Episode 135 - Roger Rickard - Leaders on Leadership

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Entrepreneurs and leaders are risk-takers, and they recognize opportunities where others see chaos. They stay focused and determined because they have their goals set that they need to achieve. Dr. Tracey Jones sits down with Roger Rickard to unravel more insights about staying focused. He is the founder and President of Voices in Advocacy, author of 7 Actions of Highly Effective Advocates, and host of the Voices in Advocacy Podcast. Let’s dive into this episode with many deep insights regarding taking the next level in leadership despite different obstacles. Tune into this and don’t forget to stay focused!

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Roger Rickard - Leaders on Leadership

I am very excited because my guest is Roger Rickard. Roger knows that successful advocacy can change the world. It is his life's work as Founder and President of Voices in Advocacy, Author of 7 Actions of Highly Effective Advocates and hosts of the Voices in Advocacy Podcast. He has years of experience as an advocacy professional, speaker, trainer, consultant and author. Roger is a BIG man at 6'8", a BIG thinker, and he has BIG ideas for helping you to succeed with advocacy.

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Roger, thank you so much for being here.

Thank you very much for having me, Dr. Jones.

You can get that out of the way. Tracey is fine. I'm delighted to have you here. For our readers, do you know why I'm smiling at Roger? It’s because my dad was a big guy. We’re like, “He had to be 6'7”.” He was only 6’3”, came at the company, always had that bow tie. Roger, you look fabulous. I love BIG Man with BIG ideas. That's where we're here for. For our readers out there, I met Roger on NSA Broadcasters Podcast Forum. Be sure to get out there. That's how other great leaders find other great leaders and being part of the things like this. Why I'm so excited is Roger hit on one of my favorite words in the whole world that I've only, in the past few years, understood and that's advocates. As a matter of fact, in Spark, A is for advocates and you cannot get there without them. Roger, I am so excited to unpack your work in advocacy and your work as a leader. Thank you so much for being here.

Thank you very much for having me on the show. I'm very excited to at least share a few thoughts and a little new nugget here and there.

My father wrote a speech called The Price of Leadership and spoke extensively on leadership. In this speech, which our readers can download for free, he really went into the tougher side of leadership. He talked about the four key elements that you are going to have to do if you are truly paying the price to be a leadership leader and not a leader in name only. The first one of these is loneliness. We have heard the word, it's lonely at the top. A lot of people have this romanticized idea of being a leader and they get there and they're like, "This is different." Can you unpack what loneliness as a leader has meant for you or maybe share with our readers what to do if they are in a season of loneliness?

From the standpoint of a season of loneliness, we're not afraid to go out and get help on things that we feel that we need, whether it's we need additional speaking skills, presentation skills, any other set of skill sets. What we're often afraid to go out and confront things like depression, loneliness, or feeling of the burden of everything sitting on my shoulders. It reminds me of my father. He was a blue-collar worker who probably was hardworking but didn't have a clue of what I did and couldn't wrap his arms around it. I would often come to him and I would say, "I want your advice." One day, he looked at me and said, "I don’t know why you are asking for my advice?" I said, "Because I want it." He said, "But you never take it." I said, "You don't know if I take it."

It reminded me in the story that I went back to him with his question from the President of the United States has thousands of advisors. No matter what they say, that person has to make the decision. Whether it's the leader of the pre-world in the present United States, leader of the household, leader of a small business or whatever you are as a leader, you have to make that final decision. I hope that you don't make it lonely. I hope you don't make it in a vacuum where you don't seek out other authority. No matter what the decision you make is, you take all those things in totality. If you ask for advice, you're going to upset people one way or the other, but don't be afraid to ask for that. Don't be afraid to seek your own help for things. You can look at loneliness in many different ways. I have been an entrepreneur all my life, for the most part. There are times when you're alone making decisions where you're very concerned of, “I'm making the right decision,” because the person that impacts the most is you. You've got to have a little bit of confidence. You've got to go out and seek additional help when you need that help and advice from others.

Being in the military, when you started out, you recognize, and you feel like, "I'm feeling alone," we call in the cavalry, calling reinforcements. It's natural for leaders to, "You're going to go through this." I love the fact that you said, “Not everybody is going to rejoice in your decision.” I think that's something that leaders struggle with. It's kind of a, “I made this decision.” You're always going to have people and even your father said that, "You're not going to take my advice," but we still seek that. That's absolutely an important point.

I would like to follow that up with, I just became the Immediate Class President of the chapter of National Speakers Association. I was on a call with my successor. I said to her, "I will always publicly support you." Privately, we can have our own conversations and know that I will give you what I think is the best advice I can give you and know that I respect whatever your decision is. It will not be heard if you decide to do the absolute opposite of what I recommend. I want you to have the knowledge, you make the choice.

That's absolutely brilliant. That unpacks the loneliness that publicly and then we can have a discussion in private and you respect.

Our private conversations will always remain private.

That's why that tearing down from within is the worst kind of assault because it's like, “We already had the discussion in the boardroom. We're supposed to be out and have a united front.” I expect it from the enemy but leaders need to watch out for that. If you've got that sabotage going on for your team, you're going to be lonely because they're not with you.

That's right and you have to make a different decision. How do you get them on the bus or how do you throw them off the bus? You need that and build that trust. You, as a leader, if you go out and you do what you say if you promise, deliver on your promise, and stay the course with that. You said military a little bit earlier. Those military minds are the people that always put up and told the truth. We ultimately do want the proof. Sometimes, it hurts to get the proof but that's what we ultimately want. If you don't want that, you're probably not the right type of person to be in leadership.

Thanks for unpacking that. Next, we talked about, sometimes there's going to be times of loneliness, you also talked about weariness. This thing was, in anything you do and you know as an entrepreneur, sometimes there are days where we’re working 40 hours in a day, let alone a week and it's weary. You also talked about there's good weary and bad weary. I know there are days when I go to bed and I'm like, "I am so tired but I am so tired in a good way," versus being weary. Either way as leaders, we need to stay on top of fighting forms. Can you speak to weariness maybe when you went through a season of that and how you stay fully charged so you can teach people the art of advocacy?

It's two sides of a coin. You pointed that out. Sometimes, you're weary because you know you achieved something and you worked hard to get that achievement to do that. Sometimes, you're weary because you're just tired of doing it and you're tired of either feeling like you're beating your head against the bottom and not getting any closer to your goals. That comes in many different forms. Let's take one of them. I love the weary of, “I'm exhausted because we've done great work. I love that feeling.” That motivates me more. When I know that I've achieved something where somebody gets somewhere, somebody does something, I see that the work that I did or the work that our organization does helps somebody else, that's fuel. Weary is like being hungry. Sometimes, you're hungry and you need more fuel because you're burning all those calories or you're weary and you need to eat to replenish the batteries and you're exhausted by that.

When you feel like you're alone, you can sometimes get in this melancholy to where you're weary because you feel like you're tired of fighting the fight. I would recommend to anybody at that point, one of the things that I do is I take a step back for me and I say, “With what I do, is that affecting somebody else?” I will often go back and I will look at people that were unsolicited that responded to me. For example, I spoke in DC. It’s a great audience talking about advocacy and how to be engaged and involved. At the end of the event, a female bartender came that was in the room and said, "Boy, did you touch me?"

It's great when an audience that you're paid to be in front of feels they’re touched, but it's super when someone that doesn't need to care and listen. All of a sudden, they’re touched by one of the things that you did. I said, "If you have an opportunity, explain to me what you felt. You may not be able to do that right now, but here's my card." She sent me an email that was eight paragraphs. She poured her heart and soul into why I touched her. Any time I feel lonely by myself and weary, pick up something like that because then you look at what you've done and say, "It makes a difference. It's time for me to keep the frame moving forward."

There are many times that I'm going to ask you this question next that I've been like, “I'm done.” My dad always said, "If you can want to quit, just don't do it." I engage in my little pity party. Somebody sends these eternal life insurance policies and I'll get one of these in the mail. It's always the day when I'm about to go, “I'm done. I've taken it so I can go.” I'll get one of them sign and I'm like, “Here we go. I'm right back in the game.” I hear that. We need to keep charged and remember the good stuff.

Let me add one thing. I love the statement, “It's always darkest before the dawn,” and it is.

An earlier guest said, "Tracey, don't quit halfway because it's just as far to retreat as it is to finish," and I'm like, "Of course.” Anytime where you ever felt like you've been doing this for many years where you were like, "I'm not sure that I'm making enough of a difference." We know we're making a little difference but sometimes we start comparing ourselves. Do you ever feel like walking away?

The simple answer is short. There are times when you sit and you start to say, "Is it worth it? Is it worth my time? Is it worth my energy? Am I making a difference?" Let's face it. I'm in business, who also makes money as well as making a difference. Am I doing enough? Am I getting enough out of all the energy that I'm putting into this? I hate the term bio-rhythm but these all tie together. This is the beauty of this and you know this. There are days when you're lonely, tired, weary, worn out, and feel alone. I have fewer of those the older I get. I am very confident in what I'm doing will work but it reminds me, I played a lot of baseball as a young lad. Do you know how you get to the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown as a professional baseball player?

Staying Focused: Be confident to confront depression, loneliness or the feeling of the burden because you have the power to create your destiny.

Staying Focused: Be confident to confront depression, loneliness or the feeling of the burden because you have the power to create your destiny.

How?

You succeed 3 out of 10 times. If you have a 300-batting average in baseball, you are a superstar and you're in the Hall of Fame. You're going to fail 7 out of those 10 times, you can either put your head down and fail. I know where this came from but if I wasn't starting in a baseball game and let's say it was the bottom of the ninth inning and we needed runs, I always wanted to be the guy that came off the bench. Here's my logic. In a nine-inning baseball game, there are three outs per ending, and that's 27 outs. If I make the last out, my mentality was I was only 1 of 27 outs. If I get the hit, I hit the home run. If I bring in the winning run, I'm a hero. I love those odds. Give me that chance to be the hero because if I fail, I'm only 1 out of 27 to fail. Give me the chance to succeed.

Roger, that is brilliant. I forgot about the 300. It’s a great metaphor to keep in our minds and soldiering on.

When you tie that together, Babe Ruth had more strikeouts than he had home runs.

That's one of the stories too. My dad would tell me that as a kid growing up. I was prepared for this but he's like, "Tracey, this is like the pendulum. You're going to have the best year or worse year.” It's just young, old, rich, poor, black, white, debt to debt, Christian, Monk. It doesn't matter. Life is a series of ebbs and flows. Ecclesiastics to everything that there's a season. I love the fact that you said, “It is what it is,” but for our either younger leaders or starting out, please understand, it's not that you have it figured out, but you're at a better place with it. You understand the value you're providing. I go through those downtimes, and more infrequently, when I do, I capture them and cast them out quicker.

I think the key is as time goes on and more experience that you have is that you've felt that before. The more you're used to feeling something, the more that you can settle into it.

What you said brings to mind normalization. When we talk about it, we remove the stigma and the fear. We call it for what it is and say, “It is what it is. Now, I can unpack it with the unemotional part of my brain and assign a meaning to it.” "I want to quit. Am I going to quit? No, so let's go into action mode.”

I've been down this path before. What did I do for myself to get me out of that? What can I do now if I need to change that? Introspection is key to that. You talk about the ebb and flows. Anytime you're in business and you're a leader, you are virtually the head of sales. I don't care what title they give you or where it is. If you don't have revenue, you don't have a business. Whatever your title is, everybody needs to embrace the fact that there are sales. I often go back to that when I get to that point. I say, "As a salesman, what do I need to do to either convince myself or somebody else along the way?” A salesman isn't about necessarily getting the contract. It's about convincing.

That was insightful. I love that you said, “You got to convince yourself first,” because I was like, "I'm not a salesperson. I'm an engineer. You better believe I am." Otherwise, as you said, you can't hang the shingle because you can't pay the bills and you can't pay other people. Do you know what I had to do? I had to convince myself first. I need to hire sales that never worked out because I had to convince myself first and be the queen of sales or the king of sales, whatever you're going to be.

We were talking about being lonely or weary. There are days that you don't want to do the sales. What I've come to realize is there are also days that I am really into it. Whatever my schedule is that day, I change it and I just keep plowing more and more into the sales aspect of it because I know I'm on and I feel good about it. I know how I’m going to react and how I'm going to sound on a phone, Zoom call, or even face-to-face. If you’re not into it, don't do it.

It is fire rhythms. As I said, there are days where everybody I've talked to, "Done. I'm in it." Thank you for bringing that up too because some people can get very bounded about how to make this many calls every day and stuff like that. As an entrepreneur, you've got plenty of stuff to do.

In my opinion, with some of the things that I do, I have daily devotions and motivations. Some days, I just decide I'm going to read more about that stuff. There must be the hunger that I need to nourish, recharge, and retooled to be able to move forward with that. It smothers for me now to stop what I'm doing, go recharge rather than keep banging my head against the wall but everybody has to do that. They have to find what makes them self-comfortable.

I think the more seasoning you get, the more you understand yourself. I remember in my younger days, I'm procrastinating. Now, as you said, I'm like, "No. I need to just take half a day or a day." I'm very structured and very goal-oriented. I know we're going to do this and I need that. I can tell I need it because I'm on fire doing that. I don't feel bad and I get that right back into the flow. It’s a great insight for our leaders, Roger. Thank you. Loneliness, weariness and the next one you talked about is abandonment.

Abandonment typically has a negative connotation. Fear of abandonment is a very real thing. For those of us in the pet rescue business, abandonment is a cardinal sin. My father talked about abandonment as a leader is we cannot be all things to all people. You'll dilute your brand and you’re burned out. My dad would always say, "We need to abandon what we’d like and think about in favor of what we ought and need to think about." Can you unpack abandonment for us and help us understand how you stay very focused?

I think one is through for themselves. They don't always stay focused. Part of that is because of the way your brain is wired and you're willing to take that risk. All of a sudden, you see another debt in a hole somewhere and you go, “Should I go down there? Should I do that?” The reality is we all do this and we all step away. The more you recognize that, the better you are from the standpoint of saying, "I just went down that rabbit hole. Stop, get out of the hole, and get back to what you need to do." I also think that it's okay from time-to-time to go down there because that's where creativity goes.

Sometimes, it's okay to go off on a tangent. You and I have done that on calls together. We start a conversation that it also been led to this and led to that. It started with new ideas and new ways of doing things or picking something that has been on your mind forever. It's something that's been on my mind for years finding a different way to do it. All of a sudden, that light bulb comes on. Do we have maybe gone there? Not necessarily but going there, we found the answer to it. Leader's times are valuable.

The other side of that is your ability in a gentle, loving manner they know. Part of I think what makes a business and leader successful is their ability to focus on "no" as much as "yes." No, this isn't the right thing for our business. No, this isn't the right thing for my staff or my employees. No, this isn't the right thing for my customer. No, this isn't the right thing for our brand, for our image. Being able to recognize all of those things and abandon, “Done. Thank you but no. That's now off the table. Move on.” That's important because by doing that, you're telling everybody else it's okay for them to as well.

Can you walk us through the World of Advocacy? How did you hone it? I always look at abandonment is singularity. You cut it and you prune everything else away until that laser becomes, not a kaleidoscope but the most powerful beam of you. How did you dial in your advocacy focus? I'm sure there were a lot of different things and do a lot of different people. A lot of different people calling you to do something that's there but not there. Could you walk us through that?

That's a very difficult process but let's not sugar coat it. It doesn't come to you easily. Particularly, when someone says to you, "I want to hire you to do XYZ." No, my business is A. My business is Advocacy. The hard thing is you turn down potential money somewhere and do something for somebody else. That drives you back to the abandonment. How do you then say no? How do you stay focused? Advocacy could be a big umbrella. What I chose to do is, I made very purposeful decisions. Not all at one time but it’s how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time. I figured this out one bite at a time.

Once you figure one thing out, it starts to come in another area. In my business, what I do primarily, I have about eight competitors. That's it. Did I start off saying, “How can I get this down to where there's only a couple of us?” Quite frankly, I can even drill it down further. I don't even think I have eight competitors. I think I had one. All the reasons are immaterial, but I continue to keep chipping away. When I have a conversation with somebody, they may ask what I do. “I help you grow your community of advocates.” What does that mean? How do you do that? Those are different answers.

What differentiates me from, even my group of eight, that figured out. I know what differentiates me. If you don't want what I have, I don't take it personally. I live in Scottsdale, Arizona because I made a lifestyle book. Doing what I do if I was in Washington, DC, I would be crazy busy and we'd be turning down business left and right and trying to figure out how do I get more boots on the ground to do more business with that. I also use that to my advantage now because there are a lot of people that work inside the bubble of DC. They work on K Street and I worked through Main Street. I work with the people out in the middle of the country and that's a mindset.

That's not geography. When an organization in DC recognizes that what they need is support out in Main Street, then I'm more of the guy for them. I figured that out. It's the ability to constantly hone and refine. It was Jerry Seinfeld that said, “Anybody can write a joke. The great ones can get a joke down to about eight words.” How did you get your business down to where is that fine-tune? Everybody knows and understands. I had conversations, “I don't really understand. Explain more. Tell us a little bit more. Why don't we understand this?” That means you're probably not the right fit for me.

Staying Focused: When you're alone making decisions, you get worried if you’re doing it right or not. And because the person that impacts you the most, you have to be very careful.

Staying Focused: When you're alone making decisions, you get worried if you’re doing it right or not. And because the person that impacts you the most, you have to be very careful.

It's not resonating.

It's the faster we can all get to know.

I don't want to waste their time or my time.

It's both "know" and "no." How fast can we get to know whether this is a yes or no?

For the readers out there, this is a lifelong process. I've been back from Tremendous Leadership for many years. Now, I finally feel like I've been chipping, honing, iron, this and that. Every now and then, I'll allow my creative side to go down a rabbit trail. I tend to get back on but it is a process and it takes time. For the leaders out there, if you've been in entrepreneurship or you're starting out, which a lot of our market is, give it time. It takes time but it will evolve as you get to know yourself and what you're bringing to the table. You're so much clearer on what conversations to have with who and when so you can abandon all the other stuff, you're going to get bombarded with people telling you all these things that are going to do for you or asking you to do all these things for them. Life is so much more streamlined and profitable.

I remember taking a class in Politics. It's amazing what you can remember because that was more than a day or two ago. I remember taking a class in college on Advertising and Marketing. The instructor showed it out at the television line and he asked the question, "Is this a good ad or a bad ad?" Everybody had opinions. I remember someone in the class said, "What's your opinion?" He said, "I can't tell you whether it's a good ad or a bad ad because A) I don't know where they were running. B) I don't know the demographic that they were trying to reach, and C) the demographic they're trying to reach actually make a difference in their business," which makes me think we jumped to conclusions on something. If you're watching ads on television, listening to them on the radio, or anything like that, you jumped to a conclusion. Do you like the music? Do you like the visual? Do you like all that? It may not be for you or designed for you.

Political leaders put in their speeches three items. They put lines that the people that love them. Their saints. No matter what, they love them. They put lines in the speech to make the saints happy and they reinforce why we love them. They put lines in the speech for the savable. The people that may like this, that kind of like this, and maybe think the idea is okay. How do they get them to go to yes? They don't put anything in the speech for the sinners. The point of that is if you listen to a speech and you don't like it, then you're probably viewed as a sinner. I don't mean that in a negative connotation.

In political campaigns, when you're running for office, you're trying to get one thing and that's a vote. You need the money, staff and all of that, but when you cut it down, would you create that vision? That person either loves you, you’re a saint, they might consider voting for you or there's no way in God's great time that I'm ever voting for you. You've got to forget about the sinners. You got to keep the same happy to keep marching for you, and then with the savable, you've got to do your best, create something that allows them to hang their hat on why I chose to vote for you.

That's in business so let's pick that out of the political conversation and let's put that as the leaders. You're going to have the naysayers. There are people that no matter what you do, there's nothing you can do to please them. It's hard then block them out. They're immaterial. How do I get new customers that I want? How do I convince them? How do I take care of my customers now? How do I take care of my employees now? They're my saints. They've already decided to join the team. If I don't take care of those people, ultimately, they've left us.

You've really unpacked abandonment. Lastly, vision and it is no trauma on this. I can remember my dad teach me, “Vision is seeing what needs to be done and doing it. Otherwise, you can be very esoteric and philosophical but it's actually getting it done.” Can you unpack what vision means to you and share some insights for how you help hone and move your vision forward?

Vision is clarity of purpose. For me, when you asked that question, the first thing that comes to mind and the thing that I couldn't get around is clarity of purpose. I love to use analogies. If I know what I have to do, then the vision is really simple. When I was an athlete, what do I need to do to be a better hitter? What do I need to do to be a better fielder? What are some of the tasks that are going to get me there? From a leadership standpoint of vision is, what else would we need? What don't we have now? What don't I have to be able to help somebody else out? If I don't have certain skill sets, then I need to get those skillsets and be a constant learner. That's the thing I love and embrace. I think every minute I get older. What else can I learn? Unfortunately, I don't have enough time in life to learn what I want to learn. If you would've asked me that when I was in college, it would be like, “Get me out of here. I want to get out and I want to do things.”

“Retired at 55. That's it. I'm done.” It's like, “We're just getting started.”

I have a very successful cousin who said, “I'm out at 55 and I'm done.” In my case, I don't think I'll ever retire because I want to keep doing this. I want to be engaged. That makes your task easier. We need to be better at A. How do we get at A? Within that, what do we do to do it? To your point, do it.

You got to execute it. Otherwise, it's just talk.

There are things that sit on my list that I don't do in a timely manner. Let's go back to all the other points we talked about. If I don't do that, then I lose. We've got to create the discipline, do the actual work, and hold yourself accountable. I was having a conversation with somebody and I said, "One of the hardest things to do as a leader is to hold other people accountable." I immediately corrected it and said, "To do that, you must first hold yourself accountable." You've got to tell them when you flipped up. “I didn't do this as well as I should have. It's on me.” It gives them permission to accept the fact that it's on them too.

We've covered loneliness, weariness, abandonment, and vision. We have these tremendous leaders reading. Is there anything else on leadership that you would like to share? A lot of people are like, "I know the word but I've never heard it in a professional context." Could you share a little bit about how you work with organizations and what you do for them?

I think that segue is right. What else would I bring up? I would bring up advocacy, quite frankly, because leaders have to be self-advocate. A self-advocate is someone who is willing to represent themselves, their views, interests, visions, so on and so forth. You have to be willing to speak out for what matters to you. As a leader, you have to be an advocate. If you're a leader in the business context, you need to be the advocate on behalf of your customers, employees, and suppliers because if any part of the cog or that wheel isn't operating correctly, there's a reason why we have four tires on a car. We need all four.

All four have to have proper air and have the proper threads be able to get us down the path that we want to go. If any one of those isn’t working properly, then we're not getting there safely, as efficiently and as fast. What I do, I said this a little bit earlier, voices and advocacy helped organizations grow their ad. What I mean by that is we help, inspire, engage, educate, and activate your supporters to take action to the issues that matter to them the most. Examples of that are easy, whether they be social causes or they may be great organizations.

Oftentimes, an organization says, “We exist because we're going to be your voice wherever, whether that voice is in government, media, public arena, or some sort. We're going to be your voice. With that voice, we're going to stand up and educate people to the issues that matter to us.” I’ve been to a podcast interview and someone said, "What we do is a special interest and people think special interest is negative." When you can take a special interest and make it in the interest of the public, then that's when you succeed and there's a lot of them. Advocacy, interestingly enough, I ask a lot of people on the street. What do you think advocacy means?

Often, they'll go to lobbying and backroom deals, smoke-filled rooms and all those negative connotations of things when advocacy itself is defined as a speaking out in favor of a cause, issue, interest, or whatever. I view advocacy in a very positive light and people need to be advocates. They need to know how to be more effective and efficient advocates so that they can create more influence. Leaders need to be influential or they won't succeed. You can be missing other traits. If you can't be influential, you'll never convince people. We talk about change or this organization has to change. We know how hard it is to change the wheel of the organization and to change the steering of where you're going with the organization. It's really hard if you have no interest.

I heard it said, “As a leader, they don't have to know everything but they have to know everybody.” That's where those advocates either in the form of a resource or a sounding board.

It's also, “Who knows who, who knows who? I have to know everybody. I have to know somebody that knows somebody.”

What do they say in sales is for every person, they have 250 contacts they can introduce you to. If you're meeting with ten people, that's 250 times 10. If you feel lonely or tired or whatever, you go, "I don't know where they are." Go out and just find one because it's that synergistic effect and they're out there. I think it doesn't dawn on people. They think that certain people have magical advocate fairy dust that sprinkles on them. I'm like, "They're out there, but you got to go find them." They get dialed in as you did with that particular mission that resonates. That's a special interest of their heart that they want to join you in your mission and what you're trying to do in business, a nonprofit, special interest, government, or anything.

Staying Focused: Feeling weary and exhausted because of productive work is good. It will motivate you further to focus on your goals.

Staying Focused: Feeling weary and exhausted because of productive work is good. It will motivate you further to focus on your goals.

It’s absolutely true, Tracey. You never know where that influence will come from. You must keep your eyes and ears open to it all the time. There are thousands of stories of someone that was ignored that might've been literally a janitor or a maid somewhere. It turns out the maid's son, daughter, brother or sister was a big leader and you’ll never know where that's going to take you. Treat everybody with kindness. Treat everybody the way you want to be treated with respect and it will come back to you plentiful.

What a wonderful way to wrap this up. How can people get connected with you and possibly reach out to you for your services or just include you as an advocate in their network?

You can reach me on any of the social platforms under my name @RogerRickard. You can find me anywhere, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, any of those. If someone wants to email me, it's Roger@VoicesInAdvocacy.com. You know the website as well and you've been listening to the Voices In Advocacy Podcast in any of your streaming services.

Roger, thank you so much. I scribbled a ton of notes. I can't help it because you had some great insights in our discussion and I thank you for it.

Tracey, I want to thank you because the work that you're doing on behalf of helping leaders is so vitally important. It's important for the things that we started off with, whether it's loneliness and weariness. It's important for all of those reasons. God bless you for what you do with that. Thank you for everything you do.

Thank you and God bless you too, Roger. To our readers, we are so thankful for you. If you like what you read, please be sure and hit the subscribe button. Do us the honor of a five-star review. Share and drop us a line or a comment. We'd love to hear from you. We hope you got value out of this. Please share, connect with us. Get on TremendousLeadership.com, download your free copy of The Price of Leadership so you can read more about it and know the leader. If the going gets tough, the tough get growing. You get out there. We're so thankful for you and congratulations to you all. You are a true leader and you are paying the price of leadership. Have a tremendous rest of the day. Bye-bye.

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About Rodger Rickard

Rodger Rickard.jpg

Roger knows that successful advocacy can change the world, it is his life’s work as the Founder & President of Voices in Advocacy®, author of 7 Actions of Highly Effective Advocates, and host of the Voices in Advocacy Podcast.

He has more than 30 years of experience as an advocacy professional, speaker, trainer, consultant, and author.

Roger is a BIG man at 6’8”, a BIG thinker, and he has BIG ideas for helping you succeed with advocacy.

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Episode 134 - Dr. Debra Dupree - Leaders On Leadership