Today we’d like to introduce you to John Daniel.
John , we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I grew up in Pittsburgh as the third of nine children. We lived on the edge until my dad became a police officer when I was nine-still a very modest income for a family of 11. I started working as a teenager to support the family and to have some money for myself. At age 20 I started working for a bank as a messenger-twenty-five years later I was a senior vice president. In 2000 I was recruited to be the head of human resources for a large regional banking company in Memphis. I later joined another major bank as Chief Human Resources Officer-for 16 years I was a member of the executive management team running a multi-billion-dollar banking company. During that time my wife, who I met while in high school while working at a car wash, died of cancer. We were together for 40 years. In 2014 my heart failed. I lived on a Left Ventricular Assist Device (LVAD), a machine that supports a failed heart, for a year while waiting for a donor heart, which I received in 2015. I remarried in 2014 and my wife and I became active in the American Heart Association. In 2022, we were honored to receive the Living Heart Award for our contributions to the AHA and the greater community. I serve on five non-profit boards and have been active in other ways in the community. In 2022, I was appointed to a one-year term as a Fellow at Harvard University as part of the Advanced Leadership Initiative. The fellowship allowed me to learn community leadership and social entrepreneurship. In 2024, inspired by my Fellowship, I started Bluff City Pickleball, an LLC and a club to inspire people to connect and improve their physical and mental well-being. We just celebrated our second anniversary. In 2025 we were voted as the Best New Small Business in the Mid-South. I continue to serve in many leadership roles in the community. In 2025, I released a book called Ancestral Mindset, Adopting an Evolutionary Framework to Lead, Influence and Collaborate. It is a look at how natural selection shaped our brains and how to use that knowledge to understand, lead and influence others.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Life is always full of challenges, and I have had my share.
Growing up poor.
Having to learn the norms of business and the middle class-quite which were quite different from the working-class background I was raised in.
Moving from the mailroom to the C-suite-both a challenge and a great opportunity.
The death of my first wife after a long battle with cancer
I lived with a damaged heart for over a decade and eventually survived two open heart surgeries including a heart transplant.
Losing all three younger brothers to sudden death.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I retired as an HR executive now I spend my time as a community leader and the owner of a small business, Bluff City Pickleball, a social enterprise that considers our social objectives-connecting people and improving their physical and mental well-being, as equally important to earning a profit.
As a transplant survivor I have dedicated my life to doing what I can to improve our community and the lives of our most economically disadvantaged.
I am a consultant, both paid and sometimes pro-bono to help organizations improve their cultures. I am a frequent speaker on leadership, resiliency, and human behavior
How do you think about luck?
I don’t think in terms of luck. All of our lives are impacted by random events-a cellular anomaly, an accident, a health setback, our company being acquired, an unexpected early death of someone we love. The key to life is to know that events will impact us, and the way to flourish is learning resiliency.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://johnmdaniel.com
- Instagram: johndaniel8716
- LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/johnmdaniel3rd
