From Ordinary to Extra Ordinary. Oh yes you can!

There are so many lessons in the book Ordinary to Extra-Ordinary that apply: show up everyday prepared; you are enough! Don’t let imposter syndrome settle onto your shoulders; keep your network growing and flourishing always; don’t be distracted by the money; know WHY you work. And many more!

Pattie Dale Tye has 30+years in a very successful corporate career filled with insights into how her career was extra ordinary, even though her beginnings were very ordinary. Giving back to move forward, grace and gratitude and always remembering the needs of others served her so well in career. She is now a Forbes author who has published a book full of those types of career learnings

https://pattiedaletye.com/

The Interview Transcript

Hugh Ballou:
Welcome to The Nonprofit Exchange. This is Hugh Ballew. We’re recording episode number 415. I thought it was last week, but this week is #415. That’s a good number. We’ve done this many times. So we’ve talked to people about leadership. Today’s episode is very unique. So I’m going to we’re going to talk about, you know, the unique title we have today is from ordinary to extra ordinary. Notice that’s two words. Oh, yes, you can. Patty Dale Tye is our guest today. So Patty, tell Patty Dale, you go by the two names, tell people about yourself and a little bit about your background and your passion for this work that you do.

Pattie Dale Tye:
Thank you, Hugh. And boy, 415 episodes. I’d call that S-U-C-C-E-S-S. That is amazing. I’m fortunate now to be in my third stage of career, which is why I wrote the book, When Forbes Called and Asked. But I had a long 35-year corporate career with companies like AT&T. And most recently, when I retired, I was with Humana. increasingly large scale responsibilities, accountabilities, and ability to make changes in the lives of some of the most vulnerable that walk in our country. And I was able to, when Forbes called, say yes when they asked me to put some life lessons and leadership lessons on paper. and share with others because, like the title says, you can go from ordinary to extraordinary with passion and purpose. I, Hugh, grew up in a very southern town, small town, North Florida, was nobody special, yet I ended up reporting to the CEO of a Fortune 15 company and just did some amazing things. And I know that there was a strong cord of faith that allowed me to get from that little hometown to somebody that’s here, somebody that you want to talk to. So that’s it in a nutshell.

Hugh Ballou:
That’s it in a nutshell. So she’s talking about those of you who are watching on video can see it. If you’re listening to the podcast, it’ll be on the webpage for this episode. Ordinary to extra hyphen ordinary, achieving remarkable career success through passion, purpose, and preparation. Patty Dale Tye, who’s our guest. So say a little more about the inspiration and the background that led you to writing this book.

Pattie Dale Tye:
Absolutely. It had really three purposes. One was to say thank you. I bet a lot of why you do what you do is to give gratitude for those along your journey. And they continue to, you know, I’ll be part of your journey now. But a book is a beautiful way to say thank you. And I dedicated it to my parents, who were my very best teachers and role models, and to my husband, who has been wind at my back for 34 years last week. And so it was a great way to say thank you. It was a wonderful way to give back. I’m not, we are not blessed with children. I have nieces and nephews, Sunday school teacher, et cetera, all that. But I don’t have those human beings that I’m lifting out to the world. to do extraordinary things. So I thought, let me take my life learnings and share them with people that I will never know in hopes that they can do two things, have a better life and give others a better life. So it’s for leaders. I think leaders are having, I think this is one of the most difficult times to lead in all candor. I think we just, need to get our footing back under us and remember that we are a connectional society and we need to, you know, lead and we need to be led. So that’s enough of that and have teams. But then the third reason was to build a platform of, continue a platform of generosity. I have been given much in my life in terms, I believe, of talents, of connections, of spirit, of understanding purpose. And this allows me to be generous in those learnings to people I will never know. So generosity is a big, big thing in my book. Those were my main inspirations.

Hugh Ballou:
Those are all really good leadership traits, too, aren’t they?

Pattie Dale Tye:
They are. It’s funny how that works, isn’t it? I like to tell, I mentor young folks, older folks. I’ll go on a walk at my zoo this afternoon. I’m on the board of the Louisville Zoo. One of my favorite places to do mentoring conversations is a walk through the zoo on a beautiful day. And that is what today is. And isn’t it nice to walk and be around nature and all that, you know, we’ve been gifted with. But when I’m talking to people who get lost, And we all get lost in our career, right? We all get lost. I try to remind them to of the cord that is there through their life from when they were even in high school and junior high. Did they have leadership roles? I was the chaplain in my church choir. So where were your early leadership traits coming forward and why? And then go to the next and go to the next. And two things are happening. Number one, you’re doing an inventory of self-worth. And when you are stuck in career, you need that. You need to go back and remember how wonderful you are. And you are. Everybody stumbles. You just got to go back, recenter, and put one foot in front of the other. So you learn what a wonderful trait pattern you have in your quilt, if you will. And then I remind them, career is a long journey. Hugh, you know this, 35, 40, heck, if you’re lucky, maybe 50 years, 60 years. It’s one of the most important journeys you will take. I don’t count it as higher than my journey of faith or family or health in all candor, but it’s just below. And it enables all of those very precious journeys in life. So I try to remind people it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Stand back up. put one foot in front of the other and remember how wonderful you are.

Hugh Ballou:
It’s a marathon for life, and I think we forget that. You know, we were talking before we went live with this interview, and I had shared with you that I’m an expert in what I do because I’m old enough to have made all the mistakes. And that does qualify as learning opportunities. And I think sometimes, especially, we’re talking to nonprofit leaders and hopefully some clergy, and you and I talked about we’re aligned with our faith and we show up in the world as people of faith. The purpose of the show is not to take a faith position or a political position. But it is to show up as who we are, and that shapes who I am. And there’s no reason to soft pedal that or work around it. But it’s principle-centered leadership. And I think what you talked about, we’re in times where people have really compromised the principles. And getting back to the basics, but let’s explore just a minute what you talked about in uncovering our potential. I stepped in front of a choir at 18, never having been in a choir. Somehow God blessed my journey because I had a 40-year career. So I went from 12 choir members to 225 over the career. But applying myself, and I did make a lot of mistakes, but I had potential that I just didn’t really know I had. But somebody believed in me when I was nothing but potential. So, two sides of this coin. How do we proceed when we are nothing but potential? And how do we empower others? You talked about mentoring other leaders. How do we help others when we think they have potential they don’t see?

Pattie Dale Tye:
Right. And we all have potential. We are all specially made. I was blessed that at a very young age, 14, no, 15, the youngest of three, many life lessons at the dinner table, but one that my parents were concerned about was that they realized one day, she doesn’t talk. She doesn’t say a word. She gets through the meal. She leaves the table, you know, happy kid, but she doesn’t say much. And by the way, a few years later, my husband would be at that same dinner table and realize you couldn’t get a word in edgewise because I’m from a very vociferous family. But they were concerned that I was not landing on potential that I might have. And they Took me to a place called Florida Presbyterian College. You may know that name Hugh.

Hugh Ballou:
I used to live there. Ah St. Petersburg, Florida.

Pattie Dale Tye:
Yes, absolutely. Well, they had a specialty in Helping young people find their aptitudes their true aptitudes now when I arrived I hoped that I would have the aptitude that you have which is a music i thought i’m gonna go to juilliard i’m gonna be this great pianist blah blah blah blah And that is not what showed up. And aptitudes, as you know, are your natural gifts, your innate strengths. And it’s important for all of us to know those things. But you don’t stop there, because you can have strengths and skills, but no passion for that strength or skills. So I’ll give you an example. You could have an aptitude called fine motor dexterity. And you could use that to be passionate about surgery, or you could use that to be passionate about knitting or art. So you first need to understand your skills and abilities. And then as you mature into life, you look around and you go, I found I’m passionate about this. I’m going to direct my skills there. OK, back to 15 years old. I find out that I love to bring order to chaos. I am analytical. I’m a problem solver. And I’m a little bit competitive. And I have the tiniest bit of tonal memory, so a little bit of music in me. At that point, they take you into another room. And the beautiful thing is, they’re going to tell you the career that you are destined to succeed in. And that, to be at 15, to hear that, was wow. Cut to the chase. Get me to Juilliard. Well, Hugh, when they pulled back the sheet and showed me what my destiny was, it was life insurance salesperson. And I write as a 15-year-old, I burst into tears, got in the family station wagon, pouted the whole way home. But Hugh, do you know that 10 years later, I was Mutual New York’s one of their top life insurance salespeople? Wow. Because I learned how to take those aptitudes. And I stumbled. I refused to be insurance for a long time until I realized I was passionate. about numbers. I was passionate about helping people that were in chaos find the calm. I was passionate about being able to talk to people about a subject, death, that nobody wants to talk about because there is a way to not have it show up so much in a catastrophic way. So you get what I’m saying. I learned that I could take those skills, and if I was passionate about using them, The world was my oyster and it happened to be a life insurance salesman oyster. Go figure.

Hugh Ballou:
Wow. Wow. So for the listener out there, how do they discover their passion?

Pattie Dale Tye:
Okay, sure. Sorry about that. I got caught up in my own thing and I’m a giver backer. So I should have done that. So I went to the Johnson O’Connor Research Foundation. They are in, I know they’re in Houston. They’re probably online now. They’re in New York. They’re in St. Petersburg. and other places in Florida, but you’ve all heard of Gallup. You can use the Gallup Strength Finders to do this very similar work. I love Richard Bowles, What Color is Your Parachute? And he even has now taken that concept and helped what color is your parachute in retirement? What color is your parachute when you’re a teenager? So there’s something very, basic and basic, but in deep importance about knowing who you are and knowing those God-given strengths and talents. But then at a point in life, saying, how do I apply those to the places I’m passionate? Because then, as I had a minister say, the work would be no work. It would just be a joy to do. And so there we go.

Hugh Ballou:
There we go. So you talk about getting comfortable with the uncomfortable. What do you mean by that?

Pattie Dale Tye:
We are in a constant state of change, not only as a society, and goodness knows we go through a lot of change in society, technology, etc. But as a people, we are not meant to stay still. We are meant to rest, but we aren’t meant to stay still. And for me, it means get comfortable that you will not always be the expert. It’s OK. In fact, if you bend your life or fold it into a place where you’re only the expert in that space, you’re going to have a little life. Look at all the people learning how to play pickleball now. That’s change. That was uncomfortable to pick up that racket, even if you were a tennis player, and learn a new way to get that ball across the net and to score points. Change is inevitable. When you change, there is a period of discomfort. And I learned to get very comfortable with this period of discomfort. What I would do is I’d name it. What’s making me uncomfortable today? Why am I stuck? Why am I ornery? Why am I in a tough, mood in a tough place. And those could be something that happened in a day or, Hugh, it could be something that said, you have outgrown this position you’re in. You need to make a change. You need to look reality in the mirror or with reality in the mirror and say, I’m not comfortable here. It’s time for me to get uncomfortable and move to something else. And the older you get, For a while, the less comfortable that is to be uncomfortable, because you want to show up as an expert. But everybody has to learn and start over if we’re going to thrive as human beings the way that God intended.

Hugh Ballou:
I’m doing that at 78. I’ll tell you about that when we finish here. But the uncomfortable part, I’m thinking about the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. I think he was talking about Christian worship. He said, comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. And I think you and I serve as mentors for others. So that’s probably appropriate for us to help people be comfortable with their discomfort, right?

Pattie Dale Tye:
Yes. Acknowledge it. Write it down. What’s happening right now? If you have researched your aptitudes and your passions, and this isn’t lining up with that, there you go. It’s time to move along. It’s time to do something different.

Hugh Ballou:
Yeah. I’ve done that. I’m in my third career. I’ve done that. And I’m enjoying my third career. Verity did his best work in his 80s. That was his third period. So I use that. I’m no Verity, but hey, there’s a model to go after. So you also talk about, laddering up, ladders up, by everything ladders up. Talk about that a minute.

Pattie Dale Tye:
We have a limited amount of capacity. We have limited real estate, if you will, in our lives every day, right? Time is the great perishable piece of our life, piece of our world. And so I believe that everything needs to build on something else. And I’ve mentioned a couple of times in this conversation about that cord. that you can look back, Lou, Hugh, you can look back at your life and see the cords and see the thick colors of the cords that have remained the constant. They might have started out little, but they got bigger and bigger and stronger and stronger. That’s laddering up. It’s saying nothing is throwaway. Everything is building on the other. That’s one way to think about laddering up. The other way I think about laddering up is lifting while you climb. So don’t just go up. Turn around, reach back, and give somebody a hand, because somebody gave you a hand. I’ll guarantee it. So that lift while you clink, while you climb, weave your hands together and say, step here. Somebody’s done that for me. I need to do it for you.

Hugh Ballou:
You’re listening to this interview on a podcast or watching it on a video. And if you can’t get all these tips, don’t worry. There is a transcript. You go to the the nonprofit exchange.org and you’ll find this episode listed. Yeah. Look, look for this, this title, um, about, um, extra ordinary. So Patty Dale, there’s, um. The nature of your business, you call yourself a coach, a consultant, what do you call yourself?

Pattie Dale Tye:
Right now, I’m actually a chief operating officer for a law firm, go figure that, talking about reinventing yourself after 15 years in the healthcare space. But these folks needed someone with business leadership and I have that, so I’m doing that That led me, candidly, to have a little bit of time to research writing a book. And so I’m doing public speaking on my book, just like this, in a way to get this, what I think is a very simple message, but an important message out to folks, that they deserve a seat at the stage, on the stage, talking across to you, just like anybody else.

Hugh Ballou:
Wow. Kudos for that. So you’ve talked about mentoring young leaders. What are some of the turnarounds or some aha moments they’ve had in working with you?

Pattie Dale Tye:
Oh, gosh. I remember helping a young woman who was very disenfranchised with where she was, but scared to death to take the next step. Just again, sounds simple but true, sit back and say, what do I bring to the table? What are the beautiful skills that I have? And why am I uncomfortable where I am, first of all? Well, she was undervalued. She was not in a group of people that were stimulating her or helping her grow in a direction she knew she needed to grow in. But she was scared to death. first big job change. Helping her understand, A, how good she was at what she did, B, that it wasn’t like breaking up with a boyfriend. You could leave these people in a better place, stay in touch with them. Help them any way you can for the rest of your life. But they served a need in your life, and they no longer do. And then when she was comfortable with those two things, she was able to lift her eyes up, Hugh, and look three or four more layers up in an organization and feel confident in going after that. And she did go after it, and she got it. So I just gave her courage. I gave her courage. That’s a lot of it. It’s letting people talk. And it’s just redirecting them. I’ll tell you the other just real quick one. Nine times out of 10, I’m also being called with the opposite. I want to leave. I’m tired of this. I want to go do something different. This is the shiny new toy. And when we sit back and really look at what they have right now and where they are and where they are able to grow in their current role, This one over here doesn’t look nearly as shiny. We get restless. Sometimes we wanna be too uncomfortable, right? We get restless and we look at the shiny new thing and understanding sometimes that where you are is where you’re supposed to be and it’s not time to go, but there will be a time to go. So just keep lifting your eyes up and looking for it, but this might not be your time.

Hugh Ballou:
The word that comes to my mind when I think about you and your work is philanthropy, which is not really about money. It’s the love of humankind in the source language. So I’m going to share for those people watching, for those people who are not watching, they’re listening on a podcast. It’s Patty P-A-T-T-I-E. D-A-L-E-T-Y-E PaddyDaleTye.com. So Paddy, walk us through, and we go there. Of course, there’s a tab at the top for your book. And halfway down, Ordinary to Extraordinary, there’s a cover of your book. And they can probably find it anywhere they find books. But what else will they find on your website?

Pattie Dale Tye:
So thank you for asking that and for showing the website. They’ll hear a little bit more about me. They’ll find a little bit more about me. But there’s also a self-assessment, a career assessment. How comfortable are you right now? I mean, is it a time that you need to go and change, or does this affirm that you are in the place you should be right now. And if they take that assessment, they’ll get feedback from that assessment. There are also other resources on the website. I encourage folks to sign up for my newsletter. That’s there, and they would get those twice a month. And those are, to me, just super fast, easy reads that I would have wanted to read when I was in the workplace. They’re inspirational, but they also can be cautious. I love one of them. The title was How to, I think it was lightly charring bridges and that’s about, that’s sort of goes back to the gal. I said, was scared to death that if she left this company, she had done the most horrible thing in the world. Well, you never want to burn a bridge, but you sometimes have to char it lightly, but you, you never ever want to burn a bridge.

Hugh Ballou:
And as I’m getting in touch with Patty Dale and a contact button. So when people send you an email, I’m sure you’re going to respond.

Pattie Dale Tye:
Absolutely, and happy to. Love it.

Hugh Ballou:
So, Patti Dale, we’ve covered a lot of topics. What do you want to leave people with? A thought or a challenge or something to think about as they move forward?

Pattie Dale Tye:
It’s important for me to leave with folks the deep belief in themselves that they can do it. And I firmly believe if I can do it, anybody can. Because I started out in a very, very, very ordinary place. And I am nothing special. And yet, I ended up with an incredibly special career. And I think these days, more than ever, Q, people are looking at social media and they’re seeing an image that it truly it’s false, but they believe it enough that it chips away at confidence, chips away at confidence. And that’s, don’t let it, don’t, don’t let it do that to you. If I can do it, you can do it. Turn off the social media, click it away.

Hugh Ballou:
It’s worth staying for the whole interview right there. Pattie DaleTye, thank you so much for being your extraordinary. Thanks for being our guest today on the Nonprofit Exchange.

Pattie Dale Tye:
Thank you, Hugh. And I would say right back at you on the extraordinary piece.

Hugh Ballou:
Thank you.