Have you ever wondered what it takes to be a trailblazer in the world of sports? How about understanding the journey of someone who transitioned from playing college football to becoming the second African American athletic director at a Power Five school? Gene Smith, Athletic Director at Ohio State University, takes us through his inspiring journey, unveiling his passion for sports, his challenging transitions, and the lessons learned in the pursuit of excellence.
As we unfold Gene's story, he shares his mission of being missed - a concept that revolves around building strong relationships and a memorable presence. He navigates us through his leadership lessons from the fields to the boardroom. You'll also hear about his remarkable achievements during his tenure at Ohio State and the significance of emotional intelligence in leading successfully.
Our conversation would be incomplete without discussing the impact of mentoring the next generaration, of college sports leaders . Gene's philosophy on values, integrity, and personal growth forms the bedrock of his leadership and helping others reach great success . He shares stories of creating a positive environment for his team. As we wrap up the episode, we express gratitude for Gene's relentless contributions towards equality in athletics and his lessons of reaching back to pull up the next generation. Join us, and let's be inspired to always strive to be a baller!
Have you ever wondered what it takes to be a trailblazer in the world of sports? How about understanding the journey of someone who transitioned from playing college football to becoming the second African American athletic director at a Power Five school? Gene Smith, Athletic Director at Ohio State University, takes us through his inspiring journey, unveiling his passion for sports, his challenging transitions, and the lessons learned in the pursuit of excellence.
As we unfold Gene's story, he shares his mission of being missed - a concept that revolves around building strong relationships and a memorable presence. He navigates us through his leadership lessons from the fields to the boardroom. You'll also hear about his remarkable achievements during his tenure at Ohio State and the significance of emotional intelligence in leading successfully.
Our conversation would be incomplete without discussing the impact of mentoring the next generaration, of college sports leaders . Gene's philosophy on values, integrity, and personal growth forms the bedrock of his leadership and helping others reach great success . He shares stories of creating a positive environment for his team. As we wrap up the episode, we express gratitude for Gene's relentless contributions towards equality in athletics and his lessons of reaching back to pull up the next generation. Join us, and let's be inspired to always strive to be a baller!
I felt that I needed to make sure that I could demonstrate that we could do the job. People who were brown like me could do the job, and I didn't want to be the excuse for any hiring authority to say, look, he couldn't get it done. He couldn't get it done at Eastern Michigan, he couldn't get it done at Iowa State or wherever. I didn't see it as a burden. I saw it as an opportunity. I saw it as a challenge. It drove me to try and be the best that I could be, be inquisitive and curious, and so I learned a lot fast.
Speaker 2:This is Tim Brown, host of the Be A Ballad podcast, and I'm excited to have with me today, as a guest at the Appalach Director at the Ohio State University, gene Smith. Gene has been over four decades an athletic administration experience. The most important in Gene has committed to helping that next generation panning forward, as we say, and Gene has truly done that. So I'm excited about this conversation. Today we talked to a fellow Clevelander. Brown's fan cast Indians, let's go, that's right, let's go.
Speaker 1:We're glutton for punishment, I would tell. Although I like the Brownies this year we're going to be in Vegas. Now, that's right, we're going to be in Vegas now.
Speaker 4:I love it.
Speaker 2:Welcome Gene to the show.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Tim I appreciate it.
Speaker 2:And when did you fall in love with sports?
Speaker 1:You know, really it wasn't until high school. Wow, you know, I really fell in love with it because we didn't have organized sports in the public school system. I was in, we played the street ball and all that stuff. But when I went to Chanel, you know they had organized sports and it was a challenging time for me. So I dove straight into it and wrestled and played baseball, played basketball, ran track, I did it all and obviously football was the one that I fell in love with the most. But yeah, it was really in high school where it became kind of my passion.
Speaker 2:How was that experience leaving the neighborhood? Because you're a Kennedy guy, I'm a short guy.
Speaker 3:Yeah right.
Speaker 2:And we beat up on y'all all the time.
Speaker 4:That's right, but that's it.
Speaker 2:It was good Said it was a real deal I was at. How'd you end up at Chanel?
Speaker 1:Yeah, my dad sent me down in the ninth grade after, you know, getting ready to leave Charles W Elliot. I'm like, say, go to Chanel. He said, look, you're not going to go to John F Kennedy, which was the natural writer of passion. So I he just said, look, you're going to go to Chanel High School I didn't know where it was and you're going to catch the bus over by St Henry's and you're going to bus out to Chanel.
Speaker 1:And it was all boys, all white. There was three black kids in the class at that time and I in the school at that time and I think he wanted to separate me from where. You know, me and my boys were going. You know he, you know we were, we were trying to survive in the neighborhood and there were, there were things that occurred and I think he saw it and he just wanted me to be in a different environment and you know, at the time I was pretty angry. It was a hard transition because it was all white and I was not Catholic and it was really challenging for me and and sports became my outlet. So it was, it was just right after the civil rights. This was 1969. So it was really a challenge for me, but it was the best thing for me and I'm glad he did it.
Speaker 2:He talked about who were some of those coaches who were kind of role models.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know it's. You know I had a in high school. I had some really good coaches. Joe Lynch, the basketball coach was probably the best one you know. I remember I, you know I hit a kid in the basketball game. I punched him, oh Lord, and Joe sat me down and you know we established a great relationship after that, I'm sure.
Speaker 1:It was my first years, you know, I was so frustrated with so many different things and I let it out. And so he, he taught, he taught me a lot. And then I, you know there was another one by the name of Kerry Bulkman in football he was just great and Bob Spicer there were so many high school coaches that were impactful. But you know, when I got to college it was the air procedure and our head coach was pretty impactful and the defensive line coach, Joe Yanto, was really impactful for me, so I was blessed.
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Speaker 2:You know you played defensive in Notre Dame for four years, one of the national championship team. You know, like, can you talk about? You saw excellence. Can you talk about what excellence? Because these young I don't think these young guys really understand what excellence is. They think just you know getting a lot of likes and all that kind of stuff. Can you talk? Can you take us inside? Because you know we see Notre Dame, we see all that and you were there. You talked about Air Parcet. You dropped spames there. You take us inside there. What was the excellence?
Speaker 1:No, you know, it's funny. When I went from high school to Notre Dame, we won the championship in freshman year in 1973, you know, beat Alabama in the sugar bowl.
Speaker 1:We were undefeated. And so I walked into a situation where I saw excellence at its best. You know, I was weird. There was a great tight end by the name of David Casper. He called him the coach. He played for the Reds and he was so committed to doing everything that he could to be the best tight end in the country. So I saw him work at it and saw him start practice before everybody else. And so all those little things that the those who were at the top of the pyramid do to be the best.
Speaker 1:I witnessed it my first year. Mike Thompson was a great free safety. He was always the first one with the ghosts, with our tight end, dave Casper, and then he was the last one to be, and so I just saw this excellence and it inspired me and inspired others. And also I had a roommate who was, you know, the best high school player during his time and Ross Browner at war, in war in Ohio, and I ended up playing for the Bengals and he was actually, I think he was third in the Heisman Trophy one year and went to Lombardi at Lombardi and Ross and I would work out all the time, and you know so we used to. We come stay at our house in Cleveland and we go in the shaker heights and run, because they were the only ones that had a polyurethane trap Right.
Speaker 2:Brown, yeah, brown, yeah, everybody else had a center track.
Speaker 1:So so so so you know, I just saw, you know top of the pyramids do athletes, you know, and that's in themselves to be the best.
Speaker 2:You also had an experience as an assistant coach. Yeah, that was great. I wanted to undisputed national championships.
Speaker 3:You had the player deal. You had the coach deal.
Speaker 2:So how did that shift go from being a coach to athletic administration?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know well, I didn't aspire to be a coach. My degree was in business administration. Okay that Dan Devine at the time asked me to stay on and be a graduate assistant. So I did that and then he promoted me full-time after my first semester and so I coached for four years. And then they brought in Jerry Faus and he didn't hire me back and so I decided I would just go do what I wanted to do, which was being business.
Speaker 1:So I went to work for IBM selling computers in the early 80s to manufacturing and distribution industry, and then the defensive back coach at Notre Dame gentlemen, by the name of Paul Schultz God Blessing passed away. But he called me one day and said hey, gene, he had become the athletic director at Eastern Michigan University. And he called me and said Gene, I have this position, an assistant AD position. I need somebody with business background. I need somebody to understand football. He had just hired a football coach and he wanted somebody that he could trust. So he taught me into it. I love some money on the table at IBM. I didn't love it, but so I went and he taught me the business and two years later he retired and ultimately they promoted me. So I found my career path and I'm forever indebted to him for the opportunity he gave me, everything he taught me, and you know so I was blessed to have that relationship.
Speaker 2:What would you say was one of those life lessons that you learned from him that you still care on today? Yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:I think for him he was interesting. He was not the people person that I am, he was the detailed person, and so I learned to pay attention to the details. I was a salesman.
Speaker 1:I was selling IBM computers in the 80s, when everybody was scared of computers, I thought they were going to replace them, and so he was the guy that taught me around about details and compliance and things of that nature, and so I became really detailed oriented with his teachings and you know we talked football all the time, so you know that was something that you know. I'm blessed that I had a leader who understood the sport and because in the collegiate landscape you know it's football and basketball that drives it, and so he was really good in that space as well.
Speaker 2:You know, in 1985, arizona State made history. I heard Charles Harris as the first black African group at a Power Five school, and then, eight years later, you were hired as a second at Iowa State. How was that being a trailblazer? What was that experience?
Speaker 1:like it was. You know it's funny for Charles and I we're only two at a time. So you know we go to meetings and I, you know I knew that certain people didn't want us in the room and you knew that. But there were people who embraced us, but there were times that Charles wouldn't be at a meeting and I'd be by myself. I was always on the loose. But you know, my mom always taught me to rise above everything. You just rise above it all. And so you know, I fought through challenges that were people didn't want me in the room or want me around or want me a part of, didn't want me as part of a working group.
Speaker 1:But I was fortunate that I had three people that dragged me in and took care of me. One was Cedric Dempsey, who was the athlete director of Arizona State. He became the president of the NCAA. Another one was Delos Dots. He was the athlete director of Texas. But the main player was Michael Cleary from Cleveland. He ran the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics, which is still in Cleveland on the west side, and you know, he again, god bless him. He passed away, but he pulled me into committees and placed me on committees and I think it was because I was from Cleveland, he was a Notre Dame fan, so I think all that stuff. So he, those three, kind of pulled me in and gave me opportunities that I otherwise would not have gotten, because there were people who didn't want me there. It was the same for Charles. Charles was older but it was the same for him.
Speaker 2:You've also said this, that I can't fail. Yeah, you can't be. I couldn't be the black athletic director. That didn't make it Right. I always felt I didn't want that to be an excuse for not having to hire another one. So why was that so important to you?
Speaker 1:Well, you know, at that time, you know we didn't get opportunities. You know, it was kind of like not just in athletics, it was in different industries, and so I felt that I needed to make sure that I could demonstrate that we could do the job. People who were brown like me could do the job, and I didn't want to be the excuse for any hiring authority to say, look, he couldn't get it done. You know, he couldn't get it done at Eastern Michigan, he couldn't get it done at Iowa State or wherever. So I didn't see it as a burden, I saw it as an opportunity, I saw it as a challenge. It drove me, you know, to try and be the best that I could be, be inquisitive and curious, and so I learned a lot fast, and that was always a part of me was just to make sure that I didn't fail so I could open the doors for others.
Speaker 2:And truly you did that. You know you have quite a tree, Quite a legacy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, bless the yeah.
Speaker 2:People talk about Bill Ballet's hacking his coaching tree or. Prasail's Bill Prasail, his coaching tree. But I'm looking at yours. Yeah, I'm pretty blessed and I'm going to call the road. I'm going to call the road now. We've got Patrick Churn, first Asian American AD at a par for Washington State. Yeah, you got Martin or Jaron spent three years at Boston College, ucla. Now he's returning to Big Ten next summer. You got Ben J. You got Heather man. Yeah yeah, that was good.
Speaker 1:How does that make you feel? It was great. You know that was pretty intentional, tim. So all four of them worked with me at Ohio State. Oh, wow, and they were all my, that was my leadership team and they all inspired to be athletic directors. And then that's part of my job, and all the supervisors of our department understand, as part of their job, to help people get to where they want to be, and so we had a strategic plan to help them be ADs.
Speaker 1:I remember sending them to the North Carolina one year because you had North Carolina, north Carolina State Rake Force, all of that right there, and I called my colleagues at those schools and said, hey, I'm sending down a group and hopefully you can spend time with them and teach them what you know and introduce them to other people in your department so that they can learn from other places, not just me. And so Fluan Joe Constitue Leon from Oklahoma, a good friend who's the athletic director, flew him in and did a session with them and a couple others to teach them about how he became an athletic director in his leadership style. So there were a number of things that I did to try and give them the growth that they needed and that's always been a part of me. Scott Barnes, the athletic director at Oregon State, used to be my associate at Iowa State. He was my main fundraiser and he aspired to be an AD, so I taught him all.
Speaker 1:When a visiting team football team comes, the athletic director usually comes on Friday night. Right right, go visit time with them, go spend time with them. When we go on the roll, make sure you, if you go with me, just make sure you connect with the athletic director at that place and tell them you only need 15 minutes of your time. Next thing you know they'll give you 45.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, right, right so exactly right, but anyway.
Speaker 1:So it was important to me to use my opportunities to give other people opportunities, and back in the day, in the good old boy system, there weren't a whole lot of us who didn't make any calls for people. So when I reached a level in this career where I felt comfortable, presidents would take my call. That's what I did. That's big.
Speaker 2:yeah, I hear a lot in our conversation about relationships. Can you talk to young people or anybody who's listening to this pocket? Why are relationships so important?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know I would tell young people, people are the heart and soul of all that matters in life Making sure that you connect with people. You know you yourself have to have the highest values integrity and respect for others, but people are the main source in our society for us to be successful ourselves. Do the eyes of others, you see yourself, and if you don't establish relationships with people and empower them to help you see what you don't see your barn spots then you're not gonna get better, and so it's so important for everyone in our country to do everything they can to establish relationships. I tell people I have a purpose. Every day I have a purpose, but I have a mission as well, and my mission is to be missed. Wow, that's deep. You can't be missed if you don't have great relationships.
Speaker 1:You know, we all have people in our lives that you know we got there, gone for whatever reason, because they behave in a certain way. But if you aspire to be missed, you treat people the right way. You open up to people, you hopefully create an opportunity for people to open up to you. You be respectful, you be honest, you know it's. You be nice. It's so easy to be nice to them. It's so easy to be nice. It just drives me nuts when people are so disrespectful or just not nice. I don't think it's easy, wow.
Speaker 2:Be missed. I like that. That's it, that's the mission. That's the mission and it's good. Be missed, be missed. You know you are. The word is that you fundraise is one of your major gifts being able to raise money.
Speaker 1:That's it. That's it, that's what we do.
Speaker 2:And as we're sitting here thinking about your career and listening to you talk about that, IBM selling computers, so you brought that to the deal and since you've been in Ohio State, you raise a lot of money for different facilities. Most of us have been private funding, so how have you been able to do that?
Speaker 1:Well, it gets to what we were just talking about. Talks about relationships, and so listening is a critical skill in fundraising. So a lot of times people don't understand that you got to really tune into what is a person interested in. You may go into a fundraising call and you have a particular thing you're trying to sell, but if you don't ask the right questions and listen, you might understand that they're not interested in what you're selling, but they might be interested in something else. They might be trying to raise money for ability, but they might be interested in scholarship.
Speaker 1:So, asking good questions and being curious and being respectful and doing a lot of that and listening, and then 99.9% of the time you're going to hear a person's passion. You really will, you'll learn it. And then you, from a fundraising perspective, you try and guide that passion to a fundraising opportunity. I always tell my teammates in development don't try and force somebody to give to a capital-contained facility when they're not really passionate about it, because they'll regret the gift. You want them to cherish what they just did, and so anyway. So it's listening, established relationship listening or just being curious.
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Speaker 2:What is your leadership style?
Speaker 1:Tim, I don't have one style. I use different styles kind of seamlessly, in different measure depending upon the business situation. There's a great article, the 1988 Harvard Business Review. There's a gentleman by the name of Dan Goldman. He was going around the world doing a survey of the top 400 CEOs around the world who had been very successful. He was going out with the intent of trying to understand what's the one leadership style that they employed. He found out that they use multiple leadership styles depending upon what they're dealing with.
Speaker 1:I remember reading that article. It was only like three pages but he said the one thing they all had in common was a high emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence, they were very self-aware, they were able to self-manage and they were able to evaluate the social environment, the group dynamics. But you have to be self-aware and be able to self-manage in order to evaluate everybody else.
Speaker 1:There's an authoritative style of leadership, the democratic style, the coercive style, the pace setting style, the affiliative style and there's another one I forgot. But at the end of the day those styles for me just kind of happen naturally and I learned about them. And it is so funny as an athlete you do that anyway, because as an athlete you learn things in the group dynamics that a lot of people don't learn. You learn how to work with people from all walks of life. You learn how to be vulnerable. If you really pause and think about the experiences that you have as an athlete and you bring them to the intellectual level, you got a lot, and actually the leadership styles many of them I learned as an athlete.
Speaker 2:It's good you know. After 19 years you're retiring from the Ohio State University. You have truly left the university in a great space. What are some of the things that you're most proud of doing that time and there's been some ups and downs what?
Speaker 1:is the most proud of you know the winning always matters. You know the championships that many sports have won. But I'll tell you, tell them the I call it the light bulb moments. You know I've always had a passion for creating environment where we develop the student athlete holistically, not just their athletic talent but making sure they learn in the classroom, they compete in the classroom, they to develop as people. Many of them don't come in with defined values. You know they, they had. They know families are part of their value system and many of them gods are part of their value system, but they don't. The others they haven't really defined.
Speaker 1:A lot of times with my freshman I'll ask them in their first session how many of you have lied before? Obviously they always there. And I said how many of you lied the second time to cover up the first lie? You know Most of them raised their hands and I asked them how does that feel? And it's so easy to just tell the truth. People are forgiving. So you begin, you go down these paths of teaching them the value of integrity and honesty and why that's so important, along with your family and God. So you go through those things and and my, my moments that I'm most proud of is those light bulb moments when I see a behavior, behavior modification occur.
Speaker 1:And you know that student athlete flips the switch or In the classroom, when they're not committed in the classroom, and all of a sudden you see the indicators and all of a sudden they flip the switch right and they understand that they they got to do better in the classroom. So I've seen a lot of that with a lot of our student athletes. Or, you know, we had a gay wrestler, no, who struggled, and I remember, remember when he came out publicly and you know it was, it was a big weight off of him and he did better overall as a human being and better in the classroom. There's so many things that these young people deal with today.
Speaker 1:When we were coming out, you know we just had to be resilient. We did, we really did, we did. Nobody really cared, nobody cared, yeah, no, they didn't care, and so you just had to get through it. You know, remember I was gonna go home, I was gonna quit school and Jo-Yan told the defensive line coach caught me and you know he set me out for a long time and Told me. You know, by the way, you know, when you drive home to Cleveland, you know your dad's gonna just make you turn around and go home. Come back here.
Speaker 2:So I'm like, yeah, you're right.
Speaker 4:Back in the day. That's what we deal with.
Speaker 1:So today is a different world for our young people. So we have to go to where they are and understand where they are and then help them get through whatever they're dealing with, and so those things I'm most proud of is those white bump moments.
Speaker 2:That's good. You know. This is a podcast about um, A lifelong legacy. What is the legacy of change man?
Speaker 1:You know, I don't know, tim, that's gotta be defined by somebody that when I leave and I I never, I never think about things in that way. I, I've always just been, I've been trying to do my job and do it the right way, and you know, who knows what somebody will ultimately define as my legacy? You know, I'm hopeful that, um, you know, we'll be around. What we talked about earlier, uh, the people. You know that I was respectful, that that I treated people the right way, that I helped young people be the best that they can be. That's one of my purposes is to Wake up every day and make sure we create environment for that talented and gifted athlete whose parents gave their daughter, a son, to us. Yes, to help develop that, we created environment where they're truly developing in so many different ways. So, you know, a lot of people would talk about the wins and losses and the money raised and all that, but I, I hope there's more around the student athlete part.
Speaker 2:That's good, you know. As we come around the corner I always ask oh, I guess there's. You know, people describe you as, uh, some call you mr Smith. I've never been your husband, father, grandfather of seven, eight, yeah yeah. So the list. You know how would you describe yourself?
Speaker 1:you know, um, I think I'm just trying to be as good a person as I could be. Um, you know, I'm driven, um, I want to be the best at anything and everything we do, um, but I'm, I'm probably A low-key kind of guy. Uh, unless I have to, you know, go street on somebody. It's just rare. Um, but I, you know, I just I just have a lot of respect for people and, um, I don't know, I just I just see myself more as, uh, that kind of, you know, kind and gentle guy and what you see is what you get. You know, I'm pretty, pretty vanilla, you know, I'm not, I'm not hard to read, so I would describe myself that way I'm tough, I have to be, you have to be, I'm tough when I have to be. Um, I'm never the smartest guy in the room, never have the highest IQ, but Pretty good going good with people, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, well, jean, I want to thank you for your time. Thank you, great, great interview. I got my light bulb moment I was thinking about my moment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you always have them.
Speaker 2:I had a couple was talking to you. It's been a blessing.
Speaker 2:I want to thank the audience for listening to a be a baller podcast with your host, coach tim brown, and want to thank jean smith for for enlighten us and encouraging us and, lastly, want to thank you for your service. Well, thank you for your service to the Ohio State University other schools you've been at, most important, I'll thank you for making sure that, uh, the, the field is getting level. Thank you, the field is getting level, that people have opportunities. You know if you're reaching back and pulling the next guy and then you passing that on to that guy, now that's right, that's right, get the next one by your example. That's it, by your example. So we want to thank you for your time and.
Speaker 2:I appreciate you Go box.
Speaker 3:If you enjoyed this episode, please share this podcast with family and friends. Be a baller podcast is available on all major podcast stations. Be sure to come back next week as we continue to discuss on how to build a lifelong legacy. Until then, don't forget to be a baller. This podcast was created by coach tim brown and produced and recorded by the video production class of Worthington christian high school.