Wiley “Chip” Souba, MD is Professor of Surgery and Adjunct Professor of Medical Education at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Chip is recognized for his innovative approaches to teaching leadership and his conviction that most of the barriers to great leadership are not external, but rather within. Thus, his emphasis is on the inward journey of leadership. He lectures, conducts workshops, and teaches courses on leadership around the world. He has published extensively on diverse topics such as leading yourself, personal and organizational transformation, barriers to effective leadership, resilience, and the language of leadership.
Dr. Souba has served as Dean of Medicine and Vice-President for Health Affairs at two universities, Dartmouth and Ohio State. He has also served as Chairman of the Department of Surgery at Penn State, Chief of Surgical Oncology at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and Professor of Surgery at University of Florida.
Dr. Souba is a summa cum laude graduate of Muskingum College and an AOA graduate of the University of Texas Medical School in Houston, where he also did his general surgery training. During his surgical residency, Dr. Souba completed a fellowship in surgical research at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and earned a Doctorate in Science in Nutritional Biochemistry at the Harvard School of Public Health. He subsequently completed a fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the MD Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute in Houston, Texas.
Dr. Souba’s clinical interests are in surgical oncology. He has been regularly ranked as one of The Best Doctors in America by his peers and has been recognized for his clinical expertise by Boston Magazine. He was funded by the National Institute of Health for 20 years to study amino acid metabolism in catabolic diseases. He has published 350 articles in peer-reviewed journals, has served as Editorial Chair of American College of Surgeons Surgery, and was Co-editor of the Journal of Surgical Research for 20 years.
Chip’s passion for developing leaders stems from his deep conviction that there is something about being human at this stage of our evolution that most human beings have not yet discovered or fully penetrated, the awareness of which would transform their lives and ultimately the world. He is committed to making that something available to as many people as possible.
You can learn more about Chip's writing and work at www.theinwardjourneyofleadership.com
Quotes From This Episode
Resources Mentioned in This Episode
About The International Leadership Association (ILA)
Connect with Scott Allen
Wiley “Chip” Souba, MD is Professor of Surgery and Adjunct Professor of Medical Education at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Chip is recognized for his innovative approaches to teaching leadership and his conviction that most of the barriers to great leadership are not external, but rather within. Thus, his emphasis is on the inward journey of leadership. He lectures, conducts workshops, and teaches courses on leadership around the world. He has published extensively on diverse topics such as leading yourself, personal and organizational transformation, barriers to effective leadership, resilience, and the language of leadership.
Dr. Souba has served as Dean of Medicine and Vice-President for Health Affairs at two universities, Dartmouth and Ohio State. He has also served as Chairman of the Department of Surgery at Penn State, Chief of Surgical Oncology at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and Professor of Surgery at University of Florida.
Dr. Souba is a summa cum laude graduate of Muskingum College and an AOA graduate of the University of Texas Medical School in Houston, where he also did his general surgery training. During his surgical residency, Dr. Souba completed a fellowship in surgical research at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and earned a Doctorate in Science in Nutritional Biochemistry at the Harvard School of Public Health. He subsequently completed a fellowship in Surgical Oncology at the MD Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute in Houston, Texas.
Dr. Souba’s clinical interests are in surgical oncology. He has been regularly ranked as one of The Best Doctors in America by his peers and has been recognized for his clinical expertise by Boston Magazine. He was funded by the National Institute of Health for 20 years to study amino acid metabolism in catabolic diseases. He has published 350 articles in peer-reviewed journals, has served as Editorial Chair of American College of Surgeons Surgery, and was Co-editor of the Journal of Surgical Research for 20 years.
Chip’s passion for developing leaders stems from his deep conviction that there is something about being human at this stage of our evolution that most human beings have not yet discovered or fully penetrated, the awareness of which would transform their lives and ultimately the world. He is committed to making that something available to as many people as possible.
You can learn more about Chip's writing and work at www.theinwardjourneyofleadership.com
Quotes From This Episode
Resources Mentioned in This Episode
About The International Leadership Association (ILA)
Connect with Scott Allen
Note: Voice-to-text transcriptions are about 90% accurate
Scott Allen 0:01
Good day, everyone. Welcome to Phronesis another episode another fun, enjoyable, interesting, fascinating conversation. Today I have Dr. Wiley "Chip" Souba and he is a professor of surgery and an adjunct professor of medical education at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth. Chip is recognized for his innovative approaches to teaching leadership and his conviction that most of the barriers to great leadership are not external, but rather within. Thus his emphasis is on the inward journey of leadership. And we're going to go there today. I'm very, very excited for that conversation, Chip. Chip lectures, conducts workshops, teaches courses on leadership around the world. He has published extensively on diverse topics such as leading yourself personal and organizational transformation, barriers to effective leadership, resilience, and the language of leadership. Dr. Souba, has served as dean of medicine and vice president for Health Affairs at two universities Dartmouth and Ohio State now Chip, you just have Ohio State listed there, it's not the Ohio State I we get that might, you might be in trouble in certain circles. And he's also served as chairman of the Department of Surgery at Penn State chief of surgical oncology at Mass General and Professor of Surgery at University of Florida. A couple of other quick notes about Chip, his clinical interests are in surgical oncology. And he's regularly been ranked as one of the best doctors in America by his peers and has been recognized for his clinical expertise by Boston magazine. He was funded by the NIH for 20 years to study amino acid metabolism and catabolic diseases. Thankfully, we aren't talking about that today. And he has published 350 articles in peer-reviewed journals. Chip, sir, what blanks Do we need to fill in for listeners there?
Dr. Chip Souba 1:54
That's plenty. That's too much. First of all, Scott, it's a pleasure to be with you. And kudos to you for being the mind behind this, this creation, it's really a great way to connect people. A couple of things about me, which have been, I would say, important shapers of me in my life. I was born and raised in Caracas. Ah, and I lived, lived there till I was 15. So I'm fluent in Spanish. I love Latino food and Latino culture and move back to the States when I was 15. Okay, ended up going to college in Ohio, and then medical school in Texas, I would say my career is rather boring in the sense that I played the game for many decades, rose up through the ranks. More recently, I would say actually, not quite so recently, probably over the past 20 years, I've really gotten interested in this thing called leadership, what is it? How does it work? Where does it get derailed? Why is it important in those kinds of things? And as you said earlier, this idea of the inward journey of leadership, leading oneself has become my major interest.
Scott Allen 3:12
Well, it's a wonderful interest to have, I believe it was, is it Bill George, CEO of Medtronic, there was a quote that I love that he had, that was the hardest person you will ever lead is yourself, talk about your discovery of this topic, because I absolutely love that you have the MD, but then you have this passion for the interpersonal dimension and the leadership dimension of the work. How did you stumble upon that interest and that passion? Because I think it's wonderful.
Dr. Chip Souba 3:46
Well, I suspect that the root, so to speak, were have always always been there. Yeah, I've been influenced by some of my readings. You mentioned, Bill George. And one of the quotes that I like is from Peter Block, who said, "if there's no transformation, inside each of us, all the structural change in the world will have no impact on our institutions." And I like that very much. And I really have come to believe that if you are not solid and square in here, you can't be as effective as you otherwise be. Wouldn't be out here. I do think leadership is an activity that involves people and moving them and organizations forward to a better place. But it has to be anchored in here. And I would say in certainly in my line of work, often where people have stumbled or failed is when they're not in when that alignment is missing.
Scott Allen 4:51
Yeah, I love that word. I love that phrasing anchored. It's anchored and the work stems from that. That anchoring Talk about that talk about some behaviors you saw over the course of your career in medicine, where you may have a brilliant individual in some respects, but because they weren't anchored, they struggled. Do you have some? Obviously, we're not naming names?
Dr. Chip Souba 5:20
Oh, of course, I would, I would say, you know, what have you witnessed? Yeah. And I would say, you know, this applies to me as well, my growth, as has looked, this is a mountain with no top. Well, it's really important for people to get that but certainly, in academic medicine, which is what I'm most familiar with. But I would say business in general, there's a strong tendency, particularly in times of crisis or stress to focus on, what do we do? What do we do? What do we do? I think what we do is important, but one of the sorts of underlying theories that I have is that it is important what leaders know, their knowledge, their expertise, their skills, but more important than that, in determining their actions, and ultimately, their performance is their way of being human. So we put a lot of emphasis in our work on being is more primal or more fundamental than knowing is important. But being anchors doing. So if you take the many challenges that healthcare has, has had to face over the past, really my entire career. But if you look at our current circumstances, where there's a huge gap between the haves and the have nots, and that sort of thing, the urge to do something has often led to fragmented projects that are not unimportant, but they don't provide the leverage that is necessary to really transform the system. You know, one of the conversations that we've not had as a country, I think we're the only industrialized country, if you will, who has not had this conversation is, is healthcare a right? Or a privilege? Do we have a moral responsibility to provide some decent level of health care to everybody, regardless of their ability to pay that got me really interested in, you know, what's going on here that we can't seem to, to right that ship?
Scott Allen 7:37
The whole notion of being? I've been in conversation with a few different people whom you know, one of them for sure, Gary Strack and, and others. And as we look at maybe some of the work of Robert Keegan, or the work of Kuhnert, and Lewis, or Keith Eigel, with the book, the map, and we talk about, again, the work of Keegan and the developmental stages. And it's kind of an interesting, fun thought experiment. If you have a group of people who are acting out of a place of let's just say, level four, level five, and for listeners, we'll put some resources in the show notes so you can explore. But it's a really interesting conversation. Does leadership fall into place does good parenting fall into place does good citizenship fall into place, if we are really working to help individuals, be more healthy in the world be more healthy with themselves and help their development as human beings. Some of these other things kind of fall into place. It was fascinating. I had a great conversation with Jonathan Reims, who's at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. And he talked about how even some of their programs in the government are really working to help, in many ways, open up the citizens to different levels of awareness and understanding. I think it's a really interesting, fun conversation. Because if again, that I love the (Peter) Block quote. I love that. And we can go to some other scholars who have said similar things. If our own shop is in order, how are we going to be of service to others?
Dr. Chip Souba 9:21
I like what you said there and a different way of thinking about it or saying it is it's very important in organizations, I think to get away from this traditional view that leadership is about a person in charge. There is no question there are times when people in positions of authority and responsibility have to make decisions. But if we can start to get people to understand that, look, leadership is not about it's not first and foremost about a person in charge. It's really an activity. I talk about it as a kind of energy or A nutrient that circulates in the bloodstream of the organization. Everybody in the organization can experience that at their particular level. They can lead. Yeah, they may not be the ultimate decider on the budget, or the strategic plan are that sort of thing. But I've seen people at very, very, what we would call lower levels of the organization, you know, 100 levels down on the org chart, really exercise incredibly great leadership. I remember when I was, when I was chief of surgical oncology at the Mass General in the 90s, there was a guy who cleaned our offices in the evening. And he was from Central America, I really didn't speak English, but I speak Spanish. So we became friends. Yeah, I love that sort of stuff. I've never had an issue, being friends with people from all walks of life. Every evening, around six, this guy would be up cleaning our offices. And I noticed over the months that the patient exam rooms were extremely clean, you know, all the sharps, needles, and that sort of thing were appropriately disposed of, the room was mopped. The examining tables had the sterile paper on them, torn perfectly. It was a place where you'd feel very comfortable having your parents, you know, receive care. And I and I asked him once I said, Eddie, what do you do such good job, cleaning the exam rooms, and he says to me, he goes because the patients cannot have germs, you know, so here's the guy that's way down on the org chart, who gets he gets what the organization is fundamentally about, you know, which is not making money. It's fundamentally about providing the best care possible to the people that you serve. And in his little role as a, as a janitor, if you will, a housekeeping person. That's how he connected with. That was the reason he came to work. You know, I thought that was, was really awesome.
Scott Allen 12:15
Well, Chip is my second guest on this, this podcast series, I hope you have an opportunity to listen to that episode. It's with a woman named Kathy Allen, she does really incredibly cool, interesting work. And again, I'll put a put an article or a couple of resources in the show notes. But she wrote an article once that really highlighted the importance of a leader's role is to unleash energy in the organization. Because that young man had energy and passion and understood his role in helping serve the patients and in what incredible care would mean, right? Yeah. And I think so many times we miss that opportunity to tap. And to help people see how they fit in and why what they do is incredibly important, and unleashing that energy and that passion for the work. It's incredibly difficult to do. It's not easy by any stretch of the imagination. But it's a reframing. It's about unleashing the energy, the untapped energy in the people, so that we can achieve whatever the mission is, yeah. Above and beyond. Right?
Dr. Chip Souba 13:23
That's right. That's right. And it's it, that's a very, very good point, one of the struggles for physicians, in this sort of new model of healthcare was to be blunt, it shows up for them as your reason for coming to work is to shut up and produce activities that generate revenue. You know, I think it's very safe to say that in the past, people who worked in academia had more time for other things. And now there's really a lot of pressure on produce, produce produce. And again, that's the doo doo doo without thinking about, well, what does it mean to be a physician? We know what physicians do, but what does it mean to be a physician? And that's what patients care about the most? Yes, they want the dogs to be technically skilled and, and savvy and that sort of thing. They want that you're being compassionate, that you're being committed, that you're being authentic.
Scott Allen 14:26
Your statement right there just reminded me of, I've done some work at the Cleveland Clinic and I was fortunate enough to come across a physician, Sylvia Perez Prado, and she was telling me a story. She does a lot of work and end-of-life care. And it's really, I'm going to try and put this in the show notes as well, Chip. I have a lot of tasks. We're only 20 minutes in. She had and I think she had learned this from someone else but essentially it was they call it the pause. Where when someone passes away, the caregivers in the room or in the space, actually stop and pause and honor that person, how she described it to me as we get into our day-to-day we go, go, go, go go. And we forget that this was a life, this was a person that deserves respect. And there's a whole history there. And she said that through this process of just engaging in a very, very quick pause, and acknowledging that it affords an opportunity for people to reflect and check back in with Why are we here? What are we doing, and actually, she's going to be speaking on a panel that I've organized this Fall. And it's for a film festival in my town, we're showing a film called the edge of purpose, and it's about people who have an incredible passion for what it is they do. And I've asked her to speak on that topic because I think it's brilliant. And it's such a small shift. But it's an important shift, right?
Dr. Chip Souba 16:01
I think it's to build on that, that not only honors the patient and the family. But if you can get in the habit. And I know, I know, this is difficult, and many of my colleagues will say, I don't have time for that. But I always tried to make it a practice to say to patients after I saw them, I would say, do you have any questions? I have time. So I'm you know, and I'm not suggesting that this sort of compassion and being present, and Silvia said, you know, taking a moment, I'm not suggesting that that only applies to healthcare, but I think it applies to human relationships in general. Yeah, if you look at your own life, I would say this to anybody or your work life, or what makes most differences, the relationships, it's the connections that you have with people when things get frenetic and stress flow, and there's pressure to produce, that's often the first to go, and we need to fix that.
Scott Allen 17:04
We're at the dinner table the other night with our kids, and I don't know if this is gonna pan out, Chip, but we were talking about life and ours, our children are 13. And then we have twin girls that are 11. But it just kind of came out of my mouth. I said, Look, you know, it's, it's really kind of about three or four P's. What is your purpose? You know, what are you here to do and make a difference and help this place be a better place than you found it? Who are your people? And you're going to come across a lot of them, but who are those people that help you thrive? and help you live your best life? And then what's the place? You know, what's that place that's gonna help you thrive and live your best life as well? And where do you feel most at home, so to speak, and I don't know, I've thought about maybe principles in there somehow. But it's, it's so true. Because if we're surrounded by people who are elevating us, and are also engaged in the work of trying to be a lifelong learner, and trying to be a lifelong learner about self, to your point, that inward journey because I loved the phrasing, a mountain with no top.
Dr. Chip Souba 18:16
You're always becoming a leader I think it's important to get that you're always becoming a leader, you never become, like you never become a parent, you're always becoming a parent even though children are older. And I think I think that's very, I think that's good.
Scott Allen 18:33
I think there's a shift in mindset there, you need to write an article called becoming a leader. And that needs to be the core message that you won't, you won't arrive, because I love that phrasing, becoming a parent, our children at two and three, my wife literally just this morning said, Hey, you know this, this stage is just a little bit of a different animal than where we were even a year ago. And we are constantly becoming, and I just reflected the other day, you know, I have to stay really, really present with how we engage and interact with our kids. And what worked three years ago is not working now. And so I love that phrasing of becoming because it's a mindset, I'm a continual work in progress. It's never finished. It's a mountain with no top, but engaging in that work and engaging in that journey. That inward journey, like you, say, of leadership, I think it's Yes. Is there a more base-level starting point than that?
Dr. Chip Souba 19:32
I don't think so. And here's another way to think about it. And we talked about this in our, in our coaching, and in our sessions is this idea that the only thing in the world that you have direct access to is yourself, right? You're the only person that knows yourself. Now you may not know yourself as well as you'd like to. You don't have first-person access to anything else. You know, most of Science is third-person access. I think the best way to become a leader or an important way to become a leader is to examine yourself. What are your fears? What are your vulnerabilities? What are your hangups, what derails you? Boy, you have to be honest with yourself when you go through that, and it is really tough work, but it's great work.
Scott Allen 20:24
It is great work and it is tough work as you're working with clients, what are a couple? You've given us some wonderful nuggets? What are some other ways that you phrase this work, or that you approach this work with clients?
Dr. Chip Souba 20:39
You know, one of the things that, particularly when we work one on one with people who are really trying to elevate themselves and are willing to go to the places that are a bit uncomfortable, what one of the things that are important to point out...I think is that we're talking about transformation here, we're not talking about change. You know, change is important in an organization. But change is about changing what you're doing. And whereas transformation is about changing your being you know the story I often tell him, if you go back and look at dick Fosbury the high jumper, when he was a teenager, in the 60s, he was a tall lanky kid high jumper in Oregon. And the way that people did the high jump then was they just kind of ran up and jumped over the bar. They sometimes like dove over or went sideways. Fosbury could only jump about five, seven or five, eight in high school and his in his writings. He said I had to do something different. What I find interesting is this is a kid in high school who took some physics. He asked a question that was simple enough, yet very important. And the question he asked was, what if I go over the bar backward? Well, it's a completely different way of being. Yeah, yeah, completely different. And, you know, the rest is history when he was 21. I think he jumped seven, four, and won the gold medal because going over backward alters your center of gravity. And he knew that from physics, I think it's about being first doing is very important. Knowledge is really kind of a flashlight or a light bulb that illuminates specific circumstances. So that's one thing we talked about transformation, for some people might be having otherworldly aspects to it. And I think that's fine and great. But it's really about getting access to a broader set of ways being acting, right, if you're a leader who has historically, when things don't go well shouted or screamed, and I've unfortunately had to deal with physicians to through stuff in the operating room if that's the only way you know how to react when things go awry. You're not going to be affected yet. So it's really learning, you know, a whole portfolio of different ways of being, including being curious, why did that guy do that? And so that I think that's one thing. The other thing is to get people to understand, and this goes back to, you know, Ron Heifetz's work that these are not technical issues, technical issues, we know how to solve and they and they usually involve change. These are leadership issues, what Ron calls adaptive challenges. And by definition, adaptive challenges require that people change, people's got to change, you know, and it's extraordinarily difficult for people to change a set of behaviors that have really been wired in, you know since they were extraordinarily young. So that's, that's an area that we really work on with people.
Scott Allen 24:15
Well, and we're seeing that just even with public health right now. I mean, I'd love to as we kind of begin to wind down our time. What are some observations that you have, just even in the situation we find ourselves in, whether it's vaccines or masks are I mean, think about the leadership challenges, they're the adaptive challenge, it turns out the technical problem was just creating a vaccine. All along, I was thinking that was an adaptive challenge, and maybe it was back then. But we now have a technical solution, but we have an adaptive challenge.
Dr. Chip Souba 24:49
As you know, there are now a handful of hospitals, healthcare institutions that have said, if you want to work here, you need to be vaccinated. This is Your example is great, because part of being vaccinated is recognizing that you're getting vaccinated, not just for yourself, but you're getting vaccinated to protect others, many of whom will be more vulnerable. That requires that you reinvent yourself, you know, that requires that you say, I'm willing to go over backward. And that's very, very tough work.
Scott Allen 25:25
It is, it is, especially and in a society that at times can be very individualistic, very focused on me, and not the collective we and in some contexts, that's a huge strength of ours. That's a wonderful gift and other contexts. That's, that's a challenge. It just really is. And it'll be fascinating to watch how all of this plays out from again, from a leadership challenge. It's, it's a wicked problem, Chip, as you think about and reflects on the last couple of months of your own growth and development. What are some publications you've been reading, maybe shows you've been streaming podcasts, you've been listening to what's caught your eye, and it could have to do with leadership, or maybe it really doesn't have to do anything with leadership?
Dr. Chip Souba 26:20
One guy that I've listened to and read about, and I think it's quite relevant, at least from my perspective to leadership is the work of David Bohm - BOHM. Bohm says, and I'm still seeing where I land on this, but that almost all of our problems, the big problems that we have in society are because we have, we have a problem with thought. And that thought tends to fragmented Eckhart Tolle who's a more spiritual person said, the most important thing you need to do is to dis-identify with the mind. And I like that very much if you're an A person. And I think this applies to all of us who have a narrative going on that says, I'm not good enough. We, I think one of those big meta-narratives that everybody has, can be an entry, to starting to understand who you are, and what your fears are. But I think Boehm is, is quite good. And what goes along with that is, as you know, there's a lot of recent work now on people call it neuro leadership, what is the role of the brain and all of this, and I think the brain is important, but I think more important is the mind. And of course, it's very difficult to get a handle on the mind, because it's so subjective, we don't really know what the mind is. And so I think that's a, that's a big problem, people will continue to study the brain. And I think it's important to do that. But how the mind works, I think is, is an area that I'm I'm sort of getting into now.
Scott Allen 28:02
Well, the mind and consciousness and I mean, Oh, wow. And, and to your point earlier about the person who frames themselves as maybe not good enough, and how that then impacts and it filters, literally everything they experience from that point, and constrains everything. Exactly, exactly. And so that's why again, I mean, I think this is like base camp, right? That inward journey is base camp, if you want to, I believe, I believe have any position of authority. So if that's parenting, if that's coaching, if that's a priest, if that's a judge, I don't care what the position is, or if you want to engage in the activity of leadership, other leading others, that's Basecamp, it feels like at least that, that you better start there. And then that becomes a way of being in a mindset that is a continual, again, a mountain with no top.
Dr. Chip Souba 29:01
You probably have worked with people. And you know, I certainly haven't, you know, I think there was probably a point in my career earlier where the future that I was committed to, was not bigger than myself, the way I wanted it to be. One of the things that I've noticed in our line of work is, is that there are incredibly bright people and in health care, but one of the derailleurs is, is the person who wants his people to do well, but not quite as well as he did. You have to want people to do better than, you know, it's and if you're not good enough, you can never get there.
Scott Allen 29:43
Well, exactly. And it kind of goes back to that whole kind of line of conversation of luck if we have a group of people who are walking around, kind of constructing the world Egan's level four I mean, we could look at it through a number of different lenses but who knows themselves who are comfortable with themselves who are comfortable in their skin, who understand their limitations, who are in a continuous space of reflection, understand what it is they value and work as much as possible to live those values and work out of a place of intentionality. when interacting with others, if you're ahead of the game, you're ahead of the game at that point. And in some cases, I mean, Chip, my cousin is in the healthcare system right now. And it's hard, my gosh, it's hard. He's on the cardiology track. And it's been years and years of incredibly hard work because the system is just, you know, built on the labor of people at the lower levels, quote-unquote.
Dr. Chip Souba 30:50
You know, there's no place on a person's veto or CV or resume, you know, whether there's an area for, you know, integrity, compassion, and that and that sort of thing. And, you know, there's an enormous amount of emphasis, maybe too much emphasis on recruiting people for their technical skills and their publications. And, uh, you know, we don't have a good way of evaluating the being side of leadership. And we, you know, we need to this, this idea that you're committed to something bigger than yourself that I'll finish with the story of if that's okay, that one of the highlights of my life when I was a young surgeon, and I started my career in surgical oncology at the University of Florida. This was back in this was in 1992, you know, the great Ted Williams the ballplayer was, was admitted to our hospital, he was not our patient, but he's not my patient. But I managed to spend an hour with him. You know, how many people get to spend an hour alone with Ted Williams, he was recovering from surgery and, and was doing fine. But one of the things I asked him, said, Tell me about the 1941 season when you hit 406. The story goes like this, you can read about it. It was the last two games of the season. And he was a Red Sox and the Red Sox were, you know, they're going home. The Yankees had cinched pennant, 17 days ago or something. And he was batting 3996 with two games left, and his manager went to him. Joe Cronin went to him and said, Ted says two games out. He said, your average will be rounded up to 400. No one will bat 400 for at least a decade. tempting, right? Ted Williams looked at me. I think maybe the way He looked at his manager, and he said, Joe, baseball is who I am. It's who I am. And he played, he played that doubleheader and went six straight with a walk and raised his average 406. That's called being committed to a future bigger than yourself, the fans, the game itself, see, the guy he was committed to the game itself was not going to sit it out, just because it gave him a statistic. So I love that story. Whether you're a professor in a business school, like you are, or a physician, taking care of patients, or a priest, or a teacher in a, in a school, you've got to be committed to something bigger than yourself, that's going to be the energy that is going to fortify you, every single day.
Scott Allen 33:40
And Chip, if you are that individual who's committed to that inward journey, and that exploration and that work, and you are the person who's committed to that future that's bigger than yourself. That's a powerful combination, right? Just absolutely a powerful combination. Sir, it has been so much fun to chat with you today. Thank you for spending the time. And we're gonna put all of your information in the show notes, so listeners can find out more about you and more about some of the articles that you've written on the topic. I just can't thank you enough. Thank you for the good work that you do.
Dr. Chip Souba 34:12
The website is www.theinwardjourneyofleadership.com (single word). All the articles and articles are available. Scott, thank you for inviting me. But more importantly, thank you for creating this resource and this portfolio of ideas for people. You know, I've already listened to a couple of the podcasts and they're very rich, so I would say, keep it up.
Scott Allen 34:40
Thank you, sir. Thank you. All right. A lot of fun. Okay, be well.
Dr. Chip Souba 34:43
Have a great day. Bye-bye.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai