Uncommon Freedom

Uncommon Man 2: Building a Legacy of Faith, Family, and Resilience with Clay Linkous

• Kevin Tinter • Episode 102

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What if the hardest challenges in your life became the very things that shaped your greatest strengths? In this powerful conversation with Clay Linkous, we explore how intentional living can transform every aspect of your existence—even through life's most difficult seasons.

Clay shares his remarkable journey from childhood farm work to building a property management empire with over 800 doors in Knoxville, Tennessee. But the path wasn't smooth. From battling epilepsy as a young father (including a seizure while driving) to losing everything in the 2008 recession and rebuilding from scratch, Clay's story demonstrates extraordinary resilience. Perhaps most moving is his family's decision to adopt two severely traumatized children—a challenge he describes as "the hardest thing we ever had to do was something that we very clearly heard God say to go do."

What sets this episode apart is Clay's framework for intentional living. He reveals his "Seven Pillars" approach (Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness, Finance, Future, and Fun) that guides both personal development and family strategic planning. You'll discover how Clay implements this framework through annual goal-setting retreats and regular one-on-one conversations with each family member. This isn't just theory—it's a battle-tested approach that has produced remarkable results across generations.

Leaders will especially appreciate Clay's insights on organizational culture—defining it simply as "the behaviors that people do when no one's watching." His experience transforming healthcare organizations reveals why culture is never a "soft skill" but the foundation of performance in both business and family life.

This conversation goes beyond inspirational platitudes to offer practical wisdom on marriage ("love is a decision, not a feeling"), parenting, cultivating the right community, and living with gratitude despite circumstances. Whether you're building a business, raising a family, or simply seeking a more purposeful life, Clay's uncommon approach to freedom through intentionality will challenge and equip you.

Ready to discover what truly matters? Listen now and take your first step toward more intentional living.

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Kevin Tinter:

All right friends, welcome back to the Uncommon Freedom Show Today. I'm really excited. I am joined by a good friend of mine, clay Linkus, and this is going to be Uncommon man episode number two. And a little intro about Clay. With over 30 years of leadership experience in numerous industries and settings, clay knows what it takes to get results in all areas of life. So listen up, friends. Depending on who you're talking to, you might hear Clay described as an international speaker, a community leader, a business owner, a board member, nonprofit co-founder, real estate investor, executive coach or church elder and, knowing him personally, also a phenomenal spouse and parent. But the titles that mean the most to him are believer, husband, father and friend. So, clay, welcome to the show. It's great to see you.

Kevin Tinter:

Kevin, thank you so much, appreciate the kind words and, yeah, just super grateful to be here, man, Looking forward to talking to you. Yeah, likewise I'm honored to have you. We've actually we've only known each other for about a year, maybe a little bit more than that, is that correct?

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, one year ago almost exactly, it was probably around maybe late May or June that we got connected through my daughter. So yeah, that's a whole another podcast we could probably do.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, and the connection, the mutual connection between you, your daughter and myself is your pastor or a former pastor? I know he's retired, but your pastor, dr Chris Stevens, right?

Clay Linkous:

Oh, yeah, super great people. Chris is a good friend and was our senior pastor for a long time and, yeah, I definitely heard you guys have, uh, have been in the same room a couple of times, so, uh, that's a great, great common connection.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, absolutely. You know, in in my book I talk, I've got a whole chapter called run with lions, and one of the things that I know that we both embrace and you even you're going to talk about it I know it's just the value of community. And you know, John Maxwell, who we both admire, says if you're the smartest person in the room, you got to find another room. And I don't ever claim to be the smartest person in any room, but I have figured out that if I get into bigger and better rooms, I'm going to hang out with bigger and better people. And so, uh, you know, having the opportunity to meet Chris Stevens connected me to a bunch of other people, and you're one of them. So I'm grateful for that connection. So, all right, so let's, uh, let's, let's let our audience learn a little bit about you. Clay, Would you mind sharing some more details about your life, both professionally and personally?

Clay Linkous:

Sure, well, I'll start on the personal side. So if you don't know me, I live in Knoxville, tennessee, the home of the University of Tennessee. It's kind of the flagship for the university here. Everything revolves around the college. Here in Knoxville we're also the gateway city to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park that many people travel to and lived here my whole life. I've traveled professionally quite extensively, but love calling East Tennessee life. I've traveled professionally quite extensively, but love calling East Tennessee home.

Clay Linkous:

I live here with my wife of 23 years. Her name is Katie. Katie is not only my spouse, she's my best friend, she's my business partner, she's my. You know, when you're in the trenches during war, that's the person you want with you. I mean, when you're in the trenches during war, that's the person you want with you. I mean that's Katie. And we have six kids. We have four biological children that are pretty much adults at this point. Kevin knows a couple of them and then we also have two adopted children. I'm going to share a little bit more a little bit later.

Clay Linkous:

From a professional side, katie and I actually own a couple of small businesses here in Knoxville, mostly around the real estate industry. The primary thing that we spend our time doing is property management. We manage about 800 doors here in the Knoxville community. Most of that is what we call small to midsize multifamily and that's where we spend a lot of our time.

Clay Linkous:

I actually have a pretty extensive background professionally in management consulting.

Clay Linkous:

I spent over a decade working in the healthcare industry as a consultant for healthcare providers, traveled both the US and Canada, even did a little bit of work in Europe and really helping them on really cultural transformations was kind of the big thing of my experience.

Clay Linkous:

I got hired a lot to help with things like employee engagement, patient experience, physician relationships and through that a lot of what we actually did was leadership development and put in place leadership systems, and so that was a big part of my background. If you go way back in time, I actually was a operational leader in a healthcare organization. I led both clinical and non-clinical areas here at a local health system. So I have that t-shirt and the stripes on my back as well. And if you go way back in time in my career, I always tell people some fun facts. I have actually been a Walt Disney World College intern, so I worked there back in 1996. But I've also been an associate pastor at one point, and I've also been a nightclub bouncer for a few years, so I don't think all those are at the same time. But a couple of fun facts about me.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, and then you put those three things in with your bio and it's like what hasn't Clay done? Pretty much everything. That's awesome. You mentioned your focus on consulting and culture. Can you just spend a couple of minutes and talk about the importance of culture in a business, in a family, really in every aspect of life, because I think it's really important.

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, you know, I think, first of all, just to try to give some level of definition around culture. I always like to think of it as just the behaviors that people do when no one's watching, when no one's paying attention. What are the things that people are doing? How are they treating each other? How are they treating the people you serve? How are they interacting?

Clay Linkous:

That's what I tend to think about when I think about culture, and what I've learned, both professionally and personally, is, kevin, it is so important and I think so many people overlook it. On the business side, I think it is considered a soft skill and a soft attribute to organizational success. But what's fascinating is there just continues to be a growing body of research around how important it is to business outcomes and organizations and companies that have healthy cultures are going to outperform others that have less healthy cultures. They're going to outperform them on bottom line, on sales, on business outcomes that typically are more traditionally thought of when it comes to business success. But it's fascinating.

Clay Linkous:

You actually included family when you were actually asking that question about culture, and that's one of the things that Katie and I kind of pride ourselves on, even with our own family is we like to be very intentional with our family and like to think about what is the legacy that our family will have in our community, in our friends, in the world, and so we put a lot of focus on, even as a family, how are we showing up differently, in a memorable way that's making an impact in the world around us? So I do think it's important and I think you know I'll leave you with this and we'll probably come back up later in our conversation but at the end of the day, culture um is really shaped by leaders, and so if you want to have a better culture, whether it is in your home or whether it is in your business um, the best thing you can do is continue to grow in your leadership skills, and that's going to help you the most in that space.

Kevin Tinter:

Would you? Is it safe to say that culture is ultimately a reflection of the top leadership?

Clay Linkous:

Oh, yeah, yeah, you know, it's one of the things that's fascinating is I um, I've spent enough time working with organizations, and when I, when I would work with these hundreds of organizations whether it was in healthcare or other industries what I would have the chance to see is, many times I would actually still be present after leadership transitions. So even at the highest level, I might start working for one ceo or one highest ranking officer and that person would leave the organization. A new person would come in and it would be fascinating to see how quickly the organization would actually shift to adopt the new culture of that person. And so you know whether you're leading your family, whether you're leading an organization, whether you're leading a department. Maybe you're not even the top boss of your organization, but wherever you're at in your organization, you still have the opportunity and responsibility to help shape the culture, and it will largely reflect who you are as a person.

Kevin Tinter:

That's so good. One of my favorite quotes and I can't remember if it's by Patrick Lencioni or Henry Cloud I'm pretty sure it's one of those two guys and I'm sure you're familiar with both of them but he talks about the fact that you can tell a lot more about an organization by who is leaving than who is coming, than who is coming, and, and, and I think, actually, when you think about, like, churches and ministries and nonprofits and things like that, uh, I man, when you look at that, uh, and in you sometimes, especially in churches, you're like, oh, wait a minute, that person's leaving the church. Um, it, it's it. I really think that it is true that it says a lot more about who leaves an organization as opposed to who is attracted to it.

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, no doubt I. A large part of my work has to do with you know what the consultant phrase is performance management. But it's really around. How are you leading and managing the performance of the people that work for you? And so how are you re-recruiting, recognizing your high performers, how are you supporting, developing your solid performers? And, honestly, how are you?

Clay Linkous:

This sounds pretty harsh in our politically correct world today, but how do you manage up or out the people that are not meeting your expectations or those low performing individuals? And to your point about who's leaving the organization, one of the things that organizations are many times just negatively impacted by is they have such a high tolerance for low performance that they actually drive away their high performers. So the high performers are saying, hey, I'm tired of carrying my weight, I'm tired of you not holding these people accountable, and so they wind up exiting and the organization just continues to try to, you know, kick the can down the road with some of that low performance, um, individuals and never really addressing it. So yeah, you're exactly right, you can tell a lot by who's leaving.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, I think, uh, once again, Henry cloud, I think, might be the one who calls it sanctioned incompetence and uh, it's a it's a profound statement, but it really hits home. All right. So I know you credit your childhood with helping shape who you are today. Can you tell us a little bit about the three significant aspects of your childhood that influenced you the most?

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, you know, I think, one of the legacies that, as I'm, you know, I'm 48 now and I'm trying to figure out. You know what's the? What's the reputation that I have when I'm not in the room, right, and I tell my kids that some of the most important conversations that are happening about you as a person are happening in rooms that you're not in right, and so when you're not there, what are those conversations that are happening and what is your reputation? And I hope that the reputation that I have is one of a person of faith. I hope that I have a strong work ethic and I hope that I'm one of gratitude, and I would be very happy to know at the end of my life that those three things are what people remember me by.

Clay Linkous:

And where those three things come from is the faith part I can definitely attribute back to my mother. She's definitely the spiritual matriarch of our family and she was such an influence she's still around, but she was such an influence in my childhood around just making sure that faith was a part of our conversations at home, that we were regularly involved in a church community, that there was ongoing activities and efforts for discipleship, and I look around now as a parent and I realize how unique that was. We just thought it was everyday life, but I realize now that that had a huge impact on me as a believer, as an individual, and really helped give me a worldview around God and the Bible early on. That forever has shaped my world and has positioned me for where I'm at today. So that's the faith part. The second part was my work ethic. So my mother and my biological father actually separated right after I was born. Now I have a really good relationship with my biological father now, but my mother remarried my stepfather and he was actually quite a bit older than my mom, so he was from a much older generation and while he was not the most warm and nurturing and nobody would call him empathetic or compassionate as far as just his style and his demeanor, what I realized that he put inside of me was this just incredible work ethic.

Clay Linkous:

So whether we were working on the farm growing up, I mean I remember spending my weeknights and weekends in the hayfields. You know square bales, putting up square bales on wagons and in the barn In the wintertime we were doing. We were working in the sawmill and stacking firewood and hauling logs, and you know we were working in the sawmill and stacking firewood and hauling logs, and you know we were working in tobacco fields and with livestock and there was just a lot of manual labor. And in addition to him being a farmer, he also was a career machinist at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory here in the greater Knoxville community. So he had a full-time career, but anytime he was not working there he was farming and making extra money for our family and was always pulling us into responsibilities like that. And now fast forward. I realized that that you know childhood experience helped give me a level of discipline and work ethic that you know.

Clay Linkous:

To use a word I love with your podcast is uncommon Um, and I'm very thankful for it. I hated it growing up. I couldn't, I couldn't wait to get out of there and go to college and do something different, so I wouldn't have to go to farming. Uh, but uh. But I look back in hindsight and I realized how much that shaped me and um, and I'm super grateful for it. And grateful is actually the last piece.

Clay Linkous:

So something that some people know about me some people don't is actually when I was a child, late in my teenage years, I was actually diagnosed with epilepsy and I didn't really start having trouble with it until I was in high school I started having some seizures and I had the most trouble with it actually my first couple years of college, and so I started having of years of college and so I started having seizures more in college and, you know, it got to the point where, like I had a really bad seizure in a friend's house where the seizure was so bad I literally fell through his drywall in one of his rooms. I had another seizure when I was interning, doing an internship, at a hospital. I was literally there working as an intern and I woke up in an emergency room because I had a seizure while I was at the hospital working. So just a lot of crazy events like that. And then the worst one was I actually had a seizure while I was driving a vehicle. Katie and I were pregnant with our first child, madeline, our oldest daughter, and I was in the car by myself but had a seizure, wrecked. The car totaled the car and I was okay, I was protected, I was really saved from any damage.

Clay Linkous:

But it was a really pivotal moment for me in life because we were pregnant with our first child, I was trying to be a husband and a father, support my family, and all I could think about was was I going to be able to have a job where I could drive to work, you know, do what I needed to do to provide for my family? Was I going to be able to even carry my kid out of fear? For I was going to drop her, you know, have a seizure, drop her, you know, hurt her? So I just started having a lot of this anxiety.

Clay Linkous:

Well, it was at that same time in my life that, just through what I believe now is just kind of divine order, my neurologist and I really kind of discovered the right medication, the right lifestyle choices and really kind of the right treatment to help me overcome that disability.

Clay Linkous:

And what's fascinating is now, 22 years later, um, I actually have been seizure free for 22 years, um and um.

Clay Linkous:

Some of that is, you know, full disclosure, some of it is, they think, that I probably grew out of it about five or 10 years ago. But there was definitely a season where, um, you know, through medication, through lifestyle choices, um, I was able to walk free from it. And in the epileptic community I realized that that's very rare, I realized that there's a lot of people that battle and wrestle with seizures and epileptic challenges, and so what it's given me is just this grateful sense of just overwhelming gratitude for not only seeing kind of miraculous ability to overcome during all that, but it also has translated into me wanting to give back to the industry that helped me so much. So that's part of what led me to healthcare was really helping. You know, that industry helping serve people that didn't know me but, you know, really made space for me at a moment where I was very vulnerable, and so it's given me that kind of attitude of gratitude towards them and towards life in general.

Kevin Tinter:

Man that's so good. A lot of times our pain gives us purpose, right? Sure, absolutely Awesome, all right, I know. Something else that helps shape us are the challenges we face in life, and you talked about your epilepsy challenge. I know you and your family have faced some challenges that have further refined you as a man. Can you share a little more about those?

Clay Linkous:

no-transcript in life, because I realized that it's actually in hearing some of those that people connect with you and you're able to help um, you know, inspire people and make a difference in people's lives. So I liked sharing some of these. Um, you know, one is, people is people. See, katie and I now, and we've got six kids we're very blessed from a financial standpoint. We just got a lot of really cool stuff happening in life with businesses and building wealth and those kind of things, and so all that's great, but there's a couple of things that happened over the last 20 years that could have actually wrecked us. It could have wrecked us as a family, it could have wrecked our marriage, it could have wrecked us financially, but none of these things defined us, and that's what I want to share is.

Clay Linkous:

The first one was when we were pregnant with our very first child, we actually had a miscarriage. When we were pregnant with our very first child, we actually had a miscarriage. Um, and Haiti was actually never supposed to have kids. Um, she actually had um, a disorder. I can't ever remember what the exact name of it is, um, but uh, polycystic ovarian disorder, I think, is what it's called, um and because of the severity of it and that kind of thing. She was never supposed to have kids, but we were really believing God for children and so we had that first miscarriage. I remember it happened in our house. We were literally in our bathroom when she miscarried and I remember us sitting on our bathroom floor, we were crying, we were both upset, but at the same time we made a decision right then and there, at that moment, that this would not define us, that this would not be our legacy and that God had something bigger and better for us. Um, and we just took a stand and basically said that this would not become our story and that we were not going to hang our hat on this and let this become our identity. Fast forward. We probably should have not taken such a stand, because then we wound up having four kids and a few more, you know. But, um, you know, I just share that in hopes that maybe that encourages somebody who's you know struggling with maybe something related to that that. You know, whatever you're battling doesn't necessarily have to be your story, your identity. Sometimes the right thing to do is just make a decision and decide that that's not going to be. You know what the story is about your life. So that's number one.

Clay Linkous:

The second thing is when we were pregnant with our fourth child, it was right in 2008. And for those of you all that have a short memory, 2008, the economic kind of recession hit and Katie was actually a nurse at that point in time, so her job was pretty stable. I actually was the sales and marketing director for a startup real estate marketing firm, so we sold marketing services to real estate developers, so I was a sales and marketing director. We had our best year ever in 2007. We were growing, we were taking a lot of market share and then literally the bottom just came out in 2008. Like overnight, people just quit paying their bills and so we shut our doors. Uh, in like April of 2008. Uh, and so I'm unemployed, we're pregnant with our fourth child and we're trying to figure out what to do.

Clay Linkous:

Long story short, we lost our home. Uh, we had to foreclose on our home. Um, we were in one of those adjustable rate mortgages and like we wound up owing more than the house was even worth. Just a lot of crazy stuff. We took our family, moved us out of that home into a tiny apartment for the six of us. We started just rebuilding our life over again.

Clay Linkous:

I decided to go back to school at that point in time. I would take care of the kids during the day, katie was working and I did school at nighttime. So, like once, I put the kids in bed, I would do school from like 8 pm to like 2 am every night and did that for like a year and a half. And we just rebuilt our life and decided that, you know, what things were important was our marriage, was our family, decided that, you know, what things were important was our marriage, was our family, and that if we had to wake up every morning and have oatmeal for breakfast, peanut butter jelly for lunch and spaghetti for dinner for the next you know a couple of years, that it would be okay and we'd survive, right. So, um, that's what we did and, uh, fast forward. You know that was 2008,. You know now, um, we have, um, a lot of things going for us from a financial standpoint and people see us now and they don't necessarily know us then.

Clay Linkous:

And I just want people to know that don't always assume that somebody's social media reel is their whole story. I mean, there's a lot going on there and you don't know what their origin story was. You don't know where they've been, what they've been through, and whatever challenges you're facing, you can definitely overcome those. The last challenge I'll share just quickly is in 2019, we actually decided to adopt two children. There was a brother and sister. We heard about their stories and felt like that the thing for us to do was to step into that moment and be a solution for them.

Clay Linkous:

So we adopted this brother and sister and it was a short-lived honeymoon, because what happened pretty quickly after that was we started realizing how much challenges these kids had as a result of the abuse, the trauma, the neglect that they had experienced both in the womb. A result of the abuse, the trauma, the neglect that they had experienced both in the womb and outside of the womb in their first couple of years. For those of you that know anything about brain science, there's those are your most formative years when it comes to shaping who you are as a person. So fast forward. The boy has some challenges with ADHD and you know fetal alcohol syndrome symptoms, diagnosis, those kind of things but the girl if anybody wants to Google this term basically has what many people consider to be what's called reactive attachment disorder, which basically means that her only reaction to accountability of any form is violence. And so if there's any level of instructing this child on what to do, it just erupts into volatile reactions and she's ridden in the back of a cop car like three times before she turned nine years old. And so just crazy stuff. And none of it's her fault, right? I mean what was done to this child and what she's experiencing in life. She didn't deserve any of it.

Clay Linkous:

But, as you can imagine, the stress that that put on our marriage, the stress that it put on our other kids, it really about wrecked us. And but at the same time, it was one of those things that we so clearly heard God tell us that we were supposed to do it, but there was no going back, there was no plan B, there was no questioning like if we're supposed to do it, but there was no going back, there was no plan B, there was no questioning Like if we're supposed to do it. It was just like we're supposed to do this and we're either going to like die doing it or we're going to figure it out Now, fast forward a day. We're in a much better place. We've got a lot of resources and things in place to help with both of them.

Clay Linkous:

But that was hard, and it was a season where I think what I'd want people to hear is that even though God told us to do it didn't mean it was easy. It was actually. The hardest thing we ever had to do was something that we very clearly heard God say to go do. So sometimes the very thing you're supposed to go do may actually be one of the hardest things you have to do, and that's probably what I want people to take away from that.

Kevin Tinter:

That's such a good lesson, clay. We have this kind of fantasy vision. Oh God told me to do it. Therefore, it's going to be easy.

Kevin Tinter:

And when you look back in scripture, that definitely isn't the case. Most of the time you think of God telling Noah go build an ark, and I think it took him about 100 years to build that. And then they spent 40 days and 40 nights in a downpour with a bunch of animals. There was nothing easy about that. They were doing God's will and he's going to sustain you through it and you're probably going to draw closer to him. You will draw closer to him in the challenges if you're open to it If you choose to.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, because for some people it actually turns them away and they become hard and that's always sad, but it's such a great lesson, real quick, kind of rewinding back to the job loss and just kind of the financial struggles that you were going through. Let me ask you this Would you change having to go through those challenges today, knowing what you know today, would you eliminate that challenge or are you glad you went through it?

Clay Linkous:

that challenge, or are you glad you went through it? Wow, that's a tough one. Um, here's the way I would answer it If I could learn the lessons I learned and grow the way that. I grew through that without having to go through it.

Kevin Tinter:

Yes, yes, okay, that's a brilliant answer.

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, but I also am super thankful that, uh, those things definitely helped shape me. But it's like you said, it's because you know, Katie and I chose to respond to those in a certain way. The same circumstances could absolutely take somebody a different direction if they chose to not lean into the right attitude and mindset during those moments.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, and then you talked about several very stressful events. What advice do you have for couples that might be struggling in their marriage right now? They're either going through financial troubles, parenting troubles, health challenges and a lot of times, you know kids with special needs are like the divorce rate is extremely high. What advice do you have for families that might, couples that might, be going through something like that right now? Uh, that will help them just draw close and stick together.

Clay Linkous:

Well, if you are a couple, um, I'd say the first thing you got to do is reframe your mindset and expectations around what a healthy relationship even looks like. Um, I find so many couples that Katie and I've talked to are actually entering, you know, their relationship with even the wrong mindset, whether that's, you know, thinking that love is just a feeling. Um, you know, I I find that, um, you're gonna have a much more successful relationship if you recognize that love is a decision, not just a feeling. Feelings are nice, but they're going to come and go. Love is a decision, not just a feeling. Feelings are nice, but they're going to come and go. But it's a choice, it's a decision. So that's number one. Number two is, I think you have to build on that by doing what some people call burning the ships, and what that means is like there's no plan B, like you don't ever put plan B on the table as an option, and what that means is is that, like you don't say failure is an option, you don't say divorce is an option, you don't say quitting is option, because, like, as long as if you never allow those things to be an option, you can't choose them Right If the only option is either success or death, like you're. Like you're going to find one of them Right. So I think you have to do that, but I think more practically. Um, I think you have to do that, but I think more practically, I think you've got to go back to the owner's manual. I think you've got to ground yourself in biblical knowledge and revelation around what God wants for your life, how God wants to shape you as a person, what God thinks about your relationship. There's just so much wisdom and practical insight in the Bible. I think it's helpful in the Bible. I think it's helpful. And then the other part of that is you've got to surround yourself with people that are not just telling you what you want to hear, but people that are speaking into your life, hold you accountable.

Clay Linkous:

You know you mentioned Chris Stevens. He's one of those, but so is his son. His son, zach, is one of the people in my life that will call me out on stuff. And you know, and like sometimes I've went to Zach and you know I've shared with him maybe a struggle that Katie and I might be having and he's like, well, why are you being such an idiot? Like why don't you fix it? And I'm like dang man. I was like, why don't you fix it? And I'm like dang man, I was like, why don't you like? You know, tell me something that makes me feel good about myself, makes me realize that she's the problem. You know, he's like. He's like no, he's like. Any conversation that makes, any conversation about your marriage that takes sides is never a helpful conversation. The only conversation that's helpful is one that is fighting for the marriage itself, not for who's right.

Kevin Tinter:

Oh, that's so good, that's so good. I have a, an Eagles group. Uh, it's a group about five. Six other guys are all Christians, um, very entrepreneurial, some of them employees, but most of them business owners. And we we we typically go through a, you know, a scripture based book, but it might be leadership, it might be.

Kevin Tinter:

The one we're going through right now is about prayer, uh, but I remember hearing Dave Ramsey talk about an Eagles group and I knew that I needed something like that, because we are who we hang out with, and I've also seen so many marriages fall apart and these are marriages that are like these are church-going people and most of the time, I'm not aware of a biblical justification for divorce in these circumstances and I'm not trying to judge anyone, but I also know that most people aren't better off on the other side of a marriage. It creates a whole nother list of baggage and financial challenges and it is not a solution to your problems typically, and what I've figured out is that the vast majority of these men, they just don't have someone holding them accountable.

Kevin Tinter:

Uh, and what I told these, the my Eagles group and I think it's it's mutual for all of us is, if you ever hear me talking about divorce, I pre giving you permission to kick me in the nuts and say Kevin, you don't get to do it, and I fully expect them to do that, but I don't think enough men and women have a friend of the same sex in their corner that, like you said, isn't going to be a yes man, and that's so good was from an author speaker named Chris Vallotton and he was talking about how marriage he calls it marriage.

Clay Linkous:

He says marriage is a death march to a life camp and what he talks about is how, historically, the church has actually over emphasized the role of the wife and you know there's a lot of narrative around wives submitting to the husband, that kind of stuff but he actually focuses heavier on the husband's responsibility. And the husband's responsibility is to love your wife as Christ loved. The church right? And he says well, what did Christ do? He died, he died. The key to your marriage as a husband is die, die, die, die. Every single moment, every single day you die to yourself and you live for her. If you want a successful marriage, die and like he just hammers that, but I remember hearing that and it just means so freeing, because if you can figure out how to live that out each day, marriage is easy.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah, amen to that. Going back to the challenges, how big of a role did healthy community play in you and Katie and the family surviving and, ultimately, thriving?

Clay Linkous:

in you and Katie and the family surviving and ultimately thriving. It was big. And I'll tell you, katie and I are pretty picky about who, like I look at Jesus's life and I see Jesus. I think some people like they'll look at Jesus and they'll throw out things like he was a friend of sinners, and you know he was a friend of everybody. And what I see Jesus is that he actually had different circles. So he had a circle of three, he had a circle of 12, he had a circle of more and then he was a friend of sinners.

Clay Linkous:

Well, what Katie and I do is we have a very, very tight, tight circle of people that are closest, most intimate, you know, friends, and when we go through struggles, we don't invite the whole world into those struggles. We invite people that are a going to believe with us and have the same worldview, same faith, the same mindset around it. B are going to hold us accountable to our part in those situations. Um, but C you're going to hold our arms up and we're tired, you know, and and not everybody can fill those roles Right, and so you know I don't, we don't broadcast the challenges we face.

Clay Linkous:

And we came and I were just talking the other night that if you know, something ever happened and one of us, you know, had a critical illness or a tragic car accident, there's a very short list of people that we're calling to come to the hospital.

Clay Linkous:

Like you know it's it's not everybody, it's not 10, 15 people, it's two or three. I mean it's. You know it's only a small group of people that I want in that room and I see that role model even in Jesus and the scriptures is sometimes he kicked people out of the room when he was trying to do something in somebody's life because they didn't need to be there. So, but to your point earlier, yes, with each one of those things, the challenges we've been through and more like it was always important for us to have people in our camp and you know you call them flat tire friends. It's the people that you can call at 2 am when you've got a flat tire or something's going off the rails, and you know they're going to answer the phone and you know they're going to get out of bed and they're going to come help you.

Kevin Tinter:

And moving on, I know one of the ways you intentionally live your life is through your seven pillars. Can you tell us a little bit more about those pillars and how you use them to live intentionally?

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, and I see you have a little version of this as well. Um, we could probably nerd out on this a couple hours. But, um, about 15 years ago I had a? Um, a professional mentor of mine teach me about organizational pillars and when we were working as consultants and coaches for organizations, we would coach them around really kind of the five organizational pillars of success. And it was broken down into a number. One was like people and culture, number two was service, or you know, hospitality. Number three was quality or excellence. Number four was like growth or impact, and number five was like finances and stewardship. And his point was that all five of those you could bucket different performance metrics and different things and a healthy organization would have what he would call a balanced scorecard where you would have different measures of success under each one of those five pillars. And it got me really thinking and reflecting because I was like hey, we're doing really good work with organizations.

Clay Linkous:

I was like what would this look like if you actually applied this in personal life? And I started playing around with some words and came up with what I felt like were the seven pillars of life success for both me personally and our family. And those seven pillars, they're easy to remember and our family and those seven pillars, they're easy to remember. The all-star letter F is faith, family, friends, fitness, finance, future and fun. And just to tell you how we've incorporated these in our lives, so every year we actually do in December like a family strategic planning retreat. Now we call it a vacation, like we'll go somewhere fun. I think last year we were in Vegas, um for New Year's Eve. But what we'll do on that trip is we'll take some hours of that trip and we'll actually sit down as a family and we'll go through each one of these pillars and the individual goals and objectives that we have for the next year for these pillars. So every year, um, I personally will go through and I'll set individual like goals and metrics for each one of these for myself, our family, for us to actually focus on achieve. Now, we never get them all right, we never get them all finished, but it gives us a roadmap and a plan. And then, throughout the year, what I do is actually during times that I have one-on-one, so like I still meet with all of our kids one-on-one, like once a month I'll take them to coffee I actually go through a series of very organic, not scripted, but very conversational questions to help figure out where they're at on each of these. So like I just had coffee with Madeline, my oldest daughter, on Monday and you know I'll say, hey, tell me where you're at in your faith journey, so I'll give her a chance to open up about that. I'll say, hey, how are you feeling about all of our family relationships? Is there anybody you're feeling disconnected with right now? How's your marriage going? I'll ask her who her closest friends are right now outside of our family, because I have found that who your closest friends are really will shape your life.

Clay Linkous:

The fitness question is one that all embodies, like anything, health and fitness. So you know, what are you doing from a nutrition standpoint? What are you doing from an exercise? Are you getting enough sleep? How's your mental health? So that's kind of the fitness one.

Clay Linkous:

The finance one is really open-ended, just about money management. You know whether it's giving, tithing, saving, investing just kind of real overall picture about finance. The future is how are you growing yourself? So you are a school-age kid and you're studying in school. Whether you're an adult and you're reading or you're going to conferences or watching webinars, like, what are you doing to make yourself better? And then the fun is exactly that. What are you doing to make sure you enjoy life? What are you doing to have a hobby? Are you traveling, are you on a vacation, that kind of thing, and what's been fascinating and you can appreciate this since know my kids, so Madeline's now 21. Part of what has helped shape our kids is I've been having a version of those conversations with them since Madeline turned five and so we've been very, very intentionally parenting. I have some version of conversation with this with Katie. It doesn't look exactly the same.

Clay Linkous:

She kind of rolls her eyes around some of it, but everybody kind of knows this is like kind of Clay's lingo when it comes to you know how he very intentionally leads himself and therefore also tries to lead his family, and then I've also tried to help others. People you know appreciate some version of this as well, so hopefully that makes sense.

Kevin Tinter:

Oh man, that's so good it's. I mean you and I really we're brothers from another mother. I mean we're both the same age, are like you know, we weigh just about the same, our skeletal muscle mass is about the same. I mean it's crazy and just the way that we live life intentionally is very similar. It's kind of the same thing by different names. So I absolutely love that and I will just say, you know and I've complimented you and Katie on this before but, uh, you know, we have not only the personal relationship but we had a professional relationship through our coaching business and then, um, a uh opposite professional relationship through the real estate company, uh, property management company, uh, that your wife runs, and then your oldest, madeline, who you mentioned. She was the real estate agent that helped us purchase the two fourplexes. So I think you said you guys operate or manage 800 units. That means 1% of those units are owned by uncommon freedom properties uh, which Beck and I own.

Kevin Tinter:

But I've told you this. I mean, I've just been so impressed by the character of the kids that you've raised. Uh, they're just. You know, your son Elijah. I think he just turned 18. Is that right?

Clay Linkous:

And when.

Kevin Tinter:

I talked to him doing the intake for fig property management I was like there's no way this kid's 18 years old.

Clay Linkous:

And yeah.

Kevin Tinter:

Julia is amazing. And so you know, I've, I've, you know, I've met three of your kids and they're just, they're just spectacular and they're a reflection of their parents and just the intentionality that you have put into parenting. And I like to also caveat that, that your kids are a reflection of you. But for those of us who have kids, that might be wayward for the time being. Please don't let that wear you down. Remember, the second generation uh was Cain and Abel and committed murder. So, uh, we can't uh over own the mistakes of our kids, uh, and probably shouldn't over own their good attributes. But I definitely want to do our part to uh, to help raise them properly.

Kevin Tinter:

So that's so good. All right, clay, as we're wrapping up. Uh, we could keep going, but I want to be sensitive to time. If you could leave our audience with some parting thoughts of wisdom or insight, what would you want them to know?

Clay Linkous:

all's coaching has made such an impact in mine and Katie's life Personally. We are at our ages and some of the best shape we've ever been, both physically and nutritionally. We've had recent blood work to confirm all that and I'm just super grateful for the impact you guys have made in our life, um and and also trusting us with, uh, uh, your all's properties as well. So that means a ton Um the no-transcript and also very intentional about how close or how far my boundaries are with each person, and so just be very intentional about that. That's going to help you.

Clay Linkous:

Number two appreciate that love is a decision, not a feeling. That's true in your marriage, it's true in parenting, it's true in your friendships and your relationships, and if we could wake up and have that mindset each day, I just believe the world would be a better place. And number three everything in life. I just realized that Jesus is the answer to your questions, and so, whatever questions you have, I've just learned that the older I get, the less that I actually know myself, but the more that I lean on him for answers and solutions, and it always turns out much better. So just to encourage anybody that's searching for greater meaning and purpose to know that that's where you'll find it at.

Kevin Tinter:

It's kind of a cliche in small groups, that's right. The correct answer is always Jesus, and it's a little bit of a joke, but it's also true. So, putting you on the spot here, and I totally agree with you about the books you read and the people that you surround yourself with top three book recommendations across all genres, but any three books. What would you say?

Clay Linkous:

Well, with the disclaimer that I have a short memory, so my recommendations are probably going to be some of the most recent ones. Yeah, so some of the most recent ones that have been really impactful. I'm actually reading a book right now I actually got a copy of it called Dope Sick and it is about the opioid epidemic. But what it does is it goes into both the science, the socioeconomic piece, and the stories of people that have been victims and impacted by it, have been victims and impacted by it. It's a fascinating read and, if nothing else, you'll come out of it with more perspective and empathy for the part of our society that is really dealing with drug addiction. So that's number one.

Clay Linkous:

Number two I actually got a copy of it here, called Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Gadara. He owns, or was the owner and manager of, the number one rated restaurant in the world up in New York City. But the book is about the journey of how he took that restaurant to be the number one Michelin rated restaurant in the world. And what's fascinating to me was it was not about the quality of the food or the presentation of the food. It was about how he motivated and equipped his people to create stronger connections with their customers. So it was all about the human connection and creating an experience and a memorable moment with people that forever defined him and his, his company. I think that would be number two.

Clay Linkous:

And then, um, you know, I'll give you one more. Uh, this one's one that some of your listeners you probably appreciate. I actually had not read this one in about 10 years, but I taught a workshop recently and it reminded me about this book and I dusted it off and just went back through and read a bunch of it. It's called what your clients won't tell you and your Don't Know For anybody that is in professional services that your job is to obtain clients and then retain clients. This book changed my whole professional trajectory when I read it, because it made me realize the things that we were getting wrong and things we were getting right from a consulting standpoint. I'll give you a little teaser.

Clay Linkous:

Most people think that client engagement and client success is about getting just the technical delivery of your services correctly. If you get that right, then people are going to be raving about it. But what the book highlights is that it's rarely the technical delivery that makes the impact. It's actually the relationship you have with the client and how well you are setting and managing expectations. So if you do those two things well, the technical delivery part will take care of itself. But if you don't do those things well, you're not going to have the client satisfaction, retention and success that you want. So I would really encourage that book for anybody that's trying to grow, especially if they're in any kind of service delivery business.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah Well, thank you. I've got three more books to add to my reading list from you, and this is why you know John Maxwell. One of the things that he always asks people is who one person you know that I need to know. And another great question is what are one or two or three books that you've read that I need to read? So thank you for those recommendations, clay. As we wrap up, I wanted to start this cool little guy segment called cars, cigars, guns and guitars and I know not every guy is into all of these. But real quick, what's your favorite car?

Clay Linkous:

So I a. A couple months ago I bought a 2018. So it's an older model, but it's a GLS 63 Mercedes. It's an SUV, but it's an AMG trim line. Okay, so it has a 700 horsepower engine Wow, and it is so nice. But it's definitely my favorite car. I've always had big SUVs, so we've got a big family. I'm 6'2", so I like to have a bigger car just to get in and out of. But when all of our kids started moving out, I was like well, I still want some sort of SUV, but I also want it to be more sporty, more luxury. We've always had Suburbans and that kind of stuff. I bought this Mercedes back in March or or April and I absolutely love it. My my wife says I'm going through like a midlife crisis, but it is.

Kevin Tinter:

it is definitely a really fun car to drive. Well, I I'm. I'm happy for you, because one of the things I tell people if you have to drive, you might as well enjoy it. Right, and for most of my life I had to drive and I really didn't enjoy it. It was merely what I could afford, but when you get to that point where you can afford it, that's awesome. Cigars you said you don't smoke cigars, so we'll skip that one.

Clay Linkous:

Guns yeah, so we have a bunch of guns. I mean, we live in the South Tennessee. Everybody has guns. I've got a whole funny story. I can tell you about that at some point. But if I had to pick one, that's my favorite one to shoot. Um, we have a, um, a Ruger, uh, two to three, uh mini range rifle, so it's a semi-automatic rifle and so it will shoot as fast as you can pull the trigger, uh, and so it's a lot of fun and, uh, me and kids, it's actually, it's actually Katie's gun, so, but she loves it and, uh, every once in a while she'll let me shoot it. So that's definitely one of my, my favorite ones to shoot.

Kevin Tinter:

Awesome. And guitars? You're not into guitars. You don't have a favorite guitarist.

Clay Linkous:

No, no, no, I mean I would. I would date myself if I told you probably the one guitarist that I actually even recognize the name, and that'd be Eric Clapton.

Kevin Tinter:

Oh brother, listen. I was born in 77 and all of my favorite guitarists are older than me by quite a bit so I as far as I'm concerned, good music pretty much died in 1989. So I agree. I agree.

Clay Linkous:

Awesome. I don't know what my kids are listening to half the time.

Kevin Tinter:

All right. So, clay, we're wrapping up here. I do want to plug your fig property management. Can you give us a website or a phone number for that? Because, just for people who don't know, you know, beck and I we finally got into real estate investing after hearing well, really, I've heard about it, read about it all the top experts in finances. They talk about being in real estate, and I guess we'll have to do another podcast because there's a lot of people that get into real estate and make some big mistakes. Um, but probably the tipping point for me was last summer on the cruise with John Maxwell. Uh, when I'm, you know, I'm a little fish in a big pond because I'm meeting these guys that are worth hundreds of millions of dollars in billionaires. And what was the one common theme? They're all in real estate. So I was like all right, I finally got to do this.

Kevin Tinter:

Yeah and um, and because I was, you know, knew your family and knew you guys had high integrity, I'm like, okay, what would you guys recommend? And your family ultimately was able to get us from finding the right place all the way into where we're now. Uh, you know, got eight units and they're almost all rented out all the time and you've done a phenomenal job and you've made it not be a full-time job for me, which is what I wanted. So go ahead, tell us about Fig Property Management real quick.

Clay Linkous:

Yeah. So if anybody's interested you can go to Fig. It's F-I-G-P-M-I-N-C so figpminccom, and you can learn more about the company there. But probably what separates us and differentiates us in the marketplace is we were investors before we were property managers. So we approach property management from an investor mindset and I think to your point about just making it easy.

Clay Linkous:

We were determined from day one to try to figure out how to create a service that investors really wanted, because that's what we built it off of. I think the other thing that kind of differentiates us is we have in-house maintenance, so we're not necessarily contracting it out. We literally I mean our maintenance supervisor is office right across from mine and it's a big part of our operations is to have that, because we know how important that is to success. So, yeah, happy to share more about it. But that's a quick overview and based here in Knoxville. Our real specialty is small to mid-sized multifamily. So somewhere between like four and 50 units. We do some single family homes and some bigger ones, but that's what we tend to be really good at is that level of size of property.

Kevin Tinter:

Well, one of my best friends from high school. He's been in real estate for a long time and his role is never less than three doors Um and really ideally, you know, never less than four.

Kevin Tinter:

So, uh, you know that's really the smart way to go for people. Uh, and the benefit of Knoxville and this is a reason Beck and I, even though we live in Phoenix and we're investing in Knoxville is the cost per unit is a lot cheaper. You know, we could not do what we're doing out here in Phoenix, but we're blessed to be able to pay cash for our properties in Knoxville and and because we have a company that we trust it's, it's not a problem. So thank you for that. I know also that you guys have a nonprofit. Tell us about that real quick as we wrap up.

Clay Linkous:

Yeah. So you know, part of what really defines us in the marketplace is our heart for not just serving our client investors but also serving the community. And so in 2020, we actually started a nonprofit called Fix Solutions, and the whole purpose of Fix Solutions is to really try to increase access to safe, affordable and sustainable housing, especially for vulnerable populations. So we tend to serve a lot of individuals that are coming back into society from incarceration, a lot of disabled individuals, youth that are aging out foster care, so just different people like that that really tend to be more vulnerable in life. But fast forward to today. Our nonprofit, um, actually owns 130 doors now. So it's not that's not clock, katie, it's not like Clay and Katie owns it literally is owned by the nonprofit and, uh, are used daily to provide either no barrier or low barrier housing to individuals that are in different seasons of life.

Clay Linkous:

And we were actually featured recently on a national news video from Soledad O'Brien. She came down with her matter of fact show and did a video segment on some of the work that the nonprofit was doing. So we're super excited about just the continued impact. And I'll tell you what really makes Big Solutions unique is, unlike most nonprofits. Really makes Big Solutions unique is, unlike most nonprofits, we actually are not the provider of services. We are the provider, literally, of housing. We depend on a ton of community partners to provide wraparound services so that the individuals keep their homes, keep their housing. So we have case managers, we have, you know, all kinds of different healthcare types organizations that we lean on to provide the service. We literally provide the brick and mortar housing for them and do it in a way that's either low barrier or no barrier. Um, so we are the, the, the landlord of choice for those populations. That makes sense.

Kevin Tinter:

Wow, that's awesome. Uh, clay, it's been awesome chatting with you today. We talk about this, but we still have to meet in person. I feel like we've known each other for decades. We're very like-minded and one of these days we're going to get together as couples if not families and really enjoy some good time. But, thank you, I learned a ton. I know the audience learned a ton Real quick if people want to follow you. I don't know how active you are on social media, but how can people learn more about you or just continue to soak in your wisdom?

Clay Linkous:

Yeah, I'm definitely active, but probably the easiest way is just on LinkedIn. That's probably, from a professional standpoint, the one that I use the most, and you can just search for Clay Linkus on LinkedIn and it'll pull up pretty quickly. There You'll find me, so we'd love to connect with you. If you're listening to this, Awesome.

Kevin Tinter:

Thanks again, clay and friends. Hope you had an awesome time, learned a ton and we'll see you next time.

Clay Linkous:

Thanks.