Joe Butler

CEO, Downing Inc.

Age: 39

Spouse: Leah Butler

Children: Grady, Bennett

Mentor: Denis Frischmeyer, CEO, DCI Group Inc.

Reasons he is a Forty: He has been instrumental in leading and growing a premier company for the last decade. He has served on numerous boards and committees in the Indianola community. He volunteers countless hours to make an impact on youths through coaching. He makes an effort to be a positive influence on everyone he interacts with.

What are your goals in your role at your company? My goals have always been centered around making the people I interact with more successful, both our internal staff and our clients. My focus is conducting business in a way that makes everyone more successful than before they interacted with Downing.

What are your goals for your community involvement? My goal outside of work is to make a positive impact on our youth. Our young people are our future, and with all of the challenges in today's society, I focus my time on making positive interactions a consistent expectation in their lives. Most of my interactions are through coaching, and I fully believe that coachable kids make employable adults.

What's your biggest passion, and why? My passion personally and professionally is to help others be successful. I feel a personal accomplishment when I see someone else being successful and knowing that I made an impact in their life to attain their goals.

What is it that drives you? I have an intense internal drive to leave everything and everyone that I interact with in a better place than before they knew me.  I want to be the solution when others are struggling and a leader when they need direction.

What are your future aspirations? I have been very blessed to lead an amazing organization that has been around for far longer than I have been alive. My goal for the future is to position Downing in a place that it continues to prosper far beyond my leadership and provides an amazing place to work for generations to come so that we can provide value to our clients indefinitely.

Three hobbies: Golf, whenever I can. Go Cyclones! Coach my kids.

Fun fact: He visits the beach whenever possible on vacation and will walk for miles next to the ocean to reset, find calmness and reflect.

One word to describe you: Tenacious.

What is your wish for the Central Iowa business community? My biggest wish for both my company and the business community is to continue to push boundaries to ensure Central Iowa remains a highly desirable area to live as well as do business.

What's one piece of advice that you would give to a young professional? Leadership typically starts with exposure or mentorship of some kind. I would advise anyone looking for leadership to gravitate towards someone they view as a leader that they can relate to. It is important to be mentored by someone that you agree with from a leadership, personality and professional perspective. Each leader needs to lead with their own methods and values, but mentorship by someone that aligns personally and professionally helps expedite this process.

What is one issue you would like to see Central Iowa leaders address? Our business leaders need to focus on identifying young professionals that are driven and motivated to start developing them into the next wave of leaders. This needs to happen early and often to ensure sustainability and focus in the leadership community.