My guest this week is Pat Lawler. Pat is the CEO of Youth Villages. Founded in 1986 with the merger of two Memphis-based residential campuses, Youth Villages is now a nationally recognized leader in the field of children’s mental and behavioral health. From the early days of serving just 80 children a year, we’ve since grown to help tens of thousands of children, families and young people annually, with a complete continuum of programs and services across 24 states and 100 locations.
RECAP
3:00 My Father, where did this come from?
4:56 What drew me in?
6:39 You don’t want to sell tools do you?– intro?
7:35 Gone back to school
8:13 Drawn to the kids with the biggest problems
8:50 Driven to get to the root
9:15 How to help people with the biggest problems
9:49 What caused these conditions?
13:37 Generational change. Always sticking up
15:27 Learning to be a good parent. Ups and Downs
19:07 Commitment to overcome what comes your way
19:56 Persistent until we get your support
20:50 Research, data, exhaust all options- no turning back
21:20 Not be deterred
21:38 The hardest thing is to change the way people think
22:25 Obsessive compulsive gene
23:05 Thousands of kids and families
24:18 The burden- the passion, the drive, the momentum, the enthusiasm, and the excitement
25:00 Clearly defined and measurable goals, hold accountable, talk experts and data
25:42 Relentless drive to make things better for other people
27:09 Horrible abuse, neglect that scars young people
28:20 Your passionate
29:28 Not now, maybe later. Failure with young people, what did we learn and do it differently learning and experience
31:30 We all need a support system- family is critical and data
32:50 They asked me to quietly close it down– intro? 33:06
36:20 Pivot, change to support families
39:30 Peer group is key creating change
41:00 I couldn’t do other work
41:20 For the bad there is a thousand more good. Balance work and personal life
42:50 Be open to change, open to where other people are coming from, bring people along slowly, engaged in the process
48:45 The courage to try it
49:05 Committed and passionate- small steps impact their life
50:41 I don’t want to hear about your successes, I want to hear about your failures
57:29 Scaling that problem
56:14 Memphis, TN Murder rate is a serious problem
58:53 Data collecting around the country and scale. Meet needs and replicate it
1:00:13 Make it a safe place for people to live
1:00:55 Deaths across the country are overwhelming/ safe place for kids to grow up in
1:01:43 If people don’t have the opportunity to earn money they turn to crime
1:02:15 Very few cities have put together a comprehensive plan
1:03:55 I know we can do it. We will learn lessons align the way
1:04:51 Giving people hope and meaning into their life
1:07:40 we had passion but no expertise. We needed advice and counsel. These supports could read a balance sheet, help organizational chart, forecast a budget, could help us solve that specific problem and raised money before
1:10:14 Just excited today as I was 41 years ago and I still have that passion and commitment
1:11:00 Moving the organization forward. We need to identify the people that need us
1:12:18 We need to understand the capacity of the problem and scale it to meet the needs
RESOURCES
