[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:21] Speaker B: From humble beginnings to leadership purpose. Welcome to your life and legacy.
I'm Christopher Nudo and on this show we explore stories and lessons and defining moments that shape a person's life, their leadership and their legacy.
Today I'm joined by Christopher Meredith, founder and CEO of MCS Meredith Consulting Services.
Chris brings more than four decades of leadership experience, including military leadership, executive advising, coaching, strategic development and systems thinking.
His story is not just about professional success.
It's about growth. It's about failure, discipline, mentorship, and most importantly, continuous learning.
He has the belief that has really shaped the systems, people and experiences around him. Chris grew up in a small, low income town in Louisiana and as a young man learned about work, responsibility in business and perseverance from his grandfather.
His grandfather was a blind man who built his own business and ran it late into his 80s.
Later, Chris joined the military where he discovered that you know what, he had a sixth grade reading comprehension level.
Instead of letting that really define him, he went back to reading school where he worked with his wife and graduated from a six month program. Wait for it in six weeks.
That experience became part of a lifelong commitment to learning, leadership and helping others grow. Christopher, welcome to your life and legacy.
[00:02:24] Speaker A: Thanks Chris. It's great to be here.
[00:02:26] Speaker B: Listen, I love your story and the the beginning with your grandfather and him being really a mentor for you. Tell us explain to our audience. When you look back at your early life in Louisiana or what really shaped you the most?
[00:02:41] Speaker A: I think the most that shaped me was community.
It was really a small, unique town. It was very low income. In fact, the 2022 census rated it as the poorest town in America at that particular time.
But with that being said, it was still a close knit community.
It was a trusting community and it was a really close knit community. And my, my grandfather in particular shaped my life in a lot of ways. My parents had influence over me as well, of course, and certainly all positive. But my grandfather was amazing. He was blind. He decided that he could work. He tried to do physical labor, cut off several of his fingers in the process and then ended up in the broom and mop business, believe it or not, and ended up supplying from local stores to colleges and then ultimately oil field supply and things like that. So he taught me a real, real, real discipline. In fact, you never went to my grandfather and asked for money. He had put you to work in his warehouse and make you earn it. But so the discipline and responsibility and the independence I think were some of the biggest things as well as community involvement and connectivity. Was just amazing. So we didn't know we were poor because everybody else was too, by the way.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: Absolutely. It's amazing how community and everybody working together. What do they say? A rising tide raises all ships. So tell us about that community. So, so we know, was your grandfather a pillar in the community with his business? Was he just one of many businesses and what was it like there? You know, were you at the local soda shop? I'm just having this vision of small town Louisiana back then.
[00:04:43] Speaker A: Yeah, it was really neat. It was one general store.
The sawmill actually is where 100% of the people worked.
It was owned by the sawmill. Actually the whole town was in fact, until 1973 when the sawmill sold. The sawmill actually owned all of the individual houses, the work crews, Everybody worked for the sawmill.
And so that close unity, I think is a way to put it because everybody loved everybody. Everybody was a part of the same mindset, a part of the same group. And as far as businesses, my grandfather was pretty unique because his business was really highly successful over time, especially into the 70s and 80s and 90s before he died.
But as far as the town, there was one commissary. So ultimately you could go down to the commissary, buy what you want and they just took it out of the worker's paycheck.
There was one cafe and there was a couple of. There was a barber shop and a little what we called a recreation hall, we called it a rec hall actually. And it had a two lane bowling alley in it and a few pool tables and a couple of rooms for the old guys to play dominoes. And so you could go all over the town, you could get on your bicycle, you could go anywhere. You didn't have to worry about any crime or anything like that.
And so really just the unity that existed. And in 73, when the sawmill sold, then the new owners actually sold the houses back to the individuals. And then later, in fact I started working at the sawmill. And later the sawmill actually closed. And that's what even created a greater level of poverty in the town. But it didn't stop the community from being the community. So it's really a sweet little town. In fact I visited, we had a celebration for one of my grandkids at his other grandparents house in that same town just recently. So it was awesome. It's a really a nice place to grow up. Even though again, we didn't know we were poor because everybody else was.
[00:07:00] Speaker B: Absolutely, absolutely. What a great story. And I can just, you know, our viewers can have this vision in their mind of this southern small town in Louisiana and just the community working around the one centralized sawmill. I love that. So when we're talking about you and the early stages of you working, when, when, when would you say that were the early stages that really developed you and your leadership? Was it your first job? Was it your third job? Was it a certain job?
Chris, tell us about your evolution into leadership.
[00:07:39] Speaker A: So the evolution into leadership was really a long process. It actually began, I really began to understand leadership when I was in the military. But prior to that, it was a combination of those things because the responsibility and taking ownership started at a very young age. In fact, at 8 years old, I was selling grit newspaper and then at night I was setting up bowling pins in the bowling alley and Saturday mornings I was shining shoes in the barbershop.
So it was really that that began the process that I really didn't even realize that it was shaping me into leadership. To me, it was just a matter of being an entrepreneur, following my grandfather's steps and taking responsibility for my own actions.
So that was where it actually began.
And then as I evolved and went into the military, that's actually where the leadership mindset began to actually form. And of course, I reflected back on those early days and that began to accumulate things within me that ultimately led me to where I'm at today from a leadership perspective.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: Yeah, I like to think of early. Those early days were like seeds that were scattered among your brain. And then when you went into the military, they started to germinate and come together and you could really understand the seeds that had already been planted in your life by so many of the leaders, your parents, your grandfather, etc in the community. That.
What an inspiring story.
So when you were in the military, what was the epiphany moment that really changed the direction of your life?
[00:09:31] Speaker A: So going into the military, I was already responsible, I was already understanding how to take ownership of things. But really when I got into the military, I began to see leaders on a broad scale. Up to that point, I had not actually seen leadership on a broad scale. I'd certainly seen it on an individual scale.
But those thoughts, those ideas of being able to see the connectivity that existed in the leadership of the military, there was great things there. There was also things that wasn't so great that I learned and I'll speak to later, of course. But ultimately it was learning the idea of leadership from the standpoint of teamwork. How teams had to function together, how every component had to contribute its own part, how each one never had to worry about what the other one was doing because they knew they were taking responsibility for themselves. And so as a result of that, I began to see patterns. I began to really develop discipline. I really began to see structure and, and I really began to see standards. And ultimately I began to see execution in that process as well. And that began to shape my thoughts of leadership as they are today.
[00:10:52] Speaker B: Excellent. Excellent. And we just have like a minute left here in this segment, but what really stood out to you when you discovered your reading deficit?
We'll pick this up in the next segment, but give us a little teaser as to, you know, you, you found out you had this reading deficit. What did that mean to you?
[00:11:12] Speaker A: So the first thing is, and of course we will pick it up later, but the first thing is I realized that I just thought up to that point, I didn't care. I thought school was about playing and having fun and all of those things and even quit school at one particular time. But when I really understood that I had that deficit, I had to challenge myself. Could I overcome it? Was I willing to take responsibility for it? And was I really willing to expand my capacity and my understanding of things? And that began the process of the challenge for me to rise to a new level of thinking.
[00:11:48] Speaker B: Wonderful. Wonderful. What really stands out in Chris's story is that legacy often begins long before we know what it will become.
It begins when we receive and understand the obstacles that we're going to face and the people who shape us and the decisions we make in life that really challenge us. When we come back, we're going to talk to Chris about leadership, military discipline, and why Chris believes true leadership is about more than command and control.
Stay tuned, Sam.
Leadership beyond command and control.
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Hey, welcome back to your life and legacy. I'm Christopher Nudo and today I'm speaking with Christopher Meredith, founder and CEO of Meredith Consulting Services.
Chris has spent more than four decades leading, coaching, advising and walking with leaders and organizations through seasons of growth, pressure, transition, uncertainty and change. His military experience taught him discipline, structure, responsibility, standards and execution. But over time, Chris also learned that leadership is not only about command, it's about it's not. It's also not only about control, it's not only about giving direction.
Leadership is also about perseverance, persistence, influence, discernment, trust, development, wisdom and understanding. Most importantly, the systems you are in that create the leadership.
Welcome back, Chris.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: Thank you Chris. It's exciting to be here. Thanks for having me.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: So, you know, let's go back to the military and what it taught you about leadership and how that impacts you still today when you're coaching people.
[00:14:54] Speaker A: So what I learned, obviously while there was a lot of teamwork and obviously you have to function as a single unit in the military and the connectivity is certainly there, there was also one thing about the leadership style of the military that while really great, awesome, learned a lot. So I'm not taking anything away from that at all.
But what I also began to see was that command and control alone or top down leadership or whatever you want to call it, actually can create a bottleneck. And that bottleneck because it ends up being with one single person, especially in a particular team or organization.
And because of that there's a lot of things that can happen.
Certainly delays can happen in getting responses. Certainly the mood of the leader can determine things or maybe the single perspective of the leader can shape things.
And so as a result of that, I began to see that that type of leadership bottleneck things. And I'm going to be very candid with the audience today Chris, because a lot of what I know today and a lot of what I've learned today and a lot of what I coach today is not about what I did right over the years. It was a lot of what I did wrong too.
Maybe it was a part of that comprehension concept that it took me a while to really grasp some things. But with that being said, I learned that it's not only about those things. As you mentioned, leadership is about presence, it's about influence, it's about discernment, it's about trust, it's about developing of people, it's about developing wisdom, it's about understanding the system that we're leading and how that system actually functions. And when you understand it and begin to comprehend it from that particular point, you understand how important every component is not just to accomplish the task at hand, but to keep and create long term sustainability within a family, within an organization, within any area of life.
And it works at every level. Whether the company is a multi billion dollar company or whether they're a single startup. The leadership that I've learned to have and learned to lead with has not only given me a lot of freedom as a leader, but it's given me an opportunity to help a lot of leaders have freedom as well, and to see their own capacity expand and to see their teams functioning as they should be functioning.
[00:17:39] Speaker B: And I appreciate that vulnerability that you expressed that, you know, you shared that, you know, you've, you know, some say, failed their way to success.
I can certainly relate to that. And so when we did your reading comprehension issue affect really your who you thought of yourself as? And so when you, when then you went on and you went back to school with your wife and six weeks later had made a drastic improvement in your life, did that affect who you were as a leader, how you saw yourself? How did it really change Chris Meredith from who he was before that point, recognizing his limitation, reading wise, and then quickly overcoming that?
[00:18:34] Speaker A: Yeah, great, great question, Chris, because it was certainly a major contribution to my current style and way of leading, as well as having the privilege of speaking to a lot of underprivileged kids and underprivileged juveniles and underprivileged young adults as well, to help them understand that regardless of your environment, regardless of where you're at, you can certainly make choices that take you to where you want to be.
So when I really, of course, understanding that comprehension level, and there's a lot that goes into that and to why that is, you know, I was a jokester, I was a clown. And I had teachers that loved me and passed me because they loved me. I had teachers that hated me and pass me because they hated me.
And ultimately even quitting school, you know, I went to work at a local grocery store and then eventually came back to school and checked in on, I think, the second period and skipped third, fourth, and fifth. So a lot of that was contributed to the fact that I did not intentionally learn anything. But to your question and to the point exactly, there was a lot of insecurity in my life. And even though I was a class clown and even though I loved to joke and pick and play and still do, but during that time, a lot of that was out of insecurity. I was one of those kind that if I walked in a room and people were laughing, I thought they were laughing at me.
And so that would create insecurity within me when I really, but because of my grandfather's teachings and all of the early years of work and the things that I learned about discipline, when I really realized that I was really at a pivoting point, I was at a crossroads. And so the crossroads was, is either I stick with this insecurity. I get out of the military, which I could have, and I go back into the log woods or to the sawmill or to the oil field or wherever the opportunities would lead me. I actually moved trailer houses one time for a living as well. So wherever those would lead me, or I would rise to the challenge and realize that I was better than that. I was created by God himself. And as creatures of God and the creation of God, I believe that all of us are in a position to excel and to exceed unless there is some obvious disability that may exist. But. But with that being said, I took the challenge and I said, I'm not going to. I'm not going to stop this.
[00:21:18] Speaker B: Let me. Let me interrupt you for a second. So what I really hear is, you know, you had just the natural insecurity that came out as a result of, you know, whether it was you didn't like school.
School was difficult. I mean, for all we know, maybe you're dyslexic but never diagnosed. You know, there could be a myriad of reasons why during school time you were not engaged. And you. That came out in, you know, the fact that you're a class clown, the fact that you acted out, you know, and, and your grades reflected that. But that's not who defines Christopher Meredith today. But what was the turning point? The point where you were like, oh, my gosh, I'm not this guy. I mean, yeah, I still have difficulty in school. Yeah, I still, you know, was challenged. But that guy that, that teacher either loved because I entertained him or hated because I didn't apply myself in class.
That person has got defined. When did that change and you become the man you are today?
[00:22:28] Speaker A: That began to change immediately when. When I had to go to reading school. Obviously it was humbling for the military to tell me that, you know, hey, if you're going to continue with us, you're going to have to do this. Reading school that changed my life. And I applied myself, I did the things I needed to do. My wife obviously contributed to that. And then ultimately, Chris, to really summarize that, 10 months later, I was promoted. I was in the training department, and. And I was training people that were ranked five times higher than I was. And so that really began to shape me at that point. And it didn't take long. And once I grabbed ahold of that, it was an open door from then on, and a lot of doors were kicked open, but ultimately it was an open door from that time on.
[00:23:20] Speaker B: Wonderful. And now you had mentioned presence and Influence and trust. And. And really, what do those elements, how do they really play into leadership when we're talking about people and organizational health?
[00:23:37] Speaker A: So in a big, big way. So presence by itself is one of the largest things that a leader can learn. It's huge because ultimately, when you really understand your own identity and you really look at your teams and you look at those that you're leading, you learn to eliminate assumptions. You learn to focus on their needs, you learn to focus on their thoughts and their feedback. And with that being said, that by itself brings a presence to a meeting or to a leadership team. And with that being said, that obviously translates into influence and trust and all of those other things. And I'm sure we'll highlight that coming up very soon.
[00:24:23] Speaker B: Absolutely. You know what? Leadership's not only about the title a person holds. It's about the conditions they create, the trust they build, the clarity they bring, and the legacy they leave behind in people and organizations. When we return, we'll explore Chris's work in systems thinking and why he believes many organizations are not machines, they are living systems. Stay tuned.
Foreign.
Welcome back to your life and legacy. Today I'm continuing my conversation with Christopher Meredith about leadership strategy, systems thinking, and deeper patterns that shape organizations at mcs. That's Meredith Consulting Services.
Chris partners with executives, boards, and senior leadership teams to strengthen leadership and strategically apply systems thinking to real organizational and individual leadership challenges.
His work is built around one powerful idea. Organizations are not machines.
They are living success systems. They are made up of people, discussions, culture, decisions, trust, communication, strategies, pressures, habits, leadership behavior, and repeated patterns. I think. I think we call that life.
And whether leaders see those things or not, those things are always working.
So, Chris, tell me, expand for us this idea that organizations are living system.
[00:26:40] Speaker A: Yeah, that's really good, Chris. And it's something that it's hard to see sometimes. In fact, I'll give you a quick example. I was coaching someone recently, and I asked this person to walk me through a project. Walk me through. They were a senior executive. And I said, walk me through a whole project that you have to go through and the people that are involved with it. And throughout the process of that conversation, that person said to me that, yeah, you can see they're all silos and they're all linear. And I said, everything you just said to me is about systems. Everything you just said to me is systems thinking.
Because ultimately, when you look at an organization, that organization is made up of people.
It's made up of processes, it's made up of communication. It's made up of feedback loops, it's made up of outside influences. There's a number of things that every organization is actually made up of. The question is, from a leadership perspective, how do we see it? Do we actually see it? In fact, that's one thing that I try to uniquely do with every single company or every leader that I coach is to see their organization and their individual situation the way it actually is, so that obviously I can help them bring connectivity to it and create that long term success.
But when I look at it from that particular standpoint, I see all of these things at work.
Now. They may be disconnected in the sense because maybe the leader is not leading it as a living system, maybe they're leading it as a siloed or a linear type system, but actually those things are taking place underneath whether that leader sees it or not. And so as a result of that, helping leaders see the actual individual components that make up that living system and how they all should be connected. I'm not saying that they are because many times there are disconnects, but ultimately how every component flows together to contribute to one another and how within each and every individual component there are all these things. The trust, the feedback loops, the communication. And again, all of those things are taking place whether that leader realizes it or not. They may think everything is okay, but if they really were to look at the patterns and look within the system and the roots under the patterns, they would see that it is not just this single organization, it is a living system that is actually operating within it.
[00:29:30] Speaker B: So with that as a living system, with our organization as a living system, and you identified what most the people in the organization would call surface level problems.
But the problem when you look at service level problems is you're typically looking at symptoms versus the actual problem itself. And you have to get deeper into it. And so how do you, how do you move these leaders from looking at the systems that they've developed, implemented, and honestly in most cases are very proud of, because they have a well run organization and have them step back and really look at the people themselves and the culture that each person brings to the table so that you can then remove the surface level problems and build a culture from a much deeper perspective?
[00:30:27] Speaker A: Well, you begin that. That's another good question. And so what you do there, Chris, is, is when you're actually communicating with a leader that is proud of their structured system that they've built. And I want to be clear, I'm a huge believer in structured systems. I certainly believe that I look at a structured system like the body of a car, the engine itself is not going to do any good if it's not in a body of a car. And so a structured system is really important because it's a framework.
It's designed to harmonize the moving parts of the company into a single predictable mechanism.
And so, for instance, the roles, the direct reporting, the lines of responsibility, the body of the organization, all of those things are extremely important.
And leaders have done a really good job of putting that structure in place. Although I will say that I'm coaching companies right now that are just now understanding the need to refine and define their structure. But those leaders are proud of that structure and they should be proud of that structure. But the living system, when you're helping a leader begin to see the living system, you begin to help them see what's happening inside that organization, how the decisions are actually made. So if I'm drawing this out on a whiteboard for a leader, I'm asking these type questions. What I'm trying to do is to not as much bring new revelation to something as much as I am to bring confirmation out and to let these leaders see what they really already know. They're just not looking deep enough to see it. So, for instance, how decisions are made, how are the people actually communicating? How are the leaders that are following this specific leader responding to individual situations, how are they building trust, how do they handle conflict and what are they rewarding? In fact, I can look at a company at any given moment and I can say, show me your core values and show me what your culture should be like and then take a look at what they're actually rewarding. And that is sending messages throughout the system looking at what actually is said in a meeting as a really good example.
So I go into a meeting and I'm coaching a meeting or I'm teaching a meeting and I'm saying a lot of things, I'm giving a great speech and everybody's nodding their heads as they agree. And so the leader assumes that when they walk out of that meeting that everything is okay, everything is going well.
And yet then there's those water cooler conversations and there's those cubicle conversations and those after hours conversations about what that leader said. So in other words, are they really aligned or are they just agreeing? And so how is the culture actually behaving? Because culture actually tells us what is normal. And so if I think I'm leading a culture and I'm setting a culture in place and then I look into the organization itself, and the people are not behaving within that particular culture, then I know for a fact that I have an issue. So what the specific answer to your question, in a simple form would be to help leaders look into all of those things and let them see for themselves. Leaders are smart, they're intelligent, they're passionate. They do care about their people and their organizations.
And, and I'm sure.
[00:34:26] Speaker B: Chris, let me, let me, let me interrupt you for a second here because you've brought up, you've brought up, you've unpacked a lot for our viewers. And I want to really take it back a couple steps here. What I'd like to do is, you know, you're in the military. You have. We're taking it back to you, Chris. We're, you know, you, you. Now, there is a point in time where you exit the military and, and as Chris's life evolves, you start to recognize all of these things that you just unpacked that you're bringing out in other organizations. Tell me the story of Chris and his, you know, did you come out of the military this smart or is this. What were the, what were the steps along the way that got you to be able to recognize these things?
[00:35:21] Speaker A: Well, Chris, that's, that's.
There's a lot of depth to that because it really took a lot of time for me to really understand exactly what I'm saying right now. Because when I come out of the military and I go into the business world and at the lowest levels and what I begin to. I begin to really sense that things were.
I didn't know what I was sensing. I just began to sense that.
That something wasn't right. I'm seeing structure. I'm seeing things on the outside. I'm seeing leaders that are probably bottlenecking and didn't realize that until later, the organizations that they led. And so I began to just really commit myself to understanding that process. And by the way, I go back to the vulnerability here.
I went through the various ranks, even into the highest levels of VP and etc. Etc.
And still knowing something was missing. And so it was through that process and then pausing at some point, and I'll speak to this a little bit later, and realizing that I myself had been leading, not with clarity, in my own leadership, and that began to change the process. So I'll come back to that a little bit later, but thanks for asking that question, by the way.
[00:36:51] Speaker B: Yeah, and I mean, it really comes back to what we discussed earlier, Chris, that, you know, when we recognize so much of ourselves and what we didn't know and what we've learned, that gives us the ability to then lead better because of our own growth. What I really like about this conversation is that it helps leaders look deeper, not just what had happened, but why it's happening. Not just about who made the mistake, but you know, what condition made the mistake more likely.
And how about, you know, let's just not talk about how to fix it immediately. But what are, what are some of the patterns and issues that keep returning when we come back?
We're going to close by talking about leadership, legacy, value driven transformation, and what it means to build what will last.
Stay tuned.
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Welcome back to your life and legacy. I'm closing today's conversation with Christopher Meredith, Founder and CEO of MCS Services.
Chris's work is focused on helping organizations, leaders and teams create lasting impact, measurable outcomes and value driven transformation. Rather than relying on top down models or surface level tactics.
Chris partners with leaders to develop leadership strategy and systems that support long term performance and healthy growth and that connects directly with legacy. Because legacy is not only about what people remember after we're gone. Legacy is about what we build every day through decisions, relationships, leadership, behavior, values, trust, and, you know, the way we develop others.
So Chris, let's start with legacy.
You've, you've, you've clearly been working on one from your early days with your grandfather, through the military, through your corporate involvement. And so tell me about legacy at this stage in your life and what you've done in your career and what it means to you and who are you leaving it to?
[00:40:16] Speaker A: A great question again, Chris, and thanks for asking.
You know, I'll go back to leadership because leadership is so deep and I want to comment on a few of my mentors in my life because this does lead into legacy.
I've had the privilege in the beginning I wasn't even really seeking them out.
But I really learned later that by, by just divine guidance I believe I was put in places in my career where people contributed to me of Course, starting with my grandfather and then the military and then other areas of leadership.
Some of my leaders that invested in me had nothing to lose, nothing to gain. They just made choices to actually teach me things that I needed to know and to impart things into me. Which means that that information, that leadership that they gave me has actually been transferred not only to me, but through me, to many, many, many other people. And as a result of that, that is leaving a legacy. Because you said it. Legacy is about today, it's also about tomorrow.
But legacy is certainly not, and I'll put it in my terms, it's not about me having a name on a building somewhere or somebody remembering how great I actually was. In fact, I'll give you one good example. I left a company a number of years ago and it was a multi billion dollar company and I was in senior leadership. And when I left some time later, one of the board members called me and he said, you should have never left. It's gotten better since you left.
I just kind of laughed and I said, well then I actually did my job and I may never be remembered for it personally, and that's okay, but ultimately I did my job. So when I look at legacy and what it actually means to me, I'll give you a few terms that I use when I'm coaching.
Generational transfer is one of those, so that it continues on and on and on.
Cultural memory.
I interviewed a group of younger people recently for a speech I did actually in Chicago at a large national convention. And I interviewed them as well as some of the senior elderly people in some of these same companies. And one of the things that I kept looking for from the younger people is not only do you want to contribute, but are you willing to learn the foundations and from the older generation, are you willing to allow the younger generation to have a voice and at the same time help them understand the culture memory that they should have and the foundation that was built. It's about institutional integrity, it's about purpose, the why we're doing things and passing that down. It's about the way that leaders are developed and creating a system for leadership development. Because I believe as leaders, we're guardians of human development. How truth is handled, how culture is handled, how I mentioned people and how they were developed, how ownership is transferred and ultimately how an organization carries out things from one season to another.
[00:43:51] Speaker B: And you know, I know that if we go back to your life, Chris, and and we talk about things like truth and recognizing culture and having persistence, these are things that you Teach today and you coach today. But let's talk about the truth aspect, because we all have these moments where all of a sudden, truth goes from not just a concept, but it becomes part of who you are and who you want to be remembered by. I like to say this is the moment where integrity really matters. And so tell me about in Chris's life, the transformational growth to where truth really played into everything that makes you who you are, that makes you the great coach you are.
[00:44:43] Speaker A: Yeah, I think going back to my early years and to my childhood and to that small town in Louisiana, Just amazing. In fact, the height of our population was 500 people.
I think that the understanding of truth, understanding of clarity, understanding that truth is even being vulnerable. Truth is admitting your mistakes. It's taking ownership for it. In fact, one of the greatest things leaders can do is admit that. And in my life, as you ask, it really began to.
It was there, but it really began to form over time, that transferring truth and being truthful and empowering people to be truthful. You know, I quite often equate it to babies. You know, babies are just totally honest, and we laugh and we think it's cute. And then when adults are totally honest, we get offended.
And so I've learned to let truth be the God.
And sometimes that truth hurts because sometimes it's things that I need to correct. Sometimes it's things that I failed at, and I have failed at a lot of things. I've said to a group of leaders just recently that I am not on this stage today because I have done everything right. I'm on this stage today because I didn't do everything right, and I learned from those mistakes. And that's where truth actually comes in. So the transfer of truth, period, in all aspects of life, whether it's just being honest about things that I failed at, or it's transferring truths that are foundational. Truth is foundational, and truth can't be shaken.
[00:46:31] Speaker B: No, it certainly cannot.
And so what would you say to a leader who wants to build something that truly lasts?
We have a few minutes left here. You know, what. What are you going to tell that leader that you know, in a nutshell, do this and your leadership will start defining the legacy of you and your corporation.
[00:46:58] Speaker A: Yeah, that. That, Chris, is something that I try to transfer to leaders all the time.
And it's something that I practice in my daily life. I'm not perfect at it. No one is.
But it's a process of development and expanding our capacity. Learn to see the system.
Learn to Open your eyes, learn to have perspective. And once you begin to see how the system actually operates and what happens within that system on a daily basis, then learn to lead the system. And that starts with your own identity. Not just your confidence level, but your true identity as a leader and your identity as a leader within that system. And as you begin to develop in your own identity and your own presence and your own leadership gravity and your own ability to see that internal flow of things that are taking place on a daily basis, then and you learn to lead that system effectively, not by command and control, but but by understanding how the system functions.
That alone will allow not only the generational transfers and the flow of things, but it will create long term sustainability.
[00:48:18] Speaker B: And how would people who want to learn more about Chris Meredith and Meredith Consulting Services get to know more about you and the teams that you can be involved with?
[00:48:31] Speaker A: You can go to my website. It is think mcs360.com that's thinkmcs360.com and if you want more information that's not on that website, there's a form there you can fill out. And, and obviously that goes directly to my email or you can email me directly at cross
[email protected] well Chris, thank
[00:49:01] Speaker B: you so much for sharing your story, your leadership, your wisdom, your perspective on growth and leadership and legacy. Today we talked about humble beginnings, military leadership, personal growth, systems thinking, organizational health. So, so, so much. And all of this is what it means to, to build something that'll last.
And to everyone watching, remember this. A legacy is not built in one moment. It's built throughout the way we lead, the people we develop, the systems we shape and the values we choose to protect. I'm Christopher Nudo and this is your life and legacy.
