Versiti - Stand Out From the Inside Podcast Series

What is the Circle of Leadership?

This podcast episode of “Stand Out from the Inside” features author and speaker Andrew Adeniyi, who wrote a brand new book called, “The Circle of Leadership: A Framework for Creating & Leveraging Culture.” This episode talks about how to create and leverage business culture, to serve purpose, people, and process. And we’ll get a bit into Andrew’s tips on public speaking, DEI, and his deeply personal story about carrying the sickle cell trait.

Podcast Specific Hashtags: #DEI #leadership #leadersvsmanagers #sicklecell #smallbusiness

Guest(s): Andrew Adeniyi

Social Media Handles: 
https://www.andrewadeniyi.com/
https://www.amazon.com/Andrew-Adeniyi/e/B08F2TK3C6

Twitter @_AASolutions
Instagram @_AASolutions
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrewadeniyi

About Our Host:

Edgar Daggett born and raised in Ann Arbor, MI. He currently serves as the Specialty Programs Marketing Associate at Versiti Blood Centers, where he focuses on direct involvement and campaign management on specialty products and diverse groups. Past family experience inspired him to begin his journey at Versiti in 2020. He knew that the need for diverse units was growing year to year, and because of his personal history, he decided to make the change – and help make a change.

Through the Stand Out From the Inside podcast, he hopes to empower new and bright individuals in his community and beyond to spread the word on the need for diverse blood products through donation and blood drives.  

“I hope you all enjoy the Stand Out from the Inside podcast presented by Versiti, where we talk about the needs of the community and ways we can become stronger!”

About - Podcast Show Series

STAND OUT FROM THE INSIDE presented by Versiti is a podcast where—we recognize community with light, uniqueness, and identity. Edgar Daggett will talk with individuals to celebrate ethnicity and blood type — it is part of our survival. Because within our communities, we have attributes that we give and serve in our community. This is a fresh podcast that will give voice to diversity and inspiration. We will promote strength, trust, caring, inclusivity, and positivity. And will go deep on the lifesaving impact of blood donation. How do you Stand Out from the Inside? https://www.versiti.org/standout

Edgar: [00:00:00] Welcome back everybody to another Standout From the Inside Podcast presented by Versiti. Again, I'm your host Edgar Daggett. Welcome back to another podcast. If you're new, please subscribe to all of our channels and visit and see all of our other podcasts that we've recorded before. Super amazing, super interesting topics here. The last topic where we have Liz Nead, where we talked about influences with hospitals, influences with the communities and what it means to be a donor in our system. I hope you guys all enjoy your time, your weekday, what time of the day that you're listening to this podcast, viewing of this podcast, or morning or afternoon hope you guys are enjoying a great day, super excited about this brand new podcast that we're bringing to you. We have a very special guest right out of Indiana. So another Big Ten state from the Midwest he's experienced seeing this cold right now with us all. If you're a cold person that you enjoyed the cold, love [00:01:00] it this, we're going to get into the season with you. I'm more of a summer person. So, you know, we're kind of going away from of my happy place, but for this podcast, we have Andrew Adeniyi. He is not only a writer. He has his book right now on the Amazon - Circle of Leadership, but he's also a speaker to small businesses. Andrew, welcome to the Stand Out From the Inside pocket.

Andrew: Hello, hello. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you.

Edgar: No, Thank you. So I just get a brief intro you're from Indiana, correct?

Andrew: Yeah, that's right.

Edgar: What part of Indiana?

Andrew: So I grew up in South Bend, Indiana, but currently live in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Edgar: So right in the city.

Andrew: Yeah. Well, I'm on the Northeast side of Indianapolis. I don't live downtown, anything like that. So I'm pretty close to the outer suburbs of, of any of that.

Edgar: Are you a Colts fan?

Andrew: I'm a Colts supporter, you know? Cause they're the home team, but it's hard for me to claim being a fan when I'm not that [00:02:00] diehard over the Colts, to be honest with you.

Edgar: Ah, no, I watch a lot of Indiana football. I am still a big fan of Peyton Manning. You know, when he was there, I was there watching a lot of his games, I'm from Michigan directly here in Ann Arbor. So, you know, when I say Peyton Manning and that's one of my favorite football players, people coming at me then they're like, Tom Brady, what about Tom Brady? They came from Go Blue, but he's also there. He's also a big fan, but that's the super cool Indianapolis. South Bend. There's a couple of schools, near South Bend. Correct.

Andrew: Notre Dame, that's the big one. That's down the street from where I grew up so Notre Dame University

Edgar: Go Irish, right?

Andrew: Yeah.

Edgar: All right. Excellent. Excellent. So I want to say thank you for joining this podcast. This is going to be super cool podcast where I wanted to bring the viewers along and kind of talk about leadership in the community or leadership within the businesses, how to stand out, how to be different. And I heard that you have a [00:03:00] book, correct?

Andrew: Yeah, that's right called the Circle of Leadership.

Edgar: Circle of Leadership and tell me a little bit about that book what's it about?

Andrew: So the book is about how to create and leverage culture. So the goal is if you're an entrepreneur trying to get it right from the beginning, the book will help you get a really good culture, or if you're a company that has an existing culture and you're just trying to make it better, the book also serves that purpose as well. In the book, I really unpack what I call the three P's of culture and that's essentially a purpose, people and process. The book walks you through how to amplify your purpose, how to prioritize your people, and then how to simplify processes.

Edgar: So not making everything too complicated, but the people are normally, that's the organization, that's the culture. The people are directly the culture and having an effective leader. I want to ask you directly. You know, this topic of leadership versus manager has been going along, going around. You know, people are asking questions, it's going all over LinkedIn. You see on your social media feed, [00:04:00] what is the major events in your opinion, between a great leader and that classic manager that people are talking.

Andrew: Well, there's a great question. So there's really two things that play when you talk about that. So the first thing that comes to mind is leader versus manager, and we'll put good or great leader off to the side for now. The main difference for me is when you talk about a leader, you're talking about managing change, getting a team to do something new, something different than what they're already accustomed to doing. That's what leaders. It's about when I think about management, it's kind of operating an existing system. It's really checkmarks and checks and balances and ensuring there's compliance, and that people are doing what they're expected to do. There's really no change involved. You're really just maintaining as opposed to changing something. So that's the difference between leadership and management to me. But when I think about the difference between say a great leader and a good leader, I think it comes down to empathy. A lot of different things really [00:05:00] couldn't differentiate a leader, but I don't think anything trumps empathy because when we talk about empathy, you're talking about self-awareness, you're talking about understanding others, people's emotions and their thoughts, and being able to relate and connect with them in order to be a good leader, you have to be able to read the room. You have to be able to understand how your team feels and how the words that you say and the actions that you have impact others.

Edgar: No, definitely. And doesn't make it a difference cause your book focuses on small businesses. Does that play a role into like whether a small business you have 15, 20 employees, maybe even less or for a massive corporation, like the Walmarts where there's 40,000 employees, does that play a role into what being a leader and a manager means?

Andrew: I would say the speaking and consulting work I do target market is certainly small businesses. However, the book applies to anywhere where there's leaders and anywhere where there's followers. So I do want to make that distinction. When I think about [00:06:00] what the book is really trying to talk through, it's trying to talk about what leaders need to do to create better spaces and environments for their people to thrive. At the very foundational level, that's really what we're talking about. When we're talking about culture and effective leaders, we're talking about people that create an environment where people can do their best work

Edgar: Anybody can be a leader. You don't have to be that high director, executive manager, anybody can be a leader, as long as you put the time and the effort to learn with the people around you, whether they're at the same level or below, correct?

Andrew: Yeah, if you have influence, you can be a, you're a leader. You're already leading. You don't need a title to lead or a team that's following you to lead. You just need to have the ability to influence because if you're influencing people, then you're already leading. You just don't have the title to validate that.

Edgar: Okay. Do you have any experiences with having a manager that's directly like Andrew in need you to hit goal X in two weeks. Goal Y in the next two weeks. Or have you [00:07:00] had experience with the manager like that or have you had great leadership throughout your career?

Andrew: I think regardless of it's a good leader or bad leader. I'm accustomed to them laying out expectations with timeframes. I mentioned to say that the best leaders do give timeframes and do give a lot of clarity around what they want you to do. I don't think that's necessarily an example of poor leadership by saying, we need you to hit this by this day, and then this way, this day. But what I will say is I certainly have seen both ends of the spectrum in terms of really good leaders and poor leaders. And a lot of the time, what I realize is that people don't prioritize or bad leaders don't prioritize their people over everything else. Great leaders do. Great leaders recognize that they get results through their people and with their people. Bad leaders don't tend to have that same line of thinking and that seems to be one of the biggest foundational [00:08:00] issues that I see between good and bad leaders.

Edgar: There you go. Yeah. So that's super interesting. You know, a lot of people don't think about, you know, it's the everyday people that go to work that are the ones leading the charge, leading the business. They're the ones in doing the face to face are in the corporation or the small business that use that. So that's an amazing book. If you all go on, Amazon, go search for his book, the Circle of Leadership. It's an amazing book, read it, kind of learn a little bit about it. And it's true that the focus directly is on the people themselves. You have to be able to learn from the people. Be able to give them a platform where they can share their ideas and create change if they want just giving them opportunities is the entire thing, giving them opportunities, giving them growth potential. And 100%. I agree with Andrew himself, that that's what makes a great leader. Now, Andrew, you know, you have also title - speaker. Can we go into what speaker, what does that mean? I'm a speaker of, you [00:09:00] know, I've seen a couple of videos where you give a little bit of motivation. You give, some kind of heartfelt messages about people that culture side, what do you do? What do you, what does that day-to-day of a life of a speaker go into.

Andrew: Yeah. So essentially you get paid to speak to people on a variety of topics. And for me, the topics I speak about, or the topics that I cover in my book. So it's really nice for me because the things that I talk about in my book are things that I've researched or experienced firsthand or both, and are also things that I'm passionate about. So I'm willingly trying to seek out more knowledge, more information around those topics. And I've recognized that speaking engagements are among the best ways to give people that content like, yes, it's an, a book and people can read it, but speaking it in person or virtually you can get the content essentially to more people than you could with just the book. So in terms of a day in the life today was an interesting day where I spoke to a group of 14 CEOs in the [00:10:00] greater Indianapolis area. And it was a really important conversation because anytime I'm speaking to people at that level, I recognize the power and the influence that they have. So I always try to make sure that the message that I'm sending across is a message that's going to serve others, especially people that fall under underrepresented groups, because oftentimes they're overlooked and they're not given the resources and attention and support that they deserve.

Edgar: So 14 CEOs today, what's the biggest group that you've spoken to?

Andrew: The biggest group? I was part of a panel discussion earlier this year for Elevate Ventures, venture capital firm in Indianapolis, and they had a conference called Kinetic and I think they had 500 business leaders register for that event. So the panel, the panel that I spoke on was on DEI. That was probably the largest group that, that I spoken to

Edgar: Now, I mean, we need tips because I inside, I know tons of colleagues [00:11:00] that, you know, public speaking, you're like, okay, you know, five groups, 10 groups, you know, you're doing this school 20 but 500. That is a massive number of tips. What, what is your mind going through when you know, you're about to give a speech or presentation for five hundred people. I think we need tips out here cause you know, a lot of us are like just 10 people sometimes scare you. That's another level.

Andrew: Well, there's a couple of things I would say: one, I practice a ton. I recite my slide decks and my presentations so much that in itself gives me a level of confidence. That's half the battle. Be so intimately close to your content and comfortable with your content that you can talk about it. I like to use a lot of stories, a lot of statistics, things that give people facts, but then also appeal to people's emotions. I try to sprinkle in humor and some of my conversations. So that's a big component. The other thing I would share is I always tell myself when I start to get nervous before I speak, because it still happens. I [00:12:00] always say this is not about. It's not about me. It's about the message that I'm trying to deliver. And it's about the impact that that message can have on others. Those steps that I just laid out typically make it a lot easier for me to be able to speak to groups of people.

Edgar: No, that's awesome. Yeah. Confidence. At least from personal experience, knowing what you're talking about, like completely like, okay, this is, this is why I talk. This is what I'm going to talk about. This is what I'm going to own and going on with that. That at least helps me, you know, if you go in, you're ready, you already know what the sides are going to be or whatever you're talking about. It helps me 100%, you know? And sometimes yeah, you can have a little curve balls or you get that one question. That's like, what the heck did they just ask me? That's the, that's the question that might throw somebody off. You just have to, at least for me, I take a seat back or a step back and I'm like, okay, Let's break it into parts or maybe let's, let me just repeat it and answer it from there. [00:13:00] You know, what about those moments where, you know, it gets difficult or like okay. You see like the crowd maybe isn't as interested or, you know, within your conversation. Is comedy the one icebreaker that you kind of use, or what else do you use to get them involved?

Andrew: Yeah. So comedy is one, I would also say engagement. I don't like sitting there and just preaching to people. I try to make it engaging from the very beginning after introduction and things like that I'm trying to get them to either read the slide, what comes to mind asking questions, activities, and then I switched it up. There's a variety. There might be true or false situations. A story where they need to share their personal perspective. I think that variety gets people more open to sharing. And if a couple of things don't resonate with somebody which is not every activity or approach is going to resonate with somebody, typically I have enough of a different type of approach to where at least something will get them [00:14:00] speaking and more open to sharing and being engaged.

Edgar: Awesome, great tips. Great tips. I really appreciate that. I want to go a little bit in detail if you can. DEI, you know, that that's three letters that have been thrown everywhere, you know, organizations, corporation, they're putting that in their front page. I know at least here at Versiti, we have our DEI group and for those who don't know, DEI stands for diversity, equity and inclusion.

Andrew: Yeah.

Edgar: Now kind of getting people involved, different minority groups, or just being involved within your community from an external or internal focus. One of the big organization that's also leading the way is Coca-Cola they have it directly on their front page. You go on Coke, you scroll down a little bit DEI. It's right there. You can't miss it. What about the DEI like, can I hear a little bit more about that? What were we talking about DEI's in so many organizations right now. You know, involving it into their own business.

Andrew: Yeah, man, there's a spectrum [00:15:00] out there for sure. You have some organizations that want to do something as it pertains to DEI, but have no idea what to do. Those are some leaders that I work with and from there I lay out a strategic plan on why do you want to focus on it? What does it even mean? What are some different goals that you can set? So we walked through that entire process. Then there's other organizations that maybe have started their DEI journey. They maybe have assembled a work group or a committee, and they're starting to work on it, but they're not really having any impact. People aren't really feeling the impact of the work that they're trying to do. That's where I can come in and say, well, let's go back to the origin of why you started this and what the purpose was to begin with. Because a lot of times it may not be on solid ground. They may not have set long-term impactful, challenging goals from the onset. They may not have assembled the committee with varying levels of leadership, and to ensure that they can move quickly. They may not have executive sponsorship. Leadership [00:16:00] might not have been engaged and bought into the initiative. So where I come in is really to figure out where are they at, where do they want to be? And then how do I bridge that gap?

Edgar: Definitely, when you talk about that small business, because I want to give an example, I went to a conference, a kind of research conference in Kansas City. We were talking about being in the community, kind of getting the diverse groups involved or being out there. Putting your best foot forward.

Andrew: Yeah.

Edgar: But we're in five different states and as I was talking and speaking, I had to speak in front of a small group and some of these smaller businesses, they don't have a DEI. They don't have that resource, to talk to and bounce ideas off. And for a small business, how do you get something like that started? You talk a little bit about that, but like small tips, like we don't need all the answers but like small tips. How do I get that started? What's the first step to do? Do I need diverse people in part of my organization. Or [00:17:00] what does that first step, what am I thinking about? What am I trying to decide?

Andrew: The first step is understanding what DEI is and what it means, right? When you break it down, talking about diversity, it's really just talking about the differences amongst people, race, gender, ethnicity, et cetera. It's just the difference amongst people. So, it's a numbers game. It can be calculated. It can be measured. That's what we're talking about when we're talking about diversity and the goal with diversity is really diversity of thought because when organizations have people who think differently, they have different backgrounds, you have less blind spots. So you're more able to make business decisions that are good. Or make decisions in general that are good. And when we talk about equity, we're talking about custom resources to help people do their jobs best. To help people succeed. It's not a one size fits all situation. Right, you can't give everyone the same tool and think that they're all gonna use it the same way you need to figure out what tool do they need to do [00:18:00] the work that you want them to do. That's equity, which is a difference from equality. Then inclusion is really just, do they feel seen? Do they feel heard and do they feel valued? Right, and I would say that's, that's the starting point. Do organizations, do leaders even understand what that means, first, that's ground level, then you transition to your why. You know, you say you want to do something with diversity or DEI, why? Is it because it's in the media and you feel pressure to do it? Do you actually see the value in it? Why do you want to focus on DEI and that's what I take leaders through. And that why is so important because that's going to influence every other thing you do as organization and how you do it, because it should tie back into why this is even an initiative or a thought to begin with.

Edgar: What you're saying is completely true. And if any of you want to find out a little bit more, or want more information. Andrew has a website that you can learn a little bit more, kind of about why your organization, [00:19:00] what are ways to take and evolve your business as well. Let's link to the website, definitely up. I visited the website. You can see down below where you're able to learn a little bit. Because what he's talking about, DEI is something that's sweeping the nation, and yet you have to find a purpose. You have to know what it is and the reason why you're doing it. Without that, as he said about public speaking, about everything we've been talking about so far, that why is super important and it'll make you understand more, why you're doing it, makes everything easier and you'll get the results that you want from the inside. Andrew, I've been talking with a lot of our viewers, a lot of our subscribers, and we've had amazing panelists in the past. And our very first panelist if you haven't seen it, the very first podcast it was with James Griffin. James Griffin is a sickle cell warrior advocate who expresses the sickle cell disease, [00:20:00] directly. And if you want to learn a little bit more with sickle cell. See, view, the first podcast listen to it, a amazing podcast. It was our very first podcast for season one, listened to it, learn a little bit about James Griffin story, where he came from and how he's doing now. But Andrew himself is actually a carrier for those who don't know. You can't see it. He doesn't express it. He's a carer, which means he carries the trait of sickle cell. And I want, we wanted to go a little bit deeper now and Andrew what's it like living with the trait? Do you see any difference than for someone that doesn't have the trait or you have some effects from that trait.

Andrew: No impact on my health or anything of that nature.

Edgar: None. And so when did you discover that you had the trait?

Andrew: I discovered I had the trait when I was in college and I was dating my now wife at the time and we're getting prepared to be in a more dedicated [00:21:00] relationship and her parents who her dad's a doctor and her mom's a nurse practitioner. She told her, my wife, to tell me I should get my blood tested to see if I had the trait because they knew that she had the trait and they've been able to see up close just the devastating impact that sickle cell has on children and individuals in general. So they wanted to prevent that and they kind of pushed for it. I was like, I don't really know what that is and I don't know if I have the trait, but I'll go and get tested. So I got tested then, and that's when the results came back saying that I had the trait.

Edgar: Other than that that day that you got tested, you had no effect, like nothing, no appearance, nothing on your skin, nothing that said you had the trait.

Andrew: No, and to my knowledge, there may be some rare exceptions, but when you have the trait, you don't necessarily feel yucky or feel ill or anything like that. It's when you have the full blown sickle cell disease.

Edgar: Correct. And when, so [00:22:00] for the viewers, you don't really experienced anything. So the trait doesn't give you anything. You don't feel sick, you don't feel nauseous. You don't have to get the transfusions, how James Griffin described - he sometimes needed six, seven transfusions a day, going to the hospitals and you had none of that, none of it until he found out that he had the trait and it still doesn't affect him in any way. But the reason why we express, making sure, okay, do I have the trait is, you know, obviously your partner Andrew had has the trait and when two people have the trait, it's not a hundred percent, but if there's a potential that your children can then have the actual sickle cell disease. And that is why we try to push here at Versiti getting tested especially cause you know, sickle cell does affect the black and brown communities a little bit more than the other diverse groups. When you both, when you don't know that you have the trait, you know, this is something like a [00:23:00] key aspect that you have to know about and you have to be aware and you can find out a little bit more on versiti.org. What the sickle cell is, what affects does it have, but you have to be aware, you know, and you don't see it. You don't express. Andrew his now wife, family is in that doctor, that medical world. So they're aware of the situation and they obviously know what to do. But for those that don't, go get tested, go find out, what sickle cell is because you never know, you never know you could be carrying the trait and it's something that flows through the family. And obviously you can be like Andrew sitting right now today with nothing, no clue, no idea what it is. No idea what the effects are on it. Andrew, I want to ask you, what’s at play now? How does that play into your role? Alright you find out you had the sickle cell trait? What did you experience? What were your first thoughts?[00:24:00]

Andrew: I think my first thoughts were, I could see myself being with her long-term and something like this was not going to get in the way of me pursuing her and down the road, starting a family. That was among my first thoughts was like, wow, surprising. But it is what it is. We'll get through it, which was a lot different than what, what was being shared with me on her side of the family?

Edgar: It's interesting and they tell you, okay, you have the sickle cell. Was your first instinct like, okay, what is sickle cell? What the heck is it? What does that mean?

Andrew: Yes. So when I went to go get tested, that was when I first learned about it, where my wife was saying, Hey, this is what sickle cell is. When you have the trait, two people have the traits. Twenty-five percent chance your kids will have the disease. [00:25:00] And I have the trait so that's where I got my foundational knowledge was what she shared that prompted me to get tested. And then when I got tested, it really is kind of caused me to go back into a little bit more research to figure out, okay, what does this actually mean? What are the implications, et cetera, et cetera. But even as I was doing that, that searching on my own, again, I'm a man of faith. So to me, I was like, I'm not going to make the decision to not pursue you because of a 25% chance of our kids having the disease, like the God I serve is not gonna allow that to happen. So I'm just going to walk in faith and I think our relationship is going to be more important than letting the fear of that, that small percentage get in the way of that.

Edgar: That's amazing. And it's super important. And I'm happy that you said that because, you've known a couple of people or a couple of donors who they find out that they have the trait and it automatically stops their life. They don't want to continue or they're scared. You don't have to be scared, like obviously, you know, 25% chance, but [00:26:00] as long as you proceed, you're aware of what sickle cell is. You can continue and, you have an amazing partner who has the information, has the resources and you obviously want to continue to have a life with. That's really all you need, that care that love for one another is amazing. It's an amazing story. And I'm happy that you said that, a hundred percent. As we continue, did you ever try to get tests for your family or like wonder where'd it come from? Did you try and do anything like that?

Andrew: Yeah. That started me asking my parents who has the trait, who doesn't? Then I found out that, I think my older sister has the trait. Younger sister does not have the trait. And then at least one of my parents had the trait. I can't remember both had the trait or not. I think it was maybe just one of them had the trait. It just caused me to kind of go back out to the family tree and figure out who has the trait who doesn't and my aunt actually, it's crazy because I forgot this but my [00:27:00] aunt actually has sickle cell. My dad's sister has sickle cell and she passed maybe earlier last year, I want to say. His little sister had sickle cell. So that just kind of was a domino effect of me learning a little bit more and figuring out well, who has what in my family.

Edgar: Yes. That's a very interesting, when they find out that your aunt, correct, had sickle cell, was there any movement from there? Was it like still too fresh or too new that, there was nothing questioned about it.

Andrew: All of my family for the most part lives in Nigeria, so I didn't grow up with my family. My parents immigrated here from Nigeria. I say that to say I was never very close to any of my real aunts and uncles or cousins. It was really just kind of my own family that was like my own unit. Because of that, I kind of grew up hearing here and there that she would be sick often. But I don't think I really connected it, knowing that it was sickle cell that was causing the sickness until I started getting older. And as I got [00:28:00] older, I started realizing just more of the impact that it would have on her, but I wasn't seeing it because she was physically in Nigeria. There was still a little bit of that disconnect between what she was really going through and what a sickle cell can do in people's lives.

Edgar: Wow. So you're first generation here in the U.S. and went directly to Indiana.

Andrew: Michigan

Edgar: Okay, so you're in my hometown.

Andrew: Berrien Springs, Michigan is where my parents first, first moved to that's where I was born. And then I grew up in Niles, Michigan before I went to South Bend. I spent like middle school, high school in South Bend, Indiana. But before then it was basically Niles and Berrien Springs, Michigan.

Edgar: I got to go back to an earlier conversation. You said weren't a diehard of Indiana, are you a Michigan fan?

Andrew: I'm not a diehard of the Colts. And Notre Dame, I'm a supporter cause I grew up there, but I went to IU Bloomington for undergrad. So I am very much a fan of the Hoosier's.

Edgar: Hoosier's, okay, were sticking in the Big Ten, [00:29:00] okay.

Andrew: Sticking in the Big .

Edgar: Alright, I like it. I like it.

Andrew: You'll like this... Well, I don't know if you'll like this, cause you're an Ann Arbor you said. Right? Okay. So I got my master's from Michigan State University.

Edgar: A little brother, a little brother. I still accept I believe our, we had another panelist that was Ohio state and she tried to give it to say the O-H, maybe the I-O, whatever it is over there, down in south Ohio or middle of Ohio, I'll accept the Michigan State, I might not accepted to much because you guys just recently beat us. But you know, it's all right. It's all right. But Andrew, I really enjoy it. It's a pleasure. It was a pleasure, like learning a little bit about your family and having the viewers and the listeners learn about the family and knowing that, you know, If you don't know, like again, he said until college he didn't know anything about sickle cell and, you know, just go out there and get tested. We have the resources here. If you're in the Midwest, go to a Versiti. Again, it's what affects, the black and brown community the [00:30:00] most and go learn about it because you never know you could be a trait carrier, and this is something to get to know for yourself, but also for your family down the line. Just knowing what sickle cell is and being aware of it, because it might not be you, it might be a family member. It might be a neighbor. It might be a community member where one day they're coming home and they just realize that they have sickle cell or anything else in that matter. And you can be aware and kind of be like, okay, this is what it is. Let me help you. Let me teach you. Let me explain. You know, reach out and be that guide, be that leader, be able to understand what the situation's going on. So, Andrew, I really, really appreciate your time. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for sharing again about your family. We appreciate you giving us your time in and sharing kind of what being a leader is, what being the difference between being a manager, you know, giving us advice on public speaking. I want to tell everybody to go visit his [00:31:00] book, the Circle of Leadership it is available on Amazon right now. Go visit, read it, learn about it, go to his website, learn about it. If you're a business owner, learn about what being an influential leader in your own business. Getting to know people, people are the leaders in the business. They are the ones that give you culture in your business. And they're the ones that are essentially the ones directly face-to-face with the consumer or the business. So thank you again, Andrew. So much for being here. Is there anything you want to tell the viewers, the subscribers.

Andrew: One thing I heard when I was doing research for my book, because I would always ask people for advice for leaders or aspiring leaders and a professor from the Kelley School of Business by the name of Dr. Powell, Philip Powel. He shared that he encourages leaders to fail fast and fail forward. And that was some of the most useful and profound words that I got from the interviews that I did. I want to really [00:32:00] reiterate that to the people listening. If you're a leader or aspiring leader, oftentimes all the conversation is about being successful and winning and what you can achieve. And there's not enough conversation around all the failures. That successful people have endured to be able to get to where they're at. I just want I encourage everyone out there. Fail fast, fail forward, and continue striving.

Edgar: Amazing, amazing Andrew. Thank you so much. Once again, enjoy the rest of your day. Thank you for being able to talk to the viewers of Stand Out From the Inside podcast presented by Versiti. Thank you.

Andrew: Thank you for your time. I appreciate it. Have a go one.

Edgar: There we go. This wraps up another podcast Stand Out From the Inside, presented by Versiti. I want to thank you all, the listeners, the viewers for joining into another podcast. If you haven't subscribed, please subscribe. Visit all of our channels. We are on Spotify, Google Podcasts, any of them, hit the subscribe button. So you never miss another podcast. [00:33:00] If you're brand new, go visit our other podcasts before we've hit amazing topics with amazing panelists. If you want more information on being a donor, being a host, or just want to test out your blood type, go to the nearest Versiti. We are found in the five states of Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, go there and get information about your blood. People need people. We always need people and especially people like you within your company. Again, I want to thank you all and enjoy the rest of your day, rest of your night, whatever time that you're listening to this podcast. Thank you for tuning in again I'm your host Edgar Dagget. I'll see you all next time.

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