Chapter 6
From Orphan to Executive
The Dr. Nathaniel J. Williams Story
Dr. Nathaniel J. Williams, DSW, Ed.D., MBA, MPA, MHS, and LSW, has earned a staggering SIX (6) advanced degrees or certifications over the course of his life and career.
He is one of only two people on Planet Earth that I know personally who has as many (or more) letters after his name than he has letters in his full NAME!
This gaudy collection of diplomas includes TWO Doctorates—in Social Work and Education—and THREE (4) Master's degrees—in Business Administration, Public Administration, Health Sciences, and a licensed certification in Social Work (LSW).
Just as he possesses many different knowledge sets and degrees, he likewise wears a lot of different hats in his eclectic life and successful career.
These hats include: husband, father of eight (8) children, adjunct professor, published author, sought-after speaker, community advocate, television show host, and business executive.
Aside from leading a multi-million dollar non-profit organization, he has authored nine (9) books and consults with and speaks to a variety of groups and organizations throughout the world.
Dr. Williams accomplished all of this before age 50—a truly remarkable feat.
And he has not slowed down much in intervening years.
Back in 1970, who would have guessed what little 5-year-old Nat Williams—recently orphaned after the sudden and unexpected death of his mother—would someday become? At that time, Nat—the second youngest of 12 children—was attending the funeral of his mother and only parent. To this day, his father's identity and location remains unknown.
Immediately following his mother's funeral, five taxis waited outside to take Nat and his nine brothers and sisters (all minors) to five separate homes in New York City's foster care system in the Bronx.
Reflecting back on these challenging circumstances, Nat has said:
I felt sorry that my mother died. But rather than feeling sorry for myself, I recognized it wasn't the end of the line for me. In time, I learned to try to find the message, or the memo, in difficult experiences I faced to see what I could learn and then internalize from those experiences.
One day, while living in one of the many foster homes in which he resided as a minor, Nat sat on the curb brooding in the disappointment he felt when his siblings were unable to visit him as originally scheduled. As he sadly sat there alone by himself, the Executive Director of the home—Sister Mary Patrick—came along and asked Nat what was wrong. After voicing his plight and disappointment, Sister Mary disappeared and then returned almost magically with a bicycle for Nat to cheer him up.
Thrilled and grateful for this unexpected gift, Nat rode off to show his cottage mates his new treasure. Then he let his friends take turns riding the bike. As he observed one of his friends pedaling down the pathway, however, a life changing impression—or message—swept over him.
The epiphany that filled his mind and heart at that particular moment was the realization that if he wasn't careful, this situation—telling a sad story and then waiting for a handout—had the potential to set a negative precedent for the rest of his life.Sister Mary Patrick's kindness and compassion aside, it wasn't the story Nat wanted to replicate in his future.
From that moment onward, Nat began to look at his life differently. He began to aspire to achieve great things in his life. He decided that someday he would be like Sister Mary Patrick herself, a caring leader of great capacity and compassion.
More specifically, he determined that one day he would be an Executive Director of an organization.
So determined was Nat to eventually accomplish this dream and life design that he even started signing his name: Nathaniel J. Williams, Executive Director.
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| Nat Williams as a young man. |
This self-affirming habit spawned confusion and derision among some of his peers.
Dr. Williams explains:
People were always making fun of me, and would ask, "Why the hell are you saying you're an Executive Director, and why are you signing your name that way?" But I persisted because it gave me a pathway. As a leadership coach, I often tell people: "If it's not written down, it's not going to happen." Writing it down made it very clear to me and others what I wanted to do and be, so when drugs or alcohol or other temptations and distractions arose, I knew what my choices would be. I was able to plan my work and then work my plan. I was able to say yes or no to things based on my direction and goals in life instead of being socially pressured into doing the wrong things.
While drugs, alcohol, and other vices ended up plaguing many of his peers, Nat was able to make decisions based on pre-determined values and priorities to chart his own intelligent and proactive direction in life.
In other words, without consciously knowing it, Nat had chosen to become a SELF-ACTION LEADER.
He came to realize that the true gift he had received from Sister Mary Patrick that day in the foster care system was not the bicycle, but the lesson he learned from the experience—a lesson that would continue to influence and inform his decisions and direction for the rest of his life.
Later, as a leadership coach, he would teach this same principle to others.
I encourage people to find the message behind the moment rather than being overwhelmed by the moment itself. I try to help them understand that there is always something to take away from every experience. The question is: what is it? If I can learn something positive from every experience, then I can turn it into a gift for myself and others.
Nat had a deep desire to be a leader. As he saw the needs around him, he began to take initiative to fill those needs. His teen years became a harbinger of the hard work, focus, and proactivity that would mark his life and career for the next several decades.
Like most teenagers, he came across opportunities to get involved in drugs, alcohol, and other temptations and distractions common to adolescents. The negative consequences of getting involved with such activities, as well as their incompatibility with his personal and professional goals became powerful deterrents for Nat. The more he eschewed such activities, the less people tried to persuade him to partake of them. He attributes this to his leadership-oriented personality and initiative, which had the benefit of tacitly, but clearly broadcasting the message: I'm not interested in that kind of stuff.
He specifically remembers one of his foster care cottage mates who got hold of some marijuana laced with PCP. The boy then stripped naked and climbed the stairs to the third floor of the foster home where he opened up a window in preparation to "fly." Fortunately, he was found before he jumped, but the young man was never the same after this incident, and spent the rest of his life in a psychiatric ward.
Such experiences served to powerfully reinforce Nat's ever-growing resolve to stay focused and avoid dangerous and risky behaviors.
After high school, Nat attended a community college in New York City for three semesters. He also worked in a home for mentally disabled adults. Through these work experiences, he became enthralled by the realization that he could make money while contributing meaningfully to the lives of others who needed his help. Seizing upon his newfound employment opportunities with characteristic vigor and vim, it was not uncommon for Nat to put in 18-20 hour workdays. Thus began his lifelong commitment to hard work and his personal quest to improve the lives of the disabled.
At age 28, Nat founded an organization that grew into a conglomerate of nine additional companies focused on human care services. This umbrella organization grew to employ over 200 people with an annual operating budget of $12 million dollars.
In addition to this massive career project, Dr. Williams has served on the Board of Directors for several other organizations and hosted a weekly television talk show in Pennsylvania.In addition to his heavy work schedule, Nat made time in his life for an even higher priority: his family. He got married in and had two children. Then, following a divorce from his first wife, he remarried and has since had five more children and adopted a sixth (his niece from Liberia), making him the father of eight (8)!
Between 2006 and 2009, Nat shifted his focus to increasing his formal education. In an extraordinary burst of energy and focus, he completed four (4) graduate degrees, including a: master's of business administration (MBA), master's of public administration (MPA), master's of human services (MHS), and a Doctorate in Education (Ed.D.) in a period of only four (4) years' time.
Nat earned two of his five degrees from Lincoln University of Pennsylvania and Cheney University of Pennsylvania—two of the oldest African American universities in the United States. In 2007, Kutztown University of Pennsylvania made Dr. Williams their first ever year-long Frederick Douglass Institute's Scholar-in-Residence. In addition to these responsibilities, Nat has also served as an adjunct professor at two different universities.
Another of Dr. Williams degrees, his Doctorate in Education, was earned at Fielding Graduate University—the same place Dr. JJ received his Ed.D. It was through a mutual friend and professor at Fielding that Dr. Williams and Dr. JJ became acquainted.
He earned his MBA—Master's of Business Administration—from Strayer University.
He has since added a Doctor of Social Work (DSW) degree from the University of Southern California (USC) in Los Angeles in 2020 and was certified as a Licensed Social Worker (LSW) in 2021.
To top off his storied academic journey, he was further recognized with an Honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Lackawanna College in 2018.
During his journey to the top of his field, Nat faced challenges rooted in his race and background. For example, he started out in life being "poor and black" in New York City with virtually nothing materially or financially. But instead of focusing on what he did not have as a young Black orphan in a challenging urban environment, Nat chose to focus on what he did have, what he could do and become, and what he might learn from each one of his many life and career experiences.
Truly, he was a classic example of an authentic Self-Action Leader who was naturally attracted to helpful coaches and mentors and encouraging teachers and took advantage of every opportunity he was blessed with along the way. Just as importantly, he has dedicated the rest of his life to helping others become successful by following the same SAL principles and practices that guided him—and continue to guide him.
According to Dr. Williams, if you are going to succeed in transcending less than ideal external circumstances, it is crucial to work with what you have and believe that what you have isn't all bad.
"You've got to work with what you have,
and you've gotta believe that what you have isn't all bad."
—Dr. Nathaniel J. Williams
In hindsight, Nat doesn't feel sorry for himself for being orphaned at five, or that he had to struggle uphill against a variety of external forces to realize his present success. Rather, he recognizes that each life experience played a distinct role in helping to guide, mold and shape his character, work ethic, and personality. This productive paradigm and positive perspective led to incredible inner growth, strength, and resilience that has, over time, led to a powerful transformation and recasting of his outer reality.
Thus, Nat has truly come to realize the great SAL truth uttered by Plutarch of antiquity and Otto Rank in more recent times: what you achieve inwardly changes your outer reality.
"What you achieve inwardly changes your outer reality."
—Plutarch & Otto Rank
Dr. Williams is a quintessentially self-made man, yet he is also quick to concede the importance and value of enlisting the help of others and involving them along the way. He further emphasizes that developing sincere relationships of complete transparency with friends, teachers, and mentors is essential to your long-term success.
Nat's powerful personal and professional story underscores and highlights the power of Self-Action Leadership in helping oneself to realize one's full potential for growth, success, happiness, and inner peace.
Dr. Williams has positively influenced and helped many people along the way and will no doubt continue to leave a positive and lasting legacy for his children, grandchildren, colleagues, clients, and patients.
The Quotable Nat Williams
- "My mission is to bring some transparency to the things we do in our lives that tend to mystify us and seem complicated—and then be a conduit for that information. Things often look larger than life, and can be very difficult to deal with, but I think there are some commonalities that flow through our individual experiences that we can come to identify and then effectively manage."
- "You have got to recognize that you've gotta work with what you've got, and you've gotta believe that what ya got ain't bad."
- "You've got to recognize and accept what you've been given, and then figure out a way to work with it—and work with others."
- "Everything isn't a burden. Everything isn't a challenge. Difficulties can be seen as a blessing. They can be seen as a conduit for major change. It is your perspective that matters most."
- "If you study a lot of successful people, you'll find a commonality among them all in that they've each taken what was given to them and rather than look at it as a burden, they've found a way to work with it."
- "So often people live their lives based on how they've been hurt, and that's why I think the hurt keeps compounding itself—they just keep looking for the same thing to keep happening, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy."
- "The most powerful words in the English language are: "Cut it out!"
- "I am my own worst enemy, and if I don't have people around me that can tell my to cut it out, I'm going to do some things that will really hurt the legacy I'm trying to build."
- "I remember somebody sharing with me years ago that you are not going to do better than your five closest friends."
- "I try to make sure I surround myself with people who can afford to tell me the truth."
- "You need other people to help you stay on the straight and narrow and you've got to be transparent yourself."
- "There were things I needed to go through to get to where I am today."
- "There's a "Take Away" in every experience. The question is: what? If I can identify that take away, I can possibly turn it into a gift for somebody else, too."
- "How can I make the most of what life has given me?"
Dr. Williams faced and surmounted many difficulties on his journey to personal, familial, and professional success. What challenges do you personally face along the road to your own personal, professional, and relational potential?
What can you learn from Dr. Williams' example that will help you transcend your own life's adversity?
Dr. Williams' is an unusually ambitious example of pursuing higher education. Where are you at in your formal educational journey? Do you have any goals or ambitions to further your own formal education? If so, what are they and what do you need to do to take the next step forward in your journey to realize your personal educational vision?
—Dr. JJ
Author's Note: This is the 485th Blog Post Published by Freedom Focused LLC since November 2013 and the 275th consecutive weekly blog published since August 31, 2020.
Click HERE for a compete listing of the other 484 FF Blog Articles
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Click HERE to access the FULL TEXT of Dr. JJ's Psalms of Life: A Poetry Collection
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