(upbeat music) - Recently on our series, Lessons and Leadership, our sister series, my colleague, Mary, again, when I interviewed Dr. Stan Brown, who's Executive Director and Professor in the practice of leadership at the Buccino Leadership Institute at Seton Hall University, one of our higher ed partners, we talked to Dr. Brown about leadership today, how it's evolved, how he's evolved as a leader.

And the importance of teaching leadership, frankly, to young people in colleges and universities.

Some people argue and question whether university life, college life, higher ed is even relevant anymore.

Well it is in the eyes of Dr. Brown and he talked about the work that needs to be done to help the next generation of leaders make a difference in a very complicated, challenging world we're living in.

This is Dr. Brown from Seton Hall.

- Dr. Brown, great to have you with us.

- Great to be here, thank you.

Thank you for inviting me.

- You got it.

We see the Seton Hall logo behind you, and let me ask you this, you come to Seton Hall and the Buccino Leadership Institute where I've taught and I've learned so much from your students there and your colleagues, and you come from a very diverse background in corporate America and other places.

Your philosophy and approach to leadership developed by so many, who would you say, if you had to pick one, possibly two, the most significant influencers of your leadership approach and philosophy would be?

- Oh wow.

I'd probably have two or three, but let em give you one at a time.

One was my father, Sherman Brown Sr., and a big part of why I would, you know, say he's a role model, or was a role model for me, was just being able to lead through adversity, you know, he and my mom raised three boys, you know, through the 70s, 80s and 90s.

And I never heard a peep of a complaint from him.

And so I think from a leadership perspective, being able to go through, whether it's crucible moments, downturns in your life, whatever it might be happening in the environment, but no one else knows that you're suffering, right, because you're always being a servant and being a servant leader, so actually, I'll stay with that one, because it's just been sort of a guiding point in my life.

You know, he left us over maybe 15 years ago, but it stays true to my heart about how I lead and leading the way he would.

- The word, "Grit," when you're talking about your dad, you didn't use the word, but it seems to me, didn't complain, no matter how tough times were.

He had a tremendous amount of grit and he imbued that in you.

Long winded way to get to this question.

There are some who argue that younger people, college students today coming out, that they lack the, "grit," needed to get through tough times because too many of us have told them too often how great they are and they're not necessarily, a lot of generalizations here, I know, they're not great at hearing tough talk and tough conversations, and they don't have a lot of grit.

I don't know if I buy it.

What do you say, Doctor?

- Yeah, well and I think that's our fault.

I also have a college-aged, you know, Junior, and sometimes we're protecting our kids so much, right, and I think with my dad, call it grit, call it resilience, it's sort of something that you learn as you grow up and go through experiences, and I think as parents, since I spent some time in the K12 industry running charter schools and leading there, we want to protect them so much, but they need these experiences, so, you know, I would say, and again, I've been so impressed with the students in our program at the Buccino Leadership Institute, and a lot of them have been through some stuff and they've gotten that grit, you know, a lot of things happened in their life before they got here that took that edge off.

But others, you know, need to go through some experiences, and some of them will go through it later in life, and some go through it early.

But I am also a believer in grit, and it's kind of hard to teach, and that's why with you having, you know, experiential learning, what we do here that sort of anchors our curriculum can put you in those situations, at least in a somewhat safe environment before you go out in the real world.

But I believe that's important, that you gotta be resilient and have grit to be able to manage, you know, changes in your environment.

- If a global pandemic hasn't taught us the need for resilience and grit, I don't know what will.

Go ahead, Mary.

- Yeah, one thing that I was thinking about as you were talking is the connection between, we have our young adults, I know the Buccino Leadership Institute prides itself in taking students from different disciplines, right.

So you're bringing them into this cohort, this group of students.

Some may be a computer science major.

Some may be art.

Some may be an English major.

Some may be political science.

What advice do you have for young adults today to remain open-minded to other's points of view, especially tied to leadership, because when you bring all those people into a room, there must be conflicting views.

What is your viewpoint, and what is your hope for the Buccino Leadership Institute in that regard?

- Sure, that's a great question, great point.

So I have the belief, and I've been in a lot of different places from insurance companies to big, you know, banks and very small schools, you know, that you try to run, and I would tell you that...

I would tell students that you have to honor the diversity of thought.

And as many aspects of diversity, but particularly diversity of thought, because you're gonna learn from that.

So respect that people have different ways, different routes to a solution and I experienced that, you know, I was trained to, you know, as a management consultant is that, you know, this is how you help a client get there and you get there pretty quickly and you have different tools and methodology.

And then when I jump into the K12 industry and part of higher ed, they just think differently.

No less smarter, maybe a little bit smarter than other folks I've found in the industry, but there's different routes to get there.

So if you don't respect that, and as a leader, you're gonna miss what the answer is, 'cause the answer's all around you.

And so I think that, respecting the diversity of thought and that's why we put our students in these interdisciplinary teams, Mary, so they can see how someone whose gonna start in nursing and then you have a finance person, they're together on a project, and they may come at it differently, right, 'cause they go through, there's just different ways, particularly as they go through their years here at Seton Hall.

Different ways they've been being taught to think, and in the leadership organization, and once you've been able to take all that in and then make decisions collectively and then individually, too, based on that diversity of thought to come up with a really good solution.

- Question in your mind, what is the correlation, the connection, Dr. Brown, between being a great leader and being a solid, confident, communicator under pressure?

- Got you.

It is almost one in the same.

Right, so you could be a great thinker, tactition, you have the answer, you made the calculation, you've done other stuff.

If you cannot communicate and influence people that you are a path to be able to follow, you're gonna be dead in the water.

Right and even, you know, we see that in our politics, in the world about, it's about how can I convince people, have the decision signs behind me that I can present to folks who like to hear that type of stuff or read it, but also have people to be able to follow me, so if folks are not gonna follow you, I don't care what type of answer you got, it's not gonna work.

If you are also, you know, I guess what the kids say, into your feelings, right, you caught some feelings, you're also, you know, you're emoting, right, along with everyone else 'cause you're under crisis.

Is that folks can hear that you have a solution and so I think being able to... And that's part of communication, that's part of particularly with, you know, our millennials and Gen Z's that, you know, it's claimed that their attention span is a lot shorter because of everything they're exposed to, is that how do I get people's attention right away?

Yes, and the phone, and knowing what's true, what's false, you know, there's a lot of conflicting information.

And just, you know, what do you do at that period of time, so it's very important to be an effective communicator, that's in your speech, and how you write.

You know, you have to teach kids nowadays in college how to go back to writing and being able to write something, you know, critically and have it believable.

And then, you know, your posture and the etiquette you take when you're inside a meeting that folks see your executive presence and know that oh, you know, the way you're standing, the way you're moving your hands, obviously what you put on the screen if you're using PowerPoint just makes sense and communicates that you have good sense of what the direction should be.

- To Seton Hall University's credit, and the Buccino Leadership Institute, the fact that they acknowledge the importance, regardless of what someone's major is, and they have this diverse group of students at the Buccino Leadership Institute, to understand the importance of having executive presence, as Dr. Brown said, particularly in pressure, filled situations, that is leadership.

We thank you and all your colleagues at the Buccino Leadership Institute and our great friends and partners at Seton Hall University.

Thank you, Doctor.

- You're welcome.

Wonderful to be here.

- You got it.

We'll see you right after this.

- [Narrator] One-On-One with Steve Adubato is a production of the Caucus Educational Corporation.

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