← Leadership Conversations @ The Kitchen Table 
Leadership Conversations @ The Kitchen Table
Ep. 80: Shane Smith, Deputy Chief - Leading through Adversity
01:18:34
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I think it takes a true servant leader or a student of servant leadership, a lifelong learner themselves, to kind of implement those changes. But at least in my experience, it's been so plagued by either the ego driven, insecure leader or by, you know, somebody that maybe have the qualities of a good leader, but they hold their card so close to their chest. They're not willing to just give all of themselves to everybody out there to make everybody better than they ever were. To me, that's success. Give everybody 100% of yourself, make them better than you ever were that, that you can, you know, you can walk away feeling like you did a good job.
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Being rescued from a three Story of.
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Emergency the First Responder Liaison Network is proud to present to you the Kitchen Table Podcast. Join us as we explore leadership from perspectives around the globe. From firefighters to fire chiefs, civilians to.
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CEOs.
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Our conversations have one simple goal. Build more leaders.
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Good morning and welcome everybody to the Kitchen Table. On the episode today, we have Deputy Chief Shane Smith on the show and the leadership topic of conversation is Leading through Adversity. Deputy Chief Shane Smith was born in Southern California into a family of law enforcement officers. His father, brother, grandfather, aunt and two cousins all served in various capacities, so naturally Chief thought he would follow that path. But everything changed when his father introduced him to a fire captain with the Los Angeles County Fire Department, where Shane spent some time at a local fire station. That experience drew him into the fire service. He started as an explorer and an auxiliary firefighter. Then he became professional for a small industrial department at movie studio. Chief Smith's journey then took him to Southern Idaho in 1994 where he worked for the Twin Falls Fire Department after joining Magic Valley Paramedics. There he served as an EMT and eventually working up to a paramedic and the rescue team leader. Chief Smith came up to the Pacific Northwest where he spent more than two decades working in South King County, Washington. He's held various positions including Special operations team leader, training Officer, lieutenant Captain, Acting battalion Chief, Division Chief of Special Operations, and most recently as a Deputy Chief of Operations. In 2007, he was appointed as a rescue Specialist on Washington Task Force one of the nation's 28 FEMA Urban Search and Rescue teams. He has held roles as a rescue squad officer, task force safety officer, and his current role as Task force leader. He had the honor and privilege of responding to a few different national disasters over the years, including the Maui county wildfires in Lahaina and the 2014 Oso landslide. Chief Smith has recently retired from The South King Fire and Rescue Department and has now started helping a position in his hometown of the city of Falls, or in the city of Twin Falls as a new deputy chief of operations. Good afternoon, chief. Glad to have you on the show today. How are you?
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A
I am well. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.
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B
Absolutely. So I understand that you very recently have retired from, you know, King County, Washington, and now you started your. Your new venture or starting your new venture in the days to come at Twin Falls. So share a little bit about that, that, that transition, but also the feeling that you have right now knowing that you are kind of going home to where. Where it began and, and after leaving 20 years up here in the Pacific Northwest.
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A
Yeah, it's pretty wild. And actually yesterday was my official last day at South King. I, I've taken some vacation, but today is my first day in so called retirement. But it was Father's Day and my parents live up here in Star, Idaho. And we had a family dinner over at the house for Father's Day, and my wife and I had a conversation. I was turning 53 in August, the middle of August. And we, we talked about pulling the plug. And, you know, I've been. I've been commuting for a while, spending most of my time in Idaho, but we also still have a house in South Hill, Washington. So I was, you know, spending most of my time over here in Idaho, and we had a long discussion and she said, just do it. And so the. My next day back to work, I called her first thing in the morning, pretty early. I said, are you sure? And she goes, yeah, put in your notice. And we had nothing lined up. We had a couple, you know, different things. We, I mean, it wasn't like I was just going to retire and, you know, watch TV all day, but so I went into HR and gave him my notice. And it's weird how these things happen. I mean, I had heard rumor and I kept a lot of contact with people in Twin Falls, but I think it was two weeks or less than two weeks position opened up for deputy chief of ops in Twin Falls. And so we had another discussion and I put in for it. And it was a fairly arduous process. And I mean, for God's sakes, I haven't applied for a job in a long time and went through the whole process and ended up getting a conditional offer that turned into an official offer. And so, yeah, now I start next Monday, the 22nd. Wow.
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B
Wait, so help me understand here. So you were going into retirement without the position lined Up.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And it just so happened to be that. I'll just call it maybe a dream position. Maybe it's not a dream position, but a position of deputy chief of ops in the town that you started. But then we're eventually moving back to, opened up and that's how you're at where you're at.
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A
Yeah. So we, we had longtime plans of going back to Twin Falls, which is known as the Magic Valley region. Right. That it's where my wife was born and raised. Our kids were born there. I have a stepson. He, he was born there, raised there. His, his father's in the area there. You know, it's always been home. My, my wife's family's there, her sister, my own, my mother in law. So we, we had it in our heads that we were going to go back there then after, you know, purchasing a house in, in the Boise area and spending so much time here, my parents are here, one of my daughters or our daughters is here. And my stepson ended up having grandkids and so. Or you know, our grandkids. And so that kind of changed things a little bit. We just were kind of thinking maybe we would, you know, plan our roots closer to Boise. But long story short, then that opportunity opened up and now we're kind of back on track. Almost as if it's just meant to be.
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We're just meant to be. Yeah.
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Yeah.
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Well, okay. There's our first leadership message of the day. I'm lean on it. If I may, Chief is, can you talk about that right there? Like I'll say the word coincidence, but I'll also also also use the word like meant to be. Right. Like sometimes you don't know the opportunities that are out there unless you put your position for. Put yourself into a position to. An opportunity can now take part. Right. Like for example, you may not have even ever looked at the DC of OPPS position had you not even thought about retirement. Right? So talk about that as a listeners tune in because we always talk about getting out of your comfort zone. We always talk about just, you know, you don't know what's out there, but you got to put yourself out there. So in this case, Chief, like how important is it that you were able to say, you know what, I'm going to retire and then to find out later that you now you got this position that I'm just going to go ahead and assume that you're ecstatic about and you know, you never would have found out otherwise. So talk about that for a minute.
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A
Yeah, it's. Well, let's back up. I never ever saw myself promoting at all in the fire service. It was never a drive of mine. So all the way up into a deputy chief position. I mean, it's just these, these opportunities present themselves and, and to your point, stepping out of your comfort zone, you know, they call it the growth zone. Right. And, and I've heard you comments over the years, you know, even when I was looking to going into training as a training officer and having discussions and having some, you know, some, some leaders influenced me and talking about comfort zone and all that. And, and so, so for me, even though the position in title is the same, here I am again, stepping out of my comfort zone. You know, I'm, I'm excited to go back to a department in an area which, which really my fire service career, I've never really counted my younger days, you know, in the very early 90s, 90, 91, 92, Industrial Fire Department, Explorer Auxiliary, all that stuff because I was just so young and dumb and, and you know, just on the wrong things.
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Sure, sure.
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But then, you know, being able to go back to a community that, that we, we truly love the community and to serve in a community that, that we have history in and even a lot of the leaders now in the area from, you know, in law enforcement leaders and the ems, and they're all people I know that were, you know, street level folks back in the day. And so to go there with, with, with relationships in history already is, is pretty rewarding, but it's not comfortable. I mean, it's a different place than when I left. Different people. There's very few people working there that I worked with. Different culture, you know, it's, it's, it's definitely stepping out of your comfort zone again.
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B
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So you said something key that I want to ask your opinion on this because how many times have you heard or I've heard so many people say, you know, getting into the fire service, you know, well, how many people, firefighters that is, that get into the fire service? Their immediate aspiration is to become a fire chief or deputy chief or chief officer. Right. Let's just go and say the vast majority of firefighters, you know, get into the profession and they want to be long, you know, lifelong firefighters, you know, work on an engine company, a busy house and stay at other careers. But with that being said, there are so many that do climb the ranks and get to those positions and would otherwise, you know, not change a thing. So who, who influenced that in you in the Sense that, you know, you just said that, you know, you never wanted to promote, but you did. And now you see yourself as a two time deputy chief of operations in two different fire departments. Like, how did that change in you? Was it influential because of a leader or you know, did your just perspective change as you went through the career? But it's just, it's interesting because I think executive leader development is something that's lacking in, especially in fire departments across the country. But even up here in the, in King county will say we have a lot of individuals that don't want to continue, but our organizations need our people to continue because we need that consistency, that secession, if you will. So for you specifically, Chief, like how did you get to the point where, you know, an individual that love, you know, you took part in so many, you know, different, you know, rescue task force team, you know, use our team, squad officers. But then you said, you know what, I'm going to go and climb the race, become a deputy chief.
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A
Yeah, yeah, 100%. For me it was perspective. There was never one aha moment or one person that influenced me. But you know, early on in my career I've gone through some, the topic of the show, some adversities that changed my perspective. And so to, to kind of sum up your, the answer to your question is it's people, it's service. I've said it a million times and most of those close to me and they've worked with me have heard me say it. But leadership is not rank at all. And I have been for the lack of better terms led by such poor leaders in my career that that also has attributed to my perspective shift. And so, you know, the only promotions I really ever put in for were, you know, the, the contractual promotional processes for lieutenant and Captain. The rest were opportunities through people believing in me and seeing things in me and you know, quite frankly asking if I'd be interested. And, and so, you know, and I joke about being sold a bill of goods on that, but, but to your point, it's an opportunity to serve people and that's the bottom line. And I say that and I know that there's people that probably don't respect me being in those positions just simply because of the position or maybe maybe something with them and with their perspective on how they saw things go. But you know, the bottom line is it's an opportunity to serve at a, at a, you know, a higher level and, and have a greater impact and influence on people. And that's what's driven me. It's not easy by any means. I don't think that, I don't think that people that have a drive for rank, a drive to be in a position without truly understanding the impacts that that position will have on people are necessarily in it for the right reason. I've seen so many ego driven leaders, leaders that their ego is, is compounded by their insecurities, you know, whereas I, I've, I've, I've always held on to this and there's a story of how this came about. But humility is without a doubt the cornerstone to build your foundation on. If you're not humble and you're allowing other influences to drive your decision to promote, you're in it for the wrong reason.
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B
And we've seen that, right? I mean, we see it all the time. And so shifting gears just a little bit, when Ryan Dupra with South King Fire was the individual that reached out and said, hey, can, would you mind having, you know, or inviting, if you will, you know, Jane Smith on the show. And I was like, sure. We always take, you know, leadership challenges is what we call. The listeners know what that is. And then when I reached out to you, chief, the first thing you had said to me was, you know, we were number one. You were humble that someone would ask and, you know, to be on the podcast. But then you said you have not much to say other than to talk about a career, mistakes and failures. And I mean, that's, that's number one. We're going to talk about reflection here in a minute. But a career of mistakes and failures is necessary, right? Yeah. I mean, if you're in a leadership role and you don't have a story to tell about, you know, how you were knocked down throughout your career, I mean, I don't know, are you, you know, worthy to be in a leadership role if you're not able to be vulnerable and talk about, you know, how you failed along the way to get to where you're at. So can you talk about why that was your first inclination or your first response was, well, you know, I could talk about a bunch of careers of, you know, mistakes and failures if that's what you want to hear. And I said, yes, that's exactly what I want to hear. Because, you know, that's what it's about. It's about being human. Right. Leaders are human. We, we need to embrace that, but also be able to let others know the people that we lead, that failure is, is a part of the process. Right. You know, the leaders made failures. We have to be able to create those environments so others can do the same, so they can then become strong leaders. So talk about why that was so right, right at the, you know, at the tip of your tongue, right when I kind of invited you is I'll talk about mistakes and failures if you want.
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A
Yeah, you know, some of that's right. There's another phrase that, that I coined a while back is paralyzed by humility. Like sometimes I have a very hard time talking about myself and the successes in my career based on my extreme level of humility that I, I, I allow to guide me. But I, I think that, you know, it's because when I look at failures, you know, there, it's not like, you know, I have a, you know, a book of failures and especially things that are task level or strategic or tactical level failures because, you know, the fire service is so dynamic. You're presented with so many different opportunities to make decisions with limited information and, but for me, it's been, you know, some failures that, that potentially could have impacted people in a negative way. Mistakes made in where my own arrogance or the fact that I was really proficient at certain skills. I mean, I have a long history of special operations in my, in my career and technical rescue and you know, the, the old, you know, go to one class and think, you know, it all kind of guy early on that, you know, reflecting back, there was times that I could have seriously gotten people hurt or myself and, and just, you know, having that experience that you draw from as you mature, I think guides you in humility. And so, you know, I, I've seen and I've worked for, I'm sure you have too. The leaders that, you know, what's on their chest is more important than lessons learned in life and being an authentic leader. And that's just not my case. I could, I, quite frankly, maybe it sounds bad, but I could care less about rank in terms of myself. I mean, I understand the hierarchy and, and the importance of it and paramilitaristic organization, but for me that's never drove me to make the career decisions that I've made. And so they've just been opportunities. But yeah, the failures and mistakes made are, when I look back are just, you know, the impacts on people and, and how potentially catastrophic they could have been.
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B
So I want to lean on something real quick, Chief, because you had mentioned part of, you know, you're the reason for you to promote up through the ranks was more about being able to have a greater influence and a greater impact, an opportunity to serve More people.
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Yes.
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And as we talk about you being a deputy chief now, you know, at another organization, but let alone the one that you've worked as one in your South King fire, when we talk about mistakes and failures, how does, you know, me being a company officer, you know, I, you know, being humble, being vulnerable with my crew, with the battalion, the other members, other firefighters is. It's easier. We'll just say that. And I just use that as a term in relation to what I'm about to say now is how does a deputy chief, you know, portray if you will, or admit mistakes or tell people that, you know, even as a deputy chief, I will embrace failure and encourage you. How is it, you know, you as a deputy chief, in your experiences, is that challenging to be able to, you know, tell your 2, 3, 400 members of your organization that, hey, I'm a deputy of operations, but, you know, hey, give me some grace, I'm going to fail. I'm going to make mistakes just as you are. You know, talk about the challenge there. But then also, how do you do that?
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Yeah, it's not comfortable.
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Right, right.
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And that's, yeah, but for me, is, is always been real, you know, genuine, authentic, open, transparent communication. You know, when I look back and I was only an admin just shy of five years, I mean, you know, a couple months shy of five years. But, you know, a lot of my mistakes early on were made through, you know, maybe, maybe not listening enough, you know, allowing emotions to get. Get the better part of me and, and, you know, in certain hot topic discussions, just not listening and, and, you know, looking for the other perspective and trying to, you know, come to conclusions and things like that in a much more efficient manner. But also, you know, you make mistakes. Learning a new job just, I don't know, you know, nothing as catastrophic as it can be when you're riding right seat on an engine company or a truck company. But, but for me, it's always been owning them. You know, owning your mistakes own everything in your world. And I have found through early on, having that level of humility, not having the answers to everything, saying, I don't know, or, you know, let's figure that out, or, you know, being humble enough to not be the, the absolute expert in everything, it. It's easier to own your mistakes. And then, and what I was going to say is, what I found through those years of kind of having that mindset is that you actually get more respect. People understand that you're authentic and, and they're, they're more you know, apt to follow you per se, because you're, you're owning everything in your world. It's ownership.
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B
Yeah, it is. And we'll talk about ownership a little bit later too, because I know it's one of the talking points which I love is, is. I mean, ownership is key. Everyone has to own it in their own world, right? Because. And we do see it often where, you know, it's. It's knee jerk reaction when something bad happens, you know, who's. Whose quote, unquote fault is it? Well, I, I always say, right, like, because I wrote no one of your books here is extreme ownership. We talk about ownership a lot in that book. A lot on the show is, well, in any circumstance, everyone plays. In any team dynamic, we'll say everyone plays a role in a failure, just like everyone plays a role in success. So, like, if we're gonna go as far as to say, you know, what went wrong on that event, training event, emergency call, whatever. I mean, every crew member had, you know, a hand in it. So it's like if we, if we adopt. So I'll just go and throw this out there. I always believed that extreme ownership only works, truly works if all parties take that or adopt that mindset, right? Because like, let's use a team dynamic where let's just use the, the leader and the follower will say, well, if the follower only says, hey, it's the leader's fault, that's why we're unsuccessful. Well, that means the follower did everything perfectly and there's nothing they could have done better. Well, that's. We know that's not correct, but also vice versa. Let's just say you had a leader that, you know, and, you know, a newer firefighter will say was failing at whatever their probationary year. Well, is it really all their fault with their failing? How about the team dynamic? The, the leader, the, the trainer, the mentor, where's their part in making sure that they are developing those to be successful, right? So there, there's a part everywhere. So when you say extreme ownership, it's key that everyone adopts that mindset. Otherwise the mindset hardly works. Is kind of where I was getting at switching gears just a little bit. Chief, when we were talking about, you know, things to talk about on the show today, you had wrote back to me and had been several days later, I'm thinking, you know, jokingly, obviously, what's going on? How come the chief hasn't sent me back the script yet? And then you wrote back, like, here you go, I've been You know, reflected so much on this. Thank you for this. And it was like five and a half pages long and then so. But what I forgot to tell you, Chief, is just. It was more just for me to find out what the talking points that you wanted to bring today to the show. And you had mentioned that it was very valuable to you because it made you think about stuff that resonated with you, but you said it was very reflective. So the question I have is how valuable was that for you to sit there and have to look at some of these questions and really make you reflect on your leadership style and philosophy?
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A
That is extremely valuable. This whole thing, you know, it's funny, we talk about coincidences or things are, you know, meant to be, but the whole thing hit me at a time when, you know, quite frankly, South King Fire is going through a lot of leadership challenges right now. And. And for me, somebody that's been extremely passionate about the fire service for a very long time was contemplated hanging it up and being done with it, you know, and then a guy like Ryan Dupra throws my aim in the hat for this. So thank you, Ryan, but no, I really, I do appreciate it. It's humbling, but. So reflecting back and then getting, you know, your, as you call it, a script, but your. Your document, that helps kind of solicit topics of discussion. You know, I look back, those questions are designed to. To dig in a little bit and figure out, you know, your own journey and. And you as a person. But ironically and coincidentally, it comes at the exact same time that I have been working on, you know, what's my purpose? You know, looking at. Looking at, hanging up something that's been such a big part of my life since I was 15 years old. And even though it was law enforcement, family I grew up in, but still public service. So really my whole life looking at. At retiring, you know, retiring earlier than I wanted to or thought I would, and. And so reflecting back on my purpose and, you know, that's not an easy thing to do. You know, you kind of live your life and you get your head down and you're just, you know, going through life, but if you ever see. Stop and think, like, what is your purpose? Why are you living your life? Whether it's the way that you are or the way maybe you're not happy or, you know, what's your purpose? What. What makes you tick? And at the same time, a very good friend of mine who happens to be a. A chief at South King, Chris Anderson, he got me down this road of developing your own creed. And so you know, that again, that's not easy. What are your standards? What are your, what are your principles that you want to live by? And, and so reflecting back. So, so anyway, you know, this, this process of being a guest on your show and my, my several pages that I didn't realize I wasn't supposed to write, but you know, gives you an opportunity to once again dig into your own thoughts, look at the reasons why and how you ended up where you're at, you know, and like I said, I never chased a chief's job. That wasn't my thing. And then, you know, I, I, I have such a hard time saying, oh, I'm a good leader, you know, I, I just, that's not me. But I do know, and I say it with humility that I have influence and impacted people because they've told me. And that to me is the most rewarding thing. Thing more so than anything you hang on your wall or pin on your chest or anything else is how you impact and influence people. And so, so for me, reflecting back and looking at why, why, why am I the way I am? Why do I lead the way I lead? And your, your assignment kind of gave me that opportunity. So very valuable.
- [27:53]
B
Yeah, I love that. So as we continue to talk about like reflection and you talk about, you know, it's good to, you know, take a moment to pause, think about kind of your philosophy, what drives you, what's your purpose. What I hear a lot of times too though is I hear that a lot from, we'll say seasoned members, whether it be chief officers or those that are far in their career. But why does it have to be so late in your career, if you will? Like, right, it's like when you have two years left, five years left, you're starting to think about your purpose, your leadership philosophy, how do you influence others? Like I imagine a time where that two year firefighter is thinking about their purpose and how they're going to influence the next 30 years in the fire service. But it's always later on. It's like executive level training. Like I applied for the EFO program earlier this year, way probably way probably the youngest person ever put in for it. You know, was it silly? Sure, maybe it was. I didn't get accepted. But the point of it is like I look at it as when you have people that are trained to be executive level officers, say chief officer, like, don't you want those individuals to be training up to that point when they still have 10 years left or 15 years left not to train up to that point. And now they got a year and a half left and they're gone. So as we talk about, like, you know, knowing your purpose, knowing your philosophy, what drives you, like, how do we get individuals to embrace that kind of philosophy earlier in their career? So, for example, the listeners here, like, reflection's key. Start that now. It doesn't matter if you're six months into the job and all that. So talk about that for a minute.
- [29:18]
A
Yeah, you're 100% spot on. We do a terrible job in the fire service of preparing people to be true authentic leaders in their career. We've, and this is just my opinion and my experiences, but I feel like we've put so much value in a piece of paper that says, oh, you're a fire officer one, you're fire officer two, you're firefighter one. Firefighter two. But really, what does that mean? What, what are we teaching? We don't get into mindfulness. We don't get into true, authentic leadership. I mean, I just finished a certificate of leader servant leadership course through Gonzaga earlier this year and that was fantastic. So what did I do? I immediately, you know, supported anybody that wanted to go through that program and, and talked about it and got the word out there and told our company officers, you know, it. Even for me, that has that perspective later in my career. Wow. They had a way of getting in your head and, and really, really diving deep into your purpose and what servant leadership is. So, yeah, we definitely, it should start. I mean, I just gave a. I don't know what you want to call it, a little speech, you know, get on my soapbox with 14 new recruits.
- [30:37]
B
That, oh, yeah, nice.
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A
Now in the academy and, you know, I always tell them that, you know, which they heard it too, leadership is not rank and that everybody has a responsibility to be a leader, but nobody teaches them that, right? So they may hear that from me. But what does it mean? How do we actually instill that mindset into these youngsters that all they're focused on is, you know, getting a badge, getting off probation, you know. Okay, so, so what about, you know, we have the JTC program, right? We have a few years of, of structured training. How much leadership training is in that, if any?
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B
Right, right.
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A
We absolutely should be planting those seeds. You know, one of the things, I was just talking about this the other day cracks me up. One of the some or some of the funniest memes I've ever seen are making fun of chiefs and there are there's so many of them are so true. I mean, like I said, I've been influenced by poor leadership probably more than by good leaders.
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B
Sure.
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A
And why is that?
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B
Right.
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A
Why. Why aren't we cultivating an environment where that job in the executive level ranks is something people desire to get to someday when their time is right and we don't. We do a terrible job with that.
- [31:56]
B
Yeah. I was in the ELA two years ago. Two, two cohorts ago. And our small group of six, we tackled this challenge. We, we were attached to the challenge or the, the, the adaptive challenge of officer development in, in, in, in the region. Right. So we had not just King county departments represented, but we had, you know, individuals from Bellingham, Pierce county, even Snow county there. But we asked if we can tackle leader development and not just officer development, because as you mentioned, you know, leadership's not a rank. Right. Firefighters need to build leadership skills as well, especially if they're going to become company officers. Right. And so we tackled, you know, a how, first of all, a why and how do we accomplish that in the region? How do we encourage departments to embrace leader development and what does that look like? But this was two years ago. Nothing was adopted even to this point. We know it's challenging, but we also know that it's necessary. Right. I ask this question a lot because we know leader development is important, especially as we navigate further into the fire service in the generation that we're at now. But we're still challenged by implementing. Right. For example, you mentioned jetcal. Like, can we, you know, add some objectives in there where maybe there's a course, maybe a basic four hour course that's added into what we call, what's it called, the, the RSI hours or ASI hours, whatever they're calling it now. Like, like, can we, can we encourage that? You know, it doesn't have to be, you know, all right, 80 hours and boom, starting today. Like, I understand, you know, implementing at a small scale first, but we're not doing that yet either. Right. We recognize that leader development's important at all ranks, but we still haven't done much to bridge that. And I'm not just talking about your night of fire departments. I'm talking about regionally, even across the fire service. But how? So, I mean, obviously we're brainstorming, we're not affecting change right here right now, but how can we start that conversation to say, you know, let's do this, let's, let's start implementing these things?
- [33:48]
A
Yeah, absolutely. I don't have the answer on how to get there.
- [33:53]
B
Yeah.
- [33:54]
A
I think it takes a true servant leader or a student of servant leadership, a lifelong learner themselves, to kind of implement those changes. But at least in my experience, it's been so plagued by either the ego driven, insecure leader or by, you know, somebody that maybe have the qualities of a good leader, but they hold their card so close to their chest. They're not willing to just give all of themselves to everybody out there to make everybody better than they ever were. To me, that's success. Give everybody 100% of yourself, make them better than you ever were. That, that you can, you know, you can walk away feeling like you did a good job.
- [34:31]
B
Yeah. Well, you said something super key too, when you mentioned that you took the mindfulness course at the Gonzaga. And it was great, awesome that you did it, but you came back and you didn't mandate that as part of whatever company officer development now. But you, you, you encouraged others and I'm, I'm assuming supported others, whether it be financially or just, you know, emotionally or, you know, figuratively, hey, I want to support you to go take this course because it was very impactful on me. But that, that's a step. We're talking about steps, right? That's a step. And so at what point does it become budget as well? Now? Right. And let's say okay, you know, because now it's like, okay, I want to support people to now take whatever the course is. Leadership Development 101 from University of Washington. I can support eight people a year to take this course. It's $1,000, it's eight grand for the year, whatever. Right. But it's a start. So is this something that you think can be done?
- [35:25]
A
Oh, I definitely do. Yeah. You know, it. All agencies, all departments are, you know, for the most part, evolving. Right?
- [35:35]
B
Absolutely.
- [35:36]
A
So are people. And, and we have a change in generations and a change in our own generational leadership in, in the department. And I think that it can happen with the right leaders in those positions that understand that, I mean, obviously when you have, you know, the poor leaders at the top of the organization, they're not going to support financially. And, you know, everything in the fire service is, is about budget.
- [36:03]
B
Yes, it is.
- [36:05]
A
So, you know, they're not going to support it, especially if they have any sort of insecurity about somebody else going to a program to learn more that they feel, you know, is a threat to them and their ego. So. So I don't know that it's something as easy as developing A curriculum for Fire Officer 1 and 2 and implementing it. You know, I mean, mindfulness and a mindset and. And true, authentic leadership is. Is something that's probably. I mean, it. You know how it is. It's infectious. Right. Over time you can, you know, it's going to make some changes, but I think it will definitely take some time to have that.
- [36:46]
B
So as we talk about vulnerability, Chief, and you know, I'll ask a question and, you know, bridge it any way you'd like if you're comfortable. But how will over the stuff we just talked about over the last, say, 10 minutes, as we talk about implementing, encouraging and helping budgeting for other people's to prioritize their leader development early, you, as the operations chief, moving forward at your new department, what's something that you are going to prioritize around this topic that we're talking about? Leader development?
- [37:11]
A
Yeah.
- [37:13]
B
At least attempt, right?
- [37:15]
A
Yeah, yeah. First and foremost, it's got to be, you know, I'm going to be a student. I mean, I'm just going to be listening and learning that culture and seeing, you know, talking to everybody, developing those relationships, find out where their strengths and weaknesses are, and then prioritize. I mean, attack it when the problem presents itself, if there is one. And. But, you know, one of the neat things about Twin Falls, I have to admit, I did four interviews, the last. The fourth being a chiefs interview, so that really doesn't count for what I'm saying. But the. The other three interviews I did with panel members, there was not one Twin Falls fire uniform on the panel, not one question about the city, not one question about the fire department. It was made up of different leaders from all over, whether it was within the city, other divisions within the city, or one of the panels had several representatives from other fire agencies across the state and some. Some a great distance away. So when I. When I got to the chief's interview and was asked what I thought the process or how I thought the process went, I said it was interesting. And he's like, well, what do you mean? You know. And so basically what it boils down to is the goal that he is a leader of the department as well as the city. Leadership was looking for good humans that. Because the rest of that is learned, you can learn about the city, you can learn about the department, you can learn all the nuances. But they were looking for people that would fit in a leadership culture. And so all of the questions were centered on leadership, problem solving, ethics. You know, they were all things that were designed to Draw out how you. How you lead. And so I'm excited about that, actually. And then, you know, studying certain things about that, the culture of the city of Twin Falls, you know, they. They view leadership at all levels and that everybody has a voice and an opportunity to lead. And so that, that's refreshing because that's definitely not been my environment. You know, there's been some great leaders at South King and some tremendous people. But, you know, I think, what are we on four fire chiefs in five years now? I mean, just. It's just been rough.
- [39:43]
B
Yeah.
- [39:43]
A
So, yeah, when I get there, I mean, it's my responsibility to. To learn their culture and size up their strengths and weaknesses and collectively come up with priority priorities. And.
- [39:56]
B
Well, you said something refreshing, we'll say, because you had mentioned that when you went through the interview process, it wasn't just stacked with, you know, city of Twin Falls fire department members. Right. And it was. It was just some value to perspectives, value to diverse thought, if you will, or diverse panelists, depending on what, you know, the organization is looking for. Because we don't see that often in the fire service. Meaning, like, right, you apply for, you know, you know, captain's role, training officer. You know, it's. It's four people from your panel that know you very well, you know, and throw biases in there. This person, you know, did a horrible job on this project, so they'd be a bad training officer, you know what I mean? And then vice versa. This person's awesome. That one call, that one call, they went on, now they're gonna be a phenomenal training officer. Right? And it's like, how many? So, but then, you know, executive chief will say, fire chief position is probably a little different. I don't know anything about that. But deputy chief, same thing, right? You're interviewed a lot by, you know, what you did, what you've accomplished, what you know about the organization. But, you know, talking about the refreshing process that you went through is, is you can learn about. You know, I'm very passionate about interview processes. I do a lot of entry level stuff with people. But it's like, are we really looking for the person that can memorize what the organization has, or are we looking for the human being you mentioned? Because they can learn the. The hard skills of the job? Because why, if we trust in our training division, you know, we can teach them. What you can't teach them is, you know, what got them to the 32 years of their life so far and talk about that.
- [41:24]
A
Right?
- [41:25]
B
So.
- [41:25]
A
But yeah, we.
- [41:26]
B
I Like that process that, I mean, that process seems very refreshing and, and yeah, because there's certain things you're not going to be able to teach people, and there's going to be some things that you're going to be able to teach people. Just what do you prioritize more? Right, so shifting gears just a little bit, Chief, you spent a lot of time in the training division, right? You were a training officer. You were on, you know, Washington task force teams, rescue team, safety officer, so on and so forth. I always ask this question because I'm very passionate about training myself. What makes an effective fire service instructor.
- [41:58]
A
I go back to it again, but it's humility. So I'll try to keep this short. But a very good friend of mine, Matt Gilbert, who works at East Pierce, he and I met at a higher level rope rescue training that was held in the Wenatchee area years and years ago. And we, you know, after class were, you know, often talking about the class and the instructors were. Were good at what they, what they do, they were good at their jobs, but they weren't what I would consider a good instructor. They. They had a captive audience. A lot of war stories. You know, here's this, here's that. Seemingly not a very fluid, systematic approach to building blocks of, of some technical skills for the students. And so anyway, we sat there talking about it and, and long story short, we ended up forming a nonprofit training group called Rescue City years and years and years ago, and we built it. It's kind of like some of my leadership journey has been impacted by poor leadership, but we've been so impacted by poor instructors that they can admit when they're wrong or get embarrassed when they make a mistake, or. Let me show you a different way over here. Let me show you this. And conflicting information between the instructor, cadre, and so for me, it boils right back down to that cornerstone again of humility. You have to be humble. And it's funny, you already asked me about some of my failures and stuff, but whenever we did a class and, and we taught a lot of classes all over the Northwest, whenever we did a class and we had our captive audience, besides doing, you know, what we called ground school, basic skills and instruction like that, anytime, you know, we had an opportunity, we talked about our failures, we talked about mistakes we made, we talked about why we do things the way we do and our approach to certain things. And. And it more often than not is because of the mistakes we made. So it wasn't an opportunity to sit up there and Always say peacock and tell you how good we are. It was an opportunity to truly invest 100% into the students because that's what it's about. It's not about you standing up there saying, I'm an instructor and I've got all these credentials and you know, I'm Billy Badass, or however you want to put it. It's about investing 100% into the students and, and making sure that, that they get what they paid for. And so, you know, we had a few things and, and this, this, this bled over into my training officer time. And I spent a lot of years in training with, you know, who I mentioned earlier, Chris Anderson and some other really good guys. And it was 100% about those that we were, we were tasked with training. And so we never got out of class early. That wasn't the deal. We taught at a lot of conferences and a lot of people are done early. And you know, at the, the vendor night and all that stuff, not us. You know, we told students sometimes you get out late. And the other thing is we didn't waste an hour of training having the students clean up. All the instructors did all the cleanup. You know, so with that humility, we talked about our mistakes. We didn't waste time, we didn't waste their time. We took the off duty responsibility of quantifying all the things we did. We did a lot of testing and a lot of different stuff, stuff of our own to, to come back and say, well, here's why we like this, here's why we do this. Not because we're regurgitating some information from somebody else. And you know, that resonates with people over time and even immediately in some cases. But you know, one of the other things too is, and we were pretty big on this, is that we, we weren't any better than them. And, and, and we showed that by if, if. And most of what we did was rope rescue, structure collapse stuff. And in the training division, you know, you're doing all sorts of stuff with fire service. But if the, if the students were in ppe, so were we. If they were in harnesses, we were in harnesses. If they were in helmets, we were in helmets. If, if they're in turnouts, we were in turnouts. I mean, you know, we weren't any better than them. And so, and early on, especially a 40 hour class or you know, some long term instruction, you know, they see that and that resonates. So I think a good instructor is somebody that is humble enough to say, you know, What I, I gotta brush up on this. I don't know. And somebody that does their homework. If you're teaching a specific skill set, like rope rescue, in my case, a lot of times you better know what you're doing and you better have good quantifiable information to back it up. Not just regurgitating what somebody else taught you. And having that humility to, to go out there and be the best you can be for them is, is key.
- [46:55]
B
Yes.
- [46:56]
A
And to be approachable. I mean, if you're not, they're gonna shut down.
- [47:03]
B
Yep.
- [47:04]
A
You know they're gonna shut down on you.
- [47:06]
B
Yeah. Well, so I lean on this sometimes, especially with individuals that are very passionate in the training realm, in the mentorship realm.
- [47:14]
A
Is, is this everything you said?
- [47:16]
B
So you mentioned? I'm just going to highlight some words that you said, investing 100% in them. Them being the students, the audience. Obviously we don't get out early because. Why? Well, because they're, they're there and they deserve all of, not just the attention but the information in what they're supposed to get out of it. Right. And I've, I've seen this in classes. Right. I've taught as well. It's like, you know, when you fail somebody out of a class, when they flunk out of the academy, whatever it may be, they were unable to get the promotion because they didn't score well enough, you have to look back at the processes.
- [47:46]
A
Okay.
- [47:46]
B
During the class that you had, that 40 hour class, I mean, they actually only spent 32 hours in the class because the final day they got out, you know, eight hours early. So it's like you, you, you cheated them of their time is what it comes down to. Right. So it comes down to something very basic. Right. Lead by example. Right. I mean, if you are setting the example of getting out early, well, then what you're saying is you've left eight hours of competence and training on the table. Right. And so, so, but the reason I'm going to say this, what I'm going to say is sometimes we lack in the training the trainer. So here's an example. Sometimes we'll apply for a position, we'll use recruit academy instructor. I was a recruit academy instructor multiple times you showed up that day. Not, not ensure I went through an interview process. Not ensuring that I knew the firefighter fundamentals or that I was an approachable type instructor. Not that, you know, I was competent in the skills that I was then going to be, have to be able to teach over the next 16 weeks. It was just because I interviewed well, and. Or it's your turn, so to speak, or no one else interviewed for the spot. So here you go. And so we. But we do that all the time in the fire service. There's some areas better than others. We'll use rescue technician, confined space, rope rescue, like. Right. I've seen it to where those instructors, not only have they gone through the training, but they've shadowed training. It took like, whatever task book to become an instructor. I mean, that's. That's where we need to be, but that doesn't reflect in all the avenues of where we're at. But it's frustrating too, right? It's frustrating because you see people unsuccessful, you see people flunk out of the academy, and it's like, well, did we do. Did we put our best foot forward in setting up those people for success? And sometimes the answer is no.
- [49:19]
A
Right, Right.
- [49:19]
B
But it takes humility. Like you say, you talked about that a lot today. It takes humility to get to the point. Point to say, you know what? We didn't do the best that we could. Sometimes we're not reflecting. We talk about reflection today. Sometimes we're just like, well, it just, you know, it's on to the next one. And it's just like, oh, man, we. We need to be better than that.
- [49:36]
A
Absolutely.
- [49:37]
B
I mean, I guess just to go a little further into that, like, what can we do to be better? You know, because we're not. Okay, here's the last piece I'll say about instructors. When we became firefighters, we weren't necessarily getting into the job to be instructors or teachers. Right. Teachers go to school to become educ. But we became firefighters, and we, you know, went to the academy. We gained so many hard skills of the job. But in our development, like all. All firefighters and all company officers are training officers. Right. We have to train our crews. We also have to mentor those that are behind us. But not all of us were set up to be successful as mentors, but we have that role.
- [50:19]
A
Yeah.
- [50:20]
B
How can we embrace that better moving forward?
- [50:23]
A
I think it needs to be an expectation. You know, I'm real big on expectations anyway, so, you know, as. As the. Whether it's executive leadership or whatever it is, or the, you know, the training chief, whatever. But what are your expectations? What level of performance do you want out of both your. Your students coming through and your instructors? And to your point, I think that we fail instructors all the time because we take, again, that certificate course. Instructor 1, Instructor 2 guess what? You're you're supposed to be a good instructor now. And we don't. We don't teach the mindset and the philosophy of what that really means and the responsibility you have as an instructor for those that are there to seek what you're, you know, offering them. I mean, that's a big responsibility.
- [51:12]
B
Agreed.
- [51:13]
A
So we do a terrible job at setting instructors up for success.
- [51:16]
B
Yeah, yeah, I, Yeah. Without getting too much, because this gets published, you know, publicly, I won't. I won't dive too much into that, because I do have extra thoughts on that. But, yes, I think it just, it does come down to humility, both from the. The leadership standpoint, but the individual standpoint to be able to say, you know what, maybe I'm not as effective as I should be, but how can I become a better instructor? So the next academy, we'll say I am a better instructor versus status quo. All right, bring on the next one.
- [51:48]
A
Right. And leaders, the people that are responsible for that end result, the number one priority should be, how can we do it better? Where did we fail? Let's do it better not, you know, reflecting on what was good.
- [52:03]
B
Right.
- [52:03]
A
You know, that, that's, that should be, you know, the, The. The known that something's going to be good out of this. What. What are we not seeing? How can we do it better? Should be the number one priority coming out of anything that you do or you're tasked with, you know, delivering information to other people.
- [52:23]
B
Yeah, absolutely. Couldn't agree more. So as we talk about tangibles here, Chief, we always want to get some tangibles for the listeners. If you could give one piece of advice, and I know it's like, oh, man, I got like, five. But try to think of the one advice you'd give for young leaders in the fire service today around the stuff we talked about, whether it be, you know, facing adversity or leading to adversity, humility, reflection. Just one piece of advice that you'd give and encourage the new young leaders to start doing or adopting. What would it be?
- [52:52]
A
God, there's so much there because I look back at what's helped me. Things aren't always obvious in the moment. You know, we talk about the adversities and, And I've. I've had a lot and, you know, I talk about 2014, for me, was a major turning point, but I didn't realize it until later. So if I could. If I could bottle up some of that and give it to young, young members in the fire service and those that, you know, aspire to be leaders is, you know, put yourself out there, open yourself up. The humility is number one. I, I said it again and again and again, but open yourself up. If you're super confident and super comfortable, then take a look at yourself. Some of the tools that really helped me was trying try to define your purpose. And even if you don't want to, try to define your purpose in life and with your relationships. And I got my 30 year wedding anniversary coming up in November and it's like, wow, how did we get there? If you're having a hard time defining your purpose in life, then just what is your purpose in the fire service? You know, just to find that. And, and for me is that reflection has, you know, opened up my mind to kind of trying to figure it all out. And it helps, you know, put definition to certain things and paths I've taken and gives me a better understanding of me. I mean, everybody thinks that it's inherent that you know yourself better than anyone else, but really when you, when you start to dive into your purpose and developing your own set of standards or your own creed, that's you, you realize quickly you don't really know much about yourself.
- [54:33]
B
You know, I agree, it's. If you mentioned 2014 many times and individuals go through, you know, milestones in their career, things that we'll call maybe a pivot in their career, a decision, something that kind of was like that you can attribute to. Yep, it was that point in time or that decision or whatever it may be that really kind of put me on this path. Talk a little bit about what was a major pivot in your career and why do you attribute it to that?
- [54:58]
A
Yeah, for me, you know, part of that reflection component, looking back at a single person or a single event, pivotal moment, all of that is just really non existent for me. But when I look back and reflect on 2014, it was, it was very evident to me now. So that that's when I was promoted. I was in training division and then got promoted to a lieutenant in January 2014 and shortly after. And for me, my drive to promote was wanting to be the person that I always wanted to work for. So I saw it as an opportunity and of course I had people in my ear and other, you know, quote unquote mentors and things like that, that, that encouraged it and you know, that I could confide in and kind of get a little more of the backstory, not this drive to promote. So for me, it kind of began my official leadership journey. But shortly after, in, in March, I was deployed. So. So I was a new lieutenant and then deployed with Washington Task Force One to the OSO Mudslide. And we were the first rotation that was there. It was there for two weeks. I was almost immediately charged with leading a squad. So I joke about it, but like, hey, a field promotion. I actually got one. So. So we had a lot of different dynamics going on with that. I could talk an entire entire podcast just on that event on. On things that we learned. But it's where I really, really started to see how important relationships were and service to others. We had everything from affected family members searching for loved ones to, you know, just uncredentialed, unsolicited volunteers that wanted to serve. And we were there days before any sort of security was. Was set to prevent. You know, lots of people in and out of there. And we were an active squad, as were most squads in that first rotation. Lots of human remains recoveries. And we worked very closely with civilians. And it really resonated with me, our actions with the civilians. You know, they. There's, you know, within the. The first moments of coming up on people that had already been there a couple days digging and searching, seeing us walking up with, you know, because when you're deployed with the task force, you're wearing a FEMA patch. They don't know that. We're predominantly firefighters and law enforcement officers that are just, you know, trying to do the best we can do to help them. And. And thankfully, Washington's mindset, Task Force One's mindset has always been, you know, we're there to help. It's not a lot of ego exists in that team, which is real comforting to see. And this was my first deployment, so coming out of that. And again, I could talk for an hour at least on those experience in dealing with people and what I witnessed others and how they served people. I mean. Jeff Negretti is retired from Bellevue Fire. Amazing. There's a YouTube video of him, American Red Cross Hero Award, talking about some of the stuff he did simply by, you know, giving people food and clean socks and stuff like that that have been there for days with no sleep. And here we are for. Fully supported, right? We have all of the, you know, the support systems in place for our team. So putting people first, even though you're there wearing your federal patch and you're there on a rescue team and blah, blah, blah. So that. That started to really open up my. My eyes on the impacts you have in this job with people in. In how kindness and service to others independent of Your rank or your position or your patch on how you influence people for the rest of their lives. So fast forward, you know, I got back in April from that and then in May again, another long story short, my father in law got in a car wreck, had a traumatic head bleed, unconscious, unresponsive, up on the phone in the middle of the night, making determinations. And this was in right outside of Twin Falls, Idaho, making a decision to fly them to Boise. And all this is so this back and forth and then we made arrangements to get my wife on a flight and get her over to Boise and, and then I had the kids got them, they were high school at the time and, and they made the decision they were gonna, you know, the, the proverbial pulled the plug off life support. And so all the family was getting there and so I went to the school, pulled the kids out of class, told them what was going on, told them I'm leaving, driving to be with my wife and her family over there. Halfway there, halfway there, outside of Baker City, Oregon, I get a phone call from the on duty battalion chief that says Tacoma police is looking for me. And by the way, my brother was a law enforcement officer in Los Angeles and then he lateraled up to the same city I worked in, in Federal Way and he lived in Tacoma. So, so he, he tells me and gives me the number of the, the police officer. And so I pull over to rest stop and call him back. And that's when he advised me that my brother had died by suicide. So, you know, here I am, you know, in, you know, literally halfway between my family who's still in western Washington, my wife's family who's in Idaho with my father in law, my brother passing away on the exact same day. So I was at a loss, I didn't know what to do. I mean, here I am, been a problem solver for a lot of years, you know, everybody else's problems and then here I have this tremendous impact on our families and I don't even know what the hell to do. You know, some of the things I reflect back on that have helped shape my character in the way that I lead and treat people is how I was treated. Some very close friends of mine did some amazing things. Here I am, you know, you know how it is, you know, families of law enforcement, military, whatever, whenever that uniforms walking up to your front porch, you know, it's never a good thing. And so having a very close friend of mine who just got promoted to assistant chief in South King, by the way, by the way Eric Sucel.
- [61:49]
B
Okay, Okay. I don't know.
- [61:50]
A
He was a BC for a long time. Ten years, I think. You know, he's very close to my family, and he bared that burden of knocking on that door. And I look back and I'm like, God, why did I make him do that? You know, why didn't I just let, you know? The police department goes, go tell my mom. And I don't know, I wasn't thinking at the time, but there's no doubt. I know for a fact that that's, you know, affected him. Great.
- [62:19]
B
Absolutely. Yeah.
- [62:20]
A
And then my dad was fishing in La Push out of cell service range, and so another firefighter, friend of our families drove all the way to La Push in the middle of the night, knocked on my dad's camper door, you know, so all. All of these things transpired in that moment. And when I finally talked to my mom, she said, I got a lot of support here. Go be with your wife. So I headed to Idaho, and that was the longest. I mean, it. It should have only been, what, eight and a half hours? And I think it was 11 and a half, 12 hours for me. It was. It was amazing. So. So anyway, and that's. That's a snapshot.
- [63:04]
B
Yeah, right.
- [63:05]
A
Both the OSO deployment and my own personal family, you know, tragedy that occurred. So now I'm on extended bereavement leave, and my department was amazing. My crew, I was at six fours at the time. My crew is amazing. I mean, they. They did so much for my family. It was. We didn't. We didn't do anything. We did nothing as far as funeral arrangements, everything was done by my crew and in conjunction with Federal Way Police as well. They were awesome to work with. So we just focused on all of us. And so fast forward, you know, a few months, I come back to work and again, a new lieutenant, who, quite frankly, had been off for quite a.
- [63:55]
B
While.
- [63:57]
A
Have my crew. I'm out of training division at the time and back on my crew and. And on the rescue team at 64s. And so we got tapped out to a river rescue down in Renton on the cedar. And the first arriving crews did a legit rescue. Pulled an adult female out. There was rumors that a kid was still missing. So we get there, everything's established. We get a briefing, and our crew of four swift water techs get split up. And so myself and my firefighter get tasked with doing a boat search on certain strainers downriver. But right before we're ready to launch and we're with two other very seasoned veteran swift water technicians that are, that are kind of known in the water world. And we get, we get asked if we could drop a crew off on the far side of the river to set up an anchor for they were going to do some sort of a tension diagonal or boat high line or something. In my gut I knew it wasn't right. I knew it wasn't right. Looking at the trajectory of the flow of the river and everything else, there was no way that after going on the far side of the river, dropping them off that we were going to be able to get back into the flow that we desired to avoid certain strainers. And it was pretty high flows at the time and a lot of strainers. So again, long story short, we did it. I said nothing. I did not trust my gut. I didn't speak up to the veterans that were, you know, oh yeah, yeah, we'll take you over there, all that kind of stuff. So lo and behold, we accomplish that task, drop those guys off, and then we start back on the original mission and didn't make it. And we contacted a, a long fir tree that was down in the river, a strainer if you will. And the boat turned sideways, started to pillow and flipped. Three of us went into the strainer. One was able to get on top. And so it was myself, my firefighter and then another one of the other agency responders that was there. And, and I can remember it like yesterday, you know, here I am months, just a few months beyond my, and, and my brother that passed away is my only brother and almost, you know, got killed. I got stuck in that strainer. I remember it vividly. I was pawing at the gravel on the, on the river bottom and thankfully where we got pillowed and the boat got stuck was at the end of the tree where the branches are not as robust as they are towards the base of the tree. And a branch snapped and you know, it seemed like eternity, but really it was, it was not long at all. Branch snapped, I went through, was able to grab self rescue kind of thing. But I'm looking and I don't see my firefighter anywhere. And so I'm, I'm freaking out. And she, she popped up finally, but got swept down river and got hung up on another strainer. It impacted her in her chest. Her head was out of the water thankfully. And then downstream containment worked and they were able to assist her and got her, got her off that. But the bottom line is 2014 was a huge wake up call for Me, it was not only me witnessing my own actions on other people, it was witnessing other people's actions for me and my family. And then it was, you know, being a victim of not a big group, but basically group think and not, you know, you know, I'm a new again, paralyzed by humility. Right. Like, oh, I'm not gonna speak up. These guys are veterans. And, and the result of that was I almost got myself killed and, and my firefighter killed. Who, who, you know, I'm tasked with leading. And there's a component of, you know, we all have ownership, as we said earlier. Yeah, there's a component of, of it's my responsibility. And so just huge, huge lessons learned for me over that time.
- [68:06]
B
Yeah.
- [68:07]
A
You know, that's, that's the, that's the snapshot of that.
- [68:10]
B
Wow. Yeah. Yeah, I can imagine. First of all, thank you for sharing all that. And 2014, obviously pivotal year.
- [68:17]
A
Yeah.
- [68:17]
B
For you. But I mean, some highlights that you talk about is you as we talked today about, you know, service to other people, but you, you hit on it so well when you talked about serving others, but then also having the experience of having other serve you and knowing what that feels like and you know, how to be able to replicate that in the way that you serve in the future. But then also, you know, taking those experiences because not everybody does experience. Let's say the. You called it, I think you called it like a wake up call. Not everyone will encounter those, but not everyone need to encounter something like that to really have a wake up call. Right. Proactive thinking, proactive training, proactive leadership development, we'll call it is, is critical because 99 of us aren't going to have those traumatic events, whether it be a call or training event or something that help us get that wake up call. We need to be living in the, in the proactive moment and say, let's develop each other and ourselves and not wait for the moment to have that wake up call. And I think that's where we need to live as leaders and as future leaders to put ourselves in that better space. Because why wait? And the thing that I, I talk about too is sometimes we don't get to become the a statistic. Meaning like if you ever, if you're so proactive in your efforts, whether it be in training and development, whatever it may be, you never become a statistic of the what if. And so it's hard to quantify, which is hard because some people, they need that quantified. Well, you're spending so much money in this is it really necessary? And it's like, well, yes, it is. Because if not, you then bring up the what ifs. Yep. And how many times in those what if situations does it end with I should have done X? You know, and so thank you for sharing the 2014 reflection because it's critical as a leader and in your case, brand new formal leader, being a newer lieutenant and going through the traumas and events that you did go through and to become, to, to get to the other, you know, the end of all that and reflect on it many years later and say, wow, you know, I went through a lot, but it shaped who I am and I can, I could talk about these things because these things shape us as leaders 100%.
- [70:36]
A
And to your point earlier in our conversation is how do you bottle that up?
- [70:39]
B
Yeah.
- [70:40]
A
How do you bottle that up and let it resonate with somebody else that is beginning their leadership journey? I mean, I have no idea.
- [70:49]
B
Right.
- [70:51]
A
I don't know how to achieve that. But some of that is what we're missing is that mindset shift.
- [70:58]
B
Yeah. And I think that's what we, we need to do as leaders, too, is, is to continue to, I don't want to say drive the narrative, but continue to have those conversations. We'll say we talk about conversations a lot on this show is sometimes it's, it's a conversations we have at the kitchen table. Sometimes it's, you know, sharing our leadership stories. But it's only effective if you will. If you're an individual that's. We'll go back to the word approachable. If people are going to come up to you and say, hey, share more with me. I'm here to listen. Or, you know, you're an individual that, you know, is always willing to, you know, mentor and to lead, you know, teach me more, you know, and if we're not those leaders, we're not going to have the opportunity to share our experiences and reflect and affect, you know, the future. And so it just goes to, you know, kind of everything that we're talking about.
- [71:45]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [71:47]
B
Let's get to this piece here. Your favorite book that you would recommend our listeners pick up because it was highly influential on you and, you know, it'd be influential on them.
- [71:56]
A
Yeah. It's almost, you know, it's funny, but again, this was a long time ago. So for me, it was the very first formal leadership book that I picked up and got into. And it was extreme ownership. And, you know, I, I'm one of those, that, that kind of, I don't know how to explain it best, but, you know, I'd rather read the impactful book that nobody's heard of than something that's gotten so popular that everybody's, you know, you know, buying it off the shelf. But back then, it really wasn't as popular as it is now, or was at one time. But extreme ownership resonated with me. First and foremost. I enjoy military history type stuff and military leadership. I mean, you look back and even in the book they talk about, you know, sensu and just the, the leadership that existed, you know, centuries ago.
- [72:51]
B
Yeah.
- [72:53]
A
But it taught me something that I really had never put much thought to about owning your world, owning everything in your world. And, and that, that to me is directly related to, to my approach to leadership with humility is that, you know, you got to own it and nobody's perfect. So, so, so what if you make a mistake? So what if you fail? So what if, you know, something happens that isn't exactly the way you wanted it to go? Own it.
- [73:24]
B
Yeah.
- [73:24]
A
And move on.
- [73:26]
B
Agreed. Agreed. And it's, I can see how it can be hard because as we talked about ownership and everyone's responsible in owning everything. And it's hard when, let's just use the example of you have a subordinate, we'll say, that has adopted ownership and extreme ownership, but their immediate supervisor does not.
- [73:46]
A
Right.
- [73:46]
B
It can be hard. Right. Because they hold on here I've owned everything, but no one else around me does. So it can be hard. But that's not an excuse to discontinue ownership, right?
- [73:56]
A
Yep.
- [73:57]
B
I mean, it's, it's, it's just got to be a part of your repertoire. It's got to be your mindset because you got to live in that world where you got to own it. You do. And I, yeah, my mother in law bought me Extreme Ownership. I think it was a Christmas present, 2014 or 15, whenever the book came out. And I was just like, ah, what is this? Right. And I actually had the book. It was probably a good nine months before I actually read it. So this brand new book. But, but yeah, it was one of those things where, you know, it's, it's very highly popular now. But I'm glad I read it. I'm glad I read it back then.
- [74:26]
A
So.
- [74:27]
B
Well, Chief, with. You're here today because Ryan Dupro, obviously South King Fire and Rescue reached out to me and said, would you reach out to Chief Smith to be a guest on the show? And that's how we're here today. So I Want to thank you very much for spending your time with us today, but to continue the leadership conversation right on this podcast. And just in general, is there someone else out there that you would like us to reach out to, to bring onto the show to add their perspective on leadership?
- [74:54]
A
There is. You know, I had a couple people in mind, and the more I thought about it, I'm gonna distill it down to one. He's gonna absolutely kill me. Anyway, just. Just like my first reaction to Ryan, to prob.
- [75:07]
B
Yeah, right, right.
- [75:08]
A
You did what?
- [75:09]
B
Most people do say that too. They're like, wait, wait, hold on here.
- [75:15]
A
But. But actually, no, I have a tremendous amount of respect for Ryan and what he's. You know, I mean, I'm. I'm humbled by him reaching out to you, so I truly want to thank him. It's been awesome experience, but. And ironically, another Ryan, Ryan Power of Spokane County Fire District 3. He's. He's somebody that I often, over the years, he. He was a. A student in one of the Rescue City classes years ago, and he was like you. You kind of mentioned earlier, one of those guys that, hey, teach me more. Hey, what about, you know, asking a lot of questions and. And a phenomenal public servant who has an amazing family and an ability to balance his professional and personal life to where it's, you know, at the appropriate levels everything should be at. And I know it's not easy, but him and I, over the years have gotten into some pretty. Pretty good leadership discussions, and he's. He's made some big life changes, decisions with different agencies and things like that that I. I've always appreciated his perspective. And. And he's. He's definitely somebody that I would recommend.
- [76:25]
B
Awesome. Well, to continue the show, we can only continue it by continuing to bring on leaders from. From our guests. I can only think of so many, and, you know, my. My list runs out, so I'm glad that we can continue this conversation. So I'll reach out to Deputy Chief Ryan Power to see if he'd be willing to take up challenge of Deputy Chief Shane Smith. So. Okay. Awesome. I love it. I love it. So thank you so much for your time. So, before we close, today's conversation on, you know, adversity, being uncomfortable, you know, you know, leading by, you know, with humility and reflection, mistakes, career failures, all that. What would you like as your lasting leadership thoughts for the listeners before we close?
- [77:08]
A
Being humble and okay with you not being perfect. In other words, suppressing your insecurities is strength. I mean, it is 100% strength. You don't have to hide behind a rank or a position or where you think you should be at this point in your career compared to where you are. Be authentic, be real. You know, be an open book, be transparent, communicate often. And, and in time, you'll see the fruit of your labor. You'll see that you, you know, you know, that whole. You're the sum of the people you associate with. You know, I have an incredible circle of friends and colleagues just based on, you know, experiences with them, with, with those principles that I lead by some amazing people doing amazing work that will no doubt be great leaders, because I've been real with them, you know, been authentic. And I think that that's. That's probably the. The biggest takeaway is, is be authentic.
- [78:19]
B
You know, thank you, everybody, for tuning in today to the kitchen table. We truly 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, stay curious.