Texas A&M · Class of 2000
A high school coach handed me the idea of the rope-holder. Texas A&M is where it got tested and sharpened, on the offensive line under Coach RC Slocum, and in a set of values older than the words for them. I did not see what this place had built in me until I reached the real world.
What A&M taught me
The foundation came before A&M. A high school coach first handed me the idea that a leader is a rope-holder, the person everyone depending on him can trust with the weight. Texas A&M is where that idea was tested and sharpened. On the offensive line under Coach RC Slocum, the winningest coach in Texas A&M history, I practiced it every day without a name for what it was building in me. I did not understand what A&M had done for me until I got to the real world and realized I had been prepared all along.
Coach Slocum taught us to take the blame before we spread it: before you point fingers, use your thumbs. He gave us TEAM, Together Each Achieves More. And he drilled the things that never show up in a box score: discipline, handling adversity, performing under pressure, being coached, how you carry a win and how you answer for a loss.
Those were not football skills. They were the operating system I have run a twenty-year business career on. And they sit on top of the values Texas A&M has run on since the beginning, later written down as excellence, integrity, leadership, loyalty, respect, and selfless service.
Leadership when it counted
What I love most about A&M is not the football, as much as I loved it. It is that this school produces the leadership the country leans on when things fall apart. That is not an accident. It is what the place was built to do.
A&M opens its doors. The values it runs on, excellence, integrity, leadership, loyalty, respect, and selfless service, were lived long before the university formally named them decades later.
Aggies hold Muster in the trenches of Europe, answering roll call for the ones who did not make it home. Remembrance is forged under fire.
General Earl Rudder leads his Rangers up the cliffs of Pointe du Hoc on D-Day, and later becomes president of Texas A&M. In 1942, on the island of Corregidor, General George Moore gathers the Aggies stationed there for Muster, and the story runs in headlines that encourage a war-weary nation.
History is full of leaders who rose in the hardest moments by holding to values instead of reaching for power. Lincoln returning to the idea that all men are created equal to hold a fracturing nation together. Rosa Parks and the quiet courage that moved a country. Jonas Salk choosing the next generation's health over his own gain. I keep a collection of pocket Bibles carried by soldiers from the Revolutionary War to today for the same reason: they are proof of what people hold onto when everything else is stripped away.
The Aggie Bonfire collapses on November 18. Twelve Aggies are lost. Our football team leaves practice, drives to the site, and clears logs by hand for hours, because the machines could not be used while people were still under the stack. Days later we beat fifth-ranked Texas at Kyle Field. I have never needed a clearer picture of what a team is.
We are at another inflection point, and it asks for the same thing every one of these moments asked for: leaders who serve. That is the inspiration behind AmplifyU. I want athletes, whose shoes I have been in, to see that the skills they already carry can make a real impact.
“The Aggie spirit is alive and well and comes from something deep inside, something that keeps us going in times of adversity.”
AmplifyU
I helped start AmplifyU at Texas A&M, but founder is the wrong word to lean on. A team inside Texas A&M Athletics and the Mays Business School built it with me, and without them it never gets off the ground. Together Each Achieves More is not a phrase I use loosely.
AmplifyU is a partnership between Texas A&M Athletics and Mays Business School. Specifically, the Student-Athlete Engagement Program and the Reynolds and Reynolds Sales Leadership Institute work together to provide student-athletes with educational and experiential opportunities that enable them to develop business acumen and to activate a professional network. Regardless of when or how student-athletes choose to enter the workforce, we are enabling and empowering them to do so with the first accredited University program of its kind in the nation that co-teaches content in tandem with University professors and former athletes currently in the workforce.
Athletes are one of the most qualified, yet untapped, sources of leadership talent in the country today. They already know how to be coached, how to perform under pressure, how to answer for a loss, and how to put the team first. AmplifyU sharpens those instincts and points them at what comes after the last game, whenever that day comes.
The book
AmplifyU reaches the athletes in College Station. I wrote this book for everyone else. Ninety-six skills from twelve college sports, each one tied to the language employers use in interviews and performance reviews, plus chapters on NIL deals, resumes, and LinkedIn.
“Your closing remarks were extremely inspirational and motivating. I am very honored and humbled to lend whatever tool I have built over my 40-plus year career to contribute to the future success of the students and leadership of Texas A&M.”
“You are a gifted speaker as you create passion in the audience and there is a sense of action needed and encouraged.”
“Thank you for putting together such a transformative program. I really appreciate everything you are doing to help student-athletes.”
“It's so refreshing to see a clear gap being filled. Thank you for playing a role in making it happen. Gig 'em!”
“I wish I had this program when I was an athlete in school”
“AmplifyU is a game changer. It's a no-brainer for every student athlete at Texas A&M”
Played a sport, now building a career? I want to hear about it.
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Aggie Muster
If you did not go to A&M, this is the one tradition to understand. Every April 21, Aggies around the world gather for Muster. We read the Roll Call for the Absent, the names of Aggies who died in the past year. When a name is called, a friend or family member answers ‘Here,’ and lights a candle. Hundreds of Musters happen worldwide on the same night. It began in the trenches of World War I and was carried through Corregidor in World War II. It is how we say that an Aggie is never gone as long as someone is there to answer for them.
I speak at one Aggie Muster every year. I do not charge for it, and I cover my own travel. It is not a booking. It is the smallest way I can pay back a school that gave me everything. If you would like me at your Muster, or you are working on anything in service of Texas A&M, reach me below.
For inviting me to your Muster, or anything in service of Texas A&M. No fee for Muster, and I cover my own travel.
Where I serve at Texas A&M
The places I stay in the arena for Aggieland.
If you played a sport and went on to build a business career, I want to hear your story. With your permission, I may feature it.