In this episode of My Favorite Mistake, U.S. Marine Corps officer and leadership mentor Olaolu Ogunyemi reflects on a defining leadership moment early in his career—realizing that his approach, while well-intentioned, caused real harm.
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My guest for Episode #338 of the My Favorite Mistake podcast is Olaolu Ogunyemi, a U.S. Marine officer, leadership mentor, and founder of Parent-Child-Connect. Oalolu is also the author of the award-winning children’s book Crow From the Shadow and the upcoming leadership book Lead Last.
Early in his Marine Corps career, Olaolu Ogunyemi believed strong leadership meant being uncompromising and demanding. Then he had a moment of realization that stopped him cold: his leadership style had crossed a line, and he had made a Marine cry. The outcome forced him to confront the difference between positional authority and effective leadership.
In this conversation, Olaolu shares how that experience reshaped his thinking about responsibility, impact, and humility. Rather than defending his intent, he learned to examine how his behavior affected trust, morale, and performance—an uncomfortable but necessary step in real leadership growth.
We explore how leaders often mistake fear-driven compliance for excellence, and why learning from mistakes requires psychological safety—for both leaders and the people they lead. Olaolu explains how high standards and human-centered leadership are not opposing forces, but mutually reinforcing.
This episode highlights a central theme of My Favorite Mistake: mistakes don’t define us—but how we respond to them does. When leaders reflect honestly and adjust their behavior, mistakes become a powerful source of learning rather than a source of shame.
Themes and Questions:
- How early leadership mistakes often stem from insecurity, not malice
- The difference between authority-driven compliance and trust-based leadership
- Why fear may produce short-term results but undermines learning and ownership
- What a mentor’s response can reveal about a leader’s true values
- How psychological safety enables people to speak up, think critically, and grow
- Why “leading last” builds stronger teams than leading through control
- What military leadership can teach healthcare, business, and family life
- How leaders can respond constructively when their behavior causes harm
- Why mistakes become turning points only when leaders reflect instead of defend
- How developing people matters more than enforcing rank or title
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- Full transcript
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Transcript:
Introduction to Olaolu Ogunyemi
Mark Graban: Hi. Welcome to My Favorite Mistake. I'm your host, Mark Graban. Our guest today is Olaolu Ogunyemi. He's a proud US Marine officer, award-winning author, and a passionate leadership mentor who's on a mission to build strong leaders from the boardroom to the living room. At work and at home. He's the founder of Parent-Child-Connect. He's the author of the award-winning children's book, Crow From the Shadow and the upcoming book Lead Last, which challenges leaders to care more about service than recognition. So, Lou, welcome to the podcast. How are you?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: I'm doing well, Mark, thanks so much for having me. I'm very excited for today's conversation.
Mark Graban: Well, so am I. And thank you for taking time out of a busy work-life schedule to join us here today. There's a lot to talk about, including leadership, your lessons learned, your books, but as we always do here, here's the main question. What's your favorite mistake?
The Favorite Mistake: Trying to Be Someone Else
Olaolu Ogunyemi: People like me have a lot of mistakes. But my favorite mistake, I believe, was in the workplace as a Marine, just trying to be somebody I wasn't. At one point I was just trying to be a good operations officer and executive officer, and I remember my mentor pulled me in and told me, “Hey, did you realize that that Marine over there is crying because of your interactions with her?”
My reaction of course was not one of what you expect, which is one of humility. My immediate reaction was, “Okay. Why are you telling me that?” And he said, “Because you are making another Marine cry with your leadership style.” I remember looking at him like, “Okay, we're Marines. And that's what Marines do. I'm your operations officer. I'm here to make this company run smoothly. And I'm your executive officer. I'm here to keep these junior officers in line. So why are you talking to me about making a Marine cry?”
It was amazing that mentor of mine and the company commander at the time truly was patient with me and hearing me out. Because my big mistake in this whole story was that I was trying to be what I thought was the best version of an operations officer instead of being myself. And that's what my mentor came back and told me. He said, “Yeah, people are starting to respond to you because you're telling them. And that's how the Marine Corps operates and many organizations operate. You say it, I do it, but they're not doing it because they're achieving the self-discipline that we want them to achieve and do the things even though we're not around and supervising.” So that will be my favorite mistake. I learned to be myself in any environment, and I learned the importance of getting to know people and knowing how to best lead them.
Mark Graban: That's powerful and I appreciate you for sharing that. I think we can kind of dig into the story a little bit. You're making me think of A League of Their Own and “there's no crying in baseball.” Similar thoughts about no crying in the Marine Corps.
Emotional Control vs. Emotion Suppression
Olaolu Ogunyemi: That's exactly what was at least in my mind first. This was within the first two years of me joining and so I had a little bit of a misunderstanding of what it meant to be a Marine and be tough as nails and all those kind of things that, quite frankly, I got from movies, not from knowing the Marine myself. And so that was just my perspective.
Mark Graban: So that's interesting that you say that perspective came from movies. I guess in hindsight that's not what was really being modeled for you in those first two years.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Not at all. What the Marine Corps modeled for me and the leaders that I had, they modeled that there's a time for everything. There's a time for a leader to understand how their emotions are being portrayed, which is something they told us all the time. Like, if you're in front of your formation, understand that if you are showing emotion, it needs to be intentional. And that emotion that you're giving, whether it's happiness, sadness, disappointment, whatever it is, the way you're reacting to a scenario has to be intentional because you can either intentionally or unintentionally lead your Marines in a certain direction based upon your emotions. So they really teach emotional control, not necessarily emotion suppression.
Mark Graban: And that seems like such an important distinction and something that would apply to leaders in so many different settings. When you talk about a time and a place for everything, there probably is a bit of a time to be a stereotypical movie drill sergeant to yell or to correct somebody in that sort of way.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh, yeah. And that's one of the things that I didn't know the difference. Using that scenario where I'm talking to this individual, who happened to be one of my rank peers, although I had the higher billet, when I'm talking to this individual, it didn't matter what it was. I'm just coming in like, “Hey, well this is what I saw.”
When I came into the Fleet Marine Force, I remember one of my first interactions with an operations officer and executive officer was me standing on the other side of the table and watching him completely annihilate another lieutenant who just checked in with me. I was like, “Okay, maybe this is how they do it.” And honestly, the entry-level training that we had, that's the way that they show leadership. And so in my mind, this is the leadership model. No matter what's going on, I'm being very firm, very direct, and if you seem like you're stepping out of line in any shape, if you're asking questions or anything like that, it's time for me to get you back in line. And that's not necessarily what they were trying to teach, it's just what I learned from early training.
The Power of Mentorship and Accountability
Mark Graban: In that story that you tell, you think of the role of a mentor. Not everybody is blessed to have a mentor, let alone a mentor who can step in, in a key moment where the situation was still ongoing. Could you talk a little bit more about what you learned through that, about being mentored and being a mentor?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Absolutely. And that was one of the feedbacks I gave one of my new commanders that showed up right before I left that unit. I told him that that mentorship in that moment was key for my entire career. I knew it from that moment that that was a key insight that he had just given me. And really it was because it's two sides. Number one, he was willing and bold enough to come to me and tell me, “Hey, you're wrong.” And that's one of the things I believe that sometimes we lose when we start talking about soft skills, empathy, emotional control, and all these other topics. We start to forget that there's a simple yet profound idea, and it's really just accountability and holding people accountable. And being bold enough to tell them, “Hey, that's right, or that's wrong.” That's one thing that he was able to do.
And on the other side, I was blessed because I realized that, okay, this man is not just in charge of me. But he is stepping in as my mentor, and so I understand that I have to receive his feedback. I have to be humble enough to understand what he's saying. If he's using his own time to sit down, and he even leveled with me. He wasn't trying to say that, “Hey, I'm the captain, you're the lieutenant and this is what I'm saying you're going to do.” Instead, he said, “Hey, I'm just gonna talk to you just as a man to man.” And he had that conversation with me and I was humble enough to not only respect him for his rank, but respect him as a man. And I think that really is what helped this mentorship early on. And it's really continued throughout my career. I try to find people who can help me grow and develop, and in turn, I try to help other people grow and develop.
Understanding Military Hierarchy and Influence
Mark Graban: I have no military experience of my own. I'm thankful to you for doing this and serving your country and serving others. The whole idea of this formal rank and hierarchy, it exists in other industries, it exists in medicine. You have formal organizational hierarchy. You have informal kind of professional hierarchy. How would you describe the military hierarchy to those of us who haven't served and haven't experienced that? We hear the phrase that must have military roots “pulling rank” and getting in trouble for that. Could you share a little bit more about finding that balance? Yes, there is hierarchy, but as you described that coaching was man to man. It wasn't “listen to me because I'm your superior officer.”
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Yeah, and I'll say that first of all, that's unique to the individual. What we are taught coming into the Marine Corps, no matter whether you go to recruit training for enlisted Marines or you go to Officer Candidates School, really the only three things that you need to learn is: “Yes, sir,” “No, sir,” and “Aye, sir.”
Mark Graban: What's the difference between yes and aye?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Exactly. Really no difference. You're just saying, “I'm going to carry out the order that you just gave me,” and that's really what it's about. When you start thinking about that, if I understand that if this person outranks me, then they have really, from the Constitution, the right to now tell me what to do. That's in line with the Constitution. That's in line with the Uniform Code of Military Justice. All those documents and things that we really support and we exist to defend tell them that they have authority over me, and that's what tells me that they have authority over me.
For us, it's knowing that you always have somebody who is over you and has authority over you. And that hierarchy is extremely important for many reasons. One of them being when you're in a combat scenario, it is not time for democracy yet. It is time to have somebody in charge and they're leading well, so that way you can all go in the same direction. And so that's really how the military hierarchy came about.
Now, what we started learning, and I learned in this moment very early in my career from this mentor, is that there's a way to do it where you don't always have to flash your rank. In fact, you very seldom should be having to flash your rank because people will now respect you for the person that you are. And that's what he was doing in that moment. He was not telling me, “Hey, I'm a captain and you will listen to me.” Although he could have very well said that, but what he realized is that I wouldn't have learned anything in that moment. All I would've done is just comply with his orders, and I would've done my best to not make that individual cry anymore. But I wouldn't have started thinking about what do I need to do to be a better leader. And that's what he was doing. He was finding ways to not just use his rank to give me an order. He was using his influence over me, which in this case was given by his position of authority, to really coach and develop me. And I believe that's really the difference between the leaders in the Marine Corps who know how to use their influence well, and those who just use the rank.
Private Sector Parallels: Leading as if You Have No Authority
Mark Graban: Well, and it sounds like the way he treated you helped you reflect and learn. If you tell somebody to do something and they do it, you might accomplish something in the short term, but you haven't helped that person grow. Like in the private sector, companies like Toyota and others that are learning from them, there's common expressions regarding getting things done through developing people. That you shortcut the person's learning and the organization's learning if as a leader you give them the answer as opposed to challenging them to figure it out by themselves. What you're saying reminds me very much of that private sector leadership notion that at least some companies try to practice.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh yeah. And in my very short time with Tyson Foods, that's one thing I learned from the CEO there. His name was Donnie Smith at the time, and I always thought it was impressive that as an intern and then a new hire, we would all go into a room and he would say, “The answer's in the room.” And that moment there really was shocking to me. ‘Cause I'm sitting here thinking about, okay, I've read articles about this guy, his salary. I think his bonus at the time was like almost $5 million. That's bonus alone, not his salary. And I was like, this guy's in the same room as me, just a couple of rows up looking at everybody and saying, “Hey, the answer's in the room,” which is giving the impression that, you know, I may have an idea of what I think the right answer is, but I want your feedback and I want you to tell me what you think. And I truly believe that's why the company was thriving at that time. At the time that I was there, I just remember the company having the best years in their history and I believe it's because that CEO was willing to do exactly what you're describing.
Mark Graban: Yeah, and I mean, I think good leadership is good leadership. Some CEOs think they have to have all the answers, or they think they do have all the answers. There could be the ego or the organization is one where it's seen as a sign of weakness if you don't pretend to have the answer, that it's a sign of weakness if you're asking your employees. I think we're on the same page, that that's good leadership and it leads to better results.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh yeah. And that's why I believe that when you look across the reading list for all organizations—I've read the Army Reading List, Air Force, I've read the Marine Corps, of course the Commandant's reading list—and every time I look at those reading lists, it's full of leadership from across the industries. That's not just Marine Corps leadership. Yeah, of course there's historical battles and things that we need to study because we should be technical experts in the job. But they also talk a lot about leadership. You see Simon Sinek, you see Brené Brown, you see all these other leaders across the industries that have written books and given us ideas of things that we should know. And so I think the Marine Corps realized that a leader is a leader no matter where you are. We may be in a different industry, but the practical advice and the characteristics that a leader must have transcends industries.
Mark Graban: One phrase that's burned in my mind comes from Gary Convis, who started his career at General Motors, so he knew what that old authority-based model was—”Do it because I said so.” And he learned from Toyota as he teaches others this phrase: “Lead as if you have no authority.” And I think the “as if” is important. He's not saying we don't have authority, but it sounds exactly like what you were sharing of there is a time and a place to use that authority. But if you're using it all the time, it probably leads to suboptimal results.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh, that's beautiful. And I love that because when I was studying Satya Nadella, who's the CEO of Microsoft, I learned the same thing. He grew up in Microsoft and I thought that was impressive that when you start reading and studying Microsoft over the years, especially in the nineties when he was there, it was really a dog-eat-dog world. Everybody is trying to make it, which is normal for many organizations. Everybody's trying to promote, they're trying to go higher and they basically are starting to undercut each other. So it's cool to read about Satya Nadella and hear from people at Microsoft to know that he truly believes in empathy. He truly believes in understanding people and helping people grow and develop, some of which I believe he learned those soft skills from his own family. That was one of the things as I was studying him and I thought was impressive, that he spent time saying that he learned empathy through his son, who I believe has special needs. He watched his wife who nurtured their son, and they sort of grew together. So that's a perfect example of what you're describing right now. I love learning from industries and leaders who do it well.
Commander’s Intent and Self-Discipline
Mark Graban: Those of us outside the military often love learning from military examples. In our private sector reading list coming from the Army, Team of Teams by Stanley McChrystal has been a very popular book. Even before McChrystal's book, I worked with somebody who had retired from Army Medicine and was now working in the private sector. This guy Jim would explain, like you were saying Lou, about situational circumstances. If it's a matter of life or death, you must do what I say. But he was talking about in non-combat settings that people need to understand the reasons why they're doing something so they can internalize it so they are more willing or likely to do it. And McChrystal, the one takeaway to me was this idea of Commander's Intent. I'm gonna set direction because of authority, but I don't know exactly what needs to be done to execute. What are your perspectives on that idea of Commander's Intent and what we can learn from that?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: No, you're spot on, and that's exactly what my company commander at the time, my mentor, was trying to teach me. That yes, if I could stand over somebody and tell them what to do all the time, then they probably will succeed at doing that until I'm not around. Commander's Intent does help them to understand how to accomplish a mission, but I really think it helps us when we're talking about the word discipline and what self-discipline is. I've always started to study that word because we throw it around the Marine Corps. In fact, that's like one of the first speeches that you get when you're at bootcamp. It talks about “discipline is the hallmark of a Marine,” and how we're gonna help recruits achieve discipline.
But when I start thinking about what that word means, I had to break it down into its most rare form or root form, which is talking about discipleship and a teacher and a pupil who are together learning. And really the idea is that teacher teaches that pupil so well that that pupil begins to apply those teachings in their own time, own way. And that's really what Commander's Intent is talking about and why it exists. It's helping people understand that, hey, I may be the teacher and I may be instructing you, but really my intent is for you to be able to carry on those lessons, whether I'm around or not.
So really General McChrystal and a lot of different officers, especially when we're coming in, study to understand how to give a well-thought-out intent and to ensure that people can operate within your guidance. And then almost more importantly, it's not just the intent, but having a feedback mechanism so people are able to receive their information and then say, “Hey, I didn't understand your intent,” or “I didn't understand your intent, and here's how I operated underneath your intent.” And that gives you the ability to refine your intent and go back and tell them, “Hey, either A, yes, this is what I meant, but let's refine in this way. Or B, that was not my intent at all, so let's make sure I communicate it more clearly.” So Commander's Intent is huge in what we do in the Marine Corps and in general.
Mark Graban: Jim, coming from the Army background, said something very similar to the way he put it. Because this hospital laboratory was a 24/7 operation, he was generally there on day shifts. He would stay into night shift and the way he put it was, “If people are only following standard operating procedures because they fear getting in trouble, that doesn't scale well because I can't be here 24/7.” He would pop in on night shift not to play “gotcha,” but because you gotta be there to talk to your people and show support for them. But I thought that was really powerful saying this can't be a fear-based, authority-based approach to discipline. Understanding why we do things and making it easy for people to do the right thing allows for that self-discipline.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh yeah. And that's one thing when I was a company commander on Recruit Depot, training recruits, so you're processing through thousands of recruits every year. I remember having a conversation with my drill instructors and it almost shocked them. Because I heard a lot of talk about, “I want them to be scared of me. I want them to think about my name. They get to the fleet and they're like, ‘Man, I would never wanna talk to that guy.'”
But then I was like, “Hey guys, I don't believe in fear-based leadership. I think fear-based leadership is not gonna give us the kind of confident and strong Marine that we're looking for. If we're trying to tell a Marine that we're going to discipline you through fear or we're going to make you accomplish the mission through fear, then what you're saying is spot on: you have to be around in order for them to actually accomplish the mission. Whereas I thought it is more important to give them a reason to do what you're telling them to do. And in many cases that's getting them to believe in the mission, getting them to believe in the vision.
We're at Recruit Depot, for example. These people who are just fresh coming into the Marine Corps, that's the perfect opportunity to mold them and tell them about the history, tell them what they're becoming a part of, and why they're becoming a part of this. What I noticed is after I continued to coach my drill instructors and tell 'em, “Hey, here's the way that we need to do it,” of course there are some that are gonna be like, “No, that's not what I wanted to do.” But then I saw the most effective ones were the ones who didn't use their sheer presence just to scare the recruits or the Marines. What they decided to do is that if they had a presence, they would talk about, “Hey man, you see how I look? This is what a Marine looks like. This is the standard we hold ourselves to.” And then you see recruits that are now more inclined to train themselves. They're more inclined to eat right. They want to eat the right thing, although you're very controlling of what they're eating. They want to eat better. They want to drink better because now they aspire to be like that drill instructor. And instead of them being scared of that human being, now they aspire to be that human being. And I think that was just more inspirational to get them to do what we wanted them to do.
Lead Last: Knowing Yourself and Others
Mark Graban: That is inspiring. Let's talk about the upcoming book, Lead Last. What do you mean by that phrase?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: The first thing I mean by that is that there are things that we have to do before we're effective leaders. In this case, what I offer is the first thing that we should do is get to know ourselves, and that's where the book is in three parts. The first part is “Who are you?” And that's really taking time to understand what our insecurities are. Understanding what all the things that we've had deep down inside of us that cause us to react or make decisions. Just try to get to know that more of an introspective look. And then the second thing is get to know the people you're leading. Because a lot of times I think we take these positions and we just go, we just run with 'em and we don't truly know who we're leading. And then the last part is how are you creating an environment for them to grow and develop?
And really that's what I talk about. That's what “lead last” means, is how are you doing these things? How are you learning about yourself and the people you lead before you consider yourself an effective leader? And of course, if you do it the right way, you're also finding ways to create a leadership that lasts well beyond your tenure, whether you're in the Marine Corps or the military like us, where we rotate basically every two to three years, or you're with the organization and you wanna rise through the teams and become CEO. It's really finding ways to ensure that your leadership lasts beyond your tenure in the position that you're in.
Mark Graban: There's a couple of different meanings there about the “last.” Understanding yourself and your people before jumping into lead and then doing it in a way that's lasting. That's a good phrase. That's a clever structure. You mentioned insecurity, that's something that you write about. What are the most common ways insecurity shows up in leaders who think they're confident or even want to portray that they're confident?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: The first thing I would say is frustration, easily frustrated. Because one thing, and I can speak for myself, one thing that I realized is before I learned my insecurities, I can find myself being extremely upset with people based upon whatever they're saying, the feedback that they're giving me. Whether the positive or negative, I found myself being upset with the negative feedback and with the positive feedback, I found myself trying to shrink away from it. Like, “Uh, that's not me. I don't want…”
And what I started realizing is that a lot of the ways I was reacting to people's feedback in this example was based upon me thinking that these people were challenging my position. Now, where did that come from? Why would I think somebody's challenging my position or challenging my authority if they're just trying to tell me, “Hey, this isn't the way that it's done,” or “Here's a better way to do it”?
Well, you have to go back to potentially my competition with my brothers, trying to butt heads with them growing up. Perhaps during that time and now that competition, there was some unhealthy competition where we were undercutting each other to get ahead. That's how we grew up in our household. Love them to death. But that's just how we grew up. So you start thinking about that. It's like, “Well, why am I reacting this way?” It's, “Oh, well now I have control and now they have to do what I say until they come back and say something and challenge the thing, challenge your idea.” And now you're like, “Well, that was a great idea. Why are you challenging?” Perhaps there's a better idea. And so that was the first thing I had to learn, that those insecurities reveal themselves in a lot of us. And a lot of times they're based on just things that we grew up with and things that we never addressed. And perhaps we just try to, especially as men, we try to put it in the back of our heads and try to push past it until you see that emotional response or reaction that you don't necessarily recognize or even like.
Mark Graban: Those are a lot of really interesting examples and more subtle examples. The one that comes to mind that might be prevalent or easy to see in my experience, I've found people tend to overcompensate for some deep-rooted insecurities. And that leads to them either being really braggadocious or, if somebody seems really full of themselves, that seems like it's often a mask or a compensation for different insecurities. I imagine you've run across that. How do you help coach somebody through that? They might not want to admit they have insecurities.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Yeah, that's very tough. Because especially for those who are very proud, if they're overcompensating, in many cases, they have a very strong personality. So walking up to 'em and telling 'em they have an insecurity is probably not gonna be the most effective manner, a direct route. The direct route's just not gonna work that well.
The way I've done it, dealing or talking with people, is I take 'em out of their environment. So one thing I always recommend for people, especially when we're deployed, is to sit down over a bowl of cereal. And the reason I use a bowl of cereal, and this is any example you can think of, is because it's something that usually we flash back to our childhood. ‘Cause most adults don't eat Fruit Loops or anything that I know of. And so you just sort of flash back for a little bit. You're putting yourself back in the mental state of a more adolescent mental state, and perhaps then you're helping them to let their guards down. ‘Cause now you're just in a mood where you're sort of happy, you're feeding that deep desire to be satiated by, in this case, some very sugary content that most of us sort of look past now in our life.
In this case, now you're letting everybody's guard down and now you're having a conversation about whatever it is. And the way I've introduced it in the past is I'll just bring it up. “Hey man, you seem to feel very offended by X that happened,” or in this case, “Like you were in a meeting and somebody said something, and then you just sort of came over top. And every time somebody tried to say something, you were overtalking to 'em. What do you think about that, man? How do you think that was perceived?” And then you continue to eat your bowl of cereal and just listen to 'em. The first interaction is gonna be very defensive. But the more you have an opportunity to talk to 'em and help them break that defense down, then you'll be able to help to provide feedback in some ways. I wouldn't imagine trying to directly address it, but I would say that you do have to find a way to address the problem and not necessarily attack the person that's sitting in front of you.
Addressing Insecurity in Children
Mark Graban: So when it comes to kids, how do you teach kids about insecurity and coach them through that?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: The best thing that I've thought of is, number one, use the things that they're interested in, especially if they're young. Pick up a book. I'm obviously an advocate for reading books. I love reading and I believe I got that from my mom. My mom was very involved when it came to reading to us. Very animated in every book that she read with us, and it's just one of the things that I think I picked up and it helps us out because books have a wide amount of themes. Sometimes when you're just having a silly moment with the children—for us it was Dr. Seuss, for my kids, it's all kinds of things—that's a perfect opportunity to talk to them about those themes in the book. There's always a character that has some kind of a problem in the book, and then you just sit down and have a conversation with 'em, and then that's when you can sort of bring up the idea of insecurities. You can again, in this case, help them let their guards down by just bringing up books and things that they enjoy.
As they get older, they may sort of navigate away from books. I know I did, especially in my early teen years because I felt like it was a chore for my dad. And so, as a teenage boy, I felt like I needed to rebel. I don't know why, but I feel like I did. So sometimes it may be just sitting down with them. If they enjoy gaming, maybe sit down and talk about a game. If they play sports, use that as an opportunity. If you see an example of something happening, somebody acting out of their insecurities, perhaps sit down and talk to 'em. Not gossip, but sit down and talk to 'em about what they saw so they can work through that. But these are some of the things you can do. Just use the things that are in their world, their normal occurrences, and just get into their world and talk to 'em about these topics just like insecurity.
The Home as a Leadership Sandbox
Mark Graban: So when it comes to Lead Last, how does that look different at home than it does at work?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: I think it looks different in that you can use home as your sandbox to use an IT term. If you are developing a product, say a software application, you always have a separate sandbox that you test this in. It's an environment where it's testing where it can break and it's not going to impact the actual organization. And that's what I think the home does for us. It allows us the opportunity to truly try all these leadership tactics and things with people who are very forgiving of us.
And the benefit is they get to see the true, authentic version of us. Because a lot of times we may leave the house and try to put on a mask and try to pretend to be somebody we're not. But when you get home, you sort of exhausted and you get to be the version of yourself that people may not see when you leave the house. So that's a perfect time to truly get to improve your leadership by just being the raw version of yourself and just trying things out. Once you see if it works for the children, then it may work with adults as you go into the workplace. Because people are people, it's all about getting to know them and adapting to their needs and giving 'em what they need to succeed. It is different in that you're being more authentic and you're being probably a more raw version of yourself at home. But it's also an opportunity to practice and sharpen your leadership skills.
Mark Graban: Thinking back to your favorite mistake story, I think there's a connection to where you talked about being the person, being the leader you thought you should be versus being the person you are. Hopefully at home you get to be the person you are and you know, you're thinking about the husband I should be, the father I should be. Hopefully that's authentically lined up with who you actually are.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Absolutely. And that's why that's also my favorite mistake because I'm a repeat offender. I was a very, very young father, so I graduated college. I was married at 22 with a 3-year-old. So I started off very early in my parenting. And so one of the things I very quickly realized is I learned a leadership style from how my parents were leading me growing up. Now, me versus my oldest daughter, completely different human beings. I was very mischievous. I was acting out. I used to hang with the wrong crowd. There's a lot of things that I was doing when I was wrong, and so my parents had to be more direct in my life. They had to be. Sometimes I wouldn't even acknowledge what they're saying until they raised their voice and I'm like, “Oh, okay. Now I know they're serious.”
Whereas my daughter, I tried that same leadership style and I recognized that, oh wait, that's not what she needs. That's not the kind of person she is. And oh yeah, when I raised my voice at her, especially at a young age, man, she just broke. It wasn't like a thing of her understanding of being like, “Okay, now I hear you.” She was thinking, “Well, I already heard you the first time. And now I feel like you're mad and you now severed the connection between us and it's a weird dynamic.” So I will say that favorite mistake is a lesson that I learned about not just being yourself, understanding that yes, you learned from your parents and your parents did some wonderful things. My parents were wonderful in my life and definitely made me who I am today. But I also understand that there are things that they did to lead me and coach us and guide us that won't necessarily apply with my oldest daughter. And that's really what I had to learn from that version of my favorite mistake.
Mark Graban: And that phrase you used about a parent raising their voice so you know they're serious, you're giving me another flashback to 30 years ago in that General Motors environment. There was so much yelling and screaming and cursing. And I remember one of the plant leaders giving some of us young engineers some coaching and said, basically, “Yeah, you've gotta yell and curse, otherwise they don't think you're serious.” And I'm like, “Well, that's one way.” And it felt more like emotional dysregulation in practice than getting intentionally angry. That was my read on it. Because they were just almost always in that mode as opposed to what you were saying about picking and choosing a moment.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh yeah. And that's one thing that we learned. We know that humans are different. We all have similarities, but we all are different. We have different perspectives. We have a different way of thinking and viewing life. But for some reason, we still think that a one-size-fits-all approach to leadership is adequate and it's just not, it's inadequate.
And so saying that, for example, that yelling and cursing is a way for people to think you're serious. Perhaps that works for one out of 10 people. And then the next person there may be like, “Yelling, all that does is frustrate me and it reduces my productivity.” Another person may be like, “Your yelling is just annoying. That's nagging. It's not there. I'm gonna keep doing my job, but yeah, it's just annoying. I wish you would go away.” And the next person may just straight up leave. So you have all these different personalities that come with leadership. But we just have to remember that there's no one size fits all. And especially for our young leaders. That was what I learned in the first two years. So for those who are watching and listening, hopefully if you're a young leader, you're picking up on that. If you try that one-size-fits-all approach to leadership, even if you study leadership books—shoot, I just told you I'm bringing out a leadership book here soon—but you still have to take that and apply it in context of your life. Otherwise it won't be effective.
Mark Graban: Yep. And I'm one of the people who left that environment, left that behind. I had the opportunity, thankfully.
Lessons from Crow From the Shadow
Mark Graban: So, previous book, the children's book Crow From the Shadow. What's one lesson from the book that adults need as much as kids?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: So for Crow From the Shadow, the biggest lesson I would say for adults is that the inner critic is oftentimes wrong. And I say that because the book Crow From the Shadow is just talking about no matter who you are or where you're from, you have the ability to control your own destiny and control your own fate. And what we see in the book Crow From the Shadow is there's this unlikely hero, which is a crow. Who's just going through life and being told that he shouldn't do things that he enjoys doing, or, “That's wrong because it's not the shadow's way.” And those are the kind of things that we're projecting through the book.
We want adults to sit down with children, explain to 'em. But even as adults, as we read that story, we realize there are a lot of limiting beliefs that we've assumed for ourselves because we just listened to other people say it. We've listened to other people say, “Because you're from here, you will do X.” In my story back where I'm from, they talk a lot about statistics and that was one of the things that I remember growing up. And it's almost like our minds at times, sometimes unintentionally, but it was happening, were being conditioned to say that, “Look to your left, look to your right. One of you three aren't gonna make it.” And it's like, why would you be conditioning my mind to say that? I get that you're trying to teach statistics, but I want you to understand that you're now conditioning my mind to think that one of us is not gonna make it. So either A, I'm just gonna work my butt off to ensure it's not me. Or B, I'm just gonna point to somebody else, say, “Okay, that's gonna be him. I'm not gonna connect with him or try to lead him or work with him. I'm just gonna move on about myself.” So it's really just understanding what beliefs that we've adopted over years, maybe unintentionally, and just knowing that we truly can control our own fate and our own destiny.
Why the Marine Corps?
Mark Graban: As we wrap up, Lou, just two final questions. Closing the loop on your experiences as a Marine officer. You said you didn't expect to become a Marine. Tell us a little bit about why you say that and how you ended up in this path.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Yeah, a couple of things. Number one, again, because I was a bit insecure myself and I was struggling with my own identity, I was just hanging out with the wrong crowd. And luckily my parents and I had some mentors out there and a bunch of people were knocking me across the head and saying, “Hey, brother, that's not the right way.” That's why I can testify that they are the reason I'm here today. So that's a big reason that I became a Marine is because I had people who, when I left the tracks, they would knock me back on track real quickly.
And then the second thing is I loved the idea of being a Marine. I loved the idea of service and I even was in Army drill team. But I thought that Marine Corps and the military in general was the last resort. That's what I was told. And that's where the book Crow From the Shadow comes in from being a personal story for me is because I was being told that's a last resort, you shouldn't do this. All these other stereotypes that come with being a Marine. And I was like, “Well, I just won't do it then.” And then I finally got to college and I'm like, “I'm gonna do whatever I want.” I just finished my sophomore year. I'm like, “You know what? Nobody can stop me from joining the Marine Corps. I'm a grown man.” And so I decided to join the Marine Corps. So that's really how I ended up doing it. I just took control of my own life.
Mark Graban: And boy, the Marine Corps brings… they get the raw material of a rebellious young man. I guess they have a way of molding you, right?
Olaolu Ogunyemi: 100%. And that's what I always tell people. I rebelled to get into the Marine Corps, which sounds ridiculous, right? So Marine Corps is definitely not an organization who likes people who rebel against the system. But yeah, that's how they found me. They recruited me somehow and truly did make me better than I was when I joined.
Mark Graban: And thinking back to your mentor, there in your favorite mistake story or whether it's parents or mentors, as a kid, someone's gotta love you enough, respect you enough to say, “Hey, you can do better.” That's so meaningful.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Oh yeah. No, you're right. It is meaningful. That's exactly what you're saying.
Parent-Child-Connect
Mark Graban: So, before we wrap up, tell us about Parent-Child-Connect.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Parent-Child-Connect was designed for adults to sit down with children and help create teachable and memorable experiences. That's really what Parent-Child-Connect is all about. It's not allowing children to be influenced by the world around them, the information they receive at their fingertips without us being a part of it. So I always tell adults, parents especially, that we have so many influences. Our children have so many influences. And our job is either to collaborate with them or combat them. But we cannot stand on the sidelines because standing on the sidelines means that we're collaborating with them and allowing our children to be led by only God knows what going into their phones or to their ears at the school or whatever's happening. So that's what Parent-Child-Connect is. It provides resources to parents, teachers, mentors, and caregivers to help them create those teachable experiences.
Mark Graban: Well, I encourage everyone to go learn more about that. There will be all kinds of links in the show notes to Parent-Child-Connect to the books. I look forward to your book coming out, Lou. So again, our guest today, Olaolu Ogunyemi, I'm really glad that we could meet and have the conversation here today on the show. Thanks for sharing your favorite mistake story and your reflections and all these hard-fought lessons learned. Really appreciate it.
Olaolu Ogunyemi: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, Mark. It's been a pleasure.
Mark Graban: Yeah, thanks.