The Voices for Voices Podcast Episode 10 with Guest, Jon Butchko
Justin Alan Hayes:
Welcome to today's The House of You podcast Sponsored by Voices for Voices. I'm your host, Justin Alan Hayes. And I'm here with an old friend really back from the grade school days. Jon Butchko. This individual, this man, this father, his has been through some tumultuous times, some traumatic times that have happened, but he also is working through that and looking to turn to page much like myself four years ago, after being in the hospital for five day inpatient stay at Akron General Hospital.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Made that decision to accept who I am, that I needed help, that I needed to get that diagnosis, get that team behind me and look at moving forward. So I cannot just survive in life, but thrive. And John is here today on our podcast, very excited to have him as just a reconnection, get into some maybe some tough topics, but things that as we grow and go through life, we hit roadblocks.
Justin Alan Hayes:
We hit situations that for better terms, they just suck. And so some go our way, some don't and some don't go our way until they stop not going our way. So with all that being said, I want to welcome Jon Butchko to the podcast here today.
Jon Butchko:
Well, thank you for having me, Justin. I'm very excited and I appreciate the work that you've done in the career and the mental health thing. And especially, as a male. It's probably an underrepresented group. So as I've learned of this, I did my own research on you. And I certainly like the things that I've been seeing from you, so thank you for having me.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Absolutely. So, we'll jump right into it. So I'll just have you kind of go through a pretty tough situation that happened to you this past summer. And then we'll transition that into turning that page of the positives and all the great things that you have to offer for individuals, for organizations that may potentially think for one reason or another differently.
Justin Alan Hayes:
We're talking real today. We're talking about human beings, we're talking about a father, an individual that has a lot to offer this world. And so that's why we have John here today. So, yeah, John, if you just want to get started and share how you'd like.
Jon Butchko:
All right, well, the situation that we referenced happened last June on a Friday night. I was accused of and subsequently charged with, and eventually acquitted of domestic violence that involved a situation at my house with a woman I was involved with and our children.
Jon Butchko:
And we had started to try to put a family together and as a result of that, it's had some implications on my personal and professional life. And again, I was thrilled to be dispensed of the charges, to be finished with the charges and really from probably even before that happened, I started putting the pieces back together in my life.
Jon Butchko:
And I'm a teacher, I'm a leader of young people. I interact with our future generation on a daily basis. And I've looked forward to now being, I think for young men, uniquely footed to help lead them into a prosperous life going forward, even when a situation happens upon you that is very ugly on the surface.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah, for sure. And the main takeaway for anybody who may gloss over that, John was acquitted, is acquitted. And so we'll just make sure that message gets out from the get go. So acquitted, and it is time to move on. So as we start, look into the future, let's look to the past a little bit, the positive times, the leader of men, of students in the classroom. What really drives you as an individual to want to get in front of students, of young individuals, the next generation of leaders?
Jon Butchko:
Well, I think initially it became I played sports my whole life coming up and was fortunate enough to play while I got my education at West Liberty University. And I always had many coaches that I looked up to that were positive examples in my life. Obviously I played for a legend at Central Catholic High school, Lowell Klinefelter.
Jon Butchko:
I was my first job in coaching after I completed my degree at West Liberty was a coach on his staff. And I was fortunate to become a head coach and spend some time in professional football, very early on. And what I thought was much more than the Xs and Os, much more than the final score at the end of the game, I began to develop a gift, I think, to help people recognize the best version of themselves.
Jon Butchko:
And the relationships you get to have with whether it's athletes or student athletes, you get to meet more of them. They open up more to their coaches. You're certainly privy to a lot of information that a lot of teachers aren't privy to. And I always respected that role.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
I'm passionate about education, passionate about sports and the most of which is football, but what I really think that I'm even more passionate than all of that about is just helping people realize the best version of themselves.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah. For sure. How do you find that maybe your strategy of helping has changed or the same? So maybe taking some of those learning experiences maybe earlier in your career of how you do help them, how you do meet them where they're at in that spot, if they are going through a tough situation or they ran a play wrong, or they're just having a rough time and maybe something off the field is causing it. How have you found just maybe your strategy of how you do that?
Jon Butchko:
Well, I think early on in my career, I focused on just being a copy of, again, the great leader and the great coach that I had a chance to play for, and really learn as an assistant coach underneath. And when you're being a leader and when you're in charge of helping a group or an organization, or in this case, a team improve, I think not being authentic was one of the worst mistakes I could have ever made early on.
Jon Butchko:
And we just were talking when I got here and it was very laid back, very funny. We always interject a bunch of humor and I was afraid to be who I really was early on. And as I've grown as a professional, and certainly some of that has come as a result of some adversity, I've decided when I interact with a group of young people or young men in athletics, when I interact with them, it's probably better to show them my scars.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
Here. You can see my mythical scars that I have. You can touch them. So hopefully you don't get them. And I think a lot of leaders, and I've read countless leadership books, create this idea of a perfect being and they try to live to that.
Jon Butchko:
And that's just not even feasible as a human being. So I would hope that if you spoke to anybody that I've coached or interacted with, they would say that coach, or coach Butchko definitely is interested in the sum total of my being as a person. But he also connects with me on a very real level.
Jon Butchko:
And when you're in charge of 15 to 18 year old boys, the phone rings and the questions, they range from a variety of topics. Not what do we do on this play? Or how do you think we'll do against this team? It's, "I want to ask this girl out," or, "How do I make some money?" And those are parts of the job though I always really appreciated. And they're probably not the parts that gain you any notoriety, but certainly the parts that as you reflect back are the parts that are the most memorable.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Just want to let you know about our upcoming Voices for Voices, A Brand New Day event, which is our annual gala event. It's on October 12th at 7:30. For those that are in the Northeast Ohio area, it's going to be held at the Canton Cultural Center and tickets are $20 and all the proceeds go towards the Voices for Voices organization, which is also a 501(c)(3). Dr. Jessica Hoefler is going to be one of the ... I call it the blockbuster speakers, but one of the three individuals that's really going to talk a lot about what she's talked about here with us today and really just that thought of A Brand New Day, kind of like with Piper's Key, of unlocking and setting her free, that's with Voices for Voices and with the brand new day event specifically.
You'll want to share experiences of real everyday people, not celebrities, just people that are going through and have gone through some traumatic things, whether that is mental health related, whether that is anything really traumatic. So it doesn't have to be mental health related. That's how I started the organization, but obviously as I'm learning and want to have a broader reach, that individuals with mental health challenges aren't the only individuals that have gone through traumatic experiences. So again, Dr. Jessica Hoefler will be one of the blockbuster speakers. We're also going to have Brian Laughlin, who is a lieutenant at the Twinsburg Fire Department. Then one of my actual former students, James Warnken, he is an online specialist with expertise and search engine optimization and data analytics and he's actually legally color blind. So he goes through certain software packages to be able to do the work for his businesses now. Even when he was my student at Walsh University, there were some I guess, accommodations, accessibility, things that he was able to do.
So really not only from a spectrum of age range, but from first responder to somebody in education, traumatic, male, female, that we are all going through and have gone through things and I really want with A Brand New Day is to talk about not just some of the tough times, but how the message of a particular mission and vision is living on and how it's touching and reaching and helping more people. So again, you can find out more about A Brand New Day at voicesforvoices.org, or you can go to Eventbrite, which is the official event platform to put events together, and you can search A Brand New Day and then you'll find the event tickets there. Then you can join us in person. We'd really love to have you and bring a friend, a family member, somebody that would like to be uplifted.
So it’s not just the speakers, we're also going to have a special needs band, RockAbility, going to be playing. So some real rock music. So some of these individuals are going to be playing real live instruments with some mentor musicians and everything from the music. It's all going to be played live, in person. We're not going to use auto tune like some of the music today, and even the singers, the vocals, are going to be done. So it's going to be a lot of fun. We hope you'll make plans to join us and you'll see more on this coming up on our social media pages, the Voices for Voices on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, wherever you consume content, as well as future podcasts.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Absolutely. And I hearken some, and my teaching days of where I'm at with Walsh University. And once I went through my mental health crisis and then made that acceptance that, okay, I'm going to accept where I'm at. I need help. If I need medication, if I need to talk to somebody and just be okay with that, once I brought that a little bit into the classroom, so taken a little bit of that tabooness of, well, this thing's happened or this current event's happened and then we're just going to sit and talk about chapters 1 to 14, that doesn't really work and doesn't really resonate.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And when I started bringing in like, hey, here's me as an individual. Yes. I'm an instructor. And I have some knowledge, I don't know everything. I learn from students as much as they potentially learn from me.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And again, that just resonated like, hey, I'm up here as an instructor, but I have anxiety talking to a group of people and people will see podcasts and see events and different things that I do. And you ask my wife and she'll like, "He's very quiet." And then he does all these things that are high profile and out there.
Justin Alan Hayes:
It's like, "Wait a minute. This isn't the same person." And, and I think that just goes to show that we all have potentially different personalities in different situations. When we have a goal to do something professionally, we step into you, whether it's Clark Kent stepping into that telephone booth and coming out as Superman, but stepping into who we want to be viewed as, and as I found as an instructor and more now in that public figure where people see things that I do, and in places I've been, and people I've met and those types of things, once I started to just live that and say, okay, well, I'm just accepting.
Justin Alan Hayes:
This is what I'm passionate about. This is what I like to do. I want to help people. And so, yeah, there might be a little flare, a little bit of flash here and there, but at the end of the day, it's helping people. And I think that's no different than really where you're at John.
Jon Butchko:
Well, absolutely is very similar. And the days that you don't feel the best or the days that you don't think you're capable of doing your best work are really what separates I think an effective leader from an ineffective leader. And if you, again, we referenced earlier the earlier portions of my career and those groups of people that I dealt with.
Jon Butchko:
And I always feel really guilty when I look back at it that I didn't give everything that should make sense now to them. And I probably should apologize to them because the person I am, and I don't do everything perfectly now. I make more than enough mistakes. We led the show off with one I was accused of that I didn't do, but certainly I feel like the head space I'm in, the mindset that I'm in, and the things that I'm able to do as a result of disarming people with humor, we had a student that probably has all Fs for the year in my American history class.
Jon Butchko:
And he asked me a question, we stopped what we were doing, researched it. And it may have been the single greatest question I was ever asked. And the answer was actually very dubious. And this happened just a couple of weeks ago.
Jon Butchko:
So I know that there are days I come home and I reflect back on what we just went through that day. And I certainly, like you said, I echo that sentiment. I learn a lot more probably from our students than they would ever, ever think that I did.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Sure thing. Do you get nervous? Do you get anxious when you are in the classroom or you're in a setting or you're in interview being asked questions, and if you do, how do you kind of mitigate that? And if not, how do you, internalize that to just kind of treat that thing as just another event?
Jon Butchko:
Well, it's so funny. My about 13 year old daughter says you're on all these things and you never get embarrassed. I don't know how you do it. And there are times when you're a little more anxious, I think, in front of a group of people than others, but for the most part, I don't get very anxious and certainly don't get very anxious when I'm talking about something I'm very passionate about, whether it's athletics or the classes that I teach at Edgewood High School.
Jon Butchko:
I do internalize it. I look at, especially when it's anytime I have a chance to make a public comment, anytime I have a chance to be in something that's recorded, something that's going to be printed. Not only for me, but chances are, they're talking about in football, a young man or a group of young men that I've spent time with.
Jon Butchko:
And I just always try to keep in my mind that this family's going to remember this forever.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
And when they started recording our games during the pandemic, a local podcast up there would pick a game of the week and they'd record it. And those games are on YouTube. We would openly talk about that as a group. Like, "Hey, you meet guys in their thirties, I'm sure you have friends like this. I know I've done this. And I know I have friends that would do this, but that recording, what you put is going to be on YouTube, you're going to watch, and you're going to watch it with your friends and with your kids. And you're going to remember that."
Jon Butchko:
So let's make sure that we do our best. And we would always tell them, "Here, look, I'll draw attention to us. Your job is just to perform as as best you can." And I think we always said we wanted to become the area's Notre Dame.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
They have their own thing with NBC and they're always on TV. I said, "We want them when they look at the schedule, okay. Our team plays here and they have to come watch us. And if they're not coming to watch us, it's because we're too far away or whatever else, but it begins and ends with us." And our team and my final season really embraced that.
Jon Butchko:
And I think it probably won't resonate with them until they're a little bit older, all those artifacts that they now have, how important they'll be for them. And again, it's just, these are things that I've done and things that my friends have done I'm sure you've interacted with people that do the same thing. So I just try to make a career and a profession, which is one of service, remember that I need to be of service to people on a daily basis.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Sure. And I like your alluding to Notre Dame and that kind of leads into it kind of the next area, but we've touched on it is really branding and personal branding that while we as individuals might not be at that current time a superstar or a household name that as you were showing and teaching your student athletes at the time that you're going to be on that stage.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And whatever that stage is that you want that brand of, you want the work that you do on the field, if there's maybe an altercation that you're away from it. And when things happen that at the end of the day, that's your brand. That's going to be again on tape. It's going to be whether it's audio or video or both, and that everything we really do.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And I'm sure you've found even more as of lay of everything we do kind of from when we wake up to when we go to bed is really our personal brand.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And there's parts of our personal brand that it's like, man, we just need to get past it because it's over and done with, and we need to move on. And I know that just from an individual process, that it stinks when us as individuals, when we've accepted and we've moved on from a particular situation and when others don't, and when we're in those situations where it's that kind of awkwardness.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And so from a branding perspective, I know you're getting really heavy into that you have been in continuing, but how do you think about that individually? And then how in the future looking to kind of build on the Jon Butchko as the brand?
Jon Butchko:
Well, I think first of all, to break that question down into a couple different types of responses. In 2022, what a remarkable opportunity you can really be whatever you profess to be. And I think there's probably people that aren't very talented that have really put out a good brand, just because they have the foresight enough to go out and say that I am this. And I am whatever that example would be.
Jon Butchko:
And you could really establish a very good brand and much like everybody else, I think I probably started to think about it too late. There was a problem that I had to address rather than just working on it proactively. So as I look to go forward, as I look to continue on with my career and my life, I certainly want to make sure that it's not doing things for attention.
Jon Butchko:
But the things that I do, if they can gather positive attention, I would love to be able to bat a thousand doing that. Is that possible? Probably not, but certainly, elevate my stake and eventually whatever group I'm associated with and my family's stake, just a result of the hard work and the awareness of what's going on to elevate that brand.
Jon Butchko:
It's so weird too, because you're talking about a high school teacher and a coach and a dad and you have to devote a little bit more time because that's just the world we operate in being a brand. And then the final part of that, I think you talked about the awkwardness, you talked about sometimes you are what somebody says that you are and the unfortunate times that has crossed, even though, we said at the outset of this recording that I was cleared and there is no legal implications, there have been people that still treat me as if that ended the way that it did on some technicality, like OJ's glove didn't fit or there's an awkwardness when I talk to them.
Jon Butchko:
Sometimes I think when I first came back, it was like when you drive by a car accident on the highway and everybody would stop and look and it's still the same guy, still the person that cares about young people the way that I do. And I just want to put honest day's work together and honest career together.
Jon Butchko:
And again, provide for my family in the way that I see fit. And I know the truth and the truth has come out. And unfortunately, in some instances still, I think I'm probably graded on an unfair curve that again, that it was some kind of technicality or something to skim by was done.
Jon Butchko:
And that couldn't be any further from the case. But it's become a mindset thing. Just continue to do your best, continue to put one good day on top of the other and continue to try to move forward with the goals that you have for yourself and for your family to improve on a daily basis.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah. I love the way you summarize that. So as a human, as a father, as a leader of people, of human beings, mental health has been somewhat of a hot topic as of late. Many celebrities, people of high stature coming out and talking about mental health struggles, illness, et cetera.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And I think definitely for my listeners to know if they haven't picked up on the podcast so far is as human beings, we all have mental health that just as we have physical health, we have mental health.
Justin Alan Hayes:
We all may not have perceived mental illness, but an individual that would come to the emergency room with an injury, a physical injury that can be seen with the eyes versus somebody that has something going on inside their mind.
Justin Alan Hayes:
You can't physically see that is sometimes it's hard for people to really wrap their eyes around that. And I think you're uniquely positioned John with your experience and in the past, and now, and going forward is having those conversations with students, with student athletes of seeing how student and student athletes, how their mental health has potentially changed either before the pandemic, during the pandemic, and hopefully putting behind us now.
Justin Alan Hayes:
If you'd just be able to touch on the mental health aspect, however much you want to get into detail for yourself and then as you're leading.
Jon Butchko:
Well for myself, the mental health things and the lingering effect things, I don't know how you can quantify them. It's certainly a different head space was then when this situation began eight months ago, but it definitely is important.
Jon Butchko:
I think probably like everybody else, when I was younger, I thought I was invincible. I thought any type of situation well, that doesn't apply to me. And now, as I've gotten older, a little bit more experienced and went through something that was really, really tough, mental health is a serious, serious situation.
Jon Butchko:
And I don't think it's always sad when a Kanye West, they'll make a bunch of jokes about it or you can read situations that come up as a result of mental health.
Jon Butchko:
I don't ever think that's really a joking matter for anybody, although, especially as it relates to men, it becomes one unfortunately, so often. But certainly that's something I've become a lot more aware of something I've become a lot more proactive about.
Jon Butchko:
And it's funny you say that. We had no discussion about this prior to it, but our school has really gone through the mental health stuff. And we just all got certified in mental health for youth and adolescents. And it was a very good program, kind of a pilot program through Miami of Ohio.
Jon Butchko:
And we got a grant and we went through it and I couldn't say that all of the professional development in my 13 year career has been something that I internalized, but this one was very important.
Jon Butchko:
And it talked about things that were probably had some pressure applied to it by the pandemic. What that did was drove a wedge in the world. And the attorney that represented me and my divorce and I, we talked casually at times. He said, "It's been crazy. We locked everybody up at their house for a while and some problems just really grew on their own."
Jon Butchko:
And you look around the world and it is very, very sad, but for my future going forward and for the young people and specifically the young men, should I return to coaching that I deal with, I think I am uniquely footed.
Jon Butchko:
We live in the digital artifacts age, so I'm sure it won't ever be a secret of anywhere that I go for the foreseeable future, but certainly to have those conversations and to pick up on the indicators.
Jon Butchko:
And of course everybody would rather entrusting their son or their daughter with somebody that's never made a mistake ever. But in the absence of that, I think there would really be some value in trusting my own children with somebody that has been through and not had too many lasting effects from what is really a tough mental health situation. It really is.
Jon Butchko:
I know we've downplayed it each and every time that we've talked and for the sake of what I do for a living, I won't go into too much detail about any of it, but it has brought about significant changes and it, and it was a completely significant situation in mine and my family's lives.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Absolutely. So we can take this conversation at length. Are there any areas specifically that you want to dive a little bit more into, or that we didn't touch as we kind of maybe go towards the home stretch?
Jon Butchko:
Well, you talked about the basis of the things that you do are about careers and of mental health, and there's a lot stronger relationship, I think, than anybody ever wants to openly admit. And certainly we learned, like I just referenced the program we were in from Miami of Ohio about self care.
Jon Butchko:
When you're responsible to others or when you're accountable to others, self-care has to become a priority. And that's something that I found myself doing more. And again, I'm only male. I can only see it from a male's perspective as I guess is what I'm trying to say, but for us, we're told our whole lives that if we're not providing, we're kind of useless or if we're kind of useless, or if we're not achieving at a certain level, that's not good enough.
Jon Butchko:
And I just hope anybody that listens, I hope that anybody that takes any of the things that we've talked about and tries to internalize it, tries to grow from it, get a good system in place.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
Take care of yourself, take care of those that you're responsible for taking care of and continue to grow, and it's going to be incremental growth. And a lot of incremental growth you think is unnoticeable, but you put enough of that together. And you've really moved somewhere.
Jon Butchko:
So I really, again, I went through an unfortunate situation and that's probably what has gotten more publicity than anything else, but I really feel like I have a duty and a responsibility to as many people as I can help. And whether it's mental health, athletics education, or I teach personal finance. So I get texts about that all the time, in any way that I can continue to practice self care by being of service and of use to others.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah. And I think from my perspective of not have gone through your specific situation, but having gone through things in my life and things that I'm starting to do now from the branding of Justin Alan Hayes and the House of You and Voices For Voices and going on a 2022 World Momentum Tour and sharing my message with as many people as possible is there's going to be people that love you.
Justin Alan Hayes:
There's going to people that hate you. There's going to be people in between. We look at any star, any celebrity, they may have a hundred million followers, but there's still going to be individuals out there, organizations that for whatever reason, whether they have a reason, actually, for whatever reason they have one or not, or whether they're they're told-
Jon Butchko:
Or they invent one.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Or they invent one or the algorithm of a search tool like Google puts one into the forefront where you take a hundred positive things and it's like, well, wait a minute, we're going to put those below something else.
Justin Alan Hayes:
How's that? And so that's something that I've learned even from my family and others. They're like, "What? You're going on a world tour and you got the white suit, and you're doing all these things." And so, yeah, they're a little bit out of the ordinary to some individuals, but when you feel passionate about what you do, yeah.
Justin Alan Hayes:
That's going to be people that love or yeah, that's cool. I wish I could try that. Or maybe I'll think about something, or maybe that'll put a thought in head, or maybe it's the other extreme of like, "Oh, that's nuts. That crazy."
Justin Alan Hayes:
So I think specifically here for John that as you know, that there's going to be people that love what you do, there's going to be like the Taylor Swift song. Haters are going to hate.
Justin Alan Hayes:
I use that in the classroom and people think I have this thing for the music and that, but I just like to bring lyrics and certain things to mind. Say the haters are always going to hate no matter how good we do or how big we screw up. And the haters are going to jump in if we screw up at a time.
Justin Alan Hayes:
But then when we do very well, some of those haters are going to try to jump on the bandwagon. And I think to your point, John, of just staying true to yourself of who you are as an individual, the self care of trying to do the best you can. That we're all put on earth to do a certain thing. And they're we're here for a reason, we're faced with obstacles for a reason.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And definitely, I think situations fortunate, unfortunate how they're viewed optically that it does uniquely position individuals like yourself and myself to share those experiences of saying, "Hey, you know what, I've been through some crap. You're going through some crap. I've been through some crap. And here's kind of how I felt, and here's how I worked through it."
Justin Alan Hayes:
And then when you do good things, don't let you know things get to your head and just take it in stride. You're going to be playing in the Super Bowl and having millions of households viewing you. And so, yeah, that could be the peak for an individual.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Another individual could be a piece of art that they put together that's in an art gallery that's seen by a bunch of people. So I definitely think and a motto and something I've tried to internalize with my self-care is Justin, if what you're doing is not going to bankrupt your family and is not illegal, give it a shot.
Justin Alan Hayes:
What's the worst that can happen? That I'm back in that same situation. And so for those listeners out there that might be sitting there and might have a dream and a thought of, "Well, I'd like to do this get," get started.
Justin Alan Hayes:
There's no better time like today. There's not going to be a straight line. There are going to be obstacles. And there's going to be times where we look back and go, "Wow. I'm really happy how things turned out. I'm not happy on maybe some of the steps and how they were perceived and some of the things that were said, the naysayers, the haters out there." And so I think that might resonate definitely with some of our listeners.
Jon Butchko:
Well, absolutely. And there's a lot of things in there. I want to make sure before I even get into anything else. Knowing you from the St Mary's days back in grade school, we were just young. When you reached out to me, obviously I started to look at your things.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
I started to check out some of the things that you were doing. And I know that myself and probably many of our classmates that I still speak to are so happy for you and so proud of you. And I didn't want this to go by without saying that. Much like some of the things that I do for a living, you put these things on and you elevate others and sometimes nobody takes care of you.
Jon Butchko:
So as a guest, I want to make sure that I communicate from one St Mary's bear to another, I'm very happy for you and proud of the things that you're doing.
Jon Butchko:
You talked about your motto in there of if it's not bankrupting my family, if it's not illegal. And we always had a motto like that in the last coaching stop that I had. We did the onsite kicks every time. We played just like Madden, where we wouldn't punt and we throw the ball all the time.
Jon Butchko:
And we always said, and we'd snap, we'd go no huddle and go really fast. And one of my assistants from that era, he grabbed onto one thing I said, completely off the cuff and it kind of became a motto.
Jon Butchko:
And we said we're flying the plane fast. And we might get there in a hurry. We might go into the side of the mountain. And what that became a metaphor for was we were going to go out there and compete and prepare that we could play with anybody in the state.
Jon Butchko:
We could beat anybody in the state. We were going to be the best version of ourselves. And when you're doing those things, like in business, like in your career, like any venture you go into, net resistance could get very tough and you're going to fail.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yeah.
Jon Butchko:
But it's the reaction to failure I think that separates good people, good organizations, good teams from those that maybe never get above being mediocre. So that's, I think kind of become a way for how I've started to live my life was that we were going to fly the plane at full speed. And if it goes into the side of mountain, it goes into the side of the mountain. And again, we completely made that up in a pregame meeting, but it really took on a life of its own.
Jon Butchko:
And I think like a lot of the shift in my thinking comes from, believe it or not, I read all the time. I read on a number of different topics. I'm naturally curious. And I think I'm actually ... Feels like I'm getting smarter as I'm getting older and a little bit more aware.
Jon Butchko:
And you knew me as a disinterested kid in the classroom and never made very good grades. And at St. Mary's, that was a very egregious failure. But I read a book right before I took this job that I was at right now. It just happened to be something that came my way and it was called Burn Your Goals. And it is a book about a guy that lived and made $1,500 a year working in a youth sports facility.
Jon Butchko:
And now he's one of the greatest mindset coaches in sports in the world. And he talks to golfers and a lot of the individual sports people, but he's talked to teams and the whole premise behind burning your goals is we all have this idea. We all see what comparison and you know what somebody we think ourselves in competition, we're in competition with ourselves has done and how we're going to catch up to that, how we're going to live on their terms.
Jon Butchko:
And it came more to living on your own terms, succeeding at your own pace, doing what helps your business, your team, your family improve and forget what anybody else is doing. So that's really become a focus probably the last four years of mine, when before I was worried about everything that everybody else had done, instead of just worrying about myself and about my family.
Jon Butchko:
And I took a temporary setback again, of course, on a situation that happened upon me. I hope that's not the end of the story. I hope it's not. And I hope I can live to my full potential, whatever that looks like. And I hope I can continue to be the father I strive to be, continue to be the human being I strive to be, educator I strive to be.
Jon Butchko:
And eventually again, the coach I strive to be, and that's evidenced by what you can do for others. And I think if you keep your very small spot in a big continuum of everything and everyone that goes on around you, if you can keep your focus on just improving, you're going to improve a lot of things much more quickly than you ever thought you could.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Perfect. And no, this isn't the end, or not even close to the end of the Jon Butchko story. There's so much more to come, so much more positive breaks, some more positive people to come into your life and to help out. Things are happening and kind of behind the scenes. And I haven't been kind of that big believer until probably maybe the last year of when are things going to maybe start clicking into place and maybe not from maybe a monetary standpoint yet, but just the relationships of meeting somebody and seeing where that kind of leads to.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And just knowing that all the gifts that you have. One of my first guests on the podcast talked about we all have gifts and we're all on earth and how are we going to share those?
Justin Alan Hayes:
And you've been sharing them. And that's been a consistent thing from beginning, middle and into the end. And I think that's what's the most important takeaway for our listeners is that we all have gifts and that we all have something to offer.
Justin Alan Hayes:
That we shouldn't judge anybody on the optics of what one person, one Google search, what something says. Let's take a deeper look at the individual and see who they are of instead of, well, this person has all this experience. And so if I bring them in this role, they're going to want my job in a year. So we're not even going to offer them the job. So just taking that mindset of saying, "Is this the right person for the job?"
Justin Alan Hayes:
Meaning can they do the job? Are they the best leader for if it's a sports team, if it's as a teacher at a institution, a school, a college, university, if it's coaching a rec league or whatever that may be. A church group that somebody's leading.
Justin Alan Hayes:
All those types of things that we all have those gifts and throughout the conversation and then leading up into our conversation, some of the background work of just researching you and seeing there's so many positives and so many things that you have to offer and you've continued to offer those through, as craziness has gone on in your life.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And so I think that if anything, it's just going to propel you because you have kind of another tool or two in your tool belt that some other coach, some other instructor, some other teacher doesn't have.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And so you'll be able to as we talked kind of at the outset of being with the individual at that point of whether that's a student athlete or a student of if they have a question like, "Okay, I'm going to stop what I'm doing, and we're going to look into what that thing is."
Justin Alan Hayes:
And I think that's something that shouldn't be taken lightly, that somebody that has those gifts and continues to share and continues to want to do them, even in the face of adversity of craziness happening, of the naysayers, the haters out there. I think that's a true test of character that you're able to get through the situation. You're able to kind of get to that point of turning the page.
Justin Alan Hayes:
And here you are, and you have these gifts, you have these experiences. And I think that really that the sky's the limit and really it's not going to be, oh, are you a good fit for whatever this is, this role, this job leading this organization. It's going to be, is this place a good fit for me? Because I'm bringing a heck of a lot more to the table than the average individual.
Jon Butchko:
Well, I hope so. I always want to be the best value I can be. Your salary, your whatever is X number of dollars. And I've taken on the attitude that I want that to look like, hey, this school, this program, whatever is getting such a great deal at only paying that much money while I'm doing it.
Jon Butchko:
I think one of the greatest leadership things that I've done and it's not to pat myself on the back, one of the things that I think is the most effective things that I've done is that I'm not afraid to show other people how much I care about them, or how much they mean to me.
Jon Butchko:
And I think we've gotten to a place in leadership where there's some toxic leadership about this is great because I'm great and I've done this and I never want to live that way. I want to be able to have a relationship, a friendship with somebody and they're better for it or I'm contributing to them in a positive way to the betterment of their life.
Jon Butchko:
And that if they happen to be a really good athlete, that's one thing. If they happen to be a really good student, that's one thing. But from theirs and my interaction with one another, I'm going to give them the absolute best that I can. And do that as many days as possible with very, very minimal lapses in that. But I try to stay away from, and intentionally stay away from some of the toxic leadership things.
Jon Butchko:
And I hope that my effort can be a good example for other people as they try to progress through leadership things and it's old players, it's many old students, it's people that I used to work with.
Jon Butchko:
Some of the greatest feelings I have are when they seek out my insight into a situation or some opportunity for them. And they'll decide whatever they decide, but they thought enough of me to shoot me a text. I always prefer a phone call. I get kind of long winded, but shoot me a text or keep up on things with my daughter who I bet if you asked her says, she has 300 brothers with all the football teams I've been in contact with in my life.
Jon Butchko:
And like I said, I hope I can stay away from the negative leadership type of things. Because there's so many good things to be done that that's more than enough Time. you don't even have time for the toxic, for the negative leadership things, because there's so much good that could be done if you seek that out and do it.
Jon Butchko:
I've toyed with the idea or I toyed with collaborating with somebody else with the idea of writing a book. I never think I'm all that interesting. I really don't. I've been in some interesting situations, but on the surface, I don't know if I'm all that interesting and the things that I've gone with, but why would we want to waste such an opportunity?
Jon Butchko:
Maybe somebody could draw upon my strength or my experience. I don't really know what it would be about. There's been ideas kicked around, but again, we were in the same classroom, but if you had to line up all the people that we went to school with, I would think I would be towards the end of that list of somebody that ever has any business being anywhere near writing a book.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Me too.
Jon Butchko:
[inaudible 00:43:17] so you know exactly what I'm feeling. You know the feeling. Like, man, am I really [inaudible 00:43:24].
Justin Alan Hayes:
Is somebody going to read that?
Jon Butchko:
They going to read this thing? [inaudible 00:43:28] I got a big family, so I'll sell some copies, but and other people probably want to buy it to nitpick. So I mean, financially I would gain from it, but can I really make a contribution to our world as a whole, to the communities I live in, the schools and the teams that I service?
Jon Butchko:
And it's funny, you said am I going to be good enough for this place or that place or this job or that job? Or are they going to be good enough for me? That's not really something I ever had thought of before. And then I think as you're finding yourself through battling through adversity and we've downplayed it, we've minimized it throughout our conversation here, but that was really, really a strenuous ... That was six weeks of just the worst day of your life on repeat. And as I battled through that, as I've worked through that I found some really good things in myself.
Jon Butchko:
And you have to relearn everything and it's still a process. It's not done, but I hope that everybody else could go through that for themselves. Everybody that I've ever cared about or worked with. And even some that I don't really care for and may have worked with, could go through and start to look at themselves because it would positively affect their career.
Jon Butchko:
It would positively affect their mental health. If they sat down and reflected and said, "I can do these things. I can provide this service to somebody else and tune out all the noise going on around you." And again, I'm working with my daughter and we talk about sports and she's crazy about the things she does in athletics.
Jon Butchko:
So we talk about getting off the bus, ready to play. And that was one of the great lessons when I was an athlete coming up and I certainly carried it on to my coaching days. And there's enough data. You can ask any of the guys that play there, I drive them nuts. Quiet, get focused.
Jon Butchko:
If you're expending a lot of energy in the pregame horsing around, that's just energy you're not going to be able to have.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Yes.
Jon Butchko:
And if you apply that to your life, you can really get somewhere. Start with the mental preparation. I don't know if there's a scouting report for life, but you can gather information about situations you're going to be in, how you're going to react to some of the possible and probable outcomes. And then apply that to your business, to your life, to your marriage.
Jon Butchko:
And I heard Jim Tressel talk early on in my coaching career. And it's always a special time at the state football coaches clinic when the sitting coach at Ohio State talks. You have grown men weeping, and it's really, really odd to see sometimes.
Jon Butchko:
And the different ones that have been there in my coaching career, they're all very well spoken. They're all very engaging and entertaining as part of the job. But I thought Jim Tressel said something it was either in 2008 or 2009. And it stuck with me ever since. And he told this story, and this is a very good story. You're free to use it, because it's not even mine, but he was looking at excellence among organizations. and not very far from Columbus as a small school Dennison university.
Jon Butchko:
And they had won I think he said like 26 national championships in swimming. So he called up their coach and said, "Hey, I'm Jim Tressel. We'd love to have you come down for an afternoon, walk around our facilities and talk to us a little bit." And the coach from Dennison was like, "Nah."
Jon Butchko:
So he upped the ante. We have our spring game coming up. We'll give you the VIP treatment. You meet the players, take pictures with them. The coach from Dennison politely declined. So he said, "How about I come over to your place? I come to Dennison and talk to you. I'll spend all day there. We eat lunch together, whatever." And the coach again declined. And finally Jim Tressel says to him, "How about a half hour?" And the coach agreed to meet with him for a half hour.
Jon Butchko:
He was so taken by that situation by meeting that coach and the things that he said, and I'll get to that at the end that later they brought the team and the coaches out on a couple of buses and they practiced at Dennison in the spring the one year and the message from the coach, and this is what I took, and I remember coming home, I was married then and saying, "Man, what a powerful thing I just heard."
Jon Butchko:
That coach declined I think what every Ohioan would want to do, go walk around Woody Hayes, go walk around Ohio Stadium. There's probably 20 future NFL guys in that locker room at any point in time.
Jon Butchko:
And that coach said, "We've had and maintained the level of success that we've had here at Dennison because we give our best to ourselves. Any coming to Columbus, any hobnobbing around at the spring game or whatever else would've taken away from time more than anything else that I could have given to our athletes.
Jon Butchko:
And it could be a day in the off season, but there's weights, there's class, there's some kind of training thing that can be done." And I really honestly thought that was a very powerful thing. And it's been what, 13 or 14 years since I've heard it.
Jon Butchko:
And it still resonates in my mind to this day that you save your best for the people that you're accountable for. And I've tried as much as I could. And sometimes being a small high school football coach, the schedule just doesn't work out quite like at Ohio State it does, but to make sure that there's nothing pulling away from who I'm supposed to be responsible for and on a daily basis because consistency is one of the precursors to success.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Absolutely. So did you want to close, so how people can find out more about you, the things that you're doing now into the future?
Jon Butchko:
Well, yeah, I have all the social media. Facebook, Twitter, I've started a blog, which is a effort in and of itself. And it's just simply my name, Jon Butchko. JohnButchko.com and my Twitter handle. And all of that is just Jon Butchko. But what I'm doing is not only looking to reenter the coaching world, it's not only raising a teenage daughter on my own, her mother's not in the picture, but what I'm doing is trying to, yes, continue my career, but be as valuable as I can to other people.
Jon Butchko:
There's certain insight that when you're working at it every day when you're coaching and football coaches haven't changed in 50 years about, I'm not giving this out or that out, because one of our opponents could be looking and then what I try to give away everything that I've learned.
Jon Butchko:
And I get really, really upset when I look around at some of the things, whether it's the social media guys or they'll have these courses and you get certified in one offense or the other. None of us invented this stuff. We don't have the market cornered on any of this. And to try to profit off of somebody else's work never really felt great for me, but the things that I'm doing just updating my ... I hand out a portfolio, the size of a small notebook.
Jon Butchko:
Very detail oriented and refining that process. And usually in a time that on the surface looks like failure, you probably want to burn the whole thing down and start over, but it didn't work out. I don't think the way that any of us wanted to there.
Jon Butchko:
And it certainly will be something that I'll feel sad about forever and sad because eventually those people that I care an awful lot about, the time was going to come where they were going to need me and I wasn't going to be able to help them.
Jon Butchko:
But I'm refining my process. I'm actively looking to regain the coaching world, but I could just as easily never do it again and still apply many of the principles that let me be successful, whether it was in the indoor game or through some of the programs I've been involved with as a head or assistant coach, but refining that process to move forward to when the phone call comes and when the email comes, we love to have you, we want you to be the face of our program, I'll be very well footed to take off and to do it at a very, very high level.
Jon Butchko:
And that doesn't mean we're going to go 10 and 0 every year. May never make the playoffs, but you could still contribute very, very well. You can still contribute a lot regardless of what the results are. So that's really where I am right now.
Jon Butchko:
Certainly the self care things are at the front. I'm busy enough raising a daughter by myself that's very, very active. Like so many Catholics, I was a lapsed Catholic and I've gotten back into it. Faith has become a guiding thing in my life. And then the groups outside of it that I involve myself with.
Jon Butchko:
And it's not all professional groups. It's not all to get ahead in the workplace. It's to help take care of my fellow man. So I think the best way I can pay back those to help me is to continue to push forward and hopefully grow a new crop of people that will be wildly successful. And I certainly cheer for them every chance that I get.
Justin Alan Hayes:
Absolutely. Thank you so much, John, for joining us today.
Jon Butchko:
Well, it's great to see you again and thank you for having me.
Justin Alan Hayes:
You bet. All right.
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