{"id":2123,"date":"2014-01-17T11:14:38","date_gmt":"2014-01-17T16:14:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.wabash.edu\/fyi\/?p=2123"},"modified":"2025-12-09T13:54:30","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T18:54:30","slug":"shift-gears-for-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/2014\/01\/17\/shift-gears-for-success\/","title":{"rendered":"Shift Gears for Success"},"content":{"rendered":"

Richard Paige — He drew me in with a well-emphasized have<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t play golf when it\u2019s hot. I don\u2019t play golf when there is a chance of rain, because I don\u2019t have to. I can wait for 250 other great days of weather.\u201d<\/p>\n

Listening to Brent Bolick \u201991 talk about his life in and around Florida, those words confidently paint a picture of a guy who likes where he is.<\/p>\n

Currently, he\u2019s the Jacksonville Division president of Clear Channel Outdoor advertising. Along the way he\u2019s held titles like salesman, fundraiser, landscaper, and public affairs manager.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wanted to be a lobbyist,\u201d said Bolick, the son of a lobbyist, when asked if he\u2019d planned on a career in billboards. \u201cIt seemed to me that most of the lobbyists I\u2019d come in contact with through my father were lawyers, so I applied to law school.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"photo<\/a>
Brent Bolick ’91 is the president of Clear Channel Outdoor advertising in Jacksonville, Fla.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There was just one hurdle for Bolick. \u201cI had very average LSAT scores.\u201d<\/p>\n

Undaunted, he went to work right out of college on Steve Goldsmith\u2019s mayoral campaign in Indianapolis. That led to a fundraising gig with U.S. Sen. Dan Coats and his 1992 re-election efforts.<\/p>\n

Bolick passed on an opportunity to work full-time with the Coats local administrative staff and ended up working at a Carmel landscape company with more than a handful of recent grads.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey gave us the flexibility to leave and interview when we needed to,\u201d Bolick said, \u201cand they loved us because we had clean driving records and could communicate with customers.\u201d<\/p>\n

He did a stint with Sue Anne Gilroy\u2019s secretary of state campaign in 1994 before settling into a public affairs position with IndyGo, the regional transit authority.<\/p>\n

From there, he took a chance with Clear Channel Outdoor, worked his way up, moved to Florida to pursue administrative opportunities, eventually rising to president and overseeing 26 people in his Northwest Florida region.<\/p>\n

Bolick feels his Wabash education gave him the flexibility to handle whatever challenge awaits.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiberal arts means you know enough about everything to be dangerous, but not enough to be an expert,\u201d laughed the political science major. \u201cBecause I dabbled in so many things, it makes it so much easier to shift gears in my world, where you may talk to a city councilman downtown, a landowner over here and a sales rep in the office. It\u2019s like handling all of the disciplines. It\u2019s a big snowball of everything.\u201d<\/p>\n

While his primary focus as president is to work with community leaders to provide for sustainable growth and consistency of regulation within the industry, one of the benefits of his multi-faceted approach was to learn all aspects of his business.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be able to shift gears from real estate to sales to finance to operations is an advantage,\u201d Bolick said. \u201cIt was interesting to learn the other sides of the business and how it all fit together.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the digital age has affected many, including game-changing developments in the billboard business itself, one thing still ties him to his college days. He\u2019s an old-school note taker.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine what it\u2019s like there now,\u201d he said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t even have computers. I think my last year there was when they opened the first computer lab in the library. Everyone takes notes on laptops or tablets and I\u2019m still taking notes the way I was at Wabash: outlines, bullet points, arrows back. It\u2019s amazing how much more wired things are, how much more tech savvy kids are now.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Wabash Q&A:<\/strong><\/p>\n

What is your favorite Wabash tradition?<\/strong>
\nMonon Bell. We were 0-4 when I was there, so I kept going back until we won one, which we finally did. That\u2019s where I\u2019m able to connect with other alums. The tough part of living down here is just how easy it was to stay connected by going to that one game.<\/p>\n

Success and failure are a part of life. To this point, what has been your favorite mistake?<\/strong>
\nNot taking that job with Sen. Coats in Indianapolis. It was lesson about humility and a hard way to learn it.<\/p>\n

If you could cook one meal, what would it be?<\/strong>
\nSteak and shrimp<\/p>\n

If you could give your 10-year-old self a piece of advice, what would it be?<\/strong>
\nOh, there is so much. Self-esteem and being comfortable in your own skin would be where I\u2019d start.<\/p>\n

If you have a personal credo, what is it?<\/strong>
\nIf you start something, finish it.<\/p>\n

If in your dreams you could have created one great piece of art \u2013 painting, song, sculpture, prose, etc. \u2013 by any other person, what would it be?<\/strong>
\nI have no idea. I\u2019m not an artsy guy. I was always fond of Beethoven\u2019s Fifth Symphony.<\/p>\n

If a picture is worth a thousand words, what are you doing in that picture?<\/strong>
\nWith any luck, I\u2019m retired and it\u2019s a big family portrait.<\/p>\n

If you could wish for one thing in your future, what would it be?<\/strong>
\nDo the best I can to get my kids through high school and college and off on their own. Hopefully, you did it the right way. I wish there was a guidebook, but there isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Richard Paige — He drew me in with a well-emphasized have. \u201cI don\u2019t play golf when it\u2019s hot. I don\u2019t play golf when there is a chance of rain, because I don\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"w_featured_image_url":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2014\/01\/Brent-Bolick-head-shot-825x1024.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2123"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2123\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3757,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2123\/revisions\/3757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}