Lead Into It
Lead Into It is your go-to podcast for real, actionable leadership insights—no title required. Whether you're leading a team, a project, or just yourself, host Sara Greco brings you powerful conversations with leaders from corporate, nonprofit, hospitality, the U.S. military, and beyond. Each episode delivers tactical tools, fresh perspectives, and lasting inspiration to help you lead with confidence in your career and life.
Because leadership isn’t about a title—it’s about action.
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Lead Into It
49. The Power of Debriefing with Robert "Cujo" Teschner
What if the key to transforming your team’s performance wasn’t hiding in another leadership book—but came straight from the lessons learned in the cockpit of a fighter jet?
In this episode, I’m joined by Robert “Cujo” Teschner—former Air Force fighter pilot, leadership expert, and author of Debrief to Win. Cujo brings the heat (and the heart) in a conversation that challenges how we think about accountability, feedback, and real team growth.
We dig into why debriefing—the military kind—isn’t just a boring recap or a dreaded feedback session. It’s a high-impact, deeply human leadership practice that creates clarity, builds trust, and drives performance. The best part? It’s practical, repeatable, and doesn’t take hours to implement. In fact, the average military debrief lasts just 18 minutes—and can boost performance by up to 25%.
Cujo also shares how his journey from fighter pilot to leadership consultant (and cancer survivor) reshaped how he shows up—not just at work, but in life. His story is a powerful reminder that leadership isn’t just about checklists or standards—it’s about how we support the people around us when it matters most.
Whether you lead a team, manage projects, or just want to give better feedback, this episode will leave you with a powerful framework and a fresh perspective on what great leadership looks like—under pressure and beyond.
Let’s keep the conversation going—connect with me on Instagram and LinkedIn, subscribe to my Sunday newsletter, or reach out at sara@leadintoitco.
Excited to be back with you!
You're listening to episode 49 of the Lead Into it podcast. Hey there, and welcome back to Lead Into it, the podcast where we dive into the messy, meaningful and sometimes miraculous world of leadership. I'm your host, sarah Greco, and today, buckle up, we're headed into high-performance territory with a guest who knows a thing or two about precision, teamwork and learning from what didn't go according to plan. This episode's guest is Robert Cujo Teschner, former Air Force fighter pilot, leadership expert and author of the book Debriefed to Win. Cujo shares what the military gets right about leadership and why businesses and teams everywhere need to borrow this page from the fighter pilot playbook. We talk about the power of debriefing not as a boring post-mortem or a dreaded feedback sandwich, but as a game changing tool for growth, clarity and connection.
Speaker 1:Kuju also shares a pivotal moment in his life that completely transformed how he views leadership, not just as a skill but as a way of showing up for the people who matter most. If you've ever struggled with giving feedback, leading with authenticity or just figuring out how to help your team actually learn from mistakes, this episode is for you. Let's dive in Well. Thank you, kujo, so much for coming on the show. I can't tell you how much I appreciate your time.
Speaker 2:Sarah, thank you so much for having me on the show. What an honor it is to be here with you today.
Speaker 1:Previously you'll have heard on the intro to this podcast talking about a little bit of your background and your book, but I'd love to hear it from your perspective, If you wouldn't mind, just giving kind of an overview of your military journey leading you to where you are today.
Speaker 2:Good Thank you for that. Starts with dad. Dad was a key part of my military journey. He was in the military intel officer in Vietnam and then he became a JAG officer, so got a chance to see the attorney side of the Air Force. As a kid I got to go in and watch dad as a prosecuting attorney do his work and I love that. I love being around the the Air Force. As a kid I got to go in and watch dad as a prosecuting attorney do his work and I loved that. I loved being around the whole Air Force family really felt connected to it.
Speaker 2:So when he retired I think it was right after I finished my sophomore year in high school, I was disappointed in him and I knew that I had to go and continue on with my family. So that set me on the path to join the Air Force. Got a chance to go to the Air Force Academy. Got a chance to live my lifelong passion, which was to fly airplanes and specifically pick fighter aircraft, and I was a fighter pilot for most of my career. Did some staff stuff experience. Um, that informs what I wrote about what it is that I love doing these days, how it is that we've tried to team as a family, and, and and so much more. So that's, that's the career in a nutshell.
Speaker 1:And can you describe a little bit about what you do today?
Speaker 2:Yeah, these days I take, uh, what it is that we used to do in the flying domain unpack it, repackage it, and and teach how we can apply all of the principles that allow us to team well in the flying domain unpack it, repackage it and teach how we can apply all of the principles that allow us to team well in the high-performance team world of, specifically, fighter aviation.
Speaker 2:My background no matter where we are, and we spend most of our time working with businesses all different shapes and sizes, but occasionally get touch points back in the United States Air Force and the Department of Defense, and that's been, I would say, Sarah, one of the most rewarding things that I've had the chance to do. Like, I came from a culture that was, a certain way, learned a ton, was taught how to lead with all of that, and the places where we now go as a team and teach don't have that benefit, don't have the benefit of the resources that our federal government does and don't have that benefit. Don't have the benefit of the resources that our federal government does and don't have the kinds of inherent training every step along the way to help their leaders to be the best leaders they can be. So I found that our shared background has been a very, very incredibly useful one in the business world.
Speaker 2:And that's where I spend most of my time these days.
Speaker 1:It's so interesting that you came to that realization and kind of saw the advantage of sharing your military background and specifically we'll go into it the power of debriefing, because I as an active duty went reserve, did a few corporate like nonprofit gigs and realized how much leadership wasn't taught early enough. And it's something that I've become very passionate about in the past couple of years, not because they were bad at leadership, it was just something different and I think that our military really has an intuition and instinct on how it should be done and it's very powerful to learn that way in the corporate setting, in different aspects of your life, and to apply it in that way.
Speaker 2:So true, and I tell you I mean not kind of the academy, 20 years in uniform, spent a lot of that time, you know, griping about this that the other, like we're really, we're really good at you know and we can talk anybody that's listening to this could be like well, you know, I worked for this horrible leader and I can't believe that you'd ever teach anything that they did you know anywhere else. And it's true. I mean there's a human enterprise our military is, and you know there's all kinds of folks at every level and some of them are better than others at doing all the things that you and I are interested in. I mean stunningly remarkable about our Air Force, about our military in general, is how passionate we are and how effective we are at instilling leadership principles from the very beginning of our journey, starting in basic training, like right there, we're all being inculcated with leadership skills.
Speaker 2:We're all understanding what it takes to team effectively. We develop some degree of empathy for how difficult it is to lead in all kinds of disruption. We don't maybe even realize how much we're being poured into, starting at the very beginning, and it just keeps on getting reinforced and reinforced and reinforced. What it leads to is really young people taking on huge amounts of responsibility and being okay with it. I mean, just think of it. It's like it is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's very true. We don't even think about it.
Speaker 2:No, I mean I was doing some interviews with some of my teammates for some of our clients. So we're in this little thing I've got eight of us and kind of going through and talking to all the folks about their leadership journeys, and one of the questions that I've asked that's been a little bit off-putting, I think. Every time that I've asked is how old were you when you were the wing commander or whatever else? You know and I that's not. That's not something we usually do, but I'm asking that just so that the business leader can get a sense of how young folks are. With you know, the responsibility of running an organization that may be geographically separated not just, you know, in North America, like other continents and thousands of people that are affected by this. It's pretty amazing. You know where it is that some people are in this whole thing and how young they are when they do it. So there's something to it and we have invested heavily into into leadership development in our military the department of defense, number one investor in leadership development on the planet.
Speaker 2:So it would make sense that that good has come of that, even if there's the occasional person that we can point out and say make sense that that good has come of that, even if there's the occasional person we can point out and say, oh, if there's anything I've also learned, there's always the people and their perspective and their story and their narrative.
Speaker 1:So it's one of those things where it's like there's good leaders, there's also going to be bad leaders. It's just kind of you have to have your right with your left hand okay, can I share one thing about this real quick?
Speaker 2:Yeah, go for it. You're asking all the questions, but one thing that comes to mind. I remember a friend of mine I ran into after he gave up wing command and I complimented him because I was on a staff at the time and I got a chance to hear about the work that he was doing and it was universally praised and it was really. He stood out as being an exceptional wing commander and when I got a chance to intersect with him again post command, I first of all highlighted that to him. I said you know, congratulations, kudos to you. And and secondly, what, what would you say, like you know, helped you to be so?
Speaker 2:good at that that's a hard thing to do, and his response has always stuck with me. He said, cujo, it's simple, I was a bad squadron commander, and that was revealed to me when I became a group commander and I watched squadron commanders who were working for me who were so much better at doing what it was that I had done so poorly. And I learned from that and I swore that I would never be as bad as I once was and I would learn from my subordinates how to be better at what I'm currently doing. And I took all that forward and became a better wing commander, and I'm like what humility it takes to acknowledge that and to openly admit it too. I thought that was pretty amazing. Like we're always, we're always thinking of you and I are constantly thinking about, we're always learning more about it, we're passionate about it, and so we're never going to stop doing that until the day that we're done doing everything which is and you shouldn't.
Speaker 1:You shouldn't. It should be something that's consistently on your mind because it's every aspect of your life. And I love that story because I bet the folks in his squadron were like he was really the best wing commander ever. I think that also says something about you can't always trust somebody's reputation. They are human, they will evolve, they probably will become better. But I think that also shares that anyone can become the best version of themselves at any point in their journey and their career and their lives and I think that, as somebody who looks back, that's incredible to hear and he could share that with everybody. It also be like these are the things I did as a squadron commander that I would not recommend. That's right, 100%, and I think actually he did that, did as a squadron commander that I would not recommend.
Speaker 2:That's right 100% and I think actually he did that openly as a wing commander, which probably only helped everybody.
Speaker 1:That humility it creates so much. So I'd love to go more into your book Debrief to Win and the power of debriefing. So I read it. I understand the concept of debriefing, especially being in the air force, but I'd love for you to go into the concept a little bit and kind of what inspired you to write the book.
Speaker 2:Excellent. Okay, we'll start with what inspired it and then I'll uh, I'll outline the fundamental concept and, um, I guess there was a time period when I was out at Nellis, when I was at the weapons school and I was given the responsibility for kind of expanding the application of debrief. You know, as an F-15 guy, for most of my career F-15s we did debriefs our way. We were very intentional about never changing how it?
Speaker 2:is, we did our thing. We're very siloed in our application and I knew other disciplines did debriefs a little bit differently. They did it their way and it was my given task when I came back to the weapons school as an instructor to standardize debriefing across the board, which I was not at all excited about. I'm like this is not fun. There's nothing cool about this. Why me? I lamented my timing. I was actually kind of bummed, but because of a degree of imposter syndrome, I wasn't going to challenge this either. So I'm like all right, I need to do it. So I take this thing on.
Speaker 2:And while I'm working on the standardization of really vocabulary and methodology of all the different teams that do them, I was confronted with the fact that in business, this thing didn't exist. I was lamenting, really lamenting, the state of leadership development. I was lamenting the fracture that they were experiencing and the team that they were on. I'm like, well, you know, the stuff that we're doing here is really about building teams that win, no matter what. It's really about learning as a team to be a better team tomorrow. And that was the point. It was all the way back in 2004 where I said someday we ought to take this out and help out specifically small business because that's the backbone of our economy to understand how to lead and team more effectively. So the origin was I got this burden I wasn't excited about in the midst of working on this thing that I wasn't excited about. Somebody highlights their challenges. I'm like, well, this thing that I'm not excited about is actually probably a solution. And then, as I start to learn about all this, I start getting much more excited and then, ironically, I turn my life upside down and make this my primary life's focus is teaching this stuff, and I'm so grateful that my timing was what it was. And here we are.
Speaker 2:And so I wrote the book in an effort to support businesses in building stronger teams and helping businesses to accelerate leadership development and to rethink accountability the way that we do in the high-performance team world, which is to say that accountability does not need to be and, in fact, probably survives best when it's not punitive in nature, which is the natural disposition Accountability is usually backwards-looking and blame-oriented probably survives best when it's not punitive in nature, which is the natural disposition.
Speaker 2:Accountability is usually backwards looking and blame oriented, but it serves us so much better if we can harness its upside and we can use it to learn as a team, and every team needs to be in a posture of learning, nothing static. That's the reason why you and I are never going to stop digging into what it takes to lead effectively, because leadership is situational, not static, and so you've got to be in a constant learning posture in order to navigate disruptions. And, of all the things that I could say about Debrief to Win is that it was designed to help us all to learn better as a team, and if we can do that, oh my gosh, those are the kinds of teams you want to be on.
Speaker 1:Right, it's all about. I mean, you talked about that squadron commander becoming a wing commander and reflecting on the feedback that he himself received and saw, and so in a way, he debriefed in a way and took that information and made himself a better person. By getting feedback you become better. That's right, as long as you apply what you learned.
Speaker 2:And as long as what you're learning is correct. I mean, if you think about it like I'm constantly putting leaders into little breakout sessions and testing them in our little simulations and watching as they're giving feedback that they actually aren't qualified to give to people who they're crushing in the process of giving it, so like it is a standard feature these days to put folks into that. And then they ask them who here is actually qualified to give the feedback on this particular thing, and when we reflect on it, nobody is. And yet we did it. So we've instinctively said yes to the challenge. Yes, I will give feedback to this person, and the person who gets it oftentimes says the feedback makes them feel worse, not better, and it's not only making them feel worse, not better, but it's also technically incorrect. They got the wrong thing from people that weren't qualified to give it, and we fall into that trap so easily all the time. So it has to.
Speaker 1:It has to be done correctly. How do you get out of that trap, would be my question, because what does it look like to do it correctly if you're not in the arena, which is like I love Brene Brown and that quote and all that. But I think this is a really good point, because it's hard to figure out. If you are in the arena to give that feedback, what can it look like to be correct? But what if you're not in the arena? What can you do to help support?
Speaker 2:Well, and the origin story to all of this? Okay, the thing that's that tees us up effectively to practice accountability is knowing what it is, that we're being held to account for, having an established standard, you know, clarifying what success is and what we find it's just that's largely absent. And so, well, one of the things that, um, that's frustrating for everybody at any level in any organization, is being told when you're getting feedback, that there's always room for improvement and that's why you didn't get the top score. I've actually come to learn that that's a leadership cop-out, it says I never even knew what it would take to earn the top score. So now, finally, acknowledging that I don't know, sarah, how to assess you, I'm going to say something fuzzy like there's always room for improvement. That's why I'm going to give you the nine out of 10,. You know, keep on trying and in the end you're unsatisfied.
Speaker 2:I actually, if I'm honest with myself, I'm unsatisfied, but the get out of jail free card is there's always room for improvement. Much better way is to set the standard long before we ever evaluate. Help our teammates to meet or exceed said standard, reward them for having done so or, if they've chosen to not even try and to aim for lower than the high mark. That also tells us a lot about what we need to know about this particular teammate. But most cases people you work with on a daily basis they want to meet or exceed and then, when they do so, setting a higher bar the next time around. That's a way to rapidly develop skill sets while encouraging people along the way that they've got what it takes to become extraordinary Like that to me works a lot better than the carrot that you can never get that's dangling out in front of you.
Speaker 1:How simple of a concept that isn't employed enough. You can tell like on video. I'm so passionate about this because everyone's like I don't understand why my individual contributor isn't doing what they need to and I'm like do they do? They know that they need to do it. They're like, well, they should just know that's part of the job description. I was like, just because it's part of the job description doesn't mean that they innately know that this is the standard and the expectation. Sit them down, set the expectation and then hold them accountable to that expectation. It's something very easy, but when they're not meeting, it, then continue. When I say it's easy, it's a simple concept, I don't mean it's easy, I actually mean it's. It's actually a very challenging thing to do because it is consistently holding a person to a standard that you're expecting them to meet and when they're not meeting them, you also have to hold it into that standard. Um, so it's not as easy thing to do. It's something simple that can help you.
Speaker 2:Well, and I tell you it works on both sides of the equation extremely well. If you and I are sitting down together and I'm trying to map out a way to progress, you to become, you know, colonel, whoever, and I'm showing you the steps along the path that are going to get you there, we're crafting this together. You're clear on expectations. I'm clear that I've given you expectations. We understand that there's clear expectations and it makes the follow-on conversation of not having done what's necessary so much easier, because the facts are the facts and we know what we signed up to do. And it helps you because you understand what the, what the steps are to progress and everything is really good.
Speaker 2:When we don't have that, we have this fuzzy world that leads us to, especially if we care, working very hard and oftentimes being unsatisfied. I have a dear friend who just retired early and had the chance to really go far. But one of the challenges that this individual had was being in a position, being specifically in a job where there was no clarity of expectations given, and so they would work oftentimes through the weekend trying to craft the approach that on Monday was shot down because it wasn't what the boss wanted and the team's like are you kidding me? Like we've just given everything, you haven't given us clarity, but yet now you're telling that we didn't achieve it. Like it's impossible to work that way and it leads to frustration and burnout and an early exit from an otherwise amazing career, like totally avoidable. And you know we could put that one squarely on on the leader and like why would we do that to each other?
Speaker 1:Well, and as if you have ever been in that position, you know how frustrating it is you can personally attest to when you don't know what the expectations are. It is there's no direction in how you can progress, and so it's just the feeling of frustration, and you don't want that for yourself and for others. So we get a little bit easier for everyone around you by just setting the expectation. And, as another reminder, expectations can change as long as you verify that the expectation has changed.
Speaker 2:That's also so, true, I mean, and being flexible to those changes is part of what it takes. We always talk flexibility is the key to air power, right, okay so, but the starting point is having something against which to measure and to pivot from. If we don't have that, then anything's, I suppose, on the table, anything's possible and it's your best guess as to what the right thing is going to be. And that's just an unsatisfying place to operate. So the whole understanding of accountability is really set with. If we haven't planned correctly, we don't have the right to practice accountability. And planning as a leadership function requires clarity of expectations upfront, because you need to know what it is that you're aiming to achieve in order to create the plan to achieve it, and that all is baked into practicing accountability well. So you know, debrief to Win really is probably the third part of a multi-part series. First part is Plan to Win. I just haven't taken the time to write that book yet.
Speaker 1:Part of the series.
Speaker 2:But the theory is valid in the workshops. We really emphasize that. You got a chance to see that when I came down to the 33rd wing a couple of years ago, which was so much fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I'd love for you to go into a little bit more about the debriefing concept and what that means, because I think we went to the plan to win and you've set expectations, but I guess it would be now you're you executed. So what does the feedback look like during a debrief?
Speaker 2:Excellent. So, you know, you think about it like, like, what do we struggle with so often? And that is where everybody's busy. We're constantly busy. In the midst of being busy, constantly, we're just always doing, doing, doing, doing, doing, acting, acting, activating, doing, doing, doing. And it's a frustrating experience to constantly be doing without learning. And so the debrief experience is all centered on learning as much as we can from everything that we've done in order to have a better iteration the next time.
Speaker 2:And the debrief can best be described as a means of team learning. We formally define it as the constructive evaluation of the quality of our decisions and associated actions, measured against the objectives that we set out to achieve. So there's three components to what a debrief is. But if you were to just go bypass all the technical stuff, it's a way that the team is structured to learn regardless of outcome, and no mission is done until we've learned from it. And if you contrast that approach with the way that things are oftentimes done, we're just running, doing, doing, doing, doing, doing and you realize that being somewhat intentional is the recipe to having a much more fulfilling experience and to being confident that we're going to go forth and win, and you realize it's worth taking the time to do it. And what's fascinating is how little time it takes to be able to effectively debrief. That for the uninitiated it may be an hour expensive time to learn some really valuable lessons that, when applied, allow us to be confident that we're going to win tomorrow to the folks who really know how to do it.
Speaker 2:And there was a meta-analysis done about a decade ago, two researchers with no connection to the armed forces of the United States, tannenbaum and Sarasoli. They did a meta-analysis. They studied the effectiveness of debriefs and in their meta-analysis the average debrief length was 18 minutes, which resulted in a 20% to 25% improvement. So an expenditure of 18 minutes yielding a 20% to 25% improvement in how things were done is one of the most exceptional uses of time. And why wouldn't we? Why wouldn't we spend our time that way? So the debrief is designed to efficiently and effectively help us to learn, to be confident that tomorrow is going to be better than today. It's also an organic means of resiliency.
Speaker 2:You know, I think back on a lot of the missions that I led out of Eglin Air Force Base in beautiful Fort Walton Beach, florida, back in the proverbial day, and they were stunning disasters.
Speaker 2:Like on my repertoire of things that I've managed to accomplish, I've managed to lose, like the best of them, and it was actually a little bit disheartening for me as a young lieutenant and captain, losing the way that as spectacularly as I did on my first assignment in the 58th fighter squadron back in the day.
Speaker 2:But one of the features of every one of those missions was I was there with a bunch of people that were intent on learning from today's experience, and the ability to bounce back quickly was mission critical in that world. You know, like if you can't bounce back quickly, especially in a combat unit, then you're setting yourself up for disaster, and so one of the most important things that I ever learned was how to, like physically, you know, learn from this thing and to change things, but also mentally bounce back from this big challenge and buy into the notion that things are about to get a lot better. That's going to, that's going to serve me personally in my, in my private life, uh, all over, and especially in the, you know, primary reason why I pivoted to how the military uh, and then it was a stunningly wonderful thing to have when you were going down range into you know, a combat arena and uh and flying missions, that that had pretty significant consequences with them, for sure.
Speaker 1:That is very interesting because during these debriefs you do receive a lot of feedback, during which it talks about your performance. I guess my question would be how much of it was usually negative, and then how did you figure out how to bounce back from that?
Speaker 2:Good, good. I think I had one debrief that stands out in my mind as exceptionally horrible, where the team lead in question had a really bad day, like a really bad day, like an emotionally intelligent day of non-existence, and used the debrief as an outlet for frustration and anger. And in 20 years, having only one of those experiences says a lot about how well trained we are and not doing it that way. Ok, so one example out of 20 years in uniform, most of the time the way that it looked, no matter where I was, and every stage of my evolution. But I would concentrate again on my time both at Tyndall and Eglin, when I was a lieutenant just learning, I was told, even on the heels of a failure Cujo, you did this right. You did this right. You did this right. You did these three things right. This is the one thing right over here. That was the issue today. Any question in your mind about what needed to have happened here and I typically, because it was very clear given the conversation that we had leading up to the summary like no questions, you know, sorry, I understand what I should have done, cool, any doubt about your ability to make that decision differently tomorrow? No, sir. No, no doubt, excellent. I also have zero doubts, says my instructor to me, about your ability, kujo, to make the right decision. So, man, go make the right decision tomorrow. Tomorrow is going to be outstanding.
Speaker 2:And, by the way, sarah, you're looking at somebody who went to double secret probation when I was at Tyndall going through the F-15B course. I mean, I had a week that was stunningly disastrous and it almost led to my exit from the career path that I'd wanted to be on. This was my double secret probation experience. So here it is Okay. So I come in on a Monday and I'm flying this profile two of us against one enemy. All the airplanes are the same, we're all flying F-15s and this is the first time that we're going to practice the art of pulling up to 9Gs while communicating and shooting and deconflicting from the wingman here, as we're all in the same piece of sky. So it's a pretty robust scenario and we go out there and fly it and haven't experienced anything like this in pilot training, anything like this in the F-15 course to date.
Speaker 2:Come back and in the van going back to the squadron, my instructor, who's a mid-killer from Desert Storm, goes hey, man, that was outstanding and he's so excited. Okay, he's like we just you did a great job today, and so I'm like coming into the debrief. I'm like, yes, we get into the debrief. He's looking at all the tapes and he stops right here. He goes. He goes dude, what happened right here? I'm like, well, that's where I shoot the bad guy, and I was feeling very good about it. He's like you still think you shot the bad guy? I'm like, well, yes, of course. I mean, who else would I be? Oh, no, and I realized that I shot my flight lead. And it wasn't until the debrief that I was confronted with the truth. I was not used to all of this information.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And even there I didn't see that I had shot the wrong person. It was inconceivable that was even possible. And now it hits me and Sarah, the feeling was horrific, okay, like if there had been a real missile on board. I mean, I can't even imagine what I've done. So now, because I've shot my flight lead, I failed that ride, okay, go in the next day. So this is Tuesday now and I go out there to refly this thing and I'm so amped up I haven't slept at all because I cannot believe what I've done and I'm feeling sick Like you feel sick to your stomach for multiple days.
Speaker 2:So as soon as we start the very first engagement on day two of this horrific journey, I pull and immediately on my very first break turn, my very first attempt to maneuver, I hear the thing saying overgy, overgy. And I am one second into this mission and I've already broken the airplane, which is an automatic fail. And two failures in the same phase of instruction means you're on now. Double secret, I call it that. Like you're, you're in this thing where you have to get counseled and you got to go talk to the thing. And then your, your name tag looks a different color because you can only fly with certain people. And actually I went to an elimination ride on Wednesday. So Wednesday, my entire future is about to come to a grinding halt here if I don't pass. And I made it through, obviously okay with the stuff behind me, but it wasn't the best week. And then I stayed on double secret probation until I finished.
Speaker 2:What's amazing to me about every one of those debriefs was how kind and empathetic my instructors were, how much they understood where I was, how much they appreciated the pressure that I was under, even the person who I flew with. And on the third day I had to fly with somebody from another squadron so that they weren't biased and didn't have any preconceived notions. I mean all these horrible things that you read about. I've lived them all. But they were so gracious and every one of them said you can do this thing. And they didn't say it just because they were trying to be nice. They actually meant what they said. Especially coming into the third one, I mean the guy looks at it he's like simple mistake.
Speaker 2:Everybody makes it somewhere along their career Overdoing the airplane totally understandable. We can avoid that, like just don't push it too hard today, cooge, and you'll be fine. And here we are. And what I've found is that in so many other aren in the F-15 squadrons writ large any of the high performance organizations that have harnessed the power of the debrief?
Speaker 1:it's the way that you want to do it because it's the most human way to learn. I mean, there's feedback where it's like the feedback sandwich and it's like good piece of feedback, bad piece of feedback, good piece, like there's that theory that's going around and I've learned that that is not the best way to do it. It sounds like what you've learned and continue to share is there's a authenticity to the feedback as well, as it's given empathetically and with truth yes, and with all those things.
Speaker 2:when you can do those things, the while it still would be hard to hear, it empowers you in a way to make you better 100%, and you have to look at what is the desired outcome of this thing, and in so many different arenas, the desired outcome of some sort of feedback is to reinforce the relative power, delta, like you know. Do you know who I am here? I'm in charge, right, I'm in charge, and I know everybody, and I've got all the power and I'm going to make you feel that delta as much as I can. Some people harness that, for whatever reasons, to the you know, to the disappointment of the rest of the team, and that's very, very sad. Our approach is different. We know that the people that we're going into combat with are the most important teammates that we have right now, and we have to be able to team very well together in order to confidently go into a disruptive space where our enemies are getting worse by the day. They're studying us daily to figure out how they're going to win against us, and so if they reveal something to us that we weren't prepared for, we can't just sit back and be like, well, I guess there's no hope, like we got to really rebound here and learn as fast as we can, and the only way that we can learn there is to learn every day, as fast and as best we can, and the point of this is to reinforce each other's strengths and to build out the things that we're not so good at, so that we can be the best we can when we're put to the test. And again, that's an approach that I think works the best. And when you look at mechanisms people use and they're used many times because it's the best we've got, like asking the questions what went well or what didn't, which I hate those questions. We'll come back to that here in a second.
Speaker 2:Or the feedback sandwich of Sarah sarah um, I love the glasses. Uh, really appreciate the look. What a beautiful background. Um, you're doing horrible in everything that you do with your work, uh, and then the other side of this thing uh, so are we gonna you know, could I? Could I encourage you to come join me for a coffee later today? It's on my treat, like everybody sees through that it's fraudulent, the first and the things. Those are only there to allow me to attack you and to feel good about it Because, like I've, said nice things around it.
Speaker 2:Nobody appreciates that the debrief is structured so that the light is shined on the truth. From the very get-go we say, okay, what was first of all? What was the thing that we were trying to do here? What was the mission? Very short summary. What was the mission? You the thing that we were trying to do here. What was the mission? Very short summary. What was the mission? You know, offensive counter error could have been the mission, whatever that means Good. What were the objectives? How did we say that we were going to define success today? And that's really important, because that's what we're measuring against. Why did we or did we not achieve our objectives?
Speaker 2:And the third part of this process is what was the plan that we had? Is what was the plan that we had? And we want to remind ourselves what it was that we both agreed to coming into this, that we were going to do. That we thought was our best chance for achieving our mission objectives. And then we're going to compare what we did with the plan and we're going to focus on any of the deltas and this is the part that's the big difference from other versions of accountability If the plan was indeed correct and we deviated from it and we can't justify it.
Speaker 2:Well then, probably that's on us. There's learning that can be gained from that Like why do we deviate If the plan wasn't correct and we followed it? Well then we can identify the fact that we had a bad plan and that was the reason why, and so we can learn from this and build a better plan, hopefully the next time, revealing to ourselves in our internal deliberations why this thing wasn't sufficient. And if the plan was a bad plan but we deviated from it in order to win this thing, because we recognized as we were executing it that it was deficient, it gives us an opportunity to celebrate that and to reinforce that and to say great, pivot midstream.
Speaker 2:And if the plan was the right plan and we followed it, we could also come back and say outstanding job following the plan. I mean, there was times when we almost got distracted. There was times when we were like, ooh, do we trust this thing? But we did and great job. And so we give ourselves the capacity to reward people for the good things that they're doing. And fundamental human nature. It doesn't matter what uniform we're wearing. People like to be told nice job.
Speaker 1:Yes, it's amazing how saying that can be so impactful. People who are listening are probably a mixture of military to corporate all the things, and yes, we spoke a lot about some military stuff and like there was some like airplane hand gestures that were happening at one point, and that's totally fine. I think my question would be now is how does this translate into business? How does this translate into the common day of being in an office and not necessarily flying a plane?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the short answer is a team is a team is a team, and the principles that allow us to team effectively are universally applicable, which means that these things that we figured out by spending billions upon billions upon billions of dollars so that we could build teams that win in disruption, they not only apply, they should be universally practiced. They aren't. There's a huge gulf what we're capable of in business in terms of building effective teams and where we are, and so I'd say that the onus is on us to get over the self-limiting belief of we're not the military. This isn't life or death. These military things won't work here.
Speaker 2:And to give this thing a try, in fact, in the minutes leading up to today's podcast interview, I was busy teaching a group of primarily leaders of software teams how to debrief to win, and every single one of them acknowledged the gaps and the lack of ability of the team to learn as effectively as they're capable of, because nobody's ever taught them how to do this and how important it is to learn how to plan correctly. People that even think, coming into one of our sessions, that they're planning well, when confronted with what real planning looks like, recognizes how far they are. And then, once we see the delta, we can fix it. So long-winded way of saying, oh my gosh, we just need more of it.
Speaker 1:And it's interesting to hear about this personally, seeing all the different ways I've seen team building, planning, strategic communication coming from public affairs and just using this, it's making me laugh a little bit. But just using this to plan meetings, to do brief meetings, I'm like wow, that would actually be really useful, just like redirecting be like hey, was this on our agenda at the beginning? It wasn't, was it? Why is it useful for us to talk about?
Speaker 2:Can I just share another quick story here? Go for it, okay. So, because we mentioned the meetings thing, I had an experience a few years ago that I think is pretty amazing. I was working with a group civilian business leadership team said that they were very accountable. I asked them how often do you practice accountability? They said once a month. Okay, once a month. I said all right. So we had a regularly scheduled meeting the day after one of these once a month accountability sessions and so we had this follow-up meeting on Zoom, just like this on Zoom, and I asked the leadership team of this company. I said, hey, I understand you had this accountability session, the one that you have every month, yesterday. Was it a success? And it was a simple question. It just yesterday. Was it a success? And it was a simple question. It just says was it a success? And I'm looking at all these people and nobody's willing to answer the question and I'm like huh, leadership team. Simple question yes, no, I mean it's done, it's happened.
Speaker 1:The silence is an answer in itself.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course it was, but I pushed them a little bit, okay so. So finally one of the people in the thing says okay, cujo, I'll buy. Yes, it was a success, it's okay, good, I'm glad. Follow on question. And they're like, oh no, they roll their eyes. I'm like why do you say that it was a success? And so the person uh, kind of thinks for a second, eyes, go to the top left corner of the Zoom window, comes back and says, okay, well, I'd say it was a success. So now they qualify, like I would say, as opposed to somebody else here might say it differently I would say it was a success because we started on time, we covered all the agenda items. We went 42 minutes long because we had a really good discussion at the end. So, okay, thank you for that. I appreciate that. It's very cool.
Speaker 2:You assess this as a success because you started on time, covered the agenda, regardless of whether that agenda was worthwhile. And you went long. And remind me, how long did this thing last? And they confessed it was like six hours. They had the six-hour meeting the day prior. I said, okay, so that's the standard, that's the bar here Start on time, cover the thing and go along, and then because I reframed that, which was a little bit mean of me. That's why we didn't want to answer your question, right, because we thought you might say something like that. I'm like, all right, fair, that's fair. And I figured that the lesson was probably sufficient there. We moved on, okay.
Speaker 2:The reason why I highlight them is the next day, I got an unsolicited email from that leadership team and it had nothing, no words, okay, like I think it was titled something like for Cujo, all right, all it was was screenshots of the next year's meeting calendar. Okay, and this was for all of their meetings, and they had wiped out by my calculations and I'm a political science major, so math in public is hard, but like I'm willing to stand by they eradicated 90% of their meetings. Why? They realized how much time they were wasting doing things that had no purpose, things that served no useful purpose, that they couldn't even. They couldn't even answer the simple question of like, was it a success? They were just. They were, as we oftentimes did in my previous life in the military, just doing the thing that the previous person did, because that's what we always do, right, good, sorry for sorry for the rant.
Speaker 1:No, I think it's an incredible to hear the different ways of you were talking about, like them, clearing out meetings, but I think I was listening to the questions that you were asking them, because it's I don't know if it was unintentionally I feel like it was intentionally you gave them feedback by asking them questions and they that silence that they provided was the answer, but also it gave them a chance to think. And so, when it comes to feedback, I there was a few questions that were asked during your pilot debriefs, your flight debriefs, where it was like what were you trying to do here or what were you supposed to do here? And I think those are powerful questions to ask during any sort of feedback session, because you get to understand their intention, and the intention behind that accountability meeting had good intent. They were trying to do the right thing and it wasn't anything that they were doing wrong. It just can be done better.
Speaker 1:That's right, and I think that's a. All those questions are just very impactful and can provide feedback that you didn't even know they needed, because they're going to answer their own questions Me, as a coach, I see how powerful questions are Um, and to empower them to figure out the answers on their own is more impactful than you telling them exactly what to do Like hey, you actually should have made that an hour long meeting. You guys didn't need to talk this long, this agenda is wrong but instead you gave them all the tools and the power to figure it out on their own.
Speaker 2:And I attribute all of that to my flubs when I was coming up. I remember a debrief. I was so proud of this. I wrote about this in the book, but it's probably worth sharing with your audience, especially those that aren't familiar with these things. I advocate for coming into the debrief with childlike curiosity, because I learned that lesson the hard way and I go all the way back to. It was probably 2001. Yeah, somewhere in that timeframe.
Speaker 2:And I'm flying this mission with an instructor at the weapons school to see if I have what it takes to be a student at the weapons school. So it's one of the most high pressure missions ever in my life. I really don't want to flub this thing in my one shot. I'm at Nellis. I'm flying an actual airplane at Nellis Air Force Base, the home of the weapon school, and we go out there and on the fifth engagement against a current and qualified weapon school instructor, I end up winning. I end up gunning my instructor, which is so hard to do at any time, and especially there, against those people. I couldn't believe it. And we get to the debrief and I spent 35 minutes telling them all the different ways to not get gunned by Cujo and I'm so proud of myself Like this is a glorious day, it's beautiful, the sun's shining. All I can think about is this is a day. I can't wait to go back and tell everybody how I dominated and we finished my spiel and I remember the instructor. He's like all right, cooch. Overall summary good briefing, decent in-flight execution.
Speaker 2:Debrief was the part that was lacking, and specifically the fifth engagement. That's where we're going to focus today and I'm like ah, you prideful son of a gun, I get it. It's hard getting gunned by Cujo, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. And I was stunned, actually, that he was doing what he was doing. I was thinking he was going down the path of lack of integrity. Anyway, I'm going to find out.
Speaker 2:He teaches me a very important lesson that I've never forgotten and I continue to perpetuate in literally all that I do. We've covered it multiple times today. He said Cujo, he said Kujo, he goes. You know, pretty decent instruction on how not to get gunned by Kujo, he goes. But I don't know, I don't know that that was actually where the instruction should have gone today. And he goes. I feel like there was some relevant facts missing. I'm like, okay, well, what relevant facts. In my mind. I'm saying you know, like what relevant facts the fact that I did gun you as much as I did with the fact that you feel bad about it right now Like what relevant fact are we missing? And he's like so, kujo, why don't we go back through the question phase and maybe you should dig into what's happening in my cockpit? And I'm like all right, I really don't understand what you're doing here, but whatever. So what questions should I have asked then, mr Instructor?
Speaker 2:And he's like, well, maybe ask me what I'm seeing at about the time that you're gunning me. I'm like, all right, mr Instructor, what were you seeing about the time that I was gunning you? He said, oh, thanks for asking, kujo, I see master caution lights and I see a right engine firelight. And in that moment it just occurs to me and all the joy evaporates immediately I'd ask the wrong questions and I was doing an analysis based upon the wrong set of facts. This guy wasn't worried about me gunning him, he was worried about whether he had an engine fire.
Speaker 2:And I gunned a guy that wasn't even paying attention to me and I was feeling good about it, oh my gosh. And I realized that the quality of my debrief was directly proportional to the quality of the facts that I was assessing. And the only way that I could get the correct facts on the table was to ask the right questions. And I was doing a horrible job of that at the time, and I was fortunate that, despite my poor execution, he still endorsed me to go to the place, and I suppose my penance was eventually, when I came back as an instructor, taking over the debrief course, to finally get good at doing it. And here we are today, so that whole path leads us to this interview on your podcast.
Speaker 1:How beautiful is that. And I mean it works because the moment that you know what questions to ask is such a powerful thing to have, and having those questions will only make you stronger. That's right it will in all different aspects, and I've definitely learned that throughout the course of my career and it's my favorite question is to ask what were you trying to do? And just to gain understanding of what they were trying to do. Yes, there's so much perspective in it, that's right and.
Speaker 1:I like that. He was like well, what question should you have asked? That's also a really great question to ask, like what question do you want to ask me right now?
Speaker 2:That's where the alarm bell started going off for me.
Speaker 2:I'm like oh, oh today may not have been as good of a day as I thought it was. No-transcript the full truth. And if the full truth reveals that I am far distant from who it is that I need to be, to be the teammate that you all need me to be, then I'm open to that and I'm going to give my all to correct this as fast as I can, because we're here, you know, as a team, to be ready to go fly, fight and win. And I think if we're clear on purpose, then everything else, everything else, follows suit. And another another gap is that we lack purpose oftentimes at the team level, not only for the things that we do and invest lots of time in, but also for why we exist as a team. I cannot tell you how often I ask the question like, what's your team purpose? And I get as many different answers as I get people that I ask the question of, or I get a purpose that's wildly incorrect, like it's to make as much money as we can, which that's not what we're talking about. One of the things that you and I benefit from when you're wearing a uniform, and when I used to, was that our purpose was very clear. We drove meaning and impact from being ready to defend our nation and that drove everything. It wasn't the money, I mean, we were willing to go live in really bad circumstances in faraway lands doing really dangerous stuff. And it wasn't about the money. There was something bigger at play here. That's usually testified to when we swear or affirm the oath of office, and so that's a really big deal Lacking in the business space. Oftentimes people say, well, we can't get to that level of purpose here, like it's not life or death, we're not doing anything grandiose, and I passionately disagree. In fact, I'll tell you.
Speaker 2:Part of my journey to your podcast today involves retiring early from the Air Force due to colorectal cancer, leaving at a time when I probably should have stayed being trapped in a bathroom most of my waking and even non-waking hours. It was hard to find employment. I eventually found my way into the mortgage loan business. So I was a mortgage loan officer. I went from a full bird colonel to trying to convince people over the phone to trust me with all their finances and to allow me to refinance their mortgage loans, and I was cold calling lots of people, 100% commission salesperson, and it was a tough pivot at a time when we were worried about a recurrence of colon cancer.
Speaker 2:So that was hard and I worked in an environment where we were told you know, go find a whale and kill it and you know, if we hit our sales goals, we're going to go on a trip and the whale in this question for the uninitiated is you know somebody with a really expensive house because that's going to be a much larger financial gain. You're going to walk away with more money from refinancing that. And we didn't have a real strong sense of team, nice people, everybody like really really nice people. But we didn't have the same dynamic that we enjoyed back in the other thing and a lot of business leaders would say well, you're not going to get that kind of dynamic that you had in the military with a really compelling purpose. But what's interesting to me about the mortgage loan journey was that some of the most rewarding work that I did was on the loans that I got the least amount of revenue from. Like we had an elderly couple who I think my take home my paycheck from the loan that I closed was about 250 bucks.
Speaker 2:Okay, and we've got five kids and milk's expensive. So 250 bucks was not going to go a long way towards covering the mortgage and taking care of the kids. But for that couple the refinance fundamentally changed their economic outlook. They went from being trapped financially. They had zero discretionary income. Every penny went towards paying the bills and they were trapped in their house. So they could afford to go on a date night, they could afford to buy a gift for a grandchild, they could afford to do some of the things that they previously couldn't do.
Speaker 2:And it took four and a half months to get to that end state. It was a ton of work for very little financial reward. But we use the mortgage loan as an instrument to do something transformational for this family and I found purpose in that and it's interesting the further we dig the places where you think it would exist the least are the places where it's actually strongest if we're open to it and if we're committed to then achieving that purpose. Why wouldn't we want to learn how to do the work that we do that much better? Why wouldn't we then debrief to win always?
Speaker 1:Well, and what you said, if we're open to it, opening yourself to a purpose that you didn't even know could exist, is probably step one, because you're opening your aperture, because you're opening your aperture to what is possible, and I think that it's inspiring to hear how, as a mortgage loan investor what was the title they used?
Speaker 2:Oh, I was just a mortgage loan officer, an MLO Officer.
Speaker 1:And seeing the impact that you can have on a couple's lives, they probably remember you for forever the fact that you worked with them so hard to make sure that they could live their life, and isn't there? I think there's a study out that says that the generation millennials any old, all those they're looking for purpose and it's hard to find, um, if you don't open your aperture to what is possible for that purpose.
Speaker 2:I even got I mean, beautiful reflection, sarah, I was. I got into an argument with a CEO in the midst of a presentation, which is a very awkward thing to do, but I couldn't believe it. You know he's like good job. I agree with everything that you said today, except for this purpose thing. There's no way that you can get to purpose, and with my company, with the things that we do, that you can get to purpose. And with my company, with the things that we do, I basically got a group of people that are being paid minimum wage to do whatever in the muck and there's no way that this works there. Now, it was a very awkward exchange because I refused to budge and it made the entire rest of the presentation equally awkward and I couldn't wait to get out of there but interestingly and stunningly, he hired me. So I ended up going to work for this CEO and doing some debrief to windward.
Speaker 2:What I found when I got to the company was that he was the only person who didn't understand how compelling of a purpose that they had there, and the people that he was sort of minimizing were so fired up. And I can't give all the details because it might highlight who it is. But I'm telling you, they understood it and it drove them and I agree, theoretically, conceptually, you'd be like, ah, it'd be hard there, but it actually wasn't and they had figured it out already. And the only person I didn't understand was the person who ran the entire show, which is both stunningly ironic and actually really really sad. But it's, I mean, if you had to pick it, pick an option. I suppose that's okay, because the people that needed it, they had it.
Speaker 1:That's really funny, because I would expect the total opposite.
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 1:Because I thought you were going to tell the different story where it was like if expect the total opposite, that's right, because that's what you're going to tell the different story where it was like, if the CEO can't have that, then their employees definitely couldn't.
Speaker 2:So that's very interesting. Yeah, it blew me away. All right, it was just profoundly stunningly amazing and actually such a good thing, and they were right. I mean, their purpose was just truly brilliant. So all that we needed to do is then back brief the CEO.
Speaker 1:You're actually good.
Speaker 2:That's right. On this point you're rocking it.
Speaker 1:You mentioned a little bit about your cancer journey. Can you dive into that a little bit more and tell us kind of how it impacted to where you've come to today?
Speaker 2:That's right. Excellent question, sarah. I appreciate you asking that my career was going very well in the Air Force. I was, sarah. I appreciate you asking that my career was going very well in the Air Force. I was pretty young into the squadron commander seat. I went off to the National War College, did very well there. I was supposed to go to European command for a year touch and go which is kind of unusual for a joint staff assignment so I could come back and get back into the F-22 program and everything was going exactly according to plan until I woke from a colonoscopy to a German doctor who told me with a tear in his eye that he found a tumor growing in my lower colon and he said he thought it had been growing for a decade, which was not the news that we were looking forward to.
Speaker 2:And as a result of two horrific GI surgeries, I found that I was fully dysfunctional. My body was totally broken. I was trapped in a bathroom. I couldn't do the things. In fact, I was responsible for a really big program in Europe that got international headlines. My boss was General Breedlove, but I couldn't post the resection surgeries actually brief him on program status even for 15 minutes because my body was undependable. So I decided to exit out and as I was dealing with the whole go from a career that was on a very strong upward trajectory to being on the phone, smiling and dialing and trying to convince people to close their mortgage loans with me I decided to debrief my own journey and what I found was that and then the doctor told me thought that this tumor had been growing for a decade. It tracked my experience.
Speaker 2:I had indications a decade prior to my colonoscopy that my body was not exactly healthy, but at the time where maybe something could have been done and I say there's a very strong caveat on the maybe because I was really young, I was 31 when the initial symptoms came out I chose not to do anything about them. I actually chose to avoid talking to the flight surgeon. The doctor avoided talking to anybody about this because I didn't have the time to be sick. I was 100% confident that my body was going to recover from whatever this thing was, because that was back in my indestructible phase and, interestingly enough, I chose not to communicate anything about what I was dealing with with anybody. I just kept all that to myself, ironically, at a time when I was teaching how to team effectively in the world of high performance teams and, as I was thinking about this, dealing with the consequences of having exited from the career that I loved I mean, I really loved being a fighter pilot, loved flying those kinds of airplanes, I love being part of those teams. I love the teammates that I was privileged to work with it occurred to me that I was the root cause of my own failure and I came to my wife in tears and I'm not a I'm not a tearful kind of a person, typically I came to her in tears and I apologized to her for letting her down.
Speaker 2:You know cause? I made her instantaneously into a single parent of four kids. I couldn't be trusted to be with them because when I went to the bathroom it was forever and just horrible, like everything about life was just, was just so upside down. And I told her in a moment of extreme vulnerability that I was the root cause of my failure and I attributed it to the lack of teaming that I exhibited a decade prior. And she came back and I met her halfway through my military journey.
Speaker 2:She's not an Air Force kind of a president Hates flying. Actually, she's not an Air Force, kind of a president Hates flying. Actually, she's the one that wouldn't accept my self-reflections. I mean she said no, no, no, no, no, no. You can't do this. First of all, you can't be looking backwards.
Speaker 2:And she's the one that said and this notion that you weren't teaming effectively at home. She goes though I think I know where you're going with it. She's like who does that? Like who, who has this, this sort of official team oriented, this intentional team orientation at home? She's like usually there's a divide. You know, you do stuff at work and then you do what you do at home, and there's this like sort of artificial divide. She's like so for you to have had that, it's like normal. I think everybody would probably have some version of that. In fact, you're very intentional about leaving the work stuff at work, so you're not doing that at home.
Speaker 2:And she said but in no way do I think you ever in a million years would have thought that something like this could have happened to you. And so therefore, you know, don't beat yourself up at all. In fact, aren't you the person she actually said to me? She's like aren't you the one that says this accountability thing is supposed to be positive and forward focused. And I just remember being stunned by that because officially I was the subject matter expert for debriefs in the Air Force for two and a half years.
Speaker 2:This person who hates flying is now throwing it back at me and she's like isn't this thing supposed to be positive and about the future, and aren't we supposed to be building towards a better tomorrow?
Speaker 2:And then she said why don't we Like, if you're saying that we could intentionally team as a family better than we're currently teaming, why don't we? And the opportunity here is you are still alive and you have this great knowledge, this experience of doing this and teaching it, so why wouldn't we use this with our family, which now has five kids, by the way? And what I can tell you is is that, of all the teams that I've ever been on, my most important one by far is my family team and, interestingly, the best wingman that I've ever had is a woman who hates flying. All right, scared Like, grabs my arm and fits of like panic every time there's turbulence.
Speaker 2:But she got it. She got it better than I did at a time when I was kind of a little bit lost with all this, and so we've been very intentional about building this team to be the best team it can be, and, though I would never have scripted cancer to be part of our journey, so much good has come from it and we're a stronger family as a result of it, and I'm very, very grateful. I mean part of that is the good Lord allows me to still be alive today. The other part of that is we did intentionally learn from this experience to have a better tomorrow, and we're living it right now.
Speaker 1:That's incredible. And it's incredible to hear how debriefing in a workspace military and then debriefing for personal life it's valuable. And I think it's also valuable to note how important it is to surround yourself with people who are going to challenge you even in your own ideals, somebody who understands what your ideals are and is going to challenge and question well, didn't you say, it's actually this and to ground you in a way that maybe you didn't know you needed at the time 100%.
Speaker 2:I'm so grateful, so grateful to my bride for for walking me through that so effectively and learn. I learned from that, learned from her how to be better at this, so yeah.
Speaker 1:As we come to the end of our conversation, the one, I have two questions left, and one has to do with emerging leaders. This seems like a large topic for probably a new manager trying to figure out. Hey, this is all really cool, how do I apply it in my day-to-day work or with my team? What is one step that I can take in order to get closer to that debrief, the power of that debrief Great can take in order to get closer to that debrief, the power of that debrief, great.
Speaker 2:So I was doing Q&A after a keynote here recently and a young manager raised his hand and said hey, you know, kudra, I'm about to go into my yearly feedback session with my teammates, and what guidance and what counsel would you give me before I do so? I said okay. I said first question what's the standard against which you're measuring your teammates in their yearly feedback? And he's like well, what do you mean by that? I'm like what I mean is what is the criterion that you're measuring them? How are you using to evaluate their performance? And he's like I mean, I really don't know. I'm like so you're saying you don't have a criterion that you're measuring them against? Like no, I'm like well, that friend is a problem. So how are you going to measure them against a non-existent criteria?
Speaker 2:And he's like well, shoot, I guess. I don't know. I'm like so how does this thing work? He's like I guess it doesn't. And so we revealed to each other there that we were about a year behind on what it's going to take to be able to provide effective feedback, and so we committed to let's how about going into this next round, let's set the standards and let's say, ok, let's use a five point rating scale. This was going to take for you to earn a five next year doing this, this, this, this and this, and it's got to be done to this level of sufficiency, and that's going to be a five.
Speaker 2:And what do you think about it?
Speaker 2:Is this something that you can do?
Speaker 2:And if the answer is yes, okay, good, let's build a plan to achieve it, because I want you to knock this out of the park, and this is what it would be for a four and for a three, and for a two and for a one, so we're all the need, but let's also be clear that I'm going to lead you better going into next year, and we're going to watch you and help you and help you to pick yourself up as you've stumbled and fall along the way, because it ain't going to be perfect, but my ambition for you is for you to knock this thing out of the park, and if you're committed to that, then let's meet or exceed that expectation next year and then let's raise that. That's how I would approach this, and if that's the philosophy that we have, then these debriefs are going to be not just easy but joyful, because now we get to celebrate those wins, and when you get to be with a teammate who's on fire with, like I did it, that's a great place to be.
Speaker 1:It is, it's empowering.
Speaker 2:I mean again, sarah, a team is a team is a team, and the only thing that's going to prevent us from adopting high-performance team approaches, in whatever team that we're on, is us. It's like the self-limiting belief that we can't do it. And if we cave in and give in to that and say it can't be done, I guarantee you this much it won't be. And say it can't be done, I guarantee you this much, it won't be. But to the optimists out there who can see the possibilities, they will do it because they're not going to give into that self-limiting belief. And to all of those and I suspect many of them tune into you, here's to a brighter tomorrow. Courtesy of debriefing to win today.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, Kujo. Where can folks find a little bit more about you or reach out to you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, brilliant. Vmaxgroupllccom. That's our company's VMAX group. V-m-a-x-g-r-o-u-p-l-l-ccom. That's our website. There's a contact us there. My team is very, very responsive and we're very happy to connect with anybody.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Well, thank you again for coming on the show. Learned a lot, a lot about accountability and high performance teams and really looking at that optimism and seeing what's possible.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Sarah, for taking this time with me. I really appreciate it and I appreciate you and the great work that you're doing out there. Keep on coaching them and leading them well in all that you do, Sarah.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much, really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, feelings mutual.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to another episode of Lead Into it. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean a lot to me if you would leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to help future listeners. If you want to learn more about the podcast or me, go to leadintoitco. That's leadintoitco. Thanks again.
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