Pause and Reevaluate to Give the Best That You Can with Enrique Acosta Gonzalez

 In this episode of "Time to Press Pause," Ellen Williams, CEO of The Salient Strategist, interviews Enrique Acosta Gonzalez, CEO of Triad Leadership Solutions, LLC. Enrique, a decorated U.S. Navy veteran, shares his journey from military service to corporate leadership, emphasizing the importance of pausing to evaluate one’s career path. 

He discusses his transition from a corporate advisor role to a CEO and the value of periodic pauses to reassess goals, clients, and personal energy. Enrique also highlights the unique dynamics of CEO-to-CEO interactions and the importance of vulnerability and mentorship in leadership. He advocates for planned pauses to gain clarity and make strategic decisions, contrasting with unplanned pauses caused by life events. 

The conversation underscores the significance of preparing successors to ensure continuity and fostering a culture of mentorship within organizations. Enrique’s story offers valuable insights for CEOs on leadership, vulnerability, and strategic pauses. 

Transcript

Welcome to Time To Press Pause, A Podcast for CEOs by CEOs. I'm your host, Ellen Williams, CEO of The Salient Strategist and today I'm speaking with Enrique Acosta Gonzalez. Enrique is the CEO of Triad Leadership Solutions, LLC, andnd over the past 30 years has served as an Executive, Veteran and Advocate, Board Member, Nonprofit Administrator, speaker, mentor, coach and avid volunteer for numerous organizations. Enrique served in the United States Navy and is the recipient of the Meritorious Service Medal, Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal and Navy and Marine Corps Achievement. He is a multiple Mentor Of the Year award winner and recipient of the inaugural 2014 Chief John Duggan Jr. Oceanographer of the Navy Award for exceptional leadership. He is also an award-winning podcaster with four shows focusing on leadership development and career success. Welcome, Enrique. I'm so thrilled that you are my guest today. We had the opportunity to meet each other on LinkedIn and here you are. 

Enrique: Well, thank you for having me, Ellen. It's nice to have this conversation and I'm looking forward to it, but thank you for inviting me. 

Ellen: Oh, my pleasure. I'm looking forward to it too. So, without further ado, please give us your press pause story. 

Enrique: Yeah. Well, my press pause story begins as a corporate employee, if you will. I served 26 years in the Navy, retired. We try to figure out, you know, what's next in our life. So, I decided to head into corporate the corporate world. Thankfully, landed an executive position where I was the advisor to the CEO and that's where my first CEO experience really occurred. But in that time as an advisor, I realized that. There was a lot of learning to be done on the leadership side and so I had to press pause on my career, my second career now, in order to evaluate. Evaluate what was important. Evaluate where I was going to invest my time and energy. Evaluate what would be beneficial from this life standpoint and how I was going to share that with others. And I love the corporate life. I love the executive suite. I loved all that came with that. Especially the personnel interaction, right? Where in my role I was able and probably the only executive at the time that was able to go throughout the entire company from the bottom all the way up and side-to-side. And be able to influence with my knowledge and my experience, those decisions for others. And it was it was a great experience. But in that in that pause which was hard because I was a go- getter, right? I was always and had been trained in the military to be the best go for the best be on the top. And having to pull the brakes and really put a stop to everything. I had the opportunity to realize that my energy and my knowledge and my experience was best served in the consulting arena where I can now go back to those CEO's and similar to the job that I had. But from a CEO to a CEO relationship. And it's different when you're working within the confines of a corporate entity, then it is to come as a fellow CEO. There are dynamics that you just cannot explain, right? It's just like having somebody from Puerto Rico speak to somebody from Puerto Rico. There's just this synergy and this shared experience that you don't have with other executives. Now, a lot of the CEO's will tell you it's lonely at the top, right? Well, I kind of give that a little, we'll say, support. Because it doesn't have to be lonely at the top. And so, when I decided to create Triad leadership solutions and become the CEO, it was because of that great reset for me to say “I can't be doing this tempo thing anymore within a corporate confines. But I could really add value to a fellow CEO, and provide that sounding board that they will normally not have.” Right? When you're the CEO, there's not that many people you can talk to about CEO stuff. So, you know that great stop for me was rejuvenating, that great stop for me was, I would say, an avenue for me to rededicate where I was going to put that effort. But it also was a benefit to future CEO's and I did not ever really expect that to be a result of me saying, “All stop.” I thought that it was really meant for me and me alone, but no. It really added a different dynamic to my purpose and now as the CEO myself, even at times of high tempo, I recall that that was the benefit that I really gained a lot of footing from. So, I institute some periodic all stops in order for me to evaluate what I'm doing. Where we're going as a company. Who I am engaging as a client because not every client is the best client. So, that has been a good thing for me to put into my regular day-to-day processing. Where and when do I need to put the all stop and reset in order for me to give the best that I can? 

Ellen: That is sage advice for sure, as a previous advisor. And first of all, I want to say thank you for your service. 

Enrique: Oh, thank you. 

Ellen: I appreciate that and I love that you said it's hard to pause because you're a go-getter and that is something I think that is a common thread through CEO's, right? Successful CEO's are going to be very driven, so it's not surprising that you became a CEO. I also love that you said that, it became a benefit for future CEO's. So, the fact that you paused to reevaluate spilled over into being able to do something that would benefit other CEO's. What types of experiences are you having now as CEO peer basically rather than advisor? 

Enrique: What I've seen different is number one, you looked at different. You're accepted different. I can't put a specific finger on what it is that switches that, but it does and I think it's just what we have grown to know as tribal mentality, right? When you are a of a pedigree or you are of a class. Once that person in that same class or pedigree shows up, it's different and we've structured the world that way, right? In America, we can network, and usually network with it, with everybody really. But like, if you go to the UK, you can't network with everybody. They have an hierarchy type structure there. Right? It's a class-based and we have something similar and it shows up now as a CEO, I see it differently. I'm being treated different. The conversations are different, they're more vulnerable. When it's another CEO. And that's one of the biggest things that I've seen, the vulnerability in conversation with me now as a CEO, has been different from when I was just an employee advising. Right? 

Ellen: Yeah, I definitely, I have seen that throughout my career as well. I'm currently CEO, so I hear you. Interesting point on the networking.  It's hard to find CEO's out networking. They definitely, their peer groups are where you have to get there and you can't get there if you're not a CEO. So, I'm not familiar with the structure in the UK, but certainly there's a level of that here as well. I want to also ask you. So, you had such a profound change in your life from your pressing pause and all stop that you've implemented that at your current organization. There are times when everyone presses pause. Can you talk about how that's affecting your organization and what you do during that pause? 

Enrique: Yeah. And I have to credit the military for that, right? We have in the military, we have what we call “safety standouts.” Now, I will tell you that most safety standouts are a result of something that went wrong, right? But it doesn't always have to be that way. And so structured stand down periods as I refer them to them are intentional so that you can actually take a look at the flow of things. When you're in a race and you're at the front and you're just going, you can't see what just went by because you're just so focused on that one point. And so, when you do the pause or the structured stand down periods, what you do is you slow down. And so now you can see everything that comes through. And what that has done for, for us or for me, in terms of clarity, being able to see clearer because not every... I've often referred to this right...there are times where opportunity businesswise seems like the best thing but some opportunities turn into obligations and then obligations turn into headaches. And so, when you structure these slow down periods or these all stop periods, you're able to clearly see what relationship is working for you. What client should not be continued to have be had on as a client. What clients did you miss that you were actually a good fit for? You can go back to and entreat them, and then maybe, maybe get them. So, businesswise, it is a great thing to institute as a normal thing, part of your workflow, because that's where you can actually dish off some unwanted help and bring on some needed and often beneficial help for your company. 

Ellen: So you're doing planned pauses. podcast. 

Enrique:  

Right. 

Ellen: And some of the other interviews I've had on the podcast, they weren't necessarily planned. Some of them were forced upon them. One was a divorce and one was being let go from an organization. And so now you're advocating for let's, let's plan the pause and really take advantage of what we can see and gain some clarity during the time when we're not leading the race. 

Enrique: Right. 

Ellen: Excellent. One other thing you said during your pause story, is that you find, at least nowadays, that CEO's are contemplating battling, dealing with loneliness. 

Enrique: Right. 

Ellen: Do you have advice for our CEO's that are currently experiencing loneliness, as far as is there an opportunity for them to take a pause? Is that the right way to go, or are there other options there as well? 

Enrique: Yeah. Well, the very first thing that I would ask the CEO to consider is their relationship with vulnerability. The reason why most CEO's feel alone is because they are not as vulnerable as they say. And you can have conversations with other executives. That won't necessarily violate all the knowledge that you need to kind of curate during the day-to-day. But allow them to help because you don't have to be lonely. It is really a choice and a lot of people say and blame it on, “Well, they don't know what it is to be a CEO because they don't have to be.” Well, that is true because of position. But it doesn't necessarily have to be true by the knowledge that you're holding to yourself where you can actually get help. And there's a lot of other executives that will love the mentorship of being a CEO, and that's one way that you can do it. In the military, we understand as we're going up and up the chain of command, that one day we will not be there. And so, it is part of our legacy to raise the next replacement. It is a actual charge to replace yourself. And so... I gave you a little story. I brought that when I was an employee, I brought that out. And I remember telling one supervisor that was under me and I was the county manager of a of an establishment. And I told him the very first day, I said, “I'm gonna give you one year to learn everything that I know and be able to replace me.” And he was thrown aback. Because I guess that's not what happens out in the civilian world, right? That you don't have those conversations day one! But seven months down the road, he replaced me. I left that organization, and he went right in. And the only way they could have done that was for me as the leader, as the head of that group, to set a precedent on being replaced. A lot of CEOs want to hold on to that spot, but guess what? Either you will move on because you found a better opportunity, or you will move on because they'll fire you, or you will move on because unfortunately, you're no longer with us. Either way, and those 3 situations you're going to move on. And so, it's incumbent upon the CEO to raise their replacement and when you do, you find that you won't be alone too much. 

Ellen: That's fascinating. When you had that conversation on the first day, I have no doubt he was flabbergasted. I I'm sure he was like, Wait, that's not the job I thought I had!” Right? At that moment, were you anticipating - well, I guess you always anticipate leaving - but were you anticipating leaving within that year? 

Enrique: No, I did not anticipate leaving within the year. I just knew that to get the best out of this individual, he had to know that I was invested in him, and he had to know that from day one. And it actually ended up being something that was a good thing because seven months down the road, it wasn't even a year, I was out of the organization and he moved up. And the point there is, as CEO, are you truly invested in your people? Are you really invested to the point where you can sit down and say, “Whether it's one year 2-3?, it doesn't matter. I want to know and want to make sure, that when I leave, this place has a suitable replacement.” 

Ellen: Listening to you, I can picture that a CEO with that approach would have a culture of that approach. So, you're not just mentoring a replacement CEO, but then that person would then mentor that next level of management and the whole organization would have a stronger culture, but certainly more experienced leaders across the board and not exclusively the CEO. 

Enrique: Yeah, for for sure. 

Ellen: Enrique, this was wonderful. I again thank you for your service. I thank you for your story. All the great advice that you've shared with us about how you managed your career and how you're helping other CEO's manage theirs. 

Enrique: Thank you for allowing me to share and it's always good to and I always say each one, help one right and we'll have a better.  

Ellen: Love that. Perfect! 

Thank you for listening to this episode of Time. To press pause to learn. More about Enrique's go to https://triadleadershipsolutions.my.canva.site/  to learn more about me. Go to https://thesalientstrategist.com/ and be sure to join us again wherever you listen to your podcasts.