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This is a mobile edition of the VMI Leader Journey podcast recorded live in the Green Room of Marshall Hall.

Court Whitman '99 discussed his leadership journey with Emily and Derek on a break during the 10th Annual VMI Leadership Conference this past October where he was a guest speaker. Court is energetic and dynamic on stage and focuses his latest efforts on high performance in individuals and teams. He also hosts his own podcast, High Performance Pathways! 

Whitman is a former NCAA D1 Football player, retired US Army Special Forces Green Beret, speaker, International Coach Federation certified leadership coach and facilitator committed to unlocking the hidden potential in others and teams to develop competence so others perform at incredibly high levels.

Whitman began his Army career after graduation from VMI – where he was a walk-on linebacker. In the Army, his first assignment was with the 82nd Airborne Division, at Fort Bragg NC. After a few years with the 82nd Airborne, Court volunteered, assessed, and was selected for Special Forces training – earning his Green Beret in 2004. After a number of years serving the 7th Special Forces Group, Court volunteered, assessed, and was selected to serve with the Army’s Special Mission Unit – our nation’s precision surgical strike unit which undoubtedly was the highlight of his Army career. Court served in a number of positions with Army Special Operations to include Special Forces Team Commander, Special Forces Executive Officer, Special Forces Operations Officer and Commander with a number of interesting and varied assignments that included four tours in Afghanistan, two tours in Iraq, and two tours in South America.

Following his retirement from the Army, Court graduated from George Mason University’s Center for the Advancement of Well-being as a certified Leadership Coach. Court currently serves as CEO and Managing Director of Court Whitman - Inspiring High Performance LLC, the Chief Leadership Officer for WHIT|BAR LLC, and as an Executive Coach for The COMMIT Foundation. In addition to Coaching, Court facilitates off-site workshops for executive teams, consults with organizations to make informed hiring decisions and build optimal organizational culture, executes multi-day outdoor leadership experiences on the Appalachian and Black Mountain Crest Trails, keynote speaks, and is the creator and host of the High Performance Pathways podcast.

Whitman’s speaking engagements include the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks, MVP Capital LLC, General Dynamics, Methodist University, and the United States Military Academy at West Point Football. Court’s comments encourage the listener to consider the way they think, organize, communicate, manage and lead. This reflection enables the listener to explore their current personal and professional habits, identify opportunities for growth, and consider possibilities to achieve different results in order to perform at a high level.

Our Center's mission is to enhance the VMI citizen-soldier journey with programming that educates, engages and inspires critical thinking, ethical decision-making, and leader development. For more information about our Center and its programming, please visit Center for Leadership and Ethics. Visit our YouTube page to see Court Whitman's remarks during the 2019 Annual Leadership and Ethics Conference.

In this episode, you will learn more about the following leadership competencies from the VMI Leader Journey: teamwork, initiative, mentoring, group development, personal values, self-understanding, and reflection.

TRANSCRIPT for Effective, Positive Influence with Court Whitman

EMILY COLEMAN: Welcome to the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics' Leadership Journey Podcast.  
 
DEREK PINKHAM: This podcast aims to share leadership stories from our VMI Corps of Cadets and high-profile leaders who visit the Center for Leadership and Ethics and VMI post.  
 
COLEMAN: We’re on this journey with you!  
 
PINKHAM: I’m Derek Pinkham. 
 
COLEMAN: And hey, I'm Emily Coleman. We are your hosts of the podcast. Court Whitman is VMI class of ’99, an NCAA division one-football player, retired US Army special forces green beret, public speaker, an international coach federation certified leadership coach and a facilitator committed to unlocking the hidden potential and high performance in individuals and teams. 
 
PINKHAM: We caught up with Court at the 10th Annual VMI Leadership and Ethics Conference where he was a guest speaker.   
 
COLEMAN:  Court is the first of four VMI Alumni speaker podcasts from the conference we plan to release.  
 
PINKHAM: Please look for them in the near future.  
 
COLEMAN: And without further delay, we give you Court Whitman.  
 
COLEMAN/PINKHAM: BOOMSHAKALAKA!  
 
COLEMAN: So, first question, tell us a little bit about yourself, your history, and what led you to VMI. 
 
PINKHAM: Right, like so we like to call it your origin story.  
 
COURT WHITMAN: I guess my origin story would be, oldest kid of 5, grew up in a military family, my dad was in the Army and as I began to make meaning of my life as a young kid and kind of figure out what I want to do as a move forward. You know, my dad was one of the most, probably, effective influences on my life and so I recognize that not every kid has a great experience with their parents, mine happened to be really good and so I said hey what I want do with my life is I just be a soldier. And so, when I got kind of through high school and I had that decision hey what are you going to do with your life at this point? It was like hey I just want to be a soldier and the meaning I made in that moment was well to do that well I need to go to a military school. And I know now that that’s not, in fact true, right, because there’s great folks that are serving as soldiers, airman, Marines throughout our country that didn’t go to the Naval Academy or WestPoint or, you know, VMI which is where I went to school so as I reflect on what am I all about um just a guy that wanted to serve others and that started for me as a soldier in the Army.  
 
PINKHAM: How did you hear about VMI? 
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, really great question, I would say that my dad went to WestPoint and so, um, I kind of found VMI in my junior high school ROTC department form a close friend of mine his name was Christopher O’Toole, that was looking to go to VMI and in passing, I saw what he was kind of studying and positioning for and I said, too late for West Point! Wasn’t deliberate on that, right, I can’t get that done, maybe I’ve got a chance with this place called VMI and so really, the catalyst for me to explore this place was a buddy, Chris O’Toole, and oh by the way we were classmates together, here at VMI from small-town rural North Carolina, Elkon North Carolina. Two stoplight town, with two people at VMI, from there. 
 
COLEMAN: So, how has your definition of leadership changed throughout your experiences at VMI? 
 
WHITMAN:  I would say that when I first would have fielded or considered a question, about what does it mean, to me, to be a leader or how I define leadership, I wouldn’t be really proud of my response, ’cause I think it’s real… I mean what I know now it would be pretty elementary, I think it was who’s in charge, right? Someone who’s in charge? Yep! They’re a leader! So, I think that’s where it started. Now, and I carried that with me even upon graduation, even as I moved into the military, it wasn’t until I began to learn that just because you’re in charge doesn’t make you a leader, right? That makes you a manager, and that’s kind of how I define management. I define management as the supervision of people and or projects in order to accomplish tasks, missions, and assignments and I’ve differentiated leadership significantly from that. So, leadership for me is simply the singular word ‘influence’ and you know I’m kind of on a mission to be a high-performing leader so I even take it a step further, and I say high-performing leadership is effective positive influence. Just influencing, my definition of leadership, is not enough, you got to be an effective, positive influence if you want to be a high performing leader. 
 
COLEMAN: So where do you draw inspiration from as a leader?  
 
WHITMAN: I’d say a couple places, specifically I’d almost approach the question of and without the kind of final tag line of ‘as a leader’ it might be for me more of just where I draw my inspiration and then I’ll comment about as a leader as well. Really, two places. I’d say my family and my faith are both two things that have really inspired me and like I said earlier I’m very much aware that everyone in this great world didn’t grow up in the way I did, but my family dynamic and family environment was incredibly strong. It was very supportive. It was in a way in which you know… almost like Stonewall Jackson says, “You may be whatever you resolve to be,” right, and I think that’s really powerful and so I had a ton of support and that just inspired me to kind of chase my dreams, to be honest. I think second to that… faith was just this idea that I’m accountable to somebody with my behavior and my actions and that accountability comes because I don’t want to disappoint my God and therefore I’ve got to be very kind of deliberate on how I make decisions and that has inspired, kind of, me as I move forward. I think as a leader, I’d have to say competitive sport as where I drew my inspiration because it starts in those moments as being a member of a team and having to follow someone. So, being that follower really is where it started and then once you do that well and have success because there’s a winner and a loser when you’re playing a sports contest and almost every case I don’t know if I even know of one that there’s not a winner at the end of it… when you experience some of that success I think the natural progression is well then how can I now be a captain? How can I be more of an effective influence and kind of take on that role deliberately? So, I think that just being an athlete, playing on a team, competing to win was kind of that inspiration that started for me for leadership.  
 
COLEMAN: So, what leadership opportunities did you take as a VMI cadet when you were here? 
 
WHITMAN: Interesting and I don’t know that I took anything deliberately, right? So, I think there’s a few things that pop in to my mind when I reflect on that. Number one, it was just being on the football team. I think that, in itself, was its own leadership laboratory and very developmental for me and I consider that a leadership opportunity.  
 
I think second to that it was really my approach to academics. I would say that was more like a leading of self and leading by example which I think is very cliché, but I was very fortunate. To be honest, quick story here, I was rejected from VMI when I first applied my first time. Not smart enough, right? I had horrible SAT scores and my body of work just in high school wasn’t incredible and so I had to reapply to get in. But that lit a fire in me, and I was fortunate to make it on the Dean’s list so I had academic stars every semester of my entire career here so it was kind of like a challenge, but I considered that as, again, if leadership is influence which is how I define it, that’s a way in which I believe I lead is through just academically, the success that I had there.  
 
I’d say third it was as a mentor as an upperclassman. So, like my third-class year specifically for new football players on the team. If you can play football and play football at VMI, it’s difficult and if you have opportunities to play somewhere else I think folks when they come here and experience what it’s like in freshman year, are like, “You know what? I think I'm going to go play for this other place because I didn’t sign up for all of this.” And so, it's just leading those folks through those moments, I think naturally just progressed so I don’t know that I pursued that opportunity but I’d say that reflecting in this moment that was an opportunity that came to me.  
 
Another opportunity is I was on the honor court. And that was something that was really interesting for me because it wasn’t a leadership position I sought out. I still remember a guy named Tim Remsey, and if Tim listens to this he's going to laugh but Tim played lacrosse. I still remember him coming into my room and saying, "Hey Court, will you be on the honor court?" and I was like, what? He’s like "no, man, I think you'd be great at it" right and so so many times in my life people see something in me that i don’t see in myself. I’m kind of open to that opportunity so honor court… didn’t go looking for it, it came looking for me and I did that for two years.  
 
COLEMAN: Yeah, but you took the opportunity.  
 
PINKHAM: Right and that’s the influencing that you're talking about. Like… they see me in that role, okay, let me check this out.  
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, and I think some of it was interesting because like I said Tim played lacrosse and I think in his mind he was like there's not athletes represented on the honor court man, we want you to do it, and it worked out.  
 
I think the final thing would be that my senior year my first-class year, I was on regimental staff and that was probably my first, deliberate kind of pursuit of a leadership position. I still remember my application and turned it in to Sergeant Major Hockaday at the time. And I took this really kind of atypical approach to the essay. I didn't even write an essay! Like, I wrote the word leadership in the middle of the page and I made like a collage of words all around it. And so, I guess it worked! But I kind of took my own approach. I think maybe just being different in that moment allowed me to kind of do that. So, those are my five experiences with leadership at VMI.  
 
COLEMAN: Those are great, so what advice would you give cadets about their leadership development?  
 
WHITMAN: I think the first thing would be take some time to reflect. I think leadership if you agree and would accept my definition that its positive effective influence, you have to understand how are you doing that. I think the best two places I would encourage people to reflect upon number one is what are the core values that you have in your life that significantly impact your decision making? Because they're there and in my life, I never called them out as core values, but they were kind of just part of my decision making and I say once you deliberately do call those out, give words to that… like honesty, bravery, you know perseverance, spirituality, humility, which happen to be my top five and signature core values. It is incredibly helpful as you begin to assess what environment you want to go into. For example, I'm not going to be able to lead real well, my ability to influence in a team that's not going to work hard isn’t going to work. Because working hard is so important for me, it's a core value for me, it’s kind of just has to be there. And so, once I was able to give language to those behavioral norms, through core values it helped me focus. So, that would be the first thing, reflect on and identify core values, that could be really impactful for people that are looking to be that effective positive influence and the second thing would be, in a similar vein, not behavior but strengths. Right? Begin to understand and put to pen and paper around what are you really good at? From a leadership strengths place… and allow that to inform you so those would be the two things that I'd kind of share with folks you know from an advice place on through leadership development, be reflective on those two things and answer those questions.  
 
COLEMAN: Great! So, what is one or a couple things that you wish you knew as a cadet that you know now or that you've been or maybe it's a mistake you made and you.... 
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, let me think, I would say that… be intentional about the relationships that you build here. For me, I was very much stuck in two places with my relationships. The football team. I spent so much time there; it was a full-time job. It wasn’t until the last semester of my senior year when I had no more football because the season was over, that I was able to really experience just getting to know other people and the other place that I spent all my time was within just the intimate relationships of my own roommates. Because if I wasn’t at practice and I wasn’t in class, in most cases, I was probably in my room studying. And I think there was a lot of missed opportunities for me specifically as I reflect back on my time as a cadet. There's so many incredible people at VMI, I didn't get a chance to know them all well. And so, I would encourage anyone listening to be very deliberate about getting to know others here on post and I would also add that the reason why I don't think that I did that well is because I was most comfortable, kind of, being in and around people that I know.  
 
So, there's a lot to be said about diversity. And diversity isn’t just different sex, right, which I actually saw two years of all-male and two years of women introduced to the Institute and I thought that was one of the best things that ever happened to the school. Because guess what? Life exists in a co-ed environment so why not have that as part of kind of your college experience. So, and then it's just a diversity of thought which is really the most powerful thing to be exposed to and I didn't really stretch my way of thinking while I was here like I should have. So, those are the two things. Be deliberate on building relationships here and stretch outside your kind of comfort zone, go beyond, you know, people just like you.  
 
COLEMAN: Yeah, I'm going to say this again, I said it earlier when we were with Karl Renne. He said kind of the same thing like go out and you know get uncomfortable, sort of, but also the two lieutenants that just interned with us we sat them down for a podcast and they said the same thing. Like, you have to go out here and meet people and do stuff to get involved and you have to get uncomfortable to get comfortable again. You know, you can’t just stay in your little bubble and they were saying people would like miss all these opportunities and they're like well why can’t I do that or why can’t I do this and it’s because they don’t go out and get them, they're not deliberate.  
 
WHITMAN: Absolutely  
 
COLEMAN: So, it's just funny how both of you are saying the same thing and you graduated in '99 and they just graduated so I mean it still carries. 
 
WHITMAN: Some things are timeless and as I'm listening to you I would say there’s one other thing that I think I might bring up in this moment and that is take advantage of the summers, right? Specifically, what I would say here is try different things that you think you might be interested in.  
 
COLEMAN: Right like job-wise? Career-wise?  
 
WHITMAN: Right, from an interning perspective. Now, the reason I say this is because I work with so many folks today as a leadership coach to help them move through transitions and transition experiences and, you know for me, I’m not giving this advice with experience because my summers were dedicated to interning with the Army. Like, I went to airborne school after my freshman year, I went to air assault school after my sophomore year and I was at what we call advance camp after my junior year which is basically the testing ground for folks who are going into the Army. It’s where we kind of get evaluated on what we've learned. So, my summers were already booked with learning more about the Army but I knew that's where I was going. So, if you're here at VMI and you’re not sure that you’re going to take, kind of, a commission in one of the branches in the military, take advantage of the summers through internship opportunities. Don’t be stuck senior year not, kind of, having a good idea of I’m not sure what I might like.  
 
COLEMAN: So, what are some things as an effective leader that have helped you on your leader journey?  
 
WHITMAN: I think some of them are pretty simple, right? it starts with just working really hard right. Effort has always been one of my edges and... Don’t be outworked by anybody, right? And so that… I think that’s kind of that ‘Well, I’m going to influence… I’m going to lead by example by being someone that can be depended upon to work really hard, but I think it matters.’ So, that's the first thing I’d say was really helpful.  
 
I think the second thing would kind of go back to just continue to learn about yourself and understand that the catalyst in some cases for the most effective impact is how can I change my way of doing things in order to be more effective? How can I, you know, have this what I call this ‘self-awareness explosion’ that what I’ve been doing ain’t working, right? And guess what? The other people don’t have a problem, they don’t need to change. I need to change.  
 
COLEMAN: Like a self-evaluation.  
 
WHITMAN: Right. And then just being willing to then shift my own behavior because I'm telling you what, if someone listening can tell me how to control others, give me a call, right, we will make a whole lot of money! I don’t know that anyone has incredible success there and that’s saying from a guy who was in the Army who has a very strict hierarchy and like hey look this person’s in charge, he outranks me… I’m going to do what they say. I've even seen that not be incredibly effective even in the military. So, when we can shift our own behavior through understanding of what the people we're working with need from us, that really allows you to influence at a high level. So, that'd be another thing I'd offer.  
 
PINKHAM: So, you talked about other practices earlier today at the conference, do you want to talk about some of those? Like the meditation was one thing.  
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, certainly, and so I would say that you know there’s a couple things that I’ve grown in my understanding not because I’ve cornered the market on the greatest habits to being a high-performing leader, but in a lot of cases I just talk to other men and women who are doing it really well in their own work. And so, there’s really four things that I guess I would share that are habits to consider if you’re looking to really consider if you’re looking to be really effective in your work as a leader.  
 
I think the first one would be, and I commented on this a little bit, is just create impact through self-awareness. You know, understanding the most about yourself opens the door for you to be really impactful.  
 
I'd say the second thing would be, you know, just activate resilience you know, understand when setbacks come, because it comes to us all. Don't stay there too long, right, there's tons of work out here about this. People say ‘well, fail fast or fail forward,’ but it’s just moving through a setback as fast as possible.  
 
Define for yourself what fulfillment looks like in your life. For a long time for me, it was all about the career. But as I've gotten older there’s so much to just beyond what you’re dedicating your time to from a professional place that really allows you to be fulfilled and I think if you can figure out fulfillment, you end up having an infectious passion and when that passion is present you end up being a joy to be around and that just allows you to influence others.  
 
COLEMAN: So, you have a podcast.  
 
WHITMAN:  Yeah!  
 
COLEMAN: You want to tell us a little bit about your podcast?  
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, I mean it’s a really interesting story I mean so I think the first thing I would say is I didn’t sit down one day and say I’m going to start a podcast, right? and I think that for a lot of folks that can identify with this, especially entrepreneurs, it’s kind of like well I’ve got this creative idea and then I try it and then it’s a miserable failure but if you allow that to inform what you do next, then you might have something. And so, my experience with my podcast is kind of like that.  
 
So, let me just start and just give you an idea of how it started. So, I’m a leadership coach. I own and operate my own company and that basically means we're not eating, we're not paying the mortgage, unless I can generate the income to get it done. So, it comes with some anxiety and also comes with this idea that how can we be more creative? So, I had this idea to put together something called a high-performance pathways mastermind group. In my work, what I’m trying to do, is inspire folks to perform at a high level and I believe the way in which to do that is to help unlock your hidden potential and help develop your competencies so you can achieve incredible results with your life. That’s kind of my mission statement. And so, I felt that if I could bring together people to listen to guest presenters speak as I interviewed them over a three month period, so four times a year, for three months you know Derek and Emily would pay, right, get this, this is probably why it’s such a failure, 500 bucks to listen to these six guest presenters, one every couple weeks, talk about their ability to perform at a high level and at the end of that, you'd have an opportunity because it was a very intimate group of just ten people, ask them questions, right? So that’s where it started. It was a web-based interview process where people would come and listen. And it was a miserable failure. Nobody was interested and so at the end of that I bumped into a buddy of mine that said, ‘Hey, Court, you know what, just because that fell apart and no one was interested in being a part of it, doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t do that. Why don’t you just record these web interviews and post them on your website and people could just get content.’ And so, I considered that and then someone else said, ‘Hey, you know Court, I've seen some of your work on LinkedIn, have you ever considered a podcast?’ I said no and so what began as this mastermind group evolved into what is now a podcast that I do and my podcast is called, thank you so much for asking me about this 
 
COLEMAN: Of course 
 
WHITMAN: my podcast is called High Performance Pathways. And it’s basically a one-on-one, intimate interview with people that are doing incredible work with their life and I’m asking them to share out things like ‘How you define high-performance?’ You know, ‘What has been your path to the incredible results that you've achieved in your life?’ And I think it inspires and it’s informative. And that’s what it is so check it out, right? It’s on Spotify, iHeart Radio, Apple Podcast and Google Play as High Performance Pathways.  
 
PINKHAM: Great, great, we will shout that out.  
 
WHITMAN: Yeah, shout it out! Keep it going! 
 
PINKHAM: Thanks for coming!  

PINKHAM: The CLE would like to thank the following: Cadet Caleb Minus ’20 for the intro and backing music. Find more of his musical stylings on his Instagram page (@mynusofficial) Col. David Gray, USA (ret.), Director of the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics. And of course, as always, our podcast guests. Find this podcast and other CLE programming information on the VMI Center for Leadership & Ethics website, or our try YouTube channel. Follow the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics on Facebook, Twitter,  LinkedIn, and  Instagram accounts. See you next episode of 'The Journey.' Thanks for tuning in! [music fades]