Leadership Lessons From My Favorite High School Drop-Out

Welcome, everyone! As a teacher, I bet you knew that your students’ brains were hard-wired to learn from stories. This month, I thought I’d share the story of four leadership lessons I learned from what may be a surprising source: My brother-in-law Frank, who actually was expelled from high school. 

I’ll spare you the complete story—it’s not mine to tell. I’ll just say that Frank was sixteen and absolutely full of a daredevil spirit ( that’s an acceptable way of printing it, but you know kids, and you can picture what I mean). I’ll just say that there was an incident involving a substitute teacher, a prank to fill up a sink with running water in a second floor classroom, which proceeded to leak and cause the roof of a first floor classroom to collapse—I’m sure your imagination can fill in the details. If you’ve worked with kiddos long enough, you know that teenage boys can sometimes act impetuously and suffer life-impacting consequences, right? 

I met Frank about forty years after this episode, and knew him as a successful leader in the corporate world by then. So lately I’ve been thinking about the kids we may view as unsuccessful or difficult in our own schools right now.

What are the lessons that school leaders might learn from Frank’s rich life? Here are a few: 

• Great ideas can come from surprising sources: At about 17, Frank took a job sweeping floors in a factory at a company called IBM. ( Yep, that IBM). He noticed a Suggestion Box for employees, and over several months he decided to submit ideas he felt might be helpful. Guess what? To Frank’s surprise, his corporate bosses actually began to consider his ideas and strike up conversations with him. Over the years more and more of his suggestions were considered and implemented. Fast forward for twenty years, and Frank became a plant manager of a large IBM plant in California.
  
  
• Failure isn’t final, and one person who believes in you can change your life: For Frank, it was his sweet Lola whom he met in kindergarten. Their decades of marriage were full of rich experiences of Lola’s artistic talent and Frank’s love of making music. Lola’s support, honesty, and celebration of Frank’s spirit was the fuel that kept him believing in himself as a young man, when the world may have viewed him a failure. What an opportunity we have as leaders to be that "one person” for so many others that are part of our lives!
  
  
• Lead from truth and love: If you saw Frank, you would sense right away that kindness and a generous spirit were part of his core being. Very simply, he embodied emotional intelligence that shaped his character grounded in self-awareness and rich relationships. By no means was he a pushover just because he was “a nice guy” though! Frank told me one time his leadership theme was “Very gentle pressure, relentlessly applied.” As a corporate leader, his open smile, bright eyes and sincere interest in his people were a magnet that drew his team to him. What might Frank’s leadership theme look like for you? What “theme” have you grounded your own leadership on?
  
  
• Pass it on: As a retired business man Frank took the time to cultivate friendships in his California neighborhood. One day, one of his young neighbors shared his dream of beginning his own landscape business, and with great respect and humility asked Frank and Lola if they would ever consider investing in him to help him get started. Without hesitation, Frank and Lola felt drawn to offer an opportunity to this young person because of their own good fortune. They had great empathy for this hard-working young man whose only barrier to his desire to be successful was for someone to believe in him and offer financial support. Frank proudly shared the story with us about how well the young man was doing, how promptly he repaid their loan, and how the opportunity to pass on their own good fortune to the next generation was so important to them.

In April, Brian and I will travel to California to celebrate Frank’s life with his four children. We’ll give thanks once again for his story, and for the leadership lessons of creativity, resilience, compassion and generosity that came from his life. The good news? Every one of those qualities can be present in your own lives, dear friends. May it be so. 

May your courage shine,

Debbie McFalone, Ph.D.

To connect with Debbie regarding serving your district’s leaders, subscribing to her Monday Messages on leadership, or ordering her book Meeting The Moment, please go to www.LiveWellLeadStrong.com. Thank you!