Author Jeff Butler: “We as humans don’t know how to manage being so interconnected”

…Taking responsibility for where you are. I wholeheartedly believe we have an environment that’s built for success, but we as humans don’t know what to do with being so interconnected. A lot of conflict comes from people not taking responsibility for their life and blaming somebody else. And I get it! I’ve done it, too. It wasn’t till I took a good hard look at myself in the mirror and realized I wanted to be someone I could look back at with pride that I realized the need for personal responsibility. I needed to do it for myself. Not for my parents, not for any sort of narrative reason. I’m responsible for where I need to be. And if I were to start a movement, that’s what it would revolve around.

As part of my series about the leadership lessons of accomplished business leaders, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jeff Butler. Jeff is a keynote speaker, entrepreneur, author and workforce consultant who helps leaders optimize their organizations. He’s perhaps best known for showing companies how to build a cohesive, multigenerational workforce.

Thank you for joining us Jeff. Can you tell me a quick story about what brought you to this career path?

It’s really bizarre. In college, I used to never raise my hand in class. I was extremely introverted. You’d probably be shocked to hear that now, because I do between 50 and 100 speaking gigs every year.

It all started when I was 24 years old. I had just founded a tech company and realized pretty quickly that wasn’t what I wanted to do long-term. After leaving that company, I took a look at my bucket list and said, “What do I want to do?”

Number seven on that list was public speaking.