Leading From the Heart

Dan Dye

TRANSCRIPT

Mandla Nkomo: Hello and welcome to Deeply Rooted, the podcast that is about the business of food in Africa. My name is Mandla Nkomo and the CEO of Partners in Food Solutions. Today I'm joined by Dan Dye, the former CEO of Ardent Mills, which is North America's leading flour supplier. Dan has served on the board of directors for eight years, and while leading Ardent Mills since his retirement, he has agreed to continue serving on our board. Dan is widely respected for his servant leadership and values driven approach, guiding Ardent Mills through its formation and growth with humility, vision and heart. In March, the board visited Ghana to see our work in action, and Dan was one of the people that joined us on that trip and he delivered a wonderful training for our clients and staff called Leading From the Heart, where he shared his personal philosophy and experience on leadership. So today I'm very excited to have Dan with us to share this with the wider audience. Dan, welcome to Deeply Rooted.

Dan Dye: Well, thank you for that kind introduction. Mandla. It's been just a pleasure working with you. And since you've joined the team and I'm looking forward to what's ahead.

Mandla Nkomo: So thanks for the opportunity to talk about leadership and to talk about PFS and join together in this journey. Dan I know that I don't need to persuade you too hard to talk about leadership, but I want to take a step back and all of us as an origin story, just tell us about who Dan Dye is and how did you end up having so much to do with the business of food? Uh, in the Americas?

Dan Dye: Yeah, well, I had the privilege and opportunity to start working with Cargill right out of university. I went to Bethel University in Minnesota, started working for Cargill on the trading side of the business, and, uh, really enjoyed that and began my career in agriculture, working with farmers and on the origination side and the trading side of the business. And, uh, after about 28 years in various roles and, uh, And the last one of those being leading the Cargill AG Horizons business, working to help farmers prosper and working closely with them. I shifted over to the flour milling business of Cargill and had that opportunity to lead Horizon Milling for about five years. And then after 33 years with Cargill, we started a new company called Ardent Mills. It's a joint venture that Cargill is an owner of, ConAgra is an owner of and CHS is an owner of. And so the joint venture was formed in 2014, and I, I had the privilege to serve as the CEO there for ten years at the beginning and just retired, as you mentioned. Uh, it's nice to stay involved in certain things like PFS in my retirement, and I'm just thankful and blessed by the opportunity. So food and AG has been my entire career. And as I tell young people, I can't think of a better place to work than in the food and the agriculture industry. You're making a huge impact in people's lives every day,

Mandla Nkomo: I mean, that's that's that's truly amazing, Dan. I mean, to have to have had a career that has taken you through through different, you know, nooks and crannies of the food industry. for all of us, there's that defining moment that defines who we become and how we show up in the workplace and what we, we, we, we dedicate most of our time to. What would you say along your career was that defining moment that shaped who you became as a business leader in food.

Dan Dye: I think, you know, early in my career, I was again blessed and fortunate to have the opportunity to, uh, serve in a, in a leadership role, probably earlier than I expected to and probably was prepared to. But I realized with that responsibility of leadership, uh, came, uh, real time and a place to take care of your people. And that's how I thought of leadership was, you know, I'm responsible to serve and to help and to support and to guide and to care for the people that I'm working with and leading in this in this new, uh, role that I'm in. And as I saw how that kind of played out, you start to look at the business and look at your even your career and the jobs that you have more, as you know, the way you work together with others and the way you serve and help others. And that really, I think has helped me and was one of those defining moments to say, hey, I've got this leadership position. Yeah, there's a title with it, there's some authority with it. But really it's a job of me helping and serving others. And and then several times in my career that's really, you know, played out. And I think of a time in the Cargill AG horizons business where we were really kind of reshaping the way we approached, um, you know, agriculture business with our farm customers and, uh, how our business model really shifted from more of a trading model to more of a serving model, a customer serving focus and really helping our farmers. And as again, as I saw th e impact of getting people engaged around the values, the vision of the organization, building a culture that really cared for others. And you saw the impact of that on business results in a very positive way. Those were things that, you know, just reinforced that the right way to lead, from my perspective, was to care for and serve others. And then just in the most recent ten years I had at Ardent Mills you know, we really had this opportunity to build a new business, you know, creating the the joint venture was a new business and there to shape and to see how our culture would end up really having an impact on the business outcomes and results and, and how people responded to that.

Mandla Nkomo: For me, I think this was one of the questions I had coming into this interview, Dan, that, you know, Ardent Mills was about creating a new organization from a couple of different organizations that had a different set of culture and values and everything else. And yet you you had the task of creating a new identity. What would you share with our listeners today about what it takes to bring people who've got different backgrounds, different life experiences, and, I dare say, different values, to embrace a new identity and a new value like you, you, you achieved at Ardent Mills.

Dan Dye:   Well, I think it's it's really, um, kind of a story of bringing together an organizational mindset around the kind of company you want to become. I think to bring those differences that you talked about together, I found it was really important to start with what what was common? You know, why were we doing this? You start with the why, and you really start to shape the vision of the organization. And we all agreed, uh, even whether you came from ConAgra or from a mill or from a trading business or Cargill or however, wherever part of those organizations you came from, you could rally around that vision. And then we established our own values. And I think that was really important that Ardent Mills had defined values. In fact, we we announced those and declared those even before our formation was finalized and approved and official, uh, once it was public. One of the first things we did was we said, these will be the the values of Ardent Mills. And we had our vision, our mission and our values established before we were even operating as an organization and setting those expectations and creating the kind of leadership mindset that says we're going to operate as an organization utilizing these values to fulfill this vision and really bring this mission to life. That's what we all need to rally around and agree to. And you have to just constantly reinforce that when you're starting something new, you have people from different backgrounds. You have to just over and over and over again communicate that, reinforce it. one of the best definitions I've heard of culture is values and beliefs practiced. It's how. It's what you do. It's not what you say, it's what youl do. Right. Leadership is about really authentic action, not about, you know, nice words. And so we really held ourselves, our teams accountable to living by those values and and putting our people first. And and when you have the mindset, I remember even at one time I said, you know, we're we're, you know, producing flour or flour based company and our specialty ingredients, but we're really first a people company. We just happen to produce flour. That's that's what we do. But we really are all about our people. And I think that helped us early on and throughout and I think continues to to help ardent Mills to achieve great things by caring for people, living by our values and having a great mission and vision and purpose, uh, to work towards.

Mandla Nkomo:  I mean, I think you've you've mentioned the word authenticity or being authentic. A couple of times and someone listening to you, Dan, might think, yeah, that that sounds quite easy. It's not easy though, right, to be an authentic leader.

Dan Dye: No, it's not easy because, uh, one you're you're in the spotlight, right? I always say, you know, when you're a leader, you know, people are looking at you, they're looking to you, they're looking for you, and they're looking up to you. And if you're not being authentic, they're going to see that. And so you have to be genuine. You have to be true. You have to be vulnerable, open and transparent with your people. And I think they, you know, uh, I have a couple leadership axioms I use all the time. One of them is that people want to be led. And I think we all want leaders. Right. And but we they deserve great leadership and they deserve authentic leadership. And I think it's really easy to say in a world where we have a lot of pressure on results and numbers and outcomes and performance and all. That's really important. Sometimes that pressure leads us to, uh, you know, at times not really putting our people first or not truly living by our values. And you have to stay true to that in those hard times. And that's where the authenticity shows how you handle difficult situations, how you treat people when things aren't going really well, how you respond when there's, uh, different challenges from the environment or, uh, competition or whatever that may be. That's where the authenticity comes in. People are looking for that consistency. They're looking to see, okay, I've heard this from my leader, but do I see it in their actions? You have to stay true to that. You have to be honest and transparent and, like I said, vulnerable and open and and when you're honest and open with your people and you really have that shared value mindset, values, mindset, then then people start to believe and and the trust builds and then the authenticity comes from that. But it's something you have to constantly work at.

Mandla Nkomo: I mean, that that's brilliant. So many nuggets. Um, you know, about, you know, defining, you know, the kind of organization that you want to be, being authentic as a leader, uh, walking the talk, as it were.  I mean, why is this even more important in the business of food?

Dan Dye: I think you raise a really important and a good point. It's it's heightened. if your culture is one of really living by your values, like at Ardent Mills of trust, serving simplicity and safety, we could go to our customers and say we will authentically live these values. And as a supplier, that's very, very positive for a for a food company that's putting product out under their brand on the shelf. And we used to say we're in the brand protection business and the brand enhancing business for our customers. We can help them both protect and enhance their brand by utilizing our products. And that's built on trust and authenticity and supply the ingredients. Right are so, so important. And flour is just a staple in people's diets. We've been, you know, producing flour since biblical times. Right. It's it's a correct it's a part of people's life. And so important when you think about bread and and the, the center that is, of of most people's diets all around the world. I think you hit a really important point. It's it's very, very important. And we see that with PFS in Africa. Right? It's the same thing. The the reliance of, um, you know, people in Africa on our PFS clients that we're helping to provide food in an area where the stakes are even higher because of food insecurity, because of, you know, challenges in the the whole food infrastructure and industry there, authenticity with our clients in PFS is critically important as well. So I do think, uh, the food industry has an even higher standard to bear when it comes to trust, uh, because we're providing the food that's on people's tables and going into their mouths and into their stomachs that they enjoy, but also count on for nourishment, nutrition, um, and life itself.

Mandla Nkomo: I'm glad you've you've mentioned, you know, partners in food solutions and, and I really want to try and understand and this is really for the benefit of, of our listeners and some who might be sitting in a corporate somewhere in, in North America, in Europe, in Asia and so forth. I mean, why should a corporate like Ardent Mills that primarily had its market base in North America, care about what's happening in Africa? What was the decision making process for Ardent to be part of Partners in Food Solutions and help to transfer, knowledge and technology to to African companies that are trying to feed communities?

Dan Dye: Yeah, it was it was in many ways a really easy decision, but also an important decision for us because like you say, Mandla, you're exactly right. Ardent Mills doesn't have any physical operations in Africa. We're a North American based business where all of our assets are. We do do some export and different products, especially specialty products that get exported. But we're a North American business at its core. And and so you might say, well, okay, what's the application there? Because many of our of the other partners that are members of Partners in Food Solutions are more multinational organizations, large companies might have some presence or growing with actual business in Africa. But with Ardent Mills, it was a little bit different. I was familiar with our with PFS from my time at Cargill, in fact, had been involved in some of the very early meetings when it was just kind of Cargill and General Mills first starting to, to come together. And, and General Mills had, you know, had really provided some leadership around what this could become. And so there was this awareness I had at Cargill. So when we started Ardent Mills, uh, there was kind of this natural connection point to say, okay, Cargill has been a partner and has been around pretty much from the beginning. You know, shouldn't Ardent Mills be a partner as well? And we needed the first year or two to really just get up and going and go through all those things. But shortly after we had completed our initial integration work to form the company, we then became a member. And really, to your question, it was it was a decision, um, that that was driven in a couple of different fronts. First and foremost, one of our values at Ardent Mills is serving, and we don't talk about that in terms of just serving our customers. That's important, obviously critically important for us. We also talk about serving each other, serving our our fellow team members, but we also talk about serving outside in the communities where we work and live. And we looked at PFS and we said, this is an opportunity for us to go even beyond that. And our people, even though we're a North American company, we're part of a global ag food business. And there was a great interest of our people to have an opportunity to get involved and to help, uh, small food companies in Africa that were growing and changing and bringing new ideas and could utilize their expertise. And frankly, we learn from them, too, right? Anytime you are helping others, you benefit and learn yourself. And so for us, it was much more than just, hey, we're a milling company, we've got milling expertise. There's a lot of of companies in Africa that are in this basic core milling business. So there's transferable skills and ways we can help that. That obviously is a very practical way of looking at it. But for us it was more of a way to live our serving value in a meaningful way that would really engage people where they could make a difference. And I tell you, Ardent Mills people, I just I love each and every one of them. They're just amazing team members that come to work every day, do their jobs incredibly well but want to do more, want to help others. And they they get excited about being on a PFS project. And we've had we have a very high percentage of volunteers relative to our total employee base at PFS partners because our people just they, they, they see that they can make a difference, but they also see the benefit that they get when they learn from from some of their folks they're working with on projects in Africa. And when they, uh, feel that sense of, hey, I can help make a difference here. But I also, um, I benefit from it as well, because there's just great people you're connecting with and growing with. And so I think for Ardent Mills, uh, it's been a way for us to think more globally and be involved more globally. And, and it's been a great partnership. And and our people have responded really, really well. We've had great engagement and, and I'm I'm sure that will continue and I know it will. It has already in my time being gone from their uh, they've continued to, to be a great, great supporter of PFS and, and, and it's just a great fit from that standpoint

Mandla Nkomo: No, you're absolutely right. And for the benefit of our listeners, um, you know, Ardent Mills is one of the smaller, uh, corporate partners that PFS has, uh, with the small staff base and yet of their staff, at least 5% of their entire workforce volunteer for PFS. And then the corporate headquarters in Denver, at least 20%. So 1 in 5, uh, are volunteering for PFS. And I think it really links back then to what you said about the values, about those values being embedded within the entire organization and people looking for opportunities to to express those out. Now, I know that you you are retired and you have recently been on granddad duty and you've really enjoyed that. But I know that if there's one thing that you're passionate about is leadership. And in March in Ghana, you took us through what you called leading from the heart. just just take our listeners through what this means and why this is important, particularly at this time

Dan Dye: Yeah, I think, you know, first, it was a it was an honor to be a part of that. And and we had some discussions leading into our board meeting in Ghana and said, hey, maybe we should put some focus around leadership. We do a lot of great things at PFS on technical and quality and food safety and In service areas and other parts of the business, and we do. We've had great success with just a general mentoring program, but we haven't really done anything specifically around leadership. And the message that I thought was really important that we could, um, share with the team, uh, was one, you know, that that when we lead from the heart, it is that genuineness. It's that authenticity. It's that true to who we are as leaders to really care for support and, yes, even love our people, and to lead in that people first manner and to lead by values. Um, really is that that genuineness, that vulnerability. And I just think that's so important. And so we put together a framework for a workshop. It was kind of a pilot, and we brought together clients from around Ghana. And Cargill was very generous to allow us to hold that at their, uh, very impressive cocoa plant there, uh, just outside of Accra in Ghana. And it was it was just a great event and we had a great turnout. And as we shared the information, to be honest with you, I wasn't sure exactly how it would resonate with people. And and I think we found and I think you would agree, the response was just very, very positive. And people really responded. I think the other thing that came through and I knew this going in, um, but was just how, how good we have of leaders in, in Africa, there's some amazing leaders in Africa and we can learn so much from them. So this wasn't about, hey, we we're going to bring this North American model or a certain model of leadership and show you how. No, it's about how do we provide tools and resources to help you do even more of what you're doing? How do we learn from you in our organizations? Uh, I think some of the PFS client leaders are some of the best leaders that I know. Um, when I look at what it takes to be to lead a food company in Africa today, um, the amount of resilience, of courage, of strength, of patience, uh, you know, dealing with the, the different challenges and resource constraints and you name it and uncertainty that they face and barriers and hurdles, they're amazing what they get done. And we saw it firsthand. Right. We visited some of that. So so we learned we had some breakout groups where we learned and talked about challenges in our businesses together with the client leaders. Um, and, and I really kind of shaped it with I always think of these four great leadership questions, and we sort of built this leading from the heart around these questions. To me, leadership is about answering these four questions. That's what leading from the heart is. And the first one is where are we going? Right. That's the vision. That's that's the direction. The second is how are we going to get there? That's our strategy, our values, how we act and behave. The third one is are we going there together? You know, people look at their leaders and say, okay, are we in this together or am I just, you know, a part of this that, you know, is just sort of very transactional and I'm here to do a job and come and go, or are we in this together? Is there high levels of trust and team? And then the fourth question, and the one that to me is my personal favorite, because I just think it's so important and it really gets to the leading from the heart is people want to know, Will you love me along the way? Do you care about me? You know, and you think about this leadership journey of where we're going, how we're going to get there. Are we going there together, and will you love me along the way? That really is the important part of the journey is do you care about me? Do you care about me as a person? Uh, because when you show you care about people, they become better employees. They work harder, they're more loyal. They they get more engagement, and they get more value from their jobs. And so the winds of this and and the heart of leadership, um, and leading from the heart to me is not a soft thing. That's a, you know, hey, let's, let's, you know, talk about we we love our people. And I get some of that sometimes, you know, hey, what really matters is the numbers. And I say, yeah, absolutely. The numbers matter. And guess what? If we really lead from the heart? I've been around business for 43 years and I have seen clearly, clearly again and again and again and again. And I see it every day today, even if I go through and read some of the news reports or listen, you know, I just finished listening to a book about a company and the changes they made. Leading from the heart gives you better results. Better results. Exactly. It's not something that that takes away from the numbers. It actually makes the numbers better. But you have to live it and you have to make. Again, back to our word of authenticity. It's got to be real. And when you then start to build your business models, your strategies, your your very culture of your organization is, is built around these levels of trust and and authenticity and our values. You're going to get better outcomes, and you're going to have a better experience for your people, a better experience for your customers. And you're going to deliver better numbers, and you're going to handle the ups and downs better. Because one thing we both know in food and agriculture and you ask, why is it so important in food and Ag? We're going to face ups and downs. We're going to face weather problems with the crops. We're going to face consumer changes in in what they like, what they what tastes good, what what's popular. We're going to face cost pressures, inflation, everything that affects the economy affects the food industry. And so how do you lead through that? It's very easy to just get very transactional and very reactionary. If you're reactionary and transactional in these environments, it's it's very difficult. But if you lead from the heart, to me that's not transactional. It's transformational. It leads from a way that makes a difference, um, in a positive way and get you through the hard times, because it doesn't mean you're going to just every year, set a new record in your results. It's going to be hard things, but how you get through those is just so much will make you so much stronger and and build a much more sustainable business model than the fact that we we put so much emphasis today on short term outcomes and numbers and results, and we we really need to think long term, especially in food and ag. And when we think leading from the heart, that's a long term approach to leading, because if you lead from the heart, people grow to expect that. And they they anticipate that and that becomes, again, part of your culture. And so when things get rough or you face some challenges, you've got to still lead from the heart and keep that compassion and care and again, genuine love for your people.

Mandla Nkomo:  Amazing. I mean, Dan, you and I could go on and on, right. And and and I think you're absolutely right. You've spent 43 years in the business space and and these are the principles that have guided you. So if you were to to give us a piece of advice to your younger self, uh, about the business of food and leadership, what would it be?

Dan Dye:  You know, I think one of the things, Mandla,  that I would say, um, maybe I, I wish I knew earlier or wish I did even a little different. I was to to better understand, earlier in my career the power and the impact of values and caring for people. And I was fortunate because I had some I had some really unique opportunities to lead earlier in my career, and it was in those moments that I started to see that. Um, but I started as a trader. I started just buying and selling corn and soy beans and wheat and and that was a that was a great way to learn the business and to really understand agriculture and supply and demand and, you know, the whole the whole food chain and supply chain, uh, side of the business. So I had that opportunity, but it was it was the trading side of the business. And that was especially back then, much more transactional. And I don't think I saw that bigger picture until I actually had some of those leadership experiences and I have again another axiom that I share all the time. Everyone wins when a leader gets better. And I think, you know, focusing on getting better as leaders. Um, I wish I would have thought of or knew that a little axiom even earlier in my career, because I think early on you're more focused on, hey, I got this trading job I'm going to buy or sell, how much money am I making those kinds of things? And once you start to think about that, you asked me about that defining moment earlier in our in our talk. And that defining moment was really seeing that difference between your job as just a job and you're trying to make money versus, hey, your job can actually be one where you help and support and care for and work with in team other people to build trust and to create culture and to build values. And, and I, uh, you know, I feel incredibly blessed to have been part of that and seen that when I did. But I even think I could have benefited seeing it even earlier and just working on that dynamic. And I think even to this day, even though I've been retired now for, man, it's getting close to a year. Uh, I'm still I'm still learning about leadership. I'm still challenging myself and thinking about it and seeing things and growing and trying to get better so that I can hopefully, maybe help, um, the next generation of leaders in some way, shape or form. And that's certainly one of the things I enjoy at PFS is, is trying to find ways to invest in the next generation of leaders. Our own PFS team, the, staff in in the US, the staff in Africa. Um, our our clients and they're, they're incredible leaders there. If there's even a small thing I can do to help or share a little bit of wisdom or experience or hard things that have helped me, uh, I'm I want to do that because I want to invest to help make, uh, better leaders. Because we all win when leaders get better. And people deserve great leaders.

Mandla Nkomo: Wow that's amazing. And, um, so there's, there's thousands of, uh, of, uh, aspiring, uh, current and, um, and, you know, our leaders who are in mid-career or are also going towards retirement that are listening to us, uh, today, Dan and, um, uh, what would be your parting shot? Uh, Africa has been handed the responsibility of taking over the, very arduous task of feeding the world. Mhm. How do we as leaders in the food industry prepare ourselves for that moment? Your parting words?

Dan Dye: Yeah, I think it really comes back to some of these core principles we've talked about today that really is to be authentic. Let's be true and honest about the challenges, the things that are hard, but also where the opportunities are. And let's find ways to partner together. I mean, one of the things I like about RFS is the name, right? Partners in Food Solutions. We're not in this alone. And if we think about our companies, our organizations, or even us individually, if we think about ourselves as we're here to to do something, you know, individually we're going to have much less impact. And so one of the important parting shots for me is work in partnership. Find those common ways that we can help our, you know, food and ag industry continue to respond to a growing population, a hungry population, a population in need of better health and better food and diet is part of that. Let's take that responsibility on and do it really, really well in partnership and finding ways to work together. And that's not, you know, that can happen across a lot of different avenues of partnership, right, to to make that happen. And I think the the other thing that I would say, uh, as, as we think about the future is, is let's stay humble and let's stay hungry in our approach. And I don't mean hungry food hungry, I mean hungry to do more to to really make a difference. Uh, to help those that are physically hungry, we need to be hungry and and we need to work hard to help others. And that's a challenge we all face. And like you said, it's a daunting task when you think about, um, when you think about Africa and the and yet at the same time, a massive opportunity. And so how do we help to make that happen in a way, uh, that that's practical, uh, that's in partnership. And that really, uh, is beginning to, to build momentum as we move forward. And I think it it takes humility to do that. It takes a serving heart to do that. And, and again, I'll, I'll end with what, uh, what we talked about in Ghana and that's, that's let's, let's all challenge ourselves to lead from the heart and, and do the right things, care for your people, be authentic, live with integrity, honesty, do things the right way. And that's how we'll have the greatest impact. And in the food and ag space, that impact is so important, so necessary and so critical for for a healthy and a great future for the next generations to come.

Mandla Nkomo: Amazing. So, folks, that was, uh, Dan Dye, former CEO of Ardent Mills. Uh, sharing from the heart, uh, his own experiences as a leader in food and agriculture and, and challenging us today to lead from the heart because that's what this food system is going to need. We need to be deeply rooted and to be very focused on what we can deliver for the continent and the globe. Dan, thank you so much. Thanks, Mandla. Thanks to you and the PFS team and, uh, pleasure to be a part of it. We are blessed and we look forward to continuing to work together. Thank you