CEO Strategies for Overcoming Decision Fatigue

[0:00]  so my nine year ago self I think that I would for one thing kind of just acknowledge that like that's okay like that this like you can do things even while doubting yourself um it's kind of like that whole thing like Brave doesn't mean you're not scared Brave means that you're you feel the fear and you do the thing anyway right so for me um the self-doubt has just been I just have learned to bring it along with me and say there it is okay I see it now there it is and I'm going to do the thing anyway I also um I struggle a fair out with like just a people pleasing kind of personality and so it is it is true that usually at Ronald McDonald House I mean everybody loves what we're doing up in here I love what we're doing up in here the staff I mean we just it's really pretty great there are also sometimes when like I have to make a decision that is either a or b and some people prefer

[0:49]  a and some people prefer B and there is no C right and so not everybody may love just whatever decision has been made and that is always hard for me because I am generally happiest as a general rule when the people around me are happy like it's taking lots of therapy to unwind that and I'm just like okay right I am generally happiest when when the people around me are happy and is also I can't ensure that everyone around me is happy all the time and so that can also be okay all right guys welcome back to a brand new episode of the heart and hustle podcast today going to be an incredibly

[1:36]  important conversation because we're talking to an amazing leader today's guest is Tammy Greenberg now she holds a master's degree in both social work and business she is the n-year CEO of the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Kansas City Tammy welcome to the show well hi Keenan thanks thanks I'm glad to be here thanks for having me absolutely so Tammy m in our previous conver ation together you said something that I thought was really incredible you said have you ever heard of the phrase get out a Dodge i what does that mean to you well it uh some of your like listeners and viewers will be like uh I don't know that phrase but I think you maybe have to be old to know that phrase but there is this expression get out of Dodge sometimes it's like get the H out of Dodge um it's kind of based on Dodge City Kansas which is where I am from I

[2:26]  am a Dodge City kid so Dodge City Kansas is in Western southwest Kansas um some might say the middle of nowhere but it's not the middle of nowhere right because it's where I'm from and it kind of comes from like the old like old western days I like to say that I did that and I I got out of Dodge it is also true that I'm very proud of my Dodge City routs so I our our High School uh mascot was the Red Demons if you can believe that still is the Dodge City Red Demons so um yeah that's that was me K and I got out of Dodge how do you feel like growing up in Dodge impacted your worldview so one of the things and I don't remember if we talked about this before in our kind of pre-c conversation or not one of the things that really was impactful for me is that my dad um was and is um a doctor and in Dodge City the medical community there is primarily

[3:15]  made up of or at least when I was growing up I'm old now I'm 51 when I was growing up the medical community was almost entirely Physicians from other countries because if you had gotten a medical degree from somewhere in the United States and you could pick where you could go in the United States you might not have picked Dodge City but if you were from another country you might we might say anywhere in America is good and so a lot of those positions were from other countries so our closest family friends were from other countries like my second mom my second dad um were Bolivian and are Bolivian like so AB espol I speak a little bit of Spanish because of this Bolivian family and so our closest family friends were from Thailand and Saud Arabia and Chile and Bolivia and Germany so here it wasn't a super small town uh Dodge City Kansas the primary industry there is beef the

[4:03]  steak so when you eat your Dodge City Steaks um and I also had was really just lucky and privileged to have a Global Perspective even in a small town so I'm a lucky kid to have grown up with all those good folks around me you know one of the things that I've appreciated when I was younger I didn't enjoy it so much but now that I have a little perspective in age right I moved around a lot I was born in Seattle grew up in Detroit spent time in South Carolina for college then out to Vegas then Hawaii now Vegas now back out Hawaii pretty soon the one thing that I recognized in moving around a lot is I saw so many different perspectives so many different cultures and it helped me kind of round out my worldview of what it's like to be a human but also see the person across from me not their affiliation not their religion not their political party do you think that that kind of shaped your worldview of how you see humans because

[4:50]  you had so much exposure at a young age to so many different types of people absolutely I absolutely do I knew when I was a junior in high school uh that I wanted to be a social worker so there I was the doctor's daughter in Dodge City Kansas telling my junior year economics teacher that I wanted to be a social worker and he said I'll never forget it he said they will eat you alive they the people who need Social Work Services they will eat you alive um and so I was not necessarily encouraged to pursue a career in social work and I knew early on that I am just I guess lucky I don't know to be able to sense this kind of sheared humanity Humanity that like regardless of political affiliation which is particularly important time to be talking about that right like we're all we're all humans here um that's one of the things I love about my job at Ronald McDonald house is that everybody loves their kids right and so there's a

[5:38]  just this element of shared Humanity that I think that if you're willing to look for it and if you're willing to be open to it it's right there you you can live in a big town or a small town and you can live in a lot of places like you did or one place if you are willing to I think if we are will willing to recognize that we all have a lot more in common than we don't then we're just going to I don't know get along better understand ourselves better understand each other other better it's a good place to start I think I mean the the antidote right to ignorance is understanding there's a famous saying it says if you truly understood and knew your enemy they would not be your enemy that's brilliant yeah seek first to understand right um yeah and I think that yeah I mean who of us should have enemies really right and so for me that like perspective of again growing up in Dodge City and um having a global kind of mindset even in a small town I think

[6:29]  that um and this was kind of this was before the days of social media you know I know that you and I are going to talk about like the epidemic of loneliness and isolation we felt sort of isolated in Dodge City I'll say that I did um in the sense of like I went to college in the Chicago area a super conservative Evangelical Christian College um and so and I became aware of all the things that I had no idea existed when I was growing up in Dodge City one of my examples of that is the gap like you know the Gap everybody buys their jeans at the Gap I got to college and I was like what's the Gap because we didn't have one in Dodge City so you know so we were isolated in a way but we also like you know had a sense of community growing up with each other and so um I think you can create Community wherever you are you can create it you can find it and you can be the source of it for someone else I want to double tap on you as uh young girl right say I want to be

[7:18]  a social worker someone says they're going to eat you alive out there in that moment we have two opportunities one is we can either say I'm going to prove somebody wrong or the other one is say you obviously know more than I do so I'm not going to to give up on this dream what was the natural reaction if we could time travel back to Young Tammy hearing that for the first time what were kind of the thoughts that went through your head gosh young Tammy uh would have no idea of all the things that awaited actual Tammy right young Tammy was really um informed by led by um inspired by the concept of like Mission work so like I grew up in a Christian environment like I said went of a Christian college and so for me the concept of service uh and that we are all children of God and and as I have grown older for me that has the definition of what that means really has

[8:05]  grown um so for me uh social work at least it started and really has continued to be sort of a Ministry kind of small M Ministry uh in the sense of like let's take care of each other so I was lucky in that I kind of went to that space when I remember his name but I won't say it on the podcast but when that high school teacher said they'll Eat You Alive um I kind of went the route of I'm going to prove him wrong I'm going to show that I can like I'm going to I'm going to do this I'm going to at least try this because it's feel what I feel called to do I'm also just super aware that there are so many folks in life who don't have um any kind of other messages folks who are telling them they can do what they want to do or what they feel called to do um so yeah so that's I think that I was I'm grateful that young Tammy didn't listen

[8:51]  to the naysayers uh I also think that it was a you know and and as you know keen and I have a wife right so as I you know I know I've talked about God a lot so far in Ministry I also am a gay person and so kind of reconciling those things and we think about like kind of the whole of our Humanity that mean there some Reckoning kind of in my journey along the way and I think that we have to like be in touch with who we are ourselves right and so for me kind of growing up small town Dodge City this like fairly conservative religious environment and continuing that kind of environment in college and kind of becoming all of who I am and figuring out a way to to move forward really authentically honoring all of it it's a lifelong journey I'll say that I'll be 52 soon and I still haven't mastered it I still haven't figured it all out but I'm in the process of learning

[9:38]  conversations like this with you kind of you know help me to keep learning from you and from you know the world you know one of the my favorite sayings right is right now is you know often when we live our truth it shows other people the lie that they've been living you know that authenticity and knowing who we truly are is something that so many people struggle with especially in this world of comparison and ideas being put into our lives and I'm glad that you're able to find who you truly were and leaned into it so early yeah well you know in the process of right we're all evolving I was actually telling someone this morning in the context of a of a kind of business conversation saying that transparent is kind of the only way that I know how to be like I just I find it easier I find it easier to be authentic to be genuine to be transparent um and I attribute that to some of my early days in terms of like coming out and kind of figuring out in an environment and a

[10:27]  kind of societal time that was much different related to lgbtq issues than it is now um it's just easier to I think in the end uh to be who you are you know it's to when you know when you are in a game playing kind of place whether it's your like instagramming right or you're being one kind of way with one group of friends in a different kind of way with a different group of friends it's exhausting like it's exhausting and I think that for me I have found it um easiest quite frankly the path of least resistance is just to be all of who I am all the time um perhap the sugar of people around me I don't know because I can be kind of silly and I can be kind of silly even in serious environments um and I can be um kind of serious and silly environments right like I'm kind of you know we all are our own whole package right and so for me I have found it easier just to to be that and and

[11:16]  again evolving right kind of growing and changing and learning as I um as I go so let's talk a little bit about your process of evolution so we go away to college right and now today we sit here we're the CEO with a 9e ten tenure at the Ronald McDonald House what happened in between going to college and then starting as a CEO what was that Journey like um I you mentioned that I uh I think you mentioned that I have a a master's degree in social work and in business so my undergraduate degree um is in Psychology and then I really have started my started and maintained my whole career in nonprofit uh my earliest jobs were in child abuse and neglect like child welfare that is tough work so Kudos shout out to all the ones out there who are keeping Kids Safe like in the moment in those environments that's just it's trench work in the sense of um

[12:05]  like literally keeping kids safe from like abusive and neglectful environments um so I started there spent um a number of years in the HIV and AIDS Arena which I attribute that um I really am so grateful for that time it was um late 90s and early 2000s when I worked in the HIV and AIDS Arena and It's when um life with HIV and AIDS was really changing for people related to new medicines that were becoming available and um quite frankly people uh expected to die and then didn't and that changes your you know your world viiew right if you think you have something terminal versus you have some something that is manageable and so I was really um lucky not only to really be inspired by the courage of folks living with HIV and folks working with folks who have HIV um it was also a super supportive environment that is

[12:52]  where my wife and I know I say wife now we weren't wives then right because it was a different world um we were partners um but that's where my partner and I were like we're going to start a family like we're going to have kids and if it was in this kind of bubble I realize now really supportive and safe um lgbtq kind of environments in those kind of early 2000s in the AG of AIDS Arena um so I kind of transitioned from that to working with the national MS Society for a long time and then with other nonprofits and like as you know I've been here at the C the CEO at Ron with El house for nine years one of the things that is really where it all feels like it kind of comes together for me is that in my leadership role now so like I started obviously in Social Work roles and then got um increasing or kind of assumed increasing levels of

[13:39]  responsibility sometimes people will say how do I become a CEO um one thing I sometimes say is be careful like it's not maybe not as easy as we some of us make it look I don't know but one of the ways to become a CEO and to kind of journey through that in your career is to say yes to stuff like say yes to more opportunities say yes to more responsibilities there's something that you feels a little bit daunting or overwhelming or a little bit outside your scope in your lane get permission to tackle it like try new things and do the hard thing and say yes that for me is where just opportunities have continued to come along um when I've said hey I don't know that I I I don't know that I know very much about doing this thing but can I watch you do the thing and then can I try doing the thing and then I get better at the thing and so that has led to me to this um what is really a pretty extraordinary organization and role I'm a lucky lucky kid yeah to have had the opportunities

[14:27]  I've got the ten to take on more than what you're assigned is something that I feel like has gotten a really negative I would say view in the world of social media because people often say especially during the pandemic I'm not going to do more than what I'm being paid to do but how are you supposed to get more responsibility on the other side of what you're being paid to do unless you live in that stretch and taking on more responsibility totally I think it's a a unique challenge for everyone A and J gen Z you know as you would say in this Workforce folks and I am the the mom of of a genz new uh kind of new worker and my other son is in college still um I think it is hard because if you've got your Lane right do the thing and only do the thing and then I think that for folks who are like but I want to contribute at a higher level I want to add more value um finding ways

[15:15]  to do that that quite frankly aren't like annoying to your boss because you also don't want to be the one who like is into all the things that you're not supposed to be into right there's a balance related to that because it can't be like oh my God the new kid is like rearranging the shelves and we didn't need the shelves didn't need to be rearranged so I think there's an art uh to that taking on of more responsibility and I think a lot of it is about communication I think it's um and understanding one's own self so kind of self-awareness why is it that I am seeking more responsibility more a bigger title better pay a different role like what's happening in my own self that I'm seeking that and then communicating with others about that you know and in kind of career work we talk a lot about mentor right so it's important to have a mentor it's important to have a sponsor and kind of

[16:02]  the difference as I understand it the difference between mentors and sponsors um a sponsor a sponsor may be kind of the person who gives you the opportunity like hey I'm going to ask you to you know throw me a line so to speak give me a chance to sink or swim on something you know and a mentor is one who might kind of just help you along the way developing skills U but you got to ask for it you got to be a good communicator I think you also have to um acknowledge when you're falling short in something we've all made mistakes we're all going to fall on our face it's one of the questions I actually always ask in job interviews I always say tell me about a time that you just like seriously totally like messed up and I don't mean like something cute like I cared too much I don't want that kind of a mess up like oh this one time I worked too hard I don't mean that like tell me about you tried something and it just totally sucked and so tell me about that because that's part of the journey too

[16:50]  absolutely our willingness to I think the only time that we truly are my personal experience the times when I learn the most is when I fail right being able to go into that moment and say what can I do better because it stings at that moment it's super important to be able to learn from which is really powerful I want to Pivot a little bit and talk about the impact in the work that you guys do in the community so if people are tuning in today and they say I've heard of Ronald McDonald house but I don't know exactly what they do why don't you give us a little highle pitch on the impact you guys have in the community I love that thank you for the opportunity um here's what I would say to your listeners and viewers there probably is a Ronald McDonald House near you um because there is a Ronald McDonald House near virtually every Children's Hospital that's what we do is we take care of families while their kids are sick some sometimes people will have a sense kind

[17:38]  like you said like I have like I have a sense that Ron with house does good things they take care of but is it is it this situation or that situation so to be clear we are talking about families who have kids who are sick uh sometimes ill sometimes injured um is the car accident situation and the helicopter has flown the family in from the car accident you've got kids kiddos in the ICU sometimes we're talking about toddlers who've been diagnosed with cancer we're talking about grade schoolers who need a kidney transplant or a heart transplant can you imagine a heart trans like it sometimes for me it feels like science fiction and it's actually happening a family comes in they say we're waiting for a heart and then they they get one their child has a heart transplant and then they go home with a healthy child with with someone else's Beating Heart in their chest it's like it's like science fiction except

[18:25]  that it's real it's like magic but it's real uh sometimes it's families who have little te babies you know I when I first started here I remember U meeting a dad at the coffee pot and I always say that we don't have like a staff coffee pot and a family coffee pot like we just have a coffee pot I meet a lot of families I drink a lot of coffee and I meet a lot of families at the coffee pot and I met this Dad when I first started and he went he made this motion and he said my baby is one pound and he made he went like this like not like this like you might do with a baby like he CED his hand like his baby is one pound and um and so I just think the1 Ness the sacredness the um joy and the grief like the enormity of what happens at a Ronald McDonald House I think almost can't be overstated um people will sometimes say you know how do you work there and not

[19:12]  cry it must be a sad place and it's sometimes a sad place and we sometimes cry it also is often a joyful and miraculous place because families are so if you can see like this little thing behind me says rhc I don't know if you can see what it says keeping families close that's kind of our deal kind of our deal it is our our deal we keep families close to each other close to Medical Care you know we keep kids close to their parents when they're sick when it comes down to it like all of all of our listeners today know that the scariest times when something really terrible happens you call your family or the friends that you think of like family right so sometimes it's not your actual family sometimes it's the people your chosen family but it's family that you call and when your family is sick or when the people you love the most in the world are sick that's when the the bottom drops out and so those are the families that are taking care of it

[19:58]  Ronald McDonald House all the Ronald McDonald houses um run kind of like franchise organizations so we are separate individual organizations um we here in Kansas City have 94 bedrooms we have five Ronald McDonald House houses um and we have 94 bedrooms and we're full every night so at this literally at this exact moment there are 94 families I'm thinking of families who are in that house and in this house in which I sit who have children who are um God I met a dad this morning literally this morning keen and I was over there in the kitchen I said to a dad I said how long have you been with us he said we came October 1st so he's been here for a while uh and I said how's it going and he just he kind of went he said we're battling we're battling I don't even know what that Dad was battling I don't know what his child has but he had kind of a worn down look

[20:46]  to him he said we're battling so we've got 94 families so we're battling childhood illness every day at Ronald McDonald House and that's who we're taken care of I think about some of the biggest challenges that we face in society today I mentioned in our previous conversation I talk about this in the podcast often 2022 the Surgeon General came on to a national broadcast since the 60s where he talked about the dangers of cigarette smoke and so the biggest threat to our society today is not another viral pandemic but an epidemic of isolation and loneliness not only are you providing a sense of a safe place for people but you're also forming a sense of community which seems like it truly is the antidote to help people navigate some of these really really tough times to know that people are going through like situations and then people are here to listen and just be there in their times of turbulence it's true I think that um loneliness is something that we are just now we

[21:35]  American society are just now getting better at talking about I think um yeah let's name it like we all we all experienced some degree of it during covid and now I think we're getting better at naming it and recognizing it seeing what H when it happens and it's happening all around us and it's happening to us and I thought it was really I don't know preent that's a real Fancy Pants word but smart I thought it was real smart of the Surgeon General to make that that kind of um declaration that this is in fact an epidemic of isolation and loneliness and I think that particularly for young people who don't realize that's what they're feeling when they're like this right scrolling and they're actually you know what you're feeling right now it feels like maybe jealousy or comparison it's also loneliness and isolation for families at Ronald McDonald House we are actively combating that like actively because when like if you think about

[22:23]  whenever you've had a crisis in your own life like we've all had crises in our life and it's I don't know I think about like sometimes like you're driving in a car right and you're like how can other people just be driving in their cars like normal people when the bottom has dropped out of my life right like whether it's grief or just an acute crisis or whatever for families at Ron with house it's like how can how can how can kids how can other kids be out trick-or-treating or how can other kids just be whatevering when my child is fighting for their life like it's just a super isolating experience to have a really sick child and then when Ronald McDonald House is there and families are staying together and they're eating together like all of our bedrooms are like Hotel style bedrooms so it's like you have your private bedroom and it's nice and it's a nice bathroom so it's private so it's like staying in a hotel but instead of a hotel you're having group dinners

[23:10]  like volunteers come in and make dinners and you're having your breakfast burritos or your spaghetti or your whatever across the table from another family who understands what it's like and we have seen I'm thinking of two different scenarios Keenan one was um kind of a while back we had two families both of their children were here with for heart transplants one was a little girl like maybe three years old and the other one was kind of a teenage boy they were both getting heart transplants waiting for heart transplants and an exam you know heart transplants it always means that one person's tragedy is someone else's Miracle right so to be clear uh and so that brother and they weren't brother and sister they were from like different towns and whatever but they became like they called each other heart brother and heart sister and their families got super close because they spoke the same like transplant language you know and they supported

[23:57]  each other through that that waiting for a heart transplant another situation that just happened like in the last month I love these boys so much little and and we have their permission to share their names they have been public about this so nine-year-old named Jackson nine-year-old boy named Jackson who was first diagnosed with leukemia when he was four he and mostly his dad comes with him to ronal McDonald house because his mom stays back and takes care of the other kids where they live I'm so Jackson and his dad stayed over and over and over while he beat leukemia when when he was kind of from when he was four to about seven um and then when the leukemia came back Jackson and his dad came back so then they were here fighting cancer fighting leukemia for a second time at the same time another family was here this guy's name is Ethan and he's like 16 or 17 he's like I don't know seven years older than Jackson and

[24:45]  he's fighting cancer for a second time so Ethan and Jackson one's from Kansas one's from Missouri one's a basball kid one's a football kid they are different ages and yet their families became super close and Ethan and Jackson became super close and so Jackson like recently I saw him like across the parking lot I was like Jackson I heard some good news about you bud and he comes over and he said Miss Tammy he said I don't have cancer anymore and I was like Jackson that I heard and he gave me actually a bracelet that says fearless and I ja so Jack I said Jackson I don't know if I can be Fearless but I can certainly fear less what's so cool is that Ethan right Ethan is still fighting cancer for the second time and like Jackson is now providing all this encouragement to Ethan so like it's support for the kids it's support for the families it's support sometimes cancer families are

[25:33]  providing support to neonatal ICU families like we got to be there for each other one of the things I appreciate about ronal with house is it's a place where um kind of the barriers come down the boundaries come down I told you transparency is kind of my game I only know how to be one thing which is me the thing that happens at Ronald MD house is people are just who they are you know there's dads who are unshaven and moms with wet hair and people wearing sweatpants and you could be like some hot shot corporate attorney at the giant whatever Association of whatever and when your child has cancer you're wearing sweatpants and you're just putting a ball cap on you know so people become kind of this most essential of who they are at ronal M house and that is I think when we're vulnerable with each other is we can build real relationships with each other we're not performing for each other at Ronald McDon house we're just real and and I think honestly back to this

[26:20]  epidemic of isolation and loneliness I think if we can figure out a way to be more real with each other that'll combat that because we'll realize we all everybody's fighting some kind of battle you know so let's support each other along the way you know I've I've recognized a pattern here um I've talked to tens of almost hundreds of CEOs on this show and talked to I thought I've talked to 10 CEOs I've talked to a lot of leaders on this show and one of the things that I've recognized in the pattern is often the most empathetic compassionate and servant leaders are often often coming from backgrounds just like yours so how did you kind of lean into this leadership style of Leaning into

[27:08]  other people being able to divulge so much compassion and so much trust into all the team members who you guys have servant leadership is a great way to kind of sum this up how do you lean into that servant leadership style because in our last conversation you talked about you flipped the organizational structure where you're at the bottom of the pyramid to be able to serve everybody else how' you gather that that knowledge I don't know if there's like a single place where I gathered that knowledge as is the case with much of the much of the knowledge We Gather like I try to stay open to what other people are teaching me which is all the time and you are right in that our um pretty shortly after coming here I flipped the organizational chart so you know at the universal organization of whatever it's like the CEO is going to be at the top right and then here comes like the and then you get kind of down down quote unquote down and you get middle managers

[27:54]  and then people who feel like and you'll hear people say I'm the peon at my organization or I'm this you know grunt worker or whatever so we flipped that at Ronald Don House Charities of Kansas City and my role as CEO really does look like this like that my job is at the bottom and it's my job and I this is it's almost my way of visually demonstrating what I'm trying to achieve in servant leadership which is it's my job to support the people who report to me so we have a team of directors as you might imagine who reach I me with 94 families every night 5,000 families a year our budget is almost 7 million so we have a a larger organization than people might think of when they just hear ronal with house right so with our $7 million budget we have we have 57 staff so it's my job to support the director team it's the director team's job to support their staff so they are then below their staff on the org chart

[28:41]  at the very top of our org chart it says families with sick kids families with sick kids that's who we are here to serve if I was in a um for-profit business environment at the top I would probably put like customers like our customers are the ones that we're here to serve um I I just I think that that's purpos driven work we at Ronald with house are lucky in that it's so easy to point to like this you know little kiddo I literally as I was walking into this spot to do this podcast with you I saw a teenager being wheeled in a cart this teenager has no hair and had crutches so clearly is fighting some sort of imuno he has some sort of immunotherapy they've lost their hair and they're being wheeled along at a cart like look like they were kind of having a fun little cart ride um that's I mean we're surrounded by purpose all day every day

[29:28]  r with old house I also think the corporate leaders can be servant leaders no matter what the job is right it's it's putting the needs of your team before the needs of yourself it's not being in it for the glory it's not being in it for the perks or the Kudos or the whatever it's being you know it's that whole it's like it's being willing to do this do the stuff um and and building this culture of being in it together something else that I tried to do so I've kind of demonstrated in the org chart this inverted pyramid I also and with 57 staff I can do this um if we had an organization of 600 staff I couldn't do this I'd have to figure out some other way but um what I do with our 50 plus staff is I meet individually with everyone every year when I sit and have listing sessions with our staff I'm asking them and I am listening to them

[30:16]  what is it like for you to work here and it kind of goes back to what we were saying at the beginning related to just being open let's listen to each other whether we're the boss or whether we're the brand new genen Z employee like asking your boss what can I do for you like I think that if we can listen to each other talk to each other uh creates this kind of openness to make everything better aren't those listening sessions kind of scary right because I know a lot of leaders will struggle with the idea of feedback right hearing feedback is really tough especially when it means what can I do better as a leader for you or maybe what am I not doing that could help you be a better employee that's a scary process for a lot of people it it really is scary um and one question I always ask so I've done it for for nine years now so I've

[31:03]  had you done it 10 different series I did when I first came and then every year since I always ask what advice do you have for me and sometimes people will say oh I don't have any you know but I have also as I have built trust with the team and as they have built trust with me I get advice about things I could do better um uh examples are that like some like for a while there I think I was honestly I was like being too silly in staff meetings they like a little less silliness might but I'm like okay that is fair I appreciate the feedback because how am I going to know if I don't ask right and so one of the tricks I think whenever someone offers feedback then is to say like thank you for that thank you for the feedback thank you for letting me know what it is like to be you in that scenario um so it is scary it's also sometimes true Keenan

[31:50]  that in those moments uh people will give advice or like say things that I'm like okay we can't do that thing they say oh we should we should do this thing for everyone like well we can't do that thing but you know what we did start doing um is sabatical we offer sabatical to staff at um when they've been here for 10 years and it's not just for full-time staff it's even for part-time staff because when you've worked anywhere for a decade let's honor that you know and so some of some of our really great organizational ideas have come out of those listening sessions because somebody has the courage to give me their idea and then I go hey I appreciate that idea let's see if we can make it happen so that's some of the ways we do culture around here yeah I mean just being in the space that you guys are the emotional toll of being around families who are going through such challenging times can weigh incredibly heavy emotionally so I wonder how you guys are trying to also combat

[32:38]  things like compassion fatigue right what is the approach on that type of stuff compassion fatigue thank you for asking about that and even um like just burnout in general right because we know that um for anybody in in a helping profession uh for and I think probably for people in leadership roles no matter no matter what kind of industry it is um for folks who are not necessarily sitting in that that seat the CEO seat which I would consider the bottom of the pyramid um there's a degree of burden and responsibility that is some sometimes sometimes I think hard to contemplate uh if you haven't actually lived it and so some of the things that we do to manage our kind of emotions I guess our own care and feeding so to speak our mental health around here and that I try to do personally too um is to talk about stuff like when we have a

[33:25]  critical incident and it can be any number of things um it is sometimes the loss of a child if a child and family has been sing with us and their child has passed away we will have a we'll get we'll get together and talk about it like let's talk about it like we don't sweep things under the rug around here because I think we don't we don't find that helpful um in the same way we have a um we have a chaplain who provides support to our families it's a non-denominational kind of non non-religious kind of support but it's like a Humanity kind of support right then so this chaplain I've actually asked for time with him like I I think I have time set with them next week because we had a really difficult family situation a loss that I like I right now personally I'm carrying it kind of heavy I can just feel that I'm kind of clenched around it and like I have a faith community I can talk to the people of mine I have friends I have a wife I

[34:11]  mean I could talk to but I want to talk to the Ronald McDonald House chaplain because I feel like that person is going to understand the the kind of intimacy the um the the the depth of what happens around here and also how to kind of conceptualize it there is a certain amount of compartmental ization that I think has to be done to be able to keep going particularly for those of us in helping roles or people who are in leadership roles like if you get derailed by all the things then you're not going to be on the rails for the next thing you know so it's um it's always it's always a balance and that is honestly where I think some of my social work background still comes into play because being a social worker like just that kind of those early days of Social Work training you're you're um equipped to handle a chaotic environment right here's a bunch of stuff that's going to

[34:58]  come at you and you're got to help your whoever's sitting across from you figure out what are the few things that you can fix or make better that are going to have a bigger impact on the whole picture so I often feel like I'm doing organizational social work because I look at what Ronald McDonald house needs and to we need to grow because we we don't have enough room for all the families who need us so there's a real Social Work component to list to sort of assessing what's needed supporting the team supporting families supporting quite frankly like myself right getting what I need so that I can you know keep coming back every day and I love it I love it every more every day more than the day before so I'm a lucky kid I mean we can tell with the energy that you bring to how you talk about these topics it's pretty infectious to be honest with you I want to I want to create an opportunity for us to kind of reflect on the nine-year journey right so being the

[35:45]  CEO of Ronald McDonald house if you could go back in time and talk to Tammy when she was just starting in this role knowing some of the challenges that she's faced some of the moments of doubt maybe what advice would you give to Tammy if you had 5 minutes with her what would you say I would say that it's interesting to me that you mentioned doubt because that is a constant companion I people are often surprised to hear that because I I come you know I seem perhaps maybe you disagree right because I was telling you before we started I was like I'm nervous does my hair look okay because the fact is I'm not all that confident right I am nervous self-doubt is a constant companion um and so my nine year ago self I think that I would for one thing kind of just

[36:33]  acknowledge that like that's okay like that this that you can do things even while doubting yourself um it's kind of like that whole thing like Brave doesn't mean you're not scared Brave means that you're you feel the fear and you do the thing anyway right so for me um the self-doubt has just been I just have learned to bring it along with me and say there it is okay I see it now there it is and I'm going to do the thing anyway I also um I struggled a fair amount with like just a people pleasing kind of personality and so it is it is true that usually at Ronald McDonald House I mean everybody loves what we're doing up in here I love what we're doing up in here the staff I mean we just it's really pretty great there are also sometimes when like I have to make a decision that is either a or b and some people prefer a and some people prefer B and there is no C right and so not

[37:22]  everybody may love just whatever decision has been made and that is always hard for me because I am generally happiest as a general rule when the people around me are happy like it's taking lots of therapy to unwind that and I'm just like okay right I am generally happiest when when the people around me are happy and it is also I can't ensure that everyone around me is happy all the time and so that can also be okay it's that whole thing like I can be okay when others are not and it is my job to uphold the from in a professional perspective this organization right and do the right you know when that was especially hard was during Co you know because like you're either going to have a mask policy or have a mask policy you're either going to or BL or blah you know what I mean and like no one was happy and so those were particularly hard days in terms of like leading this organization that's a communal living

[38:09]  environment people are living together at Ronald house during a a worldwide pandemic um you know and and and kids still got sick right not necessarily from covid so much but kids still got cancer and babies were so born prematurely and so the decision-making fatigue and the it's okay if everyone doesn't agree do the best you can trust like trust yourself to do the best you can and then kind of bless it and release it because I think that I I'm trying to get better at that like doing the best I can bless it release it have integrity throughout the process um and then be okay with it I want to double click on that decision fatigue it's a funny expression double click click click let's double click let's open up that file right there um decision fatigue is a real thing right and I think that one thing we have to recognize is we only have so much mental capacity to make highly valuable

[38:56]  decisions I know that Jeff Bezos at one point in time there was a piece of content a keynote or something that he released where he said you know what I get paid to do is to make a few incredibly impactful decisions how do you think about the idea of decision fatigue because I've never talked about that in the podcast before so let's dive into this I think it's very real uh and I think that kind of like I mentioned before just the burden of of being in that decision maker role is probably hard to imagine if one hasn't been in that role it's kind of like I think that sometimes young people or young career people will say oh I can't wait to be a boss and then once you're a boss you realize oh my gosh being a boss is actually harder than it looks making decisions is harder than it looks and the decision fatigue thing is real um because you always know you always know we if you are self-aware enough to know

[39:46]  that there's something you don't know right if you're self-aware enough to know there's something called the Johari window and it's it's it's like Donald Rumsfeld did a version of this a thousand years ago of what you know but it's like I know what I know and I don't know what I don't know right and I know other people know things that they'll never tell me so it's like you always always always have a blind spot and you you know if you're self-aware enough to know you have it it still doesn't mean you know what's in it right and so so you're going to do the best you can and it can it really can be exhausting because you're trying to weigh all the things and often now I suspect that Jeff bezos's decisions are often informed by math right just straight up you know 2 plus two on this end versus 10 plus 10 on this end I'm guessing some of Jeff bezos's decisions are like that um but the really hard decisions are the ones

[40:34]  that are not like math or it's like culture or it's if if we do X then we think Y and Z might happen but if we do X then also you know a b and c Could Happen which might derail Y and Z and so like the kind of anticipatory nature of trying to look around all the corners but not to such a degree that you get you probably heard the term analysis per is right where it's like you just think and think and think and think and think and then it's like well the opportunity to make a decision pass you by one of the things that I sometimes will say is to not make a decision is to make a decision right to not to like to endlessly Kick the Can down the road is to decide that you are you know you have decided to do nothing and so sometimes it's like you know you figure out what you can do the best you can with the information that you have um yeah and

[41:23]  and it is exhausting I'll tell you what something simple I almost always know what I'm going to wear the day before like I knew last night that I was going to wear this today because that's one less thing like when I start in the morning if I stand in front of my closet and I'm just like so I generally know what I'm going to wear and sometimes if it's like a really important meeting like next week I know what I'm going to wear for the meeting next week so I at least one less thing to have to decide so I can use my brain power for you know more important things than what I wear have you uh maybe you picked up on this or maybe not but you see me in the same outfit all the time the black t-shirt which I cycle through in packs of six they come every two weeks so I can wear the same stuff cuz I don't want to waste decisions on what t-shirt am I going to wear what shirt am I going to be able to put on to present it's a it's the small things that make the biggest difference

[42:09]  I dare say and I may be wrong there will be people who make comments and say this is I dare say that dudes sometimes have it easier than ladies in that regard I feel like as I can agree uhuh I feel like if I showed up in the same even if I had like a bunch of different shirts but if they were all the same shirt somebody at some point would be like so you know you're the same picture in every shirt or same shirt in every picture I'd be like yeah I am you're welcome my decisions are better as a result that's what I should say there you go here's a question for you it's a little bit a little bit different I was having a conversation uh with an amazing leader his name is Dr Steve B he's from one of the nation's largest Christian high schools right we were talking about his role as CEO of this large organization he said something that was really interesting to me he said Keenan I am so happy in how I show up to

[42:57]  work every day because I truly recognize that me as the CEO of this institution does not impact Steve as the person I am completely separate in the roles and one and the other do not impact each other which was a unique perspective that I don't hear from a lot of leaders do you have the ability to compartmentalize who Tammy Greenberg is compared to the CEO of the Ronald McDonald House I don't I need to apparently get some coaching from Steve Steve is that right I I don't um it's it's it is sometimes I think part of my secret sauce sometimes it's part of the secret like that wherever I go I am um I am the CEO of Ronald McDonald House and by CEO I'm like what I always say to people they say you know what do you do and I always just say I work at Ronald McDonald's house I always just say I work at ronal mcdonnel house because I'm

[43:44]  not into the title thing I just I'm really proud of the organization such as it is and um and I never miss an opportunity to tell somebody about the great work of Ronald mun house it is also true that it has has um impacted my uh I guess sense of self like out in the world like it's not like I'm some big rager or whatever but like if I'm ever being somewhere being too silly I'd be like somebody in this room might know that I represent Ronald mcal House like it's an honor and it's a privilege always I also am aware that I'm never not representing Ronald McDonald's house and so I'm I'm good with it it's a it's a trade-off that I um enjoy and because I'm just so proud of it I I'm okay with it but it's interesting that you mentioned the the gentleman that had that perspective um sometimes I think about like I mean I won't do this job

[44:31]  forever like I'm 51 as I've mentioned I'll be 52 in a minute um like who who might I be who will I be when this chapter of my life is over and it's not going to be over anytime soon unless I you know please don't fire me board of directors but um but at some point it will right like won't be the I mean I won't so it's just it's interesting it is it really has impacted my sense of self in a good way I that I just I don't know quite who I am without it um which is perhaps unhealthy and my therapist will be like okay well let's talk about that now um I will also say that Ronald McDonald House as an organization I I believe and I believe it because I think I've seen it over and over that it like it makes us better people by virtue of our association with this work I was just going to say that really okay I

[45:18]  love that um are you like I don't know I mean we have like volunteers who have been volunteers for decades we've got we've got really great staff retention because something about I think like the connectedness to the things that matter most like reminding us always um the one foot where we are all always one phone call away from an entirely different life right um and the families at Ronald withal House have gotten that phone call and you sometimes we'll say to our families like you know I can't imagine having this experience and they'll say oh I can't imagine it either to be clear I can't imagine it either but like life has just handed me this set of circumstances and so now I now I move forward so I do think that by virtue of being in this mix it kind of grows our heart I some you know there's a line in the Grinch um or yeah the Grinch the Dr

[46:07]  Dr Seuss right where it says the Grinch's heart grew three sizes that day and I think that happens at Ronald McDonald House like I think our hearts grow three sizes and three sizes more and then three sizes more because we just kind of make room for all this all the special that is here and so I think because of that I don't turn it off when I walk out the door I also think I don't want to because I like it my heart grows every day around here and that's beautiful and that's kind of you know what I often think is when we want to separate who we are with the work that we do often the work that we do is not fulfilling or the opportunity to pour into others and support them in the way in which you guys do and so naturally when you were thinking there I'm like yeah makes a ton of sense that you would want to separate yourself from being a CEO because you represent from the brand that you represent so much positivity so much impact so much empathy so much compassion and why would we try and separate ourselves from that type of

[46:54]  work which in itself is a beautiful statement so the last question I have for you here um is would you consider yourself an optimist H I would I would yes I do consider myself an optimist and um I don't know I'm I'm G to play with the words why I would I would consider myself sort of a pragmatic Optimist because uh again I'm surrounded by perspective all day every day at rotd house which is that we are all one phone call away from a different life so I am pragmatic about that um it is also true that I gosh I mean when you see the goodness that people can demonstrate to each other the generosity that people have of spirit even in difficult times you know like I'm an

[47:41]  optimist I'm a Believer in humanity and uh there's a lot of I I don't think I'm supposed to swear on this thing right I've gone this whole time and have not said any bad words so I like credit for that anybody who knows me well who's going to wow she got that through that whole time and use no bad words but just we'll say with all the things that are happening in the world there are plenty of reasons to have fear and I do have fear um and I consider myself a pragmatic Optimist that I think the good of people will win in the end yeah I completely agree I think when we're in the roles especially being a leader optimism is so important I've actually gotten a little bit of flak in my personal career um by being toxically positive and when I think about that I think that we have a choice right and you said being a pragmatic Optimist I've been trying to put a frame work around practical optimism because it gives me

[48:29]  the authority and the power to choose in the moment of adversity to look towards the positive side and that's just how I look at the world I'm not going to you know fall back on anybody else's ideals around that but I really appreciate that answer the tradition that we have here to put the wheels down on the podcast is our previous guest wants to ask you a question okay I love it and by the way I love that expression put the wheels down we're going to put the wheels down put the wheels down exactly double click put the wheels down hang oh I love it I'm going to adop all these now like I learned them from my friend Kenan so I'll give you a little bit of context around this question um previous guest on the podcast was an amazing individual named Matthew perky he's the CEO of an organization in Indiana called Josiah whites which is an organization which or helps and supports youth who have often come through you know

[49:16]  problems with the law helping them think bigger right and supporting them one of the things that he has a big mission against is trying to tackle some of the macro problems in society kids get in trouble they end up you know going to juvie or you know get you know any type of societal punishment where they have to go do things he says often we are labeling these kids like they'll never be anything greater than the mistakes that they've made so his question for you was what issue population what historic system makes you most uncomfortable and how are you going to attack it with the work that you do holy smokes that is a big question by the way my question for the next guest is much easier because you told me to prepare one so um okay I need you to ask it again so I'm I'm I'm a social worker I can handle it but I just want to give a thoughtful response what issue what

[50:04]  system is causes me the most um yeah so what what system slop population or what historic system makes you most uncomfortable and how would you attack it with the work that you do well I I think I'm going have to to to the thing that at this moment is making me most uncomfortable I'm going to tell you is um the just extraordinary The Unbelievable the cataclysmic human suffering that is happening in Gaza and in Israel I mean that is okay so I'm going to craft an I'm going to answer it with one okay well what's his name Josiah no the organization was called his name is Matthew Matthew here's what I'm going to do with that Matthew like that is the like at this moment that is it causes me like actual grief like I and I don't

[50:53]  know anybody who lives in Gaza I don't know anybody who lives in Israel I just am like oh my gosh the humanity like just the sheer Humanity of it is breaking my heart and I don't know what to do so that is part of what's hard for me is I don't know what to do um that could help the people who are you know just we we know all the atrocities that are unfolding right and that have unfolded you know over the last year and whatever um so a way that I try to make I guess some sense of I guess peace with it is that we had on October 7th here at Ronald MD in Kansas City on October 7th which was the oneyear anniversary of when Hamas invaded Israel and all all this most recent horrible stuff started happening that day was a going home day for a family at Ronald McDonald House a little baby named Silas who was has been

[51:42]  with us since the day he was born 265 days ago it was like January 15th and his big brother Canon and his mom Autumn and his grandma Patty silus his um esophagus and trachea grew together so like he couldn't I mean he had to have a variety of complicated things done and he's going home silus is 9 months old went home with a tra you know the tra thing so he can breathe and that family had a miracle on October 7th October 7th was the day they went home and October 7th was the oneyear anniversary of everything horrible that happened right um and so for me in my work CU that was the question Matthew posed for me how can and the thing that bothers me the most is what's happening in the Middle East and just the human suffering this is the human suffering it's just on a

[52:29]  scale that I think is incomprehensible what can I do in my work to combat that and I think it's naming it and finding the moments of joy and understanding that the like the the you know the Ark of Our Lives is long The Arc of the moral universe is long life is horrible and life is amazing and individual families will have Miracles while another family has a tragedy that whole heart transplant situation again right one family's tragedy is another family's miracle and like kind of growing my heart enough to make room for all of it because because it's it's it's it's heavy and it's real you know and so um I just and all of those things you know tragedy miracles happen under Ron with house roof every day and so I just at least try to be better at noticing it when it happens the good stuff and the bad stuff well Tammy Greenberg thank you

[53:17]  how I don't know what kind of an answer that was but that's what I got you did I think you did an amazing job I just want to say for everybody who's tuning in watching and listening today you truly are the definition of heart and hustle and I can't thank you enough for coming on the show seriously thanks for that this was really fun thanks for having me