Keynote Speaker:
Nick George
President & CEO, Buckingham, Doolittle & Burroughs, LLP

Let me first thank those who have preceeded me this morning, and a special thank you to Riley [Lockridge], for a wonderful introduction.

This morning is a humbling occasion. As I look out on this audience, I see faces from as far back as my days as a caddy and a stock boy.  Many of you who came here today to celebrate Heart to Heart—span decades of my life.  Standing here as the first practicing attorney to address this event, I feel profoundly both the magnitude of this event and the enormity of the honor that you are bestowing upon me.

My journey, the journey that I want to share with you today, has been a search for balance and passion.
Heart to Heart has been a partner on that journey, sometimes by my side, at times in the lead, other times as a silent but strong follower.  Heart to Heart, as you will find out, is in my blood.
 

As Heart to Heart was formed, Larry and I spent lunch hours at Tangiers and the CitiCenter, talking about the need.  It’s not about the individual decisions we make, it is about what we become with every decision we make. 

JFK liked to tell the story about a French marshal who once asked his gardener to plant a tree.  The gardener objected that the tree was slow growing and would not reach maturity for 100 years.  The marshal replied, 'in that case, there is no time to lose; plant it this afternoon!' 

 

Before we begin to plant our trees I need to till the soil with these affirmations.  As important as Heart to Heart has been to me, my comments today are not solely about Heart to Heart.  My comments are not solely about me.  My comments are about how my story and Heart to Heart may provide a seed for you to begin to cultivate your own garden. 

 

Hillel, the Jewish prophet, a contemporary of Jesus, responded to the demand of an impatient unbeliever:  “Teach me the whole of the torah while I stand on one foot”, the unbeliever demanded.  Hillel replied, “What is hateful to yourself do not do to another.  That is the whole law. The rest is mere commentary.”  I have titled my talk today; “Faith Makes the Impossible, Possible.”
 

If I, like Hillel, was asked to answer while standing on one foot: how does faith make the impossible, possible?  I would simply say: Lead with your character. The rest is mere commentary.  However, that would make a rather short speech this morning.  Come with me as I take you on my journey, my 12-step program, to lead with character.

Leading with character is not rocket science. It’s not as hard or complicated as we often make it.
Simply, ask yourself and others: what is the right thing to do?  Here is my 12-step program to lead with character:

Step 1. LOOK AT THE MORAL DIMENSION
There are two ways to look at any situation.  You can look at any situation as a snapshot or from a video perspective.  We tend to look at a situation from the snapshot, what the situation is today.  I urge you to look at a situation from a wider lens.  How will this issue play out in your whole life: what is the moral dimension?  Ask yourself, how have similar situations already played out?  If you’ve been down the street and it’s a dead-end, why go down again and again and again?

Step 2. APPRECIATE THE FRAILTY OF LIFE
George Ann is my older sister and only sibling.  She was four when I came along, and she had already begun her battle with polio.  My mom insisted that George Ann be independent...through many operations and transplanted bones.  She attended Our Lady of the Elms for twelve years, was unofficial mayor of her summer rotary camp, went to college, married, had 2 children, became a realtor, and has 4 grandchildren and one on the way.  She never complained.

She lost her husband, had a brain tumor that required a 14 hour surgery, sings in her church choir, had hip replacement, and still sells residential real estate in Florida full time.  Like the energizer bunny she just keeps going.  She is my real inspiration.  From George Ann I learned both the strength and the frailty of life. 

 

My dad died at 64, a relatively young age in today’s world.  In July ‘78 he died after an interminable ten months, while we watched him disintegrate daily.  From my dad, I learned balance.  With his death I began my commitment to health: both mind and body.  His death taught me balance in life, to prioritize my time.  At times we fail to realize that balance is observed by those around you. People hesitate in the presence of an unbalanced leader.  People follow a leader in balance.
 

I opened my own law practice one year after his death.  We talked about the trees that take 100 years to grow.  Yet other times we don’t have the luxury of time.  In his life, my dad did not get to see my practice or my presidency prosper. 

 

It is not coincidental that I went on my own after my father’s death.  I needed to control my own destiny. For whatever length of days God was to give to me.  I struggled. Not financially. I struggled as the only source of leadership at my own firm.  Perhaps it was coincidental. perhaps it was divine intervention.
The timing of my personal quest for leadership paralleled ascending to the presidency of Buckingham, Doolittle and the birth of the first Heart to Heart study group.  You will find it as no surprise that I was a founding member of the leadership study group!
 

Of one truth I was sure:  Before you can lead other people you have to lead yourself.  It is difficult for anyone to be a good leader if you don’t understand yourself first, and then others.  You have to know who you are.  What is your character at your core?  It is difficult to know these things in a vacuum,  which is why the study groups were and continue to be a source of growth and inspiration.

Step 3. MAKE AND HONOR YOUR FAMILY
However you choose to define family, whether your family is blood related, work related, or geographically related, make a family and honor the family that you make.  When I received the University of Akron Alumni Award, I talked about the lessons and the gifts I received during my years as a student.  While I received the gift of a great education in the community where I grew up, the best gift by far was the gift of meeting my wife, Ruthie.

I met Ruthie as an undergraduate student during the summer of ’65 in one of Dr. Mushkat’s American history classes.  There were three guys in the class vying for her attention.  Guess who won?  Together we have watched our children grow and flourish and build their own families.  With one trip to Los Angeles we can see our daughter Mimi, her husband Rick, our son Niko and his wife Jessie.  And now we add to our family that we are proud grandparents to Sidney.  I am so pleased to be able to say that Mimi and Sid are with us today, as well as Ruthie and my in laws.

Wherever my life would have taken me, without Ruthie and her amazing parents, it would not have been the same.  My grandparents and parents were immigrants, who came to America to find a better life in pursuit of that American dream.  From my grandmothers, I learned the value of coffee and conversation.
I learned to always get along with family, period.  In my Greek-Italian-Jewish families, we just don’t have cases where people stopped speaking to each other.  In my Buckingham family, we don’t either. When I meet someone new, I usually will introduce myself as an attorney.  Not President or CEO, because I consider myself in the trenches with my Buckingham sisters and brothers.  And I consider myself a “servant” of the firm I lead.  Part of the family I have fashioned is my Buckingham family.

 

Step 4. BE HONEST, TELL THE TRUTH, AND BE NICE
I learned from my father that in business you could still be honest, truthful, nice, and succeed.
And if that is your purpose, it is actually easier than the burden of carrying a grudge or the weight of anger.

Gairta, the philosopher, said “a life without purpose is an early death”.  As a servant leader, I struggle with how do I or we as a firm give someone purpose?  How do I influence or control one person’s life let alone 400?  One expectation that people often make has helped me answer this question: Leaders control by virtue of their being.
 

In the movie Dances with Wolves, the medicine man says to the Kevin Costner character, “of all the trails in this life there is one that matters most.  It is the trail of a true human being.”  Ask yourself each day, are you on that trail?

 

Step 5. TAKE AND MAKE OPPORTUNITIES
My family and community gave me roots.  Leadership roles gave me wings.  As a University of Akron junior, I was active in an international Greek American youth group.  And then I was president.  Come back to 1965 with me, the summer I turned 21 years old.  The Righteous Brothers, the Stones, Bob Dylan and Sam the Sham were playing on the radio - FM if you were lucky.
 

As president of this youth organization, I spent the summer of ’65 traveling around the United States, Canada, and even Greece.  The combination of this leadership position and traveling by myself exposed me to people and situations that changed me forever.  What I learned from the summer of ’65 was to take and make opportunities for the right reasons.  Take them because you will learn something and they are challenging and exciting.  Don’t take them because they are stepping-stones.
 

I never planned on being president of the Greek youth group, as I didn’t plan on being president of Buckingham, Doolittle & Burroughs.  What I did plan was being prepared for opportunities whether as a student, attorney, business owner, partner or president.

 

Step 6. THE WORK YOU CHOOSE DEFINES YOUR LIFE
Know that who you are flows into what you do.  Everyone has to have a job . . .   How you feel about that job is a matter of attitude.  You can choose to be happy or unhappy. I had the same options.  I had to make law something I enjoyed.  Think about it, we spend more waking time at work than home.  It takes more tension to “cop” an attitude.

You may have heard that a high percentage of lawyers don’t like what they are doing.  You come out of law school, not geared to solving problems.  Law school teaches you to argue your client’s position rather than what is the best way to work out their problem.  Thirty-six years ago, when I started in the legal profession, you could afford to use the legal system when you were mad or felt shortchanged.  Today, you can’t afford to sue just because you want to extract your pound of flesh.  Attorneys and their clients need to think, how can we resolve this? 

 

As attorneys we do have control over the kind of practice we design, as you have control over the kind of work you design.  I had to ask myself: Is this the kind of practice I want?  Is this the kind of client I want?  Is this the kind of lifestyle I want to lead?  You learn at and from Heart to Heart.  You have to be happy with what you do.  At end of the day people –  All of us want to know -  Did I count? Did what I contribute today count?

 

Step 7. MAKE WORK MEANINGFUL
By my 16th birthday I had been a caddy, stock boy at Miracle Mart, paperboy and I flipped hamburgers at the Bunny drive-In.  I made any job meaningful because I made sure I learned on every job I had.  I learned how to treat a caddy, and how not to treat a caddy.  I learned that a caddy doesn’t walk in front of the golfers.  And I also learned that if the caddy master liked you, you got better loops.

Many people who are my clients today, people that I have the honor of telling what to do, are the same people who used to tell me what to do . . . As I carried their golf clubs. As a caddy I even met my future in-laws when I was a scrawny 13-year old.   Little did I know that seven years later I was to meet their daughter, and meet them again as potential in-laws.

When I got my driver’s license, my dad had just purchased his own meat delivery route.  In high school, I made meat deliveries for my dad after school and during each summer.  By the time I was at the University of Akron, my dad owned his own meat company.  My first real business experience was learning to prioritize and organize the delivery routes.

In law school I attended classes in the morning, and then went to the meat company.  And I drove that meat truck every vacation through undergraduate and law school.  As an attorney, I have the opportunity to help people through truly challenging situations or times in their lives.  When I have a hard day as a lawyer I remember a hard day driving that meat truck in July or January.  All work is hard and most work is meaningful.  I know I am blessed to be able to do meaningful work that has the ability to improve people’s lives.

 

 

If you’re a jerk you can’t be on the Buckingham team. Period.  Simply put, be a good person, do the right thing, treat people the way you want to be treated.  At Buckingham, we really do it.  We work together as a team.  Our attorneys ask, how can I help the firm?  No one is bigger than the firm or the no-jerk rule.

Step 9. THE IMPORTANCE OF ACCOUNTABILITY
You can’t manage people if don’t hold people accountable.  You can’t hold people accountable without an understanding on both sides you have one job in your life:  To become what you were meant to become.  We have embraced a style of professional management which I call: Internal contracts.  Make a contract with the person you are working with.  Both agree on the terms, and agree to hold each other accountable. 
 

As CEO, I am accountable to the entire organization.  My job is to look to the future, to be more than a manager who controls by doing, to be a leader who influences by being.

 

Step 10. KNOW THAT YOU REPRESENT A COMPETENCY
In the early days of Buckingham, Doolittle & Burroughs, Lyle Buckingham would simply say to a prospective client, “I don’t know why we aren’t doing your legal work!”  Today, we have expanded the questions we ask. We ask our clients, in a somewhat more sophisticated manner, “How are we doing in fulfilling your needs?”  However we have asked the questions, our client remains number one.

We understand and hold in high regard the value of meaningful work: doing meaningful work for our clients, providing meaningful work for our attorneys.  What do lawyers want?  To be fairly compensated, and to have challenging work, while meeting or exceeding the expectations of their client.

 

Step 11. GROW THE LEADER WITHIN YOU
John F. Kennedy, in a speech prepared for delivery in Dallas the day of his assassination, said, “Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.”   While still at my own firm, I remember praying, “Lord, if you would put me in a position where I could manage a lot more lawyers, and still practice law, that would be perfect”.  And then he did.  Believe me, I wasn’t thinking “this big”.

I had a learning curve to go through: a few times in my career.  When I started my own practice; that was my first learning curve.  My second learning curve was one of leadership.  My role in my practice grew from attorney to president, directing and encouraging others on my staff.  When I went from attorney at Buckingham to CEO, I was faced with yet another learning curve and a larger constituency.
 

My rise in leadership paralleled my activity in my Heart to Heart study group.  At times I struggled as the only source of leadership.  Books gave me some comfort and guidance.  The support of Heart to Heart and their study group gave me a strong sense of purpose as a business leader, small business owner, and CEO. Even if only to confirm what I was doing or thinking.  Confirmation has great value.  At my own firm we were a speedboat; able to make decisions swiftly.
 

When I first came to Buckingham, I realized we were a battleship.   We’ll never be a speedboat, because consensus among hundreds takes time.  I had to learn there is value in every boat on the open sea, and every person on the boat.  As a leader you need to give people time to think, and debate their way to change.  Grow the leader within you first so you know  the direction to turn your ship, the speed required to make the changes in your business world, the speed acceptable to those making the changes, and the final step.

 

Step 12. KEEP A FAITH
Dag Hammarskjold, former Secretary-General of the United Nations said, “The longest journey is the journey inwards”.  Polls differ in their calculations as to how many Americans attend a worship service on a regular basis on their journey inward.  Most polls reflect that 40% of Americans say they attend worship services.  Cynics contend that 25% actually attend. 
 

Whatever the correct number, spirituality does not have to be one faith.  Life is a journey through a wilderness filled with pain and suffering, injustice, and inequality AND ALSO LOVE AND JOY.   Religion has the power to move us toward EVEN a better future.  A person does not have to be a member of an organized religion to be kind, generous, or to act with compassion. 

 

My journey started as the little brother of a sister with polio.   George Ann was my first inspiration.
Whether I was a caddy or a CEO, I grew up with a consistent mantra as my inspiration:  Do the right thing.
My parents were not the most educated people, but they were the smartest. The foundation they provided for me has weathered many storms.   HEART TO HEART has built upon that foundation.
 

For my journey, faith is what has made the impossible, possible.   Faith that the son of a meat purveyor would have all the opportunities that I could earn.  Faith that the figurative trees we plant today will be our legacy in 100 years.  Faith that in doing the right thing, you become the person you were meant to be.

It has been my pleasure to share my 12-steps to lead with character, and to challenge you to design your own 12-step program.

 

I was driving back from our Columbus office when Father Norm called to ask me to give this keynote.
Fortunately, I was not at the wheel!  I was shocked and excited to have the opportunity to address this audience, to share my journey, and to add something to yours.  Although I had months to create a conclusion that would give you something to think about for the day or for the journey, I found that JFK said it best in this timeless truth.  I conclude with his words spoken four decades ago, as true today as in the next 100 years.
 

“With a good conscience our only sure reward, LET us go forth to lead the life we were born to lead,
asking His blessing and His help, but knowing that here on earth God's work must truly be our own.”
 

Soon you will leave the poetry of this morning’s event and return to the prose of your everyday life.
Please take a laminated card with you to share my 12 steps to lead with character.
 

Thank You.