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I'll spell that to you because it's not as you
think, T -E -A -M -B -U -I -L -D -R .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 26 -year
veteran of the fire service and one of the two
men behind managing a fire company, John Brunicini.
Now, for those of you listening, you'll recognize
that last name. So we discuss a host of topics
from growing up in a legacy firefighter family,
the blue card, leadership, firefighter fitness.
sleep deprivation, managing the humans in the
fire station, and so much more. Now, before we
get to this incredible conversation, as I say
every week, please just take a moment, go to
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Every single five -star rating truly does elevate
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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...
John Brunicini. Enjoy. Well, John, I want to
start by saying thank you so much for taking
the time and coming on the Behind the Shield
podcast. Happy to be here. So where on planet
Earth are we finding you today? As you can see,
I have a man cave in the garage where my computer
is. But I'm in Phoenix, Arizona. I'm hanging
out at home. Sorry, I was a little late. I got
our time zones mixed up, so I apologize. No problem.
Isn't Arizona part of your state? They change
with the times, and part of them, they don't
change with the times. Is that right? the whole
state of arizona does not change i think us in
hawaii are the only two out of the 50 that don't
yeah i think the rest of us need to join you
it's insanity even if you look at the sleep medicine
that they have more suicides and heart attacks
the day we lose sleep than any other day of the
year excuse me of the year oh wow so yeah it
makes no sense these days All right. Well, then
let's start at the very beginning. Obviously,
you know, with the last name, a lot of people
in the fire service would recognize that. So
tell me where you were born and tell me a little
bit about your family dynamic, what your parents
did, how many siblings? I was born in Phoenix,
Arizona. A long time ago. My dad was a firefighter.
uh my mom uh was going to school and she became
a nurse i was my brother was first i was second
and then i had a sister behind me so i'm born
and raised in phoenix and still living here over
60 years beautiful now obviously your dad is
known you know as one of the the leaders when
it comes to the fire service As a human being,
though, as a son of a firefighter, talk to me
about your memories of him being in that profession
when you were little. You know, he became the
fire chief. So I was born in 62. He became the
fire chief in 78. So I was 16 years old when
that happened. But I think, you know, like most
kids growing up, they know what their parents
do, but they don't. I don't know. They don't
really think about it much. They have their own.
So I know my dad was a firefighter and he built
his own house. So there's always firefighters
over there helping him build a house. But, you
know, my dad, you know, people say he's a firefighter
or, you know, like a banker or a lawyer or something.
You know, it was just this occupation. So it
wasn't until I graduated from high school and
really started working for the fire department
that like. okay he's the fire chief and you know
a big deal and everybody wants to kiss his ring
and that whole nine yards but you know growing
up he was just my dad that was a job so someone
made it i know not very exciting no no it's good
so someone made a comment the other day that
um and they were talking about the way that our
profession is uh perceived now versus how it
used to be like you kind of just labeled you
know you were a banker you were a construction
worker you're a firefighter in conversations
with your dad and then your own perspective what
is the difference outside of new york in the
fire service between pre -9 -11 and post -9 -11
um uh i you know i don't know uh It's like asking
somebody, are you happy? Are we happier before
9 -11 as a service, or are we sadder as a service?
I don't know. I think we've made a lot of improvements
since then. I think it's made a lot of people
aware. I think kids today don't want to get it
on them nearly as much as my generation. to where,
you know, all the cancers and stuff are more
out there and aware. So I think it's less than
some of our hiring pools. But, you know, to me,
it's always, I hope it's getting better instead
of worse. What do you think? Well, I think actually
to kind of clarify the question, but I didn't
present it very well because I remember now it
was more about being perceived as a hero. You
know, and prior to 9 -11, they were saying that
we were just firefighters then. But after this,
especially with this younger generation, you
know, there's a danger of leaning into the identity
as a firefighter and having the mustache and
the leather helmet. They're almost like being
seen to look as a firefighter, which is kind
of matched with that post 9 -11 adoration. And
I was a post 9 -11 firefighter myself, so I never
experienced prior. But they were saying before
that there wasn't a lot of this talk. And obviously
what the men and women of FDNY and the other
responders did in New York by the Pentagon, you
know, responding to the crash of 93, you know,
that was absolutely heroic. But as an entire
profession, he felt like it had been skewed after
that event. You know, I know. Because I was on
the Phoenix Fire Department, I joined the department
in 1980. So I kind of did see before and after.
I know that my dad as a fire chief really exploited
city council for a lot more money he was able
to get after those events, you know. So that
was a good thing. I don't know about being a
hero. I think we were held in high esteem and
regard in our communities before that anyway.
But shortly after that, I mean, my crew walked
into a bar. It was crowded like 9 o 'clock in
the evening. I mean, the place was packed. And
when we walked in there, the whole place stood
up and applauded for us. So, I mean, that had
never happened before. But, I mean, that wore
off a couple months, and then they just kind
of always treated the way they always treated
us, I thought. I don't know. Yeah. I mean, I
think certainly that certainly when it comes
to actually putting their money where their mouth
is. And I think it's the same with with COVID,
you know, that the frontline heroes, heroes work
here when they were asking for more staffing
and PPE and beds. They were like, oh, we're just
going to clap. And it's the same with that. We
actually asked for the funding for a fourth shift
for the fourth person on the rig, whatever it
is that we actually need. Now, all of a sudden,
I feel like certainly in modern times. there's
none of that support at least in a lot of areas
yeah uh so we're scratching and clawing for all
the resources that we kind of as a service has
always done maybe we had a good period there
for a while a bubble where they gave us some
money but then there was a recession uh -huh
yeah so Absolutely. All right. Well, let's go
back on your timeline then. So when you were
kind of going through the school years, what
are you playing and doing as far as exercise
and sport? I played baseball in grade school.
And then when I got to high school, I never played
organized football up until high school. And
then I joined the football team as a freshman
and that started out the year. So I played football.
I wrestled. And then my dad built his own house,
so that was never finished. So I was also a quasi
-pseudo -ditch -digger, mason. So I was working
outside at a very young age. I think my dad had
kids just so that he could make slaves out of
us to help. build stuff i grew up on a farm i
can relate a hundred percent yeah you just had
me to work here well it's interesting when when
people have played team sports and also played
individual sports and i did both growing up as
well i was a martial artist but then i also played
hockey and some other other sports There's interesting
lessons from each of those two dynamics. So when
you reflect back now, how did those sports factor
into areas of your leadership as you progress
through the fire service? They what I remember
most is, you know, your high school, a lot of
hormones or, you know, flying. You're angry at
a lot of stuff. So football kind of saved me
because it let me take out a lot of aggression.
I mean, legally. You could smash into people
at high speeds and, you know, nothing would happen.
So it kind of got me through high school just
mentally having a valve, you know, to get rid
of steam. That's what I remember most about it.
And then, too, you know, the camaraderie and
hanging out with, you know, a team. That's always
good. And that translated, you know, directly
right into the fire service. And like you said,
I think most. People sitting around a fire station
table have been involved in some sort of team,
something, military, sports. So, but, you know,
at high school, I had no aspirations of, you
know, continuing on college sports or anything
else. I like my knees, yeah, and my shoulders,
my elbows. So I got out when all my stuff still
kind of worked. that's good and you still enjoyed
the sports you weren't completely burned out
like a one sport athlete no and then one you
know it was a very popular sport when i joined
and i joined young i was 18 years old when i
got on the fire department uh basketball was
the rage so i played a lot of basketball uh through
my 20s into my early 30s so What was your dad's
ethos as a family as far as physical fitness
and how it pertains in the fire service? You
know, there's a lot of people that know this,
but a lot of people that don't. My dad built
a gym in his backyard. That's how committed he
was. And it wasn't just, you know, a little workout
room. It was 1 ,200 square feet. It had a bathroom,
shower, locker room. It had a ray of cardio.
He had cable equipment, free weight, squat racks,
leg machines. I mean, it was a gym. So he was
very committed to that. And then, too, he had
a saying I had in the book when we're talking
about managing physical fitness. Firefighters
are professional athletes that don't get a warm
up period. So and that's really. And if you look
at physical fitness. When we're out teaching,
managing a fire company, I say it's really one
of the most important things a company officer
manages, making sure that everybody is working
out and staying in shape. And, you know, that
all starts out by themselves doing that. But
it's three prongs. First of all, we have a very
physical job. You know, we got to wear a lot
of heavy equipment. We have to be in really good
physical condition and do a couple of work cycles
in that environment. The second part of being
in good shape is the better shape you are in,
the better your body can resist stress and free
radicals. So it really helps us. And those are
the environments that we're working in, right?
Free radicals are bombarding us. And the better
shape we're in, the better we are at staying
healthy. And the third part of it is our mental
wellness. and what being in good physical condition
does. And a lot of that, like when Tim Dietz,
I know he's been on your show, you know, we get
bonked out on a lot of stuff. And those are triggers
that start dumping these stress hormones into
our bodies. And we go on these events where we
don't need them to get through them. you know,
the adrenaline and the cortisol. And we come
back to the fire station and that stuff is in
our bodies, eating us away. So the way we get
rid of all that is through exercise. So it gets
rid of stress hormones, you know, all that good
stuff. So firefighters have to be physically
fit if you're going to be in the field. Why is
it you think that there's such a resistance to
actually having a fitness standard? And when
I say a fitness standard, I'm not talking about
something that people made up where it's a 500
deadlift. vertical jump, but something similar
to a CPAT where regardless of age or gender,
you're just moving around the equipment that
we have to do for our job. It's the lunacy of
our service, isn't it? What's the number one
killer? Yeah, I mean, heart disease, cancer,
and now we've got suicide, I think doubling all
of those, but yeah, all interrelated. And what
is the number one way to combat all that? Exercise
and nutrition. So why don't we have standards
that combat all the stuff that is the number
one killers and, you know, and to me it's okay.
We talk about the killer, but we don't talk about
the 10 other people that had an event that didn't
kill them and now they're disabled in some capacity
for the rest of their life. So, you know, they're
not living to the fullest because of, you know,
I don't know. I don't know. James. Typically,
you know, they resisted my doctor and, you know,
those lines of things that, you know, and I get
protecting your confidentiality. But I mean,
when we're in a hazard zone, our lives are kind
of depending on the physical condition of the
people next to us. Right. So. yeah i'm with you
i'm with you well it's interesting because i
i have a lot of people you know from all walks
of life on here but i have you know special ops
and even tier one you know special forces soldiers
um i have the strength conditionists and nutritionists
and sports psychologists that work with those
people as well and when i'm talking to those
groups we're talking about forging performance
we're talking about endurance and strength and
breath work and all these things when those same
professionals work with our more often than not,
and you see this even in the IFF's peer fitness
training, there's a conversation of, well, let's
just get them moving. Let's try and reduce the
heart disease, which is not performance. That's
not taking a man or a woman and making sure they
can put on 100 pounds of gear and then climb
30 stories before they go to work. So there's
such a chasm when we've allowed this fitness
standard to just be non -existent. between forging
performance and having, you know, elite firefighters.
And if you look, for example, at the Paris firefighters,
male, female, they're in phenomenal shape. And,
you know, look at what they did in Notre Dame,
for example, or the Bataclan shooting. And then
you look at, you know, worst case scenario where
you've got no standards and no fitness standards.
And as you said, you know, you've got, we all
know there's many, many of us in uniform are
not where we're supposed to be physically. And
when lives are at stake. You're putting yourself
at risk. You're putting your crew at risk. And
the person that you're supposed to be getting,
if you go down, now you become the number one
priority. So the fact that we've prevented, opposed
these fitness standards for so long, it disgusts
me. And I think it's something that we have to
get together as a profession and rectify. I totally
agree. You know, a lot of fire departments, we
didn't have it in Phoenix, but a lot of fire
departments now have like mandatory physical
fitness times, you know, during the shift. And
so they, they're, they're creating a culture
where they're allowing the company officer, you
know, the opportunities that are more ingrained
in the daily schedules. So, I mean, there's a
lot of stuff that a fire department can do, but
there's always that, I don't know, you know,
once you get hired. uh it's like very few places
keep visiting uh an annual physical fitness standard
so i was a lifeguard for a long time and we had
to re -qualify every two years could you imagine
me saying it's not fair that you have to test
my swimming you're trying to take my job exactly
exactly uh you know you mentioned that uh We
had a couple of people from Miami -Dade on our
validation committee for our textbook. And one
of the things they did a long time ago is they
have to be like, like guard class three or something
as part as being in the field because of all
the water around Miami. Well, every year they
got to go do swim a quarter, three quarters of
a mile within a certain amount of time. He said
that right there keeps your entire, keeping their
life guard. card to stay in the field is what
keeps your department in shape yeah absolutely
so but phoenix uh the closest body of water you
can put in a glass you know or a pitcher we don't
get that excuse yeah ours is like we have uh
mountains that kind of surround the valley and
there's a low high angle rescue so they're running
up and down you know three mile trails So, I
mean, they have to be in really good shape to
do stuff like that. Like you say, the journey
to get to where you work is, you know, you got
to be in really good shape just to get there.
And now that you get there, you got to do the
work. So, yeah. Well, I think is it Newton's
third law of motion? And it's the one where,
you know, they show it takes like, you know,
five people to start pushing a car. And as the
car gets faster, people peel away and then one
person can keep it going. It's the same with
fitness. If you've got to that standard as you've
gone through the academy. it takes very little
effort to actually sustain it. And to be very
fair, and I always say this, the work week doesn't
help. The understaffing and mandatory overtime
doesn't help because we're setting them up for
failure now. So we have to fix the environment
too. But if at the front door, you say, all right,
you're already fit. We're just going to keep
you fit. That's a lot easier than telling that
300 pound engineer that he or she has got to
get back to, you know, 220 and active again.
Well, and that's if they did make standards,
right? Do they grandfather? We're only going
to hold the people that we hire from this point
forward to this. And anybody that has been hired
before this has happened, you know, keep eating
the cheese puffs, you know? No. I don't know.
No, I think that's why fire prevention was invented.
You know, you can go over there, go check extinguishers
while the personal trainers get you back in shape.
And if because you get this, if you like, I don't
want to put in the work. All right. Well, then
it's definitely glad, you know, good thing that
you're not on the rig, because if you've got
that little interest in even getting fit, how
are you going to be on the scene? You know, so
I totally agree. And especially as a company
officer, you know, delivering service, you want
to be able to physically depend on the people
that are on your your your unit. Are you familiar?
Like Phoenix had its own health center. uh, own
doctors. Uh, and we had annual physicals and
the whole, it was, it was very extensive. And,
uh, I don't know, going through a process like
that, you know, your employer cares, right? But
we had a tier system, tiered fitness level. Are
you familiar with that? Um, somewhat. My dad
worked with the union, the fitness initiative
and all that stuff for years. And again, it was
always a challenge. But we had four levels, four
tiers of fitness. And tier one, you could see
your abs. So maybe about 10 % of our fire department
was actually tiered one. And they were very strict
about it, too. Tier two, I think, you were, one
of the factors was your body fat. So tier two
were people that had in between, I don't know,
it was like 12 and a half. The 20 % body fat
was a Tier 2 body fat. That was probably about
70 % of our department. But they, believe me,
they had endurance. And then there was Tier 3
where if you, Tier 3, you're like a fire. You're
either getting better or you're getting worse.
And you need to do a certain set of things when
you're in this category. And then Tier 4 was
you have a certain set of things wrong with you
where you can't be out in the field delivering
service anymore. I sent two people in my career
that were really out of shape, clinically obese.
And then they're an acroleptic. You know, they
can't sleep. They bring in a CPAP machine, you
know, the size of a small Volkswagen, you know.
And I go, you can't work here. I mean, you're
out of breath just getting on the truck. So I
sent them down to the health center. They come
back. They're tier three. They put the letter
down. I mean, what does a company officer do
when that happens? Because like you say, there's
no standard where, okay, physically you have
the body fat, blah, blah, blah, and you don't
have this bad of a medical condition, but you
can't go out there and do a CPAT test. You can't
get through it. So that would be the defining
factor. Yeah. And again, it's that longevity
versus performance conversation. If you are in
great shape, the longevity is tied into that.
you are going to have a longer, healthier retirement
because you've taken care of your heart and your
lungs and your blood vessels and all the things,
your GI tract. But yeah, if you're scraping through,
you know, and I always say like there's that
phrase, would you want you rescuing you? And
that's good. But my thing is make it more raw
than that. How would you feel if your family
died because a rescuer hadn't trained? It's inexcusable.
It cannot be allowed to happen. So it doesn't
mean you just fire everyone on the spot. You
give them an on -ramp to get them back. But if
they choose not to put in the work to get back
to being in shape to be a firefighter, that's
on them then. That's not you. You knew the expectations
at the front door because the minimum standard
state, you've got to be able to do all that work
that you did in the academy. So you can't say
it's unfair. You knew from day one. I totally
agree. And then, too, if you look at how much
money would that save a fire department over
the course of 20 years having an in -fit -shape
workforce, it drastically reduced several negative
factors. Yeah, absolutely. All right, well, let's
get back onto your journey. So you have this
firefighter family. Were you yourself thinking
of the fire service when you were in the school
ages, or was there something different in mind?
No, I was, computers just got invented. Yeah.
So, and then I, I had some run -ins, you know,
with some, well, I was kind of drifting. I didn't
know what I wanted to do. And I had a couple
events that my mom actually came in to my bedroom
with a hiring packet and said you need to go
down and do something because you're on a path
to like we're worried about you so I had really
I had never thought about joining the fire department
up to that point so I applied I was still in
high school when they did the test I just turned
18 so then I got in but before that I really
I had I had never thought about. And my brother
had joined the fire department ahead of me about
a year. But still, I didn't see that as my career
path. So what was that on -ramp for you? When
you joined, were you actually kind of bitten
by the bug by that point? No, it wasn't until
I got out in the field. I hated running, like
long -distance running. I couldn't stand it.
And every morning in the academy, we had to run
like 5 .2 miles. Like we're going to run to the
incident scene. So, man, the academy, I dreaded
every morning. And, you know, it was fun learning
the vocation and everything, but just that part
of it. So, but when I got out in the field, I
don't know, like, you know, people are having
their worst day and you're going to show up and
make their day better. I don't think there are
very many people that are in jobs like that.
And the two every day is different. You don't
know what's going to happen. You're not in this
hold room, you know, or. So it was a couple of
years into the job. I really I love being a firefighter.
I look forward to coming to work every day. I
love the people I work with. So I fell in love
with it. How competitive was it to get hired
back then? Oh, God. Probably a test, 3 ,000 to
4 ,000 people for 100 jobs. Yeah, it was very
competitive. You know, but today still Phoenix
is high regarded. It's a big city. They're starting
to rehire firefighters, trying to get back where
they need to be. And someone told me they had
4 ,000 people show up for like 250 this year.
So that's a good ratio. Yeah. Yeah, there's a
lot of places I know that are a lot worse off
at the moment. One of the things that someone
said to me, and it was very profound, they were
like, the biggest recruitment tool that we have
in the fire service are the firefighters themselves.
And, you know, same in the military, you know,
you used to talk about, you know, how proud you
were to be a firefighter and it would inspire
your kids and your kids' friends and your co
-workers. And, you know, all of a sudden you'd
be pulling people into this profession. But,
you know, I've heard from many, many people,
and this would even be my perception, even though
I am sure we are in the beginning of a renaissance,
that we are going to change the fire service,
the things that need to be changed when it comes
to the human element, if you like. But right
now, a lot of firefighters are dissuading their
children, their friends from coming into this
job. So when you reflect back now to, you know,
80s, 90s and beyond. How strong was that element?
How powerful as far as recruitment were the men
and women that you were serving with? Do you
mean like, okay, the people that I hang out with
and I'm talking to them about bringing them,
you should join the fire department? Yeah, exactly.
The influence of simply firefighters saying,
this is an amazing job. You need to do this and
getting people fired up to come into this profession.
Man, you know, there's a lot of people that I
knew became firefighters. God, I don't know.
But I think it's getting less and less. Like
you said, I think the more awareness of what
we're doing. I mean, it's not a very good recruiting
tool, is it? Hey, come on over. We're going to
dip you in a bucket of cancer. And then we're
going to sleep deprive you. And then we're going
to emotionally traumatize you with the worst
things that you can ever see dealing with humanity.
So it's kind of a trifecta of a cocktail. We're
going to stress you out the whole nine yards.
And then, like you've been saying, we're understaffed.
We're going to overwork you on top of all the
other bad stuff. Even if we had a good work schedule,
it would still. be a very stress and job. So,
and I think, I think, you know, I deal with Tim
Dietz a lot, the post -traumatic stress behavioral
guy, and he goes around setting up stuff in fire
departments. He, he says that kids are different
today. So they're a lot more aware. But what
ends up happening is, and I think it was in my
day, is that people that are attracted to our
service, a great percentage of them, are comfortable
in chaos. So I think there's always going to
be a group of people that were raised in a certain
way where they're just attracted to our service.
And then, too, a lot of the altruism that comes
with some of those people in those environments,
they want to give back. prevent what happened
to them. I don't know. We're always going to
have people to hire from that group. I think
this is it. I find it very, very encouraging
because most people, some idiots still say kids
today don't want to work. They're all on their
phones. There's a group, but like I always point
out, there's a group of our generation that spent
most of their time sitting in front of the TV
eating chicken wings. It's the same exact type
of person. But this generation now, and the Wall
Street Journal did a piece on this, are going
into the trades because this awareness that they're
having, this ability to really find out information
from this little rectangle in their hand, they're
looking at college. And these young people are
going, so wait a sec, $60 ,000 worth of debt
and a piece of paper doesn't guarantee me a job?
That doesn't sound good. Well, you put that same
thing as you just laid out with the fire service
and mandatory overtime and divorces and suicides
and all the things. these people are looking
at the you know the the hero stuff as we talked
about earlier but they're also seeing that and
they're going uh i really want to serve but let
me find a different way of serving the fire service
doesn't sound sustainable um which is funny because
when i talk about 24 72 there's someone on facebook
and it's they got a joint account so that speaks
loudly their wife has to be on the same account
as them but they always say unsustainable and
i'm like i'm not even i don't respond to any
on social media but what's unsustainable is the
way that we do it now not the way that we're
trying to change it to. We know it's unsustainable
because we're in the middle of a recruitment
crisis. The proof is in the pudding. But you
change the work environment to a group of young
men and women that value their relationships,
understand the importance of sleep, the importance
of fitness, the importance of their relationships,
being present with their family because maybe
their parents weren't because they were sleeping
undead, working to the ground. And you attract
them with the working environment. Now they're
going, I do have a servant's heart. And now I
see that you're actually going to take care of
your people. Sign me up. I want to be there.
So I think we have an amazing pool of young men
and women. But we as a profession have to look
in the mirror and go, these are the things that
we need to fix. And when we do, we're going to
turn this thing around. Yeah, I agree. The 72
-24. Am I saying that right? 2472. I mean, it's
irrelevant which way it is. Yeah. I wrote a chapter
in our textbook that's on sleep deprivation.
And I've also hung out with fire departments
that have gone to that work schedule. What is
your experience? Do you know the fire departments
that have gone to that schedule and what's the
effect of that? yeah i've got a very unique lens
and i hope that this podcast was part of the
reason why why this happened but in the last
year seven fire departments went from 24 48 to
24 72 and a great example is gainesville which
is my neighbor here um where i went to college
actually uf they just switched um they were you
know they were struggling to to hire i mean you
know they were taking a big part of the list
instead of you know as we just touched on five
ten percent of the list um and they announced
that they were going to 24 72 they did it in
a way where they were like all right we're just
going to open up this the shift and the the the
personnel were like we will cover these spaces
as you fill them so initially there was more
over time for a short amount of time but they
they went to it in september This month, they
are fully staffed, four shifts. That's how many
recruits started lining up outside their door
to come here. And the FSU has done baseline testing
before they switched. And I've got someone coming
on with the results next month and they're doing
tests again. Now they've gone to 2472. But recruitment
goes up. Certainly, obviously, the happiness
and health of the firefighters has gone up. it's
a money -saving initiative because most of the
overtime now goes away at least the over you
know the 24 overtime and still all the day overtime
but so now these men and women are back at home
in their beds when they're supposed to be so
i've heard nothing but great things and this
is the thing i always ask people the administrators
the chiefs they work 40 hours explain to me why
you need to work 56 when you're the one out responding
to these person goes home at five you know five
o 'clock every day that pushes papers around
all day but you'd see and do all the things that
we have to do and you need to work 56 it doesn't
make any sense so when when people have made
the switch every department that i know so far
in depart in florida they're already seeing a
huge uptick in in staffing they've got guys that
were getting ready to leave that now aren't leaving
so they're retaining a lot of their more um you
know salty uh knowledgeable firefighters um so
yeah it's a win -win -win every single time that
i've heard of so far is it is that the schedule
you work one on and you're off for three yeah
yeah and even do it yeah so 24 72 no no 24 72
so it's ongoing yeah and it's funny because even
even the verbiage that we've always used one
day on two days off you know i had an aha moment
not that long ago a couple years ago like why
do we call that a day is eight hours you know
a civilian day is eight hours of the one hour
lunch So it's three days on, one day off is what
we've always worked. So all it's gone to now
is three days on, two days off. That ends up
being 42 hours a week, doesn't it? Yes. Yeah,
which is what everyone else works. So, yeah,
it's funny. I did a talk to help one of the local
counties try and persuade their county to move
to this. And I happen to just be messing around
with some math. The 40 -hour workweek person.
If you extrapolate over the year, they work 260
days a year. If you divide what we work into
eight hour days on a 56 hour work week, it ends
up being 365, no, 364 days a year. So we get
one day off a year. So when you put it in those
terms, people are just mind blown. But when we've
said we have this amazing schedule, I work 10
days a month, you know, one day on, two days
off. we don't realize that we've been telling
ourselves kind of fairy tales the whole time.
Wow. We're getting chipped out of a lot of overtime.
Yeah, well, exactly. Here's the beautiful thing
with that. And this is what's interesting. You
know, we all know the guys that are all in in
the profession, you know, that's their identity.
And then when they retire, everything falls apart.
If you don't have a lot of overtime available,
there'll always be overtime, of course, sick
days and events and all those kinds of things.
Now it kind of forces people, if you want to
make extra money, to kind of go down the entrepreneurial
path. I just had Paul Conway on the show yesterday.
So he's got a shield company, for example. Now
you have that separate business, separate tribe,
separate financial safety net. And again, not
working overnight in the ER, not working on an
ambulance company, something where you're still
home every night with your family. That's a positive.
Make more money if you need more money. Just
don't do it. getting, you know, staying in the
meat grinder at a fire station. I've heard both
sides. It's great. And then the way they do it
is different. Some people go to a Kelly way to
do that where you're on one, off two, on one,
off two, on one, off. seven or something and
then when they but a couple large metros uh washington
dc was one of them uh went to a four shift and
what i heard from their senior staff was they
kind of lost their fire department because having
three days off in a row it kind of became more
of a side job and then they couldn't like watch
out for people as much like you know instead
of gaining you know a half a pound on your two
days off they came in with three quarters of
a pound they had gained so they but i think the
other sides of it are the sleep deprivation and
all the other stuff it prevents even if you're
in a one -on -two -off if you have let's say
you don't have enough people to make a four shift
but The goal should be having at least what you
have adequately staffed and then having more
than that so that at least the people have opportunities
to take multiple shifts off a month. The opportunities
are there because you're staffed enough, and
that doesn't put pressure on the rest of everybody
else that's working. So if we could just get
up to that level, I think we would be way ahead
of the ballgame. Yeah, well, even I think the
way that we do that, though, is we have to bring
these people back. And that goes back to the
42. And it's interesting with the D .C., whoever
said that, because if you look at the science
that's behind sleep deprivation and all the things,
it causes obesity. It causes diabetes. It causes
heart disease and cancer. And so there's no way
in hell that they're coming back. less healthy
than they would have you know they're definitely
and then again that goes back to the fitness
standards if you want to go eat cake for three
days that's fine but you better be ready to do
the CPAT or whatever it is so but that disconnection
yeah the only thing that I've heard is you know
you know you see you know say you're a B shifter
like your brother you know A shift is off going
C shift is on coming you always see that I think
that's the only thing is they've said it's a
bit weird because there's some shifts that you
don't see but when I worked in California it
was one -on -one off um you know four times and
then we had a four or six at the end so a lot
of times you wouldn't see you know it would kind
of rotate through as well you'd have you know
one shift that you saw all the time you never
saw a c -shift for an entire tour and then so
you know is that a terrible thing i don't think
so you know if you're you know if you're because
then you pick up overtime and you you know you
do trades and stuff then you get to start see
other shifts but i i think that's you know a
very poor reason not to go to to the 24 72 and
i think again even filling like you said people
have said to me oh i want we want to get a fourth
person on the rig first and then we'll talk about
that and it goes back to well how are you going
to get if you can't even hire now what makes
you think they're magically going to start lining
up to be your fourth person they're not you've
got to fix the work week first and the irony
is boston new york some of the original fire
services they work a 42 hour week no one no one
brings that up The original fire departments
work a 42 -hour week. It's the rest of us that
are behind. Oh, I definitely agree. But, you
know, like at Phoenix, my God, what would that
cost to go to a fourth shift? Each shift right
now has about 450 people on it. So, and then
how long does it take to get up there? But I
totally agree that that's, we got to do something.
I mean. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the biggest thing
is, you know, as this happens, because a lot
of departments are saying, you know, Miami -Dade,
for example, is still sought after higher. But
all these other departments are now going to
this better work week. So that recruitment that
was kind of a luxury because you were known as
a destination department. Now that starts kind
of tapering off because the agencies around you
have got a better work week. And then so some
departments will be forced into it later. But
most departments, the money is the overtime.
the money is you know the the cost of of hiring
all these recruits and then a hundred of them
walk out the back door in the next two years
you know it's the workman's comp claims it's
the medical disabilities it's the line of duty
death payments it's the lawsuits from when we're
so tired and we make mistakes and we hit vehicles
and push the wrong meds so the money is all there
it's all downstream though we've got to have
the courage to put it at the front proactive
all right sign me up It's a big old sales pitch
there. Part of it too, though, is if you work
one shift and you have three days off, you're
going to recover from that one shift a lot better.
But when you're that one shift and it's two o
'clock in the morning, you're still sleep deprived.
So we're never going to get rid of it as a service.
I think we can help. really mitigate its long
-term effects with another shift. But as a company
officer, if it's 2 o 'clock in the morning and
you just got woken up to go on an incident, you've
got to understand what's going on in your human
body, all the stuff that doesn't normally happen
in normal people. And you also have to realize
that cognitively and physically you're not what
you were when you came to work at 8 o 'clock
in the morning. And so I've got to manage you
in a way where we're going to slow things down.
uh we're going to take more time rehabbing recovering
our work cycle isn't going to be as long or nearly
as vigorous just because we don't have we're
not in the mental physical state to perform that
way and what happens is we wake up at two o 'clock
in the morning and we think that we're the same
person eight o 'clock in the morning when we
came to work and we're not especially when we're
making critical decisions like you just covered
drug doses you know what's really burning here
am i seeing what i'm really seeing so we still
have to somebody has to come to work and be there
for 24 hours and no one's going to come to work
and stay awake from 10 a 10 p .m to 6 a .m i
mean we're all going to go to sleep and so when
we wake up we're still going to have the company
officer is going to have to manage that set of
things Absolutely. Yeah. It's very, very true.
I mean, you look at the human impact and then
you had some of these departments that are doing
48, 48, 96. So now you're in, you know, 36. Yeah.
I mean, it's, it's insane and they use it as
a badge of honor. And I don't mean to sound like
a dick when I say this, but when you're advertising
that, putting it front and center, that's telling
the world that you really don't understand this,
this idea at all, you know, and it's kind of
embarrassing. Yeah, but the firefighters get
together and they vote on it. So they vote on
it and they're like shooting themselves in their
own foot. 100%. It's like when they're doing
it, it's totally emotional. They're not basing
it on any data, any science. And if you've said,
look at what's going on. And then I don't know
if you remember Don Abbott, God rest his soul.
He did a Project Mayday over a seven, eight year
period of time before he died. You are like five
times more likely to have a mayday or get significantly
injured on your second day off, your second day
off, your second day that you're at work. And
then he has the timeframes. Okay, now you're
in your last eight or your 48 and you are, it's
at night. That is when your chances of injury,
maydays, everything skyrockets. So then a part
of that, too, is they go to these WAC schedules
and they trade. So now they're working 72s, 96s
in a row. And then they drive 150 miles home
because they can't afford to live in their community.
And they're killing themselves and other people
on the highways getting home. So, I mean, the
whole thing is just crazy. And you voted for
this. yeah well the one of the studies and i
talk about this a lot because i think it's important
for people to understand you know a little knowledge
is a dangerous thing i had a guy on the show
joel billings super nice guy was a volunteer
firefighter but only worked during the day never
did a night shift decided to go into the research
side didn't want to be a career firefighter um
and so one of his first projects i think was
phd i think um He studied a department that went
from a 2448 to a 4896, the one we just talked
about. And I think he studied like cortisol and
a couple other things. And the result, the study
showed that on the second day, they were slightly
less stressed, more rested of that second day
of that 48. So this is a better schedule. The
problem is no one, you know, clearly people took
that and ran with it, but no one actually looked
at the study. The department that Joel studied
ran one call a shift and less than one at night.
So basically nearly always zero at night. That
was a department. And the only improvement that
they saw was that second 24 of the 48, they hadn't
woken up at 5 a .m. to drive that 150 miles or
4 a .m. to go to the station. So they were more
rested that second day because they slept all
night because they don't get any calls. You can
get that benefit by changing the start time instead
of seven or eight. Like, you know, why do we
start? So you make that now, you know, it's 2472
with 11 a .m. noon start time. Now you wake up,
you have breakfast with your kids, you take them
to school, then you go to the station. You've
avoided rush hour. And then the guy or girl you're
relieving that just got hammered all night. Now
they can sleep in till 10. The rig's checked
out. They're ready to go. And so now they're
less sleep deprived on that journey home that
you said. So when you actually look at the science
of sleep medicine, 24 is pushing it. 12s aren't
the answer. 24 is what we have to do in our profession.
I 1000 % agree with that. But no, you know, no
more than 24. Like that's that's pushing it.
Go have your 72. Go try and get back to baseline.
But a 48 hour shift on a, you know, even moderately
busy, you know, station or rig. is pure insanity
and and if you're beating your chest saying that
you're a great firefighter and you voted for
that you are an absolutely subpar firefighter
because just as you said you're operating at
an absolutely depleted level by that point i
i'll fall for the later start time uh Ours was
eight. I've been on fire departments. They start
at seven. Now, one of the things that you could
say is, okay, now it's daylight and we're going
on the calls early in the morning where you'd
want to get a fresher person that didn't have
a long night there earlier. But we had a union
president in Phoenix. He was there for like the
first 15 years I was on the job. He wanted us
to start at 10 a .m. The membership had to vote
on it. It got voted down every single time. And
the biggest thing was the morning routine with
their wife and the kids. And it was going to
upset, you know, when they got off in the morning,
they had to get their kids to school. But every
time, and he'd like once a year, he would try
to get it through. And I, yes, yes, 10 o 'clock.
Well, that meant I could sleep in. I'm not rush
hour traffic. I thought it was a great thing,
but. Yeah. Well, the thing is, even with that
morning, because I've had that brought up. And
my thing is this, when I worked 24 -48, I only
saw my family one morning out of three. First
morning, I'm getting up at five. They're still
asleep. And I go to the station. Second morning,
for me, I never got back. When I got back to
the house after a 70 -mile drive, my wife was
at work and my kids were at school. So actually,
it gives you more time to help out with the family,
more time with your kid. And now it's two mornings.
out of every four if you've gone you know uh
sorry three mornings at every four if you've
gone to a 24 72 instead of one out of three which
is the way we do it now so you've given someone
basically two extra mornings per shift rotation
with their family yeah another one i'm off for
uh my wife was a flight nurse so she did 12 24
hour shifts so it was I'd come in, she'd leave.
I wouldn't see her for 24 hours. So ours was
really upside, but our kids always had one parent
home. So yeah, absolutely. All right. Well, we've
been talking about sleep deprivation and recruitment
for 50 minutes. So let's kind of get onto the
leadership side and the managing a fire. So as
you progress through, you've obviously got this,
this father who's being revered at that point
now, as far as a leader within our profession.
With that influence and your own experience as
you're navigating the ranks, let's start with
this. What were some of the things that you were
seeing as far as issues and challenges that you
recognized needed to be addressed? My dad did
a lot of good things. Fire command, leadership
stuff. But his biggest deal was being nice. So
that was kind of his mantra. But, hey, a guy's
mantra, like his deal is be nice. He wasn't nice
when you weren't nice. So, you know, everybody
thought he was a big, you know, panda bear pushover.
And just because his mantra was be nice doesn't
mean that he wasn't going to deal with business.
So, you know, I grew up with that and the way
to treat firefighters or any work group. uh and
he always he always validated himself from the
people below him and not the people above him
so that always was in the impression of my mind
but so after i retired from phoenix i went on
this blue card fire command journey and it was
critical i mean we lose a lot of firefighters
in the hazard zone and then we screw a lot of
them up too in there so But if you look at really
the service delivery package and the time of
our 24 hours, very little of it is really spent
in the hazard zone. And a lot of it is spent
just managing and driving around with the people
that you're in charge of. So what I saw in my
travels is that. Firefighters are excellent problem
solvers unless it's their own personal problem
and they have a very difficult time with having
any difficult conversation or conflict in a fire
station. And so what it leads to is I want to
be your friend a lot more than I want to be your
boss. And they don't address issues like our
workforce really needs to. And, you know, I saw
it in Phoenix. I see it everywhere. I think it's
a universal percentage. You have the old gruffy
company officers that aren't running a popularity
contest. And it's ironic that they're usually
the most popular. And then you have a group of
people that I guess just wanted to sit in the
seat and they don't want to manage anything because
they don't want to be unpopular or have conflict
or anything. So in managing a fire company, what
we wanted to do was the soft skills that we have
to use every single. moment of the day and mostly,
you know, 80, 90 % EMS, correct? Yeah. No one
ever. So this book really talks about EMS and
what's going on in the customer's brain, how
to deal with them, the body language, and then
the post part of it. You know, we just saw, we
just, you know, did CPR on grandma for 35 minutes.
What are we, our resilience after that? And then
dealing with issues. So we set up scenarios to
where you have to have a difficult conversation.
We maybe step them through the different types
that they have so that, you know, get this, we
actually try to train them before we put them
in the role that they're going to have to do
this instead of just putting them in there untrained.
So, and the response that we've had has been
really phenomenal. And, you know, it's a new
program, so a lot of the seasoned officers are
going through it to evaluate it. And what we
get from them is, I wish I had this, you know,
10 years ago. And then when we get with the junior
officers that we're doing, you know, a lot of
times we're doing class, they get done, they
got to go back to work. They come back in the
morning when they get off for the second part
of the class. They say, I actually used your
stuff last night. So that's always really good
to hear. Absolutely. That's one thing I've always
noticed with the promotional ladder is it's officer
classes. It's inboxes and scenarios and all these
things, but it's not teaching leadership. It's
not teaching, as you said, even understanding
the soft skills like the mental health. We're
all guilty of this. The guy that seemed pissed
off back in the day, we used to push his buttons.
Now we're realizing that guy needed a hug, not
a poke. So, you know, understanding as a human
being, you know, when to, yeah, of course, have
to discipline or whatever you have to do on that
side. But, yeah, understanding the dynamic of
your crew, literally, as you said, even hour
by hour, depending on, you know, how they're
doing at that moment. Yeah. And I read all the
books going through the system, you know, promoting
everything. And none of it really prepared me
for being a company officer. Really didn't. And
so I wanted to write a book, okay, when you come
through the fire station doors in this morning,
this is what you're getting paid to manage. And
so we talk about readiness. There's like nine
chapters on getting the truck ready, drilling,
chow, managing physical fitness, managing readiness.
We have a sleep deprivation chapter in there.
And then we move on to EMS service delivery,
firefighter resilience, and then the managing
human part of it. So, you know, a lot of times,
and you work for good company officers and bad
ones. My favorites were the ones that very early
on when they saw me doing something out of balance,
and I wanted them to do this for me, is say,
knock it off. Quit doing it that way. Don't say
that. They didn't let a problem grow until they
were so mad they just exploded. They very grunt,
you know, short sentences, get on the truck and
sign the drill. Those are my favorite people
to work for. So, but I see, and the more social
media, the less social firefighters get, right?
And they hide behind this and that. And I think
we're worse than we were 20 years ago telling
somebody to knock it off. I think 20 years ago
you'd hear it 80 % of the time, and now maybe
50 % you're going to get lucky. So we wanted
to ingrain a skill set in officers where it's
your job to tell people to knock it off when
you need to. So that's what we're trying to do.
But it's called managing a fire company. every
as a person i'm a i'm leading a fire company
i'm a leader i'm a leader i'm a leader and i
go well you are leading two or three other people
but you got a daily set of things to manage here
so well you said about that kind of tightrope
between the authoritarian that you have to be
sometimes and you know the the member of the
team the member of the crew what are some of
the principles that you bring to these young
leaders to try and find balance between you know
the times you have to actually be the bugles
that are on your shirt and the times that it's
okay to be you know just one of the people working
out or one of the people throwing ladders or
doing the dishes it so and believe me i've I've
had a lot of discussions along these lines. When
a company officer is the first, so you join up
as a firefighter, you're a driver, a paramedic.
I mean, there's a lot of stuff that you can do
before you're a company officer. But when you
become a company officer is the first position
that you're in where you're in charge of anybody
else. And when you're in charge of anybody else,
you are a leader. You are. Those people are looking
at you. So what we tell people is what is your
scope of influence? And you are a leader. But
what is the leaders above you expect you to manage,
right? So through my research, and he's the guy
who coined the phrase emotional intelligence.
God, I can't think of his name right now. But
I read a Harvard Business Review 10. reviews
these little books they put together he wrote
a thing where he wanted to thousands of companies
data you know it's all scientific based it's
not you know based on a personal experiences
and they identified if you're in charge of somebody
else six management styles and so what we say
is here they are here's the six and then we we
say okay here's the positives factors in using
this, and here are the negative factors. And
then, okay, how is a company officer going to
use this one out of six management styles, and
how is the fire chief going to use it? So one
that we just talked about is coercive, telling
somebody to knock it off. And coercive is a very
low -rated management style. But a company officer
has to have the ability to be coercive. And the
example I use is you should only like, okay,
you're in trouble. I have to discipline you and
blah, blah, blah. And there's a process that
you have to fit into if you're being officially
coercive. You have to change in order to be employed
here. But the example I use is that's a bad way
to manage on a daily basis, right? But I ask
it like there's, I was in a group that had about
150 people. I says, okay, here, raise your hand
if you were afraid of your dad growing up. And
everyone raised their hand. And I go, okay, anybody
under 40 who thinks their dad can still take
them. And half the people raised their hand.
And my dad loved me, and he wanted to meet the
best for me and everything. But I think a company
officer has to have that coercive, right? Your
crew members have to know that if something's
out of balance, you're going to fix it. And so
it's not something that you want to manage with
on a day -to -day basis being coercive to your
group, but it's like growing up with your dad.
You know that when you cross the line with your
dad, there's something bad going to happen to
you, right? So coercive was one. I'll quickly
go through them. The first one is being authoritative.
and that is the number one rated management style.
And what it is is people like someone in charge
that has a path and a clear vision. And so we
look at that, okay, how does a company officer
use that and a fire chief? Well, a fire chief
sets the policies and everything. So a company
officer is kind of that for their crew, but they've
got to fit into their fire chief's authoritative,
right? There's democratic. Again, a fire chief
is going to use that one a lot more than a company
officer is. Are we going to vote to go on the
next call? Hey, a difficulty breathing just came
in. You know, who wants to go? So they're not
going to be, but there is some stuff that a company
officer needs to be democratic with. You know,
what are we going to eat? What's the routine
going to be today? This is the five things that
we have to do. You guys tell me what order you
want to do them in. So there is some stuff, but
the next one is the affiliative. And that is
where a company officer lives, is connecting
with their crew, and it's the second highest
rated management style. And so if you look at
the first one, I want a boss that has good visions,
and this is what we're here for. There's no gray.
And then I also want somebody that cares about
me. So a company officer and a fire chief doesn't
get down in a 24 -hour period with their crew
members like the company officer does. So you
got it. And the two you got, the better you know
your crew, the better you can push their buttons,
the better you know if there's something going
on in their life and they're not acting normally
that you can kind of head off. So that's a huge
one. And then there's pace setting is another,
and that's the worst management style there is,
pace setting. And that's the Navy SEALs. And
I expect everybody to be a Navy SEAL like me.
And then the last one is being a coach. And I
think that, again, it's a big one where a company
officer has to do a lot of coaching. And you
have to be not the best at everything on your
crew, but you need to be the highest authority
on your crew. So that's what we talk about leadership
and management. And here are the styles. and
they say if you can use three or four of those
effectively you get like a c or b but if you
can use all six styles for the situation that
you're in uh you're going to get an a plus as
a manager the more styles that you can use the
more effective you are and we hey we've all worked
for bosses that have used pace setting and coercive
those are their only two right and then we work
with bosses that's i'm going to be affiliative
with you i'm going to be your best friend and
they don't manage things that need to be managed
So you need a blend of all six of those in order
to be effective. One of the issues that I see,
because I've had some incredible chiefs and captains
and lieutenants in my career and some awful ones.
So I've got to see, and I work for four different
departments on the East and the West Coast. So
I've got a very interesting, I always say gypsy
-like experience in the fire service. One of
the things that I'm seeing, especially when we
lose so many first responders, and now we've
got a recruitment crisis, is in some areas just
a complete lack of moral courage from a leader.
And there seems to be more value placed on their
own career path than there is advocating for
their people. With your lens, you know, talk
to me about that kind of person and how can we
kind of nudge them back into being courageous
and actually, you know, fighting for their men
and women. Are you talking about the senior leaders
on a fire department? Not even senior. I mean,
this could be a union president. This could be,
you know, I mean, collectively firefighters.
But I mean, you know, more often than not, obviously
a union leader, a chief, even, you know, city
and county, you know, administrators. I think
company officers, the whole fire department is
a product of their environment, a culture that
is created, and that culture will always start
at the top. So as far as the fire chiefs go,
I see less and less of a commitment. When I got
hired in 1980, you were a fire chief for one
fire department your whole life, and then you
retired and you didn't go anywhere else. There's
very little lateral transfers, especially on
the executive level in the fire service. And
now what you see is this rotating, exactly what
you described, is I was a deputy chief here,
and I took a fire chief job here, and I'm going
to do this for four or five years, and I'm going
to go over here and be a fire chief again. Well,
the lack of commitment that that creates when
you're drifting through, you know? And again,
I... I think that has, and then the, the, the
tenure of years that a fire chief has on a department
now, I mean, probably when my dad, my dad was
a fire chief in Phoenix for 28 years. And I know
that's a long, unusual one, but man was a fire
chief now, two, three, four years. So the, and
then, okay, here's a, every four years I got
a new mission statement. I got to learn. And
here's this person's vision and it keeps flipping
on. So I think. the more stable it is up at the
top and the more that they can do this culture
company officers have to fit into that i mean
you're still going to have some rogues but it's
it's so to me to get the company officers on
board and everybody you know managing people
in the right way it's got to stop start at the
top there's got to be stuff that they're doing
that the proof is in the pudding that i care
about the people that are working for me so And
then if you're a company officer that are in
an environment where you're in a good culture
and you're still not doing what you need to do
to take care of your people, now you're part
of the problem. And I call those people cancer.
You're more of a cancer than you are a cure here.
And we've all seen those people throughout the
service. And a lot of it's like how long will
an apartment... tolerate somebody that's just
cancerous. And I've seen like, okay, a new fire
chief comes in and I go, you're gone. And they're
like, the people, the workforce gets up and applauds.
Which is sad, right? Yeah. So I don't know. I
mean, there's a lot of factors out there that
are kind of driving our work environment and
us being a product of that. I had a guest on.
And I think he was a Marine, certainly in the
war on terror in one of the countries. And I
remember him saying that there was a certain
point, it may have been Iraq, because that was
probably the less obvious of the two post 9 -11.
And he was like, well, we got on and we just
went out on mission. And we prayed we didn't
get hit with an IED. We patrolled and took out
bad guys and went back to the base. He said that
we never really seemed to move the needle. And
it really made me think about my whole career,
even in the good fire departments where they
did have some things that progressed. But like,
what was the mission statement? And, you know,
most of us, I worked just 14, but most of us
are going to work 2025. What did you, I mean,
we save lives, but I mean, as far as proactively
improving things and preventing some of these
from happening, what did we actually change in
2025 years? Or did you just show up, put your
gear on the rig, take your job seriously, respond
when the tones go out and then go home? And I've
never really kind of heard a fire service leader
say, here's where we need to be 10 years from
now. You know, we need to change the work. We
need to start leaning into, you know, 911 telehealth
and getting rid of some of these non -emergent
calls. You know, just things that can improve
the community. Because you've got fire prevention.
They do a great job. But for us, like the mission,
like how is it going to improve? And I feel like
that's a... a really kind of glaring missing
piece of our profession that is demoralizing
because our men and women are just doing the
same thing day in day out well we are definitely
a reactionary service uh -huh and what we're
there for is we're the the agency of last resort
when all of the other things in society have
failed who do they call us us but so are you
Again, like when I'm managing a fire company,
I want to be a leader. I want to be a leader.
Well, it's very hard for, okay, you're in charge
of your three or four people, but what impact
can that company officer have on the whole entire
fire department bringing it up to the next level?
So their level of influence is... Their scope
is the people they're in charge of. And the higher
you go up and the more people you're in charge
of, the more and more positive impact you can
make on those people. But as a firefighter, I
don't want to lessen, and I know that, you know,
we come to work and it's the same, you know,
one tragedy after another. But we have a significant
impact on our communities. And I'll tell you
a little story here. It really kind of hit home
with me, and when it happened, I told myself
for the first time I had no idea what the impact
I was making. Just out there delivering service.
So I moved over here to the east side of Phoenix
about 10 years ago. That's a little bit more
high rent. Just a little. But I got out of the
west side, and I'm at a grocery store. And it's
a grocery store that is kind of a high -end gourmet
one. And I was probably buying beer or something
there. And I'm going up the aisle, and I turn
the corner, and there's this woman pushing a
cart coming at me. And she's probably about 10
years older than me, very well -dressed, and
she is staring at me. And, like, one of those
unnerving stares, right? And as we're passing
carts in the middle of the aisle now, she stops
and she grabs my arm. And she says, are you a
firefighter? And I'm kind of like, you know,
is this like, are you going to serve me some
sort of summons or warrant or something? And
I go, well, I'm retired now, but I was a firefighter.
And she says, you saved me and my husband's life
on I -10 at 40th Street. And she vividly says,
you know, my husband was driving. He was unconscious.
His legs were broken. He had to be extricated
from the car. I was next to him. You got me out.
You brought me in the ambulance. You kept coming
back, telling me what was going on with my husband.
You made sure that we were in the same ambulance.
And so there's tears going down her. her face
and she says every morning at breakfast we thank
god for you guys every morning we say a prayer
for you and i'm like i said yeah i remember that
call you know how's your husband doing you know
he's okay well he's got a lamp and blah blah
blah she goes away i i don't remember that call
you know how many people i cut out of cars on
interstate 10 10 years working as a company officer
on ladder 11. You remember, you know, but how
many other people that I have to do that? And
like I walked away going, wow, man, I had no
idea that I had that much impact on a person's
life. And I don't think that we think of what
we do every day. We might not remember that call,
but they're going to remember us vividly for
the rest of their lives. So, I mean, that's who
gets to go to work every day. And, you know,
you could hate the evil empire that you work
for and it should be better here. my God, we're
making people cry 15 years later in a grocery
store over it. Yeah. No, I mean, as far as what
we do, I couldn't agree more. I really couldn't.
I think where there's a wasted opportunity, it's
funny because I'm writing literally as right
before we sat down, I was finishing up the pilot
for this, but I'm writing a script for television
from my last book because we have done such a
terrible job as a profession. of telling people
what we actually do not only what our men and
women go through and i think that really needs
to be told as well but what does a firefighter
do i mean how many times you know in a combined
system have you been told oh why is there a fire
engine on my medical call in 2025 when we've
been doing ems since the 60s in pittsburgh you
know so or the 70s combined at least in you know
miami and la and So we've just done such a terrible
job of educating the people what we do. And I
think that's why we have problems getting getting
finances, for example, when it comes to budgetary
cuts, because they think that we sit around smoking
cigars, patting the Dalmatian and playing cards
when, you know, that couldn't be further from
the truth. But we did a little of that back at
you may have. We did Bay Hockey and some other
stuff. But but then you flip it on its head.
We also have an amazing opportunity to be the
proactive voice. Not that we are there making
proactive changes. We're the ones on the end
of 911 or 999 or 112 or wherever you are around
the world. But if you imagine the impact, for
example, if you had a bunch of firefighters saying
that that's exactly like you just detailed, like
the freeway is where we see most of our calls.
What are we going to do about driving safety?
What are we going to do about improving the standards
for the driving test and make it a little bit
harder so our drivers have to actually learn
how to navigate and therefore reduce some of
these issues? We have the ability to actually
be a very powerful voice. But as I've always
said, we don't have a Jocko Willink. We don't
have a member of our profession who's front and
center in all the biggest podcasts and TV shows.
I think that there's an opportunity, not for
us day to day in the station so much, but as
a profession to be like, hey, 40 ,000 people
die every year on the roads. Hundreds of thousands
are maimed. We see it. We're the ones cutting
these people out of the cars. Let's push an initiative
to start making the roads safer, not by putting
speed bumps and signs everywhere, but educating
these young people on how to actually drive.
you know and then no disrespect to the people
we just don't teach them well a driving test
or a joke so i think that's where for me on the
mission side we see the worst things as you said
but some of the most of these are preventable
how can we be one of the voices as well to also
start shifting some proactive measures so that
we don't cut so many people out of a car well
i don't know how many if we're going to get drivers
to drive better i think we're there to pick up
the pieces i'm going to give that to the dmv
but i i totally agree i i think that what we
project are like we're wearing all this stuff
and we're firefighters and they don't see us
doing the ems the hazmat all the other the stuff
that we do so my dad uh has always been a champion
at getting resource well the last few years uh
him going to the city council you know We use
a thing called FIREDAP. God, what did DAP stand
for? Data Analysis Program. Like you really looked
at the stuff. And it was always just how many
people we need to fight a fire. How many people
on average are going to experience their own
house fire? It's like one in a hundred. So when
we push this is what we need, you're talking
to a dead audience, aren't you? And probably
if you're in a room with 300 people, maybe one
person in that room has had a fire. So my dad
shifted gears and he says, if your grandmother
has a full code and we come in to treat her and
try to revive her, this is how many people it
takes. How many people are going to call 911
at the end of their life or during or medical
stuff? So he started presenting. What we did
and more of where I want to make it to where
I can connect with you when I'm asking you for
money or to make things better is this is what
we do. And everyone here is going to call 911
for a medical call sometime in their life. So
he's touching on that. And the burning babies
and all of that stuff, it falls on deaf ears.
And we do need to do a better job of saying,
no, this is what we're here for. When grandma
dies, we need four people in that room to try
to save her life. This is what they're going
to do. We need people to get her to the hospital.
We need, we need, we need. And it's not based
on a house fire that they're never going to have,
you know? Yeah, absolutely. I know your dad was,
again, you know, known for using the phrase customer
service. And I think, you know, really at that
also. circles back around to kindness and compassion
you know and again if you've got the the workforce
that you actually wanted to hire and you've got
fitness standards and you've got like you said
the staffing that you need then you know the
delivery of service is ultimately great human
beings in uniform doing what they do and i think
it's that kindness and compassion that we're
not seeing and even with this younger generation
when you know there's a lot of people on instagram
filming themselves you know with two three years
on with a big mustache and a helmet and leaning
on a pipe ball in front of a burnt out house
they didn't save and that's not what we do and
certainly didn't do that point it's not you know
with the other 95 like you said and i've always
i wrote this in my first book one of the most
rewarding things that we ever did on truck one
in anaheim was the back to bed calls because
there's nothing more rewarding Then going to
a home of an elderly couple, the wife's on the
floor, she soiled herself. The husband is looking
there and he's heartbroken because he was once
a broly man and now he's frail and he can't pick
up the love of his life. And we walk in, we pick
her up, we clean her up, we change her clothes
and we put her back to bed. No one's going to
make a movie about that, but that's some of the
most beautiful, heroic stuff that happens in
EMS agencies and fire and law enforcement. that's
what we've got to do is tell the whole story
of what we do it but we're so attached to this
ego element of oh i'm a salty firefighter in
a profession where things don't burn very much
anymore and that's a great thing that's a testament
to building codes and fire prevention but be
proud of all the other things we do because like
you said we do an amazing job but we've got to
tell the fucking story of what we do otherwise
as you said you go to a room of politicians you
ask for a budget that's justified that you need
and they stare at you and going well why do you
need that you guys barely do anything you get
cats out of trees yeah but i totally agree with
you getting mr smith off the ground and back
into bed uh for us to discount that and then
the burly guy that his whole identity is like
okay we're going to go on 100 calls and what
you're we're going to use your identity on two
of them what is what good are you on the other
98 when you don't give the people this is what
we're here for and my dad is everything he did
it was he he based it on the service that we're
delivering uh it wasn't egos or traditions it
was we have to and that's what a company officer
needs to do is manage the daily routine on the
service that we're delivering to our customers
which is the community yeah the service you know
the that word it comes from serve and man hey
if you're not here to serve your community you're
a cancer and i i couldn't stand going to work
with those people where every call was an inconvenience
to them no no it's not we are making an impact
on these people's lives and getting paid for
it i mean you picked the wrong like we need postal
workers uh -huh we need meat packers yeah 100
well A couple of things and then we'll go to
some closing questions. But firstly, you touched
on cell phones and it's an interesting time because
in fire stations, when they're building them
now, they're doing individual dorms. And from
a sleep point of view, that is fantastic. I've
always said it's insanity to wake up an entire
station of people, especially in a large station
for, let's say, rescue. You know, two firefighters
go on that call and eight firefighters wake up
for it. It's crazy. obviously now that really
creates a problem because people go into their
own individual bunks and now you've got this
device that people are just kind of drawn to
and it kind of fractures the firehouse then so
from that lens you've got this younger generation
you know they are raised with these screens now
and even you know let's be honest a lot of us
you know older ones are also using these same
devices what are you telling these leaders as
far as you know bringing that community back
to the firehouse and not letting it stay fractured
especially god forbid after covid where they
were told not to eat and sit together well you
know concurrent theme throughout the book and
what we teach is lead by example and if you go
to fire stations a lot of the people the times
when that is going on The company officer is
the one back in their room isolating themselves
and setting that example. And then another thing
that really, and I don't know if you mentioned
it, it was COVID, right? That put it on steroids.
But to me, it's the company officer has to get
out of their office. They have to create an environment
where they have activities that require everybody
on deck and involved. You know, it's a 24 -hour
shift, so there are going to be periods where,
okay, we're done hanging out. Let's just all
go to our – I think it's good to have that safe
place where somebody can go and have a private
conversation with their spouse or take a nap
and not – but I totally agree with you. We're
not all going to hang out in our bunks all day.
So I think the company officer has to be the
first one to take the initiative of getting out
of their bunk and doing stuff and creating the
opportunities for group activities. so it all
starts there but if the company officers went
back there looking at their phone or running
their business or whatever i mean it's not going
to be good for anybody else there's no question
that the firehouses that have been cohesive that
i worked through my career there was a strong
element of working out together of of training
together of eating together and so whether it's
an actual shared suffering thing like a crossfit
workout or simply preparing a meal and breaking
bread that i think is such an important part
of firehouse culture and like you say you don't
have to be you know together all the time but
like anaheim i remember we used to watch dexter
every week that was one of the firehouse thing
we used to go together and do the the uh ufc
pay -per -view and of course tivo it because
we get like 12 calls during it but you know all
those and it wasn't all day every day it was
just these little pockets of hours here and there
where we came together and it worked. I mean,
some of the men I worked with Anaheim came to
my wedding. We're still, you know, close, close
friends. We're talking almost 20 years now since
I worked there. So it's crazy. Our routine was
the same thing. We get together, get in the morning,
the trucks, the station, and then we had a PT
thing. We'd go out and drill and that would,
we would hang out pretty much. The whole morning
and after lunch, everything's cleaned up. It's
from lunch till about 4 o 'clock in the afternoon
was everybody's time. Like Andy and Opie were
on, you know, some people are there. Another
one in my day was Bob Ross, painting with Bob
Ross. Love that guy. I mean, he came on at 1
p .m. And like by 1 .15, you were sawing logs
watching Bob, right? Uh -oh, you froze up there,
James. So, and then we got back together about
four o 'clock in the afternoon. And that took
us to where we all went to bed. So, I don't know.
It was all kind of, and another thing too is
firefighters like a structure, right? They kind
of like coming to work and having a routine.
And that was kind of the routine with, like you
say, the 12 calls that were going to interrupt
the routine that we were trying to have every
shift. Yeah. But the, again, like workout time.
like somebody would be in the middle of a bench
press oh my god this call is ruining my workout
that's why we're here okay i have to do another
warm -up before i can get to my peak yeah i always
went into the workouts going i may not finish
this and it's funny that i would honestly say
90 of the workouts that i started i finished
And if I hadn't done it because, oh, what if
I get a call? I would be so, you know, so much
weaker and less fit. So, you know, yeah, you
get a call and sometimes it was a kind of a,
you know, red line workout and you're drenched
in sweat, but it is what it is. You know, I mean,
you're a big boy and girl. You can, you can run
the call sweaty and tired and you're going to
be just fine. So, but yeah, I mean, getting angry
about it, you know, you know, sometimes, you
know, Murphy's law, every time you touch, you
know, the exercise equipment, the tones are going
to go off. And maybe those days you go, all right,
I'm just going to go for a walk around the station
tonight. At least we'll do that. Yeah, or jump
rope or something. And if you come to work thinking
that you're going to watch the entire Super Bowl,
you really are living in a dream world, okay?
Yeah, exactly. And then I think a company officer
has to set that tone in the station. We're here
for calls, right? And I don't want to hear any
bellyaching on the way to a call that we're getting
paid to go on. Absolutely. Well, I want to hit
one more area because this is so pertinent. We
obviously we've talked about, you know, different
positions and different kind of leadership styles
and philosophies. But as I touched on earlier,
old James, you know, my crews, when someone was
seeming like they were kind of getting a little
salty, you know, we'd all we'd like a. pack of
hyenas and we start pushing the buttons and you
know it was a game and then now you know the
last 10 years we're like oh okay yeah they were
probably going through some stuff so what do
you tell these leaders as far as identifying
as you said sometimes we have good days sometimes
we have bad days like when you start seeing that
co -worker that firefighter whoever it is not
themself not seeming the same way with this 2025
lens and taking all the tools that we've learned,
all the things that Tim talks about and looking
at it as, let me not push their buttons. Let
me figure out what's going on. Let me take them
aside. Well, I think it's important to know when
that it's okay to push their buttons to try to
get the most out of them than when it's not okay
and there's something going on with them. But
firefighters are always, we're expert at pushing
buttons, right? And part of the button pushing
thing is you've got to know somebody really well
in order to push their buttons. And that brings
us back to the affiliative management style where
a company officer really has to know their crew,
and that's facilitating eating with them, cooking
meals, knowing who they're married to, if they
have kids, what's going on in their life. So
if they start withdrawing, if they start their
hygiene habits aren't what they used to be, they're
getting to work later. they're they're they get
angry quicker uh things that used to not bother
them are bothering them i mean we know those
people well enough where those have to be warning
signs for us to to and listen i don't one of
the things i hear is like okay you're trying
to turn a company officer into a counselor and
no i'm not But if you're going to get paid to
manage a fire company, there's a certain set
of things that a company officer has to be aware
of and to manage, and it's just part of being
a company officer. And one of those is seeing
changes in your crew members. And that's going
to happen a lot in our service because we work
in one of the most stressful environments that
are out there. So we have to be acutely aware
of that. We have to engage. We have to make sure
that they're eating and hydrating the way they
need to. We talked about it through the whole
podcast, James, is we have to make sure that
they're exercising and get all this bad stuff
out of them. But there's going to be a time maybe
where we also have to have a private conversation
with them and hand them a business card with
the counselor's name and saying, hey, you need
to talk to this person. It's beyond me, right?
just a company else has to be acutely aware and
i worked with basically the same crew for about
10 years the same two engineers definitely but
now i had senior firefighter for six or seven
years i knew when something was going on with
them and the earlier that you see it and say
hey what's going on with you the easier it is
to fix but i have been traveling around with
this a lot of times they bring us in is because
they had a firefighter suicide and what you hear
all the time Hey, this guy, they said he was
showing us all the signs. We saw it coming and
we didn't do anything about it. I mean, how often
have you, well, if you're seeing the signs, I
get it like out of nowhere, this person, you
know, commits suicide where there are no signs.
I'm sure that's going to happen. But this was
going on two, three years. You saw the downfall
of this person and you didn't try to intervene.
And this is a question I ask when that happened.
Would that person want to commit a suicide if
they didn't become a firefighter? And I'm going
to say 99 % of the time, no, they would have
never done that if they wouldn't have become
a firefighter. So it's our job. It's us. That
has to be in our wheelhouse to see that and prevent
stuff like that from happening. What about saying
a question? No, you did. You did. What about
though? Cause this is, I would argue the most
stigma is less stigma around alcohol use and
when they're coming in and they're smelling of
it and all that kind of thing. But the most stigma
I see is, is drug use, illicit drug use, but
these are all parts of the same exact conversation.
There's a mental health crisis going on. So what
do you tell the company or company officers and,
or just the firefighters? you suspect there's
there's some sort of drug use going on you suspect
this person's struggling but it's not just a
straight you know we're worried about suicide
conversation now you know it's a it's a slightly
different conversation needs to be had what drug
i mean pick one well i As marijuana gets more
and more acceptable across the country, I think
that that's probably even a better alternative
than alcohol if you're going to pick which one
that does more damage to you. But if you're looking
at like methamphetamines, high -end drugs like
that where you're really trying to escape reality,
then they have some issues. Should I tell this
story? And I work for this company officer, and
I work for both the ones I'm going to talk about.
I'm at one of their funerals. He was an engine
captain at my station for about five years. He
died of cancer. But I'm at his funeral, and one
of my earlier captains, when I was a firefighter,
was there, and he came up to me at the end of
the thing, and he says, I went to your dad's
funeral, and I want to talk to you, but... There
was a crowd around you. He says, so I got to
tell you, your dad saved my life. He says, I
was addicted to cocaine and amphetamines. I was
a sex addict. And he says, I was this close to
committing suicide. And I saw your dad and your
dad was patient with me. And he kept saying,
Joe, we got to get you fixed. We got to get you
fixed. And he finally put me in a 12 -step program.
And he said, that saved my life. So he was thinking,
you know, tears are running down. And the stuff
that Joe saw through his career and the dead
people that we worked on, I mean, Joe was just
stressed out. He got divorced. All this stuff
was going on in his life. So my dad looked at
that as you're taking all of – when we hired
you, you were the best person on the planet.
But now here 15 years later, you're a stressed
out person that we need to help you get back
to your baseline. And it's because of this job.
Right. So that's my first response is let's try
to help them get better. I mean, we're kind of
responsible for them getting this way. Why don't
we get a better so that they can live the rest
of their life without having to put a gun in
their mouth? So that's the way I look at them.
I know a lot of other people, like if you fail
a drug test, you're out of here. They don't take
any accountability in it or like you're left
on an island. I don't know. To me, if I had a
member coming in hungover all the time and this
is a result of stress and we need to get you
some help because it's going to lead down the
worst road. Did I answer your question, James?
I don't know. Yeah, no, you did. 100%. I think
that's just it. And you literally used the analogy
that I do. If you have someone, whether it's
the salty guy, whether it's someone who's coming
in hungover, whatever it is. And from day one,
they were an absolute turd. Then that's a different
conversation. But just like you said, all these
bright eyed firefighters that towed the line
on that first day that were, you know, incredible,
average, whatever. They were good firefighters
for all those years. And now 10, 15 years, they're
going through this stuff. of course the job is
a part of it. I mean, you know, I talk about
childhood trauma, all these other things too.
There are other compounding elements, of course,
but there's a vicious cycle. And going back to
the sleep deprivation, you know, you've got the
sleep deprivation, you've got the toxic leadership,
the organizational betrayal, the breakdowns in
relationships because we're never home, the side
effects of alcohol because you're not sleeping
properly. You know, the list goes on and on and
on. But many of those are preventable and many
of those are. job related especially this generation
that we're talking about you know the last you
know i mean 50 years really when ems really start
taking off so yeah of course the job is a massive
part of this so i agree with you a thousand percent
we owe it to that person to try and get them
to help go through you know the hopefully they
got a good union and they've got they've got
direct links to places where they can go to you
know sobriety and addiction counseling and mental
health counseling but you know why would you
discard someone Who you, as you said, you thought
was the perfect fit for your department just
because they had the audacity to start struggling.
Yeah, it's not fair to that. And like I said,
would this happen to you if you never took this
job? And I think most of the time it would not.
It's the job that creates the stress and all
that. And Tim, Tim Deese calls it your backpack.
You know, you throw stuff in your backpack and
it gets full and then it tears and then stuff
starts coming out of it that they never dealt
with. They just kept throwing in their backpack.
And we talked about earlier, our service attracts
those people that are comfortable in chaos. So
they come with a backpack that's half full. Absolutely.
And then we throw, we fill the other half. And
we go, oh, it was your childhood. Well, it was
a combination of both, you know. But me, I did
24 years out in the field, and there was a call
that I went on, and kids, freeway, the whole
nine yards. And, like, going back to the station,
I said, my backpack, I ain't going on another
EMS call. I don't want to throw another. That's
my last one. So it was just full. It's going
to happen to everybody that's in it long enough.
So. I had a great leader, Terry, my captain in
Anaheim, and we had a horrendous wreck. I wrote
about it in my first book, but a little, I think
she was basically about three years old, was
decapitated in a wreck, and she was still pinned
in. It was obviously a fatality. We worked the
wreck. The driver was actually okay. The passenger
was killed. we clear the scene where you know
we're going to go back and extricate the child
when you know pd are done and the coroner's ready
for us and we and we're young firefighters myself
and my partner and we're getting ready we get
toned down we're getting ready to go and terry
dfo's us he's like you are not coming with us
and we're of course like embarrassed i'm like
no no we'll be fine we'll be fine he goes you
are gonna see so much horrible in your life you
don't need to add this to the list He and the
engineer were getting ready to retire shortly
after. And so and I thought that was such incredible
leadership because would we have been OK? Probably.
But did we need to be there when really you just
need one person on the spreaders? No, we didn't.
And I've said the same thing even as a medic.
You know, if you go in and it's, you know, you're
just seeing if it's obvious signs of death. There's
a whole crew need to go in. No, they don't. And,
you know, there's no medal for seeing the most
horrible shit. So even with that backpack. As
a leader, can you mitigate how many of these
things that your crew sees? And I thought that
was such a powerful lesson from a true, true
servant leader that I work with. Yeah. And I
talk about that in the book. If you know you're
going on a dead person, minimize, because every
dead person that we go on, a little pebble we
throw back in there, any pebble that you can
prevent from going into someone's backpack, prevent
it. Yeah. and then when you're young i mean it's
empty right yeah a lot of room in here right
it's when you get older and it starts filling
up it's getting heavy absolutely and it's going
to happen i mean uh and and hopefully that you're
resilient enough where you know you can carry
a lot of that but some people just come with
it's half full when they get here and we hire
a lot of people from the military i mean we're
we're actually kidding ourselves if we don't
realize that they've got some stuff and that
we need to do some stuff to help them keep their
resiliency going yeah especially this and the
more the the more that you feel like your organization
cares about you the less those uh pebbles are
smaller and smaller because you got you're in
good company you know yeah i got my back Absolutely.
And even like you said, the tools, everything
from nutrition to sleep through to mindfulness
and counseling and even the psychedelics and
things that people are realizing are working.
There are so many tools that you can use. to
turn those struggles into strengths i truly believe
that post -traumatic growth the hope of that
is what we should be talking about you had these
things happen it's going to make you a great
first responder but you can't bury them you've
got to address them and then you'll be more compassionate
and empathetic on scene you know you you have
this diverse background you grow up in the streets
here or in a domestic abuse home there and that's
going to be an asset as you help these people
but only if you deal with it. And I think that's
the thing, again, going back to this younger
generation, you're going to see them do this
horrible stuff, but we are going to give you
all the tools to, to stay in great physical health,
you know, to work on the mental health. And so
that when you go home, you're not, you know,
your family aren't walking on eggshells that
you can walk through the door and be a, you know,
a loving mother or father and, and, you know,
enjoy those 72 hours with your family. Exactly.
And so just going to a bar, and hanging out with
your co -workers who identify exactly what you
went through and i just feel like this is a safer
environment blah blah blah yeah absolutely all
right well i appreciate that all very different
you know interesting perspectives when it comes
to leadership um for people listening let's first
let them know where they can find the course
in the book uh managing a fire company i know
it's uh it's a long web address, but that's at
managingafirecompany .com. It'll take you to
our homepage. We also, we have an online training
program. We have an instructor training program
and we actually certify people as a managing
a fire company. So it's a kind of a broad program
that all starts with a textbook at managingafirecompany
.com. We launched it about a year ago. It's really
kind of taken off. I think it. Every fire department
wants to do officer development, and I think
they're seeing that this actually works, and
it's something that we've gotten really good
reviews. I taught a lot of incident command classes,
and it's really fun to see people's competency
run those incidents, but going to these and having
them come back. And saying, I use your stuff
and it worked and thank you so much. I don't
know what I, I mean, I don't know the impact
that I'm hearing. It's just a lot more satisfying.
Absolutely. Well, I mean, it's a massive void
that we've identified is we've got to teach people
how, you know, the human skills or how to actually
lead, not just simply, you know, have the classes
that allow you to step up the ladder. And I appreciate
the opportunity, James, coming on and talking
about all that good stuff. So, you know, I ask
you a question. Who do you think is more important
in the fire department, the fire chief or the
company officer? Oh, the company officer. I mean,
like you said, the culture is set from the top.
But who do most of us interact with every day?
The company officer. So hopefully the company
officer has got a good relationship with the
chief. So then it just filters down. Yeah, hopefully
I have a good chief. Yeah, it helps the company
officer be even better. Absolutely. Well, that
was your book. I just want to throw a couple
of closing questions at you. The first one I
love to ask, is there a book or are there books
that you love to recommend? It can be related
to our discussion today or completely unrelated.
Well, my favorite book is the book Dune. But
Primal Leadership talks about emotional intelligence
here. And I can't, doctor, it's a doctor, primal
leadership. I think it's really a good read.
I'll look it up as you talk. That's where I got
the six forms of leadership, management styles.
And two, they looked at. successful companies
and they thought it would be like really smart
people and they went to college and it wasn't
after interviewing thousands of these excellent
managers it was because they had emotional intelligence
and they knew how to treat people and get the
most out of them so i think primal leadership
really talks about those and what it does it
reminds me when i read it of my dad and how he
managed people so so that's my book that i would
recommend for a firefighter so daniel just for
entertainment read dune uh -huh daniel goldman
is that right primal leadership yes yes that's
it dr daniel goldman okay now you just opened
up another thing quickly we're talking about
leadership we're talking about obviously you
know the promotional element one thing that's
been kind of interesting again staying at the
firefighter level my my whole career but watching
these you know these people that go through these
promotional processes and then the prerequisites
is this necessity to have a college degree to
promote. Having a college degree myself and arguably
there not being a lot of real world application.
I have mine in exercise physiology, so at least
it's a pseudo real degree. I really question
the validity of a degree as far as the ability
to be a good leader in a promotional journey
or a firefighter. What is your perspective on
that? I agree with that. And it's not because
I just, well, I have a PhD, a public high school
diploma. But I never had one. So, but I don't
want to say that I'm against people having degrees.
And I get what you're saying. You know, you have
to have a degree in order to get promoted battalion
chief. And my degree is in archaeology, where
it really doesn't apply to that service. So,
the more, if you just look at somebody going
through the academy in like a six -year course,
they ought to get a bachelor's degree in fire
service application or something. Because all
the training, I mean, it ends up being more than
what somebody going to college does. But my dad
was a big fan of education. And he had a study
one time, though. If you look at police officers.
it doesn't matter what their degree is in uh
if you if you have a bachelor's degree you're
50 times 50 less likely to get a violence complaint
against you excessive force if you have a master's
degree you're 90 less likely to get excessive
force complaint against you and it's it's not
it doesn't apply to law enforcement but my logic
and decision making is influenced by how the
higher my intelligence is but for for a firefighter
you know colleges just don't offer us the stuff
that other occupations have i mean so to me it
doesn't But here's another question. Are leaders
born or can they be educated to where if I do
go to fire leadership college, they'll actually
graduate and be more of an effective leader for
it? Or did I bring that skill set in just by
the way I was raised, you know, by my parents
and, like, natural? What do you think? Can you
be educated to be a better leader or is it more
of an ingrained? Well, I can tell you, I watched
a group of local battalion chiefs go through
Jocko Willink's muster. And that is a great leadership
program. And then I watched nothing change. And
most of those actually left that department.
So inspiration certainly doesn't equal action,
that's for sure. But just going back to what
you said, I think the problem is we don't have
a good degree. You know, the one the one people
say is what public safety or whatever it is,
but. you know when you think about a degree i
think we should have a degree that has you know
rope rescue and trench and you know all these
things are applicable and you know pediatric
airways and now you have an actionable degree
and then if you're then going to go up to like
the leadership side then why are we not using
like you said emotional intelligence and all
these these great leadership things and then
there's a didactic portion where you're forced
to actually use it and that i think then can
train a leader and put you in environments where
it's okay to fail and you regroup and you redo
it until you start getting it right but when
you look at the academic level in our or track
in our profession it doesn't pertain to what
we do it's so academic and theoretical and therefore
these people i mean because we see it how many
people do we know that race up the promotional
ladder that couldn't lead their way out of a
wet paper bag so you know the proof is in the
pudding And a lot of it is having difficult conversations.
So what we do is we classroom, we talk about
it. Here are the structures and algorithm on
how to have this. And then we break out and we
take four chairs and we put them like you're
in an engine company. And okay, you're the student
here. You're in the company officer seat and
you got to tell me to slow down and stop. And
here's a kid, he's 25 years old. He's never been
in that seat before. He goes, well, how do I
say that? Tell me to slow down. And okay, you
got three seconds or I'm going to run the light
and I'm going to hit something. One, two, three,
and boom. Okay, let's try it again. Tell me to
slow down and stop. One, stop, stop. It takes
them 10 times before they go, stop, you know,
and it's okay. So you got, I think they're a
way to develop those skills on being decisive
and, you know. addressing things. The other one
is, okay, so we got done with this one. And then
when we get back to the station, you have to
talk to me, right? Hey, I don't like telling
people to slow down. Our life's in your hands.
Please don't make me do it again. But you got
to have this little conversation before you go
back to the station. They're stuttering and they're
like shaking. I've never had a conversation like
this before. Well, when's the worst time to have
it? In real life, let's practice these so that
you get a routine. Oh, and then we build up to
where, you know, we're a firefighter, right?
We start acting like assholes, okay? So what
asshole move am I making? Am I denial? Am I deflecting?
Am I discrediting you? So that they get a routine.
Oh, I know what you're saying. Like, how do I
respond to that? But we're actually trying to
train them on how to do it before they have to
do it for the first time. I love that. I think
another one, when I think back, and it's funny
because in the academy, you always get those
guys screaming at you and the baby's dying and
that stuff. And then you work with them in real
life. A few years later, you're like, oh, you're
actually not a very good firefighter. But the
ones that are screaming, you know, and I think,
but in parenting terms, you know, if you are
always screaming at your child, when they do
something that actually requires them to really
listen. You have no other mode. You have no other
gear. But if you're normally calm, you normally
talk your way through these scenarios, whether
you're a parent or in a fire station, then you
raise your voice and you say, stop, that engineer
is going to slam on the brakes because you don't
normally raise your voice. So I think, you know,
that that's something that I've seen as, you
know, as the firefighter still is the best leaders
were always calm. And when they raise their voice,
they were like, you know, you were like, oh,
shit, we're really screwed up if he's raising
his voice. The first shift, I had a fire station.
My company officer grabs me, takes me into my
rack that I had made, and he tells me that my
bed's made wrong. We go out on a car accident
intersection where this car got clipped, and
it, like, spun around three times, and there's
two adults that have been ejected. He loses his
mind. And, okay, you care more about my bed being
made and how well it is, and you're totally incompetent
when there's any kind of stress or pressure out
here. It's kind of like you lose a lot of respect
for people like that. You're really worried about
the wrong thing here, pal. Yeah, exactly. Maybe
that's just that they're so incompetent that
they worry about the bed or your uniform or the
station being clean because they can't manage
anything past that. Yeah, well, humility, I think,
is an area where I see, you know, the best leaders.
I mean, I had Al Benjamin on the show, who's
a legend in Rescue One, and he was always a firefighter,
senior firefighter. And you talk to Al now, another
example is Peter Park, who's a renowned strength
and conditioning coach. And Peter kept asking
me, James, how would you train this person? And
I am not. I'm a weekend warrior strength coach
at best. But that's what you see with these good
leaders. They never stop learning. They're humble.
Yeah, if you step out of line, they'll put you
in the place. But they're not shaming the rookie.
They're bringing them over and saying, all right,
let me show you something. That is a good leader.
Well, and you just said something. I have never
met a lifelong learner that I didn't like. There's
just something about that person that when they're
always reading or trying to learn, there's just
something that attracts me to that type of. individual
so absolutely all right well speaking of learning
we talked about books what about documentaries
or films that you love a documentary that my
wife and I just watched it again it's about and
I forget what they call it but they made a movie
out of it but Disney did a documentary and I
think The two of them kind of were side by side.
It's when they went to Thailand and they rescued
the soccer team and the kids out of the caves.
And it was a documentary where they actually
had the divers that went in there and rescued
them. And the lead guy was a retired London firefighter
that was a cave diver on his days off. And I
don't know, just watching that process, it was
it was just. and totally different than what
we do but i mean it was still the service part
of it i thought that that was a phenomenal documentary
and then you know hey i know it's been out for
a while but i just watched it i'm not a very
big tv person uh maverick top gun part two i
thought that was cool except my daughter is a
Is it aerospace engineer? And she says, you can't
eject when you're going Mach 10. Your head is
just going to explode. So. Yeah, we just lost
Val Kilmer, too. It's a shame because he looked
very ill in that film. But yeah, he just passed
away. I'm glad he made it in it, though. Yeah,
absolutely. All right. Well, speaking of amazing
people, 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? God, you know, you
already had him, Tim Dietz. To me, that guy is
just a rock star, what he brings to the fire
service and the simple tools that he can give
a company officer to do their job better without
having to go to four years of counseling school.
But other than that, you know, another superstar
that I've been dealing with is the fire chief
out of Oklahoma City, Richard Kelly. And he was
like a two -year firefighter when the Oklahoma
bombing happened. And he was personally responsible
for rescuing or assisting, rescuing like 16 of
the people that they pulled out that were alive.
And then he did several body recoveries. But
he is a really interesting. and he's moved himself
in the fire chief. So based on the Oklahoma thing,
you know, we've been talking about what can you
do to improve. That event started them out doing
a lot of stuff a lot earlier than our service
is doing today. So having him involved in the
managing a fire company process, he was way ahead
of the ballgame. Even Tim's curve, you know,
where he came into the thing. Oklahoma City was
doing a lot more. So he'd be a great guest. Yeah,
I would love to get him on if you're able to
help me connect. That'd be incredible. Yeah,
I'll send him a text as soon as we're done. Beautiful.
Yeah, I had Chris Fields on who was another firefighter.
He was a lieutenant by that point, I think. But
he was in that tragically iconic picture where
he's holding the dead child and that. that haunted
him for years he had his massive downward spiral
and then again incredible incredible post -traumatic
growth journey and even his marriage his wife
was forgiving and he did a lot of you know bad
stuff and they are you know still you know bound
tightly now to this day they're they're a beautiful
couple i've seen him and he's phenomenal you
know another one is uh he became a doctor after
the charleston nine uh oh david griffin david
griffin yeah have you had him on the show yeah
he's been on and actually we were just talking
funnily enough going back to the 24 72 i did
a zoom call with all their chiefs because they
were looking at it and they didn't actually put
it into place because they just had a contract
very shortly after but hopefully the next time
they all get around the table they're gonna they're
gonna go to that but yeah i mean i've i've been
to you know their memorial station next to the
the site and everything and yeah i mean you talk
about again humility like just starting from
scratch as a fire department and rebuilding it
i mean you know david and some of the other guys
travis house i mean they've all got these powerful
perspectives of you know that day and you know
what they're doing now so yeah very powerful
but he he wrote a book post -traumatic growth
i mean so he'd be Right up until your topics.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. What I'm actually doing
now is people have had on the show before, like
David, cause he's been on, um, trying to get
people on together. So maybe down the road, get
you and Tim together and we'll do another, another
episode. Oh, wow. That's an interesting dynamic.
Then they bounce off each other and I can just
sit back. Yeah. I'll let Tim do most of the talking.
You know, another one of my fire service heroes
that I thought had. a huge impact still having
it is dan madrakowski from uh underwriter laboratories
fire research he is a phenomenal human being
i don't know if that's lionel um crowther has
told me about some people from ul and i think
dan's name is one that came up recently as far
as getting steve kerber as a director but dan
is kind of the The brains, and I don't want to
take away anything from it, but Dan trained Steve
Kerber when he was working at the government
agency NEST. So Dan came from NEST, and he trained
all of these thermodynamic engineers, and then
they went off to UL and other places, ATF, another
group that he's trained and worked with. So he
is really kind of a giant among that whole group.
And he is just the nicest human being on the
planet. I think he's married. He's got like six
daughters. So he's got one of those, you know,
vans that have like, like the softball team shows
up at the grocery store. Yeah. My brother's got
one of them because he had a little boy and they
wanted one more child and they had triplets.
So they've got four kids now. Surprise, honey.
Exactly. All right. Well, the very last question
before we make sure everyone knows where to find
you. What do you do to decompress? Well, I got
out a blue card. Another thing I started doing
five years ago, I started playing the drums.
And, you know, I'm semi -retired. So that really
has helped me keep busy, decompress. Another
thing, it's math and a bunch of other stuff,
so it helps my brain not think about anything
else. I don't know if you play an instrument
or anything, but it's hard to think about human
tragedy when you're counting one, two, three,
four over and over again. Yeah. But that's, I
love hanging out with my family. My favorite
time on the planet is, I have two daughters,
is when my wife and two daughters are sitting
at the same dinner table, the lunch table, whatever
it is, talking, hanging out. So walking the dogs.
I'm pretty boring, James. Pretty boring guy.
I don't jump off a cliff with some weird suit
on or scuba dive. Speaking of that, just before
we do, the transition. is a place that can be
very jarring for you know our men and women because
you have had this amazing career you know obviously
you've accumulated stuff but also there's that
that tribe that you've been a part of there's
a sense of purpose it's very hard not to identify
as a firefighter specifically as a profession
and then you know one day you're not and the
doors have closed behind you and your id doesn't
work anymore and you know there's another warm
body in the seat that you were in before What
was your personal experience transitioning out
initially? I said to myself, why didn't you retire
earlier? And I know I stay connected in the fire
service, developing a program and hanging out
with firefighters and still training them. But
to me, man, it was... I didn't know it could
be this good. I've heard stories about what you
referenced, you know, my whole identity is wrapped
up in this. And now that I'm gone, I've kind
of lost contact. That wasn't my case. I loved
it. And I talked to a guy that you're familiar
with the drop program. Yes. Well, they extended
the drop and he did 35 years and then he dropped
for five and then they extended it for two and
a half. And then he just retired. And I said,
how's it going? He says, man, I'm so stupid.
He said, this is so good that I should have done
it like 20 years ago. And I go, exactly. Now
you're going to enjoy five years and die. But
to me, retirement has been the best thing in
the world. And my kids were still young. I retired
young. So they were still in grade school, high
school. So I got to spend a lot more time with
them earlier on than I would have if I was still
in the fire service. So I love it. How about
you? I mean, you're out of it, is it? Yeah, my
path is a little different. It wasn't a retirement
retirement. It was trying to fix the last place
and realizing that I wasn't going to do it from
within. and taking a leap of faith and doing
this full time. So I didn't anticipate being
out so soon. But just like you said, you know,
you have in that particular case, a very toxic
environment. And then you just pull the plug.
You say, screw it, I'm doing it. And in my case,
I cashed out. I took the lump sum and gave myself
a salary for a year and a half so I could get
this up and running and really, you know, hopefully
get a sponsorship so I could pay the bills, which
did happen at the right time. But it was, it
was like, wow. Just lying in my bed, knowing
that there were no tones was amazing. Being there
every morning, making my son's lunch. I used
to walk him to the bus and then it became, you
know, being in the passenger seat where he drove
himself to high school. And then it's, he's driving
off to high school, all those, you know, I didn't
miss a morning with him, you know? So, you know,
you hear people, I've said this like. So many
departments, you know, they fight tooth and nail.
They'll go to arbitration, all kinds of stuff.
The contract negotiations will last three years
and they're fighting for a 50 cents or a dollar
pay raise. And I always tell them the only currency
that's really valuable is time with your family.
So whether you're fighting for a better work
week or whether you're considering retiring early,
like this is like you said, you know, you don't
start. And this is the thing I think people forget.
That doesn't mean you're not serving anymore.
I'm serving doing this. I'm serving writing books.
You're serving with the training you're doing,
empowering the next generation. So you can serve
in a thousand different ways. But doing what
we did, it is a young man's game or young woman's
game. And there will be someone filling that
seat the day you leave. Don't fool yourself.
So pick a point where you're like, all right,
that's enough. And especially if you've got kids,
don't miss their childhood. And you retire and
they're already off to college because, you know,
it's too late then. So, yeah, I agree with you
100%. The guys and women that hang on for dear
life chasing that dollar amount are usually the
ones that we see die within five years. I think
the average lifespan of a firefighter after they
retire is 11 years. So I've already beat that.
Yeah, I've heard only five or six by most of
the people. I think the 11 years, we die 11 years
younger than the average person. Oh, maybe. But
if you think about that, the people standing
on the diamond on day one are arguably a lot
fitter and healthier and mentally resilient than
the average person. So we should be living a
lot longer than the average person. So, yeah,
you are doing very well. You're smashing it.
But you made the right choice. I was 44. I mean,
that's young. Yep. Yeah. Absolutely. So it's
been almost 20 years. Yeah, exactly. This is
the thing. People have got to be like, be the
person that the city hates because you're still
alive. My granddad worked for an insurance company
in England. And I remember when he told me he'd
been retired longer than he'd worked. You know,
that was a good day for him. I want to go beyond
that, James. I want to, when I die, said this
person had collected a pension from the fire
department longer. than any other human being
has ever like 50 years he was retired yeah well
that's totally doable this is what i've said
recently with people you know we our generation
i'm a little bit younger than you but you know
there's that element of you know you're 40 years
old now so yeah of course i'm on blood pressure
meds and i'm 40 and it's like we've got this
skewed you know lens of what old is and you look
around like how many people do you see all over
the place are living late 90s early hundreds
like loads of people so that's completely doable
getting to you know 94 and then and then you
know beyond well i'm do you ever like go to a
firefighter thing you know being retired for
like 15 years and now everyone's old all they
come up and they go hey this is what's wrong
with me this is what's wrong i'm i feel terrible
for them But on the other side of it, I don't
take any prescription meds for anything. My blood
pressure is still low. I'm like, thank you, God.
But they're falling to pieces. Yeah. Well, this
is the thing that's crazy, too. I touched on
this when I did that talk for the 2472. Fire
service statistics. If I ask people, how many
people have we lost to suicides this last year?
Well, let me show you the national fallen firefighters
says it's this amount, like 70 or whatever it
was. So I know I can name 70 people that we probably
lost in the state of Florida. That was the ones
that we actually know about, not the ones that
were hidden because of the stigma and the shame.
So that's one state times that by 50. And then
I always ask him, like, well, what population
is not represented? The retirees. There's no
VA for the fire service. What fraction of a percent
of the line of duty ones compared to the ones
that transitioned out, the get into their fifties
and sixties and are alone in that apartment and
they're not counted, you know? So this is what's
so sad. This pray, if we knew those statistics,
I think it would be terrifying and it would really
jar everyone, but it's behind a curtain. But
if you could see the impact on our retirees and
how short they live and actually annotate it.
And then that would be such a huge selling point
then for we need to change it because, you know,
like you said, our generation aren't living very
long. This next generation hopefully will be
like you where they'll be living 30, 40, 50 years
after retirement and good for them. Yeah, the
suicide rate is, Deets thinks it's about 50 -50
active versus retirees. And I totally agree that
they're not looking at the numbers or this was
a suicide that they called something else. He
ran into a fire chief where he goes, there are
two of them in six months on their department.
One was a fall injury and the other one was a
hunting accident. And the fall injury was a guy
that got on a ladder, hung himself and kicked
the ladder off. And the hunting accident was
he shot himself in the head with a deer rifle
in his bedroom. So how do you, and it's just
like that, it's like, it's a reflection on the
whole organization where they try to go, oh,
this was, or they ran, they were going 110 miles
an hour when they mysteriously hit the underpass,
you know, median, right? Single vehicle accident.
How many of those were suicides? So we have no
idea what the real number is on suicides. Yeah,
absolutely. All right. Well, I want to be mindful
of your time. For people listening, let's just
reiterate where they can find Managing a Fire
Company. Are there any other places that they
can reach out to you personally? Managingafirecompany
.com. It's got an info at Managing a Fire Company.
It's an email. That's what I'm trying to get
to. If you click on that, I'm CC'd on that along
with my office manager. So it's probably the
best way to get a hold of me. as through the
website and then two if you go there it's really
just one big page with a bunch of buttons you
can click on and have pdfs to kind of explain
the whole thing and again james i appreciate
you let me come on your show and mentioning it
yeah well thank you so much i mean it's been
such an amazing conversation i've had a run of
of conversations recently with firefighters of
your generation chiefs and all different ranks
and to have these voices talking about the things
that need to change whether it's in the leadership
and you know mentoring our officers or we're
talking about work weeks and mental health and
fitness standards it's a very powerful voice
because we romanticize about your generation
you know the old salts but when you're saying
you know no we were wrong about not wearing our
packs we were wrong about saying suck it up buttercup
you know this is what we need to change i think
it's a it's an imperative voice for the young
fire service especially 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
well thank you for having me and again it's been
a pleasure talking to you and on our original
conversation That was another long one that was
very refreshed in talking to people with like
minds in the fire service. So thanks for having
me.