Leadership Pride from the “sidelines”

 

 

Let me begin by expressing just how proud I am of the teams at Butterfly Equity and Generous Brands. The recent announcement of their deal to acquire Health-Ade truly brought a smile of pride to my face. This acquisition expands an already impressive platform of better-for-you refrigerated beverage brands and fulfills a vision we first embraced when we repurchased the company from Campbell’s in 2019. Back then, the business was facing serious challenges on both top-line and bottom-line performance, and we knew we’d have to rebuild the team, stabilize the CPG and retail fresh carrot businesses, and carve out the company from Campbell’s before we could pursue any larger strategic opportunities. Of course, none of us could have anticipated that Covid was just around the corner.

Yet, I am deeply proud of how the team united through the pandemic. They not only weathered the storm but emerged stronger, never losing sight of the major strategic priorities: splitting the historic company into two distinct, focused entities and expanding the robust refrigerated beverage platform with new brands. These were ideas conceived in 2019 … and now, they are realities.

When I retired early last year, as we took steps to split the company into its two natural businesses (one focused on retail fresh carrots, the other on CPG brands and products), I had a chance to step back and observe how both independent teams would perform. While it was sometimes difficult to be on the sidelines rather than on the front lines, it has been a genuinely rewarding “legacy moment” to watch leaders—some I’ve worked with for years and others I helped bring on recently—rise to meet new challenges and seize fresh opportunities. None of these moments have been more significant than the acquisition announced last week.

With a career now spanning over four decades, my hope for the next chapter is to experience more of these “legacy moments,” seeing great leaders and their teams make meaningful impacts across the business world and leave lasting legacies of their own. Rather than leading from the front, my focus is on coaching, mentoring, and advising from the sidelines—always ready to support the teams I admire so much.

Noting that I rarely include last names in my essays, I feel compelled to recognize the exceptional leadership, vision, and influence of Adam and Jeff. Their relentless drive and steadfast dedication were instrumental in making this deal happen. I also want to shine a light on the remarkable team of Phil, David, and Todd—brilliant operating executives at Generous Brands whose expertise and collaboration have truly laid the groundwork for this achievement. Over the course of my career, I’ve had the honor of working with many gifted individuals, but these five stand out as Generous Brands charts its course toward new opportunities. I am deeply grateful for their remarkable impact, and it fills me with pride to cheer them on from the sidelines.

Leadership requirements for a very challenging world!

 

 

Over the years (now more than 16 years) since I started posting essays on this blog, I have intentionally steered away from partisan political topics.  In our ever more stratified world and country, I have worked to be a voice sharing thoughts about lessons of leadership and life. stories, insights and experiences (literally printed on the “masthead” of my blog) that would resonate and connect to readers across countries, continents and political affiliations.  Today I turn my attention to the path ahead in this country (and I suspect it will have broader application) and what I see as a “requirement” for leaders working to be agents of progress in a challenging world.  While my data source may seem partisan, my intent is to use the FACTS of today to push us as leaders to be mor effective in light of the challenges of tomorrow.

Last week, right before the holiday the house passed the budget bill that had come back to them as part of the “budget reconciliation legislative process” from the senate.  The FACTS of the bill are stark and have been widely reported…. Including extended tax cuts for wealthier Americans, budget increases for Defense and ICE, with large budget cuts in SNAP and Medicaid… all resulting in a significant increase in the budget deficit and an expansion of our National Debt.  What has been equally well reported is the broad unpopularity of the bill captured in polls taken across the last month or so featured below.  While its a dangerous idea to try to lead and govern a  country based on polls of the moment, this is a brutal picture that shows just how unpopular this bill is across a wide range of individual polls and polling methodologies.

My purpose for this essay is not to complain about this bill or prognosticate on the implications of the budget moves (there is plenty of that going on in the media currently.) My intent is to share a few thoughts that have struck me on how I need to act/operate as a leader today in light of the FACTS of the budget and our current landscape and encourage other leaders to join in thinking about their approach as well.

A few key ideas/themes keep resonating as priorities going forward… and here are three that I am currently working hard on implementing:

Clear Eyed:  

We live at a time of incredible and accelerating change.  Historic global norms, alliances, business models, tariff plans, tax policies, supreme court rulings emerge and fall by the wayside daily and it’s difficult to keep up with the barrage of headlines announcing the latest dynamics.  In this context, I am working to stay current and accurate with the facts at hand while also working to NOT get whip-sawed by the histrionics being applied to these moves by any political party or orientation.  It’s why I used the spelling of “FACTS” in capital letters above as I commented on the recently passed budget bill.  While the potential implications are always important to consider… it’s the “FACTS” that are in the bill that will be most important to “see” clearly.  Now more than ever I am focused on that “clear-eyed” approach and am working hard to bring that to life daily.

Positive/productively focused on tomorrow

I have always “joked” that we were just trying to “make tomorrow a little bit better than yesterday” as a way of describing my focus for the business/team/organization that I was involved with at that moment.  While a historic “joke,” that admonition seems like a “stretch-goal” in today’s reality.  Considering the challenges that are emerging from so many facets of life, it’s difficult to keep “working on tomorrow” with a positive/productive tone.  Regardless of the challenges and pressures, I know I need to keeping working on my “positive/productive” headset and to keep my focus and action on ways to improve the ‘tomorrows” for all of us!

More resilient than ever

Recently I posted an essay on the topic of resilience ( see more at, https://fylegacy.blogspot.com/2025/06/resilience-vital-priority-for-leaders.html)  The idea was to reinforce that for leaders that “resiliency” was a very important characteristic, centered around the definition of “the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness.”  This idea that we need to “recover quickly” seems truer and more relevant today than when I posted that essay just a month or two ago.  I am focused on how I can bounce back/ “recover quickly” from challenges and issues that arise. 

As we face the dynamics and challenges that lie ahead… either in your specific challenging business landscape or in the wildly changing political world…. keep these three ideas in mind.  While certainly no panacea, I believe that these three “leadership requirements” are more important today and in the days ahead than in any time of my now 40+ year business career and professional life.