Esprit de Corps: My Life, in Teams

How Teams Shaped My Personal and Professional Development

Post #18 of #20: I am reflecting on twenty years of personal and professional experiences in Birmingham and beyond. Visit www.medium.com/HonestlyEd to read the full #20For20 series.

As I reflect on my personal and professional development I can’t help but think about the effect tight-knit teams have had on my life. For the purpose of this post I am defining teams as groups with whom I have had deep, immersive experiences. Some of those experiences were brief as seven days others have evolved over many years.

They changed my life. Most for the better, but some had high drama attached to stinging lessons learned. I truly believe one’s role or title on teams is less consequential than our relationship to other team members. I recall out-of-body experiences where a team was so in sync we hardly need to vocalize anything. We were just right where we needed to be and when we needed to be and it just worked. Whether dumb luck or experienced leadership — things came together. Other experiences where I thought things would be much better, even with a seemingly conspicuous set of ready made factors the team just couldn’t quite get right. Those situations were incredibly frustrating, to say the least.

Teams lift us higher and keep us up at night. Working, praying, fighting each other or fighting for one another. If you are in leadership, then you will inevitably experience the full range of team dynamics.

Personally, there were many teams that affected how I thought about teams, about people, and about life. I have featured each of them below along with links to existing, deeper stories where I have covered them already. Others are simply acknowledgements of some pretty special times and special people.

Click this link to see images of many of those teams and the people that made them what they were.

• Boy Scouts Troop #250
• The Sovereign Seven
• Young Professional Organizations
• Birmingham Chamber of Commerce
• Chamber Institute
• Team Resolute: University of Alabama Executive MBA Program Team
• Relax, It’s Handled
• Alabama Media Group
• The Woodfin Campaign
• Executive Leadership Team: City of Birmingham

Boy Scout Troop #250

Read: Really Hard Cases Read: Ain’t No Mountain High Enough

I have already shared two extensive stories about my experience in the Boy Scouts, but I cannot overstate the impact of Troop #250 on my adolescent-leadership development. Scoutmaster Cid Duncan and my brothers from the troop imbued me with a sense of brotherhood, fellowship and collective struggle.

The Sovereign Seven

I will be writing more extensively about this group in the coming months. We pledged the Beta Upsilon Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha at Alabama State University in the Spring of 1996. A legendary, jewel line (group) of seven black men that have the deepest, dynamic relationship in my life and, arguably, in all of our lives. Covid excepted, we get together annually for our February anniversary and have been with each other through over the top triumphants, tribulations and everything in between.

No one untouched. No one unloved. No one unscathed. Our story is the story of legend. Ask somebody. #BYWDB

Young Professional Organizations

READ: Yung Birmingham (a four part mini-series)

My early years in Birmingham were littered with civic endeavors with groups like the Birmingham Change Fund and Birmingham Urban League Young Professionals. These groups, among many others, evolved to take national prominence and became the source glue and, to be honest, repellents for relationships between current leaders that are currently shaping the next 30 years of Birmingham’s future. Personally, these organizations were cauldrons of trials at the project and relationship level for me. I learned a lot, much of which has been express in my four-part mini-series appropriately titled, Yung Birmingham.

Birmingham Chamber of Commerce

READ: A Far Smaller Birmingham (a three part mini-series)

I learned to be a professional manager as a rising leader at the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce. I started on someone else’s team and eventually grew to lead my own teams. We were a motley crew of young people with varying skills and understanding of how Birmingham and the world worked. We served during a relatively quiet period of Birmingham resurgence, navigating the line between hope and nihlism.

Chamber Institute

I was one of four Chamber staffers selected to attend a four-year, 96-credit hour certification program for chamber of commerce professions. Each year, I would travel to Athens, Georgia and have a weeklong, immersive experience with other chamber professionals from around the Southeastern United States. Words can hardly express the intense camaraderie and nearly bizarre level of loving fellowship among a diverse group of chamber professionals from a wide range of various chambers. Karaoke, classrooms, late night hotel conversations, emotional outbursts — everything was on the table and it was all perfectly in line and in sync with our cohort.

Team Resolute: University of Alabama Executive MBA

I received my Executive MBA from the University of Alabama in May 2007. Exactly one month prior to completing my U.S. Chamber of Commerce IOM (Institute of Management) designation that followed my completion of Chamber Institute. My small group of four professionals — two from Birmingham and two from Huntsville — was a collection of sweet souls. We were kind to one another, always seeking understanding, giving each other room to lead and to serve. Our team leader, Brandi Wheeler, was learning inside of the experience and we were proud for her to be our voice. One of my greatest personal accomplishments was helping coach our team through our final, capstone presentation for a group of Proctor & Gamble executives who flew in to hear our recommendations. We travelled to three cities Germany where Brandi took a massive number of photos on her professional camera. I still have those photos here and reflect on my first experience taking in real beer and German culture, much of which felt familiar because of my childhood in the germanic-settled city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Relax, It’s Handled

Read: Relax, It’s Handled: Lessons Learned in Business (a two part mini-series)

My crucible and my freedom was found in leading a family-owned business. But, it wasn’t just the work. It was the team. Our interns, our staffers, our vendors and our clients were a collective team. I loved my employees and took great pride in working with them. When the work got tough as work often does, it was the team I leaned on. I brought two staffers with me from the chamber of commerce and we added special value to clients I viewed as special.

Alabama Media Group

Talk about a wild ride. The company, formerly known as The Birmingham News, was an amazing and sometimes forced mash up of tradition and innovation. Our marketing team represented pursuit of new markets, new relevance and new connectivity to the markets we served. The relationship were interesting, innovative and, at times, intense as we sought to define reality for the organization. Our team, formed by marketing innovator, Vicki Applewhite, and eventually led by marketing genius, Bart Thau, served as a bridge between the old world and new world. Lord knows it came with its scars, but the experience and the projects turned out to be incredibly consequential to the next phase of my career with Randall Woodfin.

The Woodfin Campaign

READ: Why I am With Randall Woodfin READ: In Retrospect: Three Years Ago Today READ: The Real Power Behind Randall Woodfin READ: Yung Birmingham: The Legacy (part 4)

Technically, I have been a part of two campaign teams for Mayor Woodfin. The first as campaign manager and the second as treasurer. My experience as campaign manager was the penultimate role of my career, requiring me to draw on every bit of my prior experiences. I was the eldest member of the team by far — older than the candidate and every single member of staff and I was only 42-years-old, fresh off of a divorce and an enjoyable role at Alabama Media Group before being asked to serve in this role.

Our team felt like we were going against the entire power structure of the city and if endorsements, polls and social media were any indication we really were! A bond formed through the crucible. The greatest source of pride for the Mayor and me was what happened after we won. Our staff went on to serve and lead on other local, state, regional and even national presidential campaigns. The Woodfin Campaign birthed an entire new, previously unconsidered set of leaders that are now setting the tone and policy for our nation.

Executive Leadership Team: City of Birmingham

I won’t litigate what we found at City Hall when we got there, but you need to know that it took everything we had to build a system and team that served the vision of Mayor Woodfin. We survived murders, financial crises and even Covid. The City never sleeps and for our core team at the City of Birmingham, many of us have been on point for incredibly big moments — some of which you will never fully know about.

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These teams and these people undergirded my experiences over the past twenty years and beyond. There is no way I could leave this series without a massive shout out for them all!

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Ed Fields recently celebrated 20 years in Birmingham with #20For20 — a series of reflections, insights and homage.

I am a poet, essayist, and civic strategist. I currently serve as senior advisor and chief strategist for the City of Birmingham Mayor’s Office. Follow me on LinkedIn, Medium, or Instagram.

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