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808 with the founder, Ernie Colling. or go to
transcendcompany .com. Welcome to the Behind
the Shield podcast. As always, my name is James
Gearing, and this week it is my absolute honor
to welcome on the show 23 -year veteran of the
U .S. Army, Lieutenant Colonel Retired Oakland
McCulloch. Now, in this conversation, we discuss
a host of topics, from his journey into West
Point, Operation Desert Storm, supporting operations
in Bosnia, peacekeeping in Kosovo, disaster relief,
the importance of courage in leadership, writing,
and so much more. Now, before we get to this
incredible conversation, as I say every week,
please just take a moment, go to whichever app
you listen to this on, subscribe to the show,
leave feedback, and leave a rating. Every single
five -star rating truly does elevate this podcast,
therefore making it easier for others to find.
And this is a free library of well over 1 ,000
episodes now. So all I ask in return is that
you help share these incredible men and women's
stories so I can get them to every single person
on planet Earth who needs to hear them. So with
that being said, I introduce to you, Oak McCulloch.
Enjoy. Well, Oak, I want to start by saying thank
you so much for taking the time and coming on
the Behind the Shield podcast today. Yeah, what?
Since we talked, I've been looking forward to
this. This is going to be a great show. I'm really
looking forward to it. Great conversation. Likewise.
All right, well, then let's start at the very
beginning. Where on planet Earth are we finding
you today? Yeah, so I live in Daytona Beach,
Florida now. Grew up in Northern Illinois, so
I'm just a dumb farm boy, which is why I live
in Florida, because I'm never living through
winters like that ever again. It's not going
to happen. Well, let's start in Illinois then.
So tell me where you were born and tell me a
little bit about your family dynamic, what your
parents did, how many siblings. So I was actually
born in Tennessee, Loudon, Tennessee, but we
moved to Northern Illinois when I was about three,
I think, right around that time. I can't remember
when we moved, but I remember that we did move
there. So most of my life, young life, I remember
living in Illinois. My parents, my father never
finished the eighth grade. My mother never finished
the 10th grade. He was a factory worker most
of my life. I worked on farms as a kid, but he
was a factory worker, worked long hours, provided
very well for us. My mom stayed at home for the
first part of my childhood, and then she went
to work in a factory. And eventually my father
bought a bar in the small little farm town that
I grew up in called Kirkland, Illinois. 1 ,200
people. And when I say small, I mean everybody
knew everybody. I always sit and tell people
I used to do something bad on my way home from
school. And I only walked. My house was six blocks
from the school. By the time I got home, my dad
already knew what I had done. So everybody knew
everybody and had no problems telling on you.
But yeah, it was a small little farm town. Loved
growing up there. I wouldn't trade any of it.
It was a great place to grow up. The rest of
your question, I had an older sister. She died
when she was six and I was four of leukemia.
And so then I became the oldest. And then I had
three younger brothers. I have a brother that's
two years younger than me. I have a brother that's
seven years younger than me, and he passed away
about four years ago. And then I got a brother
that's 12 years younger than me. So, you know,
when my wife and I got married, he was 12 years
old. But actually, I'm probably closer to him
now than I am any of them. When you reflect back,
what impact did losing your sister have on you
and your parents? Because that must have been
absolutely horrendous. Yeah. So obviously more
impact on my mom than than any of the rest of
us. And now she's buried two children, which
I can't even fathom. I mean, that just blows
my mind. But but I remember, you know, I kind
of even at that age of four, I realized that.
things had changed, that I was the oldest now.
I was kind of responsible for, at that point,
I just had one younger brother. And that just
kind of stepped up a little bit, which kind of
took me down that road of leadership, I think.
I think I started it at that point, not knowing
it at that point, but kind of, as I look back
on it, I think that's probably when it all started.
That community that you had in the actual town
itself, what are your perceptions of that environment
versus a lot of the kind of urban suburban sprawls
that we live in now? Because when I think about
the loneliness that you hear from people that
are surrounded by millions of people, I feel
like once we kind of disconnected from those
smaller communities is where a lot of the human
issues started arising. Oh, I absolutely agree
with you. I can remember as a kid. We used to
block off the street and we'd have a street party.
All the people in the community, you know, in
the neighborhood, they would all come out. We'd
all take our dish to pass or whatever it was
that they did. And there was food laid out there.
We played in the street. We did games. We knew
our neighbors, you know. It just amazes me moving
around as an army officer. Most of the time.
my wife and family and i lived on post but every
once while they didn't have post housing or we
didn't want to live on post and we lived off
post and i remember one time we were in maryland
moved into this community it was about 35 40
years old and the person that lived next to us
and the person across the street had lived there
since the very beginning of the community 30
something years they had never had dinner together
never They didn't even talk. And it wasn't until
I had my promotion party, I got promoted to major
and I had a promotion party and invited everybody
in the neighborhood that they finally connected.
And then they actually liked each other. And
there's a concept. But, you know, I think when
we stopped doing that, when we stopped having
those community type things, I think we did lose
something. And my wife and I have lived in two
older houses in our lives. since since uh i was
my last assignment on active duty and then when
i retired and they both had a big front porch
and our thing was if we're sitting on the front
porch we're open for business come on up sit
down have a beer have a drink talk whatever you
want to do so i think we've got to get back to
more of that uh i one of the problems i see in
bedroom communities and those types of communities
is people come home from a long day work. They
drive in the garage, they shut the garage door
and they never come out. And so they don't even
know their neighbors. They couldn't even tell
you their names. Yeah, there's a couple of houses
on my street. I've never even seen them. It's
bizarre. I know people are living in the houses,
but I've never seen the actual human beings that
are in there because I think they do the same
thing. They drive in, the door closes behind
them. And so I don't know if they're like, you
know, smuggling drugs or if they're just really
shy, but whatever the reason, I mean, I've been
here for several years now. It's bizarre. Yeah.
Yeah. We got to get back to building communities
and people getting to know each other, you know,
and that. That goes one step further. If we start
doing that again, then people will care about
their neighbors and help them out when they need
help, whether it's a little bit of financial
or helping them put up their hurricane shutters
or helping cut their grass when they need to
because maybe somebody's sick and they can't
do it. That all went away when we stopped having
communities. When you look back at the time on
the farm, I grew up on a farm, and there's a
lot of discomfort in growing up on a farm. The
hard work itself, the rain, the cold, getting
kicked by animals. What elements of that upbringing
served you well when you got into uniform? The
self -discipline part of it, for sure. I started
working on this guy's farm. It was a dairy farm
when I was 12 years old. You know, he would come
into town, pick me and another young man up.
And the other guy was about two years older than
me, probably. And he'd take us out there. We'd
milk the cows. Then he'd feed us breakfast. Then
we'd go out and work in the fields, do whatever,
bale hay or whatever he needed us to do, feed
the cows, whatever. And then we'd come in, have
lunch. Then we'd go back out to the field, do
whatever he'd bring us in. We'd have dinner and
then he'd take us home. And and so I just remember
the discipline piece of it, the self -discipline
to get up in the mornings to, you know, go to
work on those days. And and just he was one of
those guys that could fix anything, you know,
with with bailing wire and a pair of pliers.
He could fix anything on the farm. He was just
amazing guy. he uh he was probably in his easily
in his 60s at that point uh but maybe even older
and uh and just taught us like one day we were
bailing hay and we had a loaded trailer of hay
and he said oh jump in that truck and drive that
to the barn i said fred i said i'm 12 years old
He said, I don't care. Get in the truck and drive
it to the barn. So that was the first vehicle
I ever drove. I learned how to drive out there
on the farm. Yeah, I learned on several vehicles,
a dump truck, and then my dad's a vet. So their
veterinary kind of van that they had to move
animals around. And yeah, it's a pretty good
place to get some experience behind the wheel.
Right. Yeah. And just the work ethic, you know,
that you worked till the job was done. If that
meant we were done at 6 o 'clock after dinner,
we went home. If there was still more work to
do, we'd go back out after dinner and he'd take
us home when we were done. But that stuck in
my mind, the work ethic. Finish what needs to
be done today so that tomorrow we can start fresh.
And again, I think that's something that has
gone from a lot in our society today. Absolutely.
What about sports and exercise? What were you
doing and playing in the school age? Yeah, so
as a young kid, I played baseball and basketball.
Started in Little League and worked my way up
and played basketball in school. And then high
school, I played basketball, baseball and football
and was always the captain of my team. So I think,
again, go back to the leadership piece. I think
it started, certainly got some early development
there as the captain. of the teams um and i played
college baseball and i had i had scholarships
to play for very small schools um i had a scholarship
to play basketball and i had two scholarships
to play football um but i chose baseball and
so that's what i chose to do at the college level
and and and loved every minute of it again the
the motivation piece the self -discipline piece
the um The work ethic of being an athlete certainly
has stuck with me throughout my entire life and
had great benefits for me throughout my time
in the military. What about career aspirations?
As you were progressing through the school ages
and into college, were you envisioning yourself
as a professional athlete or was there another
career in mind prior to the military? Well, you
know, I think every young... man who plays sports
has a dream that maybe they would want to play
in the NFL or the NBA or the Major League Baseball.
And I certainly did. I thought I would love to
be in the Major League Baseball, but I quickly
realized that that wasn't going to happen. As
good as I was, I wasn't that good. I wasn't good
enough to play in the Major League Baseball.
senior level. I might have been in a minor league
for a few years, and I think I could have done
that, but I'm not sure that I could have ever
broken into the Major League Baseball. But, you
know, I quickly realized that that wasn't going
to happen. And I think I was a sophomore in high
school when I kind of, the thought of being an
officer in the Army entered my mind, and I started
pursuing ways to make that happen. I applied
to West Point. I applied to all the academies,
but I applied to West Point. I applied for ROTC
scholarships to all the services. And I got accepted
to all the academies, except the Air Force Academy.
They didn't want me. And I got accepted for all
the ROTC scholarships, except the Air Force ROTC.
They didn't want me. For some reason, the Air
Force didn't want me. which is fine with me.
It worked out better anyway. But I got accepted
to West Point Naval Academy, Merchant Marine
Academy, Coast Guard Academy. I got accepted
to all those. And so I really did start down.
I had already come to the conclusion that that
was the right path for me and that I was probably
going to make a career out of it, whichever service
I pick. So what was that initial on -ramp like
for you? Where did you find yourself kind of
assigned, which role? And then what was the either
great leaders or poor leaders that you had early
in your career? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Well, I started
off, you know, I went to my office. I got commissioned
as an infantry officer. And I went to my officer
basic course at Fort Benning in Georgia. Then
it was the school for boys. Now it's. You know,
it's mixed gender, so boys and girls. But then
it was this guy in the infantry, and so I went
there for my six -month basic course. Went to
Ranger School, got hurt, didn't graduate from
Ranger School, so they sent me to my first unit,
which was Fort Stewart, Georgia, because my wife
was already in the Army. She was an Army nurse
at that point. She got commissioned about six
months before I did, so she was already at Fort
Stewart working at the hospital there. So I showed
up, and there were three of us lieutenants, infantry
lieutenants, who showed up that day. Same time.
We all walked in. I mean, within five minutes
of each other, we all walked into the in -processing
G1. And they told us, they said, there's only
one platoon leader spot. The other two, you're
going to go to work on a staff until a platoon
leader spot comes open. And so they took us down
there, and we interviewed with the battalion
commander. And for whatever reason, he picked
me to be the platoon leader, and the other two
went to the staff. And I remember Colonel Snipe,
great leader, very smart man, very tactically
sound, very fair, and a servant leader, which
kind of took me down that path. to to understand
that that was the right leadership to be second
battalion commander not so good um so so you
know you just never know who you're going to
get there's there's good and bad people in every
profession and and you just got to understand
that and but but having said that you still learn
from those people you learn what not to do you
learn other ways to do things. So I think you
just got to keep your mind open, even when you
got a bad leader, to still learn what you can
from those people. Absolutely. Well, then what
about deployments? Was Desert Storm the first
time you deployed, certainly out there? That
was the first wartime or that type of deployment.
My first actual deployment, besides the National
Training Center, which technically it... is a
training deployment my first real deployment
was hurricane hugo in charleston uh because we
were so close to them they activated us and we
went up there and uh i was uh at that point i
was an itv platoon leader i believe uh there's
dayton myself because that vehicle hasn't been
around for a long time um and and they drove
us up there in buses and we got to the, there
was, they had to stay at the old Charleston Naval,
a building that had been abandoned and it looked
like it had been abandoned both inside and out.
I don't, we didn't have any running water, no
electricity. I mean, it was basically camping
inside of a building. And there were, my platoon,
we were in one room. So there was, here's 30,
25. men sleeping in this one room on their sleeping
bags and um and and so then the next morning
they took us took us me and my platoon to this
warehouse and they said okay lieutenant you and
your platoon is going to run this warehouse and
i said i'm an infantry lieutenant i know nothing
about running a warehouse and my battalion commander
looked at me and said figure it out lieutenant
He got back in the vehicle and drove away. And
we did. We figured it out. Between me and the
platoon sergeant and my junior NCOs, we kind
of figured out what we had to do and came up
with a plan on how to do it. And we did it. What
were some of the things that you remember from
that time? Obviously, we've had more recent hurricanes.
There's been more and more coverage, social media,
all that kind of thing. A lot of times, those
disasters, there's that heartbreaking element,
but there's also a... An amazing response when
it comes to community and people coming together
again. So what do you recall from that deployment?
Yeah, the first thing I recall, again, having
grown up in middle America, in northern Illinois,
I had no idea what hurricanes were. I knew what
tornadoes were. I used to live through a lot
of those and saw the damage that they could do.
And I guess my mind was, okay, it's the same.
Driving into Charleston, the devastation was
just unbelievable. And I thought to myself, wow,
Mother Nature is something else. I mean, trees,
just acres and acres of trees just broken off
like a toothpick. And then we got to right along
the river, the bay. The whole downtown was completely
flooded, probably five feet of water in the streets.
And then went out to the barrier island after
a day or two. We went out to the barrier island
and there was nothing left. Not even the foundations.
It had taken the foundations of the houses. It
was just completely gone. And I guess the second
part of that is the reaction is the amount of
stuff that came in to that warehouse, lumber,
toilets, light bulbs, clothing, food, you name
it, from all over America was being sent there.
And that was our job was to intake it, log it
so that we knew where it was and what we had.
And then when. people started coming to help
rebuild then we started handing this stuff out
you know the the lumber and the appliances and
whatever else was given to us there at the warehouse
so the the the generosity of the american people
was was just amazing to me that's what i've heard
over and over again and it's so sad because More
often than not, the news cycle determines how
much attention there is on some of these disasters.
And you look at footage from North Carolina now,
they're still pulling bodies out of the mud.
There's still people that are completely unhoused.
You know, it's always important to be reminded
of these stories and put people back on the radar
because, you know, the people in L .A. still
have no home. You know, the people in North Carolina,
you know, the northwest coast of Florida here
is still recovering from all the storms that
we had. Right. Three storms in 18 months, all
devastating storms. Yeah, absolutely. Well, then
what about Desert Storm? Walk me through kind
of where you were assigned and then that conflict
through your eyes. Yeah, so Desert Shield, Desert
Storm. So I was in the 24th Intermediate Division.
We were the second Army unit to get there. The
82nd got there before we did. But then we were
the first heavy unit to get there, and we were
bringing our stuff in. And I remember I was a
general's aide during that time, the one -star
general's aide. And we were kind of getting everything
on the boats down at the port. to get it shipped
um and they were navy ships and the two -star
general had decided he wanted to send his bradleys
and his tanks he wanted to send all those first
so that they could be first on the ground ready
to go if needed be and we loaded this ship and
we loaded with a bunch of tanks and a bunch of
bradleys and then i remember the guy in the navy
whoever the captain of the ship said Sorry, dudes,
you got to unload some of that heavy stuff. He
said, we'll never make it out of the port. He
said, we don't have enough clearance to get out
of the port. So we had to unload a bunch of it,
load lighter stuff on. And it finally got home.
And I remember I got there on the, I believe
it was the 14th of August is when I landed in
Adamah at the airport there. And I flew over
on a 141. So I was in a little. you know, one
of those cargo seats all the way across. We flew
from Fort Stewart to Bangor, Maine, from Bangor,
Maine to Sicily, and then Sicily to Audemars.
And didn't get a whole lot of sleep during that
trip. And I remember that ramp came down and
just the heat in August in the desert. And I'd
been out to National Training Center, Fort Irwin,
but it wasn't the same heat. First of all, it
was very humid because you're right on the coast.
So not only did you have 120 degree temperatures,
but you had 75 % humidity. And the minute that
door went down, I mean, you were just soaked.
And you just stayed soaked because it wouldn't
evaporate because of the humidity. So you were
just wet all the time. And then we moved further
out into the desert. and my job was to coordinate
the day -to -day operations of the general and
coordinate his security detail a hand -picked
number of rangers that we from the ranger battalion
that we had as his security detail and his they
drove his humvee and his vehicles and those kind
of things and i had to coordinate coordinate
two helicopters two blackhawk helicopters that
were assigned to us And on a rotation basis,
we'd fly one today and one tomorrow while the
other one got their crew rest and all that. So
my job was to coordinate the day -to -day operations,
who we wanted to go see, where is it? Let's get
them there. Is it easier to fly there or is it
a drive there? Does the weather allow us to fly?
So we were figuring all that out on a daily basis.
And that was during Desert Shield. and then we
moved out for even further west because in during
the invasion we were the furthest left part of
the big hook the only people that were west of
us was the french brigade that was out there
so we were the furthest west american unit in
the hook and so we moved out there and for the
two to three weeks before deserts storm happened
and then I remember the night Desert Storm kicked
off with the air raid like it was yesterday.
It was January 17th, my anniversary, and I remember
watching all these planes go. Well, first the
Apaches went out and took out, I guess, radar
and air defense weapons and then just planes
after plane after plane after plane going over.
right over top of us. It must have been the corridor
because they were just flying non -stop. And
then two weeks later, three weeks later, February
14th, so almost a month later, and I remember
that day because that was my father's birthday.
So air war started on my anniversary, ground
war started on my dad's birthday. Then we crossed
over and for four days we basically drove and
blew stuff up and ended up on the Euphrates River
just north of Basra. So that was really the four
days. And then we stayed there for another week
or two, maybe three as an occupation until we
could get everything and everybody out. Yeah,
I had a couple of people on the show who had
different perspectives of that, and obviously
some of them that were on, what was it they called
the main strip? Was it the Road of Death? Yeah,
that was much further south of where I was. That
was the Marines and I think First Cav. I think
that was the dividing line between the Marines
and First Cav. Okay. And really, most of that
death came from air, not from ground troops.
Yeah. Yeah, I remember him saying as well, when
they set fire to the oil fields, the actual oil
was miles away, but you could feel the heat apparently
from miles away. I mean, the smell of that all
over, even as far west as we were, we could still
smell, had a smell of oil in it. Did you get
to interact with the Iraqi people in that particular
deployment? I did a little bit after after those
four days after the actual combat piece of it
was done then then we did you know we kind of
shifted from being an invasion army to an occupying
army and there were some communities there that
in our area that we had to interact with you
know and uh and they would come up and ask us
for about family members or whatever. So I had
a very little bit of interaction with them, not
a whole lot, but a little bit. You hear from
a lot of the guys that went to Iraq in the more
recent conflicts, the war on terror, global war
on terror, excuse me. And you hear early on,
there was a lot of gratitude towards the allied
soldiers when they were there. But as we stayed
and stayed and stayed, that started to turn.
With the Desert Storm perception and obviously
your career after that, if we could Monday morning
quarterback, how are we able to facilitate some
of these conflicts and try and avoid that feeling
of occupation for the very people that we initially
were protecting? Yeah, I mean, that's an interesting
question. Age old question, isn't it? Because
I think you probably could have run into the
same thing in Vietnam. You know, probably when
we first got there, we were heroes. And then
by that time, we were ready to leave. And we
did leave. Not so much even with the South Vietnamese
people, probably. I think, you know, that's one
of those things. And I think General Powell had
it right. You know, you have an objective. You
accomplish that objective. And there's got to
be an insight to it. There's got to be an end
piece that says, OK. This is what we're leaving
at this once we accomplish this thing. And I
think part of the problem that we ran into after
2003 in Afghanistan and Iraq is that we got so
involved in nation building, which is not our
job, and nor should it be, that we got bogged
down into that. And then we stayed much longer
than we should have, which then caused the people
in there to resent us and want us to go. And
I think we absolutely stayed longer than we should
have in both Afghanistan and Iraq after 9 -11,
when we re -went into Iraq and went into Afghanistan.
For me, it wasn't a... big deal we were we were
there less than two or three weeks and we there
was always the plan that we were coming out very
quickly so i never had to deal with that i i
dealt with a little bit in kosovo uh during that
deployment but not in iraq give me one second
i'm so sorry that's all right hey get out thank
you she's doing her job too well there's a Murphy's
Law. I haven't had a package delivered in about
two weeks. And when we sit down and do this,
all of a sudden everyone wants to send me stuff.
All right. We'll stay on this topic because,
again, you are such the perfect person to ask
this. Coming from a complete layman, someone
who never served in the military, donated to
the Salvation Army, was about the closest I got.
When I look at... how many people make an incredibly
large amount of money when we send our men and
women off to war? I wonder where the checks and
balances are. Of course, there is a time and
place, and World War II is always the perfect
example, where we roll up our sleeves and then
we head towards the tyranny and we try and be
part of the solution. But when you understand
that military weapons and uniforms and MREs and
all the things that... create these bases and
these abilities to go to war that, you know,
there's such a huge amount of money made. And
you look at the parallel with the pharmaceutical
industry, the answer is to make people healthier.
And yet the push for healthy Americans seems
to be opposed. And, you know, we're inactivity
and processed food seems to be the biggest lobbyist.
I really worry about the resistance to peace,
the promotion of diplomacy. In this position
that you've been at, how do we stop our young
men and women being sent to wars that they never
should have been a part of? Yeah, well, I just
saw something online the other day that is absolutely
right. It said, a country run by banks will always
be in debt. Run by... Big Pharma will always
be sick and run by the military industrial complex
will always be at war because that's how they
make money. They don't make money in peacetime.
If you're the military industrial complex, they
don't make money. Big Pharma doesn't if everybody's
healthy. And so we really got to change the way
we do our government, the mindset behind the
government. I think if you follow on what's going
on. today in America with the new administration,
I think that is the mindset that we're going
to change the way we do things. Because I will
tell you that there is no accountability for
equipment, for money, all of that stuff in those
times. It's all about give me more, give me more,
give me more, and a lot of it is wasted. and
i saw saw a lot of that waste um when we got
ready to cross over the border we got the order
bury all of our camouflage nets so you're talking
about camouflage nets for every vehicle in the
division what 15 000 camouflage nets that we
just buried out in the desert and just left them
Well, when we got back, guess what we had to
reorder? Camouflage nets. Camouflage nets. And
that's just one of the things that we did. It's
mind -boggling how much money is just thrown
and nobody cares where it is or what happened
to it. And we got to change that mindset. And
I think we're starting down that road because
we finally figured out that. After being $35
trillion in debt, we actually do have to think
about what we're spending and how it's being
spent. Absolutely. I mean, there's so many false
economies. The false economy of the way we do
medicine at the moment is it costs people trillions
of dollars. The false economy of constantly thinking
that war is a solution for everything is, again,
it's crippling our nation. And if you look at
the money needed. for education, for the first
responder professions, for more areas of recreation
so our young people can actually be out and play,
the money is there, but it's being wasted in
these other areas. Yeah, I agree. And I think
you're absolutely right. I mean, there is money
available, but it's not being put in the right
place because we don't have our priorities in
the right place. Again, I think, and not just
America, I mean, I think that's most of Western
civilization, what we call Western civilization,
you know, the European countries, Australia,
New Zealand, Canada, you know, all of them. I
think we've, for far too long, we've kind of
lived that way that... we can do whatever we
want we don't have to worry about what it costs
or where the money goes because there's all we
can always print more um and and it's finally
caught up to us and we got to start thinking
about those things and again i think we are i
think this elon musk is is whether you like the
guy or not but whatever you think about him um
i kind of tend to like the guy Somebody asked
me one time, if I could have lunch with anybody
in the world, who would it be? And I said, Elon
Musk, without a doubt. I mean, whether you like
him or not, he's a brilliant guy and he's interesting.
But he is uncovering all kinds of waste, fraud
and abuse in our government that's been going
on for, your guess is as good as mine, 50, 60,
70 years. So I think there is a mindset. I think
the American people have said we've had enough.
And we want some accountability. There's a dirty
word for you, accountability. And our leaders
to take some responsibility, another dirty word.
But I think we're going to demand it here in
America here soon. It's funny because there's
such a parallel in the fire service. And again,
I'm not an economist. I never rose above the
rank of firefighter. You know, I don't hold a
doctorate, but it's so easy. Me neither, and
don't want one. But it's so easy to see, again,
the false economy. You just have to take a shallow
dive into the financial side to see that, for
example, in the fire service, they are woefully
understaffed at the moment because of mismanagement.
I mean, there's no other way to describe it.
The people that are at the helm, whether it's
our unions, whether it's the chiefs, have basically
refused to... progress with the the massive uh
increase in the amount of calls that we're running
i mean there's so many departments 20 years later
have the same exact staffing and our calls have
gone through the roof and you look at because
of these holes now these these vacancies are
not able to fill and that firefighters are having
to work that some sign up for it many are actually
forced into it So the overtime that's spent is
millions and millions and millions and millions
of dollars. The amount of money that's wasted
on recruiting and training people that then leave
two, three, five years later is millions and
millions of dollars. And so we need Elon Musk
to look at the fire service too and go, what
are you doing? I'm sure at Tesla, they invest
in their people. I'm sure Rest and Recovery,
just like Google and Virgin, they've probably
got gyms and cafes. You know, masseuses and all
these things, because you see these in the Silicon
Valley companies because they know that it's
going to create a healthy workforce and increase
productivity and longevity in them. So I think
we've got to look at everything. I think we're
at a point now where I think we can and we should
look at everything and see how we can improve
it. And I think, you know, part of the problem
with. recruiting for first responders and the
military and pick a profession out there. I mean,
all of them. I mean, there's restaurants here
in the area that can't even open them like it
used to because they can't staff waiters. So
I think we've got to get back to, and I think
a lot of that is leadership, that people are,
I'm a firm believer that this great resignation
that we see going on. in the Western world is
because people are fed up with being treated
the way they've been treated by the leaders.
Leaders, and I use that word very loosely, are
treating their people, you know, and goes back,
I believe it was Steve, it was Richard Branson,
who said, train people and treat people so that
they can leave, train them so that they can leave,
treat them so that they don't want to leave.
And that's the point you were making is we got
to figure out how to keep the people that we
recruit. You know, when I was a kid, people stayed
with a company their entire life. My dad's best
friend worked at Ford Chrysler Motor Company
in Belvedere, Illinois, for 38 years. You know,
you don't see that anymore because one, because
the way they're being treated. Number two, just
because. I guess our culture, there's always
something greener on the other side of the fence,
I guess. But I think a lot of it is the way they're
being treated. They say, I'm done with this company.
I'm moving on. And even pro athletes. When I
was a kid, pro athletes stayed on the same team
their entire career. Now they leave for an extra
$100 ,000 when they're making $21 million. You
know, we got to fix our mindset here a little
bit. I really feel, and I just posted a piece,
I haven't written an article for, I think it
was 2019 was my last one. So basically almost
six years. And I only write when something's
burning in my heart. So I've written two books
since then, but this was something that's just
been so apparent and it just needs to be said.
I think it started with COVID and then it's just
really shown itself more and more, but you've
got people that are taking very large salaries.
have all kinds of jewelry and brass on their
class A uniforms that actually aren't leading.
And I'm seeing a lot of cowardice in these positions.
And it can also be union leaders and presidents.
It can be all the way down to the firefighters
themselves. But taking a step back and going,
what is the most important thing? Now, to me,
the first thing is your family. And we have a
profession where divorces and domestic violence,
all these things are very, very common. You know,
and then it's, you know, your own health, of
course, and then your ability to serve your community.
And when you look at the, you know, what's happened
and this resistance to change, all of those have
diminished. And locally, and this is in the article,
the department that protects my family had four
suicide in as many years, but they had a fifth
one who survived. stuck himself with a paralytic
in an ER on a call and told someone and then
dropped down. And thank God they were able to
revive him. And I asked about this gentleman
for a long time. No one even knew who he was,
what his name was, from the same department.
That's the culture. Isn't that scary? No, it's
horrendous. And that department also, after this,
a local businessman, not the fire department,
funded a study with IHMC. I don't know if you
ever came across them, but they work with DARPA,
NASA. Naval Special Warfare. They're a human
performance organization, research. And they
came back with, what are you doing? You've got
to get these work weeks down. That's the first
thing. You're killing your people. And with all
this free research done with this top performance
agency, they still were like, no, we're not going
to do that. So this is now at the point where
there are some raising, as you said, servant
leaders, courageous people with moral courage.
But you really now see. If they refuse, if they
will not advocate for the health of their people,
even if they've never lost anyone, you've lost
four, almost five people. Actually, they lost
a former firefighter to suicide a few months
after that as well. If you've got this litany
of deaths in your department and you still refuse
to act and the solutions are all out there. And
like we said, the false economy, the money is
there. It's just having the courage to stand
up and actually do what you're paid to do. That
is just heartbreaking because I see that so much
now. They're paid, they have this position and
title, but they actually don't have the metal
to do what they're paid to do. I agree with you
100 % and you see it across the board in every
profession and at every level. I always use three
words and I think we got to get back to these
three words. As an organization and certainly
as a leader, accountability, everybody needs
to be held accountable for your actions, for
your performance, for everything. And that includes
from the lowest person in the organization all
the way up to the highest person. Everybody needs
to be held accountable. And I don't see that
happening today. Authority, because as a leader,
you get authority just from the title you have.
Whether you deserve it or not, you get it. Unfortunately,
I see too much in this world today that leaders
are afraid to give away some of that authority.
They think they've got to hang on to all that
authority, and that's the exact wrong way to
do it as a leader. You've got to hand that. When
you assign somebody a project, give them the
authority to make it happen. When that project's
done, you can bring that authority back to you,
and you can hand it off to the next person that's
got a project. The best leaders are the ones
who give the authority out to the people who
are actually going to do the job where it needs
to be done. And then responsibility. You know,
as a leader, you don't get to pick and choose
what you want to be responsible for. Sorry, it
doesn't work that way. You can't say, well, that
went really well. I'm going to take responsibility
for that. That didn't go so well. I'm going to
blame James for that. Sorry, that's not a leader.
not even close to a leader. You got to own everything
in your organization and you got to make the
right decisions because now we all make mistakes.
I got there, but you got to go into it with the
mind that I'm going to make the right decisions,
not because somebody's watching me, but because
it's the right thing to do. Even if it's not
in my best interest, if it's in the best interest
of the people, I have the privilege to lead and
it is a privilege to be the leader. or the organization
even if it isn't in my best interest that's the
right decision and we got to do that and i don't
see that happening today not at all absolutely
well i want to move on to eastern europe then
let's talk about kosovo and bosnia and again
your kind of perceptions of what you saw and
the roles you played yeah so but for bosnia i
was not assigned inside of bosnia i was a congressional
liaison officer for the Supreme Allied Commander.
Went on trips into Bosnia with him and those
kinds of things, but I was not assigned there.
I was there to track all the CODEL visits all
over the theater and coordinate their trips and
those kinds of things, and I did that, and I
did that for the four -star general. In Kosovo,
I was there for nine months as an operations
officer for an armored battalion, and we had
our sector, and I was out every day. My job was
to run the day -to -day operations of that battalion,
do the plans of what was coming up, who was going
to do what, and then to make sure that it was
executed. So I was out the gate every single
day. There wasn't a single day that I wasn't
out with visiting troops, visiting. towns. I
used to hold meetings. When I first got there,
you know, the three groups in Kosovo were the
Albanians, the Serbs, and the Gypsies. The Roma,
I guess, if you want to call them that. And so
when I first got there, they did nothing together.
You know, you had this Albanian town and right
next you had a Serb town and, you know, they
were completely separate, didn't use the same
stores, didn't use the same gas stations, nothing.
So when I go there, when I got there originally,
I held meetings in each one of these towns and
I'd have a meeting with the Serb in this town
or a meeting with the Albanians or I'd bring
Serbs in from all over our area and we'd have
a meeting downtown. And they all started exactly
the same way for the first couple weeks I was
there. You know, the first 15 minutes of it was
The Serbs telling me everything that the Albanians
had done mean to them for the last 1500 years.
And when I did to the Albanians, they would tell
me what the Serbs. Finally, I just told them,
look, I'm a history major. I know you're all
bad people and you've done bad things to each
other. So I don't care. We're going from this
point on. So I don't want to hear any history
lessons anymore. Let's talk about how do we make
it better for you now, today, you and your family.
And I finally got to the point where I was making
some head. way with each of the groups and then
I so then I got brave and I said okay we're going
to have a joint meeting we're going to bring
all the leaders from all three groups in and
that took me a while to get everybody to agree
and coordinate that piece of it but we eventually
did and we started making a difference there
was a a quarry there in our sector that before
the conflict before we got there The Serbs owned
the quarry. Now the Albanians owned the quarry.
Well, they didn't have any explosives and we
weren't going to give them any explosives. So
the quarry was just sitting there. And there
were, I think there were 25 Albanians who were
employed at the quarry doing nothing, just sitting
around. So I finally walked up one day and I
said to the owner, the person in charge, whatever
he was, the Albanian, I said, I can get you explosives.
We'll bring them in. We'll monitor. You tell
us what piece of the mountain you want blown
up, and I'll make sure it gets done. And then
you can start working again. He was all excited,
and I said, one caveat. You've got to hire five
serves. No, no, no, can't do that. I said, okay.
You don't get any explosives. And I walked out,
came back the next week, made the same offer.
I think I think the third week or fourth week,
he finally said, OK, I agree. And so we did.
I sat through the hiring process to make sure
that it was all up and up. And once he hired
those five, I made sure that any time they were
on the premise, the on the. in the quarry that
I had a security detail standing there making
sure that they were safe. And when it first started,
the Serbs were completely by themselves. They
were doing their job, but they were not interacting
with the Albanians. They'd eat their lunch at
a completely different place. They had them working
in a completely different place. By the time
we left, the Serbs I didn't even have a security
detail there anymore. The Serbs and the Albanians
were eating lunch together. They were talking
together. They were working together. And we
did the same thing at a meatpacking plant that
was owned by the Serbs. And they needed something
done that they couldn't coordinate. And I said,
well, I can make that happen for you. And they
were all excited. And I said, you got to hire
five Albanians. And eventually they did. And
by the time I left, the meatpacking plant was
up and running. Same thing with a gas station.
There was a gas station central in our area of
operation. And it only sold gas to Albanians.
And so one day I walked up and I said, you're
going to sell gas to Serbs. And he goes, I can't.
I said, yeah, you can. He said, no, can't. I
said, okay. Took a padlock and I locked all of
his gas tanks. The pumps? Yeah, pumps. And I
said, when you're ready. Then we'll take them
off. Until then, you're not selling gas to anybody.
Either you sell it to everybody or you sell it
to nobody. And I think it took him about three
days and he decided that he might be able to
sell gas to the service. So I think, you know,
the thing, and I went through all that, not to
toot my own horn, to explain the situation on
the ground when we got there. The hatred. I mean,
we in the West, in America, we think we know
what hatred is. We have no idea what hatred is.
And it's a good thing that we don't. They hated
each other and had been taught that way for many,
many years. I'll give you a perfect example.
I was taking a Serb priest, the highest ranking
priest in our area, to a meeting. He didn't have
his own vehicle, so I went and picked him up,
and I was taking him to the meeting with me.
And I got a call that there was a disturbance
in one of the Albanian towns, and they needed
me to go there to help settle it down. So I said,
okay. So we drove there, and here's this Serb
priest all decked out. No doubt he's a Serb priest.
He's sitting in the back of my Humvee, and when
I got out of the Humvee, I said, do not get out
of this Humvee. I said, if you stay in the Humvee,
my guys can protect you. You get out, you're
on your own. And when I came back after about
45 minutes, an hour, he's sitting there in the
Humvee. And as I'm walking up, there's this little,
probably five -year -old Albanian kid who walks
up to him, looked in there, noticed it was a
Serb, and he went like this. A five -year -old
kid. That's hatred that's been taught. over generations
and you know and you're you're from the uk you
know how long you know let's talk about northern
ireland and ireland and in the uk how many years
it took to get where we are today and we're still
not perfect there but we're certain you know
they're not blowing each other up and killing
each other on the streets like they like they
did 20 years ago but it took us about 50 years
to get there because you're not going to change
the people there now the adults, you're not going
to change the kids. They've already been brainwashed.
So the best you're going to do is change the
kids' kids. And you might get a few of those,
but your real chance is those kids' kids' kids,
which is about 50 years. I know we talked on
the phone a couple of weeks ago about this. My
personal opinion when it comes to Gaza, Is I
see that back and forth. So that's the perfect
kind of landscape for the beginning of this conversation
is that hatred between Palestinians and Israelis
in that area seems to be a very similar example
of what you just laid out. Absolutely. But the
response to October 7th thing about that, right.
You know, which was absolutely horrific to me
is like getting in a street fight, you know,
someone punching you in the face once and then
you punch them and then. stomp them until they're
just mush now you know the way i parallel it
is you know i witnessed obviously from the mainland
what was going on in in northern ireland and
we had lots of bombings in the mainland and innocent
you know men women and children were killed and
it would be like the british then going over
and completely destroying the city of belfast
every man woman and child um so that's james
gearing's opinion of it and i think now seeing
our president standing side by side with netanyahu
i'm disgusted when they're talking about owning
Gaza now. That's my personal opinion. Talk to
me again with this history lens that you have
and understanding two cultures that have got
this insidious hatred for each other. Where do
you hope that conflict, that area of the world
goes? And then if you have any opinions on what
we're saying we're going to do as a country,
feel free to put that in as well. Yeah, so I
think, you know, you got to break the cycle.
And it starts with kids. Again, you're not going
to change the minds of those that don't. That's
sad. You might change one or two, but you're
not going to change enough to make a difference.
You got to start with the kids. And we, you know,
and we see it through our history that an overreaction
like that, where you punish. and other people
to the point where you just drive that hatred
even deeper. You're justifying the hatred in
their mind. So then they just pass it on even
further and stronger to their kids. We've got
to find a place in the Middle East, in Gaza,
between Gaza and Israel, that is a common ground
that both sides can agree to. And I don't know
what that is. The perfect solution would be a
two -state. The Palestinians have their own state.
Israel has its own state, and they both agree
to accept each other. Will that happen in our
lifetime? I don't know. Could outside forces
make it happen artificially? peacekeeping force
that stands between the two of them until we
can. But you're talking about 25, 30, 40 year
commitment to do that, to get to the point where
they're not needed anymore. I think that the
problem is the overreaction on both sides for
so long. that it just fuels that hatred and it's
just a vicious cycle i do something to you you
retaliate and do twice as much to me which then
makes me want to do twice as much to you and
it's just that vicious cycle that's going around
and around and around and we got to break it
and i think it can be broken we've proven it
can be um again northern ireland ireland uk um
I think Kosovo seems to be in a pretty good spot
right now. I haven't been back there since I
left back in 2000. But I know we have an embassy
there. I know people who were stationed at that
embassy and it seems to be that we have started
to turn the corner to where they're living in
somewhat peaceful ways now. But it takes a lot
of effort and it takes... some restraint on maybe
in the beginning forced restraint on both sides
but then eventually you know they got to figure
that out themselves and and have that constraint
i i don't i think america has a place to help
it can't do it we've learned that uh you can't
force peace on people uh They got to decide on
their own. You can help them decide that. You
can separate the two warring factions until they
can decide that they're going to work together.
But you can't force it on them. So I think we
need to play a part in it. I just don't know
what that part is. That's a little above my pay
grade. Yeah, I mean, again, coming from a complete
layman, what I'm seeing through... the lens at
least that I'm perceiving that at, is that we've
taken a side, Israel's side. So I don't know
when you're holding the hand of one country,
how you can forge peace with the other. Yeah.
I'm not sure that Trump is completely on the
side of Israel. I think he is going to hold Netanyahu
accountable for what he does going forward. At
least that's my perception. I may be wrong. But
I think, is he leaning more toward supporting
Israel? I think probably, as most Americans are.
But I do think that he will hold Netanyahu accountable
for the actions going forward. And he needs to
be held accountable going forward, because he
has not been held accountable for a long time.
So I think there is some light at the far end
of the tunnel, and that tunnel is a long tunnel.
But I think there is a light down there, and
we just got to work toward it. I had an American
physician, Palestinian American, who works as
an ER doc in Chicago. So he obviously is seeing
a lot of violence in his hospital. And he went
over there on one of the humanitarian trips.
And it was such a fantastic interview because
you said that before they went into Gaza, they
were in Jerusalem and you had Christians, Muslims
and Jews all praying side by side and living
somewhat harmoniously. So I think this is what's
so sad. You know, if you really boil down to
what's important to most of us, whether you're
Catholic and Protestant or a loyalist or whatever
your kind of faction is in your part of the world,
you want. a roof over your head, food in your
stomach. You want your kids to be educated. You
want a safe place for them to play. We've all
got the same thing. And this is what I heard
from a lot of the military guests that have come
on. When I ask about kindness and compassion
through the soldier's eyes, it's always, oh,
we just saw families being families. They said
it could have been in Kansas, but it was in Kandahar.
Same kind of thing. So it seems like the further
we're pulled away from our commonalities. Let's
be honest, this country in the last four or five
years, we were dragged into World War I trenches
with COVID and masks and police and all these
other things. Then that wedge is cleaved, it's
driven between you, and now you're easy to start
kind of dismantling. But when you actually see
that shared humanity, I think that then... kind
of debunks a lot of the myths of this hatred
that we've been fed, whether it's hatred of the
other political party in America, whether it's
hatred of a different religion in the Middle
East. Yeah, well, you know, to go to that point,
there was a school in one of the small little
towns that we had, and there was an Albanian,
it was before the... before we got there, it
was a mixed school. So there were Albanians and
Serbs going to that school, little kids. And
when I got there, the windows had all been blown
out and there was, you know, there were no desks,
there was nothing. So I worked with an NGO, which
is another subject. But I worked with this NGO
who had desks. And I worked with some other people
who helped put windows in. So we put the windows
in and then this NGO said, well, I can provide
desks. And I said, great. And he said, but only
for the CERB kids. And I said, no, that's not
going to happen. I said, this is going to be
a mixed school like it was before. And it took
me a while to make that happen. But eventually
we did. And, you know, one of the things I carried
in my Humvee was I carried a huge bag of soccer
balls. And every time I saw a group of kids out
playing, I'd throw a soccer ball up to them.
And I did that at this school. I brought a soccer
ball and I handed it to this kid. And an Albanian
kid said, where's ours? I said, that's everybody's
soccer ball. Put teams together that all of you
can play with it. And they did. again by the
time we left they were playing next to each other
with each other uh playing soccer doing all kinds
of things so so you you we can fix it um but
it but it takes an effort and that's only one
little piece of that pie and you know that big
piece of pie but it but you got to start somewhere
you got to start in those small places make that
work and then as people see that it works Well,
I want some of that. I want my kids to be able
to play safely with other kids. I want, like
you said, a roof over my head. I want food. I
want my kids to get an education. You know, I
always I think no matter pick a place in the
world, it doesn't matter. But I would say here
in America. I would use this analogy because
I'm normally talking to Americans. You know.
80 % of Americans are center, left, center, right.
They might be a little bit left. It might be
a little bit right, but they're pretty much center.
Absolutely. It's those fringes on the end who
unfortunately have had the voice. They've had
the media. So we think that's the thing. And
I always tell people, if you want to fix something,
you got to start with what you have in common.
Because if you start out here with what you have
differences about, you'll never get to fixing
the problem. If you start with what you have
in common and work your way out where your differences
are, then we can start compromising and coming
to meet closer to the middle. Will we ever get
exactly to the middle where everybody agrees?
No, that's called fantasy land. But at least
we can get close enough that everybody agrees
that that's a good. way to solve the problem
that we're trying to fix but you got to start
with what we have in common that we all want
a good educate our kids to have an education
we all want medical care we all want good food
for our our families we want a job all those
things start with what we have in common and
then work your way up that's funny because that's
how i view these interviews as well people on
the show have you know got all kinds of areas
where they venture towards those 10 % on either
side. But if you start in the middle, you can
have an amazing conversation with someone. And
then you start pushing the borders a little bit
if that's where the conversation organically
goes. And then you're like, okay, that was a
little Islamophobic or whatever it was. Let's
just go back in the middle again. Hold my hand.
Here we go. I don't mean that to be patronizing,
but this is where the great conversations happen.
You know, you don't like Manchester United or
Chelsea or, you know, insert whatever here, transgender.
Okay, that's fine. I don't remember asking you
that. Let's just talk about the things that,
you know, are actually pertinent that hopefully
people listening will get takeaways from. Over
a thousand conversations, I have never had a
problem yet because this is, you know, like you
said, 80 % of us agree with each other. We really,
really do. Now, we may not agree 100 % right
down the center, but we agree enough that we
can make a compromise that both sides benefit
from, not one side over the other, that both
sides benefit from. But to get there, you've
got to start in the middle and work your way
up. And we all have things in common. I don't
care how much we are different. There's always
those one things. And I was, you know, after
the election, right, Thanksgiving. A lot of people
ask me, so how do I bring up, how do I talk to
my Democrat family members after the Trump victory?
I said, again, start with things that you have
in common that every American likes and wants
and needs, and then work your way out toward
there. And that's always worked for me. That's
always been my answer. And it's worked here.
in my job in America, in many different jobs.
And it worked overseas when I had to deal with
groups that didn't like each other much. I still
was able to start with what they all had in common
and work the way up. Absolutely. Well, let's
transition to 9 -11. You've already been in the
military for quite a while by that point. How
did that day unfold through your eyes? And then
how did it affect the trajectory of the next
few years for you? Yeah. So I was a major and
I was at our Army Command General Staff College
that morning. And I'd already been in S3 for
two years, an armored battalion S3. I'd already
been to Kosovo. I'd already had my branch qualifying
job. So I knew when I went there, I probably
wasn't leaving there. I was probably going to
be an instructor because they weren't going to
send me back out and take a job that somebody
else needed. So I kind of figured that. And the
morning of 9 -11, we were in class. And I remember
the class like it was yesterday. It was law class.
We were learning international law. And the professor
was sitting there teaching us. And it was boring
as could be. I was trying to keep from poking
my eyes out. And somebody ran in the room and
said, you got to turn the TV on. And the professor
reluctantly turned on the television and here's
this. I think the first building had already
been struck and he turned it on just about the
time right before because we watched the second
plane strike the second building. And we watched
it for about 30 minutes or so. And then he said,
well, now we're going to turn it off and get
back to class. And we said, oh, you're sorry,
that's not happening. And so we watched it for
a little while, and eventually they sent all
of us home because they were worried about having
1 ,500 majors sitting in one building that they
thought it was a terror magnet. And so they sent
us home, and I remember sitting there. My parents
called. My wife's parents called. My brother
called. just on the phone all day kind of talking
about what this means. And I told every single
one of them, because I actually believed it at
that point, and I think it was, I said, this
will change America forever. And I don't think
it had to, but I knew it was going to. And I
think we went down some roads and some ways that
we didn't have to go, but we did. which led to
the war on terror and invasion of Afghanistan
and Iraq. And a lot of restrictions being put
on Americans that were never there before. You
know, one of the saddest things to me was we
didn't have class for like three or four days.
I think I didn't have class till like the following
Monday. We went back to the building. And they
put up barricades all around the building. And
they said, well, it's just temporary. And I said,
there are no temporary barricades. You put a
barricade up, it's there. Nobody's going to take
the chance to say, well, I'm going to take it
down and then something happens. So, I mean,
they since built a new building at Leavenworth
that houses the Command General Staff College.
And when they built it, they built. prettier,
but it's got barricades around it. I mean, so
I think, you know, once those things happen,
it's hard to unwind them and to get those freedoms
and those, that way of life back. And I think
we still haven't gotten there. Again, I'm hoping
that going forward we do and we unwind some of
this anti -American citizen. stuff that's going
on it has been going on in this country for a
while now that we got it got to give people back
their freedoms absolutely yeah I went home to
England a few times actually last year and it
was so sad because around you know Westminster
and some of the areas they're not pretty barriers
at all just big old yellow striped you know concrete
barriers and steel barriers and it's because
of some of the attacks and I get it but again
like at what point do you say look you know the
chances of some of that happening again are diminished
do we need to you know have these all over the
the city now on the what if i mean you know where
is that line yeah and you're absolutely right
and what point do we have to say okay we're going
to live our lives and we're going to not live
in fear um and i think we we have been living
in fear for a while and we got to get over it
um Because let's be honest, if somebody really
wants to attack a building, they're going to
attack the building. They'll figure out a way
to do it, especially now today with drones and
everything else. We got to do the things that
we can do to minimize the dangers, but you can't
live in fear. We got to move past that. Correct
me if I'm wrong. Did you tell me that you helped
write some speeches for Obama? I did not. That
was not me. Okay. I'm thinking of someone else.
Okay. Because I was going to ask an interesting
question after some of the speeches that we heard
over the last two presidencies, about articulation
and communication. Yeah. I never worked for one
of the presidents. Worked for a couple of four
-star generals, but never a president. Okay.
All right. Well, then let's talk about your transition.
I know this can be very jarring for a lot of
people in uniform. You know, you've got this,
especially yourself. I mean, early in your life
and such a long career, you know, you have purpose.
You've got this tribe, you know, and then one
day you're kind of that's it. You know, the idea
doesn't work and you're out. What was the transition
like for you specifically? Yeah. So you're right.
I mean, it's a huge part of your life. You know,
I spent. 23 years on active duty. If you count
my time in the National Guard and ROTC, you had
another, so almost 30 years I'd been, the Army
was my life. I mean, that was how I identified
as a soldier, as an officer. And so it came down,
I was on active duty. My last assignment, I ran
an Army ROTC program at the University of South
Alabama in Mobile. And I loved it. I'd still
be doing it today if they had left me there.
But they got to the point where they offered
me a couple of jobs that one I wasn't willing
to take. And the other one my wife didn't want
me to take. So I always told my wife, you know,
for the first 20 years, we and you specifically
have very little to say on what where what assignments
I get. The Army is going to tell us after 20
years, you get a. equal say and uh so when she
said that you're not doing that i said okay then
we need to retire and and it was it was time
for me to retire looking back on it um we loved
it in mobile we loved we we had bought our first
house there we never bought a house because we
were always moving around and and uh lived on
post most of the time and so we we loved our
house we loved our neighborhood it was time and
so i then i had to figure out what i wanted when
I grew up. And, and so I'm looking around and
I had to work for Fortune 500 is there in the
area. But I knew I didn't want to move. And what
I was, there was no army bases in Mobile, but
there were two Coast Guard bases. And one, one
of the commanders used to hold a monthly meeting
with community leaders, veterans. active duty
coast guard army whoever you know whoever the
commanders were for the recruiting command and
all that that were in that area and i was on
that invite list i used to go every month to
this breakfast and one of the guys that was there
was the guy who ran the food bank and he was
a retired army colonel and he'd been running
that food bank for about probably 15 years And
he asked me, he said, oh, what do you plan on
doing now that you're going to retire? And I
said, well, I don't, I have no idea. And he said,
well, I got a deal for you. He said, you come
work for me at the food bank. You'd be my associate
director. And you do that for a year, 18 months,
and then I'll retire and you take over as the
director of the food bank. And I said, it's a
servant oriented job, which I was in my heart.
I don't have to move. Done. Too easy. So I decided
I wanted to do that. And when I retired, I had
three months of leave built up. So I was going
to be on terminal leave for three months. And
I told him, I said, I'm going to take at least
a month of it and not work at all. I said, so
I retire one October. I said, all right. I went
on terminal leave in August. I said, I won't
come to work till September. And he said, OK,
well, two weeks into my terminal leave, he gives
me a call and he said, I really need you to come
to work. We've got this project going on and
I need you to run it. And so I did. And I went
there and I started working it. I took over that
job running the day to day operations of that
food bank. And it was a large food bank. It covered
52 counties across three states on the Gulf Coast.
So the whole Gulf Coast of Mississippi, the whole
Gulf Coast of Alabama, and about a third of the
panhandle of Florida. And I took over that job
about a month, maybe a month and a half before
the BP oil spill happened. And so when that happened,
the number of people that we had to feed increased
dramatically because all those people who made
their living in the Gulf. The people who did
shrimping, fishing, canning, all that, they couldn't
go out in the Gulf. So they didn't have an income.
They didn't have a job. So I had to come up with
some new ways to bring food in and get food out
to help take care of that additional, not only
the people we normally took care of, but these
additional group of people all along the Gulf
Coast. And so when I took over, We were handing
out 1 .2 million pounds of food a year. When
I left two years later, we were handing out 3
.8 million pounds. I doubled the size of the
truck fleet, almost doubled the size of the staff.
We increased the size of the freezers, our facilities.
So we made a lot of changes. We implemented new...
food handouts that we had never done before,
a new way to do it. We came up with that. And
people always say, well, how'd you do it? And
I said, well, again, go back to my years as a
kid. My dad beat into me that you make it happen.
You do what you got to do to make things happen.
Would I have come up with a lot of that? Would
I have doubled the size of the truck fleet if
it hadn't been for the BP oil spill? I don't
know. Because the need might not have been there.
But I saw the need. I knew that there were ways
that we could fix it, meet that need by fixing
the how we did business at the food bank. And
I came up with those plans and we implemented
them and they worked. So that was an interesting
time for me. You talk about making a huge jump
for being a combat arms officer for 23 years
and running a food bank. You don't get much different
than that. That's 180 degree difference. Well,
I always tell people, I say tell like I'm some
authority, but it's become clear to me, let me
put it that way, that you hear people that transition
out the military or first responders and they
get into finance, you know, and they're just
so unfulfilled and it's a rocky transition. We
have that servant's heart. That's what sends
us into uniform. And it's a beautiful thing.
And I think that where people struggle is that
they think that they have to be wearing that
uniform or do a similar thing when they transition
out. So cops become security officers. Firefighters
normally just teach at fire academies or paramedic
schools. But you can serve in so many different
ways. Your uniform is just a costume, really,
if you think about it. It is. And you hit that
right on the head. I think the transition for
me was pretty easy. It was a culture shock. Let's
be honest, dealing with soldiers to dealing with
people working at the food bank and a lot of
volunteers, which I'd never had to deal with.
But it was about service. I understood that piece
of it, that it wasn't about me and it wasn't
even about the organization. It was about what
we had to do and why we had to do what we had
to do. And to me, that made the transition a
little bit easier for me than probably some people.
If I had jumped right into a Fortune 500 company
as, you know, where profit was the bottom line
and I had to do whatever I had to do to make
a profit, I have no doubt I would have hated
it. Well, as far as feedbacks themselves, it's
something that we've all heard of. I don't think
anyone's really kind of seen behind the doors.
What are the services provided? Obviously, you
know, one would assume that there's certainly
an emergency element as just like you said, there's
an oil spill on a community that makes their
money from the ocean. Perfect example. But did
you get to also glimpse at some of the poverty
that this was serving as well within one of the
most affluent nations in the world? Oh, absolutely.
I mean, when you start when you get 50 miles
from the Gulf Coast in Mississippi, Alabama,
and even the panhandle, I mean, you saw all kinds
of. poverty and poor communities that had been
affected by many things over the years economically.
And, you know, for years that food bank had served
those communities and had it pretty much down.
You know, we'd bring food in. Originally, when
I first got there, most of it was coming from,
a lot of it was coming from the government, from
the USDA. You know, we'd get cheese. vegetables,
canned vegetables and those kinds of things and
hand them out. Did a little bit, you know, we
had food drives, you know, the Boy Scouts always
had a food drive. The post office always has
the food drive. So we get some food from that.
But again, if we were going to increase the amount
of food that we were going to hand out, then
I needed to come up with new ways. And we started
implementing agreements with Walmart, with Winn
-Dixie, with the big supermarkets. For food that
they could no longer sell because it was past
the sell -by date, the food's still good. It's
good for another two or three years. It's just
it can't be sold after the sell -by date on the
label. So they're either going to have to send
it back to the manufacturer to be destroyed,
or they could give it to us and write it off.
And we finally got them convinced to do that,
and we were getting food from... a bunch of different
places and then then we talked to the local farmers
and got some food from them that they couldn't
for whatever reason they couldn't get it to market
and it was just going to sit there and rot and
and so we eventually got some of that too and
so we got to hand out fresh vegetables and fresh
fruit and um so it just came you know you just
had had to think through some some new ways of
doing things um and convincing people that it
made sense for them as well and but yeah i i
saw some parts of america that most people don't
even would never believe that's how people live
in america yeah well that point exactly in a
country that's supposed to be one of the most
affluent on the planet with this unique lens
that you had what were some of the contributing
factors to this poverty? And if you were king
for a day, how can we change some of the structures,
like you said, I mean, the huge inefficiency
in our government system, for example, to empower
these communities to not receive more handouts,
but to actually be able to grow and produce and
earn and not be on the poverty line anymore?
Well, you know, it's funny that, and I'll answer
that question, but it's funny that you phrased
it that way, because I was... One of the things
that made me finally decide, because I had been
offered a job to do Army ROTC recruiting as a
Department of the Army civilian, which I eventually
took. And I left the food bank after two years.
But one of the things that convinced me that
I needed to leave was I was at a conference,
a national conference for food banks. And I'm
sitting in this conference room with a bunch
of people like me, associate directors, directors
of food banks. And this lady gets up and she's
talking about all the projects that she is coming
up with to grow her food bank and to feed more
people. And I said, that's fantastic. Good for
you. I said, but let me ask you a question. What
projects are you coming up with to get them so
they don't have to come to the food bank? And
she said, it's not my job. I said. It is. Absolutely.
We don't want to be in the business of growing
food banks. We want them to go away. You know,
I understand you got to grow them when you have
to, like I did in the Gulf. But that's not what
we want. We don't want bigger food banks. We
want less food banks. There will always be some.
I got it. Because you're always going to have
to deal with emergencies and those odd cases.
I got it. So I think to answer the question,
I think there's a couple of things that have
contributed to communities being so rundown,
impoverished. I think one, that we have outsourced
all of our jobs overseas. So you had factories
that had been in an area for 75 years that's
now gone. Well, in those communities, what happened?
For many, many years, people who worked there,
their kids came and worked there. And their kids
came and worked there. And they worked there
all their life, like we talked about earlier,
that people would spend their entire life working
at a factory or a company or whatever it is.
And now that's gone. So what do those kids do?
Our education system is absolutely broken, completely
broken. And these kids, especially these kids,
were getting almost no education, zero. If somebody
really wanted one in that community, they could
figure it out and they would be the ones who
got out of there and make it. But the majority
of those kids had no chance. And we got to we
got to fix that. And I think that's common. And
then I think. that um again it's it's that vicious
cycle that once they start down that road of
becoming impoverished that there's nothing to
help get them out to not as a handout forever
to get started to fix that to to do some training
to become an electrician to do some training
to become a plumber or whatever it is that that
community needs and there's just nothing there
right now which leads to you know for so many
years we've insisted that you had to go to college
to get to be successful in this country and that
is absolutely not true and we gotta stop that
and we gotta put some money into our trade schools
and our apprenticeship programs and which the
australians do very well And we don't. We don't
do it well at all. And it shows. I mean, you
can't find a plumber today or an electrician.
And when you do, they make more money than I
made as a lieutenant colonel with 23 years in
the Army. So why would you not tell some kid
to go be a plumber or an electrician or a mechanic
or a welder? College is not for everybody, but
we've driven that into people's heads that if
you can't go to college, you can't be successful.
So this young man, young lady. who can't afford
to go to college because they're from that community,
their mindset already is that they're going to
be a failure, that there's nothing they can do
to be successful in this country. And it's just
that self -licking ice cream cone. Okay, I don't
believe I can be successful, so I'm not going
to be successful. And I think that that's what
we're finding in a lot of rural America today.
Thought about this a lot recently. And my son
is my youngest is now 17. So he's actually going
to college. But that's because he wants to become
a veterinary surgeon. So that is the track for
that. There are things you have to go to college
for. There's many things you don't have to go
to college for. And if you want to go to college,
good for you. Do it. But we shouldn't be pushing
kids to go to college to get a gender's degree
study or, you know, some some degree that isn't
going to give them a job. that's going to make
them successful. Absolutely. Well, I saw an article
in the New York Times a couple weeks ago I shared,
and it said a lot of Gen Z are going into the
trades. And my bonus boy, my stepson, is a mechanic.
And he hated school, hated academics. He's an
amazing mechanic. And so this is what I tell
the fire service in this recruitment crisis.
You have got a lot of young people that actually
do want to do our job. but they're also very
intelligent. They value their physical and mental
health. They value their relationships and they
research. All right, well then what is this job?
What are the hours? How much does it pay? When
can I be home? And it's not laziness. They just
want to see, okay, what looks good and what looks
bad. And on paper, the American fire service
looks fucking horrendous at the moment in a lot
of places. So we're blaming all these kids don't
want to work. And that's absolute bullshit. Some
kids don't, but that's every generation, you
know, all of us, isn't it? But if you actually
show a young person that you care and you invest,
going back to, I'm assuming Tesla, but I know
Google and Virgin, Richard Branson, that really
invest in their people, people flock to them.
And then you can set that bar high, the fitness
standards and the hiring standards, and you can
make young people challenge themselves to reach
it. But right now, we're offering financial incentives,
we're lowering the bar, and it's not working
because that's not the problem. You've got to
show these people. It's a profession that they
have to fight to earn. And if they get there,
we will take care of you and you will be an amazing
firefighter, have an incredible career and a
healthy retirement. You hit right on the head.
When you lower the standards, now you're not
going to keep them because they're probably not
going to meet the standards later on. And this
is the thing that I always emphasize when I go
around talking to companies or corporations or
organizations like... first responders is you
have to show this generation coming up that there
is a path forward for them in that organization
whether it be leadership or just promotion to
the next level whatever it is and the way you
do that is through leadership development programs
and professional development programs and if
you don't have that if i'm an 18 year old and
i come work for you and I have aspirations to
be a leader and you don't have a path forward
with a leadership development program that I
can see there is a path forward that I might
have an opportunity to be a leader, then I'm
going somewhere else that does because that's
part of my aspirations. So you're losing the
best people out of your organization that are
going somewhere else because you didn't take
the time to take care of them. And provide them
with a professional development and a leadership
development program, not just for the leaders,
for everybody. Because, you know, the analogy
I always use is this. Pick a sport team, any
sport you want, who year after year after year
are at the top of those sports teams, professions.
They're always in the playoffs or just miss the
playoffs. Oh, you know, it's the teams that.
build from their minor league, from their farm
team. It isn't the ones that go out and find
the $25 million free agent for one year and then
he leaves because he gets $21 million and $100
,000 goes to the next team. It's those ones that
you grow and teach them the culture, teach them
your culture, teach them your standards, your
beliefs. That's how you grow an organization
and we are not doing that. in most places today,
but certainly in the first responder area and
in the military, it's broken. One of the beautiful
solutions aside from obviously fixing the work
week. And I mean, there's even some great technology
now with telehealth where you can integrate into
911 and take away some of the calls that they
should never be running in the first place, a
non -immersion call. So there's so many solutions
out there to take the workload off, give them
a healthier environment. And then, like I said,
put standards in because the number of guests
I've had on that didn't realize that the fire
service doesn't have fitness standards. I've
still yet to hear of a department that has a
true punitive standard. And as I was a lifeguard
for quite a while when I was younger, you think
about, say, the extreme lifeguards, so the Hawaii
beach lifeguards. Can you imagine if they were
like, well, it's not fair that we have to do
swim tests? That is what my profession has done.
You're trying to take my job. It's too hard.
I mean, it's, it's absolute insanity when you
think about it, but this is what we've allowed.
So you create that healthy environment, but you
also put that bar up because lives are at stake.
Realistically, you might have to throw on a hundred
pounds of gear and climb 20, 30 flights of stairs
before you even go to work. That is the problem.
The problem is if you don't have high standards,
then you don't draw the people that you want
to draw. and again that just leads to the turnover
because if they don't if that they're not the
people you really want to draw then they're going
to become disenfranchised and they're going to
leave after three four years and you're starting
all over again and you're already back behind
the power curve again and the other piece of
that and we kind of touched on it earlier that
vicious cycle it applies to leadership so When
we promote people who should not be promoted
to leadership positions, and we're doing that
today in every profession, then they're not good
leaders and they drive out the good young men
and women who are in that organization because
they're not going to put up with that. Who stays?
The average or maybe a little bit below average
person. Well, then who gets promoted? They stay,
so they're the ones that are going to get promoted.
And who's the leader that they are emulating?
this horrible leader. And so that's the leader
they become. So then 10, 15 years from now, when
they become the leader, they're going to drive
out the next group of young, outstanding young
men and women. And it's just that cycle that
goes round and round and round. And we are in
that cycle right now that just is just continuing
on the do loop. And we got to break it. If we
don't, these organizations are in a lot of trouble.
Well, this is even affecting the mental health
of our first responders, because a number of
people that I spoke to, and obviously people
that listen to the Behind the Shield podcast
are the ones that want to improve themselves,
performance, longevity, all the things. And the
kind of detrimental element to the toxic environment,
to the organizational betrayal, to the micromanager,
I mean, all these things, that is... Something
I hear far more than, oh, I saw this horrible
accident with this child. That, of course, hits
us hard. When your tribe doesn't support you,
you've got the very patch on your shoulder and
you literally have sworn an unofficial oath that
you will die for this department. And, you know,
God forbid that it comes to that. And then they
turn around and they don't support you, whether
you got cancer and they cast you out or have
had, you know, law enforcement officers that
were shot on duty and then got discarded or you
made the right choice, but you got thrown under
the bus because of politics, whatever the thing
is. That is by, you know, absolutely one of the
reasons why we lose some of our men and women
in uniform to suicide, because that kind of betrayal
is crushing to someone who truly has a servant's
heart and takes this profession seriously. Not
just the suicide, but certainly you're right,
that is the case. But just through attrition.
If you're a good, working, upstanding, meet the
standard, and you see people that don't are getting
promoted, or you see people who are improperly
handled by leaders, then you leave. You go somewhere
else with the hope that you're going to get a
better leader somewhere. So, yeah, again, it's
just that cycle. just continues and continues
and continues and and if we don't break it then
then uh organizations die they really do absolutely
well one of the solutions that i think is is
incredible and not only is it for the recruitment
element but also even the diversity element because
you know as we've known in the past there have
been departments some more famous than others
that really were not, you know, leaning into
other cultures and ethnicities in the hiring
practices. And that was addressed by a massive
pendulum shift the other way where they were
scooping up, you know, a hundred of insert person
here and then just bringing them in. And then
that created friction because within that group
was some people that were phenomenal firefighters
and some people that had no business doing the
job. So the solution of the mentorship programs,
and I absolutely love the one we have here in
Ocala, my friend Chris Hickman started it up.
You go into a central location and you reach
out to the whole city, but especially the underserved
populations, they just have to show up at that
station. They get free gear, free training. They
get kind of prepared for the fire academy. There
are scholarships they can get for the fire academy
because that is a barrier to entry in our profession.
If you can't afford to go to school, you can't
be a firefighter a lot of times. And then there's
obviously a lot of people looking on the other
side to hire these young people. So to me, this
waiting for your chief or your president to fix
your problems is ridiculous. They say you want
to change the world, start at home. I think the
next step after that is become a mentor in your
community. Oh, absolutely. So talk to me about
the ROTC program and what took you to Florida.
So again, I left the food bank. I came to ROTC
here at Emory Riddle. And I ran for the active
duty lieutenant colonel. I ran the program at
Stetson for a couple years. I was the only person
stationed out at Stetson into land. And when
I got there, there were 15 cadets in the program.
And the guy who hired me said, oh, grow the program
or I'm shutting it down. He said, it's not worth
my time to have 15 cadets out there. That was
January 2011. Seven years, we had 115 cadets
out at Stetson. So we went from 15 to 115. We
were commissioning 23, 24 lieutenants a year
out of Stetson, a partner school. There are whole
programs in Cadet Command that don't commission
23, 24 lieutenants. Then I was there for two
years, and then the job for the recruiter. for
the entire program came open and I applied for
it and I got it. And I kind of looked at the
same thing. You know, again, I approached things
with where are we? Where should we be? How do
we get there? And I walked into a new lieutenant
colonel, new lieutenant colonel had taken over.
And so I walked into his office and I said, you
know, this program should be twice the size that
it is. I said, this is a great university. Great
program. You know, we got such a variety in our
program. We got a liberal arts college out at
Stetson. We got a historically black college
in Bethune -Cookman. We got an outstanding engineer
in aerospace school here at Emory Riddle. We
ought to be drawn from all over the world to
come here. And he said, OK, make it so. And so
I said, OK. When I took over as the recruiter
for the entire program, we had 166 cadets in
the entire program, all three schools. Well,
I added Daytona State College. That was one of
the first things I did. I made sure I worked
through the agreement and the professor of military
science and the president of the university signed
it and we added them to the program. So now we've
got four schools, a community. I call it a community
college. That's not the way it's called anymore.
State college, whatever you want to call it.
And at that point, it only had two year degrees.
Now it's got seven or eight four year degrees.
So you can go there the entire time, be an ROTC,
graduate from Daytona State. We actually graduated,
I think, during my time there, four or five people
from Daytona State and commissioned them out
of that program. So that part of the program.
So I looked at, okay, what is the problem? And
so I realized we needed to be a national draw.
We couldn't just draw from around the area and
those occasional ones who knew about Emory Riddle.
So I worked the national scholarship program
really hard and got our name out there that it's
a great program. I worked with all... for schools
to get some special things. So, you know, free
housing if you're on a scholarship. So it truly
is a full ride scholarship. I worked to get dedicated
dorm rooms for cadets. So all the cadets were
in the same area. I just worked a lot of different
things trying to make it, like you said. These
kids today go online and they figure out what's
the best option for them. They're not just walking
in blind. So I tried to make it look as good
as possible on paper for them so that then I
could get them here to visit. And once I got
them here to visit, it was a done deal. Very
rarely did I lose a young man or a young woman
from coming to our program if I could get them
and their parents on campus to sit down with
me and other cadets. And I always had other cadets
with me. because they were your best people.
If you took care of them, you didn't take care
of them, you don't want them around. If you take
care of the cadets, they'll sell the program
because they love it here. And it ended up, by
the time I left, and I was there for 13 years,
by the time I left, we had one family who sent
four of their kids through this program. Wow.
Several times we had, at the same time, we had
three or four. brothers and sisters. So this
pair of brothers and sisters, that pair of brothers
and sisters. So they would go home and tell their
brother or their sister about the program and
that kid didn't come to the program. So it became
that they were selling it for us to their own
family. They'd ask me, sir, how do I go back
and talk to my high school? I said, tell me the
high school. I worked out the details. I said,
you can show up on this day when you're back
home here's a bunch of flyers here's my cards
go talk about they said well what should i talk
about i said talk about your experience what
does it mean to you to be in this program what
is it done for you don't worry about the money
piece and all that when you get them somewhat
sold they'll contact me from the card you handed
out and i'll do that piece you just tell them
the benefits of being in this program when i
left as the recruiter In October 2023, so 12,
almost 13 years, the program had 388 cadets in
the program. Wow, that's amazing. Yeah, we were
commissioning 55, 60 lieutenants a year out of
our program. Just to put that in perspective,
the senior military colleges, VMI, Citadel, Norwich,
Texas A &M. Only commission 100 lieutenants a
year out of their programs. What you said about
these students coming into the meeting with you
because they're the best advocate, this is something
I've heard a lot from military first responder
guests. Back in the day, our greatest recruitment
tool were the people in the job, in the uniform,
because we would tell our friends, oh my God,
it's amazing. We do this and this and this. Now
you've got people coming in. There was obviously
a multi -generational element for a long time.
And what's so sad is this last, you know, certainly
five years or so, it's the opposite. The number
of first responders that I know that have told
their children, I don't want you to be a firefighter.
And the only thing that's changed. That's happened
in the military too. During the last three or
four years that I was here, I had, I don't know,
four or five. Lieutenant Colonel is either on
active duty or retired or Sergeant Major on active
duty or retired. He told me that they told their
children do not go in the military right now.
And that's where 75 % of our officer corps comes
from is historically has come from family members
of people who had been in the military career
wise. And if you lose a nose, something's wrong.
Something's wrong. Yeah, but I mean, again, I'm
an eternal optimist. I always say I'm an angry
optimist, but I am a glass half full kind of
a guy. When you are a crisis, there's no better
platform to force change because literally, yeah,
there will literally be a collapse of the fire
service and law enforcement in certain towns
and cities if they don't turn it around. These
poor people, it's like log PT. You know, you
say you're supposed to have eight people on a
log. There's a lot of departments where that
log's only got five people. They can only hold
it for so long. They're going to quit. They're
going to break whatever happens first. And then
now what? Someone said to me, imagine calling
911 and it's just a dial tone. That's a real
potential. So going back and just fixing, because
the fire service hasn't changed. The people that
were raving about it, it's the same exact job.
We've been doing fire and EMS for 50 plus years
in this country. It's the work environment, the
decline of the support and the incline of all
the calls. And then obviously the lack of support
governmentally from a lot of these people too.
So you fix those elements, you'll go back to
having cheerleaders again. It will fix itself.
Absolutely. Yeah, I agree with you 100%. It goes
back to leadership, as most things in this country
do, as most things in this world do. Good leaders
create good organizations that take care of people
who then take care of the organization. That's
that's the cycle we want to be on. Good leaders
taking care of organizations and people and then
the people taking care of the organization and
doing the things the leader needs to do. That's
the cycle we want to be on. And that's not the
one we're on right now. Well, speaking of leadership,
talk to me about your leadership legacy, your
company that you have. And if anyone's listening,
how can they reach out to you? Yeah, so I wrote
my book and published it in February 2021. And
I titled it Your Leadership Legacy, Becoming
the Leader You Were Meant to Be. So obviously,
leadership legacy has some meaning to me. And
since then, I've been out talking on the speaking
circuit about leadership and success and those
kinds of things. In fact, I was just in San Antonio
last week talking at a conference about leadership.
I was the keynote speaker there. And so to me,
leadership as a leader has two parts. A very
small part of your legacy is what you actually
accomplished in that organization. Now, it matters.
Results do matter in the real world, maybe not
in fantasy land. where everybody's a winner and
everybody gets a trophy maybe not but in the
real world that we live in and work in results
do matter so that's important but the problem
is if you tie your legacy to what you actually
accomplished in that organization and you leave
and we're all going to leave and you leave and
the next person comes in and they change everything
then what's your legacy so you got to be careful
that that's not what you're tying your entire
legacy to Your real legacy is that next generation
of leaders that you helped produce. And then
they will help produce the next generation of
leaders in that servant leadership mode that
you just taught. So to me, that's what your legacy
is, that next generation of leaders. That's what
leaders do is they create more leaders. And you
do that through mentorship and coaching and training.
holding people to standard, all those things.
So that's what this is about. It's about making
better leaders. And I always say I've got four
ways to get my message out. I've got my keynote
talks. I've got my book. I've got my social media.
I'm on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Hex, YouTube,
Rumble. And there's videos and I write articles
and blogs and those kinds of things. And then
I've got podcasts. This is the 216th podcast
I've been on as a guest. And so to me, it's just
about getting that message out there. And so
I try to use all four methods as much as possible.
If you want to get a hold of me, either buy a
book or the book is on Amazon. If you want to
buy it, it's... Easy to find. There aren't too
many Oakland McCulloughs out there. And it's
available hardcover, paperback, e -book and audible.
And I did the reading for the audible book. The
only other voice on there is my wife. She did
the forward and about the author and everything
else is me. And then if you want me to come speak
at one of your training events, conferences,
company, whatever it is that you're doing, some
leadership stuff, then just reach out to me.
go to my website, www .LTCOakMcCullough .com
and my email and my cell phone number on there.
Give me a call, send me an email and we'll start
that conversation. I'd love to come speak to
your organization. Brilliant. Well, I want to
throw some quick closing questions at you before
I let you go, if you've got time. I do. All right.
The first one, we spoke about your book. Are
there any books that you love to recommend? Yes.
Will they be related to our discussion today
or completely unrelated? Oh, they're absolutely
related. People ask me that all the time. So
because I talk about professional development
and the importance of reading, you know, Harry
Truman said, not all readers are leaders, but
all leaders are readers. And I absolutely agree
with that. And so my favorite leadership book,
three of them, two of them have nothing to do
with the military whatsoever. One of them is
On Leadership by John Wood, probably the best
leadership book I've ever read. And if you've
never been introduced to John Wooden's Pyramid
of Success, that book will do it and you will
be absolutely amazed. That has hung on my office
wall for many, many years. The second one is
Lee Iacocca's Autobiography. John Wooden shows
you what servant leadership is about. Lee Iacocca
shows you what vision and culture can do for
an organization. And then the third one is a
military book. It's an Israeli. Eventually he
ended up an Israeli general, but the book is
by Kahalani and it's called Heights of Courage.
And it's when he was a armored battalion commander
on the Golan Heights in 1973 and was attacked
by... the Syrian division plus on the Golan Heights
and it is an exercise no matter what your profession
it's about the military no doubt about it but
about it's about crisis management how do I solve
this crisis and then go to that crisis and then
go to that and it's that's what he's doing is
going from crisis to crisis to crisis sometimes
two crises at the same time and he had to make
a choice which one's the the worst situation
at this point and so it is a exercise in crisis
management so you got servant leadership you
got building the culture and you got crisis management
those are three great books brilliant thank you
what about uh films and documentaries that you
love yeah well that's i mean there's so many
great um great war movies out there um you know
we were soldiers once and young um The one that
Mel Gibson played in that was about General Hal
Moore, who I actually got a chance to hear speak
twice. And in fact, I have his book that We Were
Soldiers Once Known signed by him and Galloway.
I wouldn't take a million dollars for that book.
And that's a great movie. But there's so many
great ones out there that aren't even military.
The Cowboys with John Wayne. Talk about leadership.
He brought on these young kids, had to teach
them, mentor them, coach them, be the leader,
father figure for them. How to build a team,
basically, is what that movie really shows you.
And I think well worth the look. But there's
so many great war movies out there. Saving Private
Ryan is another good one that deals with culture
and leadership and building a team during adversity,
how to handle crisis, crisis management. A lot
of things in that movie that you can learn from
as a leader. I've had Captain Dale die on a couple
of times. I actually did a boot camp with him
years ago as a stuntman in Japan. And he was
talking about the Saving Private Ryan with Matt
Damon and then the Band of Brothers with, I always
forget the actor's name, but the guy that played
Ross in Friends that plays the instructor there.
Yeah, David Schwimmer. That's right. Thank you.
And how they deliberately, I think with... Saving
Private Ryan, they just kept Matt Damon away
the whole time. And then Schwimmer, he kept having
excuses for being pulled away. So it created
that shared suffering tribal element and then
that outsider. So it was so interesting. Coming
from the fire department, you might in your academy
have that one person that's not putting in the
work or comes in at the end or whatever it is.
And I could see that exact thing. So what a beautiful
way to... To get that to really show on film
than to keep the actors away while the others
are getting their asses handed to them. I think
the key, whether you're reading or watching films,
is you got to concentrate on not just the movie
and the storyline, but you got to concentrate
on what is it that you can pull out of there
that you can use as a leader in your profession?
Because leadership is leadership. Doesn't matter
where you learned it, doesn't matter where you
practiced it. Leadership is about people and
trust. And if you understand that, you can lead
any organization. And no matter where you were
a leader, if you move to a new profession, you
can be a leader there as well, as long as you
understand it's about people and trust. So every
time you're in a situation, try to put in the
back of your head lessons that you're learning
and things that you're seeing that will help
you in the next situation you're in. Are you
going to be in that exact same situation? No.
But you'll be in something similar that you can
adapt something that you learned from a movie
or a film or a book. Absolutely. Have you ever
watched the show Ted Lasso? I have not. I think
you'd really like it. It was pretty interesting
in a storyline. It's an American football coach.
that's brought over to coach a British football
team, soccer team. And the initial reason is
it's this divorced couple and she's trying to
run the team into the ground despite her ex.
But it backfires because this guy is just such
a great coach. It's not technical. And they...
paints it so well because he literally doesn't
even understand the sport so it's not about the
technical side it's about the human side and
forging relationships and the takeaways are so
so good this is on apple tv but i highly recommend
that i'll take a look at that because that sounds
like something that you could actually learn
good good lessons learned from about leadership
yeah yeah and it's funny too so it's very entertaining
all right well then The next question, is there
a person that you'd recommend to come on this
podcast as a guest to speak to the first responders,
military, and associated professions of the world?
Yes. Sean Downs. I saw him speak at the National
Fire Prevention Association Conference in Orlando.
And he talks about... Leadership and dealing
with cancer and health issues and things like
that. That are a huge issue in the fire departments
today and great speaker. Absolutely worth having
him on the show. He works in the D .C. area in
the fire department up there. And I can I can
send you his contact information. In fact, I
can. connect the two of you if you want. That
would be amazing. Let's make it happen. Thank
you so much. All right. Well, then the last question
before you just underline where people can find
you online, what do you do to decompress? Yeah.
And we all have to, I don't care if you're a
leader or just a worker bee at some point, you
got, you got to have those things that allow
you to rewind and refuel your body. And for me,
it's the four F's faith, family, friends, and
fishing. You know, for me, it all starts with
faith and then family. And you, you know, you
got to do that on occasion. You got to recharge
your battery, because if you don't, you can't
give what you don't have. And at some point,
you will burn yourself out if you don't take
some time. every once in a while to recharge
your own batteries. Absolutely. All right. And
just one more time online, the social media handles
and the website, where are the best places? Yeah.
So on my website, www .ltcoakmccullough .com,
there is a button on there that goes to all my
social media, LinkedIn, X, Instagram, Rumble,
YouTube, all of it, Facebook. And then there's
my cell phone number and my email address on
there. And you can contact me any way you want
and would love to be in contact with you. Brilliant.
Well, I want to thank you so much. We've talked
for over two hours now, but getting your perspective
on some of these topics that we've discussed
with the background that you've had has been
invaluable, truly. So I want to thank you so,
so much for being so generous with your time
and coming on the Behind the Shield podcast today.
Yeah, well, thanks for having me, James. Like
I said at the beginning, I've been looking forward
to this ever since we had that phone conversation
because I knew it was going to be a great conversation.
And, you know, I try every single one of these,
whether it's a podcast or my speaking engagements,
my goal after every one of them is that we hopefully
we helped at least one person be a better leader,
a better person. And if we did, then it was worth
our time.