On September 13, 2013, Mindshare Technologies honored and recognized Mark at their annual Best Practices Conference in Park City, UT.
He was honored on the last day of the conference as part of the Red Shoes Experience presentation. The company is focused on customer service and improving the customer experience. So, when someone stands out by exhibiting excellent customer service/going above and beyond to do a job, it’s as if they are wearing red shoes. Mark stood out.
They point out that there are five pillars to Red Shoes living:
1. Awareness
2. Gratitude
3. Everyone has a story
4. Respect
5. Put yourself out there
Think how these elements apply to Mark as you review.
They showed a 13 min video of Mark, with footage from Lifetime’s Coming Home episode, which aired in March 2011, and from NatGeo’s Eyewitness War, which originally aired in August 2013. When the video ended, everyone stood and applauded (they didn’t know anyone from the family was there, so it was purely spontaneous.)
I was honored to speak to the group for 10 mins about Mark’s background, what he stood for, and his desire to get between the flock that he loves and the wolves bent on their destruction. He definitely put himself out there. Mark lived a selfless life long before he joined the military. He even served as a full-time missionary for two years in Oakland, CA.
After speaking, the president of Mindshare Technologies, Lonnie Mayne, presented my wife, our son, and me each with our own pair of red shoes. We are grateful to the good people at Mindshare for inviting us and for recognizing Mark’s example of sacrifice and valor.