How to build a workplace people don't want to leave with Marcus Nack | Episode 87

Chris Lee: Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of the Parks and Restoration Podcast. I am Chris Lee, the founder and co-host of this show, although I don't have my normal co-host with me because he is off getting ready to have a baby so he's got other priorities. But ⁓ I with me today Marcus Nack. Marcus works me here at Des Moines County Conservation. ⁓ He is environmental education manager. and I wanted to bring him on the show for a number of reasons. One, he's just a fun guy to talk to, but ⁓ two, he is a practitioner of a lot of the things that we talk about on this show. Specifically, this whole idea of building an incredible culture at your organization, managing the ecosystem of your workplace, and using that as a way to then get the results and get the other things that we want to accomplish, the mission accomplishments and everything. So.

Marcus: you

Chris Lee: going dig into that a little bit and then talk about Marcus's own podcast ⁓ who knows where else we'll go. We just kind of slapped this together and just today that we're going to record the show together. So Marcus, welcome to the show. Absolutely. All right. So we just an interesting situation the other day where we had, ⁓ we've got an ⁓ and she came and to ⁓ have a chat. And ⁓ this is not the time.

Marcus: Well, thanks for having me, Chris.

Chris Lee: this has happened. So walk me through kind of what happened there and why you think that is.

Marcus: So interestingly enough, sometimes employees fall in our lap. You know, if you kind of practice ⁓ what you really believe and you tell the truth and you're honest and ⁓ ⁓ like good juju just happens to you. ⁓ the case of this intern, ⁓ juju just happened to us. ⁓ there's a company that reached out and said, hey, I've got somebody who's interested in conservation, maybe education.

Chris Lee: Yeah. Right?

Marcus: Do you mind if they do a job shadow? And you know, the job shadow developed into an internship and then the internship kind of developed into the situation that you're bringing up now, Chris. The that came up now ⁓ is ⁓ we this intern who isn't really sure what she wants to do as a career and decided give environmental education a try. So came on over to the office and after ⁓ a bunch time with us, after practicing, teaching things interacting with the public and interacting with kids and most of all having fun and being silly. ⁓ like, I wanna do this forever. My internship is limited term. How do I make this ⁓ my and how do I lock it in with you guys is kind of the skinny of the situation.

Chris Lee: Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ ⁓ you talk about ⁓ a leader's perspective to have someone to you and say, you know, I want to here forever. ⁓ How do I position where I can do that? You're like, like, ⁓ you know, we must done something right. And it just back to all the things ⁓ that we talk on the show is, ⁓ you know, when put people first, when you put your culture first, when you try to create an incredible place to work. This is what you get. You get people that are coming to you and be like, I don't ever want to go anywhere. had this, I think I've talked about it on the show before, our resource manager, he worked here, think he ⁓ started as a high school intern ⁓ and worked every summer through college. And, you we kept telling them after them first couple of summers, like, hey, ⁓ you might to think about going somewhere else and getting some, some job experience with other agencies and stuff like that. And he's like, Nope, if you're going to keep having me back, I'm keeping, I'm going to come back here. That's just all there is to it. And as fate would have it, a position opened up a little bit before he graduated college. and, you know, I'm like, I already know who I want to hire in this position. cause he'd proven himself over the last several years. and then we had another situation here, at the nature center, where we, had to hire a teacher. And, for a, a, a position and, ⁓ was like a position. And then we. We're trying to find a way to keep it going. We got some grant funding to keep it going for a little bit. And he ended up deciding not to go back to teaching full time. Once the next school year opened up, took like a $30,000 pay cut to, you he just went back to teaching half time that he could stay working with us. And, know, was because ⁓ of the that we've created here. And I got to give you a lot of credit. You know, I listened to a lot of the... ways you handle the staff the way you interact with the education staff ⁓ at the Nature Center. ⁓ you do incredible work and make a great place ⁓ them to work. So I wanted to just first take a minute. Let's back way up. First off, let's find a little bit about you and ⁓ how you up in this line of work. ⁓ And then from we're to jump into... What's your philosophy for being the manager of an environmental education division at a county conservation department?

Marcus: Sure, well, as a fellow Midwestern, part of a Midwestern culture is you don't like to talk about yourself. So let's get that out right away. So I'm Marcus Nack. Way back, I was born and raised in Lombard, Illinois. It's a suburb that's

Chris Lee: Right?

Marcus: just outside of Chicago by a short train ride. And when I was growing up, we would spend our weekends, since I was not walking yet, taking road trips on weekends up to Wisconsin, up to the upper peninsula of Michigan, ice fishing, doing whatever we could, getting out of the city so we can have our reset, basically. Whether it be fishing ⁓ camping, oftentimes I would have to tell my teachers when I was in grade school, Hey, that first week in October, I'm not gonna be here because we have our family camping trip. And so as time went on and on and we were about to graduate high school, my friends were like, hey, I'm going to school. Hey, I'm going to school. And I'm like, oh wait, I have to do something after high school. So, right, like what do I do? So the first thing I did is I opened up, actually the US Army has a book that's like, here are all the different.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm. now what do I do? ⁓

Marcus: you know, specialties that you can, know, you can have if you go through the Army. And I looked through the book and was like, ⁓ I could do this, I could do that. I could, you know, do all these different things. And I took a couple of online quizzes on ⁓ the internet thinks I should do as a career, you know? And I just didn't know. I didn't know. Next to the book where, you know, the Army book that I had from a recruiter, ⁓ I also a spreadsheet that I had written out.

Chris Lee: Yeah.

Marcus: that was like, this is how much it costs to do an over-the-counter elk hunt in Wyoming. This is how much it costs if I want to go and hunt mule deer in South Dakota. So I didn't know at the time that would kind of guide me to what I wanted to do, but eventually it did. I went to my community college pretending I didn't know what I really wanted to do. I wanted to study some science, is what I wanted to do. Because I figured if I spend my time on vacations, in these outdoor places, you know, going up north is what we kind of call it. I can find a career where I get to do that thing every day and get to have like the dream job where I can ⁓ on weekends, I can do my recreation ⁓ and you know, I can work kind in the same field. So went to the College of DuPage, ran track out there, transferred up to University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. went through their undergrad degree, which was fantastic. I got to do education, which is when the public comes through and you just kind of talk about what's around you and in little bit of inquiry based ⁓ I also got to lead field trips. I in the summer camp industry up there for quite a while and they kept on ⁓ offering different positions to keep me around for a while. ⁓ After ⁓ my undergraduate program that I went through, I was working for the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point for a couple years. ⁓ know, I was like, educating ⁓ some from Beijing, China for a month so I can make a couple bucks there. And, ⁓ you they taught me a little bit of Mandarin. Don't remember it very well now, but more importantly, they taught me a lot of different physical skills because our communication was so different, right?

Chris Lee: Yeah Okay.

Marcus: So I think that kind of squared, started to square me off when it comes to picking up on cues from people. And then, you know, one job after the next, finally they were like, hey, there's this grant that we can go for. And if we go for this grant, then your school would be paid for. Would you want to be a grad student? And so I kind of kicked around the idea after studying environmental education for, you know, so long, do I really want to go back to school? And what's the process in this? And eventually they're like, first step is you take the GRE, the big graduate exam. You can only get in if you take this exam. And I'm not a great test taker, so I was pretty concerned. ⁓ So, you know, long story short, I took the exam. I got into grad school because we got the grant. I did grad school for a couple of years, and then I was the ⁓ of summer camps. So ⁓ saw lot of ⁓

Chris Lee: Sure, sure, sure.

Marcus: you know, in field practices with environmental ed skills and things that they taught us all through school. And then right after that, I took a seasonal job in Oregon. I worked as a forestry field instructor. I was a hundred yards off the ocean. Right off highway 101, I was teaching kids to teach kids. So it was a season where we teach sixth graders to teach like third graders. And that was a really rewarding job. came back, worked for the university again, and then I applied for jobs and I was coming up blank. I say Chris, I was coming up blank, I applied for about 83 jobs. ⁓ it was like ⁓ was happening because I lived in the same town as the College of Conservation. The radius ⁓ the town to find a conservation job is, yeah, and highly competitive. And... ⁓

Chris Lee: Jesus. ⁓ Yeah, pretty saturated. Yeah, yeah.

Marcus: And so getting a full-time position to live up there was just not happening. So I did what everybody else would do is I took a job just doing like a regular Joe Schmo job. I was working in sales. I was working for a soda company doing sales. And every time I would drive past a bottle or a can from this company, like a part of me would die.

Chris Lee: Right?

Marcus: Like I would feel like my heart drop into my guts and say, ⁓ that's because of me. Like if it wasn't for a position for the things that I'm doing in my current job, that might not be litter on the side of the road or you know how it goes on the side of the highway. But I'd see that ball or that can and it would just, it would kill me. So eventually, ⁓ know, my wife, she's the smarter half of us. She says, you're miserable. You're we need to change something because this isn't sustainable. And so I went on a job board for positions. I saw the name ⁓ ⁓ a student of mine. When I was a grad student, she was an undergrad. I saw her name ⁓ as return email. So I just emailed, hey, I don't know if you remember me, I'm Marcus from up Stevens Point. I see you have a position available. Can you tell me more about that? And of course she remembered me. ⁓ chatted a little bit. interviewed, I actually interviewed for my current position when I was between ⁓ for that company. So like I had finished at a gas station on my way to ⁓ a Kroger or something like that, or a Piggly Wiggly. ⁓ I ⁓ hey, I gotta take a quick call, you know? And I interviewed for my current position. ⁓ ⁓

Chris Lee: Nice. Right, yeah. Yeah, and it's worth noting this was 2020, wasn't it?

Marcus: Yes, yes. Well, it was 2019 going into 20, because I started in April.

Chris Lee: Okay. Okay. Yeah. Right. So yeah. So we didn't at the time you applied, we didn't know what was coming and ⁓ yeah. I that now. Yeah.

Marcus: like the interview went great. You know, I think I think the first thing I what I remember is, you know, you and Kelly were asking me about what's going on in my life now. And I was like, you know what, I'm just I'm hoping got time to hunt turkeys and, you know, those kinds of things. And you were like, it's funny. ⁓ I've just been turkeys the last week or or something like that. I remember we kind of connected there and about ⁓ a couple of

Chris Lee: And yeah, I was on that interview. Yeah.

Marcus: Steve Rinella books we had read or something like that and it kind of worked out great. So wife and I packed up a and a couple of truckloads and we made our way down to Southeast Iowa having never been to Iowa before. My first time to Iowa was when we were moving here. ⁓ So made our down, moved into ⁓ a house.

Chris Lee: Yep.

Marcus: And then that's when my current position started.

Chris Lee: Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, you, you started as naturalists and then, ⁓ and ⁓ right in 2020. So ⁓ April of 2020. So we hit the peak of the pandemic. So there's a hell of a time to move into an education position ⁓ schools shut down and everything. ⁓ was, ⁓ utter chaos. then, I, I, I lose track of time, but sometime after that, I don't know, Kelly ended up

Marcus: Yeah. Yeah. you

Chris Lee: take another job up in Northland where she was from. then that opened up the environmental education manager position. And ⁓ you right into that because you definitely earned that role. So yeah, you've been doing great work here ever since and we're happy to have you. If anybody sees this the ⁓ video for three people that watch this on YouTube, Marcus's background, there's a deer hanging on the wall and there's an archery target paper behind him So when did you get started in hunting and archery? Because that, as mentioned in this podcast before, so anybody that's listened to multiple episodes of this podcast, I talk about there's this guy that works for me that just lives for deer hunting. ⁓ This that guy. ⁓ We're to him right now. So how did that come about and how did that become such a defining part of your life?

Marcus: It's nice to reflect on that again. So my dad started hunting when I was about...

Chris Lee: Thank you.

Marcus: six or seven.

Chris Lee: Doing the six, seven handshake there, yeah.

Marcus: was about six or seven. And my dad, ⁓ would go up to Wisconsin for the rifle season and hunt with some of ⁓ long lifelong friends that lived up there. mean, his ⁓ best from ⁓ first had a cabin up there that he had built. He was a contractor. And so my dad would go up and do deer camp. You know, once you're interested in, you're like, ⁓ I need to learn more about this. So on the weekends between watching Motocross and Looney Tunes and Three Stooges, we would watch a little bit of hunting on TV too. Sometimes it was on ESPN, which doesn't even have that anymore. I don't think, maybe. And the outdoor channels, I mean, like it just kind of evolved. you know, when I was really, when I was younger, I was pretty, I was a sensitive kid.

Chris Lee: Right.

Marcus: I was really in touch with my feelings, I guess is the way to put it. ⁓ When I was really young, I fell off of, I was trying to do a back flip off of a bed. We were jumping on the bed and I fractured my skull. And so I was in a neck brace and after that I was like, I can't get hurt. So I was really sensitive to things and.

Chris Lee: you

Marcus: My parents were like, he's too sensitive to like give this hunting stuff a try. He says he's interested, but pretty sensitive. Let's see, let's see if as time goes on, he wants to do this. So we'd watch, you know, on Sundays, like Bo-Tech would have a show on and we'd watch it. And I'm like, dad, when can I come and do this? And eventually I convinced them ⁓ take me up to do the hunter safety course just outside of Chicago. We were up in ⁓ the Bass Pro Shop in Gurney Mills by Six Flags. and I took the hunter safety course. And then from there, were off to my very first deer camp up in Conover, Wisconsin, just outside of Eagle River. And like my dad's best buddy. So like I've known him for years and it was fun. ⁓ Like we all these jokes with each other and you know, up there, was just a blast. ⁓ I had swooshy pants and three feet of snow because

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm.

Marcus: The deer season in northern Wisconsin is very different than here in Iowa. eventually ⁓ on walk through, I ⁓ took first deer and from there I was just hooked. I mean, it was it was it from there. was, hey, Dad, when's when's camp again? How many days till camp? You know, it's going to be right around Thanksgiving time. And we would always have a countdown so we can go up and spend time his old buddy, Louie. ⁓ And ⁓ would for us one time. We even stayed up there for Thanksgiving. We were like, we've got no deer. So we're going to just keep hunting until we have some luck. So I that.

Chris Lee: ⁓ cool. ⁓ How did mama handle that?

Marcus: You know, I was pretty young. So like maybe differently than was shown to me, but she seemed okay with it. But, ⁓ know, my dad really made it a priority to spend time with me ⁓ this thing because I liked it so much and we could connect about it. Otherwise I was a skateboarder and I was like, you know, doing city stuff and you he couldn't really connect with that too much. But when we were fishing or hunting or hiking, any of that stuff.

Chris Lee: No, okay. Mm-hmm.

Marcus: was kind of the time that I really got to spend with dad. Dad works a lot of hours. He works for a 24 hour roadside assistance for semi's business. And so if he gets a call at two in the morning, he has to go. So a lot of holidays, birthdays, stuff like that, dad was just, he was out working. It's like, Merry Christmas guys, open your gifts. Where's dad? Oh, he's laying on the highway, changing tires so someone else can make it home for Christmas. So the time I got with him, super valuable. We bonded over hunting right away. So back in, you know, 2002, my first season, we made it a point, hey, every year we're gonna get together and we're gonna deer hunt. It had kind of evolved from Wisconsin to Southern Illinois. We have a great group of guys down there. And even when I went to school in Wisconsin, I was paying out of state prices to go hunt Illinois with dad. So from there, I came down here to Iowa, you know, like the Mecca of deer hunting. And I went to a really good archery shop because I dabbled in archery a little bit. And then I really, you know, got technical and almost obsessive with archery. And kind of where I am now. So I am, you know, everything I do revolves around deer hunting, whether it's, you know, putting in some miles at the gym, lifting weights so I can drag a deer out or or

Chris Lee: Yeah.

Marcus: not be as winded on my way up a hill. mean, my, build a freezer. Almost everything I do every day is to help give me an edge or an advantage when I'm in the deer woods.

Chris Lee: it's paid off so I know ⁓ tomorrow you shoot archery league and you're usually one of the top shooters in the local regional league so And then this year you had some pretty good luck in the in the tree stand I know ⁓ and ⁓ fact weekend is the Iowa deer classic ⁓ as we this this will come out after that But ⁓ you'll be your deer up there won't you? ⁓ all right

Marcus: We've got them right here.

Chris Lee: There it is. it is. Look at that beast. Yeah, so anybody that's not watching this on YouTube, you're gonna have to now ⁓ see the ginormous deer rack that Marcus is holding in front of the camera right now.

Marcus: Here he is. I just, you know, have them right here in the podcast studio.

Chris Lee: you should I mean who doesn't have their deer antlers just sitting in their podcast studio, ⁓

Marcus: to go. ⁓ the the deer classic is going on today and I'm shooting the 3D at noon tomorrow. There's 3D shoot where they have foam animals out if you don't know anything about 3D shooting ⁓ and circles ⁓ are points ⁓ and they have some prizes and giveaways and stuff like that. ⁓ So I'm a bunch of guys from the bow shop up there and we're gonna we're gonna shoot them up.

Chris Lee: Nice. Yeah. What did that do your score? You just got the official score back, didn't you?

Marcus: He went 193 and 5 eighths is what he went.

Chris Lee: It's a beast man. It's a beast.

Marcus: Yeah, yeah, pretty exciting. I had them on camera for about a month before I had an opportunity at them. I mean, I scout and hike and like I said, about every moment that, you I'm not spending with family or at work, I'm doing something to give me an edge or an advantage in the deer woods, so.

Chris Lee: Yeah, yeah. you know, for anybody listening, not kidding. He puts in the time. he, you know, Marcus is ⁓ absolutely over hunting. And I've talked about this in previous episodes. ⁓ So this ⁓ so this into the next area of our conversation of, ⁓ of the that you want to be part of. So, you know, I talk about the core of organizational ecology is this whole concept of, of ⁓ looking at organization if you were looking at it through the lens of wildlife management. And job as a leader is to create the type of places where people can thrive. Just like in wildlife management, you create the type of places for the wildlife that you're managing to thrive. And only in doing that do you get the results that you want. In wildlife, it's getting more wildlife or they're healthier or whatever. But in your organization, it's the same thing. It's delivery on mission. It's ⁓ happier people. And one of those things is making sure that you're tying back to what it is that gives them energy. And we've, I've talked about this in the previous episode, actually several of them, how people are wired to pursue that, which it gives them energy. And for you, obviously it's, it's deer hunting in the outdoors and archery. And we build a system around making sure that you have the time ⁓ to out and do that. ⁓ And, and think that's helped create ⁓ a workplace here. And ⁓ that's up in how others have. have interacted with us and have wanted to come join us or stay working with us. Generally, don't have any trouble with recruitment. Now, sometimes the pool of people is just kind of small, but once we get people in our and we do a really good job of trying to reach all the way down into the high school levels, so we try to get like high school interns and local interns so we can kind of vet them in real world. job application rather than a one hour interview. then ⁓ we get them into our ecosystem here, ⁓ if granted, if this is the line of work they want to do, generally want to stay. ⁓ And of time we don't have any trouble finding our summer interns. The last couple times we've had positions open up, we've had ⁓ people knocking on doors ⁓ to apply for ⁓ And so That's the downstream result of creating a fantastic ecosystem. I want to dig into, now know a little bit about you and your background and ⁓ everybody be jealous of this monstrosity of a deer you got this last year. I want to dig into a little bit your philosophy for managing your division. So you're the environmental education manager. ⁓ So you're head of the environmental education division at Des Moines County conservation. So ⁓ we have three divisions. We've got our field division.

Marcus: You

Chris Lee: which is all the parks and land management. And then we got our education division, which does all the naturalist stuff, the school programs and public programs and all that kind of stuff. And you're the head of that. So walk me through a little bit your philosophy on managing managing the division and just how that plays out every day.

Marcus: it's hard for me to put that in words. So I guess can relate it to deer hunting too. ⁓ So let's do that. I'm a diehard deer hunter and I like to do everything I can that gives me an edge to success. ⁓ If we count ⁓ a deer harvest, good hunt, you know, I get to do the thing I like the most.

Chris Lee: Yeah, that's good. Let's do that.

Marcus: So in ⁓ out the things you can do ⁓ give yourself that edge, you have to find ⁓ what you like to do, which you don't like to do. And you to figure out how to have fun doing things. don't what way to explain it, but I think a big philosophy for me is that we got to have fun and lead by example.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm.

Marcus: Usually on the first day of a hire's term with us, we point out, hey, there's going to be times where we need to get down in our computers, look at the screen. We need the program numbers for annual reports, or we need to have certain things that we have to do. That's the not so fun stuff. But in return, we also get to do the really, really fun stuff. For instance, during February once a week, we get to go out with the public, sneak around in the woods like ninjas and call and respond to owls. So the barred owl is mating. If you call out the who cooks for you, we get a lot of return from the owls. So it's kind of like a, know, here's the not fun stuff. You're gonna have to hike a lot of miles. the really fun stuff. We get to check. cameras to see if we have deer on camera. And then the payoff in the end is that you get the satisfaction of having happy community members. It feels good to have like a good teaching session or in my case, if you have a real nice 193 and 5 8s on the wall.

Chris Lee: yeah and I see that Often or hear that because we we ⁓ share a my office is not directly across but it's just on the other side of the area from where you guys are and there's often times that you guys will just be laughing and cackling over there and ⁓ And just you know a time and I'm in you know being the introvert that I am in my office doing my admin computer stuff and you know like man they're they're just hooting it up over there having having a good time that goes back to creating a great workplace ⁓ other thing that i've that i've noticed ⁓ really good at ⁓ i've talked about in previous episodes here of doing like pre and post mortems so every time there's a program ⁓ you do a really good job of of ahead of time ⁓ kind going through okay you know let's make sure we got all the things kind of figured out you know, what ways could this go off the rails? could this be better? ⁓ then after the program's done, almost you do an AAR, after action review. ⁓ And like, you know, what, what did we, how did we intend this to go? ⁓ How did actually go? What, what did we do right? And then what are ways we could improve? And I, and I hear those conversations going on over there and never have I it the vein of you screwed this up. it's always been how do we collectively make this better? Because the focus is just, we just wanna give better programs. We always, always wanna give better programs. let's figure out how to do that ⁓ a non-accusatory, ⁓ passing way of, know, sometimes things just don't go all that well. So we're gonna identify that and work through that. How did come to develop skill? Because it seems like you do that really, really skillfully.

Marcus: I think that working in the camp industry, having thousands of people come through camps and come through some of my programs, whether it be undergrads or the participants in programs, there's lot of reflection, especially if you have like poor performance, or at least you tell yourself it was a poor performance. Oftentimes others don't know. And then when I was learning, environmental education, part of my practicum in college was doing exactly that, stopping and having a reflection with the team and saying, hey, this strategy, even at lunchtime, and we still have programs later in the day, this group really responds well if you XYZ. So if you have a call and response that's really, really good, if I yell, know, one, two, three, eyes on me. You know, they like to say one, two eyes on you and they will be dead silent listeners. Right. And so if you can tell the team at lunchtime, hey, they're really responsive to this. If you're having any issues with behaviors or getting them to quiet down a little bit so you can drive, you know, your your points home on your lesson. Here's a strategy that has been working really, really well. Sometimes at lunch, it was it was often an opportunity for the educators to kind of get together in a quick huddle and say,

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

Marcus: Man, group B is having a real tough time sitting still when we're looking at microscopes. And then the rest of the day we know, okay, instead of having them sit in front of microscopes, we gotta run these kids. Like, we need to get them up, we need to get them moving. the end of the day, you can really tell the difference when the team is working really nicely together or when the team has some shortcomings. So I think that just to answer your question, the development over time.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm.

Marcus: having thousands of kids through summer camps, through field trips, there is always an opportunity to improve. And then, you know, when you think you didn't do a good job or you think that you failed at something, taking a moment to ask why, not just I failed, maybe next time will be better, but like why ⁓ specifically it fail? And to give that like some deep, deep thought, because it could be useful to the people around you at lunch too.

Chris Lee: Yeah, and that analytical view, think is a bit of a superpower for anybody, really. That perpetual drive to always be better and not just ⁓ browbeat of, that didn't go like I planned. I guess I just suck. But instead, taking approach of, that didn't go as I planned. Where did this break down? And then kind of taking a scientific approach to, let's see. Was it a preparation thing? Was it just ⁓ not being able to adjust on the fly and really digging in and then that then informs how to do better. It's a growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. what I see ⁓ ⁓ this shows up with you in a management position in with your vast experience ⁓ leading and programs over all years that you've done that. you've got a lot more experience than most of the people that come and work for you. And so it'd be really easy for you to just come in and say, well, here's what you should do. But I don't know that I've ever seen you do that. What I see is you come in and you're asking questions, and especially like in an after action thing of, all right, so maybe this didn't quite go as we planned. So what happened? And what could you do differently? And, and, and you're leading the discussion rather than, than demanding from on high of, know, this is here's, let me give you all the answers. You're, you're leading. And I think you also do a really good job of recognizing that the way you might do things is not the same as the way the people you're leading are going to do things. And you give them that, that flexibility. And I think that shows up really, really well in their, their confidence over time. and their willingness to perpetually improve. Is that just a product of having to do that with kids? Oftentimes you can't just command kids to do things because they're going to fight back, but if you let them come to their own conclusions, or where did that come from? that how you were raised? I'm curious.

Marcus: Mm-hmm. So earlier in my career, I would stretch myself too thin at times because I found like I was, I was producing some pretty high quality work. And then if somebody recognized that and, you know, a coworker and said, you did a really good job on that. What should I do? I would offer myself to help them. And then

Chris Lee: Hmm. Yeah, I feel that. ⁓ yeah, here, let me do that for you.

Marcus: offer myself to help. Yeah. And then offer myself to help another person on another thing and offer myself to help another person on another thing. And eventually I was like pulling myself thin everywhere. And I was like, I'm I'm doing job. You know, like I I'm admittedly volunteering myself to do that. And eventually I something had to give and.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Marcus: you there were like cues that you can pick up on that you can only learn if you fail ⁓ if you ⁓ up on it, you can make a change, you know, like that. And some of those skills are like very important, especially if you're teaching, ⁓ up on a social cue of, hey, group isn't interested. They're all, you know, eyes down on the table, sitting ⁓ down this. And instead of stretching yourself thin, ⁓ like I did in the past, kind of helping people to identify like, did you look for this this time? That might help if the, you know, the kids are just slogging along for your lesson. So try to pick up on some of those cues maybe, because I, there's only one of me. I couldn't help everybody. So I think that's where that started, Develop Chris is And then after time went on, ⁓ it a lot of people that I was, you know, with.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm.

Marcus: And then when they found success and they were excited about it, I could share that excitement with them. And then it was like, everybody is like vibing.

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm. Yeah. That ties back to your working genius. I was just checking on the wall. I have the whole list of everybody's working genius. And you have discernment and enablement as your two working geniuses. And so that enablement is coming. That's that place where you want to help. But I think this unique superpower that you've cultivated ties back to that discernment in that you can now have these conversations and The help comes from helping others ⁓ what the is for improving themselves ⁓ and their program delivery or ⁓ whatever is. So ⁓ you're helping. You're just not offering yourself to do the work. And then with your genius of discernment, you get lot of energy from going through different ideas ⁓ and narrowing down.

Marcus: Mm-hmm

Chris Lee: which ones are likely to work best. so from a mentorship perspective, that's a really great genius have. So ⁓ if interested in Working Genius, if you haven't listened to previous episodes of this podcast, ⁓ Jeremy I talk about this all the time, ⁓ it's six types of Working Genius. You can go to workinggenius.com, read the book, ⁓ six of Working Genius, learn all about it. It's ⁓ great, stuff. ⁓ There's too about it, I think, on the website parksandrestoration.com. So that's my little side note there. ⁓

Marcus: Yeah.

Chris Lee: ⁓ I want to spin off a little bit. You recently started your own podcast. ⁓ And so tell me about that.

Marcus: Okay, so it's a newer thing. I've got about six episodes out. My podcast is called the Paid Time Outdoors Podcast. You can find it on Spotify. You can find it on YouTube. I even made a Facebook page. I haven't advertised it a ton lately, or a ton I should say, but I feel like I need to get ⁓ some episodes really my belt before things improve. But ⁓ essentially, yeah.

Chris Lee: It's gonna be a chart topper now after all these millions of listeners jump over to there Smash that like button yeah ⁓

Marcus: Hey, shout out, click like and subscribe down there. Yeah, but I found that ⁓ have a lot of interests. mean, I like a lot of different things, not only deer hunting, but, know, like I like throwing darts, shooting pool. I was a rugby player. I was an athlete. So I like athletics. I like running. You know, I like a lot of different things. ⁓ And I've met a lot of really interesting people up to now in my life. And kind of dissected like what it is that people do. And the Paid Time Outdoors podcast is all about how people spend so much time working so hard just to make it to that weekend or just to make it to use the paid time off or a sick day. Just don't tell the boss when it's a sick day. To use that time to do the things that they love the most. Because like if I'm going to take a vacation, you know, there's a day where I can take off a Friday.

Chris Lee: Thank

Marcus: and then I have a four day weekend, I'm gonna concentrate all the stuff that I really care about, really wanna do in my life in those four days. So the podcast dives right into that and asks, I asked the guests on the podcast to pick one of the topics that they love to do the most, that they make time for and surprise me with it in the podcast. We'll catch up, talk about some jobs that they've had in their life as they were coming up. And then I kind of say, hey, so what's the topic we're talking about? What's the thing that interests you so much that you're gonna use your paid time off that you've earned working your butt off to go do? And that's what my podcast is all about.

Chris Lee: I like it because I there's a You can learn a lot about a person by what they how they choose to spend their time and And ⁓ what allow their calendar to be filled with outside of the working hours, right? and so think that's some really it's an interesting a different way ⁓ of learning about people that you're talking to Rather than you know, your background and then know, the typical interview questions when you approach it of what are you doing in your free time and why? That's great. So I'd encourage everybody to go out there and listen to the Paid Time Outdoors podcast. can find it, I imagine, on all the podcast platforms, Spotify and Apple, which I guess there's probably others, but those are about the only two that anybody ever listens to, I think. And yeah, check that out. Awesome.

Marcus: So what have you been doing with your time off lately, Chris?

Chris Lee: work and raising the family. That's about it.

Marcus: Yeah. Here's a question for you then. So you have your interests and your time off, right? Where you would take some time to do, I would guess river things. If I were to guess what you like to do, because you're the river man. ⁓ Have your weekends changed a lot since your kids have different interests than you do?

Chris Lee: Okay. That's good guess, yeah, for sure. Yeah, yes ⁓ Not well, I guess is the short answer ⁓ So like a lot of parents we're we're in that Dealing with with ball and sports stuff. So my daughter plays travel softball ⁓ wife was a softball player growing up and so, you know, she's kind of being into that ⁓ daughter's kind of Getting it. She's 10. So, you know, she's not like

Marcus: Mm-hmm. And how does that fit in your life? Hahaha! Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee: doing the full on travel all over the place yet, the first weekend of spring we've got a tournament a couple hours away, we gotta get a hotel room, and of course we had to get one with a pool. so there's that, and then I was just sitting down with wife the other day and she's like, so we need to go over weekends where we're looking at having softball tournaments, and it's like this one, and then that one, and then that one, and I'm like, you're really fucking up my summer, woman. you we're gonna have to have a talk about this." She's like, get over it, you know. So there's that. It's balancing that family life with really all I want to do is just go down to the river, pull my camper down there, go out on the boat, catch some fish, hang out, soak up some sun, maybe sit the sandbar, drink a couple beers, and just, you know, love life. But we're gonna do this running around thing. And that's what parents do, and I recognize that, and that's fine. My daughter likes to fish too, so. everything in life is a balance, like, you know, just like in conservation, everything's a balance. So we're, we're trying to strike that and, and figure that out as we go. And then my, boy, he's seven. Um, he's got a broken arm right now, but once it heals up, he'll get into soccer. And then who knows how that'll consume our life. my, my daughter is interested in sports. My boy is absolutely nuts for soccer. The kid sleeps with a soccer ball. Uh, so it'll be interesting to see. that goes in the future.

Marcus: then I know that we're taking a leadership course right now that we're some different interesting ⁓ leadership A lot of that stuff in our course that we're taking kind of comes up and you say, hey, wait a second, I already do that. ⁓ upon ⁓ you that like something you learn from a mentor is something that is a great practice, not only at your career, but in your private life as well. ⁓ Have been

Chris Lee: Yeah.

Marcus: using any of your leadership, ecosystematic leadership findings? Have you been using that at home as well?

Chris Lee: Hmm. Yeah. See listeners. All right. So this this is Marcus's superpower here. He's a guest on my show and he's asking me questions, right? So I don't know that I've ever anyone that has as ⁓ high EQ as this guy has and and this this is how he is. He's just interested in humans, which makes him actual great human being. So to get to question, we are taking this class. It's called the Better Culture. mindset leadership class. And I'll take a moment to put a plug in here. I am interviewing Brett Hogeveen. He's the co-founder ⁓ of Better Culture, is this organization does this leadership training. And it's all about building incredible cultures. ⁓ And I absolutely love because I truly that if you just focus on the culture, you focus on the ecosystem, you do that first. That is the one and job of a leader, period, full stop. And you focus on that, then everything else comes as a result. Um, and so I'm really digging this class. They've got some really great insights. Brett, uh, is also the host of the better culture podcast. And I've been following that loving some of his episodes. And so, uh, through the, course that we're taking together, uh, I was able to talk to the facilitator. She reached out to better culture folks and said, you know, Hey, Chris, you guys own podcast. So she connected me with Brett And on March 27th noon, ⁓ hosting an interview with Brett Hogeveen from Better Culture. And if anybody wants to be part of that, you can simply go to parksandrestoration.com and the registration link is right there. So that listens to the show is welcome join us as part of that. So to answer your question, leadership concepts that I'm applying at home at the core it ⁓ is just this of a great ecosystem. I recognize that I'm not going to get all of the details right. I'm sure in 20 years I'm going look back at my parenting and be like, ⁓ man, I screwed my kids up. Because all parents do. You're ultimately a product of all the ways that your parents screwed you up. But they do the best they can. ⁓ that's what my wife and I are trying to do. I'm sure we don't get it right all the time, but we're trying. ⁓ But the core of it,

Marcus: Yeah.

Chris Lee: We were just trying to create a great ecosystem. I mean, we can have days where, you know, we're arguing, we're fighting, kids aren't getting along, you know, it's just, it's a typical parent stuff that you deal with a 10 and seven year old, which was kind of yesterday. But at the end of every day, you know, I'm there to put the kids to bed. We hugs. We say good night. I love you. See you in the morning. I'm there every morning, almost every morning to wake them up. give hugs and you know I love yous as I head out the door to go to work I figure if I get that right I can screw up about anything else and long as they know that they're coming home to ⁓ to a that built on trust and love you got a lot leeway on the on the detail stuff you know so that's you know it's just just trying to create a great ecosystem ⁓ do I you know, wanna do some things different? Yeah, for sure. You know, like I would like to on more trips and give them more experiences and that kind of stuff. But you know, ⁓ you what you can. So that, mean, that's kind of the core of it. The other thing that I'm really trying to do is this concept of energy. And I talk about it a lot on this show is what it my kids find energy in?

Marcus: Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee: And this applies to anybody, whether it's your kids, whether it's your coworkers, whether it's the people that you lead. you can ⁓ if you can figure out what it is that they find energy in, what it is that drives them, their, you know, their elements, what is it puts them in their element. Like with you, it's, it's, it's deer hunting hands down. Like that is absolutely obvious with other people. It's not so obvious. ⁓ we have a guy that works for us. His thing is racing, right? You know, he races on the weekends. and just he He loves things that go fast and he races a sprint car. That's his thing. And so yeah, we're going to, we're to try to the conditions that, that cultivate that. I'm trying to do the same thing with my family. I just, you know, just what is that, that they get excited about and a 10 and seven year old, you know, you, you maybe don't have it yet. My boy's clearly excited about soccer. My daughter, I'm not really sure. She likes softball enough, but I think it's just because she's got some friends there that do it. I don't know. We'll see. But I'm just, I'm always trying to keep my eyes open for what is it that makes them tick, you know, because manifests in so many ways in life. it's gonna show up in the career that you choose, you know, because if you choose a career that drives a wedge between you and what you love to do, then you're gonna be miserable.

Marcus: Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee: And if there's that you love and you can ⁓ a career around doing that kind of stuff, like I have this inkling that my daughter has this bend towards art. She's always and making things pretty. And so that career path, not necessarily as an artist, but are there career paths that tied to that more so than doing other things, right? And so just trying to follow the energy, I think that's absolutely critical. It's critical in ecosystems, it's critical in workplaces, it's critical in families. But the show's not about me, this is supposed to be about you, Right? Yeah, thanks a lot, man. Geez. But so what are some of the takeaways that you've had from the Better Culture Leadership program and how's that manifested either at work or in your life?

Marcus: Mm-hmm. Sorry for hijacking your podcast, but yeah. ⁓ I've had some really good ones that have come out of the class. first off, I think it's great that you're taking time with your family, with your kids to build like a really good habitat at home. Cause your home range, your home habitat really has to be ⁓ place where you don't have so much anxiety and you have to be comfortable. One the things in the leadership course that rang really true in my mind, was that anxiety is the foe what's it, anxiety is the foe of communication and is the foe of like learning. Like you can't, if you're anxious, ⁓ like that first, the base one ⁓ taxonomy need. ⁓ you're not comfortable, if you can't, you know, live in a place where you can be yourself, you're not gonna be able to learn, not gonna be able to communicate, you're not gonna be able to understand or comprehend.

Chris Lee: Yeah. Yep. Right. Yeah.

Marcus: Comprehend is the word I'm looking for. So I found that that rings really true that before I can dive into, you know, something that's really upsetting to me, I need to slow down ⁓ think about it first. Like is, is there something here that is making somebody anxious ⁓ I, before I even bring this up at all? Is it like, I'm so jazzed up because I have so many lesson plans that are coming up. ⁓ really anxious to just to get out and ⁓ teach this lesson and teach this lesson. there an anxiety there that is so strong that comprehension of like a small task or a small thing is just floating right past you? ⁓ if I can sense that the anxiety is high, that is not when I'm gonna ask something of a staff member or ⁓ my wife, if she's really anxious about something, that's the last time to say, do you mind if I go out with the boys tonight? You know?

Chris Lee: Right?

Marcus: So that rings true for me in both my work habitat and my home range, I would say. That's a really good one. ⁓

Chris Lee: Mm-hmm. Yeah Yep Yeah, well and and again this getting back to to your superpower of having this high emotional intelligence and that you can got a really good an act pun for being to read that in people right mr. Mack there But yeah, I you do I and I've seen that both inside and outside of work and And so having that rather you know, like I've got time to talk about this thing. We're going to talk about this thing. Well, no, like you need to need to understand the mental state of the person that you're going be talking to or else that communication is just going to, it's just not going to work really. So that's, yeah, I thought that was a really good insight to among many of this, man, this better culture leadership program has been pretty incredible. I've done a lot of leadership classes, different leadership programs. This one, it's a cut above, man. It, it, uh, it really gets at the heart of

Marcus: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee: of a lot of things, this people-focused kind of concept I think is ⁓ critical. ⁓

Marcus: Definitely. There are some post-it notes that I have on the side of my computer, you know, from things that I've learned in the course. One of them is about, you know, what I just spoke to. The other one is when there is like a major breakdown, if something isn't getting done or there is a job that's ⁓ falling by the wayside or ⁓ performance, there's method that they use, you you reevaluate ⁓ skill, or ability. Like, is this an effort, skill, or ability? And like from there, rebuilding it, after you kind of frame it that way, makes a huge difference to me as well. It's like, hey, I can't blame you. This is just something you haven't learned yet. if it's like, you're just ⁓ being that's something completely different.

Chris Lee: Yeah, right. that yes, exactly. Two very, different things. ⁓ know, same core things that maybe brought the conversation up, but two very different sources of issue. Yeah, it's fantastic. So anybody listening, you're want to find out more about this, ⁓ join us the conversation with Brett Hogeveen ⁓ on March at noon. ⁓ Sign up that at parksandrestoration.com. All right, Marcus, I want to close with this.

Marcus: Mm-hmm.

Chris Lee: So for those listening, most of them are in the parks or conservation field or something adjacent to it. What would be ⁓ key takeaway ⁓ you would offer to those in the field that want to be ⁓ leaders, maybe they're or just better coworkers, but that want to just do in their roles? Because like I said, bring a lot of really great stuff to your role as a manager of an environmental education division. What would be ⁓ takeaway that you would leave listeners with as we end the show today.

Marcus: Great question. And to answer it without giving it a ton of thought, ⁓ have fun. And within fun, there is also like play. It's really, really important that people make time to play because there is a certain amount of happiness that comes with it. And there is skill growth that comes from play and happiness, you know, ⁓ mostly play.

Chris Lee: Yeah.

Marcus: If you're having fun with a group of people, it seems like you bond with that group of people differently than if you are just completing tasks and checking boxes. So my suggestion is to have fun, play. And think that that changes the dynamic of your staff, your family, of your group, ⁓ of tribe, simply by and having fun.

Chris Lee: Yeah, I think that's sage advice and I can see there's an ecological parallel there. Like that's a universal force because like you think about the species out there, oftentimes you'll see they're developing skills through play, especially in younger You've seen lion, you've all seen the ⁓ Geographic videos of the lion cubs ⁓ each other, you know, and the baby fawns doing the jumping up and down thing. ⁓ and the baby foxes practicing their pounces and stuff. Like play, but it's so much more than that. ⁓ skill development through play. think kind of a universal thing out there. We forget that in our workplaces. I know I'm certainly guilty of that. I'm a very kind of serious person. ⁓ And ⁓ it's having someone like you ⁓ on staff here that can bring that insight and be like, come on, we're going to slow this down.

Marcus: Thank you.

Chris Lee: brings some smiles into this place, into this ecosystem. And I do appreciate that. right, ⁓ we'll close with that, folks. Thanks for listening. If you get a chance, go check out Marcus's podcast, Paid Time Outdoors. ⁓ And someone wanted to connect with you, Marcus, what would be the best way to do that on the interwebs? How would they find you other than through the podcast?

Marcus: Thanks. ⁓ You can go on to the Paytime Outdoors Facebook page. also have a YouTube channel you can communicate with me through there. Those are two really good places to get a hold of me. Thank

Chris Lee: All right, if you want to know more about the parks and restoration or the upcoming meetups that we have Not just the one with with Brett, which is on March 27th, but there's one coming up with Dr. Nick Eskew he is from the United Kingdom ⁓ and he runs ⁓ the The conservation careers podcast so I'm gonna be on his And then he's going to do a meetup here on the Parks and Restoration podcast. And we're going to be talking about an international perspective of wildlife management. So what he does is he talks to ⁓ work in the field of wildlife conservation from around the world and a very broad ⁓ perspective talks about how people can get into that type of career, no matter where you're at ⁓ around globe. I like this ⁓ this concept when we first connected. He said that one of his emails to me, said, I see that talk a lot about hunting on your podcast. He said ⁓ something to the extent of that can be kind of controversial. ⁓ we talk about that on my show? And I'm like, controversial? Like, no, like hunting is conservation here in the United States, ⁓ he has an international perspective and, you know, outside of North America, conservation and hunting are not. synonymous like they are here and so I'm really looking forward to having that conversation if you want to be part of that the registration link is on parksandrestoration.com with that Marcus for being on the show good luck ⁓ luck at the bow shoot over the weekend and be sure to ⁓ rub it in that ginormous 193 inch rack ⁓ up at the up there at the Deere Classic ⁓ and people feel real bad ⁓ so

Marcus: Thanks for having me.

Chris Lee: Thanks for being here folks. Thanks for all you do out there and we will talk to you again in a couple weeks. Take care.