In “Being a Blue Collar LGBTQ Executive,” Jamey Seely, Chief Legal Officer at Gates at time of recording and now General Counsel for Crusoe, shares her journey to the C-suite and what it means to lead authentically in traditionally blue-collar industries like energy, manufacturing, and nuclear. Named one of Denver Business Journal’s Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Business, Jamey reflects on her career path, the two common legal career tracks, and why inclusivity, resilience, and curiosity have shaped her leadership. She also discusses the importance of mentorship, board interactions, and building trust across global organizations—reminding us that diversity is not just policy, but lived experience at the executive level.

For the full interview: https://ocns.co/evp-gc-jamey-seely-being-a-blue-collar-lgbtq-executive/

10 Min Clip Transcript

Michael Mitchel: [00:00:00] Hello, this is Michael Mitchell. I launched the podcast Exploring Talent in 2019. In 2021. I renamed it CXO Conversations. Hope you enjoy this episode and will subscribe to CXO conversations. For more great interviews, visit oc national search.com or your favorite podcast platform and subscribe. Enjoy. All right.

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I’m joining Jamie Sealey at Gates, fairly new global headquarters for this episode. For almost three years, Jamie has been the Gates EV, p, and Chief Legal Officer. And when I say fairly new, I think I still has that new building smell to it. She’s been named by Denver Business Journal as 2020s Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Business, an honoree by as pioneer for being a trails trailblazer in business 2019.

2019. Outstanding women in business. In 2018 out and Proud Corporate Counsel Award by the national L-G-B-T-Q Bar Association, and that’s just since she’s arrived in Denver today. We’ll, we will talk about the path to being a Chief Legal Officer. Most people refer to as general counsel. Uh, two Legal Career Paths, board and Interaction being an executive and L-G-B-T-Q and Blue Collar Industries and Nuclear fallout.

[00:03:00] Welcome to the conversation, Jamie. Please share an interesting fact about yourself with everyone. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. All right. So, um, in addition to, um, doing the whole legal thing, I, uh, try to do a lot of other fun things. So I love to, uh, run marathons all over the world. I love to cycle all over the world. I love to race cars.

I love to do all those exciting adrenaline junkie things, and I’m always open to, uh, it’s new ideas for those too. 

Michael Mitchel: Didn’t you do a marathon in Africa? Yeah, 

Jamey Seely: tell me about that. I did, so I did a marathon, um, in South Africa, and it’s supposed to be the hardest one. This, this group does is called an adventure marathon.

So basically it’s marathon distance, but they add all these really. Challenging obstacles to it. So when I signed up for it, I thought the challenging obstacle was gonna be that, um, you know, there were gonna be wild animals on the range at the same time I was there. So I thought that would be it. I thought, okay, that’s just, that’s enough.

That’s no problem. And then I got there and they drive you on the course. And so you have no [00:04:00] warning of this at all, but they drive you on the course. And when you’re driving on the course, you notice, first of all, there’s eight miles at a 14 degree grade, which basically means if you’re running up. You’re not really running.

If you’re running down, you’re running real fast. If you’re going down, you’re trying not to Just tumble. Yeah, you’re trying not to fall. And then, you know, on top of that, they did 12 miles of sand just. Sand. Just like, so it’s 

Michael Mitchel: 1.5 energy output. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, exactly. For, for 12 full miles. So, um, yeah, that was kind of, that’s kind of what you sign up for with these when you do these things though, is you don’t really know what you’re gonna get into.

Um, so you thought you were 

Michael Mitchel: gonna be dodging zebras. In fact, it’s much more 

Jamey Seely: Right. Kind of. Kind of, kind of kinda like a lot of my, my GC jobs too, you know, you don’t know what you’re gonna, what you’re gonna get into when you sign up for it. 

Michael Mitchel: I’ve tried running. I, I’m a cyclist, I biked here. Mm-hmm. Right.

It’s, it’s a gorgeous day out here in Denver. Beautiful. But, uh, you know, when you get tired and you want to see, when you, when you get tired of running, you stop, you stop moving. At least on the bike. Yeah. You can coast for a while. [00:05:00] 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. It’s a much, much more helpful thing. I’m trying to transition, but it’s, it’s a tough transition.

Michael Mitchel: So for those who are off in North Gates mm-hmm. Um, and they probably have, most people have no idea how much Gates interact with Yeah. How much they depend on gates. What does Gates do? 

Jamey Seely: Hmm. So we are this really cool product that you probably never see, but is in everything that you deal with on a daily basis.

So at its simplest level, we make belts and hoses. There’s a lot of marketing grates, technical terms I could give you on that. But very simply, belts and hoses. Now the question is where are those belts and hoses? So if you think about your normal day, um, and if you think about, you know, you wake up, you turn the ceiling fan, well, there’s one of our belts in your ceiling fan.

Probably if you go start a load of wash, there’s probably a belt in your washer or dryer that we made. There’s nine of our belts in the ATMs that you might frequent from time to time. PlayStations have our belts, dati. Motorcycles have our belts, Harley [00:06:00] motorcycles have our belts. They’re, they’re all over the world.

But because we’re not like an iPhone where we have, you know, our brand is right on the front of the product, you don’t see it a lot of times. So we’re this fun, you know, hidden product that’s in a ton of different, different things. 

Michael Mitchel: Also, bicycle belts. ’cause I sell, yeah. Courage Classic. A couple years ago, gate was a sponsor and they have a whole line of bikes with the, with the belt as the dry train.

Yeah. 

Jamey Seely: One of, one of our favorite initiatives is to take, anytime you see a chain that’s driving something mechanical and replace it with a belt. So we’ve got these great, you know, belts that go on bikes now. So it gets rid of, uh, you know, rookie marks for you guys who are bikers, because that’s the first thing I learned when I started biking is, you know, you rub up against the chain and you just leave these great greasy marks all over you.

No rookie marks with the belts. It’s great. 

Michael Mitchel: But also, uh, automobile hoses and belts. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Still, yeah. All, all automobiles, um, all kinds of, uh, agricultural equipment. Um, you know, well, you can find our, our belts and hoses in that. All [00:07:00] kinds of construction equipment, so like Caterpillar, John Deere, Kubota, I mean, you know, all, all of the big.

Makers of, of things that, you know, move people and move earth. Um, you know, usually have one of our products in it or we’re trying to get one of our products in it if they don’t, if it’s not there already. 

Michael Mitchel: So there was, um, a. You guys have a, a job specification here called Vulcanize, and I thought that was such a cool term.

I’m like, that’s a real thing. Sounds 

Jamey Seely: like, sounds like a villain, right? Yeah, it does. 

Michael Mitchel: It does. It does. But, but when I, I had envisions of, you know, I don’t know, just steel being poured or heavy industrial factory and there’s someone in the bows of this factory in there. They’re vulcanizing. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, yeah.

Whatever that is. Yeah, well, exactly. It’s, you know, it, it, it is, one of the cool things about Gates as a company is, you know, we started 108 years ago in Denver, and so when I moved here from New York, it was fantastic because you would say, oh, I’m with Gates. And even though. It’s not a product that people see every day.

People used to see the water [00:08:00] tower or, you know, other things from, you know, gates’ history here. So it, it was like this great bonding thing, being a new person to, uh, to a community where, you know, people kind of automatically. Felt like they knew something you know about you, or you had something that where you could, you know, bond with ’em because almost everybody, you know, knew Gates and it was, it was great.

I’ve never worked for a company like that where it was such an integral part of the community. 

Michael Mitchel: I moved here in 98, from 1998 from Seattle, and my first bank was Gates Credit Union. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s, it’s, yeah, it’s amazing. Yeah. Really amazing. And, you know, still lots of, uh, you know, markers from, you know, the family that, that owned it before as well as the.

You know, the company that we continue to be today. 

Michael Mitchel: So, um, and I said Chief Legal Officer, but I think most we’re gonna kinda get into it. Yeah. Um, most people will say, uh, general counsel. Yeah. So, so, but I’m using Chief Legal Officer because that’s kind of, you know, we’re at the seed level. Right. Um, but.

Tell me what your role here is. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, so, so I am the, the Chief legal Officer, which means I’ve got this great team of lawyers that handle [00:09:00] everything from the company’s, you know, compliance programs, which is a big part of, you know, gates and being a healthy public company is having, you know, good compliance, good ethics, good, you know, standards that we live by too.

You know, every contract that the company does, you gotta have, you know, a team that looks at it, make sure it’s okay, and then we, you know, move forward with it. We’ve got all of our securities law filings where, you know, we do all of our disclosures to the public about our financials and everything we’re we’re doing on those.

So we have a team that pairs with, uh, accounting and finance and does that and then, you know, we are. A big innovator. I mean, that’s, that’s one of our cores. So I’ve got a significant IP team that, you know, is filing patents and reviewing other people’s patents and trying to, you know, figure out where we wanna go with products and helping support our r and d team on, you know, where there’s already IP and where there’s not.

Um, and then, you [00:10:00] know, I, I have kind of the other. You know, legal stuff where we have to, you know, unfortunately every company, no matter, you know, how big or small you are, you, you know, we’ll be involved in litigation at some point. So we always, you know, have teams that do that. And then teams that help our, you know, HR and employment teams with all of those, um, regulations and making sure, you know, we’re always on kind of the right side of, of that, of those transactions.

And, and that’s kind of. It’s kind of the gambit. I mean, it really, the fun thing about being in law in a corporation is you cross almost every area. The company Right. Does does business. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s not, it’s, you know, people talk about silos in companies. Well, it’s virtually impossible for, for my team to get stuck in a silo because.

We really aren’t, won’t be doing our jobs if we do sales contracts, 

Michael Mitchel: factory openings, HR issues, m and a IPO. I mean, list goes on and on and on. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, it really does. It’s, it’s, it’s a great way to get to know a company too, because you do have to get, you know, so involved in so many different aspects of it.

[00:11:00] So, you know, one of my first things I did when I, when I joined was I talked to our head of operations and said, you know, tell me how, tell me how you make things, because 

Michael Mitchel: have you toured a factory? 

Jamey Seely: I have, I have, yeah, I won. We actually have a great, um, one of the great things about this new location in particular is it gave us the opportunity on the 14th floor to have a great, um, customer experience center, which just reminds me that I forgot to give you the tour.

So I owe you a tour. At the end of this, I, at the end of this discussion where I show you all of our cool. Products. And, um, you know, it, we, we kind of really try to take this journey, like we talked about at the beginning, at the opening here, of showing people, oh yeah, you can’t see our product in these everyday appliances, but let’s put a clear cover on it so you can, let’s, let’s take, um, you know, the robotic arms and put ’em, put clear covers on those so you can see all the.

You know, different, uh, bells that got on those, A 

Michael Mitchel: aero electronics, does that? Yeah, yeah. They’re headquartered here. They’re south down the tech center. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And that you, it’s just, and it goes way back. So you’re like, as a kid, [00:12:00] I’m like, I remember. Oh, that’s them. Right? 

Jamey Seely: Right. Yeah. And then we’re a, we’re a material science company too, so we’ve got a really cool display that talks about things like, you know, we deal with high pressure hydraulic hoses.

Right. So, you know, you don’t wanna have a puncture. So, you know, we’ve got things like, you know. Kevlar that we can put on the top of it, which to me sounds like a great science fiction movie, right? Because I feel like Kevlar is, you know what goes on, Batman, not. That what would’ve gone on our products. But 

Michael Mitchel: actually I, I know ’cause I was a hydraulic mechanic on f eighteens in the Navy, so I appreciate the good, a good hydraulic hose that’s not gonna blow up in my face, literally.

Jamey Seely: Nice. 

Michael Mitchel: Um, so for someone who’s not in the legal field, what do you, what do you feel that they can take away from this conversation? We try and keep this open, you know, keep, we want anyone to get something out of this. Yeah, 

Jamey Seely: I think maybe just a kind of a general understanding of how, you know, you can interact with, uh, the legal teams and you know, how to really get the most out of that interaction.

I think, you know, just a great deal of breadth too, because, you know, like we. Like we were talking about earlier, one of the things that’s great about, [00:13:00] you know, the chief legal officer role is just how many different areas we touch on. So I think, you know, kind of that that breadth of, um, of exposure to a business is, would, I think, be really helpful.

Mm-hmm. And then I think just, you know, how to, uh. How to really, um, you know, work deal with boards when you’re getting up to that, that level too. 

Michael Mitchel: All right. So how does one become a general counsel, chief legal officer for a large company? 

Jamey Seely: You know, I, um, when I was in law school, I decided I wanted to be a Chief legal officer, and I’m not sure I really even knew exactly what it was at the time when I said that, but I just thought, okay, I wanna work in a corporation.

And I really wanna help the corporation grow and solve its hard problems and, you know, be that, that trusted advisor. Um, and at the time I was working for, um, in law school, I was working for the oil and gas professor. Um, so we had this really great conversation. He said, okay, I, you know. You gotta tell me what you really wanna do because this is, you know, not just a [00:14:00] job, it’s a mentoring opportunity.

So I, so I told him that, and we had this great exchange where he, um, he, he got up, I still remember this, I mean, like, it was the day, but he got up. We, we left his office, we walked down the hall, down some stairs. When he knocked on another, uh, professor’s door and he said, Hey, I want you to meet. Um, so and so, he’s the head of the securities law practice, and if you wanna be general counsel, you need to get a job with him.

Um, because getting a job with me is gonna teach you the subject matter, but getting a job with him is gonna teach you everything about, you know, how companies have to interact with the public, which is a whole different level. And is, is really what’s, you know, sometimes. Considered the most critical thing for, for the gc.

So I ended up actually getting a job with both of them. Um, and it ended up being, you know, incredibly fun and helpful. But I, I still remember that discussion because in, in that day, the thought was, you know, if you’re not, you have to be [00:15:00] an expert in securities laws because you really have to be focused on the public company’s disclosures and you have to really know board governance, um, first and foremost to be in that.

Chair, 

Michael Mitchel: but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone go straight from law school to corporate counsel. Is that right? 

Jamey Seely: Right. So does everyone have 

Michael Mitchel: to do their pay, their pay their dues in a law firm? 

Jamey Seely: You know, there, there are a few companies that, um, will take you right out of school. Um, I was actually working for this little bitty company, um, called, it was called Mobile at the time.

Later became ExxonMobil when I was in law school and scrappy little 

Michael Mitchel: startup still. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Scrappy little startup. Exactly. Exactly. So it, uh, and they had this great, we had this great conversation where they said, look, we like you, we think you’re bright. We could actually bring you on. Um, but the problem is you need to think about it from a long-term perspective.

Um, and her point was, she said, you know, look. I can, I can give you lots of contracts [00:16:00] to work on, but in-house we don’t really have any sort of formal mentorship or apprenticeship like you would find in a law firm where you really, where someone really teaches you the craft. Of being a lawyer. 

Michael Mitchel: So she was really selling the opportunity 

Jamey Seely: clearly.

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So I, you know, it’s sound 

Michael Mitchel: like this, like toiling away in a file cabinet somewhere. 

Jamey Seely: Right. And you know, I’m, I’m like a, you know, I’m a, I’m a law student. This, this is, could be my first job and I’m trying really hard to listen, but not just say, I don’t care. Yes. I want the job. Um, so I actually did pause and, and thought about it.

And I realize she’s probably right. Um, that it probably did make more sense for me to go, you know, work in a law firm for a while and really get those tremendous mentors and, you know, have that great, um, learn that craft because, you know, law is. There aren’t a lot of things anymore that really are a craft, but you know, learning how to practice is entirely different than the theory they teach you in school, which, you 

Michael Mitchel: know, when had that [00:17:00] conversation go today.

Because today it’s all about mentoring and mm-hmm. Preparing tomorrow’s leaders today. Yeah. So that mentality I don’t think is still true. I’d like to think, 

Jamey Seely: yeah. 

Michael Mitchel: Regardless of what area of expertise you’re in. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, no, I, I, I hope so. I hope it’s more of, I hope there is more focus on mentorship. I mean, that’s one of the things that I spend a lot of my, um, volunteer time on right now, 

Michael Mitchel: right.

Jamey Seely: Is, is mentorship and, and especially, you know, with the general council mentoring program and, and, you know, helping mentor, you know, uh, young, young lawyers across the city. So, 

Michael Mitchel: so do you see, what do you see as the way of trends of. For people who wanna become a gc. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, so I think the biggest thing I’ve seen trend-wise is it used to be that you had to be a corporate securities m and a lawyer, um, to be the gc.

And if you weren’t. You could do really, really well within the corporation and you could be a number two or a number three, but you really couldn’t be the gc. But that actually isn’t necessarily the [00:18:00] case anymore. Now, I think what, um, corporations have started to realize is that, you know, they have started to look more at, okay, where is my biggest risk?

And if my biggest risk is I get sued. All the time, and I have to deal with all these state regulators about, you know, reg, about how they’re governing my business. Maybe I need like a regulatory and litigation lawyer as my general counsel and maybe I can get that expertise, you know, in a number two or a number three lawyer on, you know, how to deal with all my governance and securities issues.

So I think companies are really kind of starting to look at it. Much more broadly now, and frankly, boards are starting to look at it more broadly because it used to be that the boards were really the ones who. You know, we’d get nervous about whether or not the GC had, you know, the competence to make sure that they hit all their governance, um, tick marks.

And if you, if you know, if you make your board nervous, you certainly can’t kind of get the job. So [00:19:00] I think if you’re not in that securities, you know, role, I think there’s a lot more things open to you now. I think you just have to be prepared. Address that question. And this 

Michael Mitchel: is a journal journalized statement, but I think, um, you see more companies coming back and forth between being public and private and back and forth.

I mean, there’s one company here locally that they’ve done it. I think they’re in the third, you know, so that, that I think that would keep their general council staff busy. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Say the least. And that those are, those are really exciting, interesting projects for sure. Yeah. I mean those are, those are the things where um, you know, you’re burning the midnight oil, um, but you don’t really care ’cause it’s so fun.

Um, but yeah. 

Michael Mitchel: Well, we’re gonna talk about, we’re gonna get to why you came. Mm-hmm. A follow up. But up. Before we do, I wanna say, I wanna ask you why should, why should someone wanna become a general legal counsel? A chief legal counsel? Mm-hmm. I’m tripping over those own terms. Yeah. Yeah. Why? To, why would someone wanna do that?

Because is it, you know, ’cause they think it’s the top of their profession. Mm-hmm. Is it because of personal, uh. Career goals? Or is it because of the, what the role does for a company? What, what are your, [00:20:00] yeah. I mean, I know you’re not speaking for everybody, but Sure, 

Jamey Seely: sure. Look, I think if it’s just ambition, I think those aren’t, I think those, you know, there’s plenty of ambitious lawyers and I think if it’s just purely ambition driven, those probably aren’t the best GCs.

I think. You know, the drive you need to have to really be. A great GC is you need to really want to understand everything about the business because when you’re at that GC level, you, you, you see so many different things, um, and you can’t actually, um. You know, you have to be really quick to see an issue and spot it and then research it further because, or delegate it to your team because you can’t possibly have huge expertise in abs in everything that you’re gonna come across.

So you have to have this really love of learning the business and where it’s risks are, and then you have to have this ability to, you know, really be comfortable. Um, issue spotting and then going and [00:21:00] getting teams to figure, to figure out the issues that you’ve spotted. 

Michael Mitchel: Hmm. Okay. 

Jamey Seely: Because you just can’t be, you can’t be broad enough, so you, you have to be, you have to be thin, thin enough to cover everything and then rely on others for the depth.

Michael Mitchel: Gotcha. Okay. How would you describe, and this is a very broad question, and we’re gonna try and drill down. Okay. We chat a little bit of this before we start, we started recording. Mm-hmm. But how would you describe your interaction with the, your peer CXOs and with the board? Yeah. And I know it’s broad, so we’ll, we’ll kind of pick a lane, like, you know mm-hmm.

When you have to, when you’re acting with the board and the board asks you a question that might not be in line with what the CEO envisions. Whatever that that topic issue may be. Yeah. How do you walk that line? ’cause I’ve always believed the higher up you get mm-hmm. The more policy intrigue there is, but it’s in time.

You’re here to serve what’s best for the company, the employees and the, and the shareholders. Mm-hmm. Would you fair that’s, do you think that’s a say, that’s a fair statement. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. No, I think that’s, that’s, that’s a very true, you do serve multiple roles as the GC and it can often [00:22:00] be very uncomfortable. So one thing I learned from.

Um, back in my years in energy is I worked for a company that was half Japanese owned and half, um, US owned. So there was this, um, cultural aspect of it as well that actually has ended up being very helpful. So the cultural aspect of the way the JA Japanese corporations opened, operated at that time was.

There was never a discussion in the board room that had not been preceded. So you had all these, um, pre-meetings before the board meeting where you vetted out all these questions and you know, really, um, kind of dug into issues. And then the board meeting was like this formal, um, ceremonial process.

Michael Mitchel: Reenactment. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, almost, almost. But the lesson from that was, um, to really think about. All the things that might come up in a board meeting and build [00:23:00] consensus with your peers in the C-suite, um, about those before the meeting happens. So even if you have to say something that’s gonna be slightly contrary to another member, it’s not a surprise.

To them. And then everybody’s prepared, and then everybody makes the best arguments. And then that’s what’s best for the shareholders because then the shareholders get this really robust discussion, um, you know, in that board meeting because no one’s being surprised by anything. Um, that’s, that’s happening there.

So that’s kind of what I, that’s one of the very early lessons I took from, you know, the beginning of my career into the boardroom to try to really make sure that you’re anticipating. What the, what the issues are and what the potential questions would be. And then, you know, occasionally you’re, you’re just always gonna get the, you know, the question that no one anticipated and you just have to go with the right, the right theme in mind 

Michael Mitchel: when inter interacting with the board is the issues and the topics more.

Um. Big picture or [00:24:00] detailed. 

Jamey Seely: I, I find with the board what there, you know, I heard this great description of how a board should behave once and the, and the way that they described how a board should behave is a, a board should always be noses in, but fingers out. So, in other words, you’re supposed to have your nose in the business and be paying attention to the big picture issues, but you’re not supposed to have your fingers in the middle of it.

Trying to, that’s the, that’s the job of, of management, right? Yeah. It’s actually, I think, a really good, uh, metaphor for, especially for someone who’s trying to make that transition, which ’cause a lot of board members were CEOs 

Michael Mitchel: before. Mm-hmm. 

Jamey Seely: And were CFOs before, and the hard part of the transition for them is.

How do they, um, you know, govern without really getting in there and doing it themselves? 

Michael Mitchel: So that really reinforces again, our earlier podcast guest we had was General Kevin Chilton. He’s a board member of CenturyLink. Okay. And he pretty much. He didn’t use that analogy, but you just reinforced what he had said.

Yeah. He’s like, we’re big picture. Yeah. You know, we’re [00:25:00] steering the big ship, but we’re not in the engine room, essentially. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, yeah. You’re not, you’re not trying to, uh, to control the day to day. 

Michael Mitchel: Yeah. They don’t, you don’t need to get a tactical level issues of describing the situation. They’re more interested in big, big chest moves.

Jamey Seely: Yeah. I think that’s exactly right. Strategy, innovation, you know, where’s the business going? Um. I mean, a little bit of where it’s been, I think is helpful, but more, you know, where, where are you going? 

Michael Mitchel: That’s really, I think, a really good kind of advice is mm-hmm. Focus on the big picture. Yeah. Don’t get into minutiae.

Yeah. ’cause you could just see them rolling their eyes. I mean, you’re, they’re probably, by the time you, you get into detailed, they’re checking their phones, that’s when you know when you’ve lost the room. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. No, you’re right. You’re right. If, if, if you’re, if you’re able to look up, you can tell when you lose the room.

Really quickly. 

Michael Mitchel: So this is gonna tie back a little bit earlier, a little bit what you alluded to, but why do you feel you were tapped to be the. Did you see for Gates? 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. So, um, you know, I, I know the key thing that they were, were looking for is, you know, I joined at a really interesting time for Gates. I joined, um, right before [00:26:00] the IPO.

So my, my job number one when I came on board was take the company public and then, and it was such a, it was, you know, very close in time. So I think. You know, I joined in SEP at the beginning of September and we went public at the ending end of uh, January. So, you know, normally you’d wanna do a lot of other things, but because that’s such an all consuming task and because the timeframe was so compressed, that was really the number one focus.

And that was, you know, that was the big, exciting bit too for coming, for coming to Gates is, you know, it’s very rare that you join a company and they say, oh, no, no. We know we’re going public. 

Michael Mitchel: Mm-hmm. I mean, 

Jamey Seely: you know, you can join a lot of companies and they say, yeah, we wanna go public. Yay. It’s gonna be fun.

That’s, that’s our goal. But you, you know, you rarely ever come in and they say, no, no. We are going public 

Michael Mitchel: and that’s why we’re hiring you. Yeah. You’re gonna do it. So, 

Jamey Seely: yeah. So that, so I think, you know, for, for this role in particular, at that juncture in Gates’s, um, growth, it was really critical that they have somebody with that, um, public company experience [00:27:00] to really kind of come in, lead the transaction from a legal side, but also, you know, you gotta put all the governance in place because, you know, you don’t, that, that, that just doesn’t stand itself up overnight.

It’s a whole different. Process to go from, you know, private company to, to public and have all those checks. I think, I 

Michael Mitchel: think we met just after that happened. ’cause you’re, you’re starting to emerge in reemerge. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Yeah. I was, I didn’t, I don’t, I didn’t actually live here for the first six months I lived here.

I just went back and forth to the office. Oh, 

Michael Mitchel: I can’t imagine the hours. But there was kinda a mm-hmm. Um, a cool thing out of for as reward for all the hard work. Right, 

Jamey Seely: right. Yeah. I got a cool deal toy. I, we, we, we were, we were joking earlier that, you know, we, we do really love our deal toys. But yeah, I mean, it was an amazing transaction, an amazing experience for which he’s referring to 

Michael Mitchel: is, and I’ll put the picture up on, on social media, is.

There’s a, it’s a little dusk deal toy. Mm-hmm. But it’s a replica of the old Gates water tower. 

Jamey Seely: It is, yeah. That, 

Michael Mitchel: by the way, is, [00:28:00] it does come apart. We found Michael found the hard way. Um, but, and it talks about the, the day at one you went in public. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Right. It does, it does. Yeah. As well. You know, it talks about our, our metrics that we said, oh, there’s, there’s 

Michael Mitchel: a, the strike price.

Mm-hmm. You got the strike price. You got the IPO. 40, if I’m reading this right, 44,275,000 shares. Mm-hmm. Common stock, $19 per share. Right. Wow. And then there’s your ticker, uh, GTES. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. 

Michael Mitchel: Well, I didn’t mean to do that plug, but that’s just kind of cool. Yeah, no, thanks 

Jamey Seely: for the plug. Appreciate it. 

Michael Mitchel: Um, so what was that like?

Yeah. During the 

Jamey Seely: appeal? So yeah, so that was, that was the, um, definitely one of the more amazing experiences I, I’ve had. I mean, just, you know, the complexity of those deals are. Astounding and really fun to, to run from the legal’s perspective. And then this is actually, you know, the, the fun part about doing an IPO that everybody kinda gets excited about is, you know, when, when you get to the big day, you know, you get to go ring the bell on the, on the New York Stock Exchange.

Um, and the [00:29:00] fun part for me is that was actually my second time. To ring the bell on the New York Stock Exchange. Really? Yeah. So, yeah, that’s right. You 

Michael Mitchel: told me. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, 

Jamey Seely: yeah, most, you know, most people, you know, you sort of hope you get to do that once, but, um, the, the really cool thing is, yeah, that was actually my second time to, to do it.

So it was, it was really amazing. I think, you know. Leading up to an IPO, you know, it’s just a blurry mess because, you know, you’re, you’re not, you don’t get to sleep. You know, you, you just, you’re working every night, crazy hours because there’s always something that comes up right at the end that you gotta quickly solve.

And then, you know, you solve it through multiple chains and just get it done. But when that, when that day comes where you’re like, okay, I made it to the bell ringing day. You know, we can, we can do this, but the New York Stock Exchange really does. This tremendous job of making sure that, um, all the pomp and circumstance you would expect of a day like that is there.

Mm-hmm. I mean, they, they know that this is. The pinnacle for a lot of [00:30:00] companies that they, you know, people work for decades to kind of get there and then sometimes, you know, if you’re lucky, you finally get there and they make such a amazing show and production out of it that it’s just like this perfect way to kind of package and feel like you really, you know, got to, to be, you got that goal that you were going for for so long.

So it’s, they do a great job with it. I mean, they have, you know, there’s so many traditions in there from, you know, signing of books to signing of bricks. So you just kind of get this like. Behind the scenes walk of, of Wall Street. That’s just amazing. And then, you know, there’s then this, you know, then you could act actually like stand on the podium 

Michael Mitchel: in the room, in the big hall in the 

Jamey Seely: room.

Yeah. Where, where all the traders are, you know, not, they don’t yell as much as they used to, but there’s still, you know, a lot of yelling and a lot of ticking and, you know, all those, you know, fun things you would associate with being on, you know, the floor of one of the world’s, you know. Biggest exchanges.

So it’s, it just was such an amazing experience. I just really can’t, you 

Michael Mitchel: know, for many That’s a once in a lifetime. Em, perfu So far it’s been twice. 

Jamey Seely: [00:31:00] Yeah, it’s been two. So I, I’m, I’m excited. My, my, I, I’d, I’d love to, uh, yeah, I’d love to do, do that even more times. So maybe, we’ll, maybe I can talk gates into another one.

We’ll see. 

Michael Mitchel: So prior to Gates was manufacturing you, you came from energy sector. Yeah. Um. And how would you describe your, your current energy? You know, energy, I would think a little bit like May, perhaps manufacturing is a mm-hmm. Is a fairly blue collar industry. Yeah. Um, but how would you describe that experience from a LG L-G-B-T-Q perspective?

Jamey Seely: Yeah, so I think that’s, it’s always the, um, when you’re in. One, one of those industries. I think it’s, it’s always the hard part is, um, that moment of, of, you know, when someone really gets to know you. Um, and sometimes when you’re in the more senior roles, like, like I am now, that, you know, people know that in advance, but often not.

They often not, or, or not, they don’t. So, you know, you always have these, um, moments where people will ask you, oh, well what does your [00:32:00] husband do? And you know, I, I always have to say, well, no, I actually don’t have a husband. I have a significant other. And she is, and you know, you, you try to enunciate really clearly because you, you want to make sure that that person picks up on what you’re 

Michael Mitchel: saying.

On what 

Jamey Seely: you’re saying. Yeah. And, and doesn’t, you know, ’cause you, you wanna kind of avoid that. That awkward moment of, of, of that conversation. But there, there always is this, this moment and it’s, it’s, it’s a very interesting phenomenon because I was talking about this with a couple of friends and you and I, I think we’ve talked about this before.

Mm-hmm. Where, you know, it’s, it’s really interesting. It’s not like you do that once in your life and you’re kind of done. So, you know, when you, when you are gay, people ask you a lot of times, well, what’s your coming out story? And I’m like, well, I have to come out every day. All over again because there’s always somebody that I have to reexplain to the fact that yes, I am gay and this is my, you know, significant other and yeah, and I mean, 

Michael Mitchel: he’s my girlfriend or whatever.

Yeah. Whatever, 

Jamey Seely: [00:33:00] whatever, whatever. You know, the, the term, you know, at the time is, but it, it, it is something you have to do over and over again every time you meet somebody new. So, you know, I think in. In those, uh, days of the energy sector or, you know, red state versus blue state. I think the goal is really always that, you know, for me, I just wanted that to be, you know, a part of who I am.

I didn’t want that to be, you know, like a, a big aha moment. I just wanted it to be no big deal, really. Just like. You know, I’m, any other aspect of who I am is just, it’s just a single part that makes up who I am. So I think, you know, getting through that, that moment each time you meet somebody new of, oh, hey, you know, this is who I am.

No, I don’t have a husband, but, and just kind of going through that as you know. As un awkwardly as possible is usually what I consider to be a really big win, because really that’s just what I want at the end of the day. I just kind of want it to be just like a fun conversation with a [00:34:00] friend. 

Michael Mitchel: Right. I think when you know you, you have to wonder, ’cause like at, we were talking this earlier, earlier, Hollywood doesn’t use the term actor.

I don’t think they use the term actors anymore. Right. Except for the Oscars. Right? Yeah. For the category. But I’ve seen more and more it’s just actor. Mm-hmm. And regardless of the gender. Will there be a time where it’s the same way with spouses? Yeah. Instead of just saying husband and wife. ’cause that’s very gender specific.

Or girlfriend. Or boyfriend. Just spouse. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. I don’t know. You know, I 

Michael Mitchel: wonder if that moment’s ever gonna come. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. I don’t know. It’s a really good question. I wonder, I wonder the same thing. Especially as, you know, we start to, um, really kind of change our views of, of gender and, and of women as you know.

It was just, it was just recently International Women’s Day Day. Yeah. So, you know, as, as we sort of change. On all of those differing fronts as a society. I think all of those things will, you know, morph in ways that we hadn’t really anticipated. So I think it’ll be interesting to see. 

Michael Mitchel: Do you have any advice to who?

Who, to anyone else who has to go through that every day? 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. You know, I think the, I [00:35:00] think the key thing for that is really just to kind of decide. And well, I think there’s two key things. I think first the most important thing is just to get really, really comfortable with it yourself. Because if you’re not comfortable with it, nobody else around you is gotta be comfortable with it.

It’s just you, you can’t sort of hide that. Um, at level, you’re talking about level, that moment 

Michael Mitchel: when they asked about the, your spouse not, not about being LGBT. I wanna make sure we’re clear about that. Well, I’m talking 

Jamey Seely: about both actually. Okay. I’m talking about, you know, a lot, I think for a lot of L-G-B-T-Q people, a big PO moment in their life is actually getting comfortable with who they are and talking about who they’re even 

Michael Mitchel: in 2020.

Jamey Seely: Yeah, I still have people come and talk to me even in 2020 about, Hey, I’m not sure I’m ready, or, you know, I, I’m just, I don’t, I, you know, I don’t wanna make that, um, disclosure yet. I don’t really, I just, I’m not ready to go there. And it’s just a matter of, you know, I think, well, I think, you know, you, we changed so much as people, as, as we, you know, progress through life.

And I think it’s just a matter of, you know, when you get to that point where you are comfortable. So I think that [00:36:00] actually is still. A significant issue for a lot of people. Un unfortunately, but hope, hopefully that always gets easier. But, but yeah, I think, you know, and also kind of thinking about how you talk about, talk about those discussions and, and then kind of coming up with, you know, how you want it to go in, in your mind.

I think that’s kind of one of the best. Bits of, uh, advice I got, you know, from a, just from a professional standpoint was just, you know, just envision you the way you want these things to go. And then once you have that vision in your head, it’s very easy to know how to react and to set things up for, you know, success for both you and, and, and the.

Everybody else you’re dealing with. 

Michael Mitchel: Well, I would imagine that it wasn’t like during your interview selection process here at Gates, you said, oh, by the way, it’s not on your resume, but Right. I mean, when you’re looking at a, because I tell everybody when they’re interviewing, you’re looking at the company just as much as they’re looking at you.

So during your process, how did you get a sense of Gates’s culture? Of inclusivity? Yeah. And how do you That’s, 

Jamey Seely: that’s a really good. Good question, right? Because [00:37:00] the worst thing you, you know, that could happen is I could get into a place where, you know, they don’t actually have a good culture of, in inclusivity where diversity is not embraced and then, you know, then you’ve got a long road ahead of you.

Right? So I think there’s a lot of things you can do. Um, and I think, you know, one of ’em is you can go and, and, and first, you know. Look at their policies, which I always do ’cause you can find those online. But I think that only gives you a partial picture, right? Because every day now, everybody has something right online, everyone says, and everybody has a good, you know, legal team says the right things, um, online.

So I think you start there, and then I think the next thing you do is you really ask, okay, who’s in charge of that? Um, and you know, inter, usually in the interview process, I usually meet whoever’s in charge of that. And, you know. I ask them a lot of questions about what do they specifically do to implement tangible Yeah, the culture.

Um, because that gives me a really good sense of, is this a document that you [00:38:00] just made? And it looks really pretty and maybe you put it on some walls in the, you know, in the break rooms. Um, but. Or is it a living, breathing thing? 

Michael Mitchel: Mm-hmm. 

Jamey Seely: Um, and so I’d love to see, you know, for example, um, if you ask me what I do, I would say, well, I support these organizations.

I go to these events, I do these mentoring programs, and you would immediately see it’s not a superficial thing, but there’s actually action associated with it. So I’m always looking for. The action part. ’cause the action part is the ultimate manifestation of actual, you know, an actual cultural initiative and an actual, um, you know, viewpoint on, on something.

So that’s how I, if I really wanna dig down super deep, that’s how I always look forward to. 

Michael Mitchel: So, um, you know, is there anything that, um, any additional thought, uh, is there any additional steps you think others could take when they’re looking at a company to really gauge that sense of inclusivity? 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, I think, you know, I think you could ask if you, if there’s a [00:39:00] diverse, if there’s a diversity and inclusion committee.

Ask, what do they do? Um, because that’ll tell you a lot about, you know, both 

Michael Mitchel: internally and externally. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, internally and externally. Like, are they doing things internally or is it, you know, something that doesn’t, that isn’t particularly active? And then you can ask what they’re doing externally too, because that’ll give you a good, uh, sense of, you know, is it an internal mission or as an internal mission and an external mission.

Or you know, frankly, sometimes is it just an external mission that says a different thing too, right? If, if you’re not really working on yourself, but you’re only working on, you know, the way you look externally, then that’s probably not the right balance either. 

Michael Mitchel: Okay. I mean, it’d be pretty easy to tell if it’s just lip service.

Yeah. Once you start getting under the hoods, what, that’s what 

Jamey Seely: you’re really looking for. I mean, everybody knows the right things to see, but I think. The, your, your kind of job as the interviewer is to be that, you know, that news anchor that’s going in there and pushing and going, well, okay, but, but what did you do on that [00:40:00] one last year?

And what’d you do on this one? And then numbers don’t lie. Mm-hmm. I mean, you can always, like, you know, look on websites to see actual numbers. 

Michael Mitchel: Yeah. 

Jamey Seely: Um. And, you know, actual numbers tell one or two things, right? You either actually have a diverse board or you don’t, and you either actually have a significant percent of your, um, workforce that’s diverse.

Or sometimes companies will say, look, we don’t, we’re not at numbers that we’re happy with right now, or we’re working on it. I’ll give you credit for that. I, I’ll ask you a lot of questions about what you’re doing to work on it. Right? ’cause I want to know that’s real. But, you know, I, I will give companies a lot of credit that, you know, put numbers out there and then say, you know, actually we’re, we’re working on having these, um, increase over time.

Michael Mitchel: Okay. Fair enough. Okay. So I, I’m gonna stick with your energy days. Yeah. Because, um, you alluded to a little bit of it, but it, it’s interesting. So you worked in a nuclear field. 

Jamey Seely: Mm. 

Michael Mitchel: Um, I think that might’ve been interesting, to say the least. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. [00:41:00] It was very, very fascinating. Ta talk about some of the, um, you know, you’re working with some of the brightest minds in the world.

I mean, you know, you’ve got your rocket science and you’ve got your crazy. Nuclear engineering mines, and we were in this really amazing contest. Um, when I was in the nuclear field in particular, the Department of Energy had just announced this, um, financing package where they wanted to increase. The amount of nuclear that was available because it’s, you know, a no carbon to low carbon, um, base load capacity.

So, you know, nice, nice for, um, a nice alternative to coal. So they started this contest and the contest basically was, you could get this great f. Federal financing, but we, but they didn’t have enough money for every project out there. So where there were 30 projects all vying for this federal financing to be the first new nuclear plant built in over 30 [00:42:00] years in the United States.

Michael Mitchel: And how much does one of these things these puppies cost? 

Jamey Seely: Well, it depends on the billions 

Michael Mitchel: and, yeah. Yeah. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. That’s, that’s the fun thing about nuclear is, you know, a project is 10 or $20 billion, so. It makes them infinitely more complex. 

Michael Mitchel: That’s one 10th of Jeff Bezos. 

Jamey Seely: You’re right. Yeah, you’re right. But that, but that’s what makes ’em so fun from a legal perspective, right?

Because when you, you know, when you deal with a, an acquisition that’s a $10 million acquisition or a hundred million dollars acquisition, I mean, you know, there’s, there’s only a certain amount of variation that happens in that. But then you, when you start talking about designing and constructing and financing something that’s in the 10 to $20 billion scale.

That is a really complex asset. That’s a lot of people that need to invest in that to actually get to that number. So it, it makes it, you know, from a, from in every aspect of it, it just gets, you know, more and more fascinating. Also gives you more room to, [00:43:00] um, to do, you know, interesting things with, with that.

Um, like, you know, when it’s that big, you can, you can bring in. You know, international partners for, uh, for transactions because, you know, you have the capacity to spend time, um, you know, courting international investors, but it’s, yeah, it fun, fun projects. 

Michael Mitchel: So you’re chasing financing, but then mm-hmm. You hit a and 

Jamey Seely: building.

At the same time and 

Michael Mitchel: building, but then you literally hit Yeah. A, a tsunami wave. Yeah. 

Jamey Seely: We literally hit a brick wall. Yeah. Um, you know, one of my best life experiences from a learning experience for sure, um, we, uh, we had heard that we, we, we were one of the two winners, um, of, you know, of the project on a Friday.

I think it was a Friday. I forget my days. ’cause you know, those days really blur, but literally, um, the next day Fukushima happened and when Fukushima happened, everything in the nuclear world ground to a halt. It’s one of the things [00:44:00] that’s very unique about nuclear is if there is any sort of nuclear instant, anywhere in the world.

Everybody in the world seizes 

Michael Mitchel: up, 

Jamey Seely: seizes up and looks at what they’re doing and thinks about, oh my gosh. We have to immediately look at how, and actually it’s a good thing, right? Because that’s how you want somebody to react, is you want to have such a strong safety culture that you say, I don’t care where in the world something happened.

We gotta look at it immediately, figure out exactly what happened, to make sure we don’t have any of those issues and that, so that that happened. Um, and then, you know, for us, the really, you know, big thing that that came out of that is, um, you know, one of our partners was one of the owner of the majority of those nuclear plants Oh really?

In Japan. So, you know, that, that was kind of the, uh, that was the end of the project as intended originally anyway, so that was a very. Incredibly audacious project. My wife wants, 

Michael Mitchel: my wife wants to go to Chernobyl. 

Jamey Seely: Oh yeah. I had game. Okay. 

Michael Mitchel: It, it would [00:45:00] be because we went to the Trinity site. Mm-hmm. In New Mexico, it’s open twice a year.

Jamey Seely: Mm-hmm. To 

Michael Mitchel: where they tested the first nuke. 

Jamey Seely: Okay. So 

Michael Mitchel: you can actually stand on ground zero. 

Jamey Seely: Oh wow. 

Michael Mitchel: And then I’ve been to Nagasaki. Oh, wow. Yeah, in the eighties when I live in Japan. Okay. So I’d go but though, 

Jamey Seely: yeah, 

Michael Mitchel: I’m 52. I’m not having any kids.

Um, so going back to, uh, bus, uh, work, um, what advice would you give to those who wanna be a gc? You know, a general, uh, a chief general? I’m still tripping over a chief legal officer ’cause that the reason why I I trip over that is. Not many people use that term. It’s more common use gc. Mm-hmm. General counsel.

Jamey Seely: Right, right. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s, it is one of those things that we’re kind of, we’re a little schizophrenic on right now. Yeah. Some, some people want CO, some people want gc, uh, kinda all the same to me. 

Michael Mitchel: I, I’m, I’m more of like, what? Call yourself, whatever you want. Just do the job. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, exactly. Well, I, and I think that’s actually a bit of the, a bit of the advice is, um.

You know, whatever, if, if you really want to be the gc, you’ve got to learn the business and learn it broad. [00:46:00] Um, because, you know, when you step into that GC chair, you, you can’t be, you know, just good at litigation. You can’t be just good at. Um, you know, response to health and safety issues. You have to, you have to be able to handle everything.

So really, you know, breadth is the key, I think, to kind of train yourself for that, especially these days. Versus, you know, in prior times when you know, you, they really, you know, did, did you, you know, were you a securities lawyer? All right, you check the box. I think now it’s a bit different. I think now you just really need to be prepared for that breadth of things that’s gonna come at you every single day.

’cause no day is gonna be the same. And then I think you need, you need to be also prepared for being that trusted advisor because that’s really, you know, what is, tends to be the MO thing that’s valued most by other C-Suite, um, you know, members is, you know, are you. The calm person when [00:47:00] Coronavirus breaks out and you gotta figure out an action plan because that’s really, you know, what people need from, from their legal plan teams.

Mm-hmm. Is action and focus and you know, this willingness to jump into whatever the problem is and figure it out with the team. 

Michael Mitchel: And, and I, as you’re sitting in front of the whiteboard with some, some ideas outlined specifically on that topic. Yeah. Um, any, any key experiences you think the mid managers should be looking for or gaining, gaining in preparation for the GC role?

Like mm-hmm. M and a, I mean, I guess it depends on what do they wanna work for? Big company, they wanna do the startup scene, 

Jamey Seely: you know? Yeah. I think it really does, but I think it comes down to, um. You know, look at the two polls of a business. Look at and, and understand the risks the business has. So whatever your business is, really learn the business itself well enough to where you really understand what the risks are and learn how to tolerate those.

And then you really also have to understand the opportunities because you can’t just be that lawyer that’s always, you know, afraid of the [00:48:00] risk. You gotta understand what the opportunities are because that’s what really. Um, allows you to help with risk taking decisions. Mm-hmm. Is to understand really the magnitude of the opportunities.

So whatever the business is, you really just need to grab those two polls and understand them incredibly well. 

Michael Mitchel: Okay. Can you, you, I think you might have kind of alluded to this. 

Jamey Seely: Mm-hmm. Is 

Michael Mitchel: there a moment where you locked yourself in on the C-Suite path? 

Jamey Seely: Um. You know, there’s, um, yeah, I mean, I, I, so, you know, it’s funny, we all in our twenties, you know, we, we, we go to college and then we decide, Hey, I’m going to law school, and, you know, and then someone says, well, what do you wanna do?

Like I mentioned earlier? And you say, oh, I’m gonna be a gc. So, you know, yeah, I, I always had from a very early, you know, point in my career that is a goal. Um, but, you know, I think there’s other. Goals that I set along the way. Like, you know, I wanted to be a partner in my firm and I really wanted to, you know, develop that level [00:49:00] of being able to, you know, speak to clients and develop that trust.

Um, I don’t know that, you know, I think it’s also really important to be open to other things too, because I left law for a while. 

Michael Mitchel: Mm-hmm. 

Jamey Seely: So I, you know, I had a three year period where, um, you know, I, I took a business role and I was working on an incubator and we were doing startups and, you know, we were.

Testing out new technologies in the energy space, and I think that was. Incredibly good experience for me. And I think, you know, when I, when CEOs or other um, C-Suite people interview me now, it actually ends up being one of the things that they like the best is the fact that I left law for a while. And because to them it means I really understand their problems because Oh, interesting.

I was in that role. Um, so, you know, I think. I think there’s no experience that I’d necessarily be afraid of, or, or, you know, that are, that are bad experiences. I think, you know, the, the more that you can really grow, you know, the, [00:50:00] the, the better in terms of, you know, getting to that ultimate goal. Cool. 

Michael Mitchel: Okay.

So, um, what’s the, this is my favorite question. Mm-hmm. And it’s that, so when I ask everybody, what’s the best, worst job you’ve ever had, ever, high school, college, whatever it is. 

Jamey Seely: Best, worst job. 

Michael Mitchel: And what influence did it have on you throughout your career? 

Jamey Seely: Um, we should 

Michael Mitchel: learn from it. ’cause we, we’ve all had a crappy job, but we’ve taken something from it.

I like to think. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah. Yeah. Um. Yeah, I mean, I’d say my very, very first, uh, job in law, I was a litigator and it just didn’t suit me. Uh, you know, I, I, I am so I had to make a career change, um, ultimately to be a business lawyer and to go more down the m and a in securities route. Um, that was my best worst job in the sense that, um, you know, it’s actually very hard from the outside to know.

You know, which, which way you wanna go. And I think most lawyers, you get put into two boxes. Business or, or [00:51:00] litigation. And litigation. You know, at that time in my life, it seemed to make perfect sense. You know, it really wasn’t a really good way to, you know, know until you kind of got into it. So I’d say that was one of those to tough jobs, because a big part of it was realizing, ooh, you know, this is not really what I wanna do for the next, you know, 30 years.

It doesn’t really, you know. It doesn’t use my skills the right way. It doesn’t use my personality the right way. Um, and then, you know how you work yourself out of a situation like that because, you know, it’s not like you can just, I’m gonna quit your job. 

Michael Mitchel: I’m gonna, I’m gonna push you a little harder on this one.

Mm-hmm. What’s the worst job you had that’s not in the profession you’re in now? Worst job, job you had? Not in the profession I had now. School in college. 

Jamey Seely: Um, well, waiting tables is brutal. I mean, I’ve waited tables all through, um. College and uh, and an undergrad, and I think that’s. I think that can be a, uh, occasionally can be delightful, occasionally can be, you know, humiliating as you see.

Michael Mitchel: I, I, I could see where if I ordered from you and, and [00:52:00] I’m sorry. I missed, I didn’t order this. Yeah. Yes, yes, you did. Okay. I did. Yeah. 

Jamey Seely: It, it is, it is a good, uh, exercise in, in the beginnings of the art of persuasion. I’m like, I’m pretty, I’m pretty sure you’d like it. 

Michael Mitchel: Yeah. I’m, are you, you’re gonna like this.

Just trust me. You did order this. Yeah. You may not have verbalized it, but you ordered this. It’s going to. 

Jamey Seely: Favorite thing you’ve had? 

Michael Mitchel: Yes, ma’am. 

Jamey Seely: Yeah, no, that those, those are tough jobs. I mean, all those jobs you have, you know, growing, growing up, um, and, you know, before you kind of pick your career path, I think are always great, but always, you know, a mix of, of, of really, really hard, I can’t 

Michael Mitchel: remember if I’ve told this story before, uh, on this podcast, but I’ve never, I’ve never had a aer a wait, wait, a waits or a serving job.

Mm-hmm. But, um, in college I worked in, I was going, I went to UDub, so I’m in Seattle. I worked at. Stick’s drive-in. Mm-hmm. It’s a local, it has, they have three of them and their, their, their shtick 

Jamey Seely: mm-hmm. 

Michael Mitchel: Is you add it up in your head. 

Jamey Seely: Oh, really? 

Michael Mitchel: Yeah. So, and they charge, wow. They charge for the, for the sides, the condiments, the ketchup, and the [00:53:00] pickles and all that.

Oh my God. And they’re, they’re a nickel le so you gotta go. So I like two milkshakes, two fries, three burgers. Mm-hmm. And two condiment. No, actually, you know what? Make that five fries, three shakes and one burger. And Michael’s mathematically challenge to begin with. Why they hired me is beyond me. And my roommate was doing sub work for the South Seattle Symphony.

Okay. At the time. And, um, he actually, he often would tell me, I’m glad we didn’t join the Marines together because I lasted. I don’t know how I lasted three days and he wanted to work for him for like a year, and we started Oh, wow. We joined the, I talked to him into going with me. Mm-hmm. We were roommates and 

Jamey Seely: Oh, that’s hilarious.

Yeah. So, wow. Wow. Yeah. No, that’s, that, that’s, that’s really fun. You know it, that that would be a hard job. Yeah. I can’t say that was my 

Michael Mitchel: best, worst job. That was just flat out my worst job. Uhhuh. Yeah. Yeah. That was awful. So, yeah. Well, Jamie, I’ve really enjoyed the conversation. I, this has been a blast.

Mm-hmm. Um, thank you so much for, for being on the podcast. 

Jamey Seely: Thank you. This was really, really fun. Thanks. Glad we got to do it. 

Michael Mitchel: Cheers. Okay. I’m not gonna [00:54:00] tell you what you should take away from this interview. For each person who is unique in their passions, career goals, and experiences, I do hope you learn something and enjoy the conversation.

Please give us five stars, iTunes, and share your comments. That’s the only way we can improve and ask the questions that you want to hear. I’d like to thank Jolan Crossland, an award-winning banjo and bluegrass artist. Jalan HA is from the Bighorn Mountain to Wyoming, and he graciously provided his music for exploring talent.

When I think of talent, Jalan always comes to mind First, please visit jalan crossland.com. I’d like to thank Angie for all of her research during her 16 plus years at my firm, OC Executive Search, and for her work on this podcast. I always give credit where credit is due. Exploring talent’s name came from Angie.

Thanks for my PO producer, Joseph or without this podcast would not be possible. And of course, Corey, my pod engineer. Please follow us on LinkedIn under Exploring Talent. My LinkedIn is Michael Mitchell with one L and our Twitter handle is talent explored. Share our [00:55:00] show and please drop me a note. Thanks for joining.