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HOST: This leadership development podcast is brought to you by: Ovi Vasquez, Inspirational Leadership Keynote Speaker. Fatherless farm boy from rural Guatemala—Inspiring teams to peak performance. He challenges teams to embrace change and step into bold leadership through leadership culture. He grew up in a village without electricity, learned English in two years, graduated from high school in three years, earned a B.A. in management, in two years. Ovi has worked for Apple, Tesla, Salesforce, and Uber. He is a TEDx speaker, author, and social entrepreneur.

GUEST BIO: Meet David Hawthorne, Chief People Officer at Anchor Point Management Group, leading 16,000 employees across 23 states. With 24 years at Anchor Point, David brings non-traditional HR thinking, radical transparency, and accountability-driven leadership to restaurant and beauty franchise operations. Raised in a military family and the first college graduate in his family, David leads with discipline, clarity, and people-first values.

Find our guest at: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thedhawthorne
Find our host at: https://www.ovinspires.com

Leadership Development Keywords: executive leadership, people operations, accountability culture, transparent communication, talent retention, franchise leadership, organizational change, resilience, expectation setting, workforce development

Leadership Development Summary: In this episode, David Hawthorne defines leadership as being the role model others choose to follow. Drawing from an impactful high school English teacher and early restaurant managers who gave direct feedback, he explains why communication and accountability drive results. David shares how transparency builds trust, how expectations reduce confusion, and why safe, honest dialogue retains high performers. His insights apply directly to executives managing scale, performance pressure, and multi-state teams.

10 Takeaways on Leadership Development
✅ Leadership starts with role modeling
✅ Set clear expectations early
✅ Communicate good and bad news
✅ Accountability drives execution
✅ Resilience sustains long-term growth
✅ Promote communicators, not just technicians
✅ Give responsibility to grow leaders
✅ Don’t underestimate your team
✅ Retain top performers through proximity
✅ Culture is created by leadership behavior

5 Titles for Leadership Development
✅ Leadership Is Role Modeling
✅ Accountability Without Excuses
✅ Communicate Clearly or Create Confusion
✅ Promote Communicators, Not Just Technicians
✅ Transparency Builds Trust

5 Sound Bites for Leadership Development
🗣 “Leadership is being the role model.”
🗣 “Set expectations and follow up.”
🗣 “The cover-up is worse than the crime.”
🗣 “Humans are humans.”
🗣 “Pick up the phone and call.”

10 Chapters on Leadership Development
00:00 – Meet David Hawthorne
01:57 – What Leadership Means
04:07 – The English Teacher Who Shaped Him
06:46 – Military Family and Nine Schools
09:18 – Communicating Openly
10:56 – Top Three Leadership Traits
12:10 – Gaining Commitment Through Transparency
14:42 – Retaining High Performers
17:07 – Promoting Supervisors to Managers
25:24 – Setting Expectations Over Policies

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