and welcome to this episode of 100 days of service now I'm your host Kylie Alexander and today we are joined by one of my favorite people in the ecosystem let me tell you a little bit about him Jeff Kathy is one of the best storytellers I know his empathetic nature informs his leadership his generous spirit and his work with customers to deliver exceptional service now outcomes Jeff has worked in Tech sales leadership in various capacities at service now and currently at Glide fast Consulting so I wanted to invite him on this episode of 100 days of service now to talk about the three seas of servant leaderships to win in career and life so without further Ado let's welcome my friend my mentor and colleague Jeff Kathy to the [Music] stream welcome to 400 Days of service now Jeff Hi klie how are you doing well I'm so delighted to have you here and really looking forward to this conversation before we get into servant leadership why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself so I've been here at Glide fast for a year and a week very fortunate to be here at Glide fast after having served the uh I guess combined now the better part of the last seven years in the service now ecosystem uh I live in the Dallas Fort Worth area I'm a native aranson uh but but raise backs yeah but I've embraced everything Texas except for the Longhorns certainly the the Razorbacks are who I'm a fan of I've been married to my wife Shannon for 26 years I have a 23y old daughter Kylie uh in a 17-year-old son Carson right on you know Texar Kansas kind of grows you up in a particular kind of way I'm curious a little bit about how that informs your leadership your interaction and engagement with customers yeah it's interesting so I I grew up in in very rural uh South Arkansas very much a blue collar uh mentality very much a help your neighbor and even help a stranger mentality growing up uh there sometimes you're far removed from the city and and maybe having the things that you need you just have to be resilient work with others to uh achieve and to have and and growing up there I wouldn't I wouldn't trade anything for it it's uh helped form me personally and professionally my entire life you know there's something about that kind of small town living where you know your neighbor I think my sister is in the chat we grew up in a type of uh Community where you you visit people by going to their back door right and whenever someone ring the front doorbell I like wait a minute who's that the same I grew up it makes me think about how that upbringing gives you perhaps uh I'll call it a white glove type of Engagement with customers that small town background must really go far with how customers receive you yeah it's uh it's interesting you know growing up uh where I did and and and everybody was uh you may not have been friends with everyone but you knew everyone um you know you can escape people knowing your business and and things like that growing up in a in a small town so you got to learn to communicate you have to learn to uh get along and it it seems very simplistic talking about those things forming you professionally particularly when we are in Tech sales but at the end of the day regardless of of what it is personally professionally so many times it's all about people it's all about relationships and how you can communicate and understand with one another for sure sure you spent some time in the Army National Guard as well talk to me a little bit about that I uh I did that kie after uh College I was uh uh a 91 Mike which is I guess your your grade or your your job title which was a a hospital dietitian cook okay then yeah so uh yeah interesting time never was deployed to uh to combat but uh with summer camps and trainings uh in being a cook uh I I know for a fact I can cook to 2,000 omelets in a couple hours uh provided I have enough eggs you know what that really feels in the blanks for me because we were recently talking about how you were throwing down just this past weekend for Super Bowl Sunday with all the wonderful things that you were making because you was talking about you made these pork ribs and I was like oh pork ribs and you was like but kie that ain't that ain't it what it really is is that next day when you take those ribs you get in get some new potatoes you get some eggs and you put put that in a tortilla see now I understand I see the line I see the through line on that well for sure talk to me about sports because I know you're a huge sports fan but you're also a bit of an athlete yourself well I I used to be played everything in in high school growing up uh played football in P vaed in college now that was 30 years and maybe 50 pounds or so ago uh but always have been drawn to sports many of uh and what we're going to talk about today servant leadership coaches that I've had beginning with uh Lester Harris and Frankie Gan and Mark Perkins and Denny Rosenberg Tommy Barnes so many good men in my life uh that were servant leaders that I had a front row uh seat to uh to see how it is to Servant lead Jeff what is servant leadership servant leadership I I think is a a a leadership style a way that you car yourself that prioritizes the growth the the well-being the education the enablement the empowerment um of others I I think that leaders uh servant leadership it certainly doesn't require a title it requires a mindset and a want to to make your situation the situation for those around you you know is is good and is best uh is it can be and a lot of times to make that happen somebody has to take uh the reins and and drive that forward and it's what I've always tried to do professionally taking that level of accountability you mentioned that it doesn't require a title that it requires a mindset what I appreciate about the way you frame that is that it allows everyone wherever they are in their career regardless of their title this is a practice that they can uh adopt and put into practice in their own lives so that that's I I think that's really powerful so for the folks out there watching keep in mind that it doesn't matter your title it doesn't matter how long you've been in your career if you've been here just got here yesterday if you've been here for decades this is something that will help you to grow both professionally and in life so I know you broke down the three C's Jeff so what is the first SE of servant leadership well there could be C's but these three are my favorite to employ in use and practice uh every day uh compassion character and competence and and compassion I guess is the the first one I'd like to talk about as it would relate to sales and selling uh will kind of be the the view in which I talk uh about it but certainly it could be applied uh in everyday life anywhere everywhere with anyone okay so when you talk about compassion you talk about servant leadership I don't don't want it this to be lost you are also a leader in Tech sales what role does compassion play in that capacity so to talk about it from a from a customer and as a seller I guess kind of standpoint first you have to be genuinely interested in the customer and their outcomes first you you you've got to be mindful you've got to be cognizant you have to understand that I think ultimately with compassion as it relates to sales is we as sellers have to get into a position to be able to to understand the customers pain or their Vision in in solution uh of what success looks like and how they're going to to measure that you know how do you get there you you again you've got to be genuinely uh interested in the customer and the outcomes they want what organizationally does the customers company get from me what does the customer that I'm actually dealing with and speaking to what what do they get personally from it you know and and so I think you have to ask very candid and probing questions uh to get to a level of detail and understanding you know of the customer issues uh you have to have the active listening to if you can't active listen you know that's a problem so uh you'll often see me on sales and whatnot I've I've always got my notebook I'm always writing notes active lisening uh you know is very important there but back to the the uh compassion part you really have to get in and feel what your customer needs you know and you have to put their success uh certainly before your your own and and I think that it's one reason that I've enjoyed working at Glide fast for the past year and a a few weeks the the whole servant leader mind share the compassion character competence um you know Mike Lombardo that founded our company uh he was a practitioner early on in his career uh with service now you think about how we are tasked with and measured with uh you know customer first and on time on budget they're happy uh and driving a good seat rating for us which you know hopefully we will have earned you know and be in good favor with the customer all of those things I think uh are relatable in a part of how you need to be compassionate to be uh an effective seller and a not just a vendor but a partner to your when I when I hear you speak it makes me think about uh professional empathy you talked about you have to put your customers needs first about kind of like flipping the script and like what the priorities are it's not the priorities of the me but it's the priorities of the customer the person that's sitting across the table right empathy seems to be a big part of how you engage and even what you recommend even Beyond Tech sales but what you even recommend career can you speak a little bit more about that you just have to be genuine uh and and authentic people don't want to be sold that they want to be educated and and they want to make a decision if if we're talking about compassion uh professionally uh I think uh in having been in leadership people don't want to be managed they want to be they want to be helped they want to be guided they don't want to be managed they want to be helped they want to be guided empathy goes a long way in in in both scenarios thank you for that let's talk about the second SE of servant leadership so we have compassion what is the second SE that you're going to share with us today this is my favorite one actually and its character character see I'm giving some air horns for that one because that is a super important one tell us what you mean in the context of career and in life the importance of character in in the three C's of servant leadership sure so character includes a lot of different things with how you car yourself how you act how you're perceived uh some of those are like trustworthiness accountability uh resolved and resilience creativity uh those things come to mind when it it comes to character those things are very important for when you have to show character I I'll give you an example when everyone and everything is is great it's going very smooth there are no problems everybody and everything is great at that point but what happens when adversity strikes hello and this is one of my favorite things to talk about you know with with customers is you know projecting and and and being sincere and you don't know unless problems arise but you can trust that Jeff Kathy that klie Alexander that Glide fast we're not going to run and hide if there's an issue or are we going to work to minimize and try not to have any issues happen of course but you know we're all human at the end of the day and issues do sometimes come up and so I think how you um at a great leader one time Chris Mills he was like you have to run the conflict that's where your value really shines for a customer uh in character owers the the the bright side or the good of any situation you know those things are are what character means I think to me and how character should be conveyed to the customer like hey I need you to know and I want you to know you can count on me you can count on us if and when things uh go bad and I think if if you employ that your worth and your value to your customer and even how you think of yourself will be very positive and and favorable let me ask you about this you just said something that really hit you said leader Chris Mills want to shot him out talked about your value shows up in running the conflict how do you I'm thinking of someone who may be new to the ecosystem it was October of 20122 I just want to backtrack this a little bit where CEO and president of the board bill mcder of C of service now me talked about his initiative to scale up a million people in the service now ecosystem with his ambitious Plan called rise up and there are probably lots of folks who are listening to this session of 100 days of Serv now right now thinking okay how do I run conflict or how do I build the grit the muscle the backbone to run conflict when I'm just now entering this ecosystem can you share a little bit because you've got a lot of experience you've had I'm like wrote took notes National Guard college played Sports how does someone entering this ecosystem or entering their professional career right now build the capacity to be able to run conflict so many of the greatest lessons I've ever learned in my life personally and professionally have come from Bad situations you know it causes pause it causes retrospect uh it causes you to assess you know what happened how did I react to it or what did I do and and what was the the the reaction you know to that and and often times those bad situations how you you deal with it you know that's going to form your for character things uh aren't Easy A lot of times uh sometimes when when things go wrong and I think in you know in terms of building character and it's one of the hardest things to do is to be vulnerable to yourself is sometimes very hard to do many of us in sales are uh Alphas or or very self assured or very uh confident in to make yourself vulnerable to a situation oh you know what this is my fault or I contributed to you know the issue you you you have to have enough self-confidence to be vulnerable to learn and improve from it and then to whomever the issue affected or hurt um you know you got to be vulnerable with them too and and I think that you know know the things that I said that that make up character trustworthiness accountability uh that sort of thing how do you build capacity it it's doing those things it's it's being vulnerable to self and others and and just being open to to learning and improving I think uh every day I know if if I were buying uh I wouldn't want my seller to have that kind of character I I love that it also makes me think that even though we may just be new in career early in career certainly we've had you know a few Decades of experience and other environments where we could have or had opportunity to start to build those strengths you know building that backbone getting those reps in so that you can practice at once being confident as well as being vulnerable I I love the jewels you're dropping here let's go to our third sure three C's of servant leadership we have one compassion two is character what is your third C Jeff competence competence what do you mean by competence in terms of the three seeds of servant leadership sure um competence I think is something that's very tangible when it comes to product navigating uh issues legal any number of things that that a seller may have to deal with and and navigate I think it's also uh an intangible you know in terms of how you get there you know be it business Acumen um you know the ability to lead to take action uh to be decisive you know it goes back to the compassion and character that I talked about earlier competence is uh uh many different things again it's in Tech sales it's about your your product your outcomes your how uh your your why and then the intangibles are are all of the things as as you look to and you think about what we do here at Glide fast right we have customers and and sometimes many customer uh uh Representatives that we are working with on on problems and and projects and and goals on this side we've got service now in in their Sellers and in their solution consultants and Leadership and then we have that of of Glide fast internally so you know you have to have a great Confidence from like an intangible standpoint of taking you know cross functional teams three different organizations in lead guide direct as the the implementation The Advisory uh the partner working everything in quarterbacking to use a a sports term um everyone together to to work toward that same common goal and to get there you know in a same common fashion you know it's a character can come back into play there if you have differences of uh opinion uh and and sometimes there's uh friction when you have that competence is is being able to drive and servant leadership is being able to drive all of those people all of these different teams and and companies and and personal maybe goals and objectives in the same direction toward the same success I like what you're saying because in this way it's a it's a win win for everybody right it's it's a win for the customer it's a it's a win for the colleagues that you're working with and it's a win for yourself personally so I love how all of these things kind of fit together you know from the three C's that you lay out here from compassion character and confidence you see how they really work together Jeff before I let you go can you kind of give me a summary of like what are those three seeds of confidence and and how we might apply them in our life and in career you know klie that's a a heck of a good question I think ultimately and simply it's it's living by selling by uh the golden rule or if you were to to reference uh uh Matthew 7:12 in the Bible it's it's doing unto others as you would have them do unto you and I think if you take that approach if if you have a mindset right of of servant leadership and and have that underpinned by The 3c's Compassion character uh confidence uh you'll find that that your day your life uh your career will go so much better that you will contribute to uh and hopefully be looked upon favorably by your customers your colleagues your family your friends uh Etc servant leadership again is a mindset not a title and and so much of it is is rooted just in in how you treat others well Jeff Kathy I want to thank you so much for joining this episode of 100 days of service now folks are you okay with people following you Jeff on LinkedIn I would love to the more the merrier listen I have left the link to Jeff's LinkedIn so be sure you check the description of this video and be sure to follow Jeff because he has so much information and so much goodness for you that I know that you will grow from Jeff thank you so much for being this episode of 100 days of service now Kylie thank you and for everyone out there that attended thank you I appreciate my pleasure thanks Jeff all right bye bye listen don't go nowhere don't go nowhere why don't I want you to go anywhere because I want to tell you a little bit about what's coming up on the next few episodes of 100 days of service now so next week we have Lyn Bor she's going to be talking about five insights into HR in a post-pandemic world that is going to be on Tuesday February 20th and then the very next day on Wednesday the 21st I'm going to be joined with a repeat guest actually I've interviewed him twice once at the knowledge floor knowledge 23 floor and then also earlier in uh or actually last year now so we're going to be joined by Corey CJ Wesley he's going to be talking about the wi mindset and then finally we're going to talk a little bit about the good work that the service now.org is doing we're going to be here with John bat stubner of service now.org so there's a lot of stuff that is coming up and I cannot wait for you to hear all these wonderful things that these guests have to say so until next time stay kind and be curious [Music] bye [Music]