Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
What Grief Taught Me About Leadership (That Success Never Could) with Jay Jacobson
28 Plays6 days ago
Most leaders think success is what shapes them—but what happens when success stops mattering? When you’re sitting in a moment you can’t fix, can’t control, and can’t win… what’s left of the leader you thought you were?
Today’s guest is Jay U. Jacobson, a funeral director, entrepreneur, and leadership voice shaped by moments where pressure, grief, and responsibility collide. Jay has testified before the United States Senate on funeral ethics and draws on decades of experience in disaster response, business ownership, and mentoring leaders to explore what leadership looks like when it actually matters. He’s the author of Lead by Legendary Example, a story-driven book on integrity, presence, service, and legacy in real-world leadership.
Connect with Jay: https://www.jacobsonprostaff.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jayscookies/
At The Second Voice, we explore the inner conversations leaders rarely say out loud.
If this episode resonated, it is likely because the second voice is active in your leadership too.
Hosted by Luisa Hogan, leadership resilience strategist and founder of Vermelho Consulting.
Luisa works with founders, executives, and senior leaders who carry real responsibility and want to lead with steadiness, clarity, and self-trust under pressure.
Her work focuses on nervous system regulation, leadership identity, and the inner dialogue that shapes how leaders show up when things are hard.
Work With Luisa
If this episode sparked reflection, here are ways to go deeper:
• Leadership resilience workshops and advisory
• Keynotes and curated live experiences
• The Steady Leadership framework and private sessions
Learn more at: vermelho.com.au
Stay Connected
Follow along and join the conversation:
• Instagram: @thesecondvoicepodcast
• Instagram: @luisahoganhq
Subscribe, rate, and review The Second Voice to help more leaders find these conversations.
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Guest Overview
00:00:01
Luisa Hogan
Most leaders think that success is what shapes them, but what happens when success stops mattering? When you're sitting in a moment that you can't fix, that you can't control, and that you can't win.
00:00:13
Luisa Hogan
What's left of the leader you thought you were in those moments? Welcome to the Second Voice Podcast, where we uncover the conversations that leaders don't say out loud. I'm your host, Louisa Hogan, and today we're exploring what leadership looks like when success can't teach you anything, but grief can.
00:00:32
Luisa Hogan
My guest today is the wonderful J.U. Jacobson. He's a funeral director, an entrepreneur, and a leadership but leadership voice shaped by moments where pressure, grief, and responsibility collide.
00:00:45
Luisa Hogan
J has testified before the United States Senate on funeral ethics and draws on decades of experience in disaster response, business ownership, and mentoring leaders to explore what leadership looks like when it actually matters.
Early Leadership Lessons
00:01:00
Luisa Hogan
He's the author of Lead by Legendary Example, a story-driven book on integrity, presence, service, and legacy in real-world leadership. And I am so excited to have you with me today, Jay. Thank you so much for joining me from across the world at 10 p.m. at night. I know it's early in the morning for me and it's 10 p.m. for you, so I really appreciate you joining me. Thank you.
00:01:22
Jay Jacobson
This is just a great way to wrap up my weekend, so I'm glad to be joining you.
00:01:27
Luisa Hogan
Excellent. Well, I'm glad to hear it. Well, I've given a little bit of a bit of a bio about you, Jay, but ah I'd love for the listeners who don't know who you are, tell us a little bit more about your background. I want to know more. i've I've never interviewed somebody who has been a funeral director and has been an entrepreneur in the space. So tell me more about you.
Career Beginnings and Mentorship
00:01:45
Luisa Hogan
What led you to where you are today and your and your path?
00:01:49
Jay Jacobson
Well, my journey starts much much earlier than most people think. i I started at age nine with a paper route. some of the the most vital lessons that I ever learned from leadership were actually learned at four and five o'clock in the morning by just showing up, being consistent, being there every morning, making sure that newspaper was delivered before my clients had their first cup of coffee in the morning.
00:02:17
Jay Jacobson
And then later in the week when I would have to go back and collect the fee for the subscription. And that that process of collecting for the subscription taught me so much about being present.
00:02:32
Jay Jacobson
A lot of people don't realize that 40 years ago when I was carrying newspaper, 50 years ago now, um we we had to go back and we had to collect for the the subscription every week.
00:02:46
Jay Jacobson
And I think some of the people on my route had a newspaper subscription just so somebody would come and visit them once a week. And I
Impact of the Pandemic and Training
00:02:54
Jay Jacobson
would be that person. So on Thursday night, I'd be knocking on the door and they'd say, I've got a piece of pie. Come on in and have a piece of pie. Or I've set out a board game. You want to play a board game while you're here.
00:03:05
Jay Jacobson
And looking back, you realize how lonely some of these people were that, you know, just to have a newspaper carrier who's only nine, 10 years old stop in.
00:03:16
Jay Jacobson
and just spend a few minutes with them. So they had they weren't so lonely that evening. It drove my dad crazy. It took me forever to to make it through my collection route, but I was doing something important. I was giving my presence.
00:03:30
Jay Jacobson
And I learned very early on that the gift that you can give of being fully present in the moment is something no these folks will never forget. But I went on from there.
00:03:40
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:03:42
Jay Jacobson
I you know i had a host of other job opportunities, everything from walking beans for farmers to making hay to detasseling corn.
Key Leadership Skills and Integrity
00:03:52
Jay Jacobson
I spent some time in my high school years working for our local phone company where I learned a lot about technology and and how all of that works together. And ultimately, I started working in funeral service.
00:04:08
Jay Jacobson
My foray into funeral home work was quite different than most of my colleagues Most of the people I went to school with, they started into funeral service because their parents and their grandparents or even their great grandparents had owned funeral homes and they were just going into the family business.
00:04:28
Jay Jacobson
Well, I was the first one in my family ever to even go to college. I've got five brothers and I was the first one to graduate. I've had one other brother that graduated from from college, but that was it.
00:04:40
Jay Jacobson
um But when I was a junior in high school, I was asked to be a pallbearer at my aunt's funeral up in South Dakota. And to put it mildly, it was not a good experience. it was It was terribly done. It was well not well organized.
00:04:56
Jay Jacobson
It wasn't professional. So I came back from that experience saying somebody has to be able to do this better. And it became my life's work. I literally started the day after I graduated from high school.
00:05:09
Jay Jacobson
I moved into the basement of a funeral home. in the town that I was going to be going to college in, in that fall and started my career. And I've been doing it pretty much ever since.
00:05:18
Luisa Hogan
Wow.
00:05:21
Luisa Hogan
Talk about a calling. That just, that's so amazing because ah you you heard that calling and you answered that calling, right? It's, so you know.
00:05:30
Jay Jacobson
And for people, if you pay attention, and you listen to what's out there and what's really, really speaking to you, you find your calling. It isn't something that you have to go searching for. It finds you.
00:05:42
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:05:42
Jay Jacobson
you just have to be willing to listen.
00:05:45
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, I so agree with that. And that's about, you know, this podcast all about that inner voice and listening to the inner voice and which inner voice you listen to. And so sometimes that calling comes to you and people need to learn like what what's the real calling?
00:06:00
Luisa Hogan
Can I hear that voice? Can I listen to it? Can I heed it? And amazing that you did that. So you were in college still and then you you you started that work. And then what, did you set up your own business or were you working with somebody?
00:06:11
Jay Jacobson
Well, I I spent um most of my career in funeral service working for other people, whether that be small family-owned funeral homes, which is where I started.
00:06:18
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:06:22
Jay Jacobson
The funeral home I started at was owned by second-generation family and and ultimately became a third-generation family. And i learned a valuable lesson in that is that family is thicker than employees.
00:06:39
Jay Jacobson
And as soon as his son said, I want to come back, and going to the funeral business, I was out. um A big eye-opener for how the world really works.
00:06:50
Jay Jacobson
But things like that made a huge difference because I learned something, and I always found myself in a better position. So I went from working there to working the
Personal Grief and Leadership Approach
00:07:00
Jay Jacobson
summer after my first year of college for another family-owned funeral home that was only 15 minutes from my hometown.
00:07:08
Jay Jacobson
Had two wonderful mentors there. One of them was 85 years old when I met him. I think he had funeral director license number two in our state. So he'd been doing it a very long time.
00:07:20
Jay Jacobson
And he was meticulous. And he was consistent in who he was, whether he was working or he's in the community or he's in his church. He was always the same person.
00:07:33
Jay Jacobson
And it was refreshing to see somebody who could function at that level and could always be the person you expect. And on the flip side, the owner of the funeral home was only 27 years old.
00:07:46
Jay Jacobson
And he was very good when he was working. But as soon as the time he was off the clock, his life fell apart. um Ultimately, he ended up losing his family. he ended up losing his business.
00:07:59
Jay Jacobson
But just watching these two examples, the dichotomy of success in life versus success in business and what that teaches you,
00:08:11
Jay Jacobson
that you have to have that success in life in order to have long-term success in business is a lesson that stayed with me throughout my career. But I've worked for large corporations.
00:08:21
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:08:25
Jay Jacobson
I've worked for small cooperatives. And i've I've done a lot of work lately working for a lot of independent funeral homes in a consulting nature, going in and helping them build their staff. to train the the people the next generation coming up
00:08:43
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. So in that role, you're seeing a lot more of that working with leadership in that role and, and you know, mentoring leaders in that space.
00:08:52
Jay Jacobson
Yes, um there's a huge gap in in the
Communication and Adversity in Leadership
00:08:56
Jay Jacobson
funeral profession here in the in the United States. And a lot of it has to do with COVID.
00:09:03
Jay Jacobson
When COVID hit, everybody was isolated. um The workload, the stress load for funeral directors and funeral service was immense because when everybody else was dying from COVID, we were the ones going out and we were going out and getting exposed to it on a daily basis.
00:09:21
Jay Jacobson
And then having to go back home to our families and worry about, are we going to contract something that's going to spread to them?
00:09:22
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm.
00:09:31
Jay Jacobson
So it was very real stress that we felt at the time. So a lot of the people in my age, the late in their career, just decide I'm done. I'm going to give up.
00:09:44
Jay Jacobson
And so we don't have those mentors in place anymore. And so you have the owners who are still hanging on, owning their funeral homes, and you have new people coming into the career, but nobody in between to help train them, help mentor them long term.
00:09:59
Jay Jacobson
And so that's a role that I've been stepping into more and more, everything from training people how to answer the phone to how to conduct an arrangement conference with families, how to anticipate things that could go wrong in a funeral service, just be there and and be present with with what's happening.
00:10:19
Jay Jacobson
And the communication skills that that we're having to teach, particularly younger people are so much different than what that I had to experience. For a lot of us, or for most of us,
00:10:33
Jay Jacobson
When we're growing up, we learn to read body language. wever We learn to read what's going on in a room by observing. And that happens usually between age 13 and age 18.
00:10:47
Jay Jacobson
Well, that's exactly the time that we're handing young people a cell phone, a computer screen, a tablet.
00:10:53
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:10:54
Jay Jacobson
And so instead of having their eyes up looking at around a room, they're looking into the palm of their hand. And so they never quite learn those people skills.
00:11:05
Jay Jacobson
They don't know understand what the body language and the tone mean. And so I'm spending a lot of my time helping them learn that and really practice to know how to read that reel.
00:11:18
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, never I never thought of that. And what an important skill to have in the work that you do, right? Because you're dealing with people in their most vulnerable time of their life, you know, grieving.
00:11:30
Jay Jacobson
Yes, we have we We have crucial conversations with families several times a day. Every time that someone comes in, every time they call us, there's a there's ah huge amount of crucial information that we have to process through, that we have to help them through and and and help solve a problem they have.
00:11:49
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:11:54
Jay Jacobson
And so when we don't have those communication skills, and communication
Preparing for Grief and Personal Resilience
00:11:59
Jay Jacobson
skills are a huge part of leadership. You can't communicate, you can't leave. But if you don't have those, then you're sitting at a disadvantage and you aren't able to best serve the people around you or even your coworkers.
00:12:12
Jay Jacobson
So we start with that we start with those communication skills
00:12:18
Luisa Hogan
i'm I'm interested to know, Jane, like what are some of the leadership lessons that you've learned on this journey as a funeral director and even working now directly with, you know, various people working in the in the space?
00:12:34
Luisa Hogan
What lessons have you learned in leadership that people wouldn't have thought of in terms of, you know, you're experiencing, you know, people going through this grief, you know, how you have to be there for them. And, you know, what are the general lessons that you can apply to leadership in general, even if you don't work in the space that some people would never have thought of?
00:12:59
Jay Jacobson
Well, probably the biggest and and most foundational is integrity. um Everything grows from integrity. If people cannot trust you to be the person you say you're gonna be, they can't trust you to do the things that you're you're promising to do, then nothing else matters.
00:13:17
Jay Jacobson
So you've gotta start with that foundation of and integrity and and those skills, whether it be integrity or it be servant leadership or it be adaptability, or vision, whatever it is, they have to be practiced in small ways and they have to be practiced every single day.
00:13:37
Jay Jacobson
Now you spend a lot of time talking in your podcast about what success teaches us about leadership. I would argue that success doesn't teach us a lot about leadership.
00:13:48
Jay Jacobson
It's everything we do to lead up to the things that challenge us to to have success that teach us about leadership. those those little tiny decisions we make when they're small issues, they're little things that don't really matter a lot, but in the big picture they do.
00:14:07
Jay Jacobson
And so when you practice integrity and when you practice focusing on vision every single day, when the big things come up, things like sitting before a senate committee and having to testify when responding to a plane crash you've already developed those skills They show up because you practice them.
00:14:30
Jay Jacobson
They don't show up because you need them. They show up because you rehearse them and and they're part of who you are.
00:14:37
Luisa Hogan
yeah yeah and that's when your authenticity is so important too right so if you if you practice it what what is the this is a podcast about self-talk tell me what is the
00:14:42
Jay Jacobson
Yeah.
00:14:51
Luisa Hogan
What is the self-talk that goes on in somebody who does your line of work? You know, what what are you saying to yourself while you're doing your line of work to keep you, um because I imagine we were challenging dealing with the grief all the time, right?
00:15:06
Luisa Hogan
So, you know, what's what's the self-talk that you experience?
00:15:07
Jay Jacobson
It
00:15:10
Jay Jacobson
is. You begin by realizing that people are counting on you, not just the family that's sitting in front of you, but the whole community and the whole staff around you. But one of the things I always tell myself, and I and i ah often remind my staff and those that I'm training, we do this every single day.
00:15:29
Jay Jacobson
Our families, our clients only get to do it once. They only have one chance at remembering their loved ones.
00:15:33
Luisa Hogan
Thank you.
00:15:36
Jay Jacobson
And
Impact of Servant Leadership on Youth
00:15:37
Jay Jacobson
so we have to remember that, that it is special and it's unique and we owe them our very best every single time. Whether that be cleaning the car, mowing the grass, cleaning a toilet, a video presentation and we put together, or if something as simple as writing an obituary for a family.
00:15:59
Jay Jacobson
We have to give it our very best every single time. Because they're counting on us. um And you know it can be it can seem a little bit rote to us, but it certainly isn't to our families for certain.
00:16:13
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. Yeah. I imagine that could be a really challenging, you know, for somebody maybe even new in the work and still learning about the work that you're doing. And you're right.
00:16:23
Luisa Hogan
It feels like roads. It's just, you know, it becomes routine. Every job but you do, you've got routine parts of your your role. So i could imagine how challenging it would be to keep reminding yourself about that.
00:16:34
Jay Jacobson
Yeah.
00:16:34
Luisa Hogan
So you don't go into work today and just treat it like another day. Right.
00:16:39
Jay Jacobson
And there are skills that we can use to keep our keep us from becoming routine.
00:16:40
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:16:48
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:16:48
Jay Jacobson
um
00:16:49
Jay Jacobson
When I sit down with a family, a lot of my colleagues will sit down with a checklist and they a form to fill out. I sit down with a blank sheet of paper. And I start by saying, tell me about your loved one.
00:17:04
Jay Jacobson
And I let them go. I let them tell me whatever they want. And then we let the conversation go wherever it drives on its own until I've got a good picture of the person that we're caring for and the family that's
Entrepreneurship and Storytelling
00:17:18
Jay Jacobson
caring for them as well.
00:17:20
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:17:20
Jay Jacobson
And so when you have those two pieces, the person that you're burying or cremating and you have the family you're serving, you can find ways to make it non-routine by being present in that moment and really focusing in on the conversation that's happening
00:17:37
Jay Jacobson
the body language in particular that's that you're seeing, you can get a really good picture of who these people are and how you can serve them. Now, a lot of families are broken.
00:17:51
Jay Jacobson
They come together and have to make decisions in a room with a person like me, and they just as soon be in any other room without their relatives there because they don't get along.
00:18:03
Jay Jacobson
But for that short period of time, They have to sit in a room and make decisions together. And if you miss those cues, if you miss that somebody in the room is uncomfortable, you can spend that whole arrangement conference and talk to everybody else and miss somebody who's very important and has something that needs to contribute to the conversation.
00:18:23
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:18:25
Jay Jacobson
They just need to have permission. And so it's not unusual for me to sit there and see the person that's sitting there with their arms folded and the scowl on their face And I'll say, you know, John, it looks like you have something to add to the conversation.
00:18:38
Jay Jacobson
And just kind of pull them in. And the whole room just kind of melts. Because all of a sudden, you've touched the elephant in the room. And you're inviting them into the conversation.
00:18:51
Jay Jacobson
And that's where healing can start happening for some of these families. When somebody starts talking and others start listening because I'm listening.
00:18:54
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:18:59
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. You know, i'm I'm getting goosebumps because I think there's such a lesson in, I work with organizations, I go in and consult to big businesses and so forth.
00:19:09
Luisa Hogan
And I i think anyone listening here today, if you're thinking, oh, well, I don't work in this space, i I'm never going to be a funeral director, there's nothing for me to learn.
00:19:16
Jay Jacobson
you do. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
00:19:18
Luisa Hogan
I just think what you just said is something so important, because if you are in a a in ah in a team or where you're working with customers, you've said it it's like servant leadership, you're serving those people. And you're doing that whether you're handing out hamburgers, you're doing customer service on an insurance line, whether you're dealing directly with people that you're helping with clients, whatever it is, What you just said is exactly what we need to take into all of our roles, not just in something like this. And somebody listening might be going, oh, well, you have to do that because you're working with people in their most vulnerable and grieving state. You have to do that no matter what role you're in, right?
00:20:01
Jay Jacobson
You think about a boardroom and you're sitting around a boardroom table and you're on the board or you're conducting the meeting.
00:20:03
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:20:09
Jay Jacobson
The same situation applies. You have people in that room that by their very function are designed to disagree.
00:20:13
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:20:19
Jay Jacobson
Board only works if people disagree.
00:20:19
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:20:21
Jay Jacobson
If they all agree, you don't need the board. But when you can take that disagreement and you can channel it in positive ways and you can keep it from digressing down to the personal level and stay with the issues and help model what it means to treat people with respect, to listen to them, to hear their point of view, and then be able to ask the question, have you considered also?
00:20:49
Jay Jacobson
and bring other ideas into that same idea and and mold it and shape it until you have something that is better than all of the ideas that came to the table individually. You have something that works for the whole group.
00:21:03
Jay Jacobson
That's what we're talking about. That's the same principle in a funeral rink. When we bring all of those ideas in, we shape them, we mold them, and we create something that honors the person that we're talking about.
00:21:16
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:21:16
Jay Jacobson
or And in the boardroom, we honor the issue we're talking about.
00:21:21
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:21:21
Jay Jacobson
So these are all life skills that are that transcend in individual occupations.
00:21:22
Luisa Hogan
So true.
00:21:28
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. 100%. I see that in teams. Often I work with teams with change management, dealing with change. But the first thing that we have to deal with is how that team trust each other, how they have open discussions so that they can agree on on things. And we don't often, you know, we don't need a general consensus or everyone to agree. We need people to say what they disagree with. And then at the end, even if I still disagree, we agree that this is the way forward, even if I disagree with what it is. And it can be really tricky for people to see that. And I think in an environment where you are primed to listen,
00:22:07
Luisa Hogan
you, it it could pi could potentially you're reminded through the work that you do to do that, but other people in other roles forget that that's the whole purpose of what we do, you know, to listen to each other, to get perspective, to disagree.
00:22:22
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:22:22
Jay Jacobson
One of my board presidents, he hit it on the nail. He said, you know, We have to disagree. We have to respectfully have dialogue in the meeting.
00:22:27
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:22:32
Jay Jacobson
We have to hold the meeting in the meeting, not outside of the meeting. We have to make a decision. And then when we go out from the meeting, we have to support the decision that we made as a group.
00:22:43
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, 100%.
00:22:44
Jay Jacobson
And it's pretty simple, but so many boards and so many organizations get that wrong. And so you, it is, it is hard because
00:22:50
Luisa Hogan
They find it hard. Mm-hmm.
00:22:54
Jay Jacobson
if you If you don't feel heard in the meeting, those things happen. And so you create space so people feel heard in the meeting. Then you eliminate a lot of that.
00:23:03
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm.
00:23:05
Jay Jacobson
Well, I'm going to go talk to somebody after the meeting because I didn't get my chance. You give them their chance.
00:23:13
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, for sure. I'm interested a little bit more in in grief and, you know, as from what I understand, you know, reading up about you and going through your work and, you know, before our interview today, Jay, you've gone through some of your own grief and you experience grief with um with the people you work with every single day. Has grief changed the way that you see your own leadership or your responsibility as a leader?
00:23:41
Jay Jacobson
It absolutely has. it Late in my career, I lost my mom.
00:23:47
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm.
00:23:47
Jay Jacobson
And it really changed the way that I looked at how I approach making arrangements with families, how I listened.
00:23:59
Jay Jacobson
i was I was sitting on the other side of the table. And so I had a funeral director who was asking me questions. He was going through all the things that I normally went through with families.
00:24:09
Jay Jacobson
And it felt hollow. It felt like he wasn't listening. There are many times, my my mom worked for the Postal Service and in the United States, when you're a postal worker, you're on you're not on our social security system, which is our federal retirement and and benefit organization.
00:24:29
Jay Jacobson
But he repeatedly asked questions that were only specific to social security. And it just bothered me he wasn't listening. He hadn't heard what was really going on. He had a form he was filling out.
00:24:41
Jay Jacobson
And it really refocused me on, okay, let's let's get to know the person we're taking care of first. Let's make sure that we do everything right. And and I think one of the the hardest parts for me happened in the internment out of the Veterans Cemetery.
00:25:01
Jay Jacobson
My mom was cremated. Being the funeral director, I'm mean always the last person in the line. So when they set up the procession with the cars, I made sure everybody got in procession. i followed in behind.
00:25:14
Jay Jacobson
When I got to the cemetery, I was the last one coming up because my car was parked the furthest away. And the funeral director started the committal before I was there. And that always set difficult with me because that's of the things I've always strived to do.
00:25:30
Jay Jacobson
Always look around, make sure everybody's up, everybody's close, everybody that should be there is there before you ever say one word of the committal service.
00:25:31
Luisa Hogan
Hmm. Hmm.
00:25:40
Jay Jacobson
And so those little things mean a whole lot. We're actually going through something right now. my my One of my favorite aunts passed away earlier this week and her daughter is about 12 years younger than I am. So growing up, I never got to know her very well.
00:25:59
Jay Jacobson
Well, when they had to put my aunt in a hospice home, it was close to my residence. So I invited her to her daughter to come and stay with us while she was in the hospice house, got to know her, got to really get to understand part of my family I didn't have an opportunity with.
00:26:17
Jay Jacobson
But just being present for her and being able to listen to the stories and watch as she went through this and and what it meant to her to have somebody who was actually listening of was a good example of why it's important to be present.
00:26:32
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. Yeah. It's, it, it changes things when you have to experience the thing that you're usually working in, right. When you're the one on the receiving end and yeah, that's so hard.
00:26:41
Jay Jacobson
Exactly.
00:26:44
Jay Jacobson
You notice a lot more. Mm-hmm.
00:26:46
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. And I'm sure it made you think even more about what was important in the work that you do. And again, like I can hear it in your voice and I can hear the passion in your voice about service and presence and you know, those are things that I feel very strongly about too, servant leadership, serving, you know, everything that you do has to be in service to the people that you're working with.
00:27:07
Luisa Hogan
Because when you do that, it returns twofold, you know, it it really does just in in meaning and, you know. So, yeah, i appreciate that.
00:27:16
Jay Jacobson
And one of the side benefits of doing that kind of servant leadership is there young people watching, whether that be coworkers or in my case, my grandchildren are always watching and they're learning from you and learning from the example that you lay out before them.
00:27:33
Jay Jacobson
And, you know, I've been around love, I'm 65 now and watching as some of those traits start to show up in your, in your grandchildren and in your coworkers.
00:27:45
Jay Jacobson
And you just get that little smile in the back of your head that says, I recognize that. And you know that you're making the next generation better.
00:27:51
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:27:56
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, for sure. It's a little pat on the back moment for yourself, really.
00:28:01
Jay Jacobson
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
00:28:04
Luisa Hogan
i I want to talk about something that's that I'm very passionate about and that's the the term, you know, i'm I'm the strong one because I believe that we need to be steady leaders, not strong leaders because strength is often performative.
00:28:16
Jay Jacobson
Right, exactly.
00:28:17
Luisa Hogan
You know, we're we're pretending that we're strong on the outside but inside we're we know we're we're internally broken, but we're we're showing everybody this this face.
00:28:28
Luisa Hogan
um What does strength actually look like when you're navigating brief grief, or even if it's not grief, maybe prolonged uncertainty? What have you found? You've seen lots of people who are going through a grieving process who are portraying their strength or who actually are strong. what What in your mind is somebody who is strong?
00:28:51
Jay Jacobson
My wife.
00:28:52
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:28:53
Jay Jacobson
and And I'll tell you why. this The book that I read wrote was never meant to be written. I never set out to be an author. But about two years ago, my wife went in for a routine knee surgery.
00:29:07
Jay Jacobson
It went horribly wrong. And since that time, over 18 months, she had to have 12 major surgeries. And in that time, we went through horrible things for her.
00:29:19
Jay Jacobson
the pain of of having to have a a knee replaced multiple times, the pain of infection, the the pain of the the delirium that comes as being in the hospital and having that much anesthesia, all of those things and and and just getting built back up and just being about able to to walk with a walker and having to start over again to watch her every single day for the past two years have some type of therapy, whether it be physical or cognitive or emotional therapy, and to watch, to see what she has been able to accomplish and still maintain a positive attitude.
00:30:04
Jay Jacobson
And that's that's strength, but it's it's more than strength.
00:30:04
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:30:11
Jay Jacobson
that's It's that resilience of knowing that I can do this, to have the the ability to go through all of this and still be able to be a presence for the people around her.
00:30:25
Jay Jacobson
She's always there for the grandsons. She's always there for our daughters. And as much as she can, she's there for me. And so that is the picture that I see when you talk about that kind of strength.
00:30:37
Jay Jacobson
Now, i I get to have strength when I'm dealing with families, because but I'm a little more detached because I'm there to help them.
00:30:37
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:30:45
Jay Jacobson
Yes, I'm there to connect with them, but she's living the issues that we're dealing with then and That's the measure of true strength.
00:30:56
Luisa Hogan
Amazing. She sounds like an amazing, I mean, to go through therapy, some type of therapy every single day for two years. You're right. That's not for the faint of heart. So
00:31:05
Luisa Hogan
um i I wish her a lot of healing. I do hope she she heals up and that she comes good for you. I do hope that for her.
00:31:05
Jay Jacobson
It is not.
00:31:14
Jay Jacobson
She is doing really well. She is walking with a walker. We were out this weekend and she did a lot of walking.
00:31:18
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:31:21
Jay Jacobson
She did shopping. in an outdoor mall for the first time in years and it was just really nice to be able to to watch her do that.
00:31:31
Luisa Hogan
Yeah. Well, A couple of last questions for somebody who's listening, who hasn't faced loss yet or faced that amount of grief yet, but inevitably will, we're all going to face grief someday.
00:31:47
Luisa Hogan
um particularly when it comes to losing a loved one, how, what advice would you give to to people out there to for how they can start building inner alignment so that when that grief inevitably comes that they can be strong in that non-performative way and be those servant leaders in those moments what can people do to to align themselves to that now
00:32:17
Jay Jacobson
I think one of the biggest things that I see on the funeral side of it is don't be afraid to say the things you need to say. um a lot of families go and say, I'll i'll get around to that, and they never do.
00:32:29
Jay Jacobson
so tell the people that you love them. Tell the people I'm sorry. Tell the people I forgive you. um Those are probably the most important phrases that you can use leading up to losing somebody.
00:32:45
Jay Jacobson
Because when the person's gone, you can't you can't go back. You can't go back and and say, you know, I wish I had done. Do it. Do it. Go on the trip. dan Do the things you wish you could do and don't wait. Now, you know, spending my whole career in and around people who had lost and lost people before they were ready, it helped us approach our life differently.
00:33:13
Jay Jacobson
We didn't wait until we retired to travel. We didn't wait to take our kids to special events and special things. We did it throughout our lives.
00:33:24
Jay Jacobson
And I always told them, I said, I don't want to be in the nursing home thinking I should have. I'd rather be in the nursing home remembering what I did.
00:33:31
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:33:34
Luisa Hogan
yeah
00:33:34
Jay Jacobson
And so when you start looking at your life with a a sense of urgency, that it is it's very temporal. No one's life goes on forever. forever And so you crowd as much as you can and living and and quality living into that tiny amount of space that we have.
00:33:53
Jay Jacobson
And then you can face the end with no regrets. The people around you can face it with no regrets.
00:34:00
Luisa Hogan
yeah Brilliant advice. And I think um advice just in general for leadership, you know, be present. Again, it comes back to that presence that you so wonderfully talk about. so i Be present in your every moment. Don't be like delay. Somebody told me the other day, one of my podcast guests, she didn't say it on the podcast, but she said it to me while we were chatting and she said, should and shame are the same word.
00:34:20
Luisa Hogan
because, you know, you you it's you hold shame with the word should and you you, you know, in leadership, it's the same, you know, be present, don't hold back on what you need to say, but do it kindly, do it with, you know, um kindness and awareness and everything works out so much better, doesn't it?
00:34:39
Luisa Hogan
When you do that.
00:34:39
Jay Jacobson
It certainly does. yeah I mean, remember remember the person across from you, whether that be your family, a coworker, a stranger, they're all going through their own stuff.
00:34:41
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:34:50
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:34:51
Jay Jacobson
They all have their own hurts. They all have their own challenges. And if you can lift one little burden from them, make one little thing better for them today, imagine how much better they'll feel tomorrow.
00:35:05
Luisa Hogan
Amazing.
00:35:06
Jay Jacobson
So as people, we we need to remember to do that. that i mean Face everybody who we've come in contact with as if, you know, they're they're important. They're special.
00:35:19
Jay Jacobson
and they're going through their own private grief, their own private troubles, and do what we can to help.
00:35:29
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, for sure. Well, you, you're the author of an amazing book. I've read through all of, I've, I'm in the process of ordering your book before I came onto this interview, I've saved it. I want to read your book because I reading all the reviews, how people have just been talking about how it's just such a story of a, it's such a revelation to them.
00:35:49
Luisa Hogan
Tell us more about your book and where can people find you? Where can they connect with you if they want to connect with you more or talk to you more?
00:35:57
Jay Jacobson
this leadership book isn't written like any other leadership book. it
00:36:00
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm.
00:36:00
Jay Jacobson
It is written from stories like we've shared here, stories of being a paperboy, stories of sitting in front of a Senate committee and having to give testimony when you're in your late 20s, stories of helping people through plane aircraft disasters, all of those things that help build the the leadership characteristics we talk about.
00:36:31
Jay Jacobson
And so all of those stories are firsthand. All of those discoveries we made in terms of what's important in leadership come from those stories and they are derived directly from them.
00:36:41
Luisa Hogan
Mm-hmm.
00:36:42
Jay Jacobson
So it it points you directly to how that was built. In the second half of our second, is last part of the book, it's actually a 10 week workshop and how to build those leadership skills in teams.
00:36:56
Jay Jacobson
So my publisher wanted me to do two separate books. I said, no, I want them all in one. And I'm glad I did because you finish reading the book and then you have right in front of you the next step.
00:37:07
Jay Jacobson
How do I take this from the book that I just read to integrate it into my team that I'm trying to build? And you don't have to wonder, it's right there. But that book, Lead by Legendary Example, it's available on Amazon. It's available in both print and audio.
00:37:27
Jay Jacobson
It's available on Apple's audiobooks. We had a wonderful gentleman, Fred Lang, who did the narration for us. I couldn't do it myself because I couldn't get through reading it. It's too emotional.
00:37:41
Jay Jacobson
And in fact, he would email me and he would say, i understand why you didn't narrate this because for me, who didn't live those stories, I'm having do them three and four cut cuts.
00:37:52
Jay Jacobson
So I'm not breaking up reading. it And so it's very emotionally written. it's ah it's a It's not a long, long book, so it's an easy read or an easy listen.
00:38:04
Jay Jacobson
And so I encourage you to to check it out. um As far as getting in touch with me, you can reach me at my website, jacobsonprostaff.com,
00:38:16
Jay Jacobson
or I'm also on LinkedIn. And one of the other things that we haven't talked about here today is I also run a cookie company, one of my entrepreneurial things that I've delved into.
00:38:32
Jay Jacobson
It's a hobby that went crazy, and now we'll ship as many as 650 dozen cookies a week all over the country.
00:38:38
Luisa Hogan
Amazing.
00:38:40
Jay Jacobson
That's jayscookies.net. But that's that's another place you can find me.
00:38:43
Luisa Hogan
Do you ship to Australia? I don't know. We probably couldn't get them into Australia.
00:38:47
Jay Jacobson
one It takes so long to get in there that by the time they get there,
00:38:50
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:38:52
Jay Jacobson
They're not soft and chewy like they need to be. So
00:38:55
Luisa Hogan
Well, you know what? When I'm in the States next, I'll be definitely looking up yourly looking up your cookies. I feel like there's so much more we could have talked about.
00:39:00
Jay Jacobson
you let me know.
00:39:02
Luisa Hogan
i you know I can't wait to read your book because I'd love to delve more into those stories and I encourage everyone listening to do the same and to to look up your cookies.
00:39:03
Jay Jacobson
Oh, there it is.
00:39:11
Luisa Hogan
You know, talking about your cookie business, have you applied all of the the lessons that you have learnt through your um funeral director work into your cookie business or have you found that you've it's completely separate for you?
00:39:25
Jay Jacobson
You know, those life skills, those people skills translate. And there's something almost primal about giving somebody cookies. It forms a relationship.
00:39:34
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:39:35
Jay Jacobson
and And our cookie business actually started working from my consulting business. We were helping businesses say thank you to their customers. They didn't know how to do it. I said, you know, I'll bake them some cookies. We'll send it out see if it works.
00:39:49
Jay Jacobson
Well, we put a website up in November. And by Christmas, we were doing 250 dozen cookies a week.
00:39:55
Luisa Hogan
Wild.
00:39:55
Jay Jacobson
But we just we work with businesses mostly. We also work with consumers directly. But businesses will send me a list. I want these 50 people sent thank you gifts. We do the baking, the packaging. We even do the thank you notes to go with them and make sure they get delivered or shipped.
00:40:12
Jay Jacobson
And it makes it easy so the business people can focus on what they do to make money.
00:40:17
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:40:17
Jay Jacobson
And we can focus on thanking their customers. We hear over and over from our business clients.
00:40:20
Luisa Hogan
Amazing.
00:40:24
Jay Jacobson
that we've tried a lot of different things to say thank you but this is the only thank you gift that we have ever sent out that our customers send us a thank you for the thank you.
00:40:33
Luisa Hogan
Amazing.
00:40:34
Jay Jacobson
And so that connection is, yeah, yeah.
00:40:34
Luisa Hogan
Well, congratulations on that.
00:40:38
Jay Jacobson
It's a lot of fun to send a smile. After years and years of working in and funerals, we send smiles on the other business.
00:40:41
Luisa Hogan
Yeah.
00:40:45
Luisa Hogan
Yeah, that's what a balance. I've always wondered, it sounds like, you know, like ah people who do, um you know, florists, people who do flower bouquets and send them out. I think what, what a wonderful, happy job because you, you deliver smiles and every time you hand somebody flowers, unless it is for somebody who's grieving, but even then in the grieving moment, you're giving them something that uplifts them. And what a wonderful way to, to live your days is to do that for people.
00:41:11
Jay Jacobson
Yeah, and who doesn't love a nice soft chocolate chip cookie? We didn't,
00:41:15
Luisa Hogan
Oh, my husband's going to be straight on to looking up your cookies because we love we love cookies.
00:41:20
Jay Jacobson
yep.
00:41:22
Luisa Hogan
My daughter would love your cookies. So definitely look that up next time we're in the States. But yeah, thank you so much, Jay.
00:41:29
Jay Jacobson
we
00:41:30
Luisa Hogan
We'll carry on.
00:41:31
Jay Jacobson
ah We do some interesting flavors. We've got things like triple chocolate Guinness espresso. We've got an Irish coffee one that has Bailey's Irish cream and Jameson whiskey in it.
00:41:42
Jay Jacobson
We do a champagne cookie. So we have some unique things and they usually come to me about two o'clock in the morning. I wake up thinking, hey, this would be good.
00:41:51
Luisa Hogan
That's when the best ideas come. I think you need to come to Australia and make those here for us, I think, because Irish irish coffee flavour, oh, my goodness, can you even make a better flavour?
00:41:55
Jay Jacobson
should be there yeah
00:42:01
Luisa Hogan
That's amazing. Oh, well, that's wonderful.
00:42:03
Jay Jacobson
it's wonderful
00:42:05
Luisa Hogan
Well, Jay, thank you so much. We've run out of time today, but I have so appreciated talking to you. um i really resonated a lot with what you've had to say, and I'm sure the listeners will too. Thank you for sharing so authentically with us. And I can't wait to read more about your story and your experiences with the US Senate and, um you know, responding to airplane crashes and, you know, learning those lessons too. So I know that I'm going to get a lot from that. So I appreciate that. um For everyone listening today,
00:42:33
Luisa Hogan
What I've taken out of today talking to Jay is that grief doesn't just change how we feel. it reveals who we are and we're in leadership. That truth is what people will follow long after success. And that is what we need to be aiming for in leadership is finding that authenticity, finding that service, finding that presence.
00:42:55
Luisa Hogan
um so that we as leaders can align ourselves with what is good for the world in general. So thanks again, Jay, and thank you to everyone listening. We'll see you next time.
00:43:06
Jay Jacobson
Thank you.