Every fast-growing town hears the same slogan: We’re full. Go home.
Kristin Stevens heard it during her first campaign for Round Rock City Council. The mood around Texas was “put the walls up,” she told me on Rock Solid. “We’re closed for business. Don’t come here. We’re crowded.”
Kristin, city councilwomen and former Mayor Pro Tem for the City of Round Rock, made a different call. Instead of saying don’t come here, she says welcome. Then she asks one more thing: How can I get you involved?
Read that second sentence again. It is not a greeting. It is a job offer.
A Wall Answers a Question Nobody Asked
The person who just moved to your town is not wondering whether you have room. They are wondering whether they matter here. A wall answers the first question. Kristin’s line answers the second. She sits down with people who just arrived and asks what their passion is, and the goal, in her words, is to get them involved.
I come at this as an outsider from Brooklyn who lives in Brushy Creek, TX (right between Austin and Round Rock). My kids went to Round Rock High School, and my wife and I have a home care business here. I told Kristin on the show that the people I run into around town are the most welcoming I know. She treated that as something a community has to keep doing on purpose.
Pedestal or Playground
In January I will speak at TEDx Round Rock Play, and my talk asks one question: are you building a pedestal, or a playground? I will save the rest for the room. But Kristin gave me another clean example.
A pedestal has room for one person, and everyone else looks up. A playground works only when other people are playing, and the person who built it gets measured by who walks in on their own and what they find there. I grew up in Brooklyn, where nobody handed us a game. We made up wiffleball, stickball and stoopball every afternoon, with new rules depending on who showed up. Somebody built the place. Everybody played.
Most of us build pedestals, and it makes sense. A pedestal gives you a spotlight and a scoreboard everyone understands. Social media just glorified those pedestal (real or imaginary). A playground gives you noise, arguments, and games you did not design. You cannot take credit for most of what happens on it. But a pedestal ends the day the leader leaves. “How can I get you involved?” is a playground question. It opens the gate and assumes the other person has something to bring.
She Learned It From a Man Who Changes His Mind Out Loud
Kristin grew up watching her wonderful father, Charlie Culpepper, who joined me on Rock Solid earlier. Blue Santa deliveries at Christmas. Meals on Wheels with her mom. Frontier Days downtown. The service came first, she said, and the politics came much later.
I asked her which leadership lesson she took from him, and her answer surprised me. He listens. He will tell you when he disagrees, and he has thick skin, but he listens. Recently he called her about an ordinance the council was repealing and wanted to know why. He came in with a strong opinion. She walked him through the reasoning. He became the biggest proponent and took on informing the public.
Count what happened in that one phone call. A leader with decades of credibility asked a question, took an answer, changed his position, and then taught the idea to other people. Fred Rogers said the people who help us play make the greatest difference. Charlie is one of them, and Kristin is now passing it on.
Welcome Has a Trap
Kristin does not stop at welcome. She warns about what comes next. Once a community finds you, everybody wants you for something. “We are not a community lacking for service,” she told me. The danger is that your service gets diluted because you raise your hand so many times.
She left a 22-year career in health care when she was elected, because she could not give patients 110 percent and the city too. Her rule now is simple. If she cannot do something to the best of her ability, it is not worth it, to the organization or to her. It is all in, or thank you but no thank you.
That is the half of servant leadership most speakers skip. You teach people to say yes to the right thing, and you teach them to say no to the rest without guilt. On the show I told her that my wife has a hard time saying no. She teaches Alzheimer’s Association classes at the Round Rock Public Library, sits on the board of Adult Protective Services, the aging services council, PTSA, and runs a home care agency with me. Kristin’s answer is worth stealing.
What a Servant Leader Actually Teaches
Put it together and the job looks different from the one on most conference stages. Say welcome first. Ask what the person cares about. Hand them something real to do. Show them how to protect their own focus. Then let them run the game.
Round Rock is approaching 150,000 people, and Kristin still tells a story about a man in a coffee shop who pointed out the mayor to his friend and said he would make the introduction. Small-town feel does not survive that kind of growth by accident. Somebody teaches it, one welcome at a time.
Two moments in this episode I am not going to spoil. One involves an Instagram reel sent by a friend who lives across the street from Kristin, and the phone call she made before she sat down with me. The other is a love story that starts with a bond election and ends with fireworks. Both are better in her voice.
The Question I Am Carrying Into January
Who did you last say welcome to, and what did you hand them so they can play in your playground?
Hear the full conversation with Kristin Stevens on the Rock Solid: Round Rock Business Leaders podcast, or watch it below.
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