From Drug Dealer to Nonprofit Leader: Doug Smith's Remarkable Journey of Transformation

Episode Transcript
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Doug Smith (00:00):
Hey, leader, and welcome to another episode of
the L three Leadership Podcast,where we are obsessed with
helping you grow to yourmaximum potential and to
maximize the impact of yourleadership. My name is Doug
Smith, and I am your host. Andin today's episode, you're
gonna be hearing me beinterviewed by my friends
Antonino Rero and Jaden Johnsonon their podcast, which is
called The Boss A Juicepodcast. What a name. If you

(00:21):
aren't subscribed to italready, please do. Again,
that's the Boss Juice Podcast.
And in our conversation, you'regonna hear me talk a lot about
leadership, about homelessness,about generosity,
entrepreneurship, and so muchmore. I think it's gonna add a
ton of value to your life. Soenjoy the episode and I'll be
back afterwards.

Antonino Febbraro (00:41):
Welcome back to our third installment of the
Lunch break series of the BoschJuice podca st. With us today,
we have Doug Smith of the Lthree Leadership Podcast here
to talk about his story,entrepreneurship, and you know,
the Pittsburgh community ingeneral. Doug, thanks for
coming on To get started, tellus a little bit about your
background about the LL thr eeLeadership Podcast and how you

(01:03):
got kind o f st arted in, in topodcasting.

Doug Smith (01:05):
Yeah. Honored to be here. The Boss Juice podcast.
Yes. I've seen you guys on mysocial for a while , so I was
honored to , to get the invite, um, specifically about the
podcast, how I got into it ,uh, based , I , and we can go
into my story later, but I hada really , uh, hard childhood.
Uh, people would not anticipatethe life that I'm living now if
they would've seen the lifethat I had to live when I was a

(01:26):
teenager. But , uh, when I wasaround 18 years old , uh, I had
my life turned around, I hadlost my mom. She passed away
when I was a senior in highschool, and my whole life
turned around at that point.
And I had two , uh, men whowere leaders that came into my
life. One was who would be oneday my future father-in-law.
And , uh, the other was a youthpastor named Larry Bettencourt
. And I started interning atthis church. And , uh, Larry

(01:48):
would bring in leaders from thecommunity. So, you know, before
there was podcasting, we'd havein-person events like this. And
so someone would speak and he'dsay, Hey, if you really
connected with this leader, youshould ask them out to coffee.
And he gave us this wholeprocess for getting mentors and
what to do during a meeting,what to do after a meeting. And
so I started doing that and Iwould invite leaders out to
coffee every single month. Andafter about 10 years literally

(02:10):
of doing that, all my peersstarted saying like, wow, Doug,
you get to spend time with allthese cool leaders. I wish I
could. And you know , I alwayslaugh. I just thought like,
have you ever asked ?
Yeah . 'cause 99% of the reasonyou probably haven't met with
'em is 'cause you haven'tasked. And so, but I saw that
as an opportunity and Ithought, Hmm . This was before
podcasting was really big. Ijust thought, Hey, what if I
start recording myconversations with leaders so

(02:31):
it's not just selfish andbenefiting me, but benefiting
anyone that would listen. Andso , uh, my wife bought me
literally a $50 recorder off ofAmazon. I know nothing about
equipment. And , uh, I wouldjust, my first interview was my
father-in-law, and so I threw asmall recorder in between us on
a couch and his living room.
And that was the beginning of ,uh, now we're 400 plus episodes
in. I've been doing this for 12years.

That's awesome. What year was that
when you first started?

Doug Smith (02:54):
2012.

Oh, wow.
Okay. So you're like, you're nog you're a podcast,

Doug Smith (02:58):
OG podcast. Before it was cool is what I tell
people. Yeah.

Jaydon Johnson (03:00):
A couple .

Doug Smith (03:01):
But now the competition is fierce. Oh

My goodness. Oh my goodness. Yeah . But that's
a cool story. That's a reallycool story. And you started
off, it was just audio, no micand a video camera. Just the
recorder.

Doug Smith (03:10):
Yeah, just audio. I , I didn't had video for a long
time, probably until like fiveyears ago. Okay . Yeah . So
yeah .

Interesting .
Awesome .

Doug Smith (03:16):
I could probably learn from you guys. Yeah .

Dylan . Dylan's great. I need
to boss

Joe . Yeah . A boss . .

But actually, I'm gonna throw your
question back at you that youasked us before this. Who was
your favorite interview?

Doug Smith (03:28):
Yeah, for me, and again, it's like, I am sure
it's the same for you guys,it's like picking your favorite
child. Yeah . Um , I'd probablysay Clint Hurtle . Uh , he was
the former manager of thePittsburgh Pirates, and I had
seen him speak at a few eventsand just a phenomenal,
phenomenal human being. But hewas the first really big
interview that I had, or atleast that felt big to me. Uh ,
you know, a professional sportscoach. And he was a larger than

(03:48):
life personality. And , uh, howI got it was, I was, I had a
friend that's friends with him,and we were at a fundraiser and
he's like, oh, I'll introduceyou. I'll set you up. I'll
throw you a softball. Andbasically he just said, Hey,
Clint, this is my friend Doug . And he just , just
total silence. I'm like, how amI gonna turn this into a
podcast interview? And I justsaid, you know, I admire you.
And , and I just asked him, andman , he's such a servant , uh,

(04:10):
leader minded guy, and he justsaid yes. And so I still
remember shaking, walking intoPNC park and into his office,
but within five minutes, hemakes you feel so comfortable.
And , uh, from then on, we'vebeen great friends since. And ,
um, he lives in Florida now.
And , uh, yeah, definitely oneof my favorites.

That's awesome.

One of the things that I think our shows
parallel is we interviewleaders, you know? Yeah . We
interview, we focus more so onentrepreneurs, but we interview
leaders, entrepreneurs are ,are leaders. And you've
interviewed a lot ofinteresting leaders, and one of
the things that we've noticedon our show is that we've
noticed that when we askcertain questions, there's a
common characteristic or commonanswer that a lot of guests
give from your interviews withyour guests. You know, what

(04:47):
would you say is a commoncharacteristic , uh, that they
portray or they talk about onyour show?

Doug Smith (04:53):
Yeah, I think one thing, and we were kind of
talking about with this beforewe started recording, is , uh,
people's lives aren't perfect.
There's the , you know, theirlives are hard. We were just
talking about Clint Hurtle ,and Clint's very open with this
, and he would share it on apod . He shared it on my
podcast. Like he went through ,uh, he got divorced twice. He
was an alcoholic for a while .
You know, if we go into mystory, you'll hear my
background. And I thinksometimes when we see leaders

(05:14):
or people we admire, you know,we see the social media
highlights or see them in anewspaper on ES , espn , and we
think, oh , if I just, if Icould be Clint hurtle , my life
would be perfect. But thereality is, man , we all go
through suffering. We all failmore often than we succeed. And
I think that's been what's beenso humbling about it, is when
you actually get to know 'em,it's like, wow, these, these
are just real people who arejust like you and me. And it

(05:35):
really encourages me and givesme courage to, to go out and
make my own risks. 'cause Irecognize that there's no path
that's just straight up intothe right. It's tough, and I'm
gonna hit times where I want togive up and someone this , but
that's why I need communityaround me.

Yes. It seems like those people, the
characteristic is they were thebest at dealing with the
adversity. They were able tocontinue and push forward
harder than the other people.
Yeah . 'cause it's likeindefinite that you're going to
do that or have to deal with

Doug Smith (05:59):
That. Yeah. Never give up.

Yeah . Never give up. I like that. And so,
in interviewing these guestsand you see them, they talk
about their adversity and theirhardships. Is there something,
do you think that, and you, I'msorry, you had mentioned
community. Do you think that itis their community or the
people in their life that helpsthem succeed? I know you had
talked a little bit about howyour , you know, your
father-in-law played a bigrole. Um, or do you think that

(06:24):
people can take their ownaccountability and kind of turn
their life around?

Doug Smith (06:27):
Yeah, for me, so at L three leadership, one of our
core values is community.
Mm-hmm . And we always say thatno leader should ever do life
alone, but in community andother people that can charge
pretty hard and , and go prettyfar and be pretty successful on
their own. Yes. But what Ifound, I actually had a leader
tell me when I was in mytwenties, he said, Doug, I
think only about 2% of leadersmake it to their finish line.

(06:47):
Uh, truly realizing all oftheir potential and doing
everything they were supposedto do . And a lot of times it's
just because they didn't havecommunity around them that when
things got tough. So, for me,one of the reasons we do
mastermind groups is we believeevery leader needs to be three
things, fully known, fullyloved, and fully challenged. So
what that means is you need aplace and a group of people
around you, and you're fullyknown that you can come to and

(07:10):
share anything with. And when Imean anything, anything, you
could be going through thehardest thing ever, but you can
share that because number two,you're fully loved. And so ,
uh, we had a , I have a groupI'm leading now, and we had a
national leader who mentors me,come in and pour our guys . He
said, guys, if you'restruggling with something, you
don't have to tell everybody,but you have to tell somebody.
And he said, the people youneed to tell are the people in

(07:31):
this room. And it's becausethey couldn't care less what
you're going through orstruggling with, but it's
because they couldn't caremore. And so we need that. But
then not only do we need to befully known and fully loved, we
also need fully challenged. Youknow, I often joke that my
personality, I'm a words ofaffirmation guy in the love
languages. Like, just pat me onthe back, tell me I'm awesome,
and man , I could charge backout there mm-hmm

(07:51):
. Um, but sometimes I don'tneed a , a hug and a high five.
Sometimes I need a full a slapin the face. And that's the
fully challenged part. And weall need challenge a time with
the truth of, Hey, you'rebetter than that. Or, Hey, you
need to do and we need truth.
And so fully known, loved andchallenge is absolutely
essential for anyone inleadership. Yes .

Speaker 4 (08:09):
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Speaker 5 (09:09):
That's

Awesome. In a previous episode, we
interviewed Jeff Cher . Yeah.
And , and he, he's big onleadership too. Has this whole
leadership, you know, class and, and , and masterclass and
stuff like that. He hadmentioned, you know, one of the
qualities of a leader is kindof having accountability and
responsibility, but reflecting.
So if you know, your team kindof points out something's
wrong, you know, addressinglike, Hey, maybe you're right.

(09:31):
Do you see that quality orcharacteristic in leaders that
you've interviewed?

Doug Smith (09:35):
Yes. Teachability is , is everything. In fact,
the mentor I was talking aboutwrote a book called The Key to
Everything. Oh , okay . And thekey to everything is
teachability. Uh, this isabsolutely huge. You know, I ,
I shared , uh, on FridaysClinton Hurdle actually got me
doing this. I started sharingfailures in my life. So we call
it Friday fails. And one thingthat we do on my team , uh, at
Light of Life is we havequarterly retreats. We get
offsite and we spend a large ,large part of the morning

(09:58):
planning and things like that.
But then we spend the afternoonactually identifying,
discussing, and solving issues.
Well , one question that Ialways ask, no matter what in
those settings, is, is thereanything causing division,
disunity or distrust on ourteam? Is there anything causing
disunity division or distrust?
'cause if there is, we're nevergonna be successful as a team.
And so, , the one timeI asked this, it was actually

(10:20):
one of our team members, it wasour very first day, so this is
her first experience. I askedthat question, and one of our
marketing team members said,you, you, Doug , you are
causing division, division,disunity, and distrust. And
it's like, and this is front ofthe whole team. It's not like,
Hey, this is a one-on-one. Soit's like, what do you do with
that? Mm-hmm . Uh, well, one, I could get
defensive and say, you're,that's so stupid. I am not, I'm

(10:42):
a great leader. Or I can say,okay, hey, lean in and lead
with curiosity. Like, tell memore. Help me understand what,
what is it about the way thatI'm leading? And then she ended
up being very specific ofsaying, Hey, the way you
communicate , uh, gettingcertain things done is very,
very frustrating to us. And ifyou just did X, Y, Z, that
would be a lot more helpful.
And so I was able to make ashift in my leadership and

(11:03):
become a better leader becauseone, we created a safe culture
where people could actuallyspeak up and speak the truth
and give that feedback withouthaving any punishment. And, you
know, I wanna encourage theleaders. When we talk about
teachability, there's a leadercalled Andy Stanley, and he has
this great quote. He said, if ,uh, when people give you
feedback, if you don't listento them, you'll soon be
surrounded by people who havenothing to say, because people

(11:25):
realize that you're not gonnaactually receive the feedback.
And so I think being humble andteachable is one of the
greatest skills that we canever develop in our lives.

Can we get a sneak peek into this Friday's ,
uh, failure of the week? What'dyou call it? The

Doug Smith (11:38):
Friday fail. Friday fail. What was I gonna do this
week? ? Uh, I did havethis planned. You may have to,
to edit this back

To it , and if not , it's something, if you
remember something. Oh , justlike

Doug Smith (11:46):
A , I remember top tier failure. Yes . No, no.
Just recently. It's actually onthe same subject as
teachability. Okay. In the pastthree weeks , uh, I've had
three separate meetings where Iwas in a meeting with an, an
individual, and all three ofthem pointed out to me that I,
I was getting really defensiveand energetic about what they
were telling me. Yeah. And, andI didn't even notice it. Like,

(12:07):
I, I was, it was it , I wasactually a blind spot. I'm
like, me defensive, I don'tget, I'm Mr. Teachable, but
it's like mm-hmm . Okay . Three specific people
said that. And so for me, it'sjust recognizing like, okay,
what is causing that failurefor me to get defensive? And do
I have too much on my plate? AmI too passionate about
something? And so I really hadto dissect that and get back to
those people. Apologize, ownit, and say, please continue to

(12:29):
call that out me when you seeit. 'cause again, that's the
only way I think we get better,is when we get coached. That's
awesome .

Sure .
Absolutely. So you hadmentioned Light of Life. Can
you explain what you do there?

Doug Smith (12:37):
Yeah. So Light of Life, for those listening here
in Pittsburgh, we're anonprofit on the north side of
Pittsburgh, have been there forover 70 years, serving the men,
women, and children of our citywho are experiencing
homelessness. And so what we dois we have a continuum of care.
And what we mean by that is, nomatter where someone is in
their journey of experiencinghomelessness, we want to have a
next step for them. So we havea street outreach team that'll

(12:59):
go out to those , uh,encampments and sitting out on
the street, and we'll buildrelationships with them in
hopes that they'll come in fora night of shelter or a meal.
We have an emergency shelterwith up to 75 beds for men,
women, and children that canstay there every night. And
they'll get a warm bed, a hotmeal, and a shower. Uh , and
then we have long-termprogramming as well. And so we
have men and women who can livewith us anywhere from nine

(13:20):
months to two years, and wehelp them with their recovery.
If , if addiction is part oftheir journey, we help them get
an education and findemployment. We help them have
housing, and then ultimately ,uh, you know, relaunch them
into society, hopefully betterthan when they walk through our
doors. And so it's a greathonor to be there. I've been
there for 14 years and I'mcurrently serving as the
Assistant Executive director.
So basically overseeing theday-to-day operations of the

(13:43):
organization. And I've been inthat role for about two years.

You mentioned that you help these
people kind of recover, findhousing, and then get
employment. Mm-hmm . How could
businesses in Pittsburgh orentrepreneurs in Pittsburgh
help you guys or help the lessfortunate people get more
involved in the businesscommunity? Yeah.

Doug Smith (14:00):
It , specifically on the employment end , and I
know this depends on, you know,what your business is, but
hiring the men and women thatwe serve, you know, a lot of
these men and women , uh, we'rein a position where, you know,
they're undesirable in the ,for the workplace. And so we're
so blessed to have partnerswith businesses that'll say,
Hey, we'd love to give someonea second chance. And we see
that happen. We , uh, there'sone guy that that's coming to

(14:20):
mind that , um, one of mycoworkers got him a job at BNY
Mellon , uh, over 10 years agonow, and he's still there, and
he's loved. Wow . And, youknow, it's just an amazing
thing. And so you can make ahuge difference. And, you know,
I think sometimes as employers,it's like, well, what's their
skill level? Like, you'd besurprised mm-hmm
. How skilled the men and womenwho walk through our doors are,
you know, we talk abouteducation, you know, sometimes

(14:41):
we have to teach people how toread and get a GED, but other
times, literally, we're justtrying to help people who
literally have master's ordoctorate degrees , uh, but
because of some of theirchoices found themselves in our
door at our, you know,doorstep. Um, and we're able to
help them find it. So I wouldsay employing people one, and
then two on the, the ways toget involved. Volunteering is
always huge. So you can alwayscome down. That's how I'd
encourage you to start yourrelationship with light of

(15:01):
life. Come down and serve ameal. See what it's like.
Interact, get to know some ofthe men and women. Get to know
their story. Don't just, youknow, scoop them food. Say,
Hey, how are you? What's ,what's your story? And listen
to them. And I think, you know,most people come to light of
life volunteering, thinkingthat they're gonna change
lives. Uh, but what they end upfinding is there's , their life
is the one that ends up gettingtransformed. Yeah . And it's a
beautiful thing. Yeah . Um, andthen I'm in fundraising, so I'd

(15:23):
be remiss not to say, you know,Hey, you can support us
financially as well. We'refunded primarily through
individuals, businesses,churches , uh, in the region.
And so without them, wewouldn't be able to do the work
that we've been doing for 70years.

It's such an issue that's occurring right
now in our country. And it's atopic, we hear it politicized
constantly. But really , uh, itannoys me when you're dealing
with having conversations abouthuman life, and it's a
political conversation, like itgoes a layer deeper when it
comes to human beings, like ourbrothers and sisters who really
did maybe just one or twodecisions. They went off the
beaten path, and now theyreally just need another

(15:57):
chance. So when I hear storieslike this, nonprofits like
this, like, it just veryuplifting to know that you guys
aren't making politicalstatements. You're literally
looking at somebody for thehuman being that they are. Yeah
. And you're seeing the best inthem, and you're, and you're
just, you're, you're trying toconnect with them in a human
level. So like, it , it'sawesome. I love that.

Doug Smith (16:17):
Oh , and I learned this personally. And again, we
can go more into my story, but, uh, you know, I was a drug
dealer in high school intodrugs. I had a younger sister,
and I mentioned how my lifekind of turned around because I
had different people cominginto my life and show me
another way. My sister keptgoing down the same path. Uh ,
and about a year into my timeat Light of Life, she came to
me, she was five monthspregnant with my nephew, first
nephew. And she said, Doug, Ineed help. And I said, well ,

(16:37):
what do you mean you need help?
And she said, I'm a heroinaddict. And , um, I had no
idea. I had done drugs, butnever gotten heroin and had no
idea what to do. So I reachedout to our program director at
Light of Life. And for nineyears, light of Life walked me,
my family and my sister throughmy sister's addiction. She
ended up homeless twice in thatnine year period. Had two kids
, uh, was in our program threedifferent times. The third time

(16:58):
she was in our program, she wasclean for 18 months. It was
beautiful. I felt like I had mysister back. Uh , we're a
faith-based organization too.
And so she rededicated her lifeto Christ and became a person
of faith. So that was reallyimportant to me. Um, but
unfortunately after those 18months, she ended up relapsing
for , uh, the Upteenth time.
And she overdosed and passedaway in December of 2019. And I

(17:20):
always share that story goingback to the human side. If you
would've ever asked mepersonally, if I would've ever
known someone in need of lightof life services , uh, let
alone it being a family member,I would've never believed you.
But what I've come to learnthrough my sister's story and
through getting to know men andwomen in our program for the
past 14 years, is everybody issomebody's sister. Everybody is
somebody's brother, somebody'sson, somebody's daughter,

(17:42):
somebody's mother, andsomebody's father. And when you
see it that way, it really doeschange. Everything does , when
I show up to work every day , Ishow up because, because as
long as someone's breathing,there's hope. And so I see my
sister walking through thedoors. And again, on the faith
side, I don't mean to get tooheavy on the spiritual side,
but for me, you know, knowing,even though I didn't get the
natural when I wanted with mysister, I believe I'll see my
sister again because of lightof life services. And the

(18:04):
reality is also the work we do, uh, is extremely dark. Like
we , we say that we stand onthe gates of hell, like it's
life or death. Mm-hmm . There's people
that will walk through ourdoors today, and if they have a
good experience, it could bethe first step to their
transformation. And if theyleave and have a bad
experience, we may never seethem again. And tonight could
be their last night. And so ,uh, the work we do is so, so
seriously. But you said, I lovewhat you said, it's all about

(18:25):
seeing the individual. Andthat's why I encourage you
guys, when you come down, getto know people's story. Fred
Rogers, Mr. Rogers mm-hmm . He often said
that there isn't a person thatyou couldn't learn to love if
you just knew their story. And, um, I think there's so many
preconceived notions about whypeople were homeless, and we
can get into that if you wantto, but it's a very complex
issue. And many, many peoplewere one or two decisions or

(18:47):
paychecks away, way more.
They're way closer tohomelessness than they think.
Yeah . And so I think we allneed to keep that at heart with
the issue.

In a previous episode, we
interviewed Benny Fisher, andhe had said that, you know ,
his company is , the company issecond chances, but he said,
America is the country ofsecond chances. And it sounds
like you guys at Led life do agood job of giving people that,
that second chance at life, atat work, whatever it may be. Do
you think that the community,the Pittsburgh community, does
a good enough job at supportingsecond chances and helping

(19:15):
people get back onto theirfeet?

Doug Smith (19:17):
Yeah, I think in general, I think we all want
to. I mean, I think, and Iwould say I would add to the
second chance, third chance,fourth chance, of course, fifth
chance. Uh , hey. And me too,right? It's not just people
walking through doors of lightof life. I need five chances,
six chances, seven chances. Youknow, we all, we all mess up.
Um , but I think that that'sour hardest pittsburghers. We
want to help, we want to cheerfor the underdog. We want
someone to rise up out of theashes, so to speak. Um , where

(19:39):
I would say we, we've grown, orI see growth in Pittsburgh, and
the mayor often says this, hesaid, man, Pittsburgh was one
of the most isolated cities inin the world. And what he means
by that is, you know, there's amillion nonprofits, but none of
them talk to each other. Uh ,there's a million organizations
trying to help, but none ofthem talk to each other. And
so, what I have seen sinceCOVID , uh, as a lot of
organizations, and I'mspecifically thinking in the

(20:00):
realm of, of homelessness atleast, yeah . These
organizations along with thecity, the county light of life,
are all coming together andsaying, listen, we may all have
different philosophies on whatto do about this issue, but we
all want the same thing. We allwanna see people's lives
transformed. We all , we don'twanna see a people out on the
street. And so we want to helppeople. And so that's been a
beautiful thing, and I hopethat that continues. And I hope

(20:20):
that that makes us even betterat giving second, third, fourth
chances.

Sure. Wow .

That's encouraging to hear. I'm happy
that, to , to hear thatPittsburgh. 'cause one thing
that we did , um, in the lastlunch break special is we do
try to, you know, break downprevious episodes that have
come on and kind ofinterconnect for the audience
who've watched multipleepisodes. Sure. And also look
at these larger topics,specifically in our city,
because we're pittsburghers,you know, we have vision for
the city, and we want certainoutcomes to be there. So to

(20:47):
hear that in the nonprofitsector, that you guys are
improving your communicationtenfold, that's super
encouraging. When we talkabout, like, the tech scene,
for example, like much lessimportant. But also if you see
more of a community beingbuilt, that's when amazing
things happen when everyonecomes together. That's

Topic though, too, kind of. We can
get into a discussion on that.
So one of the things wediscussed on our previous lunch
break series was howPittsburgh, you know, frames
itself in the entrepreneurialnature of, it's a tech company,
it's gonna be the next SiliconValley, it's gonna be the next
Hollywood, you know , yada,yada, yada. Mm-hmm
. But it's likelacking certain things where

(21:24):
like, the money isn't here. Itseems like, like if you're, if
you have a , a health startup ,you're off to the races. But
tech ai, things that are morerisky, like the culture here we
we've discussed in the past isdifferent in that the city
might not be willing to take arisk on something that might
not see a return for fiveyears. And it's just, we talked
about it like, maybe it's theculture here,

Conservative.

Right. You know. Do you feel that the
culture around nonprofits inthe city is, is like that? Or
are people more close-minded into , you know, helping
fundraise? Or what's been theexperience around that?

Doug Smith (21:56):
Yeah. Not at all.
For me, at least a light oflife. And , and again, I know
there's, I forget how manynonprofits are in Pittsburgh.
There's plenty. Yeah. Um, butmy experience, at least the
light of life has been peopleare overly generous.
Organizations are overlygenerous. Foundations are
overly generous , uh, because Ithink everyone wants to help.
And so that's been myexperience overall. Again, I
can't speak for all nonprofits.
I would also say, you know, atlight of life, we're dealing

(22:17):
with a major issue that's frontand center of everyone. And I
think everyone's heart. Andsame thing with the food bank,
like in general, like basichuman needs. You know, those
are the areas that peopleusually care about the most. So
often, even, even when there'spandemics or, you know , uh,
issues going on in our economy,we're usually the last to feel
it . 'cause everyone has aheart that, hey, no matter how

(22:38):
bad things are, we wanna makesure that no one goes without.
And , uh, that's one of thebeautiful things about what we
do. And I think the nonprofitcommunity here in Pittsburgh,

That's amazing.
That makes me proud. Um , I , Iwant , I root for Pittsburgh.
We were talking about sportsearlier. We're rooting for the
professional teams. We're rootlet's go root for the tech
scene. But to hear that, youknow, at least as of right now,
the , the , the overall visionfor Pittsburgh and the
nonprofit scene is looking verypositive. Like, that's amazing.
I love to hear that.

And let's dive into a little bit more
about leadership. Sure. Andkind of, I want to talk more
now about your journey ofbecoming a leader. So you had
briefly mentioned, you know,you had some run with drugs and
, and whatnot. Can you justopen up a little bit about your
story? 'cause I think that it'simportant for listeners to
understand that leaders are notperfect. We might have a shady
past , we have a shaky past ,but it's about how we overcome

(23:27):
and build ourselves up to a , a, a better version of
ourselves. Can you just share alittle , a little bit more
about your story? Yeah.

Doug Smith (23:32):
Yeah. Growing up at , I grew up in Wexford, north
Allegheny School District had apretty normal family life until
middle school. In middleschool, you know, two things
happened to me. One was , uh,my mom got diagnosed with a
rare nerve disease. So itwasn't ms, but she basically
lost, she had pins and needlesin her legs and feet 24 hours a
day. Ended up in a wheelchair,ultimately ended up in bed most
of her life. Um, and so thatchanged a lot. My dad had to

(23:55):
work two jobs, and my dad's abus driver for our school
district. And , uh, at thetime, he was driving trucks on
the weekend to get our familyby. So my dad, you know , I
went from always being aroundto basically being able to do
whatever I want as a13-year-old, which when you're
13 is awesome. No onewants boundaries. But it wasn't
awesome for me long term . Uh ,and then I also went to a
faith-based , uh, camp over onesummer, and that's when I
became a person of faith. Andso I actually wanted to be a

(24:17):
pastor when I was in middleschool. Uh , but because I had
no boundaries in the middle ofeighth grade to ninth grade ,
uh, I was in the woods andtried drugs for the first time
with my friends and neverlooked back, felt totally away
from the whole church thing.
Never wanted anything to dowith that. Again, found out
that my mom had these pillscalled Oxycontins that I could
sell, which is basicallysynthetic heroin. And so I sold

(24:38):
that in our high school. Um , Idid all kind of drugs and just
basically partied. Barely. I ,you know, I had to go to summer
school every single year justto get to the next grade. Um,
but that all changed my , youknow, and if you would've ever
said anything to me like I'm aleader. In fact, I remember my
senior year of high school, meand my buddy got called to the
office for the upteenth time.
And , uh, and the viceprincipal , uh, Walter Minsky ,

(24:59):
who I still am friends withtoday, he looked at us and
said, guys, I'm so sick ofseeing you here. Uh , you guys
are leaders and people followyou. And you can either use
that influence for good or useit for bad. And right now
you're using it all for bad. Iencourage you to do otherwise.
And we walked outta the room,we just laughed. We're like,
can you, that guy thinks we'releaders. Funniest thing ever.
Yeah. Well , uh, fast forwardlater that year, in my senior

(25:21):
year, my mom ended up passingaway. And if, again, person of
faith, the only thing thatbothered me when my mom died is
I didn't know if she had arelationship with Christ. And I
didn't know why that botheredme. 'cause I didn't care about
God at the time. Isn't thatcrazy? Yeah. Uh , but I'm
tormented by that. I'm gettingdrunk in high every night. And
that thoughts just hitting melike, you're never gonna know.
And three months after my mompassed, I get this call from a

(25:41):
relative I don't even have arelationship with. And she just
said, Doug, I really felt likeGod put you on my heart this
morning and wanted me to callyou and let you know that I was
a nurse in the hospital withyour mom. And I led your mom
into a relationship withChrist. And I think God wants
you to know that. So for me,that's crazy. Hey , my niece
hit the floor. I opened my eyes. I started crying. I said,
God, whatever you want for therest of my life, I'm yours. Two
weeks later, I, I put inquotes, randomly got invited to

(26:02):
a Bible study that was led by amom in our high school. 150
kids would go to this everyweek. Wow. And I saw this
beautiful girl sitting on thecouch. I'm like, I think I
could show up here every week.
Uh , left. And I said, fellas ,I told my high school friends,
I met the girl I'm gonna marry.
Uh , which spoiler alert I did.
Uh , and her mom was the onethat led the study. And she
said, I said that to my friend. She said to her mom, I can't
believe Doug came to to Biblestudy tonight. He's one of the

(26:25):
most influential kids in ourschool. But he used all his
influence for party and drugs.
Like if he ever got intentionalwith his life and followed God,
like I think he could changethe world, . And this
is really the start of theleadership journey. Like, for
whatever reason, that mom whowas married to who would be my
father-in-law, who was the deanof admission at Carnegie Mellon
for 45 years. Oh wow . Yeah,yeah, yeah. A little
intimidating. No ,

But that's pretty cool. That's a good
father-in-law. . Yes.

Doug Smith (26:47):
But he came into my life and he became a father
figure. And, you know, I was, Iwas telling someone my story
the other day, a friend fromhigh school who knew me, and he
said, how many, how many kidsdo you feel like that are in
this situation that you were inactually get out? And I , I'm
an optimist by nature, as youcould probably tell. Mm-hmm
. And I said, Ibet 50%. And he goes, I think
it's more like five. Wow. Imean , my heart just shattered.

(27:09):
But what I've learned in myexperience is the number one
way, and again , again, as afaith-based person, God was the
number one way out. Mm-hmm . But in the
natural world, the number oneway out was having people show
me another way of life. Mm-hmm . It was having
my father-in-law, Dean of amission . Say, you're a leader.
You have potential. You shouldgo to college. 'cause I barely
graduated high school. You needto go to college. You can do
great things. You can changethe world. They brought me to a

(27:31):
church where I met the youthpastor. I mentioned. He was the
second father figure in mylife. And these two men showed
me a different way of life andactually gave me a vision of
myself as a leader and someonewho could actually do something
with your life. I had no, whenI say I had no ambition, I was
the laziest kid. I used to makemy parents, I, I wouldn't even
take my dishes from in one roomto another. I'd just leave them
there for my dad to clean up.
Uh, and so for me to turn mylife around from there to where

(27:54):
I am today , uh, isunbelievable. But it's really
because of the people that camealongside me and showed me that
I had potential to be a leader.

Amazing. In the world of social media, this is
the real, like, blessing in theworld that we live in today.
Uh, people that have podcastsis that Yes . You know, with
social media now, everyone isso interconnected. This is the
information agent . Wethankfully can be that type of
mentor, at least a first stageof that with the youth, just by
making content and putting iton our phone . So it's, you

(28:22):
know, to go to God, I reallybelieve it's a blessing. It can
be a curse as well, but if weuse our platform for good, we
could be that first step forsomebody who's in that
position, you know, to get outof it. Or at least think that
it's possible just hearing astory like this. So we are
living in interesting times and, and that's incredible, man.
Yeah.

Doug Smith (28:39):
That's so incredible . Well , and
everything I do today, I do forthat very reason. Yeah. Every
podcast I write, every socialmedia post I, I put out there,
any, anything that I put, it'sbecause, man , if this impacts
one person and they get asimilar message that I got and
helps 'em turn around theirlife, man , I'll do that every
day for the rest of my life.
'cause it's possible. Iunderstand people . Like my
story is living. I don't carewhere you are, how bad your
journey is right now, how oldyou are. You can have an

(29:01):
amazing life if you'll juststart to live intentionally and
get around the right people.

Going off that topic, have you ever
gotten feedback from someonethat listened to your podcast
or read one of your posts andsaid, Hey, you changed my life.

Doug Smith (29:13):
Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Oh , it's crazy. Mm-hmm. Uh , I feel like
I get that all the time. Um,one that comes to mind, I, I ,
I used to have a blog. That'show I basically started before
podcasting. And again, this ismore on the faith side of
things. Again, I don't knowyour audience, but , uh, I
actually wrote like how to havea relationship with God , uh,
on my bout page. And , uh, thisgirl who I didn't even know,

(29:34):
like calls me out of nowhereand she's like, Hey, I , I just
want you to know that Iliterally just printed out your
entire about me page. And I, Igave my life to God. And I
think I'm supposed to tell youthat. I'm like, and now she's,
she's a leader in her communitymaking a huge impact. Um, I've
had people come up to me andsay, Hey, I was at the darkest
point . I remember I wasworking at a bank , uh, when I
started writing. And this kidcame up to me who I didn't even

(29:55):
know. And he said, Hey, I justwant you to know I was in the
darkest season in my life andyour posts on a daily basis, or
the only thing that got me by,thank you so much for doing
that. Mm-hmm .
And so people can criticizecreators all they want of like,
oh, are you just doing thepodcast for you? Or you just
want, like, no, I, I believe Ican impact lives. And I've seen
that and it becomes addicting.
Like I am addicted to helpingtransform lives. 'cause there's

(30:16):
nothing more fulfilling. Moneywon't fulfill you that way. Uh
, big house won't fulfill youthat way. There's nothing like
knowing that you had a positiveimpact in the life of another
mm-hmm

.
So me and my family, theholiday season are coming up
and we have a tradition everyyear , uh, right before
Christmas. We watch It's awonderful life together. Yes.
And I mean, that's the basis ofthat entire story is that he
thought that he had missed outbecause he hadn't got all of
the material wealth. But thenhe realized that his life was
completely fulfilled becauseall he had done his whole life
was served . So it's anamazing, amazing story. Dude.

Doug Smith (30:44):
I cry every year.
I'm trying not same year , man. When he opens the book and
the , the angel, what's AaronJoe's name ? Clarence. Yep .
And it's like, man, he has nofailure. Who has friends? Yes .
Oh ,

It hits us every year on , there's usually
like 20 people in my parents'living room. And , and we're,
we're losing it a little bit.
. Yeah ,

Absolutely.
Yeah. Oh my , that's aninteresting topic though.
'cause I want to tie in your ,your , your faith. So I'm
Catholic. Yeah . I was raisedCatholic. I'm a practicing
Catholic. Whether I go tochurch every Sunday is a
different story. But, but I, I, I , yeah . You know, I Jesus,
Jesus and I are tight. Okay .
All right . You know , um, good. But I think that as a
Catholic, and, you know, beingstrong in my faith and being an

(31:22):
entrepreneur, there's thisquestion that always came up in
my mind around, you know, greedand , you know , 'cause Jesus'
teachings are a lot about, youknow , kind of helping the
poor, you know, don't, don't begreedy. You know, you know, be
, be selfless. And I feel likethe, the business world, the
entrepreneurial world is more,you know, all about how much
can we take in and how muchprofit can we make. Do you

(31:46):
think that, you know, there's away that, you know, faith can
be served in business?

Doug Smith (31:51):
Oh, for sure. I mean, when it comes to greed
and, and I forget, I'm notgonna remember the actual
statistic, but Jesus talks moreabout greed a lot more than he
talks about a lot of the stuffthat we bicker about and judge
other people for that crazy , no one, no one ever
looks within themselves andsay, am I like, no one ever
reads that scripture whereJesus calls people out on
greed, thinks, oh, that's me.
. Right ? Yeah. Butman, how many times in
scripture does it say like,man, here's a warning to those

(32:13):
who are rich mm-hmm . Um, on the
generosity front. So, so one inChristianity, so from , at
least from my journey , uh,tithing is a part of that. And
so it's giving 10% of yourincome. We, we tithe off the
gross , uh, to God that I'vedone that since I was 17 years
old. And so one, and we believethe tide belongs to God. So
that's not even technicallygiving, it's just giving back
to God, what is his. But evenhaving that heart of like, Hey,

(32:33):
the first thing I do when I getpaid is I give my 10% to God.
Now, where I've, my wife and Ihave been challenged and have
tried to grow in generosity isevery year we, we just pray
about God, how do you want usto give this year? And we try
to increase that percentage ofour income. And some years
we've been able to do a lotmore. Some days we , we've had
to scale back. We do have fivekids or fifth kid on the way.

(32:54):
Uh , which is crazy. Wow . But, uh, the , the model or what
inspired me, Rick Warren, whois a pastor in California, he
purpose-driven life bestsellingbook of all time outside of the
Bible, he has a TED Talk that'sphenomenal. And when he wrote
The Purpose-Driven Life, hesaid , um, he became very, very
wealthy. Right. Obviously, ifyou have the second bestselling
book of all time. And he said,I didn't buy a new car. I

(33:15):
didn't buy a new house. What hedid do, which I love, is he now
reversed tithes. He gives 90%of his income away and he lives
off 10%. And , uh, he paid backthe church any, every single
penny and dollar that thechurch ever paid him. 'cause it
was never about money for him.
And for me, that's kind of beenthe motto of like, Hey, I , I

(33:36):
don't know if we'd ever get to90%. That would be pretty cool.
Yeah. But what if we thoughtmore about how much we can give
than how much we could save andinvest every year , um, and
make a difference through ourgiving. Um, I think that could
go a long way in helpingpeople. Uh , yeah. But overall,
I would say entrepreneurshipand faith. Like you guys are
making the world the best wayI've heard faith work
integration is no matter whatyou're doing, if you're making

(33:57):
a widget, et cetera ,ultimately you're making the
world more of the way it oughtto be in the kingdom of God.
And so there's great work . Youknow, a lot of times people say
to me, oh, I, you know, I don'twork at light of life. Like,
the work you do is so noble,but the work you do is a
software creator is just asnoble. Like, you're creating
something that make , is makingmillions of people's lives
better. And again, you might beon the coding end of that

(34:18):
thinking, what does my codinghave to do with this? But on
the other end of the user, it'slike, Hey, how many apps am I
grateful for that I use everyday that there's hundreds and
thousands of people that madethese things possible? A
hundred percent . And I thinkwhen you find your purpose in
that , uh, it's a lot morefulfilling and not being like,
oh, I don't work at a nonprofit, so I must not be making a
difference for God. I don'tthink that's true at all.
Right.

One of the other interesting things I
think about our society is sortof our tax code. I mean,
there's , there's taxincentives for businesses to
donate to nonprofits, tocharities. Do you think the
government does a good enoughjob of incentivizing businesses
to help nonprofits?

Doug Smith (34:50):
Uh , yeah. So I'm , I'm not gonna be great at all
of these questions. ,you guys could probably answer
what I will say, and I'llchallenge those, especially if
people of faith, if, if you, ifif giving to benefit from, from
taxes is the only reason yougive, then like, it's really
not charity at all. The realquestion is, Hey, if you got no
benefit from the government forgiving , would you still give?

(35:11):
And would you still give it thelevels that you would? And I
think that's the true, youknow, Jesus warn about, it's
all about your heart, right?
The , the story, the widowsmight, she gave everything she
had, which was barely anything.
And Jesus said she gave waymore than all those
entrepreneurs who had tens ofmillions of dollars, and they
may have given hundreds ofthousands of dollars, but
compared to what they had andwhat was in their heart, they
did it for the wrong reasons.

(35:31):
And , and Jesus actually says,man, if you give for the wrong
reason, if you are giving toimpress people to say, wow,
look at me, or Look what I did,you , that's your reward. There
is no other reward. Yeah . Likeyou did it for you. Yeah . And
so generosity is all about aheart issue and how you can
make an impact. So that wouldbe my challenge to
entrepreneurs listening to ,

To add to the point that you made earlier, I
think that's the importance ofcommunity and fellowship is
that if you have people holdingyou accountable, they will ask
you or they will see thosethings inside of you. It's
still up to us to accept thetruth and to, you know, reflect
on the reason why we're doingthings. But it starts with
having a bunch of people thatyou trust that can call you out
and be like, Hey, man, you looklike you're a , uh, a reap in

(36:09):
the glory. A little bit toomuch on that thing that you did
being on stage, or, you know,this doesn't seem , uh, doesn't
seem genuine. So,

Doug Smith (36:16):
Oh, and you mentioned community. Uh , so
I've been leading mastermindgroups for over 10 years now.
And part of the , what we do atmastermind groups is we share
our goals with each other. Andoften what I found is people of
faith have giving goals, andthere'd be people who maybe
weren't in that season of theirlife or maybe weren't people of
faith, and they hear aboutother people having generosity
goals, and then they getinspired, and then they start

(36:36):
to give, and then you can goback and forth. Like there's a
, there's a guy named DaveRamsey, I don't know if you
guys are familiar with him.
Yeah . Dave Ramsey, one of hislife goals was to give away a
million dollars in a day. And Ithink just a few years ago, he
did it. Like, man, when youstart getting excited about
generosity and impact, you canmake financially think of how
much that would drive you tobring in even more revenue for
your business, when you canmake an even bigger difference.
Of course , it's , it's a muchbetter motivator. Yeah ,

Of course.

I agree.
Absolutely. I think that'simportant too. Speaking of Dave
Ramsey, I , I know a little bitabout his story. He's done a
lot for his employees. I mean,if you listen to his story and
what he's done for some of hisemployees, it's incredible. So
when you talk about, you know,I'm sure that guy makes a ton
of money, but where his heart'sat, you know, I think he's, you
know, more focused on the , thegiving than , than the money.
So , oh ,

Doug Smith (37:16):
Yeah. He's one of my heroes. I know recently, I
think around every Christmasthey'll go to either Costco or
the mall, and everyone gets athousand dollars, every
employee, and he has a thousandemployees. Mm-hmm
. Gets a thousand dollars justto go buy their family presents
or whatever. It's just oneexample. So yeah. Find heroes
that are generous and , andhave them inspire you. Mm-hmm
.

Absolutely amazing , man . Absolutely. So,
going back onto the , the wholepodcast realm and interviewing
, um, different leaders and ,and starting a podcast in
Pittsburgh, one of the things Iwant to talk about on the
entrepreneurial side is webelieve, I believe that
podcasters are another level ofentrepreneurs. You know, there

(37:53):
, it's, it's still a risk.
You're , you know, it , thebarrier of entry might be low,
but it's still a risk. Youknow, you're still trying to
create something, buildsomething, build a brand and a
business out of this. Do youthink that Pittsburgh has a
good culture around podcastingor

Media in

General, or , or media in general? Sure.

Doug Smith (38:09):
Yeah. Uh, I don't pay that much attention. Like,
there's a few people on myisland, like, you guys are on
my radar now. Um, so I , Ithink so, but at the end of the
day, it's just like, Hey, just, just create like, and, and
when I meet podcasters, so ,uh, this is totally random, but
if you're meeting people thatcompete against you, like
hopefully that just drives youmore of like, Hey , uh, I'm
reading a great book now calledChoose Your Enemies Wisely

(38:30):
. Um , which is really,really interesting. Yeah . Uh ,
but it's basically like, Hey,how many, like if you watched
the last dance with MichaelJordan, like how many times was
he driven by an enemy who wasanother player who said, man,
Jordan's not that great. I I'mgonna own him tonight. Mm-hmm
. And what didJordan say? Man, that's all I
needed. Yeah . Yeah . So, butwhen we actually, so I think
it's great to compete againstone another. Um , but what I

(38:52):
found is when we actually get,and again, going back to
community when we get in a roomtogether. Yep . Hey, we can
compete all day out there. Butyeah , it's , it's a
brotherhood, it's a sisterhood.
It's brothers and sisterscoming together and friends.
Right. And so understand , Ithink on the community sense,
yes. It's very, very good. Evenif we have some, Hey , I need
to outdo that. I need to , man, boss Juice is competing with
me now. Yeah . But you

Mentioned it even with nonprofits, the
nonprofit scene in Pittsburgh,you felt really , uh, grew, you
know, two three x because ofcommunication between different
nonprofits. I think to answerhis question, my opinion is
there's not, we haven't , uh,reached our full potential in
regards to the media potentialthat Pittsburgh has. Yeah.
There isn't massive brands, youknow, like there's not a Joe
Rogan podcast or Yeah . Evensomething , let's change that ,

(39:32):
something smaller. Yeah ,

Absolutely.

But it starts with people coming together and
just like, you know , repostingeach other's stuff. Like, I'm
very thankful that we got tosit down with you today and ,
and hear your story and Yeah.
Just amazing. So, you know,hopefully we, we spend 2025,
you know, helping each otherout. So is

Doug Smith (39:47):
That the goal of the Box Juice podcast is , uh,
competing with Rogan ?
Yeah . That's

Good .

One , one day. One

Day. Like I always told him I'd love to
have him . He reminds me a LexFriedman. He's a Lex Friedman
guy. I believe in him. ,

Doug Smith (39:57):
Let's go .

Let's go. Yeah.
Good question. Asker, you

Know, I've got him better. I will say, you
know, it's been a , it's been ajourney. You know , Dylan's
been Di Dylan . People don'tknow. I gotta shout Dylan for a
second. 'cause he , he's goodat what he does. He's, he's
good at critiquing and , uh,you know, he gives me good
feedback. And so, as you kindof mentioned, being able to
take feedback and listen towhat people say, you know? Uh ,
so he's

Blunt. He tells you the truth. Yeah . Even when
it hurts really bad. He's ourguy. That's our guy .

Doug Smith (40:20):
I can't wait to hear the feedback on this
episode. Let's

Go.

But Doug, you know, I , I appreciate you
kinda sharing your story andyou know, things about
nonprofits and your , yourviews on podcasts and , and ,
and leadership. Usually we askour guests a question and it's
about their word of advice forentrepreneurs. But I want to
change this question todaybecause, you know, I do view
you as an entrepreneur , uh, asa leader. But we wanted to

(40:46):
change, you know, Jay and Iwere talking and we kind of had
an idea for a different type ofquestion. And Jay , this was
your , your idea. So why don'tyou kind of hit him with our
Yeah . Our little change of

.
So we do one word of advice butbecause of the fact that you've
made such a career in media andyou've been doing it for a very
long time, what would be yourone word of advice for podcast
or brand personalities based onyour experience? What's the one
word of advice?

Doug Smith (41:09):
Oh , man . Me with one word, with anything. It's
tough. You

Can make it like 20 ,

Doug Smith (41:13):
Trust me . So , so start where you're at and get
feedback and get better. Startwhere you're at, get feedback,
get better. So start whereyou're at. One of my, the , the
greatest things that I hear forfeedback from me on a positive
note is, Hey, I went back andlistened to the first 20
episodes of the L threeLeadership podcast, and I am
blown away by how far you'vecome in question asking and
quality, et cetera. And so tolook back on a journey of

(41:35):
growth, the 12 years,phenomenal. Always get
feedback. The times I've grownmost, I ask two questions at
the end of every , uh, podcastthat I do. Number one is, Hey,
make me better. What, what wasthis experience like for you?
I'm gonna ask you guys the samething when we get off this mic.
What , what could I have doneto make the experience better?
How can I be better the nexttime I'm a guest or the next
time I'm a host? A lot of timespeople say, oh, you're great.
Great. I've had probably threeor four, and I'll just give you

(41:57):
one if it's , if it's helpful .
Helpful. Yeah . Uh , I rememberwhich it was two, same piece of
advice from two differentleaders. One of my mentors
said, Doug, when I listened toyou on the podcast, it sounds
like , uh, you're so focused ongetting to the next question,
that you're not actuallylistening to the guest. And I
would come up with a , uh,three or four pages of
questions. So I thought, okay,I need to chew on that. Ken

(42:20):
Coleman, who works for DaveRamsey, he's interviewed people
for a living. I brought up thatfeedback to him after an
interview, and I'm like, Hey,speak to me. He's like, well,
what are you afraid of? I'mlike, what do you mean? What am
I afraid of? He's like, you'reafraid of something. If you're
so focused on going to the nextquestion that you're afraid ,
you're , you're not afraid whatthe audience think the audience
is in here. He said, you'reafraid of the person you're
interviewing. You think thatthey're better than you. And
the reality was, I did. And Iwas so insecure about what the

(42:42):
people sitting across methought of me. Mm-hmm
. That I , Ididn't let my curiosity lead
the interview. That feedbackchanged everything for me. And
so I got feedback that wasnumber two, start where you
are, get feedback, and thengrow. Okay. I changed some
things after that. I stoppedcaring . I not completely, but
I stopped caring about what myguests think. I listened . I
didn't have to follow my scriptof 30 questions. If you guys

(43:04):
said something and I'minterviewing you, and I'm like,
wow, I'm just gonna followthat. Yeah. That was a game
changer in my interview skill .
So that would be my advice topeople in media. Just always
get better.

That is amazing, man. Yeah, that is,
that is awesome. Cool . Doug,thanks for coming on, man. I
really appreciate the time.

Doug Smith (43:18):
Yeah . Lost juice.
Hey, we're playing with Rogan.
Let's go. Yeah , let's

Go.
Absolutely. One day, Joe, wewant you to come on. .
Yes.

Doug Smith (43:25):
I'm , I , invite me, I I went in the room.
Remember me when you're thatbig. Yeah .

Hundred percent . Okay. Cool . Thank
you so much, Doug . Doug , Doug.

Doug Smith (43:33):
Well, hey , leader . Thank you so much for
listening to my conversationwith my friends from the Boss
Juice podcast. I hope that youenjoyed it as much as I did.
You can check out theirpodcast, the Boss Juice
Podcast, anywhere you listen topodcasts. I encourage you to
check them out. I also wannathank our sponsor in Dosha
Marketing Solutions. They arethe producers of this podcast,
and if you are looking for helpwith your organization's
marketing, I cannot recommendthem enough. I've been working

(43:54):
with them for years. You cancheck them out@enddosha.com,
that's a n do CI a.com . And asalways, I like to end every
episode with a quote. Andtoday, I'll quote Lao too , who
said this, A leader is bestwhen people barely know he
exists. When his work is done,his aim fulfilled. They will
say, we did it ourselves. Ilove that. Well, that's gonna
make a wrap on today's podcast.

(44:15):
And as always, leader,remember, don't quit. Keep
leading the world desperatelyneeds your leadership. I'll
talk to you next episode.

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