Why would an award-winning filmmaker move to Iowa planning to retire... only to end up making one of the state's most ambitious conservation documentaries?

That's exactly what happened to Charlie Morris.

After years producing conservation films around the world—from South Africa's disappearing great white sharks to threatened forests on the East Coast—Charlie arrived in Iowa intending to leave filmmaking behind. Then he started asking a simple question:

"Why is everyone telling me not to swim in the water?"

That question led him down a rabbit hole of water quality, prairie restoration, farming, cancer rates, and the remarkable people dedicating their lives to protecting Iowa's natural resources.

His new project, The Iowa Prairie Documentary Project, is more than just a film. It's a multimedia effort combining documentary filmmaking, podcasts, interviews, articles, and eventually a book—all designed to tell the deeper story of Iowa's landscapes and the people fighting to restore them. Find more about the project: Facebook, website, podcast, YouTube

In this episode, we explore storytelling as a tool for conservation, why asking good questions matters, and how an outsider's perspective can sometimes reveal what lifelong residents no longer notice.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Why Charlie abandoned retirement to make a documentary about Iowa.
• How storytelling can change minds in ways facts alone often cannot.
• The surprising advantage of approaching conservation with a beginner's mindset.
• Why Charlie believes full interviews are just as important as the finished film.
• What he's learned after interviewing more than 100 Iowans.
• The challenges of producing a documentary on a politically charged topic.
• Why Iowa's landscapes may be one of America's best-kept secrets.
• What conservation professionals can learn about telling difficult stories with courage and authenticity.

Ready to take your leadership to the next level?
Join the Next Level Leadership Community at parksandrestoration.com for exclusive leadership discussions, live meetups, bonus resources, and a growing network of parks, conservation, and natural resource professionals committed to becoming better leaders.

About Parks & Restoration
Parks & Restoration is a podcast and leadership development platform exploring leadership through the lens of ecology — for the land, via the people who serve it. Each episode is designed for current and aspiring leaders in parks, conservation, and natural resources who want practical wisdom on leadership, culture, stewardship, and building organizations that thrive.

Are great leaders born...or are they built through experience, relationships, and deliberate practice?

After spending ten years as a junior high English teacher, Teli Van Rycke made the kind of career change most people only talk about. Today, as Regional Director of Workforce Innovation at the Greater Burlington Partnership, she develops leaders, strengthens workplace culture, and helps shape the workforce of tomorrow.

Together we unpack several assumptions about leadership—from the myth of the "born leader" to imposter syndrome, hiring, organizational culture, mentorship, discipline, and why putting people first may be the most effective way to accomplish any mission.

• Why the idea of the "born leader" may be one of leadership's biggest myths.
• Why great organizational culture retains talented people better than pay or perks.
• Why putting people first is often the best way to accomplish the mission.
• How recruiting relationships often outperform traditional hiring processes.
• Why imposter syndrome doesn't mean you're unqualified.
• How mentorship accelerates growth and confidence.
• What the Working Genius framework reveals about building stronger teams.
• Why discipline extends far beyond the gym.
• Teli's leadership philosophy: Be the leader you want to have.

Ready to take your leadership to the next level?

Join the Next Level Leadership Community at parksandrestoration.com.

Parks and Restoration is a podcast and leadership development platform exploring leadership through the lens of ecology — for the land, via the people who serve it. Each episode is built for current and aspiring leaders in parks, conservation, and natural resources who want practical wisdom on culture, growth, and what it really takes to lead well.

Better leaders. Better parks.

What do a lightning storm, a white suit jacket, and a barbecue competition that ran out of food have in common? They all showed up at Burlington River Days 2026 — and they all left Chris with something worth talking about.

This week's episode is a little different. Fresh off three days on the riverfront (and one very memorable Saturday night with a multi-platinum rock band, a delay, and skies that opened up right on cue), Chris shares three leadership lessons straight from the after-action review — one he got right, one that's got him questioning conventional wisdom, and one he's still learning the hard way.

Three Leadership Lessons:

• Don't fret over what you can't control. For an entire week leading up to an outdoor festival, Chris didn't open his weather app once. That was a choice — and it paid off. When a storm rolled in Saturday night and delayed the headlining act, the plan they'd built did its job. The lesson: know what you can't control, build your contingencies, trust your people, and don't let uncertainty eat your mental bandwidth.
• "Be yourself" — but maybe not always. Chris developed a full-blown character for Burlington River Days' social media: white suit jacket, Panama Jack hat, irreverent viral videos. It generated hundreds of thousands of impressions and was completely unlike who he is the other 51 weeks of the year. So what does that mean for the authenticity we're all told to lead with? Chris doesn't have a clean answer yet — but he's asking the question, and he's inviting you into the conversation.
• Set clear expectations. Work backwards from the end goal. The barbecue ran out of food in ten minutes. The beer lines were long. The common thread? The committee knew what they were doing and why — but they never got explicit about the visitor experience they were trying to create. What should someone feel walking away from this event? What stories should they tell Monday morning? Without that clarity defined upfront, communication downstream gets fuzzy. Chris has preached this one before. He still dropped the ball. He's owning it.

Key Takeaways:

• Worry is a tax on mental bandwidth — and it doesn't change the outcome
• There may be a meaningful difference between inauthenticity and context-specific performance
• Working backwards from the customer's experience, not just your organization's goals, changes how you communicate with your whole team
• Overcommunication isn't about more meetings — it's about getting alignment on the end state and repeating it until it sticks

Chris wants to hear from you. Got thoughts on the "be yourself" question? Reach out at chris@parksandrestoration.com, use the contact form at parksandrestoration.com, or find him on the Burlington River Days Facebook page.