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Alan Thornton is executive director and CEO of the Rescue Mission in Syracuse.

Alan Thornton has been executive director and CEO of the Rescue Mission in Syracuse since August 2012. He is a graduate of Pennsylvania's Messiah College, where he met his wife, a Central New Yorker who introduced him to the mission. The mission has service centers for the hungry and homeless in Onondaga, Cayuga, Broome, Madison and Tompkins counties, Thrifty Shopper stores in seven counties and many social service programs for families in need. Last year, the mission served 275,000 meals just in the Syracuse area.

Were you in leadership roles growing up?

In high school, I was active in academics, student council and sports teams.

I was vice president of student council. Working with a team to adjust key issues was important.

I leaned heavily on my experience playing whatever the sport was at the time. You build those relationships of trust that led to camaraderie and led to hard work and hopefully to success in the games that were played.

When I was 15, I spent a summer in Alaska with a missions outreach program that served under-served populations. That was eye-opening.

When I was 16, I spent a summer in Latin America with -- of all things -- a musical outreach.

I was in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Colombia and Venezuela. I was with a small group of people that were in many ways, mentors to me. They were all 20s or even 30s. On top of that, the exposure to the extreme poverty we saw was eye-opening.

I remember coming home and looking around our house and thinking, "Wow, we're very blessed." I didn't know how that would play out in my career, but I knew that I had a sensitivity to people that were struggling.

Tell me about people who influenced your leadership skills.

In college, I was very much influenced by my volleyball coach, who was involved in the lives of his athletes and the team beyond just the court, beyond just the game. He took a very real interest in our success as individuals.

I remember spending time in his office just talking about life. For me, that was something I needed. I found myself struggling with the college experience and went from where I was doing very well academically in high school to where I was having trouble trying to juggle the social, the extracurricular, the academic.

He was influential, just seeing how he led through an authentic relationship with people. He led through listening. He led though encouragement.

It sounds like he led through example. What do people learn from a leader's behavior?

I come back to the word authenticity. For me, people that are authentic, people that are transparent, people that are accessible stand out. They have conviction, but also a strong sense of humility. They don't put themselves above others in the sense of feeling that they're better. They understand that as a leader the responsibility falls to them, but they don't lord it over people.

How do you mentor and teach others to lead?

We hold leadership forums here at the Rescue Mission. We get all the managers from the Rescue Mission organization in one room and we'll take on different topics. We'll update them on where we are as an organization. We'll talk about where our priorities are, what's in front of us.

One of the things I tell people is "Bloom where you're planted." Make it a point to do your very best in the role you are in. Keep looking for the next step on your path of where you'd like to go. It will come to you naturally, I believe, if you're doing a good job where you are.

Another piece of advice I give is build peer networks. When you're experiencing challenges or a bad day, or something that you're really excited about, it's great that you have a friend at the workplace that you can turn to and share that with.

A key part of developing your leadership is to make sure you have connections that go beyond the job that you're doing.

If you're going to list qualities a leader should have, what would they be?

A leader should have vision and passion for what they are doing. The people that we hire to be in leadership roles, we want them to be passionate and have a vision for the mission.

Be transparent. When I talk about transparency, it's not holding back from people. At our leadership table, you can't hold on to information and be a successful team member.

Be team-oriented, but own their own area, if that makes sense -- a strong sense of ownership for what their part of the leadership role is.

I would add humility. It is a really important ingredient. Probably underrated a lot of times. Having humility doesn't lessen your drive. It doesn't lessen your work ethic. It doesn't lessen your vision, your conviction for what you're doing. But it tempers all those things. It's an essential ingredient as people step into new positions of authority or responsibility or leadership. It's part of how they engage.

The ability to make a decision. Take action. Leadership is active. For us, we're very consensus-oriented, so it's communicative, and we're building an understanding and taking in different opinion before making a decision. But at some point as a leader you got to be able to make a decision and set a direction.

We had to make a decision about how would we grow regionally. When we went through clarifying our mission just over a year ago, when you say you're going to end hunger and homelessness, then how does that look? How does that play out? We didn't put a geographic boundary on our mission.

We built a strategic plan that highlighted what our priorities were going to be. There was a lot of great discussion that went in to that process.

Can there be a point where you end hunger and homelessness?

I think that there can be a point where the capacity to address them quickly is there. Can you ensure that someone will never fall into homelessness? I don't think so.

I think you can ensure that there is such a strong system and a system that has capacity that they don't have to be in that position for very long.

When we talk about ending hunger and homelessness, we do so with the context of one person at a time. Each person is unique. Understand their unique barriers, whether it's access to affordable housing, employment, access to the particular health care they might need or an addiction issue. Then you go about creating a plan with them and supporting them.

Faith is an important part of your organization. Tell me about it.

I'd rather the people that we serve experience the Gospel first before they hear it. I think that's more meaningful. When you're dealing with people that in many situations are in crisis or our system has let them down or they are just in a challenging place in their life, the last thing you need to do is preach at them.

"CNY Conversations" feature Q&A interviews with local citizens about leadership, success, and innovation. The conversations are condensed and edited. They also run regularly on Sunday in The Post-Standard's Business section. To suggest a person for CNY Conversations, contact Stan Linhorst at slinhorst@syracuse.com.

Last week: Kevin Magdon explains how leadership evolves.