Who Is Your Yoda?
The Impact Of A Mentor Who Believes In You
First Time Program Director, KEBC Oklahoma City. Age 20
1989. I’m a senior at Northwest Classen High School, working full-time as the nighttime DJ, emceeing concerts, and having the time of my life. Given my hectic schedule of school and baseball, I would usually get to my DJ job around 6:45 pm for a 7 pm shift, and usually nobody else would be around. One night, as I was rolling into the station's parking lot on the south side of Oklahoma City, covered in red dirt from the baseball game, I noticed an unusual number of cars.
Unbeknownst to me, Charlie Marcus, the program director overseeing all the station’s programming, had been fired that afternoon. Staff members were in shock – it was as if someone had died. Scared and confused people just hung around the station that night. Charlie had given me my first chance to be on the air, and he was my first mentor, the first person who believed in me, and he was responsible for catapulting my career. His mentorship was a transformative experience that I’ll forever be grateful for. Without that break and his guidance, there is no doubt my life would have taken a different path. It affected me; I was in shock, too; this was the first time I experienced these feelings.
Mentorship is something that I don’t hear a lot of talk about in the business world. Most of the time, we see experts talking to other experts or experts writing books. The mentor/mentee relationship can be one of the most rewarding aspects of business life. Recognizing and embracing the role of a mentor can be a powerful tool in your professional development. In my case, it’s one of the main reasons for my achievements.
While working on this post, I wanted to list my mentors, so I tried to write down my top five mentors. I quickly became overwhelmed with many names, many more than five. It was like a flood. Oh, what about this one? What about that one? Before too long, I was awash with gratitude for the time, love, and lessons. I stared at the list, amazed at the number of people who helped me, far too many. Name by name was a joyful reminder of gratitude for the time and gifts they offered me. It was a humbling exercise that I hope you can try at some point.
However, one name kept popping into my head, and that person was John Dealy.
Joining XM Satellite Radio in 2004 was never on my radar. I was engaged in an ongoing campaign against them! 'Pay radio' was a term used to describe the concept of radio stations that required a subscription fee, a model I was vocal against. As the President of Programming for “free” radio at Citadel, I frequently spoke out against the idea, even going as far as saying it was laughable and would not work. Then, of course, as it does, the universe likes to have fun with you; that's when Hugh Panero called.
Hugh Panero, the CEO of XM Satellite Radio, got my name through a mutual friend, Andy Schoun. He was looking for a head of programming and broadcast operations based in Washington, DC. I thought I was being punked when he called because I had been so vocal against the idea of pay radio. I sat and listened to him calmly talk about the company from my office in the Upper East Side in New York; he said, “Just come down, check it out.” I said yes; I thought it would give me a great insight into what they were doing and could give me a competitive advantage back in my day job. Or that’s what I thought would happen.
At this point, I had never really listened to XM, so I thought I’d experience the entire consumer experience firsthand. I bought a radio, put it in a rental car, and drove from NYC to DC.
Frankly, I thought the stations were hot garbage—unfocused, sloppy, and poorly programmed. With a background in country music, I zeroed in on those. Somewhere just south of Philadelphia, I realized something. I hadn’t changed the station nor heard a single commercial. I said to myself then and there ‘UH OH,” This may be a bigger problem than I thought. I knew then this business model had a chance. As I have written about before, I was so inside the jar with free radio that I was blind to the actual value proposition satellite radio offered.
The facility was unreal. They had converted an old warehouse in downtown DC into a state-of-the-art studio. Hundreds of studios lined the halls, and a control room had an actual replica of the captain’s chair from Star Trek. (I’m a Trekkie, big points on that!) There were almost 100 state-of-the-art studios. Each studio represents a different channel and genre. There was a state-of-the-art recording hall where they would do live performances; it was broadcasting scale and equipment I hadn’t seen. Hugh showed me around and said, “You don’t have to travel to Iowa anymore. If you want to visit a station, walk down the hall.”
This is where I met John Dealy. John was an advisor to Hugh and the board and a key strategist for the company. John attended all our leadership team meetings at XM. He listened, took notes, and then asked some of the executive's follow-up questions near the end of our meetings. His tenor and tone were quiet, soft, and thoughtful, but the questions were piercing. He would ask the most pointed, laser-focused, simple, and almost impossible-to-answer questions. I was always amazed and found some humor in watching people squirm, trying to answer or sit, hoping to dodge one of John’s inquiries. It was all fun and games until the questions were pointed at me.
In one meeting, I updated the team on some programming plans and ideas I was proposing, and John asked me, “Erik, will this work?” I think I answered with some awful ego answer, like “I think so,” which ignited a whirlwind of a meeting that had everybody questioning our programming strategy, why we were whatever I was proposing, and then questioned everything. The session spun so far off the rails. It was brutal; I thought I had just answered truthfully; I did - it was a full-on train wreck.
Hugh rightfully said, “I want a full strategy ASAP.” Right then and there, I felt exposed. I had no idea where to start writing a strategy at this level. I was a programmer—hell, I was Chuck the Duck just a few years ago! The gag reflex was real; I was sick to my stomach with nerves like never before. John's question challenged my ego and exposed the gaps in our strategy, pushing me to create a much-needed vision. It wasn’t intentional; it was the right question, but my “Imposter Syndrome” was thoroughly triggering, and my mind quickly raced to see if I could get my old job back, thinking this would end badly.
John said, “I’ll do this with Erik.” Hugh said he wanted it ASAP. John replied, “You’ll get it when it’s ready.”When the meeting ended, I thanked John for helping me and, frankly, saving me. I started thinking about my next meeting and agenda as we walked to his office. When we sat, he closed the door and said, “Now you will learn.”
Shocked, scared, and terrified, I started a three-month crash course on strategic thinking and planning on a level I never knew existed. John's mentorship improved my strategic thinking and planning skills and transformed my mindset, preparing me for the challenges and opportunities that lay ahead in my career.
John had a method. He would make me sit in his office as he cleared his desk, got a fresh red felt-tipped pen, and began marking the white paper I wrote to describe my strategy. Stopping at every grammatical error and every incomplete thought, the red felt pen would showcase my average high school education. The sessions took hours. It was grueling. John would ask me a question, and then we’d talk about the ‘why’ and what I was trying to say, and enviably would always say, “Then write that down.” If any experience could be clarifying and confusing all at once, it was this.
One day, he told me to get a roll of dimes. Dimes? Yes, Dimes. I couldn’t remember the last time I walked into a bank and needed a roll of coins, but I did it and showed up with my roll of dimes.
With an updated white paper and a roll of dimes ready, John cracked open another red pen. With every mark, he referred back to the previous revision this time. He looked at me and said, “You didn’t correct this. That costs you a dime.” A few more moments went by—another dime, then another. Within 10 minutes, I was broke, and we had five more pages to go. “Your attention to detail is lacking,” he said. “You’ll either get it sharper or go broke.”
These sessions also allowed John to share his stories with me, such as his time working in the Department of Defense with Robert McNamara, his time as a Law Professor at Georgetown, his time Starting Companies, you name it. I began to learn the wisdom and experience I was gaining. I fell in love with this process and learning from John.
Weeks later, I made it through an edit pass with John, only costing me 60 cents, and it was time to present this strategy. I have never been more proud of a work product or worked so hard. During the leadership team presentation, John didn’t say a thing. Hugh once asked John how much he helped and what he liked. John smiled and said, “This is his work.”
That document is in my office today. It remained the core strategic framework for the next twenty years of my professional life. Later, I realized it was a crash course in so many things, mainly an MBA in strategy. It was the most intense mentor/mentee relationship I have ever had, still to this day. My colleagues and staff who were part of this process, as recent as a few months ago, still tell me about that moment, and one even held up the three-ring binder we made and said, “I keep this everywhere!”
John was my Yoda. Like Luke Skywalker, I was arrogant, led with my ego, and thought I had everything figured out. Rushing from one thing to the next, my experience with John was that of Luke and Yoda in Empire Strikes Back. Yoda knew Luke had to learn the hard way. I was young and needed to be broken down and shown another way; John did just that.
John showed me a better way and taught me many things, but the number one thing he taught me was to be a mentor. The impact of mentorship on the mentee is profound, but I see now the reward of satisfaction when a mentee achieves something or accomplishes their goals. To this day, I have tiny Yodas (now a few Grogus) in my house and a Yoda in every office as a reminder of that experience.
I didn’t see John's mentorship lesson then, but I see it now. It’s one of the greatest career gifts I have ever received.
John passed away several years ago, and I had never had the opportunity to tell him how that experience forged my resolve and knowledge about so many things. The most important thing was to be there when people asked for help or wanted to learn. Any of my former assistants who managed my schedule over the years will attest that if someone wanted to pop by and talk and ask a question and need advice, I’d stop and make time. I’d say yes to a fault, and my schedule would spin wildly out of control.
Being a mentor to others isn’t a switch that flips and you make some magical transformation. It’s fluid and likely has already happened to you. Mentorship is more than just teaching; it's about fostering growth, sharing experiences, and guiding others to find their paths. It's about being there, showing up, and making time for those who seek your guidance. John Dealy taught me that, and in doing so, he taught me how to be the mentor I am today.
So, who is your Yoda? And more importantly, are you ready to be one for someone else?
Erik, you may not have known it then but you were a mentor of sorts to me when you were in radio. You were always willing to talk, explain and teach me about what you were doing which has severed me well all these years. Thank you!