NEPA, Music, and the Art of Compromise with David Boyes

Welcome back to Environmental Professionals Radio, Connecting the Environmental Professionals Community Through Conversation, with your hosts Laura Thorne and Nic Frederick! 

On today’s episode, we talk with David Boyes about NEPA, Music, and the Art of Compromise.  Read his full bio below.

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Showtimes: 
1:38  Nic & Sam try to talk about video games
4:58  Interview with David Boyes starts
6:54   Music
14:38  NEPA
27:48  Field Notes
30:56  The art of compromise

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This podcast is produced by the National Association of Environmental Professions (NAEP). Check out all the NAEP has to offer at NAEP.org.

Connect with David Boyes at https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-boyes-979145172/

Guest Bio:
Mr. David Boyes is a semi-retired Program Manager with over 45 years of experience managing and performing oversight for all aspects of environmental programs to include NEPA, Natural and Cultural Resources, RCRA, CERCLA, P2, EPCRA, SPCC and SWPP planning. Established GIS Enterprise for Rhode Island ARNG and guided the leadership in Sustainability initiatives. Mr. Boyes served on the Environmental Advisory Council for the National Guard Bureau and in that capacity also served as the Chairman of the ARNG NEPA Committee. Following his Guard career Mr. Boyes has provided general Conservation and Planning services for multiple Federal agencies as an environmental consultant initially for HDR and currently for the Native Hawaiian Company DAWSON.    Recently Mr. Boyes has expanded on his wealth of NEPA expertise by attending International Impact Assessment workshops where he has focused on Cumulative impacts at the Strategic level as well as providing for the true integration of Social, Economic and Health concerns into the Impact analysis process. He has actively engaged with representatives of the major lending Banks as they seek to meet the mounting challenges of performing impact analysis in the highly informed societies of the digital age. He assisted the World Bank in a capacity building exercise in Latin America for the off-shore oil and gas industry where US consultants instructed Uruguayan officials in offshore emergency response measures and the U. S regulatory framework. Mr. Boyes has received training from the International Center for Hydropower, the International Hydropower Association, the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank and the IFC on Social Impact Analysis and the sustainable development of Hydropower and Mega Infrastructure in Latin America.  Most recently he presented on Dam Safety requirements in the United States and Strategic Alliances & Investing for Success in the Latin American hydropower industry to a group of International practitioners attending an ICH workshop in Argentina. Mr. Boyes currently provides management oversight for DAWSON’s 8a Set aside Delivery Orders with CBP which provide for biological, cultural, archeological, and environmental planning technical expertise services required for planning, and construction of projects in support of the Border Wall Progra

Transcript

Nic  
Hello and welcome to EPR with your favorite environmental enthusiast Nick and Laura, on today's episode, Sam and I tried to talk about video games and fail almost immediately. We talked to David Boies, about NEPA music and the art of compromise. And finally, here are facts about horses that I hope are going to shock Sam and she knows everything about horses all right already. They can sleep standing up because they have a series of tendons that lock in place and allow them I'm not surprised by that. Okay, great. She knew that when you can measure their age through their teeth. do that too. Oh, come on. All right. And last but not least, and then I have a bonus secret one. They can't breathe through their mouth or burp. I

Sam Bartleson  
didn't know about the burping but I didn't know breathing. So

Nic  
I did it was a win for me. All my other work is done. I'm going to take a nap now. There it is. Horses cannot breathe through their mouth only their nose. Even that was the thing. I used to seem to everyone. Every mammal could but hey, yeah, well you know hit the music

the annual AP conference and training symposium has wrapped up I hope everyone had a great and wonderful time. And we look forward to seeing you on the next one. Check out more news and happenings@www.hp.org Let's get to our segment even playing a video game.

Sam Bartleson  
Yes, I've been I don't know what's wrong with me lately. I've been playing Dave the diver I played Manna Lords I've played Sid Meier's six and on like a real time strategy kick lately. Oh, what's wrong with me?

Nic  
Or any of those new because it is okay. That's funny. Okay, well how do you play games then? Because for me, it's always like on to the next I never finished everything anything. I just moved to the next one. That's not totally true. I do finish some games, but I just play them for until I get bored. And then I go to the next one.

Sam Bartleson  
Yeah, but these games are like that. There aren't really stories per se. And so if you get bored of them, yeah, you just move on. So that's that's different for me. Because usually I'm like, I do everything and again.

Nic  
So you are a completionist you're somebody who actually finished much. Oh man,

Sam Bartleson  
I used to be unless so now as I age.

Nic  
Yes, yes, yes. Remember, it was still younger? years.

Unknown Speaker  
Yeah, how long did he say he was a member of the board for

Nic  
32 years?

Unknown Speaker  
Oh, just barely.

Nic  
I mean, it's still I mean,

Speaker 1  
still. Yes. No, barely a member

Nic  
of a board longer than you've been alive. That's pretty. That's pretty incredible. That's true. It's true. Yeah.

Sam Bartleson  
But he's also like, in his mid 60s, late 60s, something like that.

Nic  
We'll just we'll just say he's in his late 50s. And that way, you know, just to save him just in case. Now I think he's actually in the 70s. But that'll

Unknown Speaker  
make more sense. Yeah. He's he's still like,

Nic  
a double my age. So of course, it makes sense. Totally makes sense. Basically had like two careers two lives in doing completely different things. Yes. Yeah. That's very interesting. He basically retired at 55 and then had a whole nother career. Which is kind of wild to think it's crazy.

Sam Bartleson  
Yeah. He's retired again, kind of right. Yeah, pretty much.

Nic  
Yeah. For

Unknown Speaker  
real this time. And

Nic  
then still, he said Is he still can't get away. And it's kind of really it's really neat to think about because it's just taken out. That's my career and your life and we're in different stages in our careers and Kylie and we get to 55 I can do something completely different. And yeah, maybe do the reverse the Dave who knows? I don't

Sam Bartleson  
even know what 55 Or even look like for me. I don't even know what 30 is going to look like. But that's just next year.

Nic  
Brutal. That's 30s 30s were great. 30s were really fun. I enjoyed them immensely in lots of different ways. And yeah, it's weird to turn the clock me I have a four in front of my name.

Speaker 1  
Yeah, or to my 30s I think they'll be delayed.

Nic  
Yeah. Well, yeah, it's like a are but you're both pretty fit and pretty fun. And, I mean, not the most fit and the most fun, but you're still pretty pretty with it. So we'll see how far he goes to so there you go. Yeah. Look at us entering different decades. Yeah. Also, I love having tried to talk about video games that it just Yes. This is always better. My bad. Yeah, well, you know, why don't we just that's the perfect place to stuff. Let's not waste any time. Let's get to our interview. Sounds good. Hello, and welcome back to EPR today we have David Boies, a senior Environmental Program Manager at Dawson. Welcome, Dave.

David Boyes  
Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. So

Nic  
happy to have you here. It's a it's a truly an honor for us. Like I say you've had a long and storied career. been one of my mentors for a very long time, which I'm extremely appreciative of, but you know, I want to start actually with where you grew up. So where did you grow up? Where do you come from? Um,

David Boyes  
what is known as a service brat. So I was born in Malta in the Mediterranean, and then traveled extensively with my family throughout Britain, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales, England, and then now to the Far East to Singapore. But mostly, you know, just moving around, Great Britain probably went to something like 11 elementary schools. And four high schools along but one university, I went to the University of Bath,

Nic  
so yeah, so I mean, how did that shape you? It's an awful lot of travel when you're young. It

David Boyes  
is. You do a lot of different strange things to fit in.

Nic  
Like what I like what

David Boyes  
I was very good at accents. So always picking up local colloquialisms and, you know, always kind of had this feeling inside of not belonging. And I probably felt that way through my early adulthood until I came to the US and actually have now lived in that same town for 50 years. I probably wanted to settle down.

Nic  
You got your fellow travel when you were younger? Yeah, well, we'll definitely dive in your career in a second. But I want to talk a little bit about like, I know, you're a big music person. And I know that dad started in the UK. So what were you doing in college when you were running? Yes. So

David Boyes  
back in the early 70s. It was before civic centers and and the like, and in Britain, one of the big music circuits was the university circuit. I'm sure you've all heard of the who live at Leeds for instance. Yeah, that was an album recorded at Leeds University. So I was for a while Social Secretary at my university, which meant, you know, we, my group was in charge of all of the kind of weekend entertainment for the university. So we had a venue for about 1000 people that would, and we would put on weekly concerts with up and coming musicians. Sometimes we would have, you know, concerts that went on throughout the night. Earlier next morning. They were well attended. And yeah, we had to get pretty creative along the way. But these were bands that, you know, a lot of them became household names. Some of them were household names at the time, but you know, it was just a ton of fun, and it was something I wanted to continue as a career and we could probably talk about that later, but it didn't work out that way.

Nic  
No, that's that's perfect. I think it's totally fine to dive into that. So you decided to come to the US like what kind of gave you the, what was the drive behind that?

David Boyes  
Well, driving was I got married. I was born when I was in university, to a young American woman. As things happen, that marriage did not last. It lasted a long time had two children from that marriage. And I've been married but 25 years ago, but at the time of the graduating from university, kind of had thoughts about maybe going to London being involved in the music scene, or perhaps emigrating to Australia because they had a program at that time for students coming out of the university that allow you to Australia I guarantee you employment for a couple of years. But my first wife Claire, was adamant that we come to the United States. She felt there were more opportunities for me here. And yeah, and long term. Realistically, that's been very true. But yeah, that's that's how I arrived here. And when I got here, realizing that the music business was like almost what you would call clothes shop. Right? I decided I better use my degree.

Nic  
Yeah. So how was that transition? Was it difficult for you? Were you like, apprehensive about it? Are you kind of like, well, this is the next thing. Let's go. For

David Boyes  
me having moved my entire life. It was It wasn't that difficult to come to the US. It really wasn't well, I did miss was my family. We did. We did make efforts to get back as much as we could. And obviously, when you're starting out in your career, you're not exactly wealthy. So we'd save our pennies and make the trip when we could, you know, fortunately, later in life, I've been able to do it more on an annual basis. But back then we could do it. We did it when we could. But yeah,

Nic  
and that's very cool. Yeah,

David Boyes  
well, I have two sisters back in the UK and nephews and nieces. And it's fun to go and see them these days because none of them are kids anymore. So

Nic  
yeah. Oh, for sure. So Okay. All right. So what was the start of your environmental career like what were you doing?

David Boyes  
So my first job in the United States? I actually I was I worked in a mill for a year, up in there weren't many jobs when I arrived in the United States. I was washing cloth in a textile mill. And that job appeared in in the classifieds for a mosquito control officer in the town of Barrington, Rhode Island. So I had actually, I was an entomologist by trade and I had taken classes with the Center for tropical diseases in London. And so I felt eminently qualified to him mosquito control and apply for the job and after two interviews, shockingly, got the job, right. So it was essentially it was a marsh restoration and water management program that I installed in this community where I live. And I did that for about three years and thought, Okay, it's time to move on. And the town fathers had different ideas, and maybe an offer I couldn't refuse that offer became too much, but I ended up becoming public works superintendent in town, with an emphasis on Parks and athletic fields and refuse collection, which kind of led to me being one of the initiators of recycling in the state of Rhode Island, and various other programs. Were on the cutting edge of a lot of different things back then in the 70s. And so it kind of kept my interest and it kept me in a town for probably longer than I should have stayed.

Nic  
Well, I mean, so you've kept up with the mosquitoes Yes, years so yeah, how is how was like mosquito management? What was it like then what is it like now? How does that change over time?

David Boyes  
Well, for kind of opened the Pandora's box on you know, the the where the scale control programs up and down the East Coast. But there was also a new law that was enacted called the Clean Water Act, and part and parcel of that were dredging requirements. And so it turned out that even though we were digging ditches on salt marshes by hand, we were exceeding the the dredging limit the quantity of spoils that could be disposed of on a marsh. So we actually ended up applying for permits what turned out that nobody else was. Nobody else was permitted to doing the scale control, even though this was standard work throughout New England. So yeah, a lot of permitting occurred within my community and throughout the Northeast. And I guess that was one of the early changes that I saw. There's always been, from my perspective, anyway, a integrated approach to mosquito control. I think that continues today. And there's a lot of emphasis on obviously, throughout the industry, but I was I was fortunate enough to see that progression over time. Over and even though I was no longer actively involved in mosquito control, I was treasurer of the Northeast Mosquito Control Association for about 32 years. So there abouts and I still attend the conferences as an honoree so I can keep in touch with what's going on and what the latest latest issues are. It's quite fascinating, but I'm not going to bore you with the skin of control Yeah.

Nic  
It's funny you were on your on the board longer than Sam's been alive. So that's, that's a fun, fun anecdote. Sorry. They've already done that to you. That's okay. So how did you get it from? So public works to working in like the environmental policy sector with NEPA? Oh, well,

David Boyes  
well as with all things, all things come to an end. There was a change in the town fathers and in Barrington and they decided that our department was top heavy, and my position was eliminated for numerous reasons way too many to explain here. So I was left unemployed for a while. Fortunately, once I got over my my pride. I applied for a job as an environmental specialist with the Rhode Island Army National Guard. And I've noticed I've got to say the military, everybody says really and environment, military. They don't really coexist while they do and they do a fantastic job of being in compliance. Compliance is an extremely important aspect of daily life in the military, and what gave me the opportunity to be able to do this and the expertise to do this was my working in in Public Works was 17 years as I saw the regulatory programs of the EPA come into play. I mentioned the Clean Water Act in the beginning, but we were, you know, some of the first communities that were having to do on the ground injection control permits, we had to do underground storage tank, testing and permitting we started recycling programs. We started the first oil recycling programs. So all of these programs, when I came to the National Guard, were programs that I already fully understood. And so, you know, I came in and they the first two programs they gave me to work on the hazardous waste, but it loves to do hazardous. NEPA which is something that no one understood when attaching with a barge pole.

Nic  
Still feels like sometimes Yeah, yeah. So

David Boyes  
that's, that's where it started. Within the National Guard and National Guard is very strong on training. They gave me so many opportunities to further my understanding of so many different things. They also helped me go back to university and get my master's degree. And I'm nice. Yeah, one of the one of the selling points for that was a good third of my classes and in my master's program were in GIS, which was something that the National Guard thought they'd be interested in and we actually took it to a whole new level within Rhode Island and at the same time as that was happening across the nation and all of the different guard programs. I was exposed to a lot of different people over those years and was permitted by Rhode Island to serve on national committees. And over time, I became chairman of the National Guard's neighborhood committee. So is in involved in developing policy for the guards NEPA program. Give you an example of how I got there. That I earned and allowed me to attend NEPA classes at Duke University. And those were conducted by military personnel which was because at that time, this was in the 90s. I would say the Guard and the Army in general had some of the strongest paper programs going. Once again, it's that compliance piece. Now, they needed to comply if we're going to do this, how do we do it and how do we do it? Well, I did that for an extended period of time. I worked for the guard for about 13 years. And then when I started adding things up, that gave me 30 years and local and state government because National Guard is quasi state, federal agency. So I was considered a state employee. So I had I thought, well, it's time to retire, but try something new. When I work for the guy, they work with different contractors like you so I reached out to them saying, Hey, I, I'm thinking of retiring. Is there any interested in hiring somebody like myself, I mean, I was only in my mid 50s. That shocked the response and came to the private sector, which is where I still am sort of way.

Nic  
So what was the transition like? So we've worked basically, state government with the military and then in the, you know, the private contracting sector, what was it like transitioning to those to contracting?

David Boyes  
Well, obviously, they, you know, I came to the private sector, hey, I think I think I'm in the private sector, you know, having to account for every hour, right? When you work for local government and the state, you get a salary, and you just come into work, you're 3540 hours a week. When you're in the private sector, you have to account for every hour to some job. You have to charge it to something right, right. That's, I think it's the same for anybody coming into the private sector initially, it's, well, what do I take my time to? And it's a very awkward process I find for quite a while. But once you get into the swing of it, yet figured out and you start getting used on different jobs and you're sometime pick up more hours in the week then you've got time allotted for so I would say that. Just focusing on on a much, much more on the financial side of things from the individuals basis because it was probably the biggest, biggest change in terms of the work in terms of the type of work. I felt reasonably well qualified to be doing. Doing the type of workload I became a project manager on the on the projects. I think the first thing I had to learn was the different regulations for different agencies, and the nuances between them all, you know, they all have their own way of doing, doing business. But once you get that down, it's the analysis is the same right? Analysis is analysis. So that wasn't too much of an issue for me. Some of the agencies that you work for word interesting to say the least. But yeah, the transition wasn't overly difficult. I'd say. It's that charging your time is, right.

Nic  
Which is fine. That's all I've ever known. So I'm like, oh, yeah, it's just what you do. When you don't have to do that. is completely different. That's funny. Yeah. Well, like I don't really so you know, obviously, we ran into each other when you kept doing the private sector. And I came along as a Rite Aid, environmental scientists back in the day, but I remember one of the things about our earlier interactions I was still pretty junior, I wasn't like brand new to what I was doing. I knew what I was doing. But I was still young, and I still had a lot to learn. And you were very willing to teach me but you're also very, very willing to let me do the task like I remember you basically would do not just with me, but with everybody in the team. You gave people an opportunity to do challenging things, and then you talk about it. So like where did that? Because I always thought that that was something that still sticks with me is that you just never said, Well, I have to do this because I'm the founder manager. You're like, why don't you give this a shot and then we'll talk about what you wrote or what your idea is. So where did that come from? Because to me, that was one of the things I still think about is still very, very impactful to me as a young professional. That's

David Boyes  
a really good question. I'm not sure that came from but yeah, I mean, you put a team together. You got to trust the team, right? I mean, when I went to the private sector, I very quickly realized that I was surrounded by extremely bright individuals. Okay, I had spent a lot of time with I'm not gonna say they're not bright people, but more street savvy street smart type of people, rather than intellectuals or folks that had gone to university. So when I entered that world, it was much more of an even though it's the consultant side of things. It's much more of an academic world to me. So my expectations are those europride people, you can figure it out. I mean, that's if you went to school for Right, right, right. So, you know, if you've got to kind of figure out the impacts to a particular resource. Yeah, that's something you'll ever be able to do. Right? Yeah. So yeah, where I like to talk about things afterwards was okay. So, now we have to differentiate between the academic world and the real world. Yeah, those are, those are two different areas. I know I've told you this a million times. But, you know, if you're going to construct a new building on five acres of land don't worry about getting your, your footprint of disturbance down to the square foot. Right? Because at the end of the day, you're going to be walking out with a bulldozer operator is going to be working off for stakes in the corner of five acres and he's just going to push that and he's not gonna necessarily be within a square foot or a cubic foot of your calculations. So approximate and back off a little bit, particularly when you're doing say an environmental assessment. Yeah. Okay. They'll be approximate. Right? And so, getting people to have a better feel for that. When they are data driven. And they they want to be precise in an imprecise science. Yeah.

Nic  
Like, where you can't even be. See, we don't know exactly how things are going to be so you better overestimate it right? Kind of That's right. You can't underestimate

David Boyes  
and I never had a problem with people writing more than I was necessary. Down. You know, I didn't particularly like to see an analysis be a third of a page right? Right. Right. No, no impact.

Nic  
That's fine. You're right about this. Yeah.

David Boyes  
Just because, you know, it's then the no action alternative. Does that mean that there are no impacts? But let's think about let's think a little more about what not doing it actually results in some think about things a little differently. And it still drives me, you know, I mean, I because I still see it in pretty much every document that's prepared, cumulative impacts for instance, don't get the accused Olson consideration that they really, really should. Yeah, I guess the question is, how deep into the weeds should we be getting on cumulative impacts in an environmental assessment versus in the IRS? Right. Exactly. So anyway, I'm trying to say Oh, my dogs

Nic  
it's too fun. You're totally right. I think it's funny. We haven't talked a lot about no actually alternatives. On the show. That was always one that I remember as well. It's like, so you're telling me that no action moving this bombing or not moving this bombing range is everything's the same. Why are we moving? Because there's a safety issue. So so not moving it means that there's a safety issue. That's what they're gonna build a new road. So you can't keep it here. And so yeah, it's like the other no action is is actually quite dangerous. It's the most dangerous alternative. Yeah, and it's fun to see that but I always say like, you know, neither one of those things. It's easy learn hard to master. And I know you've seen that many times many ways. But yeah, I don't know. We'd like to ask people about memorable moments in the field. They're in their jobs. And I know there's some jobs you can't You're not allowed to talk about. But do you have any like fun, fun stories either either out in the field or, you know, working on a project where it was just really neat or really interesting that I don't know you want to kind of talk through with

David Boyes  
that put me on the spot here. I didn't I would say that a great deal of my deeper experience and has been the agencies that I really can't talk about. Yeah, no. It wasn't it. I remember one incident. And it's not a funny thing. I remember a an EA that we were working on. This was as when I was chaired the DP committee for the National Guard. And we're attempting to develop a new training site in Colorado. And it was for the aviation units when I first got the helicopter folks. And this was at the time of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. And it was, it was colder at high altitude Aviation Training Center. Okay, site, center hat. And the thing was held up for over well over a year and what truly amazed me was that because of one biologist particular survey, and experiments that they were conducting, their concern was that helicopters flying over the forest in that particular area, were going to impact her surveys. And it just struck me that here we are dealing with soldiers lives. We were training folks to fly at altitudes in excess of 14,000 feet, so they could better respond in an extremely dangerous environment in Afghanistan in particular
________________
David Boyes  
I'm in Afghanistan in particular, that we were training soldiers from Norway, and Sweden and various other NATO countries in the same methodology, and just struck me as absolutely amazing that a field office could be holding up. What I consider it's such an important mission and there was no effort in this was what to this day really concerns me is there was no effort by anybody at a higher level to interfere with that local artist that struck me, as stayed with me. And you and I've had this discussion before, but we continue to see that. So I guess it really comes down to even to this day, there's a lack of collaboration between federal agencies and sometimes I think they've got to get over the differences and realize what's in the national importance.

Nic  
Yeah, it's funny you say that, you know, compromise is something we talk about a lot. It's never easy and you know what the goal should be both parties walk away a little bit unhappy. That's right. And, you know, but we've seen instances of it, you know, I think even you know, some of our work in New York with the Park Service has been a slow evolution towards the right direction in certain ways. And that's a really neat project too. But yeah, yeah, I don't know. It's hard for compromise. Sometimes. And you know, every agency has different values. They have different missions, and sometimes they're in direct conflict. So how do we do that? What I mean, it's not easy, but, you know, we've seen examples of compromise, but many agencies who shouldn't, you would never think would compromise and they do it. So what helps get to that point?

David Boyes  
I think it's communication. I think people have to get off the high horse a little bit, meet somewhere in the middle. I think that with agencies, get them kind of boots on the ground, get them down to the level of of what it is you're dealing with, and put them in, in your shoes as it were out in the field and and discuss it and try to develop a relationship with individuals within other agencies. And I think this is kind of central to everything that we do in this business. Is to be a listener. Yeah, understand what it is. I'm just trying to be a listener understand where that other person or that other agency may be coming from, then hopefully, there they can be a listener as well. And understand where you're coming from. And that way, as long as you're still talking, you can develop that consensus where you can maybe find that there are more areas where you're similar than your dissimilar and find that sweet spot, but I think it does. It just comes down to communication, continuous communication, and not kind of making a request of somebody and then just dropping it for a couple of months. No. Follow up, talk to individuals. I was always somebody that picked up a phone and talk to somebody rather than this constant email chatter. And then meeting people. I think, when you're developing costs for a project, you've got to have that travel budget in there. You can't be just doing everything online. From Home, you've got to get out there. You've got to go and see people and talk to people, be it be your clients. Are there other agencies? Just get out there and see them grip and grin. Look them in the eyes right? And then you know that listening becomes really important. Isn't

Nic  
it amazing? I found this to be true. Throughout my career, it's like, whenever there's conflict, and it's, you know, over the internet, it's like, okay, well, I'll see you tomorrow. What do you mean, I'm coming to your office, so

Speaker 1  
we're gonna talk us through. It's amazing how the story shifts. Almost immediately. It's like, oh, now you're in the presence of someone and it changes the way that you talk and it changes the way is this really the issue and it's not like a, an intimidation thing. It's

Nic  
just a it's hard to. It's hard to be, you know, stubborn when you're looking at someone and seeing how that impacts your words. Or impacting the project and the person. So, yeah, I love that. So like I say, we're getting closer to the end of our time, but I do want to ask, did you say by the way, your town fathers, is that correct?

David Boyes  
Yeah, the county the town council and the town manager. I call him the town fathers.

Nic  
Now that's amazing. Okay. That's really, really cool. So, I mean, I know you've never usually we usually ask about hobbies at this point of the interview, you know, and we know already that music is a big one for you. But you also like to serve so how did you get into that and how did that happen?

David Boyes  
Well, I like to surf and then as quickly as I fell off a surfboard, I didn't surf as much anymore. Back when I was younger, yeah. And the community that my last high school I went to university was a new key and Cornwall. Yeah, which is now kind of like one of the centers for surfing in Europe. So back then, when we were in juniors and seniors in high school, and it was Wednesday afternoon and you had phys ed, one of the options was surfing, which is great. That's awesome that we just go down and lie on the beach because it was flat. When the surf was there, I wasn't particularly good. But I got the great idea of renting surfboards. Which I did a fair amount of. At one point had three or four surfboards and I had a friend at a gift shop. His father had a gift shop and I rented out surfboards because it's an interesting tool for some visitors to use. They get as they rent a surfboard they put it on the beach and it attracts attract it's an attraction fairly saying oh yeah,

Nic  
of course. Which is funny because the first and really only time you think surfing with our dear friends to you pile. The bar

David Boyes  
Yeah. When we were in Hawaii.

Nic  
Yeah, I b It's funny. I didn't realize how much arm work it is. Which is like 99% of it is shoulders. Yeah, that was badly so you get up. You know I my claim to fame was I was up on the board for half a second which counts because I was up but then I tried to take the board back and like like you I think I'm a person who just want physical activity. I'm going like it all out. I'm not that I don't really hold back. And so my arms were dead. Dragging that thing back. No idea. I was like, Oh, this is much heavier out of the water. Difficult

David Boyes  
and the thing and I hope we've got a minute left here. So when I go back to England these days, I had some friends they still said well, they actually they've pretty much given up surfing about this point. But always remember remember when we were in high school and they were going surfing in this place. On the other end, I played a beach called cram talk. And to get there you had to go across this river, paddle across the river to get to the beach, and they all hopped in the water and I was with them. I had only been on a surfboard like twice that paddling across this river. And all I could hear was, you know, the suction as the tide was going out on this river. And yeah, which is terrifying. And we paddle across this river and we're about a quarter of a mile out in the ocean. Oh gosh. And panicked. miles miles from safety here I fall off my board and I'm waist deep and that's why

Nic  
they're all laughing as

David Boyes  
well. They talk about it because they hadn't realized that. Man, that must have been pretty hairy dude. Yeah, right. Right. Right. And to this day, they talked about it. Yeah, it left an impression on people. But yeah, that's why there was a good surf break if there was a sandbar out there that was actually standing on and the waves would break telephony.

Nic  
Yeah. Anyway, I love it. I love it. So now it's like those.

I know we're good. It's Friday. So I know we're getting close to a tee times well. So you know, I know you've been playing golf for a while too. So my second to last question is how's your golf game?

David Boyes  
Not good. I think that it's gonna get better. disappoints me all the time. There we go. Oh, my bogey golfer you're gonna do right. Hopefully, every now and again. Hope springs eternal and today is another round and there you go. Let's see what happens.

Nic  
The pursuit of one good shot is always that's that's that's really odd as a shot. You're coming back. Right. Exactly, exactly. So before we let you go, is there anything else you'd like to talk about? Or any advice for our listeners before we head out?

David Boyes  
Yeah, I just want I think that's an open, important that we actually touched upon. In listening. When you're out with clients and gathering information. It's important. Once again to listen. Don't come off like you're the smartest person in the room. Right? It just does not go down. Well, you know. And a lot of time, clients just want to talk about their lives, their families, things that interest them, and it's important that you share that interest with them. Because I think through that interest in people, you'll get a lot more out of it. Not only for the job that you're doing but as you move forward in your career, have a better understanding of people and what it is that they have to deal with on a daily basis.

Nic  
It's perfect. It's very likely. Yeah, absolutely. So where can people get in touch with you if they want to reach out? All

David Boyes  
this probably through my email at Dawson, which is the boys BO Y es at Dawson. ohana.com

Nic  
There we go. Thank you so much. For being here, Dave. pleasure was mine. And that's our show. Thank you, Dave for joining us today. Please be sure to check us out each and every Friday. Don't forget to subscribe, rate and review. See everybody bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai