Dr. Ron Moses | Deputy Athletics Director | Old Dominion University - One Question Leadership Podcast

Speaker A: Foreign.

Speaker B: Welcome back to the One Question Leadership Podcast where we discuss all things leadership and organizational culture. Our guest today is Dr. Ron Moses, Deputy AD for Student Athlete advancement, revenue growth and competitive strategy at old Dominion University. Dr. Moses, thank you so much for joining us.

Speaker A: I, uh, appreciate you all for having me on today. It's a pleasure.

Speaker B: Well, we've had you on before. You in conversation with our co hosts Ty Brown and Randell Richmond, everyone's favorite athletic director out there. And so I'm so glad to have you back. Um, for those who don't know, I want to talk a little bit about your journey, uh, your journey to this deputy AD role. Um, you are a US army veteran. Talk to me about that decision as a young person to enlist.

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. So it was, I mean, at least for me, it was fairly, fairly easy. Right. So everybody has their own path and journey. Um, just m. Kind of growing up. So, so, you know, I kind of lived a normal, probably regular life. Everybody else did. And then my father passed when I was 11 or 12 and so home life kind of got contentious. I bounced around to a couple different areas, um, and then I ended up finishing, you know, high school at a military school, um, called Youth Challenge Academy down in Fort Stewart, um, Georgia. And they actually have one in every state. I actually volunteer at the one here. Uh, there's one, one in Virginia is in Virginia beach. Um, and so I ended up finishing there. And then from there, you know, you kind of go there until you get your like ged, adult high school diploma and then you're supposed to like time out, right? And then you're supposed to go back home. Right? But for a lot of people, what is back home, right, Coming out of this program. So because we were in like a boot camp, military style school, the military was viable option because we had already been living it, right. And so they kind of like, I don't want to say brainwashed, because it's not that. Because I do think the military helps folks, especially from, you know, contentious backgrounds, low socioecon economic classes. I mean, that's been it for years. Um, so I kind of went at, you know, as soon as I turned 17, I was like, all right, cool, right, so this is what I'm doing. And so I would thought like, hey, this is what I'm going to be doing for the next, you know, 20 odd years and I retire and I'll just figure out what else I was doing from there. Um, but then we had other plans, right? And so end, uh, up going back to college or what was like the Green and Gold program after a couple years active duty. So I just did, you know, 17, 18, active, then went back to college around regular time, and then kind of got hooked, right? Got hooked into. Went to Georgia Military College, uga, and then kind of got really hooked into college, uh, athletics. So when I was at Georgia, um, Damon Evans was the ad, um, he's at smu. Carla Williams was the deputy, um, she's at, um, Virginia. Obviously, her husband was my advisor. Um, so I got real close to them. And Arthur Johnson, who's the AD at Temple, um, was also the ad. So in playing ball and working in college athletics there, I decided to kind of pivot, um, and that kind of led me along this journey. So instead of graduating, commissioning, and going into the military full time, I decided not to take my commission and then go to grad school. And I was still serving simultaneously. And that's kind of how we got to, uh, you know, to where we are now.

Speaker B: That is an incredible story. And just the way that fate intervened and put all of these incredible administrators in your path. Talk to me a little bit about that power of mentors and how you now can serve as that person for monarch student athletes and for other younger administrators.

Speaker A: Yeah, it was. It was weird, right? So when I first got to Georgia, I, you know, I went to junior college first Georgia Military College. And I get to Georgia and I'm trying to figure out, you know, playing sports or being involved in athletics at a junior college level versus, uh, a big school like Georgia is a Woo. Right? This is a whole. This is a whole thing. I was just down there a couple weeks ago, and every time I go back, I'm still like, I was with the ad, uh, Josh Brooks, who was there working in ops and equipment when I was there. Um, Jared Binko, who was AD at Georgia Southern. There's, like, so many people now that, you know, you see later that you run across that. That. That were there in roles that you may have been or whatever it is. So it's kind of cool, um, to see some of those, uh, different people and folks. But I kind of got there, and the first thing I did when I was like, okay, I kind of want to stay involved because I got fully in the rotc. I was hurt from football let me stay involved. And one of the first things I did was with, um, Corey Bolts, who's now the SWA at tcu. She was a student when I was there, and she was running the student marketing group. And so I kind of was like, Well, I want to get involved in athletics, right? And so did that for a second was like, ah, that's not me, right? And then just kind of bounced around and did some different things. And that's kind of eventually how I got to, you know, um, like I said, Dr. Williams husband, who was also Dr. Williams, was my advisor. He was like, hey, you should talk to my wife about areas of athletics that you might be good in. And she, uh, mentioned life skills, you know, academic stuff and development. My undergrad degree was in education. So it kind of lined up appropriately. Um, and so that was kind of really. The really good mentorship was a lot of people there who actually at the time, you don't know how the pieces fit together at all, right? You have no clue, um, how the pieces fit together. And then later when you kind of go down, it's kind of cool still to this day to kind of see the people. You know, I've known Carla Williams, uh, Dr. Williams since I was 19 years old, right? Or, uh, I've seen Arthur Johnson this year. So when you travel and see people at places, I'm like, man, I've m known these people since I was in college, right? So it's kind of cool. And then from there I end up going to Western Kentucky to be a graduate student in football. I thought I wanted to work full time in football. And then what's funny is my AD, who's my AD now who's retiring. Dr. Selig was the AD at Western Kentucky when I was a grad assistant and Ross Bjork, who's now the AD at Ohio State, came in and he was one of my professors. And so it's so weird how like it just kind of fits together so people see folks in these big time positions, big time places. It's kind of cool now to be like, man, I remember when, you know what I mean, it was doing some of these different things. So I think mentorship was key. It was critical seeing people in those positions and then those folks just speaking life into you and helping you, it was really positive. And I think I do the same thing now, right. There's a lot of folks of, uh, you know, people start talking about building their tree, right? So, um, when I went to Kansas State, I worked with John Curry, who's the idea work for us now. And anytime we go somewhere, him. And there's Josh McGowan and Red at Auburn and just different people where we all take a picture of like, hey, here's folks that work with that. He really spoke Life into, um, and it's the same thing kind of going from our areas. Right. Um, I'm still over our intern program, so I still work closely with our GAS and interns. And, you know, one of them, one of them got a job with the Titans. Another one is going to University of Houston. There's another one, right? So every year we kind of take pride in people going different places. And the fun part is just going later to NACDA or whatever it is and seeing people, you know, at, at certain one. Certain spots where you just like, oh, man, you know, you used to work with us. I remember you, um, um, from those areas or just staying in touch with folks right, throughout the year. So I think that's the really cool part, um, and seeing everybody else's path and journey, um, as they go through different places. So I think that's cool. I think mentorship is important. Networking, um, is important. But also I think the longer that you have staying power in this industry, um, the more people want to help you. Right? So I'm going to enact my first year and trying to get people like Gene Boyd and Kim Miles to be my mentor. And then finally, after three, four years, it was like, okay, all right. You actually going to stick around? Because it is different, right? A lot of times I tell, um, people coming in the field, there's a lot of people that want to get in athletics. They come in, they're only in for a year or two, like a flash, and they're out, they're doing something else completely different. So people are very protective with their time, right? So I tell people, you want to be impeccable with that, but you also have to earn their trust over time, right? So now 10 plus years, I do have a bevy of athletic directors and folks that I can call because I met them years ago. Um, and then now I try to do the same thing. Even though I'm as busy as ever, I try to get back to folks. And actually on Friday is the day where I try to do my mentoring calls and talk to people and, and work through some of those aspects.

Speaker B: I was going to say, you know, this year's naaca, you need to have like a reunion just of folks that worked and poured into you. And it would probably be a who's who, uh, of ads right now in the chair. Pretty incredible. What advice? If you had to give one piece of advice to, you know, a younger staffer who maybe is going to their first NACDA or their first, you know, NCAA convention, how do you Go and break the ice appropriately. You know, you don't want to just walk up to Ross Bjork and say, be my mentor. But. But how do you, uh, get those conversations started?

Speaker A: Yeah, so what I always tell my folks is like, don't get starstruck, right? Because, you know, when you come to your first ones, right? Like, we're talking about, like, a Ross Bjork. All right? So my first act, if Ross Bjork's the AD at Western Kentucky, would I have just walked past him? Right. I think that's how some people vs. Ross Bjork, Ohio State vs. Ross, New York, Western Kentucky, right? Do you see those two people the same? Right? So my whole thing is, like, I always encourage my folks, like, don't manage up across network, everybody. You don't know. Like you. I've seen this thing twist and turn so many different places. Um, Kirk Signetti, my first grad assistant offer was the Indiana University of Pennsylvania, which was a D2 in a, uh, football. D2 in Pennsylvania. And Kirk Signetti, who was the coach of Indiana, was the head coach, right? And at the time, you know, I ended up getting Western Kentucky, Marshall, a few other, um, things I can go to. So I was like, oh, I'm gonna go to those. Because it just made sense it was D1, right? I would still make the same choice. But the whole thing is now I'm like, man, I wish you would have stayed in touch with Coach Signetti. But at the time, I'm like, this is just a D2 coach, right? So what I always tell them is, you don't know who's going to be where, right? So don't go in, don't logo chase, don't just talk to this person because you think they're a senior associate at this place and they can get you a job. Um, I tell folks all the time, manage up, down, across appropriately. Because even people that I would consider in my cohort class, right, who I was grad assistants with and things of that nature, I mean, they're doing their thing. They're starting to get AD jobs, things of that nature. So you don't never. You never know who's where, um, or who's going to do what. So even my interns went to ELs and things of that nature, which I really love that the NCAA does, so they can kind of meet peer groups and not go to nacda, because it could be the first one could be very daunting. Like, whoa, right? I'm meeting all these people. I see all these Logos. Do I talk to them? Do I not talk to them? How do I find friend groups? And I always tell folks it's the easiest to just go ahead and um, like the group I'm the most involved with, M4A. Like they have a new member orientation. So I'll send my people there so they can at least meet a cohort of people before they start. Um, but yeah, just do research and talk to people. Talk to as many people as possible. And don't be offended because I was when I was younger. When you are trying to talk to the ad at Texas, for example, not Crystal concert, Right. But whoever it was at the time, you're trying to go up to some of these folks and they don't have time. But they're getting bombarded. Right? They're getting bombarded. Um, there's a lot of ads who like to go to cows and smaller operations because they can operate and move without people. I mean, if you're Ross Bjork right now, you can't really walk outside or ward manual without a thousand interns, senior associates, reporters, whoever it is, want to talk to you about something. And it does become very over cumbersome and it's very tiring. Right. In some of those areas. So I'll tell people, just network appropriately. Then if you by chance happen to be in that area or you're with your boss, your director or whatever, and they say, hey, so, and so I want to introduce you to Ross or this, this person, that's where you can find your opportunity to follow up afterwards. Right. Write a card, send a thank you note, things of that nature and maybe that person to take some time out to connect with you naturally. Um, in some of those areas, I

Speaker B: want to take a step forward in your career journey. You have your master's degree in hr. Talk to me about that decision to go that route.

Speaker A: Yeah, so I got interested in that because, um, so here in the area, um, and I know Steph, you're familiar with the area, but the Norfolk, Virginia beach area is the largest military area in the world actually. Right. So a lot of people don't know that Naval Station Norfolk is on the same street as odu, um, which is largest naval base in the world. We also have Langley Air Force Base. We have um, for Eustace Army Base. Uh, the Navy seals are headquartered here at um, um, at ah, ah, Little Creek. So, um, we have a big airfield in Norfolk. So like there's a ton of military here. Um, military and schools. Right. Norfolk State, Hampton William Mary. So that's what we do. Our industry is military school. Port. Right. That's what we call it. Right. Shipyard. So it's a very interesting mix down here. Um, so very industrious, but very educational. And so what that leaned into is a lot of people are reaching out to me to speak here or do this or do some of those different things. So I started doing a lot of work at the Hampton VA with, um, vets and transitioning services. Then I do a lot of work with, uh, the Air Force, um, and they're, uh, winged. The Air Combat Command at Langley, um, and leading classes. And so I kind of really got into organizational development, org psych, things of that nature. So I kind of used my degree in counseling and impaired that with a degree in hr, um, particularly HR development, to talk about things as emotional intelligence, about organizations, about how we can make organizations better. Um, I always say when I consult, it's easier to make another organization better than yours because you're in yours. Right. So being able to look at organizations and figure out, okay, hey, not from. Or going to different businesses, not from the financial standpoint, but from the managerial, from the people standpoint, really figuring out how do you retain your employees without money. Right. If that's the key, um, what does employee benefit programs, what does that look like? Um, also work with the military in the tradoc. That's our training in the Doctor of Command, where we looked at basic training. Different things. Mwr, morale, welfare, recreation. So there's a lot of different things where we work in a lot of areas, um, to do that. And so that was primarily with the military, um, a couple different affiliate groups here in Virginia. I've even worked with the irs. I remember the first time the IRS called me, I was freaking out. I'm like, oh, what did I do? The IRS is calling me. And it was like, hey, we heard about you from, um, so and so. And we want you to help lead a, uh, workshop. And I actually work. I'll give her a shout out. And I think you know her step, Dr. Tamika Ferguson. Her and I, um, she ran track at uva. Her and I do a ton of work together, um, on this particular area and topics with different groups. Um, so it's become good just to work through that. And that's what led me to kind of go back and say, hey, I want to learn a little bit more about some of these areas. And then, um, Lamar Pottinger put me on to atd, which is the association of Talent Development, to where you really get into, like, how do you develop people? Right, from the human resources side. Right. And we did a lot of that in the military. We did a ton of it in the military. And I just noticed in the civilian sector and world, we don't do it right. So in the military, every time you get promoted, you have to go to a new school, new class. Every time you take a new command, you have to go learn emotional intelligence. You have to learn communication styles. Here we said, hey, you got a new job, Figure it out. Right? And then if that person can't leave or people are disgruntled, we're confused about why. Um, so we try to teach a lot of those different styles and figure out how we can really build departments appropriately, um, and build systems that outlast people as well.

Speaker B: That is all so insightful and so incredible. I think that anyone who manages people within college athletics needs to hear what you're saying. You referenced this, but you also have your, you know, your PhD in counseling and student development, which, again, you referenced that with what you just shared. Um, this is. Talk to me about how now you have translated that into your role. You've been at ODU for six years now, and you've risen from associate AD to executive senior associate AD to now a deputy ad. You also started your work in internal ops in that student, you know, internal operations and student athlete development. Um, and now here you are, competitive strategy and revenue generation. Talk to me about those shifts and how your educational background, your lived experience has supported those moves you're making as an administrator.

Speaker A: Yeah, Everything centered around the student experience first. Right. And so. And the reason why. And we'll get to the revenue piece because people, A lot of people ask that. But when Nil and Rev Share start coming about, then we start figuring out how do we educate and how do we, you know, work through. Because. And I'll go through what the life cycle is. I'll talk about it now. So I look at student success when we talk about revenue share revenue just from the student funding standpoint, right? So just from that. So, Steph, imagine you are an athlete, right? And then, so your revenue generators and your fundraisers, they're just worried about getting those dollars in the door, right? And then your CFOs, and, you know, your other folks figure out, how do I get this to. To Steph, right? Are we using, you know, like our. Our financial partner Scout? Right. So are we using somebody like, Scout to fund the dollars of stuff? Once that money gets to you, people forget that there's an additional life cycle. Of financial, uh, literacy. There's contracts, there's taxes. There's so much that comes along with somebody who's never received any money before, and now they have hundreds of thousands of dollars, right? And so what ended up happening in that area is we need to develop a comprehensive education program to help teach people like, hey, I'm going to give you a contract where you're going to make more money than you ever made before. And if I'm being frank, for a lot of people, more money than they will ever make, right? Because it's really tough, you know, even in a regular world to go back and touch some of these amounts that they touch. Now, they might not touch it again. For two, if you're making $500,000 as an athlete and you're in the real world, unless you're a really good businessman and you go into a job right away or you're playing pro sports, it's probably going to take you a long time, or you might not ever touch $500,000 again, right? And that's the hard part is like, we got people becoming millionaires at the age of 18, but it's not sustainable income, right? So, again, this is going to end unless they go pro. This million dollars a year or $500,000 a year is going to end. So we kind of really looked at it from a holistic standpoint of like, well, hold on. If we're looking at this life cycle, who's kind of teaching, you know, these folks in these areas. And so how I got involved, I was running student services, um, area under Randell Richmond, who I was on with. And, um, when he took the ad job at Kent, I ended up taking over all of our internal areas. Anything that was student facing, anything that touched students. Um, and then when we got those areas up to speed, what we really wanted to do was, wanted to improve our gpa, our graduation rates, um, we hired therapists. Um, we really built out our mental health area, which was some of my background. Uh, we've now built a student athlete dining hall. So there was a lot of things internally we wanted to do. Um, and then when nil rev share came, that was that. That lineup, everybody kind of put their hands up and was like, we don't know what to do with this. And so I kind of was like, okay, well, let me take a swing. And so once I kind of established that program of, okay, hey, we're going to. Here's okay, fundraisers, you get it in the door. I'm going to get the contracts. I'LL get it to the students, we'll do all this education piece. Then I became nationally involved with. Okay, Ron, you deal with the athletes from the payment facilitation and delivery part. Now come back to talk to the donors about, okay, what are you seeing, what trends are we seeing? What are we working with? So now I can work directly with the donors. Um, Most of our GMs work directly either, um, dotted line, report to me or work with me. Um, all the contracts, uh, when they sign, they sign, I sign. Which is a little scary because if there's ever a lawsuit of contract dispute, it's like, dang, I gotta go to court, right? So that's, that's something. But it makes you kind of be a little bit more vigilant. Right? And it's a checks and balance system. You don't necessarily want the coach signing it. And if they want to get rid of a kid, they don't. When it's me, I kind, I'm a little bit more like, hey, I'm going to take this on the chin, right? Because my name's on the, on the contract and I don't want to get in trouble with some of those different things. Um, so that's kind of how we. It naturally evolved. And I think it's naturally evolved for, um, there's a few different folks who, you know, I'll use Eric Wood at Ole Miss, who's doing that, or Terry Prentice at Mr. B State, or there's a few different people, uh, Dr. Cliff Harrell at Arkansas State. There's a lot of people now who we were academics and internal and with Nil Rev share because we had great relationships with athletes. That's where it became really like, okay, you need somebody who has a great relationship with the athlete to help negotiate, help understand, help get things to them. Because it's a different enterprise, Right. It's not pro sports, but it's what we call a professionalized model. Right. So we have amateur students within a professionalized model. So we had to really tweak and figure out, like, who works in these areas, um, appropriately. And that's kind of how that journey end up coming around and. Yeah, been here six weeks, seven, seven years this summer. And I've seen everything change from transfer portal to Nil to coronavirus. Like, I mean, literally, I feel like I've grown up here, uh, with as many changes. I've experienced more changes here than anywhere else in my career. Um, not on a school's instance, but just in general. Right. Like, everything has really since from 2019 on, I feel like that's when everything kind of got squirrely and so we've been kind of riding along with it.

Speaker B: Oh, uh, that is you. Yes. You just lived a lifetime in your almost seven years, uh, with the Monarchs. You mentioned that you have this strong relationship with the athletes. So that helped you shift gears to be now working with some external partners and stakeholders. How does your communication style shift when from talking to, you know, a baseball or, you know, a football student athlete to then going and talking to a corporate partner or a stakeholder or a donor?

Speaker A: Yeah, it's. And I'll give you the thing that's probably the toughest, that's probably the hardest. So my office, I still. So when I got promoted, I, uh, did move my office to any area they wanted me to. To move my office to a different area. I kind of kept it in the academic center, which is good and bad. You know, um, good from the standpoint is I could really have a good touch point with the student athletes and really hear, figure out what's going on. If people talking about transferring or just anything. I kind of hear these conversations first. I'm on the front line, um, and when you're kind of out of it and you're in the ad suite, um, in different areas, you don't necessarily hear any of it. The bad is people just pop up in your office at any point, at any time. They think it's still the same, right? Like I'm in here talking to you right now. My door is closed, locked. I have to frost my windows. So people don't just come and look, right. Because I'm having serious conversations. You know, there's a different level of conversation that I have. I might be meeting with a banking partner, a donor. I remember I was meeting with a banking partner and I opened the door and. And two of my football players are wrestling. You know what I mean? They just see, right? So it's like, it's a little bit different, right. If anybody's been in that, in the academic center, it can be a little chaotic sometimes. Organized chaos, right, because that's where they're relaxing. And so, um, I wanted to stay close. But then now when donors come or when anybody comes, right, I can, they can come meet with my office so they can talk to people. They can see folks, they can see some of these different things that's happening. They can see the behind the scenes backgrounds of what it is. We'll take them over to our student athlete dining hall where they can see the athletes Eating and interact with them in those different ways. And I think now a lot of times when we talk about donor fatigue, it's not necessarily that there's a general donor fatigue or empathy, lack of empathy. It's like they may be tired of paying the same stuff. Like everybody's tired of paying buyouts, right? You see how much what happened at lsu. Nobody wants to pay buyouts. Stadiums, um, to a lesser extent, coaching salaries, to a lesser extent, but they're still giving to the student experience. Right? So if you say, hey, this really benefits the student athletes, or you really figure out how those dollars can go to student athletes, I think you still have people that want to give there, right? So they might say, okay, we've been a new building. I, uh, don't want to do that. But if somebody says, like, hey, you know, we got a large gift for our mental health center, right. We got gifts for our dining hall. Right. We got gifts for different. Just different things to golf and just different things that we're working on. Um, and we try to match those donors with some of their interests if they don't want to just naturally give to the program. Right. Um, so that's kind of how that worked out. But it is interesting still being in the mix because you do. You are really intact, in tune with them. You know, I always say nobody's more in tune with the student athletes than your athletic trainers and your academic advisors. That's who they spend the most time with, you know, so that's when. And then the athletic training is right behind me and the bosses are right in front of me, and I kind of be. I'm able to see in both areas now. I will say it's very hard to get work done here, so I have to answer emails later. I'll come in on Sunday to do emails or find a time to come in super early to strategize, because once it starts getting going and people start popping in and out, uh, of your office, it's tough. So I do know eventually one day I'll have to move out of this space and go somewhere a little bit more quiet so I can get work done. Um, but it is good to at least be tapped into what they have going on.

Speaker B: It's so important. And you can give that their unique lens to those conversations you're having with, with donors, with supporters. I want to start wrapping up with kind of. I have two kind of bigger questions. Your background is just so fascinating. You've put all these puzzle pieces together to create Dr. Ron Moses and It's very unique. I want to ask a little bit about. The Monarchs are going to have a new ad in the next, you know, six plus months. Um, you're going through an 80 transition and a, uh, search process. Now, I want to know with your extreme level of experience, you know, we just talked about the seven years you've had. You've gone through everything here and you've seen the way that the university as a whole has evolved, how athletics has evolved. Um, you've seen a few classes of Monarchs come through. Um, how will you take all of your experience and all of your knowledge to support the department in this transition and maybe potentially support a new leader?

Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's been an interesting part now, right? So just being here for as long as I have, we understand the continuity. Our president is amazing. Um, his son was a student athlete at Radford, basketball, uh, player. So he's very tapped in, very in tune. His son actually works in, in college athletics as well at Texas as a development officer. Um, so he gets it right, he gets it from different angles. Um, he's very close with Dr. Uh, Greg, who is the old AD at Northwestern, who's actually coming up here to lead our head coaches retreat on Monday, um, or doing some consulting things with us. So, uh, he's very tapped into what it is that we need to do. So right now we're just running the day to day, right? Which is saying like, hey, okay, we have a baseball facility project that we need to finish right now. Uh, we are in the throes of the basketball transfer portal and trying to finish the roster and negotiate with agents and things of that nature to have those things. We're finishing baseball season, we're finishing lacrosse. Um, we're getting ready to start summer school. Semester is about to be over. Um, it's different cycle because there's no spring football portal window. So we don't have to go through that again and figure out who's on your roster, which is nice. So really my main goals right now is kind of just making sure, like, hey, we just kind of keep the ship together right now. Anybody who's been through AD or any type of leadership transition knows it's kind of tough, right? Because you'll have it. Some people will be out of here, some people will be in here. Um, but really just kind of keeping everything together, evaluating, making sure we're, you know, we're going through, getting documentation, resources, meeting with coaches. Hey, what do you need? What do you want to see doing charge meetings and Then really from there, trying to figure out, you know, most people want somebody who is. You have to be creative in the revenue areas now. Right? And that's what I'm most looking to support and learn from. Right? Because the whole thing is sometimes people say, well, Ron, why don't you do it? I'm like, in the revenue areas where I need more seasoning and learning about revenue generation, fundraising, things of that nature. Right. A lot of times, a lot of your ads who are internal, like a Dr. Williams, things of that nature, they eventually have to get a point where they kind of cross over, which is natural, um, and start to learn those different areas. And so I'm most looking forward to learning support with not only institutional knowledge, here's what we've done as work, and then using some of what they have known and experienced to be like, hey, here's something we could use from another school. Here's a little bit more renewed energy and focus in some of these different areas of how we can really kind of go. Because we're. It's really. Especially here in Virginia now, it's a really interesting mix. I mean, we got jmu, right? Who's, uh, one of our rivals that went. Just went to the playoff. We got bcu, who's another rival that beat unc. We have Liberty up the road. UVA just had a great year. We had a great football year. So in a state in general, I feel like we're in a state where everybody's kind of pushing the bar, right? Uh, um. Um, with each other, which is good, right? I don't think we look at any. I mean, George Mason's doing a good job. I don't think we look at any school in the state and say, like, oh, would you go play them in anything that is a pushover, um, or that we need to work through? So I think that's what we're looking forward to, is raising the bar even more. Because, again, it's rough when you have some of your rivals where it's like, oh, we had a great year of football, Jay. If you went to the playoffs, dang, okay, we won 10 games. Not good enough. It helps you raise the bar, right? You know, hey, we got improving basketball BC you just beat North Carolina. It helps you raise the bar. Um, so we're looking at those areas and bringing in somebody who wants to help us not only raise the bar and compete at those levels, but, you know, kind of what we do in the Commonwealth, in the state as a whole, continue to push, you know, some of the good athletics that we have

Speaker B: here, when we see you shift gears and work in, uh, the fundraising office, we're going to know Dr. Ron Moses is ready to take over the world.

Speaker A: Absolutely.

Speaker B: Um, last question for you. Bringing it back to your, you know, the start of your journey, um, and going to this military institute and choosing to, to join the army for, for a while before going to college and playing football. How do you take every step of your journey? Um, and all of the wisdom from those, those peers you have that have poured into you, the Dr. Williams of the world, et cetera, and connect to today's student athlete?

Speaker A: Yeah. No. So, um, based on your question, the college athlete, I always say, is not very different than like when I went into the military or like the young sailors. It's very, very similar. Right. It's funny when we see, you know, some of these racing, speeding tickets and we see the cars and stuff. If anybody's been around any military installation, you know you're gonna see souped up CRVs and Nissans and Chargers and things of that. Young soldiers do the same, same. It's very similar. Um, but what we did in the military was when you had squad leaders, you have platoon leaders, you have captains, you have things of that nature. And those folks, we were all in charge of the, your soldiers. Right. So if you was a squad leader, you were in charge of six, seven people downlining your group. And then there were maybe four or five squads in the platoon. If you were a platoon leader, you were in charge of squad leaders. And the whole thing is we actually worked on people holistically, their personal and professional life. Right. I know, as you know, in athletics with our employees, we can't get all into their personal life, but in the military we did. Right. And so what I looked at that is I look at it very similar to working with college athletes. When they come here, you have a total person. So I know a lot of times people see, hey, this is four star, five star, three star, but you don't necessarily know their background and their upbringing, Right. Hey, they're getting a lot of money, but are their parents taking some of this money? Do they have a child back home? What type of upbringing do they have where they need kind of a little bit of diffusion, uh, to kind of help work them through some of these different areas? Um, or maybe they came from a really good home and background with, and they're not a first generation college student and now they're getting this money and I got students. Well, I want to do investments, Ron. I Want to work in these areas, I want to kind of go through those things. So I think that's kind of really the, the what kind of really led me to it a little bit because I really did enjoy my time in the military and I was looking forward to, hey, I'll go back and I'll do these things. And when I was kind of looking at careers, I was like, man, you know what? College athletics seems a lot safer than military. I'm like, I don't know about now right now. Chaotic. Sometimes I think, like, man, I would. I was almost retired by now. You know, it'll be a little bit different, but it is very similar, right? We do, um, in the summers we take our athletes up to Naval Station Norfolk and they get to go on and off aircraft, uh, carrier. And if anybody has never been on the aircraft carrier, it's a city on the seas, 5,000, 6,000 people in the water, on the sea. And the majority of them are 18 to 21, 25 years old running that ship, right? And it's nuts. It's amazing. It's the coolest thing that you'll ever see. And we'll take our athletes up there and let them fellowship and uh, learn from them. And I was like, listen, here's people that you're same age, you don't always have a bed. It's hot outside, it's cold outside, Practice is canceled, practice is early. So some of the things that you complain about and you get on the ship and you see six sailors, uh, sleeping in, uh, little almost coffin looking beds, um, it's a difference, right? Or you hear the alarm going off at night. And um, I think it helps them kind of bring, you know, uh, uh, just learn lessons and life lessons and figuring out like, okay, it's not as good or as bad as we ever think it is. But there is a shared, um, thing of teamwork. There's a lot of different things that we try to get, uh, to them as well. So that's what I love personally. And that's why I really like this area, being in this area, because I can tap into both sides of my career, military and athletics. And I can also have my students come, come. We have seals and people come and talk to them all the time about teamwork, about no fail missions, about just kind of doing what you need to do. And so I think it's perfect. And we actually do have a lot of student athletes who when they're finished, they say, okay, I'll go into the Navy or I'll go work at the shipyard in Newport News, or I'll go work at some of the wonderful careers, Norfolk Southern, things of that nature that we have around here. So just the total development of it is really interesting, um, and having them in the area, but, I mean, they tie in, like, hand in hand, right? When we talk about military, we talk about leadership all the time, right? This is the One Question Leadership Podcast. They used to jam leadership down our throat in the military. Transformational, transactional, you know, what type of leader will you be? All of that stuff translates really well to this area. And there's a lot of things from there that I try to bring to this side, uh, that help out as well.

Speaker B: Well, Dr. Ron Moses, uh, Deputy AD at Old Dominion University, you are a leader for our time, and, uh, the Monarchs are lucky to have you. Thank you so much for joining us and for sharing more story and your background and all of this tremendous insight. We're excited to follow along with, uh, year seven of your time, uh, with Ed Odu.

Speaker A: This episode of the One Question Leadership Podcast is produced by Spades Media Group. Solving problems using creative leadership.