TLDR;
What does it truly take to embrace your most authentic self?
Join us for another episode of the Uncommon Leadership Podcast where I, Michael Hunter, sit down with Ken Miller, a resilience coach and national speaker—who has an extraordinary story to share.
Ken shares his journey from being an Ivy League graduate to a life of addiction that led to homelessness and multiple prison sentences. He takes us through his pivotal moment of surrender that became the turning point for his entire life.
This conversation goes beyond personal triumph. It’s a battle-tested lesson for all leaders who are striving for growth—whether that’s intellectual, emotional, personal, or professional.
This episode gives you the courage you need to become truly resilient in a world that’s constantly changing.
It underscores the value of treating people with empathy and respect.
And sketches a path you could follow to find freedom in surrender.
Grab a seat, let’s talk.
5 Reasons to love this podcast:
- You’ll understand that resilience is so much more than simply bouncing back from adversity. It’s a strategic act.
- Find an actionable (and practical) plan for personal and professional transformation.
- You’ll learn how to free yourself from what’s holding you back.
- Get inspired to lead from a place of radical honesty, empathy, and a genuine investment in people as individuals, not just transactions.
- To find the courage to get a different result in your life or business, by ditching all the inauthentic parts of yourself and embracing an aligned, more evolved version of yourself.
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Meet the Speakers
Ken Miller
National Speaker | Author of Becoming Ken | CEO @AIVAlution
As a Certified Fundraising Executive and successful multi-entrepreneur, Ken conflates his expertise in nonprofit leadership, fundraising, and AI-driven solutions.Through his company, AIVAlution LLC, he is at the forefront of leveraging AI and virtual assistant technology to streamline operations and drive efficiency for nonprofits and businesses.
In a nutshell, Ken Miller is a speaker, author and a resilience expert who turns adversity into action. He delivers compelling insights on topics ranging from overcoming adversity and building resilience to the future of AI in philanthropy. His mission is to empower leaders to navigate challenges with authenticity and fulfill their potential.
The best way to connect with Ken Miller is on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenmiller84/
More on Ken Miller: https://kenmillerspeaks.com/
Michael Hunter
Founder @Uncommon Change | Interlocutor / Curious Host @UncommonLeadership Interview Series | Author | Change & Innovation Partner
Michael Hunter partners with top tech leadership teams across six continents to create extraordinary cultures. With 35 years of experience at companies like Microsoft, Salesforce, and Tableau, he helps leaders sustain meaningful change. Michael believes that only by integrating mind, heart, body, spirit, and intuition can leaders truly navigate change safely and build a lasting legacy of impact + human-centered leadership.
The best way to connect with Michael Hunter is on LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/humbugreality/
More on Michael Hunter:
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Transcript:
Michael Hunter
Whether you want more innovation, more easily, you’re feeling burnt out or overwhelmed, or you simply know that something isn’t quite the way you know it can be. You are not alone. I hear the same thing from leaders every day. On Uncommon Leadership, we explore aligning personal fulfillment with business success, creating authentic teams, and cultivating the resilience, adaptability, and ease necessary to move beyond simply surviving today’s challenges into thriving.
I’m Michael Hunter with Uncommon Teams, and today we’ll uncover fresh insights into what it means to lead today. Joining me is Ken Miller. Ken is a certified fundraising executive, dynamic trainer, speaker, author, and consultant. He helps individuals and organizations harness the power of resilience by reclaiming their identity and gaining strength through adversity.
He does this from firsthand experience, moving from homelessness to a successful multi-entrepreneur. He guides leaders and teams through setbacks, via speaking seminars and small group work, sharing practical insights rooted in courage, compassion, and real-life resilience to inspire hope, growth, and authentic leadership.
Welcome, Ken.
Ken Miller
Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you for inviting me.
Michael
I have been looking forward to this conversation all week. When did you first recognize that integrating your whole self and bringing that into everything that you do might be a valuable approach?
Ken
Oh, great question. Probably, about one month after my last arrest. So I have to give you a little background. To give people understanding of who I am and why I bring my authentic self to almost everything that I do. If not, everything that I do. So very simply, I’m 62 years old. Born in 1962. I was put up for adoption at birth.
I did six years in foster homes. I was then adopted by Irene and Sam Miller. At age 12, I moved from New York to Alaska. Grew up in Alaska. I was precocious. I was a National Merit scholar as a senior in high school, I was accepted to Harvard, and I went to Dartmouth College and got an Ivy League degree.
Graduated from college in 1984 with a degree in fraternity, with a minor in drinking, is what I tell people. And, within two years, well, the first year out of college, I went to treatment for my alcoholism, and then I remained sober for a couple years, and then I relapsed. And that was to take me on a 20-year journey to being homeless and on the streets and in the penitentiary on a three-time convicted felon.
I was arrested on September 22nd, 2004. It was the last day I drank or used drugs. And, I went to prison for three years on the last term. Now we get to the part about the resilience. We get to the part about identifying what is the authentic self. So I have, and I truly believe in most occasions, we have an authentic self that either we manifest physically, or we show to others, to the external world, or we keep it inside.
And for many years, my authentic self, which is really just a kind, gentle, individual that, that’s really what I call a child of God that exists. I hid that one because you don’t want to be that authentic self in the penitentiary along the streets.
People will take advantage of you if you are too kind, or you’re too easy, or you’re too nice. So when I went to jail for hopefully the last time in 2004, about a month in, I had a conversation with God. And once I had that conversation with God, it made it a lot easier to become my authentic self. And it probably took another four to five years to really, fully, embrace my authentic self because that’s not another part. We can talk about it now, we can talk about it later, but a big part of it is you have to identify and define what is your authentic self. What is your truth, what is your motivation, what is your passion? And it took me years because I wasn’t really sure what’s that authentic self, because it really manifests itself in probably four different areas, which are emotional, physical, intellectual, and spiritual.
And there are selves in all those. And some of ’em are easier to be authentic to. And then some of ’em were more difficult to be authentic to and take a lot more work. And I mean work, and mainly intellectual and really emotional works.
Michael
What was it that particular time in jail that God spoke to you and you were able to hear that time, where maybe God had been speaking before and you hadn’t?
Ken
I believe God speaks to you often. It’s whether or not you listen or you take heed to the counsel and or direction that God presents. And lemme get back to my, let’s go back to my definition of God. God is an external entity or force that modifies behavior. That’s what my God is, okay? I just have a label I call God.
And when in conversation with that internal voice that God, that external entity, that I’m literally listening to that entity speak to me, it allowed me to, for once, understand and hear what is my truth? My truth is you’re in prison or going to prison for the third time. You’ve already spent years behind bars.
You’re getting ready to spend another three years behind bars. I didn’t know how long at that time, but it ended up being about three years. What are you gonna do different? Or you’re doing, I went in front of the judge. Judge named, I think he is named Peter Hardisty. He’s on the Supreme Court from the state of Nevada now, and he looked at me and he said, Mr. Miller, you come in my courtroom again with a felony and I’m giving you the habitual criminal statute. That’s the judge telling me, the habitual criminal statute is 25 to life. If I stole $51, which is a felony in the state of Nevada, I was looking at 25 to life the next time, and there would’ve been the next time if I continued the behavior and actions that I was doing as an addict and as a street-level hustler. So anyway, the voice or the conversation which is internal, happened I know exactly, I can picture it today. And, I listened, and the voice said that it wasn’t going to be easy. You didn’t say, Oh, it’s gonna be easy.
You’re gonna be clean and sober, and life is going to be hunky dory. What the voice said to me is that I will be there, and we can do this, we can do this. And so I got it. It still is a lot of work to do physically, emotionally, spiritually, intellectually. But I got it. And what it did, it encouraged me, gave me courage to be willing to accept whatever discomfort or pain was gonna be involved with the change.
’cause there’s discomfort in change. Yeah, definitely pain and change.
Michael
So what enabled you to hear this message from God this time, where I imagine God had been telling you this for years up till now? What let you hear it this time, and not just hear it but acknowledge it and take action on it?
Ken
Yeah. Well, in the rooms of recovery, we talk about surrender, and I had surrendered. I’ve surrendered. The day I got arrested, I was literally 1% away from suicide, 1%. I talk about that in my book, my upcoming book, quite a bit. I talked about it online, but I was so close to giving up ’cause my existence was so painful.
Physically and especially emotionally painful, just living with that. And so, I was in pain. I was in discomfort, but I just saw truth. And a lot of my spiritual walk, or my relationship with God, is about truth. And I couldn’t just walk out the unit. I’m incarcerated. I’m locked up again. Third time, let me put it, third time for prison.
I’ve been to jail 20 times, but prison third time. And also, I just knew that I clearly saw what my future, the future was: suicide, being murdered, or being in prison for many years, or just being miserable addict, alcoholic in the streets. I got it. I got it. And so I think God talks to you or your spiritual entity, talks to you often is are you willing to listen, number one, and number two, are you willing to undertake change?
Michael
What was it that helped you surrender enough here this time to hear the message and act on it?
Ken
Pain. Pain.
Michael
It just, it just gotten to a high enough level this time, higher than it had before that you said, okay, this is-
Ken
But you know, pain and hope, ’cause I had pain and took an overdose of pills and tried to kill myself. So I had the same amount of pain as my prior suicide attempt, but I had that mustard seed of faith to try one more time.
One more time. And then, because remember what the surrender says. Surrender says, I’m going to stop fighting. Remember my problem, I always tell people this, my problem, if you so believe, wasn’t with the devil, my problem was fighting God, and God’s will. That’s my problem. Okay? It manifested by doing all these negative things, but you know, a lot of who I hurt was myself.
And I am not one to say, the person I hurt the most was myself, ’cause no, it wasn’t. I’ve hurt people more than I’ve hurt me. Believe that. And look at me today. Today I’ve got a wonderful, I don’t know where these people I’ve hurt emotionally, some physically. I don’t know how they’re doing today. Okay?
But the key component is when I surrender means I stop fighting. And not only do I stop fighting, I have to live by your rules, ’cause now I’ve surrendered. When you surrender in war, there’s literally a written document. It’s a document of surrender. And in that, they lay out all the things that you have to do by surrendering, okay?
Stopping fighting is, that’s just bellicose. That’s just the violence between the two parties. But there’s a whole bunch more things that you have to do in the surrender documents. I surrendered, and I had to document, which means I have to listen to you and I have to take heed, and then I also have to have some courage.
But you said you’d be with me, and he has, when you use that pronoun, heed, my God has been with me on every single experience. That was a challenge, and I’ve had some challenges in the 20 years since then. We all do. As humans, we have challenges.
Michael
What helped that Seed of Hope flourish this time, where all the other times it hadn’t been strong enough to help you over that edge, to actually surrendering and actually listening?
Ken
So it’s about addition and subtraction. Okay? And what I mean by that, when the seed of hope is there, so you have this small iota of hope, and hope is a picture or an expectation of something positive in the future, that’s a hope. But to keep that hope alive, you need to add things. And almost as important, or maybe even more importantly, you have to subtract things.
So I had to subtract who I hung out with. I had to subtract the information I was bringing in. Am I gonna kick it with the guys on the yard, the prison yard, and talk about dealing drugs, or talk about gang stuff, or talk about manipulating or pimping women? Am I gonna talk about this? That’s what I did before.
No, I’m not allowed to do that. Then I have to also put additions. So I had to have an addition of going to the counselor on the yard, and the penitentiary. There was counselors with civilians. Yeah. I had to do the addition of getting my health back. I had to do the addition of reading again and getting the brain to work again.
I had to do the addition of adding friends that were of value added to me, ’cause I have a small group to work with, because most of the individuals in the penitentiary are not making the decision that I am making, which is to be a different person when I leave the penitentiary. Because if I stay the same person that came into the penitentiary, I’m gonna have the same results on the way out.
So that’s how I built up hope. That is literally how, by addition and subtraction of literally the external influencers, ’cause these are all external. And then what the external did, it also started to change how I thought inside.
Michael
What shifted this time in prison that let you add and subtract those things where in your previous stints and all your experiences outside that hadn’t happened?
Ken
That’s a great one. The main one was that conversation with God in jail. So the way it works is you get arrested and then you go to court. And it could be long or short, but the way I did, my arrest is I always pled guilty, ’cause I was guilty. I knew it. I fight it. And it takes approximately three months.
Did it three times, 90 days to go from jail to prison. Okay? And you go to prison as a convicted felon. You don’t go to prison as a misdemeanor. Misdemeanors are done in jail. And that’s also where you fight your case or you wait to be sentenced. So I was in about a month and I had the conversation with God.
That was the rubric. That was the framework or the foundation for everything else that happened. And I didn’t know what I had to do. And I pretty made that decision within the next two to three months as to, because I had to think about it. What do I need to do to be different, to change? And it’s just life.
But I had to change those four things, ’cause physically, I was a wreck. Intellectually, I would read one paragraph from a book, a paragraph from a book, and I could not tell you what the first sentence said, literally, ’cause my brain couldn’t even like remember intellectually, one paragraph. Okay. So I read a lot.
And then emotionally, I went to counseling. Spiritually, I went to different, and I did, I tried a bunch of different religions while I was in there. I had three years to do all these. And then, like I said, I changed my people, places, and things who I, within the parameters I could, ’cause again, I couldn’t walk out to prison and go to an AA meeting or something like that.
So I had to do what I could within the and, but I’m telling you in a lot of ways, and I tell this thing all the time, I speak about this prison was the best thing for where I was at. I didn’t have to worry about the rent. I didn’t have to worry about going shopping for food. I didn’t have to worry about my relationship with a loved one.
I didn’t have to worry about any of that. I didn’t have to worry about cutting the grass. So all I had to do and if you allow yourself, all I had to do was work on Chad, and I did.
Michael
I appreciate you letting me ask this question over and over because many of the people I talk with, leaders I work with, they’re in a similar place where they have a change to make, and or they have a change they can make, and it’s scary. And understanding what helps you in your even more extreme and even more momentous decision change, to decide that this time I’m making that shift, helps all the rest of us who are in just as scary, just as momentous, even if it may not seem that way, can help us find that key, that mustard seed of hope that’ll help us make that shift as well.
Ken
I agree. I mean, I’m not special, but I am special. Oh, if you still believe I’m a child of God. I’m a unique child of God. My story’s unique. My experience is unique, but everybody who’s listening to this and will listen to it. Your story is unique. Your experience is unique. Embrace it. Sing your song.
I say this all the time, sing your song. I don’t sing Country Western. I sing my song. If I was to take my story and give it a flavor, it would probably be soul and heavy metal, depending on where I was, and at that point, maybe some doom rock. Okay. But you know, we talk about uncommon leadership, and I’m not common. I didn’t give up. That’s the easy way to do it, is to give in to the challenge or the concern. It’s to not be resilient. It’s to not bounce back. It’s to be lazy. It’s to be fearful. It’s to be uncompromising. It’s to be unteachable. That’s the easy way. That’s the common way. Most of us, and this is just my opinion, do not fulfill their potential.
They will total potential. I’m not talking about the intent, the potential that your mother put on you, or your father, or your siblings, or your loved one, or your wife, your husband, whoever. I’m talking about your internal potential. We don’t fulfill that. I fulfill the great majority of my potential. I am who I want to be.
I’m 62. I’m happy with Ken. I’ve done some incredible things. I’ve given back to society, and I’m also a leader. And what I mean by that, I lead others, I lead my family, or I co-lead with my wife. My family, but I lead my employees. I lead my contractors. I lead the men that I mentor, I lead the people that I coach.
I lead my clients, ’cause these are external people that I can take my wisdom and also my empathy and my emotional care for you as an individual or an entity or organization, and share that with you. And in many ways, that is uncommon. I don’t look at you as a transaction. I look at you as a person, whether I’m working with you for free as a mentor, or you’re my wife, or you’re my friend, or even you’re my enemy.
I still respect you. I probably won’t associate or be too involved with you, but I will respect you. Then try not to because you caused me harm, try to cause you harm. That’s street. Unfortunately, that’s also people who are not, I call the street or penitentiary, but they still try to hurt those. That hurt them. That’s a normal reaction.
I had too much love for people to be around, going around hurting people. I say this from the stage. I don’t have a single resentment toward any individual in this world. Not a single. I, as far as I haven’t hurt anybody physically in over 20 years, ever since I got cleaned up September 22nd, 2004.
I have not physically hurt anybody. Emotionally, I’m human and sometimes I’ll stub my toe, but I’m telling you, on a scale of one to 10, it’s probably a one or two that have hurt your feelings. Okay? So, again, I’m not trying to pat myself on the back, but you know, again, I’m looking at the title Uncommon Leadership.
And again, Michael, I applaud you for bringing people onto your platform to talk about uncommon, this common leadership. I could sit up here and give you the cliches and the memes that are thrown out about leadership, but I’m just talking my story and mine is uncommon.
Michael
It is, and as you said, so is everyone’s, if we’re willing to see it that way and step into everything that means.
Ken
Yeah, it is. I mean, I gotta go on for a little bit longer, but, yeah, it is, but there isn’t, Michael, there is common leadership. So one of the things I tell all individuals that I work with, so lemme tell you about working with people. I have been mentoring for 15 years. I teach classes on mentoring.
I mentor young black men that is of my choice, and I mentor them, and it’s free and it’s open-ended. There is no end date. My time is really valuable. I’m talking about monetarily, but I take time every three months, and anytime in between, you need to talk, to mentor these men, right? And one of the things that I say to them is, Don’t talk to me in cliches.
It’s an excuse for lazy thinking. So if you come to me and I say, what’s the definition of insanity? Oh, it’s doing the same thing, expecting different results. I’ll say no. That is not the definition of insanity. What is the definition of insanity? Look it up. Well, I’ll tell you, it means not healthy. It means not healthy.
Sanus is Latin for health. ‘In’ means not. It means not healthy of mind. And predominantly, what it means is the inability to proceed. Truth or reality. That’s insane. Psychotic, schizophrenic, paranoid. Neurotic. That means you cannot perceive reality. Your interpretation, your mind is not healthy.
So, but it’s not doing the same thing, expecting different results. That’s a cliche. And so when we talk about leadership, and we wanna talk about uncommon leadership, give me your unique take on leadership. That. And then what we do is we’re, as individuals, define it, give example, and share it. And that’s hopefully what we’ve been doing on this conversation.
And for you to have a platform, I think that’s phenomenal.
Michael
Thank you.
This has been how you have empowered yourself to bring everything that you are, everything that you do. How do you build cultures where the people that you’re working with and leading feel safe and empowered to bring everything that they are into everything that they do?
Ken
Interesting. Yeah. Because at first, when I look at the word cultures, do I create a culture? I’m gonna change the word from culture to environment. How do I create an environment? We can call it culture. I’m not anything against your choice of words. We’ll call it an environment. How do I create an environment?
Number one, and this is leadership 101, is I allow people to know what the goal or aspiration or what we’re trying to achieve together as a team, as a group, as just two people, mentor and mentee. So when I work with mentors, first thing I do, What’s your dream? My job is to engender your journey as a mentor.
So what’s your dream? And then I shut up. I literally shut up, and I give them time. And I also, I’ll say to ’em, many times, I give you permission to dream ’cause people will take away your permission. Okay? When I’m working with a work team or business team, okay, this is why I am here. Whether I’m the boss or the owner of the company, or I’m the consultant or the coach type, this is my role.
So you get understanding. I always want you to be based on truth, and if it’s coming outta my mouth, I’m so big on it. This is called integrity. There’s an alignment or congruence between what I say and what I do. Okay? It’s a big part of my core. This is who I am, because what I’m trying to do is engender trust, a belief in a future perceived action, that’s trust.
So I do that to create that environment. This is who I am. This is somewhat of my background. I’ll go about the whole thing, somewhat of my background. This is what I perceive our goal, but let’s talk about it. Let’s have some consensus here as to what our aspiration or our goal, our final thing that we’re striving for.
And then one of the things that I do to engender or to create that environment of trust is I let them know that this is a platform or area of trust, and of, you can feel safe. And I’ll start telling this up front. It may take time for you to feel safe. I’m cool with that, especially when I’m working with my mentees.
I’m like, Hey, you don’t know me. I’m just another black man talking to another black man. Our experiences, they may be negative. Most dangerous thing to a black man is another black man. Period. 100%. We kill each other. Okay. That’s not our role, but that’s our history. Okay. We can talk gangs or family or whatever, but that’s the most dangerous thing to a black man is another black man.
Okay? So I know that. I understand that. But I wanna create an environment. If I’m, and I have like four companies. So if I wanna set something up as the boss of one of my companies and I’m talking to my staff, I bring them in and then I talk to ’em 1 on 1 and say, Anything you said to me, it’s gonna stay right here.
It’s gonna stay right here. Okay? So that’s somewhat other things that I do that create that environment. And then, what you have another thing about empowering people to bring their unique talent, that took me a while. I didn’t get, when I first started in business, I thought everybody worked like I worked, which, I mean, I thought everybody thought, like I thought. People don’t. I’m what they call a concrete sequential.
That’s my learning style. I like bullet points. Well, there’s people who are abstract, whatever, randoms, and they’re more into visuals, and anyway, they’re not bullet points, spreadsheets, and Excel files. That’s not them. And I thought everybody learned, like, and I learned, had to learn. So I try to find out where you’re at, and I can tell that pretty quickly.
I’m pretty good at this. And, I’ll meet you where you’re at as long as we’re both get to the same goal, whether it’s a financial goal for the company, whether it’s a growth goal for the individual, how you do it, how you take that path, it’s not of my concern. Mine is to support you and you’re unique, and that’s what I try to do.
Michael
If I, as a leader, am struggling to build this type of culture, how would you suggest I start?
Ken
Find thyself. You can’t give away. One of the reasons I can give away what I give away is ’cause either I’ve done it, I’ve looked at, I’ve gone there, I’ve gone there, and I’ve taken the time to identify my motivations, my why, my antecedents to the actions that I’ve taken over the years.
I know every single thing that I’ve done negative in this world. I’m talking about the big ones. I know why I did it, but it takes time to understand why I did it. And it wasn’t because I was drunk or high. There are motivators, ’cause a lot of people get drunk or high, and they don’t go to kill somebody.
I’ve gone to kill people on three occasions, haven’t, so don’t go looking that up because I haven’t, but I’ve gone to do it. To why I can’t, because of disrespect. I can go that, but I’m not going to. But anyway, so know thyself, so that when you’re meeting or when you’re trying to create this environment, you are vulnerable so that others can be vulnerable with you.
People are not going to come to you with their questions, concerns, challenges, if they don’t feel that you’ll be open to hearing those. But I’ll talk about mine, I’ll talk about myself back. The other one is to understand. This is the other thing I had to learn as a leader is that I have to allow people space, and I’m a very open person to allowing people space to deal with whatever they have to deal with.
Hey, I had this come up. Hey bro, take the day off, take the next couple days off, pay no problem. Deal with it. Don’t feel you have to get this contract done or get this job done. That it’s that important. What’s important is you and your family, so deal with it. I got you. If you need anything from me, holler at me.
Need anything after hours, only tell me, you can call me anytime you want twenty-four seven. I’m not gonna answer it, ’cause I turn my phone off at seven o’clock at night, but I’ll get back to you within 24 hours.
So those are some of the things I do.
Michael
Yeah. Thank you. And so it’s really, it comes back to what we started the conversation with today, of what’s going on right now. What impact is that causing for you? And what about that is exciting, and what might be scared and where do you want to, how much of that do you wanna continue living with? And what are you willing to change?
Ken
Good. I’m a big one on this. This is a little different than some; remember, we’re talking about uncommon leadership. I’m a strength finder. Personally, that’s a certain type of Marcus Buckingham. Did a book on that. But I emphasize strengths. You don’t have to be good in everything or even really even adequate in everything.
I can hire adequate, but if you got a strength, let’s run with that. First of all, you’re gonna enjoy it a lot more. I just got off the phone with two of my staff members, and we’re talking about marketing. They love marketing. I love marketing, and so they’re all excited when we’re talking about different, really niche, exciting marketing.
The most exciting thing you can do to a marketing person is tell ’em, Hey, I got some budget for you. Budget? But you, but that’s where, that’s their strength. I’m not worried about their content. Hey, we can use AI for content. I can hire someone to give you content. You love to do the delivery.
To do the social media, to do the emails, do all that, and then look at the numbers, ’cause you’re a concrete sequential like me. Okay? So again, that’s another part of it, but I don’t worry too much on the weakness unless it’s a great impediment to your growth. And if so, then let’s look at either me finding someone, or maybe I’ll find you some training.
I’m a big one on training, a big one on training. So if you need training, you need to go to a conference, you need to do this, you need, let’s do that. That’s an investment in you. And this is what I tell all my staff.
20 years from now, you’re not gonna be working for me. Heck, five years from now, you’re not gonna be working for me, ’cause I’m gonna be retired. So I’m doing this to invest in you and your future. I mean, just, I tell this to ’em all the time. I just bought three of my employees new laptops. He said for you, I don’t want ’em, they’re not company, they’re not company laptop.
They’re your laptops. Okay. And if you leave tomorrow, so be it. I’m fine. Okay. But you said you needed better equipment. Come, let’s do it. Because almost all my people are all over the world. I have people all over the world working for my company.
Michael
What is the business value of creating these cultures, buying brand new laptops for someone who may leave tomorrow, and you’re perfectly happy for them to take that with them?
Ken
Yeah. The business value is, you have happy employees, happy staff. The business value is that you’re happier as the leader because you know you’re investing in people.
I use this term all the time, loved ones. I don’t know what your relationships are. I don’t know. LGBTQ, I don’t know if you, hetero, I don’t care. I have all of the above, but you have loved ones. Everybody, whether it’s family or you have a significant other or others, but what I want you to do is be the best you.
I love people, but I can only touch so many. Michael, please hear this. The only reason I wrote my book, which is coming out next month, is so I can speak on stage. So I can touch more people. I believe my message is uncommon. I believe my message is unique, but I also believe it’s a value added to the individuals that are willing to take it in.
I know it is because I’ve gotten enough feedback from people that can say, Your message, it was incredible. And so I am so blessed. Remember what it says, strength-finders. Invest in your strengths. I believe I have a calling, and I believe I have an ability to share from the stage things that are good for others.
I’m not doing it for the money, period. And people who know me, and a lot of people know me, no, I’m not doing it for that. I do well, okay. What I do? No, I’m gonna tell you this. I do this. What I do well, I make over $700,000 a year, take-home period. People don’t want to talk about finance. I don’t talk about it.
IRS knows. Okay? That’s what I take home. Okay. But people are so afraid of people knowing about their finances or their secrets. My bank account is Wells Fargo. Okay. Can’t do anything with it, but we’re so afraid to talk about our truths. So if you’re envious or jealous of that, why? If you think, oh, well, he doesn’t make enough.
Why do you care? But I’ll put it out there. See, that’s the difference. That’s me. It’s who I am, and I’m hoping people who are listening, and I don’t know how many people hear this, I do a lot of podcasts. Again, what I’m trying to do is share my book and share, which is just my calling card, to get on stages so I can touch more people.
I touch 20, 30 black men across the country through my book club, which is free, and my mentoring, which is free. Okay? I touch maybe a thousand people, 2000 people a year, when I talk from the stage. I have thousands of friends on my social media. I get emails all day long, every day, people ask me, and I am blessed and grateful that I can share with them whatever positive, because I’m only gonna share positive things that can encourage them or inspire them to do the next right thing.
That’s what I am attempting to do, and I am doing.
Michael
I appreciate that. I say all the time that whoever you are, the world is clamoring to have you in their lives, and if you aren’t willing to be yourself and offer that to them, which isn’t to say give yourself away. And charge a million dollars an hour or whatever value you want in return for what you’re offering, that’s absolutely your right and obligation.
Even if you’re not willing to do that, why not? Because not only are you harming yourself by not allowing yourself to be that light that you’re meant to be here and radiate out, you’re also harming them by not giving them the gift of what they’re clearing to have. It’s like, imagine if Dairy Queen wouldn’t serve out ice cream.
All the people who love dairy cream ice cream would be really sad, and it is the same. Whatever the unique thing is that you’re here to do. You’re Dairy Queen ice cream to a whole bunch of people who love Dairy Queen ice cream, and if you’re not willing to give that to them and they are sad for that.
Ken
I agree. Yeah, I agree with you 100% on that. If you just wanna be the best mother that you can be, if you just wanna be the best father or the best husband that you can be, you don’t have to, again, sing your song. That’s your song. Okay? I can go on a stage in front of 2000 people and say things that you would not be comfortable saying. I’m cool with that.
You be cool with that. Just be the best you. Remember, we talked about this on at least two occasions already today. Find your truth. That’s all I’m saying to you. Find out what’s your truth, what is your truth? Who are you? Who do you wanna be? Where are you on that path to being who you want to be?
Then what do you need to do to get to that path? And sometimes you don’t have the answer. You may need counseling, you may need a mentor, you may need a coach. All those people, you may need a valued person, a pastor, to sit down and talk with, or just a good friend. Hey, this is what happened.
This is who I am now, but this is what I’m trying to be. What do you think? What do you suggest I do? Hey, I think you might wanna get into the gym. You may wanna start walking a little bit more and start the physical one is almost so easy in many ways ’cause you can see it and the answers you have to burn more calories than you’re bringing in if you wanna lose weight.
if you wanna stop smoking cigarettes, you’re gonna, do something to stop smoking cigarettes. If you wanna stop drinking, you got to do something to abstain from drinking. That could go on. That’s that physical. I’m gonna tell you what the difficulty, intellectual is not that hard either.
Start reading, start putting in better information into whether it’s podcasts, whether it’s YouTube, whatever it is. Start putting in better information that makes your brain think cognitively. The difficult one is two difficult ones, and that’s emotional and spiritual. And for some people, the spiritual’s not that difficult, ’cause they have a church, they have a spiritual life. It’s the emotional, because to grow emotionally, there’s discomfort involved, because you’re gonna go have to go back into memories. You don’t wanna go into that door, you don’t wanna go into that room. You don’t wanna bring, you don’t wanna bring that memory up because it was a painful situation, circumstance.
But to grow from it, to take away the power of the secret, you’re gonna have to go in that room, bro. I’d say, bro, that’s just a term I used. You’re gonna have to go into that room. You can go into it alone. But a lot of times, I don’t recommend going into it alone. Get a counselor, get a sponsor, get a coach, get a mentor, and how do you go into that room together?
Okay, let’s talk about that. Let’s talk about what happened to you when you were 14, when you were shocked. I’ve had that conversation with my guys. Okay, let’s talk about it. I know it sucked. I know you have a lot of anger, resentment, but let’s talk about it. Let’s talk about you want, why you, let’s talk about, my dad shot my mom six times.
Lemme tell you about that and how I felt about that. Let’s talk about yours, and let’s go into that room together. I’m here. I’m on the phone. I’m on a zoom call with you. I’m looking you in the eye. Let’s talk about it. Let’s go into that room. Let’s see what’s in that room, and let’s see if we can come out.
May not even be the first time we go in there. We’re gonna come out a different person because what in the end, what I’m hoping to do is take away that negative feelings that you have about the situation and also those negative feelings that you have about the person that harmed you. I have no resentment toward my father.
I regret it happening, but I don’t resent him. He’s passed away. I had let go of that alone. I forgave him years ago because it was one of the things that made it very easy for me to smoke crack, cocaine on the streets made it very easy. I had my excuse. So anyway, that’s so our, but you getting really excited.
See, I love going here, and thank you for allowing me to go there.
Michael
Going there is much of the point of the show is, I start, I have these four questions that I use to frame every conversation. And where the conversation goes from there and how those questions lead in is different every single time.
I love it. It’s a personification of, that’s not the right word. Instantiation isn’t the right word either. It’s close enough. Of the, what I was saying earlier, that who you are is unique and you have something unique to give the world. And every conversation I have is with a different person. And so it’s gonna go in a different direction and be unique even with the same questions framing the conversation.
Ken
Lemme just say something to that, that one of the hard lessons I had to learn, it wasn’t even a lesson, you can call it a lesson, and this was it.
If I’m right, doesn’t mean you’re wrong. And if you’re right, doesn’t mean I’m wrong. So you may look at something differently. So lemme give you an example, who I think is the most valuable player in the National Basketball Association in 2025’s Nikola Jokic, that’s who I believe is the most valuable player.
There are many who think Shai Alexander Gilgeous is the most valuable player. I disagree, but it doesn’t mean that you’re wrong. It doesn’t mean that I’m wrong. More importantly, does it mean that I am wrong as a human? Okay. Which is a state of being as a state versus a state of doing or opinion. Okay?
It’s a thing we talk about, guilt versus shame, okay? And so when people used to say or disagree with me, I would argue with them because what I thought they were saying is, I must be wrong as a person because I’m wrong on the answer, that’s in difference to what you have is an answer. And even for a few years, outside the penitentiary, I struggled with that one.
Nowadays, I just know that you have a unique perspective. I will state my argument. I will state my data or reasoning, and I can do that for Nikola all day, ’cause I’m a big analytic person. And then you state yours, or not state it, and we’ll go off. You still my friend, you’re still the person I’ve had an interaction with.
I’m not saying you are wrong. I’m saying this is my belief, and these are the reasons why I believe it. And we both go out with us. We can go from it at least, but this is the key part. Can we listen? The biggest difficulty we have today, not the biggest, one of the big difficulties we have today, is we have too much confirmation bias in media.
Which means is, you have an opinion on something in life, politics, movies, whatever, music. And you can go online and find a thousand people that will confirm your belief or choice, but you will not take in information from the other side. I go to conservative websites, and I go to progressive liberal websites.
I do. I’m a black man in the nonprofit world, which is very progressive, but I go every single day to a couple conservative sites so I can understand, ’cause they’re humans too. They have families, too. And I’m gonna say it, 100% progressives, you are not 100% correct on any of your beliefs, period.
There’s a middle. And conservatives, you are not 100% correct on any of your beliefs. This is my opinion. So, where are we, and can we meet? Can we at least be civil? And that’s the, we don’t have the civil discourse. But anyway, the key component is to be able to listen to multiple voices, to then make a learned decision.
You may stay in the same way, but believe me when I tell you I changed some of my truths or beliefs.
Michael
How do you help people find their way through all the change, uncertainty, and overwhelm that seems to be what life is full of these days?
Ken
Provide suggestions. So remember it is the two things I wanna do. I don’t care what your position vis-à-vis me is. Whether you’re a staff member, whether you’re a contractor, whether you’re a coachee, mentee friend. I’m always going to do this. Number one, I’m going to listen. Number two, I’m always going to question, Socratic.
I’m gonna question number. What are you trying to accomplish? Do you just want to talk to me? Do you just want to get it off your chest? I’m cool with that. Come on, tell me. Let’s talk about it. Okay, number three, are you open to suggestions? ‘Cause if you just wanna tell me your pain, share your pain, if that helps you, I will empathize with you, but I won’t give you suggestions, but I’ll ask you that. You want my suggestions? 99% of the time? Yeah, no, sometimes 1% of the time. Yeah. I just want you to listen. Okay. Then, and this is a key one, I’ll offer my suggestion because I’ve always said this to people, 95% of the time, I’ll have suggestions. I have done life. Brother, I have done life. I have seen almost, or heard or experienced almost everything that a black man can do.
That’s why I don’t work with women. I’ve never done childbirth, so I can’t help you in childbirth. Okay? As an Asian female, 22, I cannot give you answers in childbirth, but let me give you the caveat. I probably know who can. I know a lot of good people. A lot of good people. So if I don’t have the answer, I’m gonna do one or two things.
I’m gonna go to my large language models, I’m gonna go to AI, and we might do it right on the screen while we’re talking, or I’m going to reach out to some people that might have more experience or knowledge in this area to assist you. Now that’s upfront. This is the key, though. Let’s circle back around.
I got a guy I’m meeting with tomorrow. We talked last week. I said, Hey, let’s circle back next week. Let’s touch base and let’s talk about this situation and suggestions I gave or shared with you, but let’s check back in because that’s one of the other big parts problems is we don’t check in or not, and then modify if we need to modify.
That’s why I’m a big one on dashboards for success. Usually for business success. What are our metrics? Where are we year to date, or where are we in the present? What is our goal? What was our baseline? And then we check in once a month. That’s a normal dashboard once a month, as to where are we at in relationship to our goal, and so most of the guys I work with, we’re checking in, that’s something
Michael
For people, Ken, who would like to follow up on your vision of Uncommon Leadership and how we help people move towards that, take you up on learn more about the mentorship and everything else we’ve talked about today. What’s the best way for them to connect with you?
Ken
LinkedIn. LinkedIn is probably the easiest for you.
It’s kenmiller84. That’s my handle. LinkedIn/kenmiller84. I graduated in 1984, so that gives you a reason why I use that all the time. Ken Miller 84. And then go to my website ’cause it has my book and my speaking on there if you’d like, or you’re just even interested in me speaking.
Go to Ken Miller Speaks. That was, took me a long time to come up with that name. Actually, it did not; just gave up. I’ll just call it kenmillerspeaks.com.
Michael
That’s great. And I’ll have those links in our show notes.
Ken
And also, let me just put that out there, while I got, I do have a book coming out May 19th.
Any way that you can support me on that, there’ll be like a 99-cents special that day, but it’s May 19th. Just go to kenmillerspeaks.com. The book is going to be, I believe, awesome. Took me three years to write this book. It’s my stories from childhood, to being a successful businessman, the penitentiary, the Ivy Leagues, the crimes, prison term, all that.
But there’s also lessons to be learned, ’cause that’s a real key one, just not about stories, it’s about lessons to be learned. Okay? And there were quite a few lessons that I learned, but each chapter has lessons learned, and I think it’s gonna be a great book. I’m super excited about it. And so, anyway, kenmillerspeaks.com has the book.
But again, if you can support me on May 19th, please do. I know this is probably past May 19th, when this is coming out. But even when the, when you get, when you have an opportunity to listen to this, just go to Ken Miller Speaks. The book will be on there, or it’ll be on Amazon. It definitely be on, and it’ll be audible.
There’s also the written version.
Michael
Fantastic, and I’ll have all those links on our show notes. What would you like to leave our audience with today?
Ken
Great question. It depends on how you catch me. It depends on how the podcast goes because I have different ones depending. I just don’t have one trite, I don’t talk in cliches. Coming off of this one, and this has been a great one, Michael, I tell a lot of these, and now this is definitely going down as one of my favorite.
What I’d like to leave the audience is change, grow. Now, if you’re comfortable and you believe that your loved ones are comfortable where you’re at, just be the best you possible. But if you believe that there are areas of growth, there’s areas of accomplishments, there are goals to be met, undertake the path that you need to undertake to reach those goals, to be that person you wanna be.
I can’t work with everyone, and as you know, I work with black men for free. I’m not looking to coach anybody new. But there are people out there, and there are resources out there that can help you to identify and to reach those aspirations that you have. Okay. So that’s my message.
Do it. Grow.
Michael
Thank you, Ken, for an amazing conversation today.
Ken
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you too. I just want one more. Thank you. I’m done. Thank you for all those who are listening. That’s an investment in self. Yeah, it can be entertaining. Yeah. We laughed, and yeah, there was some sad things that we talked about potentially. I might have brought you what I talked about growing into the world, but thank you because people that are listening to these podcasts are trying to usually do something positive in their life.
So thank you for listening and being a part of Michael’s podcast.
Michael
Yes, indeed, audience, thank you for being here. What are you aspiring to, and what might be holding you back a little from reaching that? Ken and I would love to know.
Thanks, and have a great day.