or
otherwise, and that's it, right? And I think that's true for my
siblings. I think that drove them, in large part, all
of them serve in some capacity, but the law enforcement piece
(18:55):
particularly, I think it was just that impression that those
officers made on us, you know, back when we were children.
When you were a child, you saw a law enforcement officer as
a protector, someone that was watching out for you, making your life better,
keeping you safe. All your years with the Kansas City
Police Department, do you feel like you
(19:16):
fulfilled that in your role as an officer?
Yeah, for most of it, I would say. I think I could say most of
it. I think there was probably a period of my career, I did 30 years,
right? I think there's a period of my career where I was a little self
centered, a little cynical, little disengaged. You know, it
kind of peaks and valleys there. But, you know, I came in like, you know,
(19:36):
Superman with a cape, you know, in the boots and the whole nine yards, thinking,
now that I've got a badge, I can save everybody and I can make everything
right. And once I, you know, it settled on
me that, no, actually I'm one cog in this very complex
machine and my ability to affect
people's lives in a dramatic way is pretty limited. You
(19:58):
know, in the Aggregate, I'm not going to make a huge difference in somebody's
life day to day to day. And I kind of felt like I was
on this 911 hamster wheel where it's like there's a problem, we
come, put a band aid on it, we leave, we go to the next problem,
that problem then ends up popping up again and we're back and. And
I just got. This is something you've heard. Many of you, you know, as you
(20:20):
and I both worked in law enforcement, we've heard our brethren kind of vent about
this, you know, feeling like you're on this, this treadmill. So there was a
time, I think, where I, I just got to the point where I just objectified
my clientele. Like I was just like, look, these people, you know, look at
them, look at them. You know, we going to do with people like this. And
I just kind of write them off, right? There's very black and white orientation,
(20:41):
like there's good and evil, right? There's bad and good. Right.
No real gray for me for a period of time. I think that
was. I was at my least effective then. I don't think I stayed there
forever. But I burnt some bridges that'll never be rebuilt by having
that attitude. People that'll never let me live that down. And I don't know if
they should, by the way. I'm not asking for them to. I respect where they're
(21:02):
at, but for the most part, for the most part, especially
the last 15 plus years, oh my.
Yeah. I feel I walked away from that profession. A lot of people grieve it.
You and I've talked about that too. A lot of people grieve it, and I
think sometimes they feel like there's unfinished business there for them. I don't feel that
way. I feel like when I walked away, I could look back on my service
(21:24):
and feel. Feel good about it. Feel good about it. Not in a prideful way,
but in a way that, that I fulfilled my obligation. Right. I
fulfilled my oath. I did what I said I was gonna do. I
sacrificed where I needed to. And I feel looking back on it, I don't
feel a deep longing like, oh my goodness, I wish I was back
there doing that every day. I feel like that was a chapter that was really
(21:45):
important to me and I closed it out in the right way, in an
honorable way. I could feel good about it. I mean, thank goodness that
I was able to shift my attitude. You know, if I'd have done
a whole career with that cynical attitude, I Adopted for a while.
I don't know where I would be, quite frankly, Jody. Like, I don't know what
that would have done to me. I have no idea. Well, this is a good
(22:07):
transition into the reason I asked Chip to come on the
show, because many people that I know put in
decades in law enforcement and then when it's over, either
they just retire and then they go fishing or play golf, or
if they feel like they have something left, they become an
instructor or a consultant within law enforcement. And
(22:29):
Chip did not do that. Chip took 30 years
of experience working with people, being a leader,
solving problems, and he is now a senior
consultant with the Arbinger Institute. And this
fascinates me, Chip, for a couple of reasons. One, you didn't take the
path, 95% of law enforcement officers take
(22:51):
it into their career. And so I want to talk about that. But then
also, this is what I found for a lot of law
enforcement officers is they think I spent
30 years in law enforcement. It's all I know. And they
don't connect how amazing their job
was and what it taught them about leadership and problem solving and
(23:13):
dealing with people and dealing with stress and, and that goes
over into business as well. And you, you're one who
knew what you did was such invaluable experience
that you can help other people and then moved over to the Arbinger Institute
as a consultant. And I applaud that so much because
you do not have to have 30 years of a corporate experience
(23:36):
to be able to consult for corporations.
And I love that you did this. And so I want to talk about that
transition in particular, how you were able
to pull from a 30 year career in law enforcement to
now help organizations deal with problems.
Yeah, there's so much there to unpack. Well, I would
(23:59):
say first off that, and you know this from
being a law enforcement officer, I think if you can be effective
as a, as a law enforcement officer, you could do anything. Like, I really believe
that. I mean, the, the personality traits and the attributes that are necessary to be
really good in the law enforcement profession, they translate
into darn near any context right now. Look, I mean,
(24:21):
there's upper limits relative to, you know, like,
for me personally, my iq, like I'm never going to be a chemical engineer
or neurosurgeon. Right. I don't know the attributes for that. But in terms of most
of the jobs that are out there, the professions that are out there that require
working with people, if you're really good, like, you take your job
seriously in law enforcement, and you learn all there is to learn. You meet people
(24:43):
from every strata of society in all kinds of
contexts, and most of them are tense and
uncertain. Right. Those contexts. And you learn to
deal with these complex situations. And if you could do
that. Oh, my. Like, you can add, that absolutely translates into
the quote. I'm doing air quotes. The pressure
(25:05):
of a corporate environment. Right. Like I often thought people in the corporate
space, like, they throw that word around. They'll use a lot of kind
of trite, you know, colloquialisms or analogies where they'll
say things like, we're at war, or, you know, those are really bad,
in my opinion, bad analogies, because, you
know, there are people who have been in situations like that where literally, life and
(25:28):
death, that's what you're contending with. So I'm saying that to say the same
thing with people in the military, by the way, if you're really good at that
profession, it translates over into a lot of other things.
So the lessons learned there, in answer to your first part of your question, I
think the lessons learned there in law enforcement about people becoming
a student of people, that prepares you in
(25:49):
so many ways. If you're willing to expand your mind
and continue to learn and grow and not feel like you got it all
figured out or that you've got people compartmentalized
into these certain categories, like, you're open to new experiences, new
learning, you can take that foundation you get from law enforcement and you can
apply that in so many different professions,
(26:12):
different occupations. I have often said in business, all
problems reduce to people problems. In the final analysis, it's
people that don't show up to work on time, people that don't meet
expectations, people that don't get along well. It's all people.
And once you become an expert in that people space, you're definitely
primed to be effective in other professions. So,
(26:34):
yeah, I mean, I think that. Is that fair? Is that a fair answer to
your question? Yeah, it is. I find it
encouraging to hear you say that. Look, if you were
good as a law enforcement officer, you'll be good at other things. My
wife is a schoolteacher, and I see that in school teachers as well, that school
teachers think, I'm a teacher. That's all I can do. And I'm like, no, if
(26:55):
you can manage a classroom, there's nothing you can't do. Yeah, but
Jodi, your wife, should know this, too. I mean, she might know this
intellectually, but it's hard to know this, you know, from a point
of Self reflection. It's hard to know this, but being a teacher is something she
does well. It's not who she is. Who she is,
that's what she's bringing to the teaching profession that helps her excel.
(27:17):
But who she is is something much more important than what she does. Is
that fair? That is fair. That's a. Those are great words
there. I want to get back to the work you do now and the
Harbinger Institute, but there's one more thing I want to touch on. This
didn't quite come up, but I'm going to bring it up. Therefore, it will be
part of the conversation. As a park ranger, we
(27:38):
trained a lot in fighting and defensive tactics. I know you did. Most law
enforcement officers do. I will tell you one of the things
that looking back, I really like about training
in defensive tactics and learning how to fight is that
now I see what it really was was
training how to solve problems in real time. Training
(28:01):
how to solve problems when you're potentially hurting, when you're
tired, when you're under stress, when there's risk
and you have to still solve those problems. I didn't get it at the
time when I was a park ranger, but looking back, I
realized that's what it taught me. Yeah, there's no doubt about it
in that space. It's unforgiving, too. When you make a mistake, you get immediate
(28:24):
feedback and there's no hiding it. Right. You know you're doing technique
wrong or you know you're not applying leverage in the right way, you're
going to get immediate feedback. And the other thing is, you're always contending with people
who are. They have an advantage over you. Like even, you know, even
though you're well trained, you're wearing a lot of restrictive equipment, you've got a
firearm you've got to protect. You know, there's limitations on what you can do.
(28:46):
You're also bound by the law. You know, the Constitution was
written to protect people from the government, not the other way around.
So, like, the Constitution was written to limit us in what we're allowed to
do in terms of seizing and controlling people. And I think people forget that. Right.
Cops have rules. And when you're going up against someone
who doesn't have to play by the rules and they're desperate often to get
(29:09):
away or to evade capture, man, they've got a whole
labyrinth worth of options they could leverage. And you, you
again, you're bound by your training and being able to process in that
moment. As you said, I love how you Said problem solve because it's
like a complex problem and you're just, you're solving it from
moment to moment and adjusting, taking the feedback, you
(29:31):
know, judging the impact you're having on the impact of the technique you're using,
evaluating and then readjusting and reapplying other technique. I mean, it's constant
chess game, really, and the more you practice, the better you get. But at the
end of the day, I like the analogy you're making there, too. When you take
that capacity that you develop in that particular
domain and then you transfer that into any situation in
(29:53):
which there's problems, any situation that's kinetic, that requires fast decision
making. You've been preparing for that your entire life. On the mat, on the
range, in critical incidents. Another advantage for
anybody out there in law enforcement, listening. I know there, I know you're out
there. Just another advantage that you're gaining every day as
you're going about doing your job, training and preparing for the worst. You've got
(30:15):
opportunity there to be able to find a way to transfer that into
other endeavors. Okay, so you had 30
years of this unique, incredible experience. You
retire, move to the Arbinger Institute as a
consultant. During that transition, did you
take any time to evaluate your career,
(30:37):
reflect on it, write down your stories, what you learned, how
it applies to the work you do now? Yeah, I wish I would have
written down more. Jody. So funny. When you're living it out, you're like, this is.
No one's going to find this interesting. And I'm glad some people wrote some
stuff down. I'm glad we were able to capture some of my experience in a
couple of different books, you know, that I think have been helpful to people.
(31:00):
I would definitely say they've been helpful to people in my mind. Like, I had
thought about writing a different book. But
honestly, and I mean this sincerely,
everything that I've learned, I've learned from people like you, from
books, from trainers. Like, I don't feel like I have a lot of
original, original thinking. Like, I feel like it would be if
(31:22):
I'm. There's a lot of books out there that are just kind of recycled knowledge.
I feel like that's where I'm at in my life. I've got some original thoughts,
but I haven't worked them out enough to make them coherent. I think most of
what I know has been said better by people, better positioned to say
it. So I didn't go down that road. And as far
as my, Like, I didn't take much time between retiring from the
(31:43):
police department and taking the full time position with
Arbinger. So I'd been working with Arbinger as a consultant for years
before I retired, using my vacation time to travel
and do that type of thing and to learn and grow. So it was kind
of, for me, it was like I had a plan of kind of
transitioning away from my career with the
(32:03):
Kansas City pd And then it was like this fork in the road.
Am I going to pursue a police chief opportunity
so that I can scale my leadership philosophy within an organization, or
am I going to do something else? And I really didn't know what that something
else was until one of my colleagues from Arbinger actually sat down
with me and kind of painted a different picture for me
(32:26):
of what my potential might be. But I knew this.
So to answer your question, what I was sure of was
I had more capacity in me to serve. And I wanted to spend
the rest of my life serving people. That for me,
like serving people for me, that's my thing. Like, everybody has a thing,
right? That's my thing. Being of service. Now, look, part of that
(32:49):
could be driven initially by that insecurity we talked about. But I think it's
evolved to the point that I feel like I am strong
and capable. And I feel like that is a gift for which I am eternally
grateful. I can't take full credit for it. I've worked to develop some
attributes that I have, but I didn't earn those attributes. And
I feel like that and this is kind of a spiritual thing for me,
(33:11):
Jody. I don't talk about this stuff really ever, but I feel like for me,
because that capacity was gifted to me, I have an obligation that
I feel to use that in service of other people.
Now, say it out loud. It sounds so romantic, right? It sounds like I'm romanticizing
it, but I do feel like that's true. I feel like I. I'm at my
best when I am working in behalf of other people. I just,
(33:34):
I get in a flow state. I feel like, oh, yeah, this is what I'm
supposed to be doing. And I'm at my worst when I'm selfish and
self concerned and self absorbed. Like, I don't like that version of me. It happens.
He shows up. But I'm definitely at my worst. I can't think as clearly,
I can't function as effectively. But once I turn outward, as
we say in arbitrary. Once I turn outward and I start working on
(33:56):
behalf of other people and sincerely focusing on how I can
get what I Need in a way that helps them get what they need. Oh,
man, I feel alive. I feel. I mean, it's crazy, right? I feel
like I could do this forever. I don't feel like. People talk about riding off
into the sunset and, you know, retiring and going fishing and maybe sitting on
a beach and that's a vacation poster. To me, that's not a life. Like, I.
(34:16):
I feel like I want to be engaged so much.
So, you know. Yeah, man, I went off the rails there, brother. That's where the
best conversations are at when we go off trail, find the good stuff.
Now that you have, you're able to look back. You've been
retired from the police department for a little while now. Been doing great work
with the Arbinger Institute. If someone else were to come to
(34:39):
you and say, look, I'm an executive, because a major in a police
department is an executive. I know it has a different name, it's rank
based on. But it is an executive position. So someone comes
to you and says, look, I'm. I'm finishing up my executive career.
I also want to be a consultant like you.
What counsel do you have for them? You said you wish you would have wrote
(35:02):
more down. You wish you would have collected more stories. Well, now you've got the
chance to tell someone else how to prepare for it. What are the steps?
Yeah, well, look, first of all, I'd say journal, and I mean that. Again, that
sounds trite because everybody's talking about journaling like they're rediscovering it, right?
Last decade or so, people have been talking about, like, the re. You know, the
resurgence of stoicism and that type of thinking, and
(35:23):
journaling has been a big thing. We want to talk about that, like, not just
from a therapeutic perspective, but also from just being able
to help you kind of fortify who you are. I would commend that to
anybody. You're having experiences right now. Now I'm talking to this person,
this hypothetical person. You're having experiences right now that you can't
fully appreciate the significance of. You know, but
(35:45):
keep track. As you learn something, Note it down.
You know, when you find an interesting story or an interesting
success, write it down, capture it, memorialize it. You're never
going to remember it like it happened. And people are constantly bringing up things to
me that I forgot. Like, pretty neat stuff that we did as a team. I'm
like, oh, my goodness, I didn't even remember doing that. Like, that had slipped off
(36:07):
my. Or out of my memory. So that's One also
understand that every single person you meet, you can learn something
from that person and you should have that orientation with them. Like,
it gets crazy curious. So when I find successful people,
you know, the Alamolally's of the world, the Stan, the Crystals of the world, the
people that have led things and have really accomplished some
(36:28):
amazing stuff, when I'm in their orbit, like when I can have
time with them, I get so curious. I want to learn from them. I want
to get like, what are lessons that you've learned as you've gone along
your journey? What were the things that contributed to your success? Were the most
difficult things that you came up against? What kind of impediments did you face? How
did you maneuver over and around them? Like, how did you transform those into
(36:50):
opportunities for growth? Just get like, you're a student, right?
Constantly, lifelong learning. I'm wanting to know as much as I can.
You're in a laboratory right now. You, you hypothetical person that Jody's talking about,
you're in a laboratory right now. You got to treat it that way. Just approach
it with the curiosity of a five year old and you're going to learn so
much. But every conversation you have is significant beyond your ability
(37:12):
to appreciate the significance. And if you treat every person you
meet, if you treat that interaction as sacred, it doesn't mean you're going to spend
an hour with them necessarily. But if you walk past a person in a hallway,
you can regard them as a person, as a human
being in that five seconds it takes you to walk past them. And, and that
can become transformative as that becomes, you know, kind of
(37:33):
characteristic of who you are. You have genuine respect and regard for people,
it changes your entire outlook. You know, we don't see the world as it
is, we see the world as we are. And as you change your mindset, your
attitude, your perspective, opportunities will just pop up, Jody, in all
kinds of ways. Like where you're like, oh my goodness, there's an opportunity right here
for me to learn something so valuable? I've learned things from my stepson, I've learned
(37:55):
things from. Even when he was growing up, I learned things from him, right? By
just simply opening my mind up. So you're preparing every day.
Keep a bit of a journal, keep track, build a network. You're
really good at this, Jody. Build a network of people who
have varied expertise and varied perspective
and diverse ways of thinking about things. Build a network, go outside of your
(38:17):
comfort zone and have people you can lean on and go to that can
help guide you, that's huge, I think. And then don't
be afraid to experiment and iterate. You know, you've got to try things out.
Life's about iteration and, you know, you've got to experiment a little
bit, Come back to the lab, make some adjustments, go back out and experiment.
You know, you're not going to get it. It's funny, I was with a group
(38:38):
yesterday doing strategic planning session and you know, the
hardest thing for them is thinking we're going to solve this problem today. It's like,
no, we're not going to solve this problem. We're going to come close to solving
this problem day. We're going to frame it up. We're going to frame it up
in a way that we'll be able to contend with it more effectively. That's what
we're doing here today. So, yeah, that's kind of. I'm not an
advice giver. You could tell by the way that I just shotgunned that. But. But
(39:01):
I mean, that's kind of in my mind, things that I think about as being
important as you prepare for that next chapter. Well, now that we went
through your career and the transition into the
Arbinger Institute full time, tell us about the work that you do there.
Yeah. So arbitrary. Kind of saved my life in a way. You know,
just their way of explaining what was missing in my
(39:23):
life in terms of leadership and connection. I could not, not work
with them. Right. And so to have the opportunity now to do this full time
is amazing. And what I do. So I have four main
responsibilities. Content creation, executive coaching,
facilitation and delivery of workshops and leadership
sessions and then keynote speaking. I'll do speeches every once in a while as well.
(39:45):
Those are my main areas of focus. And it's just,
I hate saying this, especially when I'm saying it on the record, but
I don't really feel like I have a job, Jody. I feel like it's like,
I mean, don't let my boss know, but, you know, I feel like this is
like, right. So meaningful to me and I just enjoy
it. I enjoy every aspect of it. But day to day, a lot of travel,
(40:07):
a lot of being with, with different clients, different spaces, helping them
to focus on challenges that they're having in their organizations,
working across all, all different verticals, from nonprofit to
government to education, you name it, healthcare. So I'm
constantly. And we are an institute, so we are constantly learning. And
it's like I'm constantly learning from all the people that I'm working with
(40:29):
and the Latest thing that we've been doing, it's new to me.
I've really been enjoying it actually is I'm a contributor to our new
podcast. We. It's titled Leading Outward and Leading Outward launched
a couple of weeks ago and I think we're up to like
550 five star reviews on Apple. I don't track
Spotify as much. I'm not on that platform as much, but I guess,
(40:52):
I guess it's doing well there too. And YouTube and anywhere you listen to podcasts.
But I'm involved in some of the creation for that content. That's
because that's a new task I've taken on here in the last year. A new
role that's really, really fun. But yeah, day to day it's all
about trying to help turn the world outward, to help people connect and to
bring humanity to the workplace. All the technology we have going on,
(41:14):
all the outsourcing of our thinking that's being done by AI and
different platforms, we want to make sure that people have to be able to
function and work well together. At the end of the day, there's people behind all
of these technologies and so we want to make sure that we
help people reconnect to that fundamental truth about others and
the idea that we could work together when we have unconditional regard
(41:36):
for the personhood of the people we we work with and we're considerate
about the impact we have on them and their ability to accomplish their
objectives. So that's a mouthful, but that's where I'm at today
with Arbinger's work. Well, there's it. You're just doing
great work with Arbinger. They do. It's fantastic. This has been
a such a good conversation about using
(41:59):
your experience that you get through your career to build a unique
perspective because Chip brings such a unique
perspective because of the work he's done in leadership in
communities that not many consultants that an
organization would bring in have that type of experience. So I
appreciate this, Chip. I'm glad you mentioned Leading
(42:21):
Outward, the podcast. You all do a great job on that. I said there was
going to be two stories about Chip. I never got to the second one.
But the good news is Chip is going to going to join us
next episode and I will tell that story
next episode when Chip comes back. But for now, Chip,
I'm so glad that you joined us for an
(42:42):
episode. This is such a good talk. Jody, you're so
gracious and I love, you know, the questions you ask and I love the way
you force me to think more clearly. You know,
I. It just, it's a pleasure to spend time with you, my friend. I look
forward to the. The next time we get the chat, which sounds like it's going
to be pretty soon. Pretty soon. Well, where can we either find out
(43:03):
more about you or just find out about the work with the Harbinger
Institute? Yeah. So we're on LinkedIn, obviously. I'm on LinkedIn.
I'm fairly active on there. I check that once a day at a minimum. And
then arbinger's website, arbinger.com. you know,
that's an easy way for people to learn
so much about our work. We got the three international best selling books that are
(43:25):
out there, Leadership and Self Deception, the Anatomy of Peace and the Outward
Mindset. That's another great intro into Arbiter's work, the podcast. Honestly,
like, I'm finding. I'm surprised at the response from the podcast. I'm finding
this to be a really good entree into Arbinger and what we
do. Because a lot of people don't have time, Jody, as you know, to maybe
sit down and read a book. They don't feel like they do and it's hard
(43:47):
to. You can't really. I don't like this word. This is the wrong word. You'll
probably have a better word. But you can't really multitask when you're reading
a book, right? You gotta, you're setting still, you're focused, you're reading what it, whatever
it is. With a podcast, oh my. You could be folding the laundry. You know,
you could be taking a walk with the dogs or strolling through the
Smoky Mountains. I like that. As you know, I'm rather fond of the
(44:09):
Smokies and listen to a podcast. So this podcast, and it's also
digestible. It's like it's chunked up in a way that the episodes are short
enough where, you know, it doesn't require a huge time commitment. So I'm gonna. This
is my last shameless plug for the podcast, is that. I think that
is a great way to learn a bit about Arbinger's work in the second
episode. This is unique. In the second episode, I coach a
(44:30):
construction executive live. So we are coaching through a
real problem that he's struggling with. And, and we're recording it.
And just for him to be able to. Of course, we anonymized him. We
anonymize anybody we do this with. He ended up outing himself on LinkedIn
after the episode came out, which I thought was amazing. But that is like you
being a fly on the wall for a coaching session where you can just take
(44:52):
it in and maybe you could be helped as well. I know I'm helped when
I coach. It's reciprocal. But that's kind of a neat. I
haven't seen that on a lot of podcasts. That's an experiment we're running. So
website, books, podcast, LinkedIn to get a
hold of me Easy day. I'd love to connect with you on LinkedIn. And
yeah, that's it. All right. Thank you so much, Chip.
(45:15):
And thank you for listening to the Jody Mayberry Show.
I wish you'd stop being such a sook. Sugar J.
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