“Every man has a vocation to be someone: but he must understand clearly that in order to fulfill this vocation he can only be one person: himself.”
I come from an era where you were taught to stay with a company all your life. I know, that has all changed. Still, when I was at Barco, I bled Barco red, and I thought I would retire from there. After 13+ years, I left for WIKA. As I’m coming up on 15 years at WIKA, again, I’m saying goodbye. I never thought this would happen, I thought for sure I’d retire from WIKA, but we’ll get to that later. Most importantly, I want to express my gratitude to WIKA. This has been an unbelievable journey, I never imagined something like this after leaving Barco, I never thought I’d work at such a great company again, but thankfully I did. So, in no particular order, what I’m grateful for:
• An amazing owner. Mr. Wiegand is brilliant, he somehow is able to foresee what the future holds for our industry, he knows the business better than anyone, but he also is incredibly kind and generous to his people. I really couldn’t imagine a better owner or leader to work for.
• Very bright and ingenious engineering teams. I thought I worked with the best engineers in the world at Barco, but the engineers at WIKA are incredible also. In many ways, it’s different, it encompasses manufacturing engineering, along with some innovative design engineering, and it's just a great group of people to work with. I’m constantly in awe at how smart some of these people are.
• An outstanding accounting and controlling team. I was blessed to work with a great group that always went above and beyond. My team was so good, I often thought and said, they really don’t need me, and to be honest, they didn’t. They could run the financial side of the business on their own, and they always looked for how they could do even better. Plus, as you can see, they were so much fun.
• A fun and dynamic Senior Management Team. For many years, I just loved the Senior Management Team I was a part of. We challenged each other, fought many times, pushed each other, and really had a great deal of fun together. I’m not sure I’ve ever experienced such a great working relationship as we had for several years together, I really enjoyed and appreciated each of my colleagues for who they are and what they brought to the table.
• One of the two greatest leaders I’ve ever worked with in my life. Michael Gerster is larger than life. I’ve worked for two amazing leaders in my life, Michael and Jim Crane from Barco. They are extremely different, but still, two of the best ever. I used to say, I would run through a wall for Michael Gerster. He spent so much time on the shop floor and throughout the building, he knew virtually everyone, and showed his appreciation for the people working there, he had a special presence about him.
• My colleagues in Latin America and my opportunity to travel there. I spent about five years working with my colleagues in Latin America, and those were some of the best years of my life. I learned what beautiful people and beautiful countries there were in that part of the world. I was able to meet and work with some incredible people, and I can’t be thankful enough. I will always cherish that experience.
• My colleagues in Lawrenceville. I spent over 12 years there, and besides my team, there are so many great people there, particularly the people on the shop floor. I used to love to walk the shop floor, and interact with the “value added” people. They are the ones that make it all happen.
• The wonderful people at WIKA Sensor Technology. It may be trite to say, but they are the salt of the earth. There are so many moments I could highlight or illustrate, but what hit me most was when we moved into our new building, various people would be on their hands and knees, scraping tape off the floor, wiping down walls, doing anything and everything, without being asked, to make the place look presentable. It is just an amazing group. They would do anything they could for those lucky enough to work with them. Leaving them is going to be very painful.
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Of course, this would all beg the question, why in the world would I leave? I have a few years left of working, why wouldn’t I take the traditional road and just finish my time at WIKA and ride off into the sunset? My current boss, Todd Gardner, has been incredibly good to me. I have so much respect for him, we left him with a complete shithole when he took over as President of WIKA Americas, and in the past few years, he has built it back up again, and made it into a vibrant organization. No, he didn’t do it completely on his own, but his leadership, his vision, his business sense has been a big part of it. Plus, he’s treated me very well, I really couldn’t ask for more.
It’s Not You, It’s Me
I remember many years ago, when I started my career at Touche Ross, before it eventually became Deloitte Touche and eventually Deloitte, we did a Myers-Briggs Personality exercise among our management team. As we sat there with the facilitator, she put a line up on the board with many X’s clustered together on one end, and one X way off on the other end. The X’s represented how we all tested. Immediately several heads started shaking up and down, and a few of them said, “McCullough”. Yes, I was the one who didn’t belong.
After 40 years of not belonging, of constantly being the salmon swimming upstream, I’ve grown weary, and I’m tired of not belonging. Yes, I could continue to do this, I’ve somehow made at least a relatively good career while not belonging, I’ve worked for some of the best companies in the world, Deloitte, Barco, WIKA, and I’ve gotten to experience and be a part of some amazing journeys.
Yes, the easy course, maybe the safest, and smartest, course would be to just keep on doing what I’m doing. But something changed, something snapped, I couldn’t just keep on keeping on, I decided at 62, before it’s all too late, I need to be me, I need to do something I truly enjoy, and do what’s best for me. I need to find my dharma, my true nature in life.
As I pondered this decision, I latched on to the guilt of leaving Todd, leaving my colleagues, leaving the group at WIKA Sensor Technology. As I discussed it with Hailey, she asked, “What do the people closest to you think?” So I asked them, Laurel, my children, my brother Jim, Sheila Ewers, Hailey, what do you think?
This is just a snippet of some of the responses I got back:
• You will be so good at this Steve! It’s OK to be uncomfortable with change. If it’s what you truly desire, take a deep breath, acknowledge the discomfort, and do it anyway. The guilt and fear will fall away quickly once you have begun.
• Most of the people you’re feeling guilty about will be happy that you’re moving on to something better.
• You will enjoy that and that is so important. Good for you!
• Would you rather feel guilt and shame or regret?
I sent those on to Hailey, and her reply was, “Seems like a no-brainer to me.”
Tell Me, What Is It You Plan To Do With Your One Wild and Precious Life?
What changed? What brought me to this point after so many years? Not sure but:
• Maybe it was Laurel starting me on my yoga journey six years ago. As I often say when I begin a
• Maybe it was when I began my journey with Hailey about five years ago, and I learned how to walk in the dark and realize it’s simply a part of the journey.
• Maybe it was all the reading, Brene Brown, Rolf Gates, Naomi Levy, Nadia Bolz-Weber, Glennon Doyle, Valerie Kaur, Jack Kornfield, Michael Singer, Stephen Cope, so many great writings that inspired me to be me.
• Maybe it was taking my Yoga Teacher Training last year in the Georgia Mountains with Sheila, Tami Roberts and the Chocolate Poet Society. I never thought I could do it, and I never have experienced such a feeling of belonging in my life.
• Maybe it was taking a Pranayama and Meditation workshop at the same beautiful house with Sheila, Laurel and a wonderful group of young ladies this year. I know people will think I’m crazy, but I believe I experienced God in an incredible meditation moment.
• Maybe it was being inspired by an amazing 28-year-old young lady, Carley DeMarco, who seems to see no barriers to trying new things and making them work.
A few months ago, I got approached by Vistage, it’s an organization that does training and coaching for business leaders. They were inquiring if I’d be interested in becoming a Vistage Chair. I had been a part of Vistage years ago, when I first started at WIKA. I reached out to my former Vistage Chair, Lisa Dugan, and asked her advice. One question she asked me was, “what do you want to do with the rest of your life?”
My immediate reaction, in my mind, was “I want to start a yoga studio!”
Spoiler alert, that’s not what I’m doing. I have formulated a new plan, a new idea on that path, but it’s not fleshed out yet. So, not yet. Stay tuned.
But it got me thinking, what do I really want to do with the rest of my life? Quite obviously, I don’t have much time left, at best 5-7 years left of working, and that is probably a stretch.
I started looking for universities that might give me an opportunity to teach. For seven years, while with WIKA in Georgia, I taught at Georgia Gwinnett College as an adjunct professor in the evenings, and I loved it. Surprisingly, someone was interested, and I got an interview. As I started the interview process, I found out one of the people on the search committee, Dr. Lindsey Mason, was from Georgia and had done some course work at GGC. Serendipity.
I now start on a new journey, I will be an Accounting Professor at Ohio Dominican University. I just loved when I read the section on their website that talked about Peace and Justice that said:
• Ohio Dominican University is committed to promoting peace and justice in the world by acting justly ourselves and by educating students to become ethical and effective leaders in the global society, grounded in the pursuit of truth, justice and peace.
When I took Laurel over to the campus on Memorial Day, it was so peaceful, it was quiet, only a few campus security personnel to be seen. As we walked the path, we looked ahead, and we were shocked to see a baby deer lying under a bench, trying to get some relief from the intense sun that day. Even as we got close to it, it didn’t move. The calm, the peace, the beauty, the serenity of the campus moved us both, and we decided this was the next place for me.
Will this be where I finish my career? Who knows? Maybe I will start a yoga studio, or maybe I’ll become a Vistage chair, or maybe I’ll do something else where I’ll feel like I belong in my one wild and precious life. The quote comes from a poem by Mary Oliver, and recently when Laurel and I were on a yoga retreat in the south of France, Sheila used it in one of our practices. I had heard the quote before, but somehow it settled in quite nicely for me. Yes, this is my one wild and precious life, and it’s time to embrace it and be who I want to be, and hopefully, just maybe, I’ll find where I belong.
