Embarking on a voyage through the highs and lows of leadership, we are joined by the exceptional Stephen Clements, whose storied career, from the family-founded National Sports to the echelons of the Forzani Group and Canadian Tire, offers a treasure of wisdom on personal and corporate growth. As he recounts the emotional complexities of selling his family's legacy and stepping into uncharted territories of leadership, Stephen's narrative resonates with anyone who's faced the daunting task of navigating change within large organizations. His profound reflections on putting collective needs before personal gain illuminate a path of servant leadership that champions the voice of the individual for the betterment of the whole.
Thanks for listening!
Click here to take the LeaderImpact Assessment and to receive the first chapter of Becoming a Leader of Impact by Braden Douglas.
Remember, impact starts with you!
Embarking on a voyage through the highs and lows of leadership, we are joined by the exceptional Stephen Clements, whose storied career, from the family-founded National Sports to the echelons of the Forzani Group and Canadian Tire, offers a treasure of wisdom on personal and corporate growth. As he recounts the emotional complexities of selling his family's legacy and stepping into uncharted territories of leadership, Stephen's narrative resonates with anyone who's faced the daunting task of navigating change within large organizations. His profound reflections on putting collective needs before personal gain illuminate a path of servant leadership that champions the voice of the individual for the betterment of the whole.
Thanks for listening!
Click here to take the LeaderImpact Assessment and to receive the first chapter of Becoming a Leader of Impact by Braden Douglas.
Remember, impact starts with you!
Welcome to the Leader Impact podcast. We are a community of leaders with a network in over 350 cities around the world, dedicated to optimizing our personal, professional and spiritual lives to have impact. This show is where we have a chance to listen and engage with leaders who are living this out. We love talking with leaders, so if you have any questions, comments or suggestions to make this show even better, please let us know. Best way to stay connected in Canada is through our newsletter at LeaderImpactca or on social media at Leader Impact. If you're listening from outside of Canada, check out our website at LeaderImpactcom.
Speaker 1:I'm your host, lisa Peters, and our guest today is Stephen Clements, a seasoned entrepreneur and executive with over 40 years of invaluable experience as the founding partner of Next Chapter Ventures. Stephen wears many hats advisor, mentor and coach, dedicated to guiding leaders through the next chapters in both business and life. His mission is to empower these leaders to serve with purpose and leave a lasting generational impact. Hailing from New Market, Ontario, Stephen shares his life journey with his wife of 32 years, Tanya. Together, they have raised two adult children and are proud grandparents to two grandchildren. Beyond his professional endeavors, Stephen actively contributes to the community as a board member of the Jennifer Ashley's Children's Charity, focusing on improving the quality of life for seriously and chronically ill children and their families. Since 2014, Stephen has been an integral part of Leader Impact, actively co-leading a group in York Region. Additionally, he serves as the event coordinator for the Leader Impact York Region team. Join us as we explore the insights, wisdom and impactful experiences that have shaped Stephen Clemens' remarkable journey. Welcome to the show, Stephen.
Speaker 2:Thank you, great to be here.
Speaker 1:It is great to have you. Now I'm just going to admit I did stalk you on LinkedIn when I read, when I had the intro, and I didn't put any. There's nothing here about Canadian Tire. So I'm going to tell you it is one of my favorite stores and I think it's my husband's too. But for anyone who doesn't know, who doesn't not in Canada, canadian Tire, what is it?
Speaker 2:If you try to explain Canadian Tire the retail store to Americans, it's like you can say well, it's kind of Walmart but not Walmart. It's kind of Home Depot but not Home Depot. It's kind of Dick's Sporting Goods and it's kind of everything that everything that Canada needs under one roof. Basically is what they try to be. But what a lot of people don't know is that Canadian Tire also owns a lot of other businesses, including a chain of multiple banners of Sporting Goods stores Marks, which was formerly Marks for Warehouse, the brand Helly Hansen, as well as many, many other brands. So Canadian Tire is actually they have their own bank. There's a lot to Canadian Tire, more than just Canadian Tire stores, but there is over 500 Canadian Tire retail stores across Canada where you can pretty much get anything. I think one of the slogans is for anything for life. In Canada that's Canadian Tire other than maybe food. But there's chips and snacks. You could even survive off that for a few days.
Speaker 1:So I used to go to events and I would joke and say, well, do you take Canadian Tire money, because I had so much of it. Now, that's all electronic so it's all digital now, so like everything else that's how long I have been loving Canadian Tire.
Speaker 2:There you go, yes.
Speaker 1:Well, I want to again welcome you to this show, and we've got some questions for you and we're I'm excited to start with you. So are you ready?
Speaker 2:I'm ready, let's do this.
Speaker 1:So Leader Impact, we're always looking for a little bit of your professional story and how you got to where you are today, and I liked reading yours. I'm Canadian Tire. You had some big jobs senior VP, gm, national sports and then you went on or actually pro hockey first and then sports, so again my favorite area. But I want to hear a little bit more about your journey, how you got to where you are today and if you have a couple of snapshots of where pivotal or turning moments that you had along the journey.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I grew up the son of a serial entrepreneur. My dad was forced into business as a 16 year old when his dad suddenly passed away at 42 without a succession plan in place. So later on in the mid sixties, my dad started selling sporting goods sporting gear to schools across Ontario from the trunk of his car, which led to a 1971 him opening national sports, which was one of the first big box sports stores in the GTA. I worked there growing up as a kid and had thoughts about staying in the family business, but ended up going in different direction. I went off to attend a Bible college in your homes, in your home province of Saskatchewan, and I had thoughts of going into vocational ministry. But after graduating returned to Ontario and ended up getting back into the family business. And over the next 24 years I went back and forth between the family business and my own entrepreneurial ventures.
Speaker 2:And the first pivotal moment, other than some of those, was in 2005,. We sold the family business to Forzani Group, which most people would know as Sport Check, and I agreed to stay on for two years to lead the transition. Part of the deal at the time was my dad retire and I was a president at the time. So I took over and I was going to run it for two years and then probably move on. I was 43 years old and it was my first non-family job, so I'd always either worked for my dad or for myself. The first paycheck that didn't have my Clements last name on it was when I was 43 years old, so it was quite a change.
Speaker 2:And five years I guess six years later, in 2011, canadian Tire then bought the Forzani Group, so we went from being a small public company to part of an iconic, very large for you Canadian listeners, you know, but other outside candidates a very well-known 100-year-old Canadian retailer that owns lots of other businesses. So we were part of that corporation and shortly after that, canadian Tire purchased a banner called Pro Hockey Life, which had retail stores across Canada as well, so our team also ran that. So we were running national sports. We had 18 stores at the time. It was about the same number of Pro Hockey Life stores across Canada and my initial two-year commitment turned into a 16-year-old career.
Speaker 2:When I signed that contract, I had a friend of mine who said he'd gave me six months and he thought I wouldn't last that six months and he took the under, but in 2021, kenyatta made the corporate decision to shut down the national sports business, which meant my time as a corporate executive was done. So that's when I switched over and started doing coaching and consulting and started next chapter ventures with the help of leveraging my life experience, both in business and personally, to help younger leaders and help leaders that are looking what to do next in their lives. So that's where I'm at today.
Speaker 1:So I want to go back to because I have experienced this the company you know you talked about at 43, it was national sports, sold for Zanis. You got to check from someone else that didn't have your name on it or the company name.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:What was the emotions of feeling you had to let go? I mean, this was your dad's company going to be yours. What was, what was that like for you?
Speaker 2:I think the when I think back about it, I remember the first weekend I came. I came home and my wife, tanya, said to me you seem different. And I said, yeah, I don't have to worry about making payroll this week, like it was. Like it was this huge relief off my shoulders that because I had my own business for about 13 years at our own, we had together, we had our own businesses and the rest of time working for my father, there was always financial stress and pressure. So it was always trying like you're really were fighting for survival as an entrepreneur.
Speaker 2:Whether you were growing, there was good times, bad times, but there was always that pressure of having to. You know, we had, we had, at the peak, 800 employees. So there was always that impression of that pressure of performance. And if sales were bad, if you owe the bank money and if you couldn't pay a vendor, so there was all that personal pressure where now, all of a sudden, that was just employee number 47 or whatever, and I was just. You know I was, I was paid to do a job. Whether I did it well or not, I got paid and I tried to do it well. But it was just a totally different experience that I didn't know if I would like it at first, but as I got into it and as I got to meet people and got different experience, I really I did quite enjoy it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and do you think that that I mean going from your own company? Then you just said I enjoyed meeting the new people. That was just that's part of your journey of then ultimately going into next chapter ventures.
Speaker 2:right, like it's just yeah, it all ties together. It all ties together when you, when you look back, it's easy to see it. At the time you don't see it, but I think it's easy in hindsight. We look back and we see what. You know what. What's happened for a reason, and I think it was.
Speaker 2:But there was some hard times too. When you're part of a big corporation it's very difficult. I mean, the Verzani Group was, you know, a small, medium sized corporate company, but even there we were still the small dog because Sport Check was the big dog. And then we're part of when we were part of any entire, even Sport Check, with 200 stores, was still, compared to any tire, was really, you know, very small.
Speaker 2:So you're always fighting for resources and trying to prove yourself and trying to show that you can. You deserve to have investment in your business. So it was. It was just a completely different life as an entrepreneur. I think you can bring some of that to the corporate world, but it is totally different when you're in a corporate corporate, especially a public company, where there's all the pressure to hit quarters and and the those you know the. The one of my bosses used to say that the tyranny of the immediacy, like everything has to happen today because you've got a quarter to report on. So it's just a completely different environment than entrepreneurial, where you're struggling A lot of times just to survive.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, thank you for sharing that, and the next question is a little bit about your best principle of success and if you can tell us one of yours and maybe a story that might illustrate that.
Speaker 2:Okay, I think for me, when I thought about this, it's the principle is, it's not about me, and I guess some people call it servant leadership, but I think it's a lot more than that. Whether I was a corporate executive or an entrepreneur, it was very easy and frankly normal to think how everything impacted me personally. What was my role, my compensation, my recognition, my P and L, my team, my family? It's only been over the last 10 years that I started to look at things differently, put the needs of the business and the people in it ahead of my own, and I'm still not perfect at it, but it's something I strive for every day, and I can give you a couple of examples that I think people can relate to. The first one is happens all the time is, at least for me is I'll be in a meeting or a situation where I know there's something I should say or speak up, and obviously I think it's it's it's needs to be said because it's in my mind and I've got experience in that area. But my first thought is what are they going to? What is going to be? How am I going to be perceived for asking this question in this situation? Am I going to be a troublemaker? Am I not going to be a team player? Am I going to be going against them, you know, against something the boss had in mind. So I often think about that and it really comes down to. I think it's fear, because we're thinking more about our. You know what it's going to mean for us versus what it's going to mean for the company or the people.
Speaker 2:And the specific example that played out for me in the corporate environment was I regularly have leaders, senior leadership, team meetings that you know fairly high level, and we would have up to 10 people in the in the meetings and these would be pre covid, so they were always in person. And during a challenging business time we had a regime change so we had a new leader come in, very high level, very great, great leader, brilliant thinker, lots of big ideas, quite open minded and really nice person. You know we really like this person. They often had ideas that were so big and so out there that we just in the room we kind of knew this is no way that we could actually execute on this. So Initially a lot of those ideas just went right through and we ended up trying to do these things because everyone was, you know Things, business wasn't great when they came in, so it wasn't like we could say well, we've got it figured out. You know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:So there was some of some of not wanting to stir the pot, not wanting to make a bad impression on the new leader, which is protection of your own job, protection of your own business, business unit. And I think that it wasn't until I really clicked into this idea that it's not about me, that I was willing to stand up and you know, just. You know speak up and just ask the right questions and Not really thinking first and foremost about what an impact to me. But what could happen if I don't speak up? Because the responsibility to speak up is there, because that's why I'm in the room, I was invited that room for my experience, and if I don't speak up, then I'm not doing my job. So Two interesting things happen. One is that Some of the other senior leaders in the room, as we would take breaks or have the meeting would end, would come up to me confidentially and say listen, I really thank you for asking that question because it really need to be asked, but I was too scared to ask it and I hope you can keep doing that. And I was like, well, I feel why I will, but you know you need to speak up too. But they were fearful. And the other thing was that the leader in question loved it like he wanted people to. You know they wanted people to to challenge, they walk, because they love that kind of, they love the debate, they like they, but they don't want a bunch of people nodding their heads. So for me, I was able to take that and translate to my leadership team that worked with me and you know I was able to pass on.
Speaker 2:I've heard a couple of things this kind of some of the leader impact stuff, but one of the one of those Nikki gum, nikki gumbo from alpha. He called it the obligation to dissent. Patrick Lencioni talks about mining for conflict, the idea that you need people to disagree in a meeting. You need people to speak up and have their voice heard. So even if you don't go with their, with what they, what they want or what they're hoping for, it doesn't just become a bunch of people advocating for their own ideas, it becomes everyone pulling the same direction. So I think, unless you're gonna have the, the, put the company and the people first ahead of yourself. You're not gonna be able to do that, so certainly not perfect that it, but I think that's. That's something that I've really tried to apply, or less many years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. I think people listening you know you were invited to the table. Whatever table, whatever board, whatever council, you were invited to come and to let go of that fear and and the need to speak up, because that's diversity. If I was invited to a table as a female and it's all male, it, whatever, whatever diverse, diversity is that we are invited and we have to speak up. So that's a great. You know it's.
Speaker 2:It's not about you, it's about the best thing for the company, the best thing for the people and if and that goes in a lot of different directions If you think about guys do making decisions, you know, because it's very easy, as I said, especially in a corporate environment, to be so focused on your own business unit Even or your own, your own people, your own team and not think about the rest of the company. We're not thinking about other divisions or not thinking about other people and the impact of your decisions are gonna have another people. So I think there's a lot of selfish leaders. I thought hopefully not as many as there used to be. I mean, there's one of the great books we studied, a leader impact is leaders eat last, by Simon Sinek, and Kind of you know talks about that. That's one of the you know places. I kind of first started thinking about that and I think there's other others, but that's one that stands out to me. So yeah.
Speaker 1:So I think what I've heard and I just want to confirm is that when you were an entrepreneur versus now in the team, would you say that you put your head down more as an entrepreneur Because you you're feared about paying the bills, but now you have an opportunity to sort of look up and go this is what's best for the company, or would you say there was a transition there?
Speaker 2:for sure. Yeah, I think you. Yeah, it depends on how. As an entrepreneur, there's so many, there's so many different you can be riding really high and you could be really, really low and you could be in the middle at where.
Speaker 2:For corporate, I think it's just more. It's just, it's more every day. You just got to show up and keep doing your job and trying to get better. And I think where entrepreneurs have a lot more highs and lows at least I did as an entrepreneur and I saw that with my family, my father's 84, he's still an entrepreneur. So you know, I see that with him. So I think that it is there's more consistency and more opportunity to maybe think strategically in a in a corporate environment where oftentimes you don't have that luxury as an entrepreneur because you have to put food on the table for yourself or your employees and you're not really able to step back and make a strategic decision that you know it'll be right in the longer term, but then you weigh that against the corporate environment where you got to hit your quarter. So there is some similarities but there's some differences as well.
Speaker 1:So which is a great reason for a coach.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there you go.
Speaker 1:All right. So I mean, I think we all know we learn more from our failings and mistakes than our own successes, and I was wondering if you'd be willing to share one of your greatest failings or mistakes and what you have learned from it.
Speaker 2:Sure, this is hard because I've made so many, but I will share one of the biggest and most recent I did mention about national sports was started my father trunk of his car 1960s as our peak 21 stores 800 employees and $100 million in sales. There was many ups and downs over the years but the brand in Ontario was always strong and we had a lot of loyal employees with many, many with 20 plus years experience. When the business was sold in 2005,. Since that time, we had many different structures but and I had many different bosses and we're different owners, but ultimately I was always in charge. So, you know, as we went into, as we went into COVID, as we went into 2020, 2021, any time made the difficult, strategic decision to close down our business. So at that time, immediately, obviously I you know, I understood completely from a strategic point of view, from any tires point of view, why they were doing it. It made sense for them. But I had so many thoughts about what I could have done differently and how he could have saved that business and the responsibility had to the 800 employees and and responsibility to our vendors, responsibility to our customers, and it was a very emotional time and it was very, very difficult and heart-wrenching and I just you know it was very difficult time. But what, what I guess happened through that is, first of all, respectfully I was, I was given the opportunity by Canadian Territory to allow to stay on with my team and lead this closing. So, you know, we set a goal to make sure we operated during the close down the same way we did for the 50 years before that as a company, provide the best possible return for the corporation while treating our employees and our customers and our suppliers with respect and finding jobs for the employees within the organization who wanted them, which we were able to do and just providing a first class experience, even though we were closing the business down. And as the closing got underway if you know it's hard to remember, but only you know it was only two and a half years ago we were still in COVID. So in spring of 2021, we were in kind of that second wave phase and that's when we were closing these stores.
Speaker 2:So, my wife, tanya, we did a cross country, a cross Ontario road trip to every store to say thank you and goodbye to our store teams. And what amazes me, what amaze me then, and still amaze me, as I think back now is every single store, the store general managers and the teams. They were more concerned about me I'm going to get teary now more concerned about me than we were about them, and they were losing their jobs. They'd worked. They'd worked the front lines during COVID with masks, all day long, and now here they were, you know.
Speaker 2:So, as we hugged and we cried and we laughed and we giggled and we, you know, we grieved together, it was just amazing to see that the culture that we had built in the company, they were showing me what it meant to not be about me because they were making it up. It was about the Australian making it about them and they were trying to make it about me. So it was very, very emotional time and but we learned a lot and I just saw, I was just so proud of all the people that we worked with.
Speaker 1:So yeah, that's a pretty big deal to travel across to all your stores and personally greet them, to shut them down or to you know that's a big deal. Most people, would you know, send out the letter, the email. I don't know that was a?
Speaker 2:yeah, it was, it was, it was normal, it was something that I it was. It wasn't even in question. We were going to do that and it was just. You know, we, we made sure that the as many of the team members as possible could be there. They knew we were coming in advance, they knew when we were coming and and when we'd be there, so they could try to make sure they were there if they wanted to see us and ask us questions, and and we try to find out if they have jobs yet or if they're looking for jobs or anything we do to help them find jobs.
Speaker 2:And, as I said, almost almost every I think pretty much everybody who wanted to stay within the company, we were able to find a job somewhere else in the organization and several decided to leave and we were able to help them find jobs elsewhere as well. So that was kind of the driving force behind trying to. And also, just, we had customers that were third generation customers that you know had their, their grandparents had come to our stores and they were, you know, as kids now. So the customers were really, you know, really sad, but at the end of the day, that business moves on and we all, we all learn and grow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a great story. Thank you for sharing that. At Leader Impact, we want to grow personally, professionally and spiritually for increasing impact, so I was wondering if you'd be willing to share an example of how the spiritual makes a practical difference in your life as a leader.
Speaker 2:Sure. So I told you about going to Bible College. What I didn't tell you was that after Bible College, when I returned to the family business, I drifted away from my faith and I would say for almost 30 years from a faith perspective, I was wondering the wilderness, really a true prodigal. And it wasn't until the fall of 2013,. My wife, tanya gave her life to the Lord and together we embarked on a spiritual journey. Hers was new and mine was being renewed.
Speaker 2:Early on in that process, in April of 2014, before we'd even started really going to a regular church, we were introduced to Leader Impact by a gentleman named Denis Frappier at a Saturday night dinner party and three days later I was at his. In the spring of 2014, I was at his 7 am Tuesday meeting and I've been going to a meeting every Tuesday morning, except in summer breaks since then, and the people I've met, the books we've studied, the outreach events we've planned have literally changed my life and, as we say at Leader Impact, we're focused on all three personal, professional and spiritual. For me it's been transformational and the only reason I can even think about trying to practice a principle that's not about me is because my foundation and my relationship with God through my Lord and Savior, jesus Christ, and knowing it's all about him. I try and remember that every day, performing for an audience of one, and it's not really about me, so I think really it's for me, it's everything, yeah.
Speaker 1:So, going back to Briar Crest, how did you get from Ontario to Saskatchewan, to a? That's not a large college. Briar Crest is not large. How did you get there? And then how did you get there and then leave there with and step away from the faith for 30 years?
Speaker 2:Probably another podcast, but I'll do it quickly because I can. The people who know me well have heard this story, but my grandmother was the Dean of Students. I went to live with her in grade 12. I had there was some struggles at our home. My parents had split up when I was younger and so I lived with my grandma at Cairnport in grade 12. And then I stayed on and went to Bible college for three years. I returned back home, back to the old place I lived and back to my old friend group, back to my old life, and it just kind of they really didn't have the support in this place. They didn't really have a church and really have sound habits, and so it was just kind of a literally a drift that just happened without having really support in place to something like Leader Impact, where I could have plugged into that. I would have had people like minded people that I could have shared my journey with. I didn't have that. So I think that was one of the reasons.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think that's common. I think I've even myself when I left here grade 12, I didn't come back to the. I mean, I only went to church on Sunday because my mom took me right Like it wasn't a relationship, it was just church on Sunday and it took me. It was 12 years, like I think I was. I was past 30 when I decided to. It was time and I don't think it's uncommon, but I wanted to hear your story.
Speaker 2:I'm like I didn't go to Bible college?
Speaker 1:Yes, so at Leader Impact, we are about leaders having a lasting impact, and I know in your bio you talked about generational impact, so I'm excited to hear this question, cause, as we continue to move through our own journeys, have you considered what you want your faith legacy to be when you leave this world?
Speaker 2:Yeah, this question really made me think and start with a few things. One is John Maxwell says and I've got it written up on my wall so success means having those closest to you, love and respect you the most, and that's always been something I've thought about. And we recently had a funeral for a close family member and it reminded me of the other thought of living our lives for those who will live, who'll be in the first two rows of our funeral. So it's really having those people closest to me that that know me the best, really respect me, love me the most. And then, this morning actually, I listened to one of my favorite songs called Christ be magnified by Cody Carnes, and it just made me think that really what I'd like my legacy to be is that Christ was magnified in my life.
Speaker 2:And, mike, that's why my you know the current mission to leverage my life experience to evoke people, starting with my own family, live with purpose and make a Generational impact. It's got to be more than just about making money. It's got to be more about just building businesses. It's got to be about people, and I Think specifically all the people I've met at leader impact and the groups, the changes I've seen in people and their families and their personal, professional, spiritual lives is a big part for me and I think that'll live on long after I'm gone. And About six years ago I started with a small group of people. I Invited them to join me reading the Bible in a year and we've had the and we've had a group the last six years. It's sure we got about 40 people reading the Bible on a plan on you version Bible app and it's been amazing to see how some people's lives have been changed just by reading the Bible every day.
Speaker 1:I know at least two other groups have spun off from that doing the same thing, so we've got people reading God's word and that's something I like to see grow and continue to yeah, in our I have a leader impact group and so when you talk about reading the Bible, for year Some people have struggled and I'm like, well, you could, you could read it in chronological order, and Because people just pick up the Bible and they read it from front to back, I never knew this till a few years ago. So yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, and I don't know if people know that you can just Google Chrono, like read the Bible chronological order, and it's a year and it's easy and you read it, how it happened and and you can do it on the you version app.
Speaker 2:I've done that, it's yeah so many options we've done in different ways and there's lots of different ways and we try to change it up every year. This year we're actually using the Nikki Gumbel from alpha, using his plan. He's got lots of great commentary and, oh, we've done different ones. We've done chronologically. There's a there's something called the Bible project which I'd highly recommend. They have videos, interactive videos, which are great, and they there's that they have plans for New Testament, the whole Bible in different orders, and that gives a lot of commentary along and instruction along the way as well.
Speaker 1:So yeah, and people can do this at home. I mean, you can? Share with leader impact, but I think it's a. It's a great start and when you're not sure, so yeah, we'd open the door, all right. Well, our last question is we always want to know About our people we're interviewing. Is what brings you the greatest joy?
Speaker 2:Well, in a few, a few months, my wife Tanya and I will celebrate a 33rd anniversary and, as I mentioned, you mentioned earlier we have two adult kids, two granddaughters. We actually were able to have lunch without two granddaughters yesterday, and just spending time with our kids and grandkids and seeing them grow as people Brings me joy. My wife Tanya has her own home staging and home styling business. She had for the last 10 years and seeing her grow in her faith and as an entrepreneur and business leader Brings me joy. The two of us are best friends. We'll have to travel Together. We've been many amazing destinations all over the world and see how much she loves to experience new places and cultures. That brings me joy and, most of all, I would say that knowing that after 30 years in the wilderness, jesus welcomed me back as his prodigal son a little over 10 years ago brings me the ultimate joy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Stephen, I want to thank you for sharing all that. It. It takes time out of your day and, and I think just sharing stories is whatever Everybody needs to hear, and I think that's why I show up here on the podcast is to hear stories, because it just it Builds my own faith every time I show up. So, thank you.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you. Thank you for doing this. I know it takes a lot of time for you and I know you're busy, so I appreciate you taking the time to do this.
Speaker 1:No, I love it. Well, so this ends our podcast version. But if anyone is listening and they want to engage with you, how can they find you?
Speaker 2:I am on LinkedIn. I've only been on LinkedIn for about a month, but I am on there so I'm new to LinkedIn, and I also have a Business site, next chapter ventures, dot ca, and personal site, Stephen Clements comm, so there's lots of places to find me, so LinkedIn's probably his way to start connect with me there.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, Stephen, I want to thank you for joining us. It has been a pleasure to spend the last hour, half hour, with you. It's, it's been a joy, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you very much, lisa. I appreciate it. Thank you, you're welcome.
Speaker 1:All right. Well, if you're part of leader impact, you can always discuss or share this podcast with your group. And if you are not yet part of a leader impact and would like to find out more and grow your leadership, find our podcast page on our website, leader impact dot ca, and check out our free leadership assessment. You will also find on our web page chapter one of Braden Douglas's book becoming a leader of impact. You can also check out groups available in Canada at leader impact dot ca or, if you're listening from anywhere else in the world, check out leader impact calm or get in touch with us by email info at leader impact dot ca and we will connect you. And if you like this podcast, please leave us a comment, give us a rating or review. This will help other global leaders find our podcast. Thank you for engaging with us and remember Impact starts with you.