Of all the books on management and leadership ever written, it would be hard to find one that boils down to a message as simple, plain-spoken, and heartfelt as the one offered by Nick Rowe: Just be a good person.
That’s hardly the mantra you’d expect from someone with decades of executive experience, including serving as president of Kentucky American Water in Lexington and as board chair of the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce. But Rowe says his success didn’t come by serving his own interests to climb the corporate ladder. Instead, he says it came from focusing on being a good husband, father, friend, co-worker, neighbor, and citizen.
“Did we make the community that we all lived in a little bit better? That’s your measuring stick,” says Rowe.
From Segregated Schools to the Executive Suite
Growing up in Bowling Green, Rowe attended the segregated school for Black children across town from his home. He says he once asked his parents why he had to travel so far when other children got to go to a school in their own neighborhood. Their response was simply that the segregated school was excellent.
“They didn’t want to put in my mind or thoughts that I was any less than anyone else,” he says.
As Rowe entered third grade, the local schools integrated. He says that’s when he began to realize his skin was a different color and that his classmates treated him differently because of it. That was the genesis of another valuable life lesson for Rowe: If 99.9 percent of our DNA is the same, why focus on the .1 percent that’s unique?
“Think about where we’d be in America if people in this world would say, ‘We’re all pretty close to each other and we’re not that much different,’” Rowe says.
As a student, Rowe excelled at math and went on to become the first Black valedictorian of Bowling Green High School. That led him to a civil engineering degree at Western Kentucky University.
On one of his first jobs, Rowe worked on railroads in eastern Kentucky. He said he realized that if he went into meetings with a chip on his shoulder, his colleagues would not act favorably. So he decided to do less talking and more listening.
“I learned to just humble myself,” he says. “Those folks really treated me well and I never had any problems.”
Rowe started with American Water in 1981, rising to become a senior vice president of the utility and president of its Kentucky operations. Along the way, he married his childhood sweetheart and made lifelong friends. He also worked for 10 different CEOs, but he says he never forgot that God was his ultimate boss.
“For me it was faith, family, career, and that was my order,” he says.
At every step of the way, Rowe says he worked to be a good person and good servant-leader by living the simple values his parents taught him. He says his work was never about the job title, but about motivating his employees to deliver results.
“You have to inspire people,” he says. “People have to want to work for you.”
He says it’s up to people to create their own work-life balance. For him, that meant being devoted to his wife and two daughters as well as being active in his church and community. When an outside commitment did pull him away from work, he says he always explained to his staff where he was and what he was doing.
“After almost 40 years in corporate America, I sleep good every night,” says Row. “Was I right all the time? No. Did I make mistakes? Absolutely. Am I imperfect? Absolutely, but I feel pretty good about where I’m at.”
Chronicling a Life Well Lived
Rowe retired from American Water in July 2022. After some travelling with his wife, he decided to compile his life and business experiences in a book called The Goodwill Jar: Reflections on Leadership and Legacy, which came out this month. The title refers to a jar his family maintains in their kitchen into which they place little notes detailing each other’s good deeds and accomplishments. He says simple acts of performing and acknowledging an act of kindness are as important as ever.
“Right now, where we are in this world, we need some goodwill,” he says.
The book includes Rowe’s reflections on building relationships, disarming others with love, advocating for yourself, the dangers of complacency, making hard calls, and being a servant leader. He says he often asks the executives he coaches if anyone at work or in their community is saying their name in a good light. Do they recall that person being kind, generous, and a positive role model? Rowe says if people aren’t saying your name, then too much of your life is about you and not enough about giving to others.
“There’s so many takers in the world today: take, take, take, take, take,” he says. “It really is about being a giver.”
Rowe says people will believe in the person that you are, not the title you may hold. He contends such fundamental lessons have an important place in the modern economy, with the new realities of remote work, frequent job changes, and new generations shaping workplace culture. He says people of his generation would never have dreamed of asking for some of the benefits that young people today want from their employers, yet he argues that each new generation is better than the last.
“What gives me hope in a challenging time in America... is that there’s still more good people in this world than bad people,” says Rowe.
