Here on the “Can You Hear Me?” Podcast, getting C-Suite insights from those on the frontlines of corporate leadership is a priority. On this episode, co-hosts Eileen Rochford and Rob Johnson welcome Mark Steffe, CEO of First Command Financial Services, a firm that serves members of the US military and their families. What is his leadership style, and what are his best communications practices? Tune in now and find out.
About our guest:
Mark Steffe is the President/CEO of First Command Financial Services, Inc. which provides personal financial coaching to about 290,000 client families around the world. Mark is responsible for guiding the organization in its efforts to make lifelong financial security possible for all military families. First Command accomplishes this by creating lasting bonds with clients through face-to-face coaching and empowering them to develop positive financial behaviors for every stage of their lives. First Command is headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, and has more than 165 offices nationwide. First Command, through its subsidiaries, maintains more than $35 billion in managed accounts and mutual funds and has more than $62 billion in life insurance coverage in force, while First Command Bank holds more than $960 million in deposits.
Mark joined First Command as a Senior Vice President and Chief of Staff of Advisor Operations in 2010 and has since played an integral role in evolving the client experience in a digital world. At the same time, he has protected the integrity of the face-to-face coaching that is central to the First Command philosophy. Throughout his subsequent roles as Senior Vice President and Director of Advisor Operations for the Midwest Division and Executive Vice President and National Director of Advisor Operations, Mark helped build strong, collaborative relationships between Advisors and the Home Office. This has been crucial in enabling Advisors to help clients pursue their financial goals more effectively and efficiently. His accomplishments and demonstrated leadership ability led to his promotion to President in 2017 and expanded COO responsibility in 2018.
In January 2020, Mark was appointed as the first CEO in First Command’s history without military service experience. His selection was the result of an ethos of service to the military gained during more than a decade immersed in First Command’s culture, a deep understanding of the challenges faced by our Nation’s military families, and in recognition of the demonstrated leadership skills required to guide the organization in its efforts to make lifelong financial security possible for all military families. On day 70 in his new role, Mark was confronted with a once-in-a-generation crisis as a global pandemic was declared. Under his leadership, First Command rapidly adjusted its operations to continue to help military families pursue financial security amidst a volatile economic landscape in which in-person face-to-face coaching was no longer possible. At the same time, at Mark’s direction, First Command immediately made financial relief programs available to clients to bolster their financial outlook during the crisis.
To ensure that First Command continually adapts to the needs of military families, Mark and his team regularly meet with clients to seek out their perspectives. During his tenure at First Command, Mark has visited more than 50 military installations in 23 U.S. states and three countries. This personal outreach is supplemented by the First Command Financial Behaviors Index®, a monthly survey that assesses the financial behaviors, intentions and attitudes of career military families. Mark also consults regularly with First Command’s Military Advisory Board, a select group of retired senior flag officers and senior enlisted leaders from the Nation’s military services. The 10-member board provides Mark and First Command with an independent perspective on issues relevant to First Command’s work, as well as advice on how to best serve the interests of military clients.
In his role as President/CEO, Mark has spearheaded inclusion initiatives for First Command. Under his leadership, First Command is striving to create a more inclusive culture in which all employees and Advisors feel trusted, valued and empowered. For Mark, advancing equality is not just the right thing to do from a business perspective, but a personal imperative born from a desire for everyone to have the same opportunities he has had in his career. In service of this goal, Mark committed to the CEO ACT!ON pledge for diversity and inclusion in 2020. He also championed the hire of the company’s first Diversity & Inclusion Director. In recognition of Mark’s leadership during the pandemic and on issues of diversity and inclusion, he was nominated as one of the Dallas Business Journal’s Most Inspiring Business Leaders of 2020. Mark was also recognized in 2020 as a member of the Fort Worth 400, an annual list by Fort Worth Inc. magazine of influential community leaders.
Mark actively supports several charitable endeavors, including the annual Spirit of Giving campaign by United Way of Tarrant County and the First Command Educational Foundation (FCEF). United Way of Tarrant County is a local charity focused on providing leadership and harnessing resources to solve persistent social challenges, while FCEF is a nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering those who serve our Nation by improving their financial literacy. FCEF accomplishes this goal by offering approximately $130,000 in annual scholarships and financial education to America’s military servicemembers, civilian federal employees and their families. In addition to his philanthropic pursuits, Mark is active in LeaderPrime, which fosters connections among Fort Worth business leaders new to the city or to their roles.
Mark graduated with high honors from the University of Illinois, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in Finance. He holds Series 7, 8, 23, 63 and 65 securities registrations. He completed the Harvard University Advanced Management Program in 2015.
He lives in Fort Worth, Texas along with his wife and five children. On any given day off, you can find him attending one of his children’s sports games or cooking family dinners.
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Good To Great : Why Some Companies Make The Leap and Others Don't
Eileen Rochford: [00:00:19] Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Can You Hear Me? Podcast. Eileen Rochford, CEO of The Harbinger Group, a marketing and strategy firm. [00:00:27][7.6]
Rob Johnson: [00:00:27] And I'm Rob Johnson, president of Rob Johnson Communications. Here on Can you hear me? We always look for fascinating guests who are leaders in their respective fields. Today we are continuing our How They Do It series with a CEO who will give us insights into his leadership style, effective communication techniques and unique role in financial services. [00:00:45][18.0]
Eileen Rochford: [00:00:46] And his name is Mark Steffe. I've had a front row seat to his effective leadership and action because we have worked together throughout the past five years since he became CEO of First Command. Hello Mark, and welcome to Can you Hear Me? [00:00:58][12.0]
Mark Steffe: [00:00:58] Hello, Eileen and Rob. Thanks for having me. It's good to be here. [00:01:01][2.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:01:01] We are honored to have you. And as we do with all of our guests, whether in the how they do it series or not, we always like to start off learning a little bit more about you to kind of set the context. So before we dive deeper, why don't you give us a snapshot of what first Command does as well as your professional journey? [00:01:19][17.6]
Mark Steffe: [00:01:19] Thanks, Rob. First Command is a midsize financial services company we're headquartered in in Fort Worth, Texas. We were founded by a retired lieutenant colonel from the Air Force, the tenant Colonel Carol Payne. When he was getting out of the Air Force, he didn't see a the financial services firms that were that truly understood the unique challenges of military families, a military lifestyle, the risks that come with that as well. And instead of going to work for another financial services company, he decided to start his own. There are a couple of major life events that hit him through his military career. One, seeing a lot of airmen killed in combat during World War Two. And he saw the devastation that that created for families losing their primary breadwinner, their father, son, husband, what have you. And back in the States after the war, he saw what high inflation did to military retirement pay and literally saw retirees running out of money for the end of the month. And those major life events for Colonel Payne is really what motivated him to start first command. So his last duty station was what was Carswell Air Force Base here in Fort Worth. And he rolled off of that base and pretty much started first command. The next day we're comprehensive in our approach. Everything starts with a financial plan, and then we not only do the planning component, but we also help our military and veteran families implement those financial plans through a combination of investment recommendations, insurance recommendations and banking recommendations. We actually also own a bank. It's about $1 billion bank. And we're able to bring those services to bear for our clients as well. [00:02:56][96.6]
Rob Johnson: [00:02:58] What appealed to you about it? What was why do you how did you get involved in first command and what appealed to you about it? [00:03:03][4.5]
Mark Steffe: [00:03:03] Yeah, my career 18 years prior to joining first command was really in the wealth management business, dealing with high net worth and ultra high net worth clients. And I guess what what made the most sense for me as I was going through the recruiting process, when you're at a wealth management firm, it's a lot of fun and very interesting helping wealthy families get wealthier. But we weren't changing lives. We weren't we weren't really helping people get to a different place financially, economically. We weren't having the same impact on their lives or their families. But when you when you come to first command, you realize not only the the struggles military families face, the challenges that they have, that civilians don't have, the massive sacrifices they give for all of us, whether it's deployments, permanent change of station, which means they move every 2 to 3 years. Spouse unemployment or underemployment. And to be able to step in and help these military families get on a path to financial security and stay on a path to financial security is, for me, easily the most rewarding work I've ever done in my 30 plus years in financial services. [00:04:04][61.3]
Eileen Rochford: [00:04:05] This is wonderful. I always love hearing you talk about heartwarming, for sure. Really? And it also, you know, it's just close to my heart because our firm is all about that's one of the reasons why we work with you guys supporting organizations that are mission driven, which I love to get in in to a little bit with you. Maybe we can cover it in this next question. But I'm I think our listeners would benefit from hearing you talk about the aspects of leading a mission driven organization and how different that is, particularly when it comes to communications internally and externally. So you can you can talk about that now or think about it and we can get into it. Next question if you'd like to. [00:04:44][39.4]
Mark Steffe: [00:04:45] Yeah, we should touch on that now. It is a I want to be careful how I say this, but it really is a luxury to be able to lead a mission driven company. And I have lots of friends at other financial services companies and and a lot of times they they wish they had that unifying mission like we have. Because if for us, we know who our client, our client is, active duty and veteran military, that's our focus. That's our passion. That's our reason for being here. They say when your values are clear, your decisions are easy. They say you. I think may be easier. I don't know. The decisions are ever easy, but when we know who we're trying to serve and everybody rallies around that client, you know why you're coming to work every day. You know what work you're supposed to be doing, You know the impact of that work. And so when we have to make decisions, big decisions, tough decisions, we're all we're all rooting for the same end user. We're rooting for our client. And so everything is designed to try to, as I said before, to try to help get them on and keep them on a path of financial security. And there are a lot of great organizations out there, a lot of great people, but not always as clear on who the end client is, not always clear on what the real mission or vision of the company is. And to have everybody connected to the mission, whether it's Field or Home Office, 91% of our advisors are veterans and or military spouses. A large percentage of our people in the Home Office have a military connection. And so when we're talking about taking care of military families, everybody gets it. They know that that's the goal, right? And so it makes it clear because we're not debating on who's this trying to benefit. It's always done with the client in mind. [00:06:23][98.2]
Eileen Rochford: [00:06:24] And you also have a unique thing at first command, I think, which is your values include the value of love and that there's a connection there for sure. You want to talk about that for a minute and then we'll get into your leadership style. [00:06:37][13.4]
Mark Steffe: [00:06:38] Yeah, I mean, you can you can really look at the company really in like three big areas. We have a mission of coaching those who serve in their pursuit of financial security, a vision of lifelong financial security for our nation's military families. And these three core values of courage, love and effectiveness. And everybody, every time we talk about core values, people always ask me about the love value. And of course, it doesn't mean romantic love. It really means what we define it as. Putting others good ahead of our own. Courage is not the absence of fear, but having the fear and taking the right action anyway. And effectiveness is all about doing what is right to achieve the best results. That love value is a is a hard one for people to sort of wrap their arms around. But once you understand, it truly is about putting others good ahead of our own. That gets me back to what we were talking about earlier. It connects right to the mission and vision of making sure that we're looking out for our client's best interests, a market, whether they're active duty or veterans that historically don't make a lot of money historically and notoriously aren't well educated when it comes to finances. So they truly do need help, most of them with the help of a professional, to figure out what the best path forward financially is. But those core values really keep us grounded. And one of the things I love about the core value of love is that when you talk about it being putting others good ahead of our own, and then you think, what does the military do every day? They're, you know, they're constantly putting others good ahead of their own. And I think it lines up really well to it to the market we're trying to serve. [00:08:09][91.2]
Rob Johnson: [00:08:09] And can I also just jump in and say that you just brought it up, Mark, about people, you know, in the military are not making millions of dollars a year, typically don't have access to people like financial advisors. And you were talking about the mission driven attitude that, you know, permeate your entire organization. And I would think it also makes you feel very satisfied to know that you're helping people who might not otherwise get that kind of help. And you said you can get together as a team and you can be all behind him and that sort of thing. I would think that would be very satisfying because a lot of these a lot of these people are these military folks who are putting their lives on the line for us every day, wouldn't normally have access to something like this. And you're providing. [00:08:51][41.9]
Mark Steffe: [00:08:51] It. Yeah, it is incredibly rewarding. And a few things on that note, I've never worked at a company where I get more cards or letters or emails from clients thanking me for what first command has done for them and their families from from a financial perspective, it it's truly rewarding. We are the only company of any size that serves the military in this in this fashion. A lot of great companies out there serving the military from a financial side, but we're the only ones with 700 advisors placed throughout the United States, most of them close to a military installation that will sit down face to face, build a customized financial plan, help them implement that plan and coach them to to stay on stay on that plan as well. And kind of back to that mission of vision we were talking about. It is in addition to being a unifier, because it's so compelling to your point. Robb it for a midsize company located in Fort Worth, Texas, the amount of talent we have at first command, whether they're home office employees, field people, if you look at our board of directors, bank board or holding company board or military advisory board, we attract an incredible amount of talent, talent that you would I don't think you would normally see at a company of our size, but they're here because that mission brings them in. It attracts them to the company and it keeps them at the company. And that's, like I said, across the board at first command. It's compelling. And when people know the story and see the authenticity and the passion we have for taking care of our family. Our military families. People want to be a part of it. [00:10:19][87.9]
Eileen Rochford: [00:10:20] That's wonderful. Thank you. So, like everything, familiarity kind of breeds contempt If you're doing your job day in and day out. At first command, you can kind of lose sight of that mission. But you have managed in your time there to keep everyone so focused both on the mission and big goals, transformation efforts, etc., that you've had that you've been leading along throughout your five years. I'd love for you to talk about how you describe your leadership style. So I think your listeners would be interested to hear how you're using that style to great effect in impact. And of course, we're always talking about communications here. Can you hear me? So the role of communications in your leadership would also be interesting to hear about. [00:11:05][44.7]
Mark Steffe: [00:11:05] I would. I've always felt that probably most industries, but certainly in financial services, that the most leaders are either builders or maintainers. And I like to think of myself as more of a builder. When I when I got here and when I when I was fortunate enough to take over as CEO January 1st, 2020, the prior CEO did a great job of of building the company and creating this incredibly solid foundation. So I wasn't tasked with fixing a bunch of problems. We were my and my leadership team really had this luxury of being able to focus forward and really think about what first command can can become as we move forward. And so communication has been a huge part of that. And while the mission and the vision and the core values that we talked about are unifying and compelling, what it wasn't doing was forcing us to think differently about what could this company ultimately become. Yes, we were serving a lot of military families, but there's far more need in military families, and we have the supply right now to fulfill it. So we stole an idea from from Jim Collins in his book Good to Great. And we came up with our big audacious goal of becoming the personal financial coach of our nation's military family. We rolled that out about three and a half years ago, and it's been a very slow drip on trying to win the hearts and minds of our field force and our employees to really have them think differently and envision, well, things are going really well. We really just came off of our best earnings or excuse me, revenue year ever, best sales year ever. And at time when things are going really well, we're challenging ourselves to think how much better could it be? How many more military families could we serve than we already are? And can we serve them even better than we already are? And this big audacious goal was never meant to replace the mission or vision. I didn't put a timeframe on it. There aren't any metrics on it. It's just a forcing function to say, Yeah, why couldn't we be more? Why couldn't we be better? Why couldn't we be bigger and help take care of more military families? And so everything we did at that is all communication, because it is such an intangible thing, if you like. What are the specifics? How are we going to know? Well, don't worry about all those details will fill in later. What I need you to do is believe that this can be done in the first place. And so it took, you know, like I said, a few years and a lot of repetitive conversations to really help people think through it and then get excited about it. And right now, where before the idea was sort of being pushed on the field or the home Office. Now we've got folks pulling on it saying, how do we do it? Why can we do it? How can I get involved? And when you've got that, there's probably no real issue that you can't tackle. So I think communication, as I look back, whatever success I've had, whether it's in my career, I think communication is at the heart of it, whether it's written communication, one on one, communication presentations, I make that come in various forms. It might be a little too much information for your podcast, but I believe in it so much. A few years back when I was promoted into a role prior to this one, I actually sent a thank you letter to my eighth grade and my sophomore year English teacher because of of the impact they had on me and my belief that my ability to communicate stems and they were that a very you know stereotypical they you know everything had to be perfect. Everything had to be accurate, very precise. And of course, when you're going through middle school and high school, you think these this is just the real big pain, the rear end, and what am I getting out of this? And now I look back and I can tell you exactly what I want. I'm getting out of it. And I think communication makes a huge difference. I'm a believer that 90% of problems can either be avoided or fixed through solid communication. And I try to be very clear, very transparent with folks about first and foremost, why we're doing certain things and then the what behind it and the how behind it. I try to be incredibly approachable in my approach so people feel that they can interact with me. And if I can open up those channels of communication, we can sniff out issues faster, We can we can jump on opportunities faster. One of the things I think I'm pretty good about, at least people tell me that I am, is that I try to connect the dots. So I think in most people's day to day functions, they're going to be consumed with what they're working on or what their team or their departments are working on. And it's not easy for people that aren't working at the strategy level to see all the various pieces and how those pieces fit together. So a lot of times you'll go through a time. Town hall or some kind of workshop or something, and the various presenters will present their component. And what I try to do after that is to come up. And if you consider each individual presentation as a puzzle piece, what I try to do is to come up and give them the picture on the top of the box and to show them here's how all those pieces fit together. And when they do come together, this is what that this is what the puzzle looks like. And so instead of getting wrapped up in the individual pieces, try to paint the bigger picture and the more they understand about why we're doing something, what we need to do about it. If 600 Home Office employees, 700 office employees understand why you're doing something and how you plan to do it, then they can contribute. But if you don't share it with them, how on earth can they possibly, you know, weigh in? And then the more they know and the more connected they feel, not only do you get their effort, you also get that discretionary effort because they want to be a part of it and they know who we're serving. And we're now a right back to our mission and our client focus again. And it's kind of what I think is a virtuous cycle. But if people aren't contributing or don't know what we're doing, that's not their fault. That's a failure of leadership because we haven't taken the time to tell them. And so we spent a tremendous amount of time in various forums communicating to people so that they can contribute to their fullest. [00:16:27][321.9]
Rob Johnson: [00:16:28] And that sounds like an like really intensive what you you're talking about an internal communications undertaking. You said it was a slow drip and it lasted for a while. And with that many employees, that's understandable. But it's nice to see that people that were maybe pushing back a little bit or not getting it. You said they're they're pulling now. And I would also make the observation you said earlier that you had, you know, people send you notes and letters all the time thanking you. And I have to think that that an eighth grade or a sophomore English teacher probably doesn't get a lot of those. So that had to make a huge impact on them that this successful businessman was like, Hey, you did this years ago and thank you. I mean, I imagine they don't get a lot of that reinforcement, so that probably had a huge impact on them. [00:17:09][41.4]
Mark Steffe: [00:17:10] I hope so. But the weird twist here, can you imagine what it's like to write your two English teachers a letter each telling them how good or effective your communication is, knowing full well that the first thing they're probably going to do is pull out a red pen and start start ending whatever it is you wrote them in the first place. [00:17:26][15.9]
Eileen Rochford: [00:17:27] Yeah, I would shrink at the thought. [00:17:28][1.6]
Mark Steffe: [00:17:30] So I to put a lot of thought. [00:17:31][0.8]
Rob Johnson: [00:17:31] That's that is such I mean you're you're everything that you're expressing right now is just so communication centric and so important and you get it. And it's just so nice to hear. I mean, obviously, that's, you know, we would have somebody of your ilk on anyway, But it's incredible to to hear that. So let me ask you this question, though. Can you think of a challenge in particular that you've had on this journey or an initiative you were trying to undertake and how you were able to use communication to further that agenda to get that done? You were running It might be a roadblock and might be, Hey, we need to get this done. It may be something that you were talking about just a few minutes ago, but maybe in a little bit more detail. But but but an instance or a story where that communications expertise worked in your favor? [00:18:15][43.5]
Mark Steffe: [00:18:15] Rob, I got in this job in January of 20. I think we faced nothing but challenges like that. So. [00:18:22][6.6]
Rob Johnson: [00:18:22] So I'm only asking you to pick one. There's a thousand. [00:18:24][2.0]
Mark Steffe: [00:18:24] I'll pick. [00:18:25][0.8]
Rob Johnson: [00:18:25] One. [00:18:25][0.0]
Mark Steffe: [00:18:26] You know, and there were the big ones, right? So 69 days into my tenure Covid hit. So that was a major issue. Not long after that, you had a flash crash in the stock market. Not long after that, you had the George Floyd murder in Minnesota, which prompted us to think more clearly about what we're doing in terms of diversity and inclusion. And we focus heavily on the inclusion aspect of it, getting people to come back to work after, you know, Covid started to go away. So the hybrid working arrangement and then this transformation, we're talking about this idea of the big audacious goal. So there've been these large challenges. But as I think about how did we work our way through all of them, the recipe seems to be the same. There's a tremendous amount of collaboration between my me and my executive leadership team. None of us. I mean, who has the answer to a global pandemic? Nobody. Right. So what we've had to do and there is no there is no manual for for these types of large, large scale issues. And so what we do is we talk amongst ourselves constantly. We're always scanning the environment, reading different things, sharing thoughts, sharing ideas, and really working together in our in our own, but communicating with each other to get to the point where we feel comfortable that for first command for our leadership team, this is the best approach to handling this issue today. But when they're when the world is changing so quickly, one of the things where we're always very careful to not do and then to communicate is we never want to paint ourselves in the corner. We know that new information or information is going to continue to come out. And so we never say, well, this is it and it's always going to be this way. It's never going to change. We really try to avoid those absolutes because we know the world is going to change. We always try to take a very calm, rational approach. I mean, if you've been in the business like I've been for 33 plus years, you've seen the world get out of whack a time or two, but you always know that it's going to settle back down when you when you hit the extremes. That's not the. Making extreme decisions. We really try to take a calm, rational, methodical approach to working our way through these issues. And the other thing we try to do is, for instance, when I speak to an audience, I try to envision Marc 30 years ago sitting in that audience and saying, what? What do I want to hear from the CEO? Right. What's going to help me? What's going to speak to me and speak to me in a way that I'm going to understand it, appreciate it and be able to do something. And our goal and I've said this a thousand times at first, man. My goal in our decisions is, is not to make everybody happy. I can't do it in my own household. Make everybody happy with some of the decisions I make, let alone, you know, a field force full of advisers and the whole home office, all the employees. Our job is to make the best business decisions we possibly can. And our goal is that people will understand and respect the decision even if they don't really like the decision. And I think as a leader of an organization, that's really the best that we can hope for, that people can say, Well, that didn't really go in my favor, but I understand what the issues are. They clearly articulated why they made the decision they did. And frankly, it does make good business sense, even if it doesn't really benefit me. And if we can get to that point, I think we're in really good shape. And that's what I think my leadership team and I try to do is to just to make solid business decisions. I want to say commonsensical business decisions, but I had a boss tell me a long time ago that common sense isn't so common. So I try and I try not to go there, but I think they make sense to people and we try to explain it in a way that everyone can understand it. [00:21:45][198.4]
Eileen Rochford: [00:21:45] So you just mentioned your executive leadership team a couple of times, and I know that that's a really unique situation that you have. There's so many talented people. You're all committed to the use of effective communications. One thing that I've heard you talk about before that I think is really interesting is your your realty's kind of commitment to alignment, that you have this shared understanding that you won't pursue any major initiative until there is alignment. But I know there's a I wouldn't call it caveat there, but important and important nuance. Can you talk about that? I just think it's so, so interesting and unique. [00:22:24][39.0]
Mark Steffe: [00:22:24] Yeah, happy to. And that doesn't mean we agree on everything or that every vote is a unanimous vote. That's not at all what we're looking for. And it's not that we don't want dissension or constructive conflict. And in fact, we try to foster that in our conversations and really have an open an open dialog. And we just had a series of these meetings last week. And I really try as much as possible to have rank and titles left at the door so that when we walk into the room, it's really just a group of people who are working on a on a common issue and trying to come up with the best answer solution we possibly can. I've got an incredible leadership team and there are seven members on my executive leadership team and I make the eight. It's they're so skilled, they're so collaborative and they're so open to new ideas that it really makes it fun tackling these sort of transformative issues with them. And we're dealing with a lot of, as I said earlier, you know, what can first command become? So we are tackling large strategic issues at this point. And we we do agree that we're not moving forward with an issue until we're aligned. And that might take several meetings. It might take quite some time. It might take several discussions. But that's okay, because what we don't end up having is what you see in a lot of places where everybody seems to agree in the meeting and then the meeting breaks in and then you don't have the alignment and there's all all these backchannels and and undermining of of the idea that you thought you had agreement on. We don't have and in that in the way we avoid it is everybody gets a voice. Everybody is heard. The issues are addressed. They're debated. And what I find is if it's really an important issue and everybody's committed to solving the problem, if you're crying out long enough, you're probably going to find the right solution. And I'll also tell you, it's a place where our core values become, you know, sometimes you think, do they really live up to them? You know, are they really important or are they just a poster on the wall somewhere? I can't say that we're perfect at it. No, no one could. But man, I can tell you that a decision of any substance or size always runs through our core values. In fact, it happened in my office a few months ago. The guy that runs our field force or head in our head of human resources and I were working on a on an issue. And we we came up with a solution and we looked at it and we looked at each other and said, this doesn't feel right. There's something that doesn't feel right about this approach. And when we looked at it, we said, it's courageous. I'm not so sure. It shows a lot of love and I'm not sure it's going to be as effective as we really hope it's going to be. This is not the right answer. So we've literally scrapped that answer and spent another hour is working the problem. And what we came away with in round two was not only probably a better approach, but it lived up to all three of our core values. And when we looked at it, we said this is the answer. But I was told by a mentor of mine years and years and years ago, I asked him kind of what's the key to being successful in this business? And little this is what he said. He said, Do the right thing. That was his answer. Just do the right thing. And I can tell you, that night as we were sitting here, it didn't feel like the right. In that in that first version. But when we went through came up with a second answer to the to the problem, it fit our core values. We knew it was the right thing. And that's what we move forward with. [00:25:26][181.3]
Rob Johnson: [00:25:26] That is fascinating. So obviously, you've kind of outlined it for us, Mark. You have a unique approach to and cadence with communicating with your organization internally, the l.T, the other folks that work internally for you, and you devote much of your time communicating with those folks. Would you walk us through the various communications techniques or channels that you use, why you use them and how you know they're effective and make you want to use them again? [00:25:52][26.2]
Mark Steffe: [00:25:52] Yeah, I you know, we like any company that there are a number of emails that go out every week, but with email you don't know if you're connecting to your audience. You're not they if they read it, if they understand it, how they react to it. So for me, there's no substitute for getting in front of people and just having open and honest dialog. And and internally we do or in the Home Office, we do a number of different things. We have a town hall about every other month, and that's your traditional town hall. It'll go typically an hour and a half, some number of speakers presenting to the audience. And then we always save time at the end, 15, 20 minutes for questions. We have what we call a CEO forum, which is in the every other month but the opposite months of our town halls. And that's really just me speaking. And those are about an hour typically, and I'll open it up with a few prepared comments on a topic or two that will get us 10 or 15 minutes into the hour. But the rest of that hour is literally just an open and open Q&A. And then we also have a monthly CEO breakfast where we bring in about a dozen employees at a time in their anniversary months with the firm. And we just sit around and have an open dialog with them to understand what's on their mind and what's important to them. In every one of those venues that I just mentioned. Questions come from anywhere. They can come from the audience live, but our auditorium doesn't fit all of our employees, so a lot of them tune in virtually, and they can submit questions via the chat and some put their names on it and some submit the questions anonymously. And I don't screen out the questions. Whatever question comes, I tell them, I'm going to I'll give you one of three answers. I'll tell you. You'll ask a question. I'll have the information. I'll give you the answer. You'll ask a question. I won't have the information and I'll get back to you with an answer or I will tell you I have the answer, but I can't share it with you yet. And I think in the five years I've been the CEO, I had to use that third answer only one time. That was just a few weeks ago on a strategic issue that we're dealing with, and we were not ready to disclose it yet. To me, I hope that helps with transparency. I hope that helps with authenticity. I see people you know, people don't always like my answer, but I'm going to give you an honest answer. And sometimes the the questions are repetitive or redundant and you feel like, yes, I seem like I've answered this several times in the past, and every once in a while you got to let your own personality and your sense of humor come through as well. So people see you've got a human side as well. [00:28:12][139.3]
Eileen Rochford: [00:28:12] Yeah, I'm hearing a lot about frequency. That's a lot of communicating with your folks. It's fantastic. The consistency of holiness. Thank you. [00:28:21][9.2]
Mark Steffe: [00:28:22] Sorry to interrupt you, but one other thing, too. And then we do a similar thing with the field. We have an all field call. We have a forum that our field, the head of our field force runs as well, similar to the town hall is the CEO forum. And then we spend a lot of time getting out to the field as well and going to our individual districts and meeting in person with with with our field field leaders, the DIA's advisors and our support staff in the various districts we have. [00:28:44][22.6]
Eileen Rochford: [00:28:45] It's a lot of opportunity for input and learning, and I'm sure you're very consistent in the information that you're sharing across all those different platforms. It's got to be so helpful. I really like your openness to questions in particular that you make time for and prioritize and that you don't screen them. That's fantastic. [00:29:01][16.6]
Rob Johnson: [00:29:02] Very transparent. [00:29:02][0.3]
Eileen Rochford: [00:29:03] Absolutely. Okay. So here's my I think this is our last question. If you believe that so fast, your job puts you in a lot of big format presentation environments, often in front of huge audiences. What advice do you have for people who maybe aren't so enthusiastic about getting up to speak in front of large groups? [00:29:27][24.7]
Mark Steffe: [00:29:30] Yeah, right. I mean, I get in front of audiences, but there's never a time when I don't get nervous about it going up. And for me, I think when I stop being nervous about presenting in front of an audience is maybe the time I should should hang it up because I feel like maybe I don't, you know, maybe I don't care enough as much as I should. But we're far from that. I think for me, when I think about going in front of an audience, my motivation is I'm trying to tell the story and I want them to be a part of the story, and I want them to help write the end of the story. Right? Because the story isn't over yet. The story will go on and on and on. But I want people to be a part of it. And it's not always easy to get up in front of those large audiences. But if I'm not bringing them along and helping them understand, as I said before, what we're doing while we're doing it, so on, then they can't fully can. Tribute. And there's nothing more exciting for me than for people for people to see the idea, buy into the idea and want to contribute to the idea as well. And so I try to have fun with it. I mean, it's it's not always fun writing a long speech or standing in front of a thousand people to make a presentation. But this is our company. This is our mission. And this is who we've all signed up to serve. And there's so there's so many opportunities here that I'm excited about the messages because things are going really well at first command. So there's just tremendous upside where things could be even better than they already are. And I love sharing that message and I love giving people the opportunity not just to be told what they're going to do and how they're going to do it, but to turn that around and say, we're looking for your help. We're looking for your input, we're looking for your contributions. And together we can we can all do this. And if these strategies and these changes we're trying to make all come true, there'll be more than enough credit to go around. So people aren't going to have to go looking for credit. But yeah, I remember, you know, my early days, I didn't say well presenting, and I was always nervous and, you know, probably hopefully have improved my set over time. But right now, I just I just try to have fun with it and connect, try to make the room as small as I possibly can, maybe as a way to say it where you're really not you're speaking with them, not just speaking at them. I think the more people feel like you're talking with them and trying to have a conversation, which is why I try to be so open with you. And so so they don't feel like they're just being, you know, big part of communication. It's not just the transmit, right? People have to hear it, understand it, what you ideally want them to play it back and say, hey, they really got we were talking about. So the more we're able to do that, the more just ensures we're all on the same page. And if we can get people aligned again, you can solve a lot of problems that way or prevent or not, you know? [00:32:01][151.0]
Rob Johnson: [00:32:01] One of the things I love about this podcast is I hear great advice and then it's so good I write it down. It seems so simple. I love it's not just the transmit. They have to play it back. And you probably say that or think that a thousand times a day. And I'm like, That's brilliant. That's a perfect way to to express that. Mark we cannot thank you enough for your time, for your expertise, for your candor. I mean, this is all just amazing stuff. And I hope people that listen to this really kind of embrace some of the things I know everybody has different leadership styles, but I hope they embrace some of the things because I feel like everything I'm hearing from you when it comes to transparency and frequency and everything else just makes perfect sense. So thanks for joining us on Can You Hear Me Today? It has been an honor having you. [00:32:42][40.8]
Mark Steffe: [00:32:42] Thank you very much. I enjoyed it. [00:32:44][1.4]
Eileen Rochford: [00:32:44] I deeply appreciate you sharing your expertise and just knowledge. I think everybody can appreciate why we had you on as a guest today. It's clear you're a great leader and a great communicator. And the way you tie those things together, you just don't see that often. So thank you. You're really, really good at this. [00:33:02][18.2]
Mark Steffe: [00:33:03] I appreciate it. [00:33:04][0.6]
Eileen Rochford: [00:33:04] Yeah. [00:33:04][0.0]
Mark Steffe: [00:33:05] I am so Ching mongo. [00:33:06][1.1]
Eileen Rochford: [00:33:07] Well, you know, no amount of coaching can give you the natural ability that you have. It's truly it's remarkable. So I guess that's going to do it for another edition of Can you Hear Me? I'm Eileen Rochford. If you'd like to weigh in on our podcast, maybe give us an idea for a future topic. Just give us a shout on our Facebook. I'm sorry, your LinkedIn page. We don't have Facebook. Where'd that come from? Our Can You Hear Me? LinkedIn page. Come on. [00:33:31][23.7]
Rob Johnson: [00:33:32] That's right. You can't miss it. Pretty good traffic on there. And we would love to hear all the ideas. And that's how we generate some of, you know, other guests and topics, that sort of thing. My name's Rob Johnson. We thank you for listening and if you liked the episode, please consider giving us a review on any of the platforms where you can find. Can you hear me? Apple, Spotify and many more. Your reviews are helping other potential listeners find our show. Thanks for listening. [00:33:32][0.0]
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