Episode 214: I Left a 33-Year Career to Find My Purpose- David Campbell’s Story

How do you identify complacency before it identifies you? In this episode of The Uncommon Leader, John Gallagher welcomes David Campbell, founder of Fourth Figure, for a deep dive into the psychology of transition and purpose.

With over 33 years of experience in individual and organizational leadership, Dave shares the raw truth about his 2013 "hard luck story" and the moment he realized he was the problem. We explore the Purpose Factor—a lens for making decisions by design rather than fear—and the Law of Sacrifice required to move from "doing good" to becoming "uncommon."

We talk with David Campbell about building Fourth Figure and spend his time coaching, speaking, and developing leaders. We dig into how complacency creeps in, how purpose can replace fear as a decision filter, and what real impact looks like over the long haul.  

In this leadership masterclass, we cover:
• transitioning from corporate leadership to entrepreneurship and why leaving well matters
• spotting complacency in ourselves before it shows up in teams
• building a virtuous cycle of continuous improvement through leadership development
• using the Purpose Factor assessment to clarify fulfillment and guide decisions
• deciding by default versus deciding by design when fear shows up
• handling comfort traps like salary, benefits and health insurance without getting stuck
• faith, meaning and the origin of the Fourth Figure name
• training for longevity by focusing on foundational mobility and joint strength

=====================================================
𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 David Alan Campbell 👇
➡️ LinkedIn (primary): https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidalancampbel/
➡️ Website: https://4thfigure.com/

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Transcript

Deciding By Default Or Design

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You know, if someone asks you to do something, boom, you're gonna make a snap decision and it's going to be based on something from your past that maybe happened before, maybe you know, you just have some memory, and you're gonna say yes or no based on that experience, probably based on fear. Now, what the purpose allows you to do is actually use that as the lens to make decisions. So if you think about the two ways you make decisions, it's either by default or by design. And by default is when, hey, I let my subconscious make the quick decision for me, it's the gator brain, boom, had a bad experience with that 30 years ago. I'm not gonna actually remember the story, but my brain goes, nope, don't do it. And so I make a decision based on fear. But by design, if you can understand what your purpose is and then say, wait a second, this may this opportunity or this situation may cause some fear, but if I look through the lens of my purpose, should I move forward? And so it kind of gives you that new direction or a new way to leverage your purpose to make decisions.

Dave’s Leap Into Solo Ownership

SPEAKER_01 1:10

Hey Uncommon Leaders, welcome back. This is the Uncommon Leader Podcast. I'm your host, John Gallagher. How about this? The first five-time guest on the Uncommon Leader Podcast. I am excited to have a friend, fellow West Virginia Mountaineer, and now fellow entrepreneur who's gonna tell you a story about moving from corporate America over into the entrepreneurial world of solo ownership. My friend Dave Campbell, welcome to the Five Timers Club. Welcome back to the Uncommon Leader Podcast. How's it going, my friend?

SPEAKER_00 1:40

Hey, John, thanks so much for having me. I'm looking forward to getting the t-shirt that says five-time guest on it. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

And it's gonna be a t-shirt, it's gonna be a robe. We're gonna get to the robe just like this. I know we're gonna have that five timers club robe. Absolutely. So it'll show up in the mail. Are you a Schmedium? What size are you now? You've been losing weight and getting stronger. What are you green jacket? No, so so things have changed, man. Look, last four times, the first four times we had you on the podcast, and I was going back through some notes here. I mean, we're over 200 now uh episodes in. You were on episode 188, but you were also all the way back to like episode four and episode eight as well. You've been on several times. We've talked about engagement, we've talked about culture, we've talked about masterminds and doing hard things and doing trifecta's and Spartan races and things like that. And things continue to change for you. And since we've chatted on the podcast just a few months back, things have changed once again. What's going on in your life? Tell the listeners of the Uncommon Leader Podcast what's happening with you.

SPEAKER_00 2:39

Yeah, so thanks, John. So actually, you know, I've been looking forward to this conversation for that very reason because I remember you asking me or saying as we ended the last podcast, I look forward to hearing what's changed the next time. And so for the past probably year and a half, my wife and I have been talking about the next move. You know, I've worked in some corporate role, corporate America, if you will, for 33 years. And I've gotten to the point where I was doing what I love in my most recent job, but about 30 to 40% of the time where I was teaching and speaking and coaching on leadership and personal development, and I was weaving it into my existing job, but it wasn't really 100% my job. And I had made the decision last year that it was it was time. You know, I'd worked with Maxwell Leadership for almost eight years and just really wanted to get behind a cause and a movement that I could really get excited about and bring to people because I felt like I had something to offer. So yeah, December 18th was my last day working for a wonderful company and my transition out went really well. You know, I one of your past guests, Jeff Henderson, wrote a book called What's Next, and one of his main things was leave well. So I made sure I left well and then jumped in full speed ahead in January. So now I own my own company and I am uh filling my calendar and loving it.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

Yeah, you think about that in the in the business card founder and CEO of Fourth Figure that named your company. We'll get into that just a little bit as well. But you think about that, and I we we chatted about this just a little bit before we hit the record button because you know you and I go back to the college days, no doubt, about a friends and weddings and all those different things and grown on our leadership journey all the way through. And one of the things in your bio in your LinkedIn bio talks about 33 experience in manufacturing and leadership. So that number strikes me as a really odd number because we're not old enough really to be have done 33 years of experience. But look, tell me a little bit about what that journey feels like for you, however far you want to go back and what that leadership development journey has been for you to get to this point where you

A 33 Year Leadership Journey

SPEAKER_01 4:45

are today, Dave. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 4:46

Yeah, I guess if I look back at 33 years, it has gone by much quicker than I ever expected it to. I still remember when I first started working for Ford right out of college, I had this vision that I would work for 30 years for Ford and then retire. Of course, when you work in corporations, things get bought and sold, and we get initially got spun off and became a parts company, supplier to Ford Motor Company. But when I look back on the career as a whole, there's chapters. You know, there are chapters when I was working on the floor in manufacturing, and that's where I learned how to work really closely with people and communicate and get things done. There's times when I worked in engineering, and then I was moved up through through more leadership types of roles. There was just, like I said, there's just chapters where things happened really well, and then I always got to the point where I was ready to go try the next thing. And I've gone through now quite a few roles. Even when I worked at TE, I went through four jobs there in about 12 and a half years. I'm always looking for the next opportunity to serve and just make the most of the career. But yeah, 33 years, it's hard to believe. But I don't feel like I worked 33 years. I think that's the good thing. I feel I still have to do that.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

Yeah, we're talking about that like this. Some of the conversations we have with some of the folks that are uh younger than us getting started on this journey, we're like, man, we were there not too long ago. And we know uh we we talked about beforehand as well. We both follow Rory Vaden. We've read his book, Wealthy and Well Known. And he says, you know, really on the cover of that book, we're most powerfully positioned to help the person that we once were. And you feel that. Was there a moment, and this is this is interesting, and I we hadn't talked about this, but where you recognize I want to do this on my own? I mean, you've worked for big companies, you've worked for small companies, and each of the roles you've been in, I think by anybody's standards, you you would say you've been successful in those roles as well. But was there a moment you remember that says, man, I want to I want to kind of go out and do this on my own?

SPEAKER_00 6:33

So, you know, through that journey with Maxwell Leadership, so back in 2018, I joined Maxwell Leadership, but I was using a lot of the material and the learnings and the teachings in my job within TE. But then as I started noticing the potential impact to industry that was there, because one of the main things that I was focusing on, one was leadership development and getting engagement of leaders, but really it came down to creating what you notice on my website is that virtuous cycle of continuous improvement. And it's not just process improvement, it's really improvement of the people or you as a person, your personal improvement journey. And I started seeing that potential. And the model that I was looking at really was foundationally based on leadership and then the personal growth, but then employee engagement based on your engagement as a leader. And when you look at the statistics, I just started seeing the impact that I could have and thought, you know what, I can do this inside one company, but how wonderful would it be to go out and see how much impact I could really have out in a bigger industry? Because if you look at the latest Gallup poll, it says 31% of employees are engaged. That's not 31% of employees are disengaged, it's 31% of employees are engaged. It's got to add up to billions and billions, if not trillions of dollars, right, for companies. And they're just missing that opportunity because they don't see the leadership need that's there.

SPEAKER_01 7:57

I love that. You know, you think I I look at the mission of what you're trying to do, Dave. You talk, you touched on it said you want to recognize, remedy, and prevent complacency in both individuals and organizations. That word is something that kind of as in conversations with you, it's in been been in conversations with our accountability group as we talk about that. We don't want to be complacent. Tell me about that word and that that problem that you solved that's kind of energized you or been a catalyst to you on this journey.

Complacency That Cost A Job

SPEAKER_00 8:25

Yeah, that's a great question because this really comes back to 2013. I'm running operations for a cycling company. I'm living the dream, right? I'm riding my bike all the time, I'm in great shape. The plant's doing well, the company's doing well. And then my boss came down from Chicago one day and he said, Hey, we're going a different direction. And I wasn't in it. What? What just happened? You know, seven years with the company and now I don't work there anymore. So I spent a lot of time, probably years, being angry about that situation. I thought for a long time that my message was going to be my hard luck story. How could they do this to me? I lost my job. I came back, I built my way back, I found another job, I worked on my personal development, I became a better leader, and I thought that was my story for years. And then as I started to reflect more and more, I realized that, and this was tough, believe me, this was a tough pill to swallow, but I finally realized that it was really my own doing. I had let complacency sneak into my life and my career. We were doing great. Well, let me rephrase that. We were doing good, and we were doing good enough. We were making our margins, we were shipping the right parts, and I got comfortable. And it took me years to get to the point where I could actually reflect on that and say, you know what? You have no one to blame but yourself. Now, what are you going to do about it? So, as I've built this model to help leaders actually one, like you said, see complacency in their company, see complacency in their employees, but I think more importantly, see it in themselves so that they can prevent it. Because if you're not in some kind of continuous improvement cycle, you're you're going to get comfortable at some point. And it's going to sneak in and it's going to stay, right? That's that's the and you you have to be able to see the complacency. You have to be able to catch it before it actually turns into a problem. And that that's what I work on. I think that's what I bring to the table now is that I I actually did it. I would have never admitted it for a long time. It took me a long time to be able to say I was the problem, but now I realize that I can bring that to the table and say, hey, you know what? How many times do you catch yourself going, hey, we're doing pretty good? And maybe that's not good enough, right? Yeah, that's that's the tough thing.

SPEAKER_01 10:35

Look, I think about this from a personal standpoint, and again, um the impact that I know that you want to have with the individuals that you work with, and how many people aren't aware that you know they really are. Settling might be too strong of a word, but certainly rationalizing that things are good enough. And not being able to live out, and we're gonna talk about this, their purpose that they were called to do for the sake of you know, things are things are good enough, and there's a comfort. Look, I I thought the same before I got started in this world five years ago. There was a comfort to a regular salary that was very important and made it difficult to make that change. And I'm sure you went through some of that again. When you do well in your space, you get recognized for that, you get more opportunities. Generally, that makes things pretty good from a compensation standpoint. So, you know, how did you overcome that from a comfort standpoint thinking about that to go out on your own?

SPEAKER_00 11:31

That's a great question. So I don't know if you ever get over the discomfort. You have to realize that when you find that point of discomfort, that's the time to move forward. You know, and I don't want to call it a trap because so many of us have worked in corporate jobs, and I was very blessed to have worked as many years as I did in corporate roles, and I and I really enjoyed it. I learned so much. So I owe a lot to my experience

Continuous Improvement For Leaders

SPEAKER_00 11:55

from these companies. But you do get caught up in the fact that, hey, you're making pretty good money, you've got pretty good benefits, but then it stops there, right? You go, wait a second, is there a bigger room somewhere? Is there a bigger place? What else is out there? Is this where I'm supposed to hit my plateau? And as I've gotten out into the entrepreneurial world and I see what's going on, you start to really open your eyes and go, wait a second, there is so much more out here. Not even just so much from an income standpoint, but from a personal fulfillment standpoint, getting out on your own and getting uncomfortable is probably one of the best things that you can do. And I think working in a corporate role for so many years, it brought me a lot of benefit, don't get me wrong. But being willing to step out and go, okay, this is gonna get really uncomfortable. Oh, let's just do it, right? Because hey, one of the things I found that holds a lot of us, and I'm not throwing stones, it held us in place for a long time, especially as the kids were growing up, health insurance. Yeah. Well, if you leave a company, then you got to get health insurance. Okay. And I'm not downplaying it because that's what kept me in place for a long time. But then you say, Well, okay, well, what if I make enough money to pay for my health insurance? Right? Is that really what's holding me here? Why am I settling for a pretty good salary and health insurance? Is that really what I want to define? Right?

SPEAKER_01 13:12

And so I'm gonna guess that you face that. You face that with people then too. So not just with people that you work with, but people outside uh in your sphere of influence saying, dude, are you crazy? Like, what are you doing? I mean, how do you have those conversations, right? I mean, I I I get that. Like, I why would you why would you leave something like that? Uh you know, how do you answer that question?

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Well, you know, delicately, probably, because I I don't want to offend anybody. Look, this was our our choice to do this, but it's a conversation a conversation that I first had to have with myself and with my wife, right? That hey, are we willing to give up these things so that we can have more? You if you want to move up, you have to give something up, right? You have to sacrifice something. I'll sacrifice. So, you know, I I read the audience when I'm talking to somebody about it because you know, a lot for a lot of folks, it is okay. And there's nothing wrong with staying in a role with a company. It, you know, companies are are helping a lot of people. So I don't want to ever dismiss that. But if there's somebody that's trying to figure out what the next step is, or is there more, my my encouragement to them is to start looking into what is outside of that nor what's become normal as far as corporate roles, right? Just you know, start asking around and question what you think you believe, right? You know, or what you've been told. Be willing to at least question it. It may be that you stay where you are, I don't know. And that's okay. But it may be that there's something much, much bigger for you.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

What have you found that's interesting? And you said that or maybe there's something much, much bigger. What was some of the unsolicited advice you may have received that you had to set aside as you went through this analysis? And it could have taken it could have been years of analysis for you, but unsolicited advice that you got. You don't have to throw anybody under the bus necessarily.

SPEAKER_00 14:56

But I I won't, and I'll probably I'll answer it um pretty vaguely, honestly, because the unsolicited advice

Trading Security For Fulfillment

SPEAKER_00 15:05

comes in in volumes. Um I think it's become such a habit for people to they hear part of your story and then it just all of a sudden becomes down to oh, here's what you should do, without even understanding how long I've been researching this, or you know what my wife and I've been talking about, or what my bigger plans are, or how long I've been researching and working with Maxwell leadership, for example. But the unsolicited advice, I've I get to the point now where I smile and try to be gracious. I probably in the a few years ago I would have gotten defensive, and now I just go this is uh it's just part of people's habits, right?

SPEAKER_01 15:47

It's what in and of itself, that's a great personal development point, is that you get you become aware of it now, you smile about it and you kind of let it go versus giving it the energy uh that others would want to be giving you. What have you found in the few months in that world from a discipline standpoint, from a habit standpoint, what have you missed the most from corporate America kind of thing? And then maybe you know, what do you actually enjoy uh from being an entrepreneur standpoint? There's probably a couple sides of that.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

Well, I think if you look at what I miss the most from the company, I built I worked the last company I worked for was you know almost 80,000 employees, and I was privileged and blessed to be able to travel the world and make some amazing friends, right? So, and I was in contact with them all the time. So that's probably the one thing I I miss. But luckily I did, you know, we have LinkedIn, so I connected with you know 2,000 plus employees there on LinkedIn. So, you know, I still post and hear back from people. Oh, that's great. But other than that, I mean I did enjoy the challenge sometimes. But like I said earlier, I was doing what I really wanted to do and loved doing, which was impacting others and helping them become aware of their level of influence and potential. I was doing that 30 to 40 percent of the time and just wanted to get to a point where I could do that all the time. So now that I'm out and doing this on my own, the days, I don't know, even Susan said, Hey, you just seem so much happier, right? Because I feel like I own my time again. That first Sunday evening where I didn't not like Monday mornings, but you know, you start thinking about gosh, oh, here are all the things I have to get done this week. And so Sunday nights could get stressful, right? And now Sunday nights are not stressful. Now I still have to deliver. Well, I'm still out here building a business, but it's all on me, right? You know, you know, my boss, my boss is me. And you know, I I think you saw my post on LinkedIn this morning, right? Whereas me looking in the mirror, right? And that's in the mirror, right?

SPEAKER_01 17:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

We need to spend a lot of time there as leaders, right? We need to look at ourselves and question how we're behaving. And are we staying consistent? Are we staying disciplined? Are we doing what we said we were going to do? Right?

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Yeah, that self-assessment that goes on. And we get we get plenty of time for that. I mean, I think in that space like the Sunday nights, that's a great observation in terms of how that feels different in the world that we are now. There is a there is a freedom, but there's a responsibility that comes with that freedom that goes on with it because it's all on our shoulders now. We're the ones that got to work at it from a business development standpoint. You've mentioned this a couple times, you're like 30 to 40 percent of your time, you know, you were doing uh what you felt on my word, kind of in the zone uh in terms of your work that you love to do, and now you get to do that 100% of the time. Where does that manifest? Is that in like um and the topic that we're kind of really going to go to now is purpose. How did you align you know that with your decision? And then how does that feed you and inspire you today?

SPEAKER_00 18:41

So, what I was doing for the 30 to 40 percent of the time was coaching and mentoring people. I was teaching and facilitating leadership classes, I was bringing people in to raise their level of awareness of how they influenced other people, whether they knew it or not, and then how they could get into that cycle of their own personal continuous improvement so that their teams would get into the same cycle of continuous improvement and it would spread organically. And so now when I look at it, what am I doing now? My job now is it's a little bit different initially because I'm trying to build clientele and find clientele or find people and company owners and CEOs that are interested in what's next, what could be better, what could I improve upon. So, right now, the the biggest thing I'm doing is getting out and meeting people, which I absolutely love, but then talking to them about you know what's next for them. How do they actually understand their level of influence and what does it look like inside their company? And how do they start to focus on what's their purpose? Right. So you asked me about purpose, and one of the things that I've become very, very excited about is I've been working with Maxwell leadership. So I have, you know, the coaching experience, the public speaking experience. I have access to a lot of material with Maxwell that I can use for coaching and facilitation, disc assessments, you know, a lot of those things. But now we also have what's called the purpose factor. So it's another assessment that you can do, it takes about 25 minutes. But what the purpose factor really does is helps you get clarity on you know what fulfills you most. And if you think about the definition of purpose, it's to be able to offer the best of what you have in the service of others. And so if you want to put it into you know a quick analogy, if you think about the way we make decisions as humans, unfortunately for most of us and myself included, we make decisions based on fear, and most of the time it's unconscious. You know, if someone asks you to do something, boom, you're gonna make a snap decision and it's going to be based on something from your past that maybe happened before, maybe you know, you just have some memory and you're gonna say yes or no based on that experience, probably based on fear. Now, what the purpose allows you to do is actually use that

The Purpose Factor Decision Lens

SPEAKER_00 20:55

as the lens to make decisions. So if you think about the two ways you make decisions, it's either by default or by design. And by default is when, hey, I let my subconscious make the quick decision for me, it's the gator brain, boom, had a bad experience with that 30 years ago. I'm not gonna actually remember the story, but my brain goes, nope, don't do it. And so I make a decision based on fear. But by design, if you can understand what your purpose is, and then say, wait a second, this may this opportunity or this situation may cause some fear, but if I look through the lens of my purpose, should I move forward? And so it kind of gives you that new direction or a new way to leverage your purpose to make decisions, which so I love that in terms of using using the lens too, is that you know what lens you can look at if you understand what your purpose is.

SPEAKER_01 21:43

I've done that purpose factor assessment. I would encourage those who are kind of listening in to contact Dave about potentially doing that because I was uh you know, I got through it, I was like, whoa, I mean, this is like kind of nailed it right on the head with regards to how I think and how I want to add value with what's happening. So I think the tool is perfect. Pretty accurate, no doubt about it. And then when you can take that and apply that to the work that you're doing, and when if you're able to work in that zone of purpose, you're really talking about you get a strength in something that's usually going to rely, usually gonna lie in your purpose, you're gonna be able to teach that. You're gonna be able to inspire others. And the point of what you were talking about on your website, maximizing impact and helping others realize what their potential is, including what their purpose is, so that they can work in an area that carries out their purpose, their reason for being, if you will. That's right. I think that's really cool. Yeah. You've you've done this already with several folks. I mean, you've gone through the we'll call it the training with the Maxwell Leadership Group. Has there been an aha moment for you and your own personal assessment on the purpose side? Or maybe someone that you've worked with, you're like, whoa, you're like, I can't believe it went that well, so to speak.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

You know, I think for me, the purpose factor assessment for me when I took it, because we just found out we were gonna be able to start doing this in December, and then I signed up for it as soon as I could in January. It was reassuring for me. Um, it really helped affirm some of the things that I thought when I started looking at, hey, am I ready to go out on my own and work with others to inspire them around a cause, right? And create memorable experiences. And that's exactly what I'm supposed to be doing, and that's what I enjoy the most. It's what fulfills me. And I think I can do that in the service of others. So for me, it was very reassuring. Now I've had quite a few people take the assessment and I'm working through and scheduling the conversations, but I've had some really amazing conversations with people so far where they just look through it. It's almost it's it's not dissimilar from disc in the point that you learn a lot about yourself that you probably already knew, but it puts it into words for you. Right now it's different than disc because disk is really about your default communication styles. This is really about what fulfills you and how do you use that in the service of others. But for the folks that I have had the opportunity to speak with, it's been um eye-opening for them and encouraging for them. I think some folks are gonna find it helps them make that decision to take the next step, maybe be willing to move outside of their comfort zone, which would be, I think, really fulfilling for me just to see some people go, okay. I I did this assessment, I did some coaching with Dave, and then I made the move, and it was the best decision I ever made. So that's what I'm really looking for.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

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SPEAKER_01 24:15

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SPEAKER_00 25:18

Yeah, you know, when you look back at some of those periods in your life where maybe you made a mistake or something didn't work out the way you had thought it was going to. I try not to begrudge myself too much because one of the things that this actually did for me, and I will answer your question, but you know, it created

Lessons From Pain And Timing

SPEAKER_00 25:35

this situation of enough pain for me that I had to do something different, right? And I took away from that that I would never let myself get in that situation again, but I did, right? So it gave me some of that clarity and it headed me down this path. If I could go back and talk to myself from the 2013, I'd certainly want to shake myself and go, hey, look, you're heading down the wrong path. We have a minister that says you got every mile of road has got two miles of ditch, you know, and you're you're starting to drift off, right? You got twice the opportunity. I know, right? And you know, I think I don't know if I was ready to hear it then, you know. Um, you you would like to think if someone was able to go back and say, hey, you know what, you you might be heading off into the ditch over here. I probably wasn't mature enough at that point to see it. Uh, and I feel like one of the things that, you know, the trauma that we go through and the tough times that we go through are not the blessing themselves, but the lesson that we can take from those is the is the blessing, right? So I went through that experience for a reason. I couldn't see the reason at the time, but it really set me up with one, it got me to the point where I said I need to do some personal development and get out of this, you know, spiral, but it also put me in a situation where now I can go have a bigger impact and hopefully catch people soon enough so that they can see the complacency before it creeps in.

SPEAKER_01 26:58

I think that's the I think that's the big thing. There's an awareness that you're trying to get them to. You're like, I didn't even realize that I was complacent. And what I what I appreciate about the output of the purpose factor, that tool, is it allows you to ask that question. So tell me what you're doing today and how well does that align with your purpose factor? Like, I'm not sure that it does. And so I think it will bring some uncertainty into them. It will take them out of their comfort zone, hopefully just a learning zone, not the panic zone in terms of where you go there. But it could take them there. Also, you know, as you said that 2013, I remember there was a book that I received as a gift in 2012 from a mentor, the monk who sold his Ferrari. And, you know, it was I realized and remembering it was a gift is because it was like 2019 before I read it. I had had it uh about seven years, and one of the very first quotes inside of that uh book said, When the student is ready, the teacher will arrive. And you touched on it. You may not have been ready to hear that story quite back then. And sometimes hopefully we s we realize that before it's too late on our journey. I think um you know you've got the sweet spot in terms of what's happening. You and Susan are are realizing and and recognizing certainly the things have changed since we last talked as well. You're also uh a grandfather now, which is a little bit different since the last time we chatted. Or okay, a lot different in terms of putting that beside your name as well, that that moniker, that title, which is really cool. But how has that impacted

Grandparent Freedom And Travel Flexibility

SPEAKER_01 28:25

you and what you're doing right now as well?

SPEAKER_00 28:27

Well, I'll tell you this, John. Being a grandparent is better than they said it was. You know, I I always heard, oh, being a grandparent's the best. And I I wasn't I wasn't letting that sink in, and now I see it. Seeing your children actually take care of children uh to me has been an amazing experience. Um, I will tell you that also now that Susan and I are both on entrepreneurial journeys, it's even that much um better because we can travel whenever we need to. And you know, Susan's trying to plan between visiting our family in Alabama and Texas, you know, both of our grandchildren are spread out, and one's in Alabama and one's in Texas. And, you know, just having that ability to say on a Sunday evening, you know what? I think I'm gonna go to Texas on Tuesday. Okay. All right. Yeah, it's like done. And Susan's in Texas, so there you go.

SPEAKER_01 29:16

Yeah. You talked about, so you're talking about the the virtual cycle of personal development. Uh, you talked about your pastor uh mentioning an uh a phrase to you about every mile of road has two miles of ditch. I just love that on each side. Yeah, you gotta stay, stay, keep it in the road. How has faith played a part in this journey for you as well? Your faith?

SPEAKER_00 29:35

Well, it it is it's kind of that foundation because you know I continue to remind myself that I have to believe that you know I'm being led to do something, you know. And my faith is that if I continue to deliver and do it for the right reasons, then then I'll be fulfilled and then my mission will be fulfilled. So I just believe that you know I have a lot to offer, and my faith in God is just kind of move me moving me forward in that. And I just keep, you know, just continuously be praying and and gracious and grateful for the opportunity to be able to do this at this time.

SPEAKER_01 30:10

Yeah, I love that. And I and I know it's it's played a big impart intentionally as well. The name of your company is fourth figure. Yes, tell tell me where that where that name comes from.

SPEAKER_00 30:19

Yeah. So, you know, I came up with that name. I was prayerfully looking for a name, and I wanted a name of a company that didn't say necessarily David Campbell coaching. There's nothing wrong with those kind of names. I just wanted something a little bit more, maybe with hey, it could be just a standalone almost. I'll say something like Nike, right? Recognizable. You can put it on a shirt and it just looks cool. So I there was that, but you know, I did want some a name that meant something. And I I love the the way I found the name because you know, one of my I'll tell you, one of the stories that I tell myself is I'm not really good at witnessing,

Faith And The Fourth Figure Story

SPEAKER_00 30:55

and I think that God has a wonderful sense of humor because how about if he said, How about if I give you a name of a company where you may, if someone asks, you get to witness. So yeah, you get me emotional. So Okay, and I knew I'd get one of those in there. Absolutely. No, it's all good, it's good because I was I was praying about it and I'm reading scripture and I'm reading Daniel 325, and and I'm reading a version of it where it's he's talking about the King Nebuchadnezzar, you know, he wanted everybody to bow before him, and the three young men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, would not bow before King Nebuchadnezzar, so he sentenced them to burn in a in a furnace. And when Nebuchadnezzar threw them in the furnace and he turned it up seven times, you know, and the soldiers outside even died, he looked inside that furnace and he saw a fourth figure. And that that love. When I read that, when I read that, I was like, and I just I wrote it down because you know you thoughts are fleeting, right? And I wrote it down, I let it marinate for a few days, and I told Susan about it, and she's like, That sounds really cool. And I'm I initially even was gonna go fourth figure leadership, fourth figure coaching, and then I was and I said, No, you know what? It's just gonna stand on its own, it's just going to be fourth figure. And then it, you know, people say, Well, what does that mean? And then there's my opportunity, right?

SPEAKER_01 32:07

There's your opportunity to witness, absolutely. God is with you. You know, I think it's plenty of people say, How does God talk to you? And many times we're looking for this audible voice to come out of the clouds and say, do this, and here's your name. But it's when you have that, it's when you have that discipline of staying in the word, a reading, a learning, that he'll talk to you through that word. I absolutely love that story and I appreciate you sharing it. And I I frankly appreciate the emotion behind that from you as well in terms of that story. Three months since we chatted last. Any good books that you've had you've been reading that uh uh have have impacted you recently?

SPEAKER_00 32:42

Uh well, you know I'm reading Chris Robinson's book right now, and I and I say that you know because I I heard him on your podcast, and uh and I I'm not sure why it took me so long to get his book. Of course, I'm just about finished with that. I am reading the Bible again, doing the daily Bible reading, and then I've read I'm reading Chris's book. I've got a few more in the queue, but I'm always digging, and I I love Chris's approach because he's helping me now look more intentionally at the books that I pick. Uh so I can't tell you what the next book is gonna be. I have a list, I have quite a stack, so I'm not sure what I'm gonna read after I finish.

SPEAKER_01 33:14

Well, and his his version of complacency in that book, I mean that that was like boom, that just smashed in. His was drift. We will drift to drift. Things will be okay, and we won't even recognize that how many years later before we figure it out. And I know you and I are having a big conversation with regards to bigger rooms uh and what that means. And ultimately, you know, there our accountability group, Raise the Average, is what it's really about, is continuing to grow in such a way that we have impact on others, but also recognizing that we need to be in rooms where others are ahead of us and that's right, can continue to help us develop, help us to grow, and challenge us to grow. And I think that book does a phenomenal job of from drift to drive, from drift to drive, I think is the name of the book. From drift to drive, yeah. It's a drift to drive. Yeah. Uh phenomenal book that uh certainly we would suggest. Excited that you continue to uh dive into scripture uh and understand that as well. So you're continuing to invest in yourself. Uh, what about on the health side? How's everything going on the uh fitness journey for you as well?

SPEAKER_00 34:16

It's great. You know, if if anybody listened to our podcast before where we did the three Spartan races last year, uh I've taken a little bit of different approach, so I'm still exercising every day, but I've switched it around. And and my analogy to this one is it's a little bit of the ego where, you know, when I learned how to play golf, the first thing I wanted to do was hit the ball 300 yards, and then I'd work on my chipping and putting. And if you think about golf in that way, chipping and putting is where it's actually the most important. And so when we got into the the uh Spartan races and strength training, which I was already working on, some strength training, but I wasn't really focusing on the foundational things that actually make our muscular system work, and that's why you end up with minor injuries, maybe some severe injuries, maybe why my hip is taking three months to get back to where I can go up and down the stairs without. I went to physical therapy today for my hip as well. I think we're both learning. I am very focused on the foundational level system strength of my joints this year. That's kind of my main focus. I'm still doing the cardio and still lifting weights every every week, but I'm spending a lot more time on my foot, ankle, knee, hips, shoulders, everything that is mobile, that's not necessarily a muscle that I was probably not paying enough attention to last year. You know what? When I first hurt my hip last year, it was early, probably I think it was May. I was in China and I'm on a treadmill in the morning running in the gym, and I felt amazing. And I was like, hey, this would be a great time to go maybe do some sprints. And so I'm like cranking the treadmill up as fast as I could. I'm sprinting, and then I'd slow down and do some you know interval training. It was amazing until the next day

Fitness Foundations And Long Term Health

SPEAKER_00 35:55

when I could barely walk, uh, because I had never actually trained to do sprints, you know, and I hadn't worked on my my hip strength and all these other things. So again, I'm trying to hit the ball 300 yards when the objective of the game is to get the ball in the hole, right? And it's like I I missed my mark a little bit. I I don't regret anything we did last year and the years before of getting into shape because those Spartan races were amazing growth opportunities where we redefined our limits, I think, or we're still trying to find our limits, but I'm stepping back a little bit to uh build on the foundation. I love that.

SPEAKER_01 36:27

And I love that just the longevity component of that that we've been focused on. You know, again, I I keep thinking about you know saying the number of our age, and it is uh a number, it's a real number. Um, but you know, the the more we can extend the healthy side of that number, the more we can do from a mobility standpoint, from a nutrition standpoint. Right. Certainly we'll continue to do hard things. There's no doubt about it. I think we'll try to do uh things that stretch us beyond that, but it positions us for uh healthier life going forward, which is a lot of work. Dave, so we're on episode, I don't know, 210 or something like that. We're the first five-time guest on the Uncommon Leader Podcast. Again, the the road will be coming your way. The tenth time you're on when it's episode 500. What's the impact you want fourth figure to have had on the world when we're going through that episode?

SPEAKER_00 37:14

What are you gonna talk about? I'm gonna talk about how many times I've been on the stage and how many hundreds of thousands of people I've talked to or impacted and maybe not even realizing how many people have been impacted. I do videos every week on uh Wednesdays on LinkedIn, and I know that's starting to grow, but now I have a website. I want to get on bigger stages, I want to get into bigger rooms, so I don't know that it's gonna take that long to get to your 500th episode. When is that projected?

SPEAKER_01 37:39

But you know, I want to hear two and I'm in it at 50 a year or so again. I'm I think we've been talking about maybe adding an episode to it. So it might be just a couple years from now in terms of 500. You'll have to see. So two, three. But I think if it's on the current trend, we're talking about you know, four or five years out, absolutely. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

Yeah, so I mean, I I want to hear that I've impacted hundreds of thousands of lives, right? And I don't mean that from an ego standpoint. Yeah, I want people to on their own come to that conclusion that there was so much more, and maybe they heard something I said or they heard something that I said to somebody else, and then they said it. So, right, that impact doesn't have to be directly from me. You know, I'm impacting, you're impacting people, this podcast is impacting people. And so you and I aren't gonna actually know how many people we impact, but just being aware that every time we interact with someone or someone sees us do something, that has the potential to influence their behavior, just knowing that that's expanding and growing exponentially. So, yeah, hundreds of thousands of people and there we go.

SPEAKER_01 38:39

And I love the discussion of that on impact. You're not talking about how big your company's gonna be, you're gonna be 20 employees or something like that. It's gonna be about the impact of people. For me, that's the greatest story ever told. That, you know, again, when people say, this guy, Gamble, he had a positive impact on my life. That's the greatest story ever told. You may not even know some of the people that are already

Impact Goals And How To Connect

SPEAKER_01 38:55

saying that, Dave, and the impact that you've had. Uh, we tease, we laugh a little bit. Uh, you know, Dave and I met back in the late 80s, uh, back in college. And before we hit the record button here, we talked about that time and how I was just listening to Garth Brooks Radio. You know, this is the guy that introduced me to country music. I was like, what the heck is this country music thing? And then he he introduced me to Susie Boggus and Trisha Yearwood and Garth Brooks and Dwight Yoakum and all these others, and he even had me bear buying a pair of cowboy boots before I graduated from college that I never would have thought of. That's just a small impact, but the impact you've had on me as a friend and as a leader in terms of your growth and and growing there has uh has been even more as well. And I know you'd be on that list and I know you're gonna have an impact uh with the work that you're doing. How do you want people to get in touch with you uh and continue to learn more about what you're gonna be doing?

SPEAKER_00 39:47

Yeah, so certainly, you know, you can always reach out on email. It's just David at Fourth Figure, and that's the number for TH. So fourthfigure.com. I have my website, fourfigure.com. Certainly connect with me on LinkedIn would be fabulous. And you can also schedule a free 30-minute call with me through LinkedIn, uh, or just send me a note and we'll put some time on our calendars to talk.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

Yeah, I look forward to the impact again that's gonna have. The purpose factor, the work that you're doing with the assessments, the coaching and workshops you're gonna do, Dave, it's gonna be pretty phenomenal. So I would encourage folks to go out, take a look at his website, connect with him and have a conversation with him. Get on LinkedIn. The Wednesday wake-up call is always there from Dave and the story and the and the leadership tips that he has that he uses to continue to grow, uh, and they're gonna help you to grow as well. So, Dave, five-timer club medium will be coming your way. Uh, because we may have been like a large restaurant. I was looking back through some of the pictures even of the episodes that we've done and how we've changed physically in the last few years from an improvement standpoint has been has been phenomenal too. Uh not to mention the space and the faith's growth and our families growing, the impact that you're having. So cool. Thank you so much for adding so much value to the listeners, the Uncommon Leader podcast. I look forward to many more, and I wish you the best in this uh business venture you're going on, okay?

SPEAKER_00 41:04

Thanks, John. I really appreciate the conversation. It was great.

SPEAKER_01 41:07

Until next time, go and grow champions.