← Leadership Conversations @ The Kitchen Table 
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- [00:01]
A
Welcome to the 100th episode of the Kitchen Table. Today's episode is unique, as I was challenged by many to be the 100th guest here on the show. And in accepting that challenge, I just want to take some time to dedicate this episode to Deputy Fire Chief Bill Mack, who, without him, this podcast does not even exist. And I do want to share a quote straight from episode one, from Bill's episode, plant trees that you'll never sit in the shade of. This quote is a foundation for leadership, mentorship, and overall bettering the fire service. And it really was a testament for what Bill's leadership philosophy was. It is a quote that captures the legacy that he leaves for current and future leaders, and it's really all about preparing the future. So I just want to say thank you, Bill. And the leadership conversation continues here on the Kitchen Table. So as we kick off today, I'll begin with this. Most of what I shared today is not original. What I do share with you today comes from really just a career of learning, from school to books, to podcasts, to workshops, to seminars, to working with mentors, all of it. And I just want to credit all those sources. As you know, we go through today's conversation, and today I do want to welcome three members to the show. My longtime friend, mentor, and colleague with the department that I work for, Captain Cody Turcotte. We also have two members of the Wolfpack here. We have Battalion Chief Jason Lundin of the Renton Regional Fire Authority and Battalion Chief Troy Gibson of Hawaii Fire Department. Good morning, everybody. And let's kick this off. Cody.
- [01:40]
B
Right on. That sounds good. As I sit back and think about this, I don't know if it's season of my life that I'm in. You've always been a couple years ahead of me in my career and always been a mentor of me and a good friend outside of work, too. And I kind of. I look up to you in your personal life, how you're a husband and father, but also at work, too, and don't let that go too much to your head. But kind of, maybe it's the season I'm in in life, and I kind of want to see your. You got a lot going on in leadership and mentoring others in the fire service, outside the fire service, advancing your degrees, working on your master's, and also just community outreach stuff. And I just. How do you balance and decide what gets your yes? When you have all these tasks and commitments and wanting to move the needle, how do you say yes?
- [02:42]
A
So you've already Let this go to my head. So I want to throw one thing out there just for clarification. And this is obviously a joke. I want to keep everything light hearted today. But I'm working on my doctorate program currently, so I've got my master's, I'm working on my doctoral program. And I say that as a joke simply because this question is really a tough question. And I say that because you're asking me how do I balance? And, and by your question, in itself, there's no balance in there. And what I'm gonna say here is twofold. I mentioned earlier, I'm gonna reference other individuals. And the book that I'm going to reference is called Winning. He right here. I wrote another book. I believe it's called Relentless. But his name is Tim Grover. And so Tim Grover is an individual. He's a inspirational speaker now. But he wrote books as he was a trainer. And he was highly influential in the lives of athletes, like, for example, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, to name two. He also worked a little bit with Dwyane Wade, Shaquille o'. Neal. And I bring this up because athletics and athletes and professional sports resonate heavily with me because these are individuals that work so, so hard and they dedicate a lot of their time to be really, really good in their profession. So bringing this back to your question is how do I balance so many things? There is no balance. When you're trying to accomplish tough things. When you're trying to, you know, reach the, the pinnacle of whatever it is that you do in your professional life or your personal life, there, there is no balance. Meaning if you take the seesaw metaphor, for example, and you try to give a perfect balance on both sides, it's tough to be the best at something. And I know the best is a very subjective term, but when I use the word best, it's really just about being really, really good. Because if you have balance, it means that you're not putting your time somewhere to be the best at something, because on the flip side, you're putting your time elsewhere. So if you think about individuals like a Kobe or a Michael Jordan or, you know, high, high performing athletes, or even take someone like a Steve Jobs or, you know, like Jeff Bezos, if you were to look at their time and their energy, you could argue that they don't have balance. You can argue that there is no balance. Their time goes into what they're trying to be the best at. And that's a detriment to other things in life, other things in their lives. So when you ask me how do I balance those things, I struggle with this question because my balance sucks. I mean, it does. I don't have this natural talent that a lot of people have. I don't have this natural ability to be really, really good at many things in life. And so I have to dedicate more time and energy to, into these areas. So to be, to be full disclosure here, my balance is not very good. And it's something I struggle with. It's something that I'm constantly working on. But I made a decision in my life and I'll just use the fire service as an example. I made a decision that when I promoted to the first level supervisory position as a lieutenant, I dedicated myself to say, I'm gonna go out and take classes. I'm going to go out and seek more leadership opportunities. I'm going to put myself in assignments that maybe weren't the most coveted assignments because there was so much to learn. And if I didn't put myself in those positions, I wouldn't be as effective. We'll say I wouldn't be as good. Whatever the good means in, in people's definitions, I, I wouldn't be because I had to dedicate time to do those things. But, you know, how do I do it? It's. It's a constant battle and struggle and something that I have, people, for example, yourself, Cody, that keep me in check. You know, you and I, you know, exchange text messages even on random days, we share things on Instagram and you challenge me in questions such as this. And it brings me back to reflect on those types of things on am I really putting my time and energy into things that are important in life? And it really just helps me ground myself back to when I don't have balance. Now I'm going to go back. The economy on the other side and of the spectrum is, is recognizing that we all need balance. After I just got done saying that you need to unbalance your lives, if you're going to be really good at something, you have to tip that to one side. But I'm going to also be a somewhat, you know, contrary to what I just said is I encourage everyone to have that balance. You know, you're going to have seasons in life to where you're going to find yourselves overly committing in one area, but always try to find yourself, you know, committing yourself back. So I'm going to go back and say, as of right now, I've experienced some things currently in my life where I'm trying to reprioritize things. And so I'm trying to put that balance back on the other end so I can give back to my family, to my mental health, my physical health, which has been a struggle for the last few years. And so, going back to answer your question fully, how do I do it? It's a constant struggle. I'm working on it, and it's something that I try to come back to all the time, but I'm needed with reminders. And again, before I close off this question and end it is I encourage everybody that's listening is to have those people in your lives to continuously challenge you. So thank you for asking this question publicly on this podcast, Cody, because I see it as another challenge on that balance and help me reflect later is like, you know what? Cody asked me this question publicly. Am I seeking that balance in life? And the answer to that right now is know. But it's helping me come back to it full circle. So I hope that answered the question a little bit. It's something that I struggle with every day and something that I'm constantly working on. So thank you for the question.
- [08:19]
B
That's what I appreciate about you. You know, after I asked it, I. I was kind of curious where you're going to go with it. And you. You're real, man, you. I think it's going to resonate. I know it resonates with myself, so I'll speak for myself. That. That balance, you know, you talked about, there is no balance in the seasons. And it reminded me of something, a David White quote. He's a. He's a poet. But he said the cure to burnout is not rest. The cure to burnout is wholeheartedness. And what I kept kind of hearing in you is saying, you know, what if it's. Is it bringing me closer to or further from what my goals are? And you talked about family, mental, physical health. And then, I mean, we can feel your passion and mentorship and leadership. And so it's like right now, you're just. You might be off balance, but your. Your why is clear. And that's. Thank you. Thanks for sharing that.
- [09:22]
A
Yeah. And I appreciate that. And I'm a quotes guy. And you know this about me, Cody, and I think I shared this with you, and I'm going to be filling quotes all day long because today's episode is really, again, it's about offering perspective. It's not about offering my opinion on things. It's about offering you things that are. Are out there already with books, with philosophers, with theory, with academics, with successful People, but I know not everyone's a Russell Wilson fan, if you will, and we're from Seattle and I know, Cody, you resonate heavily with, you know, the days of, you know, Russell Wilson, Pete Carroll and all that. But he said these, these exact words. He said, you got to be delusional, right? And he said, you got to be delusional. And this is what I mean. Russell Wilson said, I'm 510 and I was a third round draft pick, you know, and, but my mindset is, is I'm the best quarterback on the planet, right? And then that allowed him to have so much confidence in himself to work hard. Whether he was the best quarterback on the planet didn't matter to him. It was his mindset. He had to be delusional. He said, I'm going to go win five more championships. Whether he won five more, it didn't matter. He found himself winning one, he found himself almost winning two. And I think that's where it's about, is that you can't limit yourself to, you know, your own thoughts. You have to push yourself. You have to think unrealistically to make things along the way. Be realistic. And so he said, be delusional. So I encourage everyone to feel a little delusional.
- [10:47]
B
Be.
- [10:48]
A
Aspire to be things way beyond you thought because even if you don't accomplish that, you'll accomplish so many other things along the way. But you can't have self limiting goals is my point. And so I offer that to everybody. Be delusional.
- [11:03]
B
I, I really like that, Berlin. And you know what, I'm gonna lean in you a little bit. I'm gonna challenge you here because I, I agree and I, I see that in you leaning into it, right, and trying to move the needle and challenge yourself and others around you. But I also see how you show up and you're present for your family too. And so with being out of bounds, with being delusional and leaning into it, how, how are you staying grounded to be, be there for your family or for yourself?
- [11:40]
A
And I'm gonna answer this one quite quickly only because this is something that I literally tried to do and I'm not the best at it again. And sometimes I will just not respond to emails, text messages, and I am just away, almost as if I was on vacation without myself again. Do I find myself with my phone sometimes when I say I'm not too sure, but I will just not let it be an opportunity at times. And that's how, that's in answering your question, that is how Because I'm one of those guys that I do check email when I'm off duty. I do. And there's, there's a thought process out there that you should separate them. Yeah, I agree. But again, it's, it's about that balance. And if you want to be highly effective as a, we'll say a leader or be very efficient in what you do, or effective, you do have to do extra, we'll say, I mean, you do. Anyone that's highly successful, anything I do, they do extra. There's no bare minimum. There's not, there's bare. There's not meeting standards at the minimum. Think about any highly successful person and ask them if they were okay with just being, you know, barely meeting expectations. And none of them will say, yes, I just barely meet it. No, they all exceed it. So. But again, to answer your question, how do I, I will literally just exit and be okay with it and say, I am not responding to texts, I'm not responding to emails. I'm going to take five days off, four days out, whatever it is. And I will throw this right back at you, Cody, and say, you're probably the best person that I know in this area because I know that you do this exact thing that you're talking about as something that I aspire or something to be a little more like, is someone like yourself who I've noticed you've taken time away literally physically and not respond for a few days at times because you're trying to be intentional about, you know, what you stand for and putting your time, whether it be in family or something else. So it's a work in progress. So I appreciate that question and we could banter back and forth forever on that one.
- [13:40]
C
Well, I think also it's a thing where it's really important that if you are in a relationship, you know, your wife or your, your spouse, your significant other recognizes the fact that, you know, I'll use my, myself as an example. My wife knew sort of what she was getting. She was, she was not only marrying me, she's marrying the fire department. And she, she knew that due to our. We have incredible schedules, we get a lot of time off, and I probably spent more time with my kids than my father ever spent with me my entire life. You know, just in a few short years, just because I, I have all this great time off that my career has afforded me. But there's also that understanding that at some point, whether it be taking classes, going to conferences, preparing for promotional exams, I'm going to have to sort of restrict what I can do for the family. And it's an ebb and flow thing. It's a teamwork thing. And I think having that understanding with your wife, significant other, etc, is key to. To having that balance where you know that. That sometimes they're going to get a lot of you and sometimes they're going to get a little of you.
- [15:10]
D
Yeah, just kind of stacking on. Those are great points. And it was very reflective for myself, I would say. I love analogies as well. And I just try to stay very mission focused. So I have to shift the mission for my. I call my little peanut brain. So my mission today will be family. It's hard, though. I mean, in my current position, you have 50 people who work under you, and I value reliability. So I do catch myself as all of you. Do you want to answer the problem? Right. And that's kind of our natural human instinct. There's a problem. I can solve it. Why don't I just solve it? But, you know, our support systems, it's. It's why promotionals, retirements, any kind of significant events in the fire service, those are really family events. And I'm not just talking about your household. Most successful firefighters have a core unit of friends and family, and then of course, their immediate family that support them. And all of us wouldn't be here without our wives, significant others, or grandparents, friends, cousins, what have you to support that. So I thought that was a really good way of. Of kind of at least framing it. For me, Berlin, is nobody successful does the minimum. And we. We can see that every day we go to work, the successful people put in extra effort. It's kind of in your DNA or it's not. Sometimes you can coach it up to a certain extent. But I think those highly effective people that you were referring to, especially in the athlete sphere, they want to win. And I know FDNY has that winning mentality, and I think that's what inherently most good leaders have, is there's an internal competitiveness that they tap into. And sometimes to kind of close the question, to balance it for someone like myself, I just have to shift the mission. I need to win my family right now. And that's just for a simpleton like myself. But great, great food for thought.
- [17:31]
A
Thank you. Win with the family today. I love that. I'm going to adopt that now. Win with the family today. That's my mission today. Thank you, Jason.
- [17:38]
C
All right, man. Berlin, you've been able to sit down and have really deep conversations with some of the Most prominent leaders in the fire service. So it kind of leads me to a sort of two part question for you. One, has there been one guest that you were super excited to interview or sort of fanboyed out on? And two, what's one message that you've incorporated into your leadership style or philosophy?
- [18:04]
B
Wow.
- [18:05]
A
Okay.
- [18:05]
B
All right.
- [18:06]
A
First things first. One thing, if anything, I, if there's one thing that I learned in any kind of interview situation is make sure you answer the question. So the very first one to your, to your first question is, was there one guest? The answer to that is no, because I'm gonna, I'm gonna go down a little rabbit hole here or a little tangent here because here's my actual thought and philosophy on any class you take or any, any interview you get into or, or any mentorship or class or whatever it might be, is if you are putting your time in somewhere to interview somebody, or if you are going to a class or you're going to be away from your family for three days, whatever it might be, you better be taking something away from it. But you better be now implementing some of that, otherwise it's a waste of your time. Here's a, here's one quick example. I'll use the book Extreme Ownership. And I use that book because those are listening today is probably one that most, if not everyone has either heard of, read or was probably encouraged you to read, whether it be in a promotional exam, whether it be for your own personal life, whatever it might be. And so here's my point to where I'm getting at is if I were to read that book and I read adoption or I listened to all the stories that Jocko and Leif and the, you know, and the Navy SEALs and, you know, and what they, you know, what they encountered. And then fast forwarding to how Jocko teaches in the business world, in the corporate world nowadays. If I were to listen to that and read that book and listen to the stories, and then I were to walk away and said I'm now not going to take ownership of things in my life, personal and professional. Like what was the point of me reading that book? I have to in some way shape or form adopt that philosophy of extreme ownership. And then we'll use the example back to the fire service. If it's a book that's encouraged you to read by, you know, your, your boss, your chiefs. And now because it's, you know, they, it's part of your promotional exam and you read it, you pass your promotional exam and then now you're an individual that does not take ownership in your new position. You really wasted your time. You're really not working toward the. The belief of what your chief officers have asked you to now adopt. It's that you wasted everybody's time. And you take it one step further. Say they send you to FDIC for a week to go, you know, take some things and go learn some things, and you come back, you never bring it back and share that information, and you never adopt those mindsets. Blah, blah, blah. You really wasted your time, and you waste your company's time. So back to your question now, Jason, is, was there one? I would say there's not one. There's all. There's been 99 episodes on this show, and I take away one to 20 things in every single episode. I may not ingrain it into my philosophy every day, but I resonate with all of it. And I try to use each and every one of those as something, as a reminder in the back of my mind. And I'll use Bill Mack as number one. One of his quotes that he talked about is plant trees that you'll never be able to sit in the shade of. Right. The overarching thing there is to make sure that you do things for the benefit of others. And I may never see the benefit of that because I'll be long gone. Right. That's something that I have to take with me always. Right. You'll use Aaron Tireman, who's the deputy chief of training now, and one of his things is be average. And what he meant by that. Some people will say, be average. That's dumb. You don't want to be average. But what he meant by that is, find yourselves in rooms where you're the most average in that room, because then those that are, maybe we'll say below you, whatever that means, you could raise them up and bring them up with you. But then you're in the same rooms where people are, you know, have a lot of knowledge and you aspire to be like them. You find yourself pushing toward them. And. And then in the. In the future, you're now in new rooms where you're average in those rooms. So that's something that he said. You know, we can go down, you know, further. We can go to Scott Thompson. He talked about mentorship. We could talk about anything that, you know, Viscuso or Anthony Castro says, like those that the goal knows information, so there isn't one. And I love this question because what I'm trying to resonate in answering your question for Those that are listening is find yourself resonating with every class you take, resonate with every, you know, speaker or mentor that you get to work with, the next, you know, course that you go into. Take something away from that, Keep it with you. Find a way to bring it back home into your personal life or into your crew level, and ingrain that philosophy, if you will, to a certain degree and continuously find yourselves in those spaces. Again, there's no bigger waste of time than reading books and taking classes, but then never taking anything away for the long term. You wasted your time and why encouragement is. Don't waste your time. And so for. For the second part of your question, would you mind asking that one more time? Because I want to appropriately answer it.
- [22:32]
C
What's one message that you've incorporated into your leadership style or philosophy that you received on the podcast, or a message that really has opened your eyes?
- [22:43]
A
Yeah, okay. That's great. I may go back to this a couple times, and one I'll mention here is David Rhodes was on the show, editor in chief of Fire Engineering and Firehouse magazine, and he talked about this. And I was actually, I'm not surprised that he talked about it, but he mentioned how, like, you have to speak up. And this is an individual that has, I think, 38, 39 years in the fire service now. But he mentioned, like, you, you have to find yourselves at times speaking up, even if it goes against everybody, even if it goes against the bureaucracy that you're in, even if it. You get. And I forget how exactly how he mentioned it, but he said you might find yourself being ridiculed. You might find yourself being, you know, pushed out of the in group because you said something so true that no one else was trying, no one else would be willing to say. He emphasized that you got to do the right thing always. And I know we go back and we could talk about integrity and how everyone says integrity is the most important thing. I also believe that integrity is the most overused word in the fire service. And I don't mean that to be offensive. I mean that to say, like, integrity is not only, you know, people will define integrity as, you know, always doing the right thing, especially when no one's looking. I say integrity is doing the right thing, especially when everyone's looking. And that goes down to things like, you know, when inappropriate conversations are happening at the kitchen table or, you know, someone is doing something unethical or whatever it might be. It's about how you step up right now in front of everybody. And that's Integrity. So David Rhodes talked about this. He says you might find yourself at times being shamed, but as long as you feel like it's the right thing, that is the right thing. And you might find yourself in a position where you get demoted, or you might find yourself in a position where you get taken out of an assignment or you get whatever it might be. But as long as you feel like it was the right thing, you got to be feel convicted in that. And so that's one message that really, it's hard because those of you that have found yourself in a space where you spoke up and you got ridiculed by it know exactly what I'm saying. But there's a saying about management and leadership, right? Managers do things right. Leaders will always do the right thing. And that's something that I take away with because leadership is not easy. It shouldn't be easy. You should find yourselves in spaces for doing things that other people aren't willing to do. And so that's something that I take away and something that I try to, in answering your question, Jason, is try to adopt in my philosophy is I have to find myself trying to always do the right thing, even if at the end of the day I get in trouble for it, if that makes sense. And it's hard because it's easy to sit in comfort, it's easy to sit back and just say, you know what? My life is so much easier if I just don't say something. Right. It's easy. And I, I battle with that. I battle with that a lot, to be honest. So hopefully that answers the question.
- [25:47]
C
Good.
- [25:49]
B
I was going to say, I've seen you have those conversations, you know, with myself, checking myself to my values, holding other people to their values, where it's easy to stay quiet. So how do you get that courage to not be quiet? What gives you the courage to kind of lean into it? Is it. Are you focused on like the, the goal over everything? Are you.
- [26:13]
A
It's. First of all, when you say, how do I get that courage? It's not. I want to make sure I emphasize that it's not easy, easy at all. I have found myself, I want, as far as to say is regret it, you know, saying something, doing something, and then later, like, I never should have said something because my life would have been easier. But that response in it of itself describes the exact reason why you shouldn't just not say something. Because it would have been easier. My life would be easier because I it the courages. As long as you can go back and think and say, you know what? I can stand behind everything that I said and did. I think that's. That's okay. What I will say is this is that first time you step up and. And say something, it's going to be very, very hard. But like everything else, it becomes easier. And I know that sounds kind of like. What do you mean? Like, as long as you. And we use the. The example of like a difficult conversation and difficult conversations is so challenging of a concept in the sense of this is they're difficult conversations because we're not used to them. If you are used to having hard conversations with people, if you've had them all the time and you're comfortable in that space, it no longer becomes difficult conversations. I think they're difficult because we don't have them enough. And if it becomes kind of a practice norm or a practice you now, it becomes a norm like everything else in life. And so when you talk about the courage, how do I lean into that? How do I stay grounded? How do I. Is if I've done it before? And so the next time I find myself needing the courage to speak up or take action when my. When it's like, oh, my gosh, do I speak up? Do I say something? It's like, I've been here before. Like, I. I know what it's gonna feel like. And yeah, maybe I might get ridiculed or maybe I get slapped on the wrist for this, but I've been there before. And so I can. I can. It's always that first time you try and speak up in front of a group, that's hard. But if you find yourself doing it, you can do it again. And you can do it again, but you also have to know and be okay with the result. Right? Because if you speak up and you know it's going to cause issue, but you are so convicted and doing the right thing, you have to be okay with the result, whatever the result is. And I think that kind of helps ground it, you know, if that makes sense. So does that answer the question? A little bit?
- [28:28]
B
Yeah. Thank you.
- [28:29]
D
Yeah, that really resonated with me. It reminded me of kind of how my mom kind of raised me is she's a civil rights boomer, right. And John Lewis got quoted a lot. And, you know, making that good trouble, right? You need to be able to make that good trouble stand up for things that are right, even when it's going to be hard. So that's kind of. Again, I think we all kind of be kind of are these Quotes, kind of people and reading, you know, we all share that, but, you know, the comfortable being uncomfortable has been something that I've cultivated and it's been valuable, you know, getting in there and, and getting your hands dirty and kind of feeling a little weird. That's when the real good work happens. And that could be physically and that could be mentally, that can be relationships, you know, bringing those kind of things to the surface that most of the time we'll avoid because I'm not sure. But having said that, there is a balance, because we talk about that balance and you know, it's. The Art of War is one of my favorite books. And you know, you need to fight battles that have, have successful outcomes towards the mission because sometimes just fighting the battle will not be good. Right. You can weaken your resources if we're kind of using in that context. So, you know, that really resonated with me is, you know, being comfortable being uncomfortable, something I like to use and, and John Lewis making that good trouble. You know, if it's right, you know, it'll, it'll work out. And there, there's a little bit of faith and belief in there, and I don't want to kind of expound too far on that. But yeah, that really made a lot of sense to me and it's something that was fundamental for me from being a child of a parent who was raised in the civil rights era, you know, in a minority, that, that really is important and, and you have to stay grounded to that in everything you do and, and pass it along. Right. Because sometimes, you know, in societies, especially nowadays, you know, people need to understand a little bit of history. A lot of things that are happening nowadays are not new. It's just, you know, it's kind of wash, rinse, repeat, and we can be better by having those conversations.
- [30:52]
A
Absolutely.
- [30:53]
D
Love it.
- [30:54]
B
I love that.
- [30:56]
D
Okay, so this one is. It's a selfish question in the sense that I'm really more interested to kind of hear. I find myself as a Gen Xer and kind of at the tail end of my career, you know, really working on communication models with different generations. And you know, I'm, I'm decent at dealing with the baby boomers, you know, because obviously my parent was one. But you know, I have older children. I have a 30 and a 27 year old and you know, I have a 7 and a 3 year old and then I have everything in between at work. Right. And I wouldn't call them my children, but they're my younger brothers and sisters and I have Some older ones. And you know, I find that communication models are difficult because you have to be very agile in leadership. And someone who is a generation junior to me, like yourself, but is also a leader in the fire service, how do you navigate doing, having those conversations and sometimes those uncomfortable conversations with people, whether they be subordinates, superiors, peers, spanning kind of the junior generations and the senior generations and even at your generational level. Because as you know, like text messaging, you know, I have a max of like about five or six text message and then I just tap out. Most people know if you send me enough text message, you'll get a phone call from me. And, and, and I totally get it. You know, I have guys at the station who will text each other like we're at the same house and I'll just open my door and yell. You know, it's just different communication models. And it's fun because we're a family and we know each other, but, you know, it, it, it's different to people. And, and I really want to kind of understand your perspective on how you navigate those communication models.
- [32:57]
A
Oh, great question. And yes, I will, I will attest everything that Troy just said, I just about four or five texts and bam, I get a phone call. So thank you for that, Troy. So this is again going down quotes lane here because again, nothing that I say is originated by me, but number one is people are your greatest assets, right? People are your greatest assets. Not your computer, not AI, but your people. And so why do I start with that? Because this is again, another quote is if you don't understand people, you will never understand leadership. So I'll say that again, because if you don't understand people, you won't understand leadership and you won't be a great leader. So why do I start with that quote? Because your question asked me about navigating generational differences. And so here's what I'll say again, full disclosure. Am I the best at this? Absolutely not. 100%, no. But it's something that I have to recognize. Number one, right? If you don't recognize this, how do you move forward? So I have worked. When I became a brand new company officer, I had individuals on my crew that were older than me. Now that I've been a company officer for a few years, some of my peers are the same generation. And then I also supervise those that are generation behind me. So if I don't understand that dichotomy and those changes, I will always struggle with leadership. So I have to understand people. That's first and foremost. So how do I navigate those generational differences? Well, first and foremost I have to understand who they are, I have to talk to them, I have to find out what drives people or drives them and then I can navigate going forward. So where does that come from? That understand that stems from me having the conversation first and foremost. So when I sit and have expectations with my crews, I find out what drives them, I find out what they're into, I find out what it is that they, they show up to work for each day, what are their aspirations, what are their goals, and then I have to navigate and change my ways to cater to them. So here's again, I'm going to throw this out there. Just food for thought is I have to cater my leadership style to my crew. Like I'm a former training officer, a two time training officer, and nothing annoys me more than this statement I'm about to say is everyone has to cater to the way that I teach. Like I find that fundamentally wrong. No, I don't say fundamentally wrong because there's a time and place for that. So I'm going to correct myself. But in the, in the, in the area that we're in now, in the arena that we're in now, in the times that we're in now, we have to cater our style to our, we'll say our audience and that's right, wrong or indifferent, agree or disagree. That's kind of just where we are right now. So I have to be able to find out what drives people and then find out how I can lead them. Because there is no one way to lead. Right. You have to lead in 15 different ways depending on the situation. Right. And we'll just use the fire service. You know, there's a time to be fully, you know, autocratic. Right. When you're on an emergency scene, you got to give order. There's not time for discussion. Right. When you come back to the firehouse, when you're in training, there's a time for a democratic discussion. There's also a time for a laissez faire. Right. There's all, there's a time to be, you know, a servant type leader. There's also a time to delegate leadership. So if that kind of answers the question, I find myself just being open in as many different ways as I can because people are driven in different ways and it just is what it is. If I have the philosophy that my way and my way of leading is the way I think I have failed as a leader. Being open to different ways is the key in leadership in my eyes. And so I'll throw that out there for discussion because I love this conversation, but kind of wanted to see what you guys thought, think in terms of that concept of leading in different ways.
- [36:47]
C
You know, I've, I think a lot of us in this generation of leadership, we understand the philosophy of servant leadership and transformational leadership, and I think we do a really good job of, or we're trying to do a really good job of, of leading to what our crews need. And for a lot of us, it's, it's like being a parent. You know, I know when I'm dealing with my son, it's a very different exercise than when I'm dealing with my daughter. And it's not a gender thing. It's just their personality and how they communicate. And so I customize, you know, how I, how I parent them, and I customize how I sort of lead with, with the crews and the people that, that I work with and supervise. One thing for me that I think I found was an even larger challenge, though, is, is leading up, figuring out how I needed to communicate and the expectations that I had with, with my supervisors and what they needed from me and what they're looking with from me. And I found that was just as varied, you know, moving from whether it be as, as, you know, a firefighter to my lieutenant being a lieutenant and, and knowing what the station captain was expecting out of us, and, and as a captain knowing what, working for the different battalion chiefs, knowing what they needed from me. So I, I, I guess I'm just adding that it's not only looking at communicating down and laterally, but up as well.
- [39:06]
A
I'm going to lean on that real quick because I love how you said is leading up, because as leaders, you're all followers too. We are all followers too, as leaders. And so when you say leading up, I think it's so important to find ourselves in spaces where we are allowing ourselves to be led. So, for example, like my firefighters, my engineers, and those who work my subordinates, I have to allow myself to be led by them so I can empower them, because they're all leaders too. And so it allows them to not only, you know, feel like that they're in an environment where they can have voice and perspective and contribute to the team, but also they are the future leaders also. So if I can give them that opportunity and ability and, and space where they can lead and feel like they can lead up, then they're going to be more prepared as leaders. When they are in that up position. Because we're all preparing ourselves for the future, every single one of us. And I didn't mention Eric Saylor's earlier when you mentioned, like, is there an episode? But Eric Saylor's talked about, you know, the, the number one thing that we need to be doing inside our firehouses now and using obviously the fire service as the example is are we doing enough to prepare the future? And that's what we're talking about, the leading up. If we aren't preparing those below us to replace us when we leave, they're unprepared people. And we wonder why we have issues at every level within organizations is because we don't have a positive succession plan. And sometimes that's formal, sometimes that's informal. You know, what we do day in and day out is an example for the future. And those people are watching us, they're mirroring us, they're aspiring to be like us. Or God forbid, they're aspiring not to be like us if you're that kind of a leader. So I love how you mentioned the lead up part because I need to. Going back to the original question from Troy is the generational differences. Those individuals that I'm supervising will say, and I'll just use the generation as it is. Like I am a millennial and I lead some Gen Z's in the fire, in the, in the fire station today. They learn differently, they teach differently and they lead differently. But I need to learn from that because if I don't, I won't be effective in leading future Gen Z's. Right. For me to think that this is the only Gen Z I'm ever going to see, then the next Gen Z that comes into my crew, whether it be a rookie firefighter or someone else, I'm going to be ineffective in leading them. So it's, it's everything is an opportunity to learn to lead in the future. And so thank you for mentioning lead up because that happens each and every day and we need to open up ourselves to be led up, down and all around. So thank you for that question.
- [41:40]
C
Well, and that also goes into that, you know, the whole concept of the transformational leadership as well, you know, it's, it's, you're not only developing yourself, you're developing the next generation of leaders.
- [41:50]
A
Absolutely. Thank you for that, Cody.
- [41:54]
B
Yeah, I mean, all that, it hits so close to home and I feel like I look at former leaders and you know, it's kind of like a president, right? You're like, why don't they just go do these things or they have all these grand ideas and then they get there and, and then the layers behind all these decisions and our goals versus what's realistic. And I look at it now and half our fire department is under six years. The majority of our fire department is not our generation. And I loved how you guys wove in the leading up and Berlin on your email signature and at work it's, you know, stay curious. And what I hear in you guys and what resonates with me is that patience and humility of staying curious and using time to our advantage to take that time to ask questions, open ended questions to find out more, don't jump to assumptions and, and instead of trying to give them the answer, mentor them up through it so they can solve their own problems but then know that they're going to fail. They're going to be told no for the first time in their career and it's going to devastate them and demotivate them. But we've been there and how do we lift them up from there, knowing that's coming and take them through those different layers? And so kind of I witnessed it in you and like, kind of what I'm hearing is that, that stay curious and be real patient.
- [43:33]
A
Yeah, I mean curiosity is a characteristic that I think, I mean it goes without saying. I guess maybe I shouldn't say it that way. It's something that we all need and curiosity is more than curiosity of like, we'll say learning like. Right. Curiosity. On the surface level we could all say, yeah, be curious on, you know, on xyz. But I think curiosity is, we need to be curious in every facet. So here's the example. I need to be curious on why you were driven to a certain decision. Right. Or I need to be curious on why an individual, you know, aspires to learn in a certain way or why an individual, you know, does certain things. I need to find myself always wondering why, you know, and let's just use example of someone that is, you know, speeding 20 miles an hour down the highway, passing everybody on the left, you know, if we stop and think to ourselves like, oh, maybe their dog just died and racing to the vet, or maybe they're, you know, their spouse is in labor and now they're rushing to the hospital. Right. But so often we find ourselves making quick judgments. We have all these, we have these biases that lead our decision making and I think that's dangerous. I think we need to find ourselves being curious and asking why why? Versus, you know, jumping to the conclusion that when someone makes a bad decision or when someone you know is doing something just idiotic, we'll say jumping to the conclusion like, that person is no good or that person's bad or that person's underperforming or that person needs to be disciplined. I think if we experience a little more curiosity in our lives and the way we lead, we will find ourselves in a space where we appreciate other people more and we can bring out the best in other people more often. Because I think too often we find out what's. What's wrong in people versus finding out what's right in people. We'll just use the example of. We'll use performance evaluations. We'll use an example. You know, performance evaluations oftentimes are used to find out what people are doing wrong. And we all know about the recency bias. We know, you know, in that we. We will tend to remember things that happened more recently. But how many times are we appreciating more people more often? It's so often we find ourselves disciplining people for something that they just did wrong. And it's like, well, how about the other 500 things that I did right? You know? And I think as leaders, we need to intentionally put ourselves in spots where we are appreciating people for what they're doing every day. Because people that we lead, I can guarantee all of us that are listening here today, our people are doing more things right way more often than we're doing things wrong. But we find ourselves at times having hard conversations for some with somebody because they did this one thing wrong. And I'd say, let's flip the script on that. Let's have conversations with everybody every single time they do something right. And let's look at that mathematical equation and talk about the imbalance there, because guaranteed, for every 50 things they're doing right, there's gonna be a wrong in there. So let's find ourselves appreciating people for all the right. And I think we'd be in a better society, forget the fire service. I think we'd be in a better community that we live in.
- [46:27]
D
Yeah, those are great points. And it kind of. As I'm kind of taking notes here, perspectives, kind of what stood out to me, right, as is having that right perspective and in those challenges of leading up, because I. I really like what Jason talked about there. It's something at battalion level. You definitely have to do a lot of. You're an information hub for the puzzle palace, the head shed, whatever you want to call it, administration. But we have a battalion chief, Chief Patter Chief, our chief of training, who we try to instill when we're teaching a we got you mentality, one canoe, right? We're all in the same canoe and. And working together because, you know, if anything, what I find, um, valuable and I try to pass on. When perspectives kind of change a little bit, I just tell them, control your space. Again, this is kind of the real simple mentality I have of if I can control my space, I'm controlling my attitude, right? And the spear around me, that's gonna. That's gonna keep the perspective proper. And I think, you know, we can get lost, Ned. I surely do. And. And having said that, you know, having these types of conversations with peers, mentors is great. And, you know, Berlin, a lot of your. You referred to Chief Sailor. I mean, I instantly wanted his phone number and developed a relationship off of that because, you know, there's a wealth of knowledge there, and I'd almost be remiss not to take that opportunity at least, you know, again, kind of what my mom taught me, the answer is always no if you don't ask. So just go ask. And. And of course, he downloaded a great deal of information, but, you know, leading up has its challenges, but as long as you come with the right perspective and communication model, you'll be successful. Great stuff.
- [48:33]
B
The thing that kind of sticks with me right now with this conversation is, you know, Chief just mentioned that, you know, own your space that we show up into. And whether it's the word or just that vision I had in my head, but the center of Ethical leadership talks about gracious space and their definition of that's a spirit and setting where we invite the stranger to learn in public, and the spirits that wake you leave behind you in your boat. You know, the setting is that intentionality of, like, where are we having these meetings? Where are we having these conversations? Are we being very intentional there? And then inviting the stranger, looking for that different perspective and. And coming together to. To learn from each other. And earlier on, Chief mentioned that we have the tendency we want to fix things right away. And I felt and been a part of it and caught myself too, but I've seen these very important meetings be pushed and, like, we have to solve them now. And the settings not right. It's. It's not in a place that welcomes trust and it feels rushed and it puts us on our heels. And it just made me think of how important the setting is and Timing with these and do we have discretionary time to make this a better environment so everyone could show up and give our best versions and work together and made me think, how do you try to find intention in creating a good setting to have difficult conversations?
- [50:21]
A
I'm going to go backwards a little bit and just say, this is when we became, wherever we became in the roles that we hold now. Most of us didn't really get developed specifically. So we asked this question is like, how do I find myself in an area where I can make sure that I understand the space and setting and time is all important or is considered? We'll say like, where did I, where would I learn that? Right? Because if I don't learn about the importance of these things, why would I, or why should I will even say that, make sure that these things are important, Right? Because if going back to I'm fortunate, and I know you're fortunate too, to have been able to, you know, be a part of the training that we went through on the, you know, from the IPSY leadership, because then we recognize and that goes back to way back in the day. And like you and I were in the, in the, in the class with Chief Tryon in the center of Ethical Leadership training back in 2019. So we're talking seven years ago now. And going back to what I was saying earlier, if we sit in these classes, but we don't take away any of it and we just walk away, it's a waste of time. So first and foremost, I appreciate the fact that you even, you know, preach on this thing, this stuff seven years later. It obviously shows that this is important to you and you've ingrained this in the way you teach, in the way that you lead, and you didn't waste a department time or your time because you take it with you. So it's not something that I automatically know. So here's one thing that I will try and do is with someone, if I run into a situation, and I ran into this very recently, where there's a difference between responding and reacting. Reacting is something gets thrown your way, and the instant that, the way that
- [51:57]
D
you
- [52:01]
A
react, we'll say respond. We'll say respond. React in that moment is a reaction. But how many times have any of us been in a situation where we wanted to have this gut reaction, but you waited an hour to respond in a text message or you waited overnight before responding that email. How many times did we say to ourselves, I'm so glad I waited, because you have a different response? We'll Say. So going back to your question is sometimes I just don't. Right? The only time I'll go as far as to say the only time something needs a response right now is when we get the tones and we're on duty, right? We don't have a choice. We can't say, you know what, I gotta wait five minutes, then we gotta respond. We got 90 seconds to get out the door, give or take to go. Every other time, every other time we have discretionary time. Sometimes it might be five minutes. Sometimes you do have a day or a week. And so my encouragement is, and this is something to answer your question is I'll find myself in that moment because I am a very reactionary person. Someone says something and I'm picking up the phone or I'm going right after it with a response. But I have learned that my response is only better if I wait. So creating the time and the setting to answer your question, Cody, I will ask myself, is now the time likely? No. So I'm going to wait. When is that better time tomorrow? In an hour, after dinner, in the morning, before shift change. Perfect. We'll do it at that time. And then it's also when and where, you know, is my office in the fire station, for example, the best likely not, right? Because as we know, the office of the company officer will say again, using the fire service specific and using the crew dynamic as the example is, it can be threatening, right? To some individuals. So maybe it's you're meeting them in the bay as the example. Maybe you're like, hey, you want to go out for coffee instead? Where we're all, we're both in civilian clothes now, so the time and the place going back to your question is so critical. And I find myself trying to take that into consideration every time and knowing that it's not every time, it's. It's just sometimes. So hopefully that answers a little bit. It's a challenge. Like everything else that I'll say today, these are all work in progresses. I'm no master at any of this, but as long as I'm trying to think about this day in and day out, having people like yourself that remind me of these things. Here's another thing about leadership that I'll say on this recording is sometimes it's just being reminded is what we need more so than going out and learning new leadership philosophy and tactics, right. A lot of the stuff that we're learning every day were stuff that we already knew, right? Things like servant leadership and things like transformational Leadership and this type of stuff. We could read a new book about it, but this stuff was hundreds of years ago written. Sometimes we just need to be reminded on some of these important things, more so than being taught new things.
- [54:49]
B
I love that. Respond, don't react. I. That comes back. Everything you just said at that. At the end, to me, it resonates with discipline. And it takes a lot of discipline and intention to be aware of what you're feeling and thinking, to take that pause, take that breath before responding. And you're right. They're not new tricks. But discipline's hard. We want. We want an easy fix. We want the new fancy thing. But discipline and consistency and how we show up, man, it's right there.
- [55:28]
A
Yeah. Well, I'm gonna add one last thing to that. As you said, discipline. Cause I love discipline. There's another thing that Ryan Leake talks about, inspirational speaker, and he talks a lot about this kind of. He says, choose your hard. And what he meant by that is, everyone has it hard. Everyone. Right? But you get to choose which path you want. That's hard. So here's the examples. You know, it's hard to stand up for your team. We'll say. Say you lead a team. It's hard to stand up for your team, to inconvenience. Inconvenience yourself for the benefit of the team. But it's also hard to be just very ineffective as a leader. It's also hard to not be liked. It's also hard to. To have people not want to be like you and follow you. Right. It's hard to get up early to work out. It's also hard to be out of shape and unhealthy. Right. And it's hard to, you know, to. To, you know, take extra classes and to go above the minimum that we talked about earlier. But it's also hard to play catch up later on and wish you would have done that 10 years ago. So you get to choose your hard. When you talk about discipline, Cody, discipline is the one thing that we all need because all of us have the answers, some of the answers to the questions that we're asking. It's like we'll ask ourselves, well, should I do X, Y, and Z? Well, you already know the answer to that. You know, should I get up and, you know, should I eat a healthy lunch today? You know the answer to that. We're not seeking for answers. A lot of the time. We know the answers, but it comes down to the discipline. Do we have the discipline to move forward, to do what we know we need to do to better ourselves, to better the people that we lead, to better our families, to better the organization that you work for. So discipline is just one of those things that I encourage everyone to really reflect on and do you have it? And if you don't, it's something that you need to work on if you want to be effective.
- [57:12]
C
All right, well, that kind of leads right into sort of my next question for you, because, you know, the fire service is filled with all sorts of challenges and struggles. So can you talk about the importance of, like, persistence and perseverance in the fire service? Because I'm not going to say old, but for seasoned guys like Troy and I, you know, we joined a fire service that took on average, like, three years of testing to get hired as a firefighter. And most of the time for promotions, it was maybe one person promoted on the entire life of the list. And I think that kind of inherent, inherently created sort of grit in that perseverance and persistence in the. In the fire service, you know, dealing with rejection from day one. And I know with, like, today's hiring and promotional climate where, you know, tons of firefighters are getting hired off their first test and promotional lists are getting exhausted, how do we as leaders help the develop that grit and, you know, push on after not achieving our goals?
- [58:17]
A
Oh, it's such a good question. The first one thing I'll say is it's easier to lead when you have that experience already. So if you're an individual that always got a yes from the day you got hired, we'll just use the fire service. Right. But we can extend further back to life. But if you got hired in the fire service and everything was a yes, you know, you got hired on your first test, you got promoted on your first list, you asked for a special assignment and you got it, and you got another promotion and you got a yes, and. And you got yeses all along the way, then it's going to be harder for you to connect with somebody else when you're actually leading someone that is going through tough times and trying to persevere when they didn't make the promotional list or, you know, they got no to an assignment that they really wanted or whatever it might be, because you're not leading from that lived experience. And I think lived experience plays a huge role in connecting with people, and it's going to be more real to them because otherwise you're speaking from philosophy and not from actual. You know, here's what I went through. Not to say that just because you went through something, someone else has to go through it. But I think that's just number one in trying to connect with others. But in today's climate, going back to what you're saying, where there's, you know, before it was, I remember you had to walk uphill both ways and sit in the snow and wait for an application. Versus nowadays, you know, you can click online and yeah, bam, you got an interview tomorrow. Obviously, I'm exaggerating a little bit, but that's just to kind of paint the picture. But number one, you have to have that lived experience. But number two is, is you have to put yourself in those positions so other people can see that you're willing to do it too. So here's what I mean by that. And I'll use the example of. Again, I'll use my example because I've been there. Is like you use day shift assignment, historically, in the fire service, no one aspires to go to day shift, right? Firefighters work nine days a month. And it's like, here, I'll go to day shift now, and I'll willingly put myself out there to work five ten or five, four, four tens or five eights. Like, that's not something that typical firefighters would aspire to go do. So why. But if you don't do those things, how can you be in a leadership position to encourage someone else to say, hey, I think you should take on that training officer role and go to the fire academy and teach, you know, in the grind for 16 weeks four times a year or twice a year, whatever it may be. You are not in a position to influence. You're not in a position to, you know, persevere. And, you know, because there's so many benefits, we'll say, say the benefit is that you become a, you know, a fantastic instructor. You become a really, really good mentor because you understand what the grid it takes to be, you know, work four tens or five eights throughout the week, or five tens, for that matter. And so when you're encouraging someone else to go through the grit and they're going through failures, it's like, well, you never put yourself in those positions. You know, if you took Easy streak all, all the way, Easy street all the way, and now someone else is trying to persevere through their failures. You can't relate again, you can't go back to relating to them because you had Easy street the whole time. So. Or have you, number one, found yourself in positions where you went through that suck, and if not, find yourself putting yourselves through that hardships. Those hardships. So then you can now speak from example to those that you lead and say, here's some, you know, some situations where I've been in and here's how it benefited me and here's how I came out to the other side. And I encourage you to do the same because you can now better yourself because otherwise you're speaking again from philosophy, not from experience. So I think that's, I think that's key is find yourselves failing. And I know one of you mentioned failing earlier. Make failing okay. Build a culture of failure is okay because then again, you're setting the example for others. If, if you've never failed or you've never put yourself in position to fail, they're not seeing it in front of you. They see it as like a failure is not okay. The culture around here of failure is all bad. And if I fail, I'm gonna suck. And so I will do anything in my power to not put myself in a position to fail. Build a culture of failing is okay. Do it from your own experience, preach it and encourage others to do the same. And, and I think that just helps. Again, I'll just go back to your question is I think it will only help others see that perseverance and that persistence. That's what it takes to see success.
- [62:24]
C
So walk the walk and get comfortable being uncomfortable.
- [62:28]
A
Yes. Every day. Not just sometimes, but all the time. Right. Step up and do things that others won't. And that's the one thing that I'll say too is leaders do things that others can't and leaders do things that others won't. Because again, it's always easy. Anyone can do the easy things. Anyone can. But if you're a true leader, you will step up to do the hard things because others won't. And that's how you, I mean, again, I'll go back to quotes and I'll go to Kobe Bryant again because this is one that recognized me. I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this Kobe. For any of you that watch the redeem team and that was, you know, when in the US had lost in years prior and they never, you know, lost in Olympic Games. And then Kobe Bryant was called up to be on the redeemed team. That was the dream Team after they lost or the Olympic, the USA Olympic team. But he was found going to the gym when everyone was also in Vegas was going, was coming back from the clubs, in the bars and they were coming back for the night and he was at the gym people like, what's this guy doing? Like, why is this guy going to the gym when everyone else is just going to bed? That's the definition of what I'm saying is he was doing the hard while everyone else was doing the easy because he recognized Kobe in this instance, recognized that there was a goal and the mission was to bring back the championship to the USA Olympic team. So he was willing to do what others weren't. People like, you know, and I'll just throw it. Like, the Carmelo Anthony's and the Chris Bosch's were like, what is this guy doing? Like, why would he do that? And again, we can go back and look at the result. The result is they won back the trophy and they won back the gold medal of the USA Olympic Games in 2008. So the point of that is you must find yourselves in these positions that other people are like, what the hell is he doing? Why would he do that? Well, the result shows for why he did that. And so it takes leaders to do what others won't, but also what others won't even imagine. Like, it was unimaginable what he did, you know, in the gym at 4am when everyone else was just coming back from the bars and everyone's like that. I've never heard of that before. Well, that's why he was. What he was.
- [64:35]
D
No, that's a. That's a great point. And you know, that kind of resonates is find your way to. To get weird in that sense. Right? Because that, for me, it's fundamental, right? You know, civil rights, there's value in the struggle, right? I was brought up with that. You know, if you can't struggle, right, you're not gonna find the value. And. And that's watch. Watch us grind. And. And there will be natural follow. Followership that comes along with that currently, because I love to kind of put things to an analogy. We have a temporary chief, and he doesn't have a deputy. Our fire chief passed away unexpectedly. And he just grinds. And it's very easy. I don't need to have conversations. I literally can watch him grind for the greater good. And that motivates me very similar to that Kobe analogy going back to Kobe, to Cody's stuff. Kobe, Colby. I'm gonna get those switched up. You know, when you guys talked about discipline and this isn't for everybody, I get it, but you know, the disciples and everybody's aware of. Of the Bible, and a discipline has this negative connotation attached to it, but if you really look at it. And it's all perspective, right? We talked, we've talked about that is, you know, be a disciple of, of whatever your philosophy is. And it doesn't have to be a negative. Instilling discipline is a good thing. It's, it's order. It's Chief Castro's calming the chaos. Right. You know, I wanted to kind of go back to picking your battlegrounds. Like I'm a big fan of, of Sun Tzu. Right. You got to have the right battleground. And, and when you talked about some of those administrative issues that, especially at a battalion level, but even a company officer level, does it need to be. And we talked about the space, does it need to be addressed right now? And our former fire chief, my best friend who passed away, he said inherently, the problems that come to his desk do not need to be addressed without proper contemplation. Because if you think about it, we work in a very action reactive type environment, so naturally we become very much that. And that perspective you guys had was great. It resonated with me because when problems come up on my desk that aren't alarm based, there has to be a natural. Does this need to be addressed right now, or can I sit and contemplate on it? And where I find the real value is can I reach out to the wolf pack? Can I, can I get some perspective, like outside, no emotions attached? And that is extremely valuable. And hopefully the listeners develop their own packs for that reason, because that will give you a perspective when you have detached, no emotions to it, that will, will exponentially make your response better. And I just thought that was worth kind of getting back on. And finally, when we talked about our classes and Berlin, I thought your point is great and your answer was on point. Bring something back. Well, I've been to some pretty vanilla classes, but what I've always brought back is I've brought back a relationship. You know, it goes without saying I'm learning here while sitting with you gentlemen, and, and it will continue to be that I will learn more from the people than I will inherently learn from the class. And that's because those relationships matter. Great points, great points.
- [68:25]
A
Absolutely. Thank you for that.
- [68:28]
D
You know, for me, I think the viewers or listeners, you know, have a understanding of who you are. But. And it's a tough one because I'm gonna, I'm gonna hold you to one.
- [68:39]
A
Okay.
- [68:39]
D
And it's a simple question. Was the mo. What is most important to you in your own leadership model and why?
- [68:47]
A
Oh, okay, I'm gonna go quickly here it's being authentic. People will want to know you, follow you, be like you, and listen to you, any of those or all the above, when they know that you're speaking truthfully. And when I say truthfully, it doesn't mean that you have the best answer. And sometimes it doesn't even mean having the right answer because sometimes it's about when you're being authentic. Sometimes that means I don't know the answer. And sometimes that's like, you know what? I don't know how to. We'll say in this context, I don't know how to advise you. In this case, we'll use training as another example. Like, right, I've been a training officer in the past, but I'm not, I don't know every discipline in training. So when I'm trying to train and mentor somebody, there's times where I don't have the best answer or the best way to train someone or to encourage them how to be successful. But sometimes it's just being real. And that's where I go with being authentic. Sometimes it's just being real and saying, you know what? I don't know how to best navigate forward because the opposite of authenticity is being fake. You know, faking your way through trying to lead somebody or to train somebody is nothing more annoying than, you know, trying to train somebody the wrong way. And that is, that's dangerous too, right? So sometimes it just goes down, comes down to when you're leading somebody in a, in a, in a space and whatever that is, it's just being real with them and just being authentic on how you answer the question or how you lead them. And sometimes it's, I don't know. But then it's also, how can we figure this out together, right? Like, we have, like, you know, Cody mentioned earlier, we got six years or, excuse me, we have 50 of the American fire service has less than five or six years of experience on the job. And everyone needs to be learned different. People learn differently. People are, you know, are being taught differently nowadays, but we don't have the answers to everything. Sometimes your subordinates have better answers than you do, believe it or not. I know some, you know, listeners cringe at that. But my recruit fire or, sorry, my probationary firefighters are the experts that are being probationary firefighters. I'm not the expert at being a probationary firefighter. So sometimes they have the best answer. And so if I'm answering questions just to answer questions because I feel like, oh, I'm, I, you know, I got most seniority in this crew, and I'm the captain, it means I have to have the answers. You're leading blindly now because sometimes the most authentic thing that you can do, sometimes the best answer in some of these cases is I don't know, but let's figure this out together. So long answer to your question there, Troy. But I think being authentic and just being. Get away from the word authentic. Being real. Right. Just being real with your people is what's. Is what's keen and what goes along with way. So
- [71:29]
D
thank you. Makes sense to me.
- [71:31]
A
Yeah.
- [71:31]
C
And you can't be fake. In the fire service, the firefighters and nurses, I think, are the two groups of people who have the best BS detectors and they'll, you know, they'll see right through it 100%.
- [71:45]
A
All right, let's jump to rapid fire. So I'm going to give each. Each of these gentlemen who've kindly asked me these very difficult questions. Thank you, by the way, to go with a quick rapid fire. So anything that you got, and let's run with it.
- [71:58]
B
What scares you most?
- [72:01]
A
The fire service or you? Tell me what scares me most is. Okay, this is what scares me most. But I find most opportunistic is not having the answer to a question when my crew is looking for an answer. Our crews look to us for answers. And going back to that authenticity, sometimes we don't have it, but that's okay. Sometimes lean on the fact that you might not know the answer to something, be honest, and move forward together.
- [72:44]
C
How do you balance giving the answer to a question that you're asked by your crews or the people that work with you versus leading them to an answer?
- [72:59]
A
Great question. So I'll give two quick responses. The first one is I don't. I try not to. There's a time and place to give the answer. There's a time and place where you encourage them to find the answer on their own. We talked earlier about generations differences, and we also talked earlier about people learn differently. And so there is no one way to answer that question because there's a time and place for both. So how do you balance that? Is it depends on the person. Time management is key. We all only have 24 hours in a day. And time is valuable. It's our most valuable asset because we'll never get it back. Everything else you could make, you know, more of time, you will never.
- [73:44]
D
We have more.
- [73:45]
A
We have less time today than we did when we, you know, when we did an hour ago, when we first started this. And to go back to Your question is sometimes I will literally give an answer right now because it'll be more effective and efficient for all of us as a crew to get something done. But when, as we mentioned also earlier, there's a lot of times where we do have discretionary time. And when you're trying to build someone up, when you're trying to go back to succession planning and building up the next person, when you're trying to get those other people to learn, to learn something new or to develop themselves something, just offering the path for them to find out the answer to themselves will be better for them and it'll also be better for the organization because you're preparing them for future roles. So when time is of the essence, I will just give the answer so we can move forward to more important things. Now, when there is no time, when there's, when you have discretionary time, I will just offer up a means to find an answer or give them the pathway and then help them generate their own answer to the question. Because there's always, I'll remember this too, is there's always usually more than one way to answer a question or solve a problem. So even if the answer that I give, if I were to offer it today, there's no saying that that is the best way. So why not let someone else come up with a way that is also a good way to solve a problem?
- [75:02]
D
If I gave you a magic wand and I told you could change one thing in the American fire service, what would you change? And briefly tell me how you change it.
- [75:15]
A
Oh, okay. Since it's rapid fire, I'm not going to say time to think. I'll say perspective. Because perspective changes everything. Everyone has a different lens. Everybody does. And everyone's lens and perspective is valuable. Is there value in taking the perspective of someone that's been in the fire service or in that organization that has 35 years on the job in your department, 100%. Is there value of having the perspective of the person that just walked in the door today that's going to spend their next 35 years? Absolutely. Because arguably that person is going to be there longer than anybody else in the organization. So that's a valuable perspective. So if there's one thing that I can, it wouldn't be necessarily cheap change, but it would be more encourage encouragement to remember is that perspective matters. So how do I change that? This is the same thing that I say to every single probationary firefighter that I get. There's two things that I do with my probationary firefighters number One, I give them two books. Number one is the emotional survival for Law enforcement officers. And I tell them to read that book but every time it says the word law enforcement officers, to use the word firefighter. Because the life changing book is about mental health and wellness and resiliency in the fire service through a long career. But the second book is extreme Ownership. But the third thing or the last thing that I say to them and tell them is remember the feeling that you had when you got the call from your chief that you got the job in the fire service. That feeling. Because these individuals that are with me now, they've only been in the fire service six months, right, because they just got out of academy and they're still new. But the feeling that they have, remember it. The reason I say that to them is because there's gonna be times in their career and all four of us here today have experienced it where we're gonna feel like we were shut down, that we feel like, you know, we were felt smaller than everybody else because of we got denied XYZ or we were ridiculed for our ideas or whatever. But if you always come back to that perspective of everything is a win from here on out, all of it is a win because of that feeling that you got when you got that job, that career phone call, life changing phone call. That perspective will just bring everything back to being appreciative and full of gratitude. So it's not so much how do I change it, but it's more building a foundation and bringing you back always to remember how you felt and everything else is a win.
- [77:29]
B
What would your younger self think of you today?
- [77:33]
A
I'm crazy and I chuckle. But I'm serious because I don't know. And I just 100 just, you know, being vulnerable and authentic as well is, is I sometimes I don't know why I do what I do. You mentioned this earlier, Cody. Like how do I balance certain things and who gets more of my energy? Sometimes I wonder why I push, but they would think I'm crazy because sometimes just being still is not just okay, but it's somewhere where we need to find ourselves, all of us more in. It's just being okay with. With where we are, who we are and where we are. We don't always need to be striving for the next thing, which I found myself at times doing more often than I should be. So my, my younger self would think I'm crazy, but hopefully a little bit of appreciative too. That hard work pays off, that hard Work pays off.
- [78:36]
B
I appreciate that. That's good. I know they'd be proud, man, you're putting in the work.
- [78:41]
D
Thank you.
- [78:42]
C
All right, self reflection, what does it mean to you and why is it important?
- [78:47]
A
Self reflection to me is at the end of each day is think about. And I do this with my kids. This is true at the end of the day with my kids, I say, what was the most fun you've had today was like your favorite thing about today. And then tell me something that you're grateful for. I do this every night with my kids. So self reflection is so important because it allows you the opportunity.
- [79:06]
B
Right.
- [79:06]
A
It's all a choice we can do at the beginning of the day, middle of the day, at the end of the day. I encourage people to journal, but it really, it's a time for you to think back on what you did today. And again, this is going back to Cody's question is really did I do, did I set out and put my time today? And what was important to me, whether it be in my personal life, professional life, and it's also an opportunity to where if I say no in that self reflective exercise I did not, is not regretting anything, it's saying, okay, how do I do better tomorrow? Because that's the only really the way that we can put ourselves on the path on where we truly want to be is if you're reflective. Because if you're not, you could be again, blindly moving forward in a direction that you don't want to be. So self reflective means is self reflection is everything. It allows you the opportunity and I'll say the opportunity to think about what you've done and again to help steer the path of where you want to go.
- [80:07]
D
What has the fire service given you that you didn't have prior?
- [80:12]
A
It's a great question and I'll just be 100% honest. I talked about gratitude earlier, right. Everyone in the fire service is going through, is gonna go through ups and downs. Well, we're gonna get no's. We're denied assignments, we're gonna, our ideas and thoughts are gonna be, you know, made fun of, you know, a lot. And so. But what has it provided for me, it still provided me the life that I have today. Right. For example, to be 11 o' clock on this Tuesday afternoon or Tuesday morning, to be sitting on a podcast and you know, with, with, with four, you know, influential people in my life, to be sitting here doing this where if I worked an 8 to 5, I couldn't. The fire service allowed me to provide for my family. The fire service allowed me to be in a community leadership position where I'm serving the community and doing it on duty and off duty. It gives me the opportunity to, you know, make good money and have the great benefits that I have. It gives me the opportunity and perspective that not many people in this. In this lifetime have. Right. It gives me the opportunity to serve. But I have things in life that I would otherwise not have, and I owe it back to the American fire service because we get to do things. We have luxuries that many don't get the opportunity to ever have. You know, to wear the badge proudly every single day, to walk in and say, you know, I get to make a difference in my community and, you know, positively influence the individuals that I work with every single day. Very grateful for the fire service. Very grateful for everything that's given to me, and it's going to give to me over the next 10 or so years.
- [81:43]
D
Thank you.
- [81:44]
A
Yeah, thank you. So with that being said, I'm just going to close this off. I want to say thank you all for being there today to help bring out, for, first of all, challenging me to do this today put me in a role in a position that was like, oh, do I really want to do this? But I think the last thing that I'll say here before I'm going to throw it out to each of you to kind of give your last thoughts is leaders need to lead. What I mean by that is we need to find ourselves in positions where we're giving back. Some people will ask me this question, well, why do I do a podcast? Well, why do I go out and speak at events? Well, my answer to that is so simple. If we are not sharing the things that we're learning, what are you there for? I mean, if we are taking classes and learning and we're, you know, we have mentors, we should be continuously finding platforms to share, right? Not I will show up when someone asks me. Yes, show up when someone asks you, but find ways to share your information. And sometimes that's just in direct mentorship in the firehouse. Sometimes that's being on a podcast when you're being asked, and sometimes it's going out of your way to say, hey, can I come speak at this next opportunity to share the information I've learned from all these people? Find your ways to share, because leadership is about sharing the information. Because again, if you're not sharing it with others and you're not passing it down, what good is that information? You're hoarding it to yourself. And so my encouragement to everyone else listening today is find your next opportunity to share. It could be big or it could be small. I'm going to ask Cody, Troy, and Jason to kind of close us off with some kind of inspirational thought on leadership that we can all walk away from today. And I want to start with Cody.
- [83:30]
B
I'm going to say make time to reflect on what's important to you in life, both at home and the fire service. Realign to what gets you excited and lean into it and help others along the way.
- [83:45]
C
Jason, first off, thanks for having me here. Had a great time. I think it's super important what you're doing with this podcast, but I would say lead with competency, consistency, and compassion. Take care of yourself and each other.
- [84:05]
A
Troy,
- [84:08]
D
for me, you know, it's on the same vein when I gave my friend's eulogy in December, but a little bit more pointed to the audience and, and yourselves. And. And of course, internally is thank you, first of all, and thank your family, thank your support teams, thank your co workers, because who you are today is the culmination of all those people. Never forget that. And please, for you gentlemen, give your family my thanks for sharing your time. And when I get off here, I'll obviously thank my own group as well. But no, just thank you and. And for the listeners, thank your families. We forget that in the fire service, but it's. It's a strain and it's a push, but it's really why we can do what we love to do, because, uh, it's still the best job I ever had, um, to quote Chief Bobby Halton, and it will be till the day I stop doing it, and then I'll just miss it. So thank you and gratitude.
- [85:21]
A
Awesome. Thank you, everyone, for tuning in today to the kitchen table. Thank you for being a part of the special 100th episode today. We hope you found this time valuable, and we hope we've inspired you to take action, to lead and to spread the leadership conversation. Until next time, be safe, be intentional, and stay curious.