From the Air Force to Project Leadership | Mike Fesko | #iolglobal

In this episode of Lead with Legacy™, Amanda C. Chambers and Sloane Lott sit down with Mike Fesko, a PMP® and PURE Project Manager, to explore the leadership lessons that come from decades of experience in the U.S. Air Force, aerospace, and IT project management.

Mike shares how his career evolved from engineering into project management, the leadership principles he learned in the military, and why successful project managers focus on people—not just processes.

Throughout the conversation, Mike discusses servant leadership, communication, mentorship, and how strong leaders build trust inside teams.

He also shares insights from his newsletter “Being a Project Manager”, where he mentors aspiring project managers and helps professionals navigate the real-world challenges of leadership.

If you're interested in project management, leadership development, or transitioning from military service into the corporate world, this conversation offers practical wisdom and inspiration.

In this episode, we discuss:

• Transitioning from military service to project management
• Why project management is ultimately about people
• The importance of communication and trust in leadership
• Servant leadership in real-world organizations
• What traditional project management training often misses
• Mentorship and helping the next generation of PMs
• Lessons learned from a diverse career in aviation, radio, technology, and leadership

Connect with Mike Fesko

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelpfesko/

https://www.youtube.com/@Being-a-Project-Manager

Newsletter:
Being a Project Manager
https://being-a-project-manager.beehiiv.com/

Learn more about IOL Global

🌐 https://iolglobal.com

The Lead with Legacy™ Podcast explores leadership that outlives titles and trends. Through conversations with faith-based and marketplace leaders, we discuss integrity, conviction, and purpose.

Subscribe to the IOL Global YouTube Channel

https://www.youtube.com/@IOL_Global

New conversations on leadership, purpose, and organizational impact are released regularly.

#LeadWithLegacy
#IOLGlobal
#Leadership
#ProjectManagement
#ServantLeadership
#PMP
#MilitaryLeadership
#LeadershipDevelopment
#ProjectManager
#ProfessionalDevelopment

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Lead with Legacy, the official podcast of IOL Global. Here we will explore leadership that outlives titles and trends. Through conversations with faith-based and marketplace leaders, we will discuss integrity, conviction, and purpose. To learn more about us, visit us at iOL Global.com. Today we are so honored to have Mr. Mike Fesco. Mike is a PMP and a peer project manager, which is how we got in contact initially, which was pretty exciting. So I am gonna let Mike go ahead and introduce himself a little bit, tell us a little bit about himself, what he's doing, um, and what's current, and then we will get moving.

SPEAKER_02 0:41

Thank you very much. Thank you, Amanda. Thank you, Sloan. Good to be here. Um, I'm a project manager. I just feel good inside when I say that. And I'll tell you what, I spent 23 years in the Air Force, had a full career there, did a lot of different things, and much of it had to do with project management or large programs. Um I just I started sensing because I started out as an engineer, uh, I started sensing that there was more uh, I guess, excitement and and management uh that I could learn and put out there if I was on the project management field. So I eventually transitioned. When I got out of that, I did industry. I was in uh aerospace and now I'm in IT. I just love the work. And I'm at a point now in my career where I like to help others who are aspiring to be project managers because sometimes you get stuck and you don't get noticed and you don't have visibility. And somebody who who's got some experience can kind of talk you through the rough spots. So that's kind of what I'm doing now in my spare time. But while I'm enjoying uh and blessed by having a wonderful full-time job at a great company. So that's where I'm at now. I also started putting a newsletter out because I thought it would be interesting for people to subscribe to that for no cost and uh read some articles about some things. So that's me in a nutshell.

SPEAKER_00 1:54

Wonderful. Well, first of all, let me thank you for your service. Sure, and we appreciate you so much, and it's such an honor. It's an honor to have you on here because I know the work that you're doing and it's really meaningful, and and that's the type of conversations that we want to have. Part of our mission at IOL is that you know, we want to serve God and we want to serve people, and I know we have some similarities in that, and so it's it's really just truly amazing to have you on here. And I think you're about 50,000 times smarter than I am. So I always learn something from you when we're talking. So it's really, really great. Okay. And the newsletter is incredible. So we're gonna talk a little bit about that at the end of the podcast. Um, but it is really amazing, and I highly recommend subscribing to that. It is, like Mike said, free. Um, so there's no reason really not to. All right, so let's just jump into some questions. What shifted for you from managing projects to experiencing personal and leadership transformation?

SPEAKER_02 2:47

Well, I think part of it is managing projects, it can be kind of stiff and mechanical when you first start because basically you have a lot of things going on, a lot of people talking about a lot of different things, all these loose ends, all these little pieces of chaos that pop up and and and can bite you. But if you watch the leaders around you and you learn to communicate, and and I know one of the big mantras of project management is you know, PMs spend 90% of their time communicating. So when you learn to do that, and you learn to gain the trust of the people around you, and vice versa, they gain the trust of us as PMs, you start to develop some of the things that are called soft skills in addition to the hard skills on the knowledge of the technical areas. So the transformation kind of happens in I just got thrown into this pool. I mean, I I was good enough, if you want to use that term, to pass an interview and get hired by a company. And then you get in there and you start doing things and you find out that didn't work. That did work. But I did find that if you if you watch the managers around you that that succeed and that inspire confidence, you will pick up things that will enable you to become that project manager style. Everybody out there can can watch leaders either on you know YouTube videos or or LinkedIn or on TV, you know, whether they be politicians or military people or industry people. You can look at leaders and see right away, do they inspire you or do they like, I don't, I don't trust that person. So when you as a PM can see enough of the leadership around you that works and start to absorb that and reflect that back to others, that's kind of where the transformation comes. And that's kind of what it happened for me. In the military, of course, the military is um kind of a uh strict regimented environment. However, a lot of people get the impression that when you get out of the military and you want to get into industry, all you can do is take orders and give orders. That is not true, especially I found in the project management realm, because you've already had years of experience of dealing with contractors and dealing with people who have requirements that have to be met. And there's there's a set of soft skills and and ways of doing that that you can develop yourself and develop more as a PM. So I think that's what it's really down to is don't be unwilling to learn every day from those who you trust and who you'd follow.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

I love that. That's such a great answer. And and and really, really points to what we're talking about here in this podcast and leading with legacy in and being the type of leader that people can trust, right? That they can turn around and go, that's somebody that I want to be like, or that's somebody that I want to work under. Because I know like I most of us have had leaders that we're we cringe at and we're like, oh, that is not the person, you know, and it's time to move on. Because when you have somebody in leadership that doesn't lead well, it makes the entire situation extremely difficult. So I've been really honored to and blessed to know quite a few of you that have been in the military and are now project managers. And and I have to say, you guys really, really emulate what leadership is so well. And I think because you've had that time in the military and you've learned those principles, how hard do do you think it is for people in the military to transition to project management? Is it easier or harder? Um, and what's your advice there?

SPEAKER_02 6:09

I think it's I think it's I don't want to say easy, but it's a familiar landing pad when you get there. It's going into a company where the people who are hiring you, the hiring manager, the team, they all know where you've been. And to some, those are, you know, people are impressed by that. Others are like, I don't care. And the other ones are like, I don't know if I can work with this person. However, it's it's easy, so don't worry about it. But I've noticed in the last year or two, there's been a uh growing cadre of people on LinkedIn, and I think you know some of them, I think Joshua's one of them, um, who who specializes in coaching or mentoring people who need that little bit of what do I do to fit in better? You know, they're they're good at that. So with a little coaching, if you're stuck. Now, I had an interesting situation related to that question. When I got out of the military, I got into a defense contractor, and I felt very comfortable being there and felt like I fit right in. But I noticed that there were things that I was surprised by that I should have done it this way or I should have done this instead of the approach I took. And it, you know, it it got to where the manager would have to coach me a little bit. And one interesting thing he said one time was, I have to remember where you military guys come from. And I was taken back by that. It's like, I don't know what you mean, but after I sat there for a day or two and thought about it, I said, Yeah, I think I get it here. So, you know, it's time for me to to learn a little bit, open up the aperture and and and see the course that he's trying to guide me on. And that's what a good manager mentor can do for you.

SPEAKER_00 7:52

That's right. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, and and we'll just kind of shamelessly plug Joshua just because you you mentioned him, and I think it's good that people know, I don't think he'll mind a bit. So Joshua Banoir, he is he owns Avalon Grade Solutions. And so what he does is he assists people coming out of the military and doing that transition into the the civilian world, um, is specifically project managers, but I don't think he is only tied to that. Um, and I could be wrong, but he does an amazing thing where he assists those that have been in the military coming out into the civilian corporate world and helps them build their resume, build those soft skills, mentors them, walks them through the process. Another one that I'm gonna go ahead and kind of shamelessly plug is Russell Parker. Um, he's with Risk 44 p.m. Mike and I are huge fans of Russell, highly advised. Russell has an incredible YouTube channel. And if you are not on that channel, absolutely go and subscribe to it. So those two guys in particular, and there's several more, um, and we won't spend all our time naming everybody, but for sure there are some resources out there. So if there's people watching this that have been in the military or are in the military and they want to do a transition over to project management or the corporate world, it is very possible. Um, these guys are absolutely killing it. They're doing an amazing job at this, and they are great mentors, you, Mike, Russ, um, and and Joshua and several, several others. So there are a lot of resources, and we would be happy um here at Iowa to put people in touch with those resources too, because we definitely want to see people succeed. All right, so moving on, I'm gonna let our director of operations, Sloan Lott, he's one of my favorite people in the world, take over the questioning for a little bit because this is not the Amanda Show.

SPEAKER_01 9:34

So I'd love the Amanda show. I live the Amanda Show every day. So I'm I'm okay to co-star on that one. But I did want to ask you, uh, Mr. Mike, you often describe project management as a discipline centered on people, not just processes. What do leaders commonly misunderstand about the true role of a project manager?

SPEAKER_02 9:53

The way you phrased that was exactly right. I mean, project management is is mechanical in a way. It's it's process, it's framework, and all that kind of stuff. But I always think about the fact that if you complete a project and look back on it, you realize every day the only way any of that got done was with people. And people can be efficient or they can be inefficient, they can be motivated or they could be unmotivated. There's a lot of stuff that goes on on people's minds every day. Now, if I think of of my life or your lives, there's a lot of distractions, there's a lot of noise, there's a lot of fog and friction of war kinds of stuff. But we carry on every day and we do the things we need to do. So when we get to the uh the point of managers needing to understand the people, the fact that they're not robots, and some people are treated like that in companies, and that's a shame. But the good leaders will understand, can strike a rapport with the people, can can converse with the teams, listening. And I think probably later we'll get into a term called servant leadership, but that's one of the big things. You can serve your customer, you can take the requirements and deliver all the pieces into a nice package, which is at least what they wanted, or maybe a little better, but it takes the people to do that. So if you can keep them motivated, if you can have relationships with them, and they don't have to be formal, hierarchical, organizational chart kind of relationships, it can be conversational, it can be, you know, people become friends too. Uh, and that kind of leads back to what I said earlier. It's like if they're exhibiting the kind of traits that would make you want to follow them or have a at least a communicative relationship with them, then you know, they're doing a good job and you can learn to emulate that too.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

Absolutely. I think leaders in uh many sectors, right, sometimes will sacrifice empathy at the altar of efficiency. And so I think that's just where we have to remind ourselves people first, people first. Mr. Mike, what happens to teams and leaders when guidance, clarity, and healthy leadership are missing?

SPEAKER_02 11:59

Guidance, clarity, and healthy leadership, not there. Ooh. Teams, I mean, basically they're gonna fall apart. They could. I mean, they could bootstrap themselves and just get through it all, but it's not gonna be a fun part. I mean, clarity, you get you've got to understand what's expected of the team. There has to be a shared vision from the beginning, and that includes not only your team, but your customer team. Because if you're not all, you know, looking far down the road together and aiming for the same spot, uh, you're gonna wander all over and that's an inefficient. Um, so basically you're gonna you're gonna erode trust, you're gonna erode efficiency. You know, you hear the term scope creep, things that start to kind of go where they shouldn't be going, and that costs money and that costs time. So there's a lot of interruptions that happen when that when that's not there.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Yeah, I agree. And and scope creep is definitely a problem. We talk a lot about that in project management, don't we? And we and we I think we talk about it more than we fix it. So, what is broken in traditional project management training, in your opinion, and what needs to change? Like if we could change one thing, what would it be?

SPEAKER_02 13:04

If you're talking about professional certification kinds of training, which is one way, there's also the certificate kinds of training and all that. I think it's focusing more on the real life of a PM. I did get my PMP many years ago, and you know, it it was a rigorous course. It really was. But as I got further and further away from it, I realized there was a lot of, and this isn't a bad thing. It's just in my mind, there was a lot of process, input, output, what leads to what? And you you start, you start understanding the mechanics of project management very well, but you don't understand the application in real life sometimes. When the Pure PM thing came up in January of 2025, I decided to look into that because it was about projects under realistic expectations, which is what Pure is about. That took a different approach. So what's missing, I think, is is mixing the two between the rigor of the PMP and the practicality of the Pure. That is that's probably what's missing more than anything else. And when you get into it, like if you're coming from military to an industry, or if you're coming from one industry like healthcare and you're going into IT, you know, for some reason the the collection of knowledge and skills has allowed you to transfer and make that jump. Willing to open your ears and again watch what's going on around you, learn from how things are done, learn the terminology, and then you know, talk to your uh manager. You that's another thing you really got to do is start a rapport with your manager because you want to go in and have one-on-ones. You want to go in and talk about the realities of your of your daily life and that kind of thing. So I think that's what's missing, is just that mix.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

I think that's a fantastic answer. And I think most of us that have been in the project management sector would agree. Um, and this is not a plug really for Pure, but we will go ahead and shamelessly plug it too. So Pure, um, Pure Project Manager is a credentialing program created by Joseph Phillips, who is one of the, if not the most incredible project management trainers online that there is. And he and I, when I was on his team uh full time, as well as I believe we had 21 instructors, um, created this credentialing program where you go through it. It's 60 hours of project management training, but it's much different than the PMP, whereas it's more real-world applicable. Talk about a lot of soft skills in those courses. I know Jeremiah Hammond does a course on emotional intelligence. We have a couple of courses on just being creative and the things that you're doing and allowing that creativity. Our founder, um, my dad, Dr. Chambers, has a course in there about uh customer service because that's really lacking and those skills are kind of lacking in how do we treat one another, which which comes back to what we're talking about here with leadership. How do we lead well? How do we treat people well? Um, and and what does that look like? And so um, if anybody's interested in that, that's what we're discussing there, and we can put a link to that as well. But I do think you're right. I think it's just, you know, the fundamentals are so good. There's nothing wrong with that. And there's nothing wrong with that rigorous training and learning that I think we need that. But I think it's just that day-to-day relation with people, how we talk to one another, how we when it's a really, really hard day, right? And everything's crashing down and it's about to snow five feet tomorrow, and you know, and and you're stressed out. And am I gonna get groceries in time? My kids gonna get home in time. How are we dealing with people? Are we dealing with them well? Are we dealing, like you said earlier, are we using servant leadership? Are we putting other people first before ourselves? And so let why don't you talk a bit a little bit about the servant leadership and what that looks like to you and and your thoughts and feelings on that?

SPEAKER_02 16:38

Yeah, so take apart the title or the phrase, servant leadership. So there's leadership, and then there's, you know, the ominous finger pointing, go do this leadership. That's coercion in a way, more than leadership, I think. Okay. But the servant part, think about what that is. Your team is there to serve the customer, to serve you, to produce all the technology and the the process work that has to go on the finance, the business, all that stuff. Um, but you as a as a PM, as a leader, you need to be able to knock down roadblocks that are in their way. You need to listen to their problems, you need to be able to effect something. You know, even if you can't do it, there's a level of escalation that you you are privileged to be in a position to take that up one level, excuse me, or more. When I was in the Air Force, and I don't know that this is a phrase anymore so much, it was it was a it was a thing called total quality management or TQM. It might still be around.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

Yeah, it is.

SPEAKER_02 17:34

But oh, is it okay? So one of the things we learned about that is that we are each everybody's customer. So no matter what you do, your output is an input to somebody else. If you're doing something, producing something, writing a report, working a schedule, whatever, that's going somewhere. The expectation or the underlying thought there is what you're what you're doing is quality that you're giving to your customer. And you know, you write an email and say, hey, I'm having trouble getting this uh data logged into this system, it's down. Well, now they're serving you in a total quality way. I'm their customer. They're my customer when I write the email. So if you can kind of keep in mind the fact that everybody is each other's customer, that helps go along. So in servant leadership, yeah, you're serving the customer, you're serving your boss, but they also need to serve you. And the good ones really understand that, and that's that's what they do. And I've I've been in in jobs where I've seen both kinds of management. Right now, I'm really happy with the management. In another job, I had, in fact, two others I can think of. It was pretty sparse and it was pretty like, don't even want to go there to talk to them because it's it's gonna be sort of a stonewall.

SPEAKER_00 18:46

So yeah, I love so I love what you said. I was trying to make sure I remembered it. So your output is someone else's input. Wow, that that is probably I'm literally gonna quote that because I love that. And it really goes back to honestly, if we just like really drilled it down, it goes back to treat others the way that you want to be treated, right? If you don't want that input in, don't put it out.

SPEAKER_02 19:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

And we're all guilty of it. None of us, you know, none of us don't fail at this, but we can learn and we can refine and we can become better at that. And so because we are so honored to have Sloan on with us today, I want Sloan to speak a little bit about that, not from a from a very personal level, but I know she's been through some experiences and I think she can speak to that as well. So let's hear a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_01 19:28

Yes. So I have been a part of an organization where healthy leadership was definitely lacking. Um, I've written a blog post uh about it and I wrote a follow-up. It's it's on our website. I will say this, I learned a lot. You can learn, you can learn a lot from people who are lacking the those leadership qualities and skills. I think a lot of times it's not that someone, a leader wakes up and thinks today's the day I'm gonna be a bad leader. I think that when they don't have those self skills, when they don't know the processes themselves well, right, they're gonna come in, there's gonna be inconsistency, and there's gonna be a lot of assumptions. You're gonna get in over your head, and that's when you're gonna snap at people, right? And that's and and we see that. So, and they're people too, right? So you have to take that into account. But I do think a lot of times the ability is not there, not the mean motivation to to be a leader. But I am very grateful to be where I'm at now. I have consistent leadership, I have kind leadership. I'm not just saying that because she's also on the podcast. She knows how grateful I am every day. Um, I I tell her every day. And um, when you've experienced lacking leadership, when you have a leader that is kind to you just as a human being, but then leads you well, I you're happy to come to work. You're happy to do what they say. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 20:49

Yeah, I agree with that to you, because I I've seen both sides of the spectrum as well. I think one thing is I was as you were saying, I was thinking sometimes I think that we fail um as leaders, though, and we don't train leaders to be or train our people to be leaders. I say a lot, I think I've said on some of the other episodes, and if not, you'll probably hear it. I want people that are better than me. I want people that can do better and faster and greater than I am. I'm only one person. And so as we're building IOL, that's one of my big focuses is in the people that we're hiring and the people that we're aligning with. I want people that are better and that can make me better. And I think that's part of leadership too, is and you have to really humble yourself to that, right? Because we're not innate, that's not innate in us and is humans like, oh, I want people that are better than me around me. No, like, you know, the the sinful nature of us says, oh, you know, I don't want that, then that's competition. But it you have to come to a level of humility where you say, no, I really want these better people and I want them to shine and I want them to do well. Um, and you know, I want to train them and I want them to train me and I want it to be reciprocal. And I think when you can get to that point, which takes a lot of emotional intelligence. That's when you can become a better leader and really kind of turn things around. You can turn a whole team around if you want to, if you if you can become humble in it.

SPEAKER_02 22:08

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. While we were talking about the other subject and this one, something kept flashing in my head about the the um concept of servant leadership and being each other's customers. Can you imagine like the job of being uh customer service? Like you you you you call up or you chat with somebody on Amazon and you know all day they've or or some company, you know, you know all day they've been pounded by people that are unhappy. And one of the things we can do as people in terms of a we're each other's customers things is sort of shine our light of understanding their position, walk in their shoes. Um and the funny thing is, um, as frustrated as I can be with some of the issues that you have with a particular company, I've had a couple um couple of interesting endings to chats where the customer service person will actually say, Thank you. You have you are something like you are you have been the nicest person I've talked to today. And when I can end a chat like that with customer service person where I was frustrated in the beginning and they feel better and they can hang up and go on to the next call, you know, it's like putting a little gas in the tank.

SPEAKER_00 23:08

It's like and you're putting you're putting that into that person, and I love that. Um I think we should all be so mindful of that because it's true. Like we, you know, we get in a frustrating situation, we may have a product or let's just talk about the internet because our internet is terrible. And so sometimes, you know, you might have to make that call. But I think there's there's multiple ways to do that, right? We can do it in anger and frustration, and we're we might get it fixed, right? And we can yell and scream. And and I know I'll be honest with you, there's times in the past when I've done that and it's gotten fixed, but it wasn't right. And did I feel good afterwards? No. And did they feel good afterwards? No. And so I love that. I love that example because we should all be better at that, right? We should be the ones setting the example and saying, hey, I know you've had a hundred calls today, just like me, and you really don't want to talk to me, but let's see if we can work this out and make this a pleasant experience. So that's a great example. Sloane, I'm gonna let you ask the next question as well.

SPEAKER_01 24:03

Okay, this is a fun one. I'm excited. I'm gonna be a little nosy and I'm I'm gonna get some answers that I'm I'm looking forward to. You are a private pilot, a ham radio operator, um, and you spoke with the International Space Station. You're a former radio DJ and someone whose work appeared at the Paris Air Show. What have these experiences outside of work taught you about leadership and communication?

SPEAKER_02 24:27

The first thing that came to my mind when you started going through that list was being humbled by it all. It's kind of like it's taught me that the things we achieve on earth are abilities we should be feel blessed with, can wake up in the morning and we can do whatever we want, right? We can choose to rob a bank, we can choose to get elected to be some important person, you can get a career advancement. But the longer you're in whatever you do, you start seeing this list of things. And I'm sort of a curious person. I like I like different things, and and that's cool, which is probably why that list has it kind of jumps from left to right to zig to zag and all that stuff. But I'm kind of humbled by it all. It's like I'm sad that it's all over, but some of it still continues. Um, you know, I'd love to do radio again, I'd love to do podcasting, I'd love to go to the Paris Air Show again, but the fact that we got to go there and demonstrate a system and stuff like that, that was just a wild experience. So I don't know, it's it's kind of reminded me that, you know, be the best we can every day, be the right kind of person every day, and that list will grow. Don't be afraid to put yourself out there, don't be afraid to take advantage, or be proud of the things you get to do in life and learn from everything every day. I like the slogan, which I heard somewhere and I can't remember where that's every day is a school day. So if you take the lessons that you can learn every day and build upon them, and then shine the light of your, I want to say, customer or to customer uh behavior with everybody, um, you know, that that really that helps that also gives you more opportunities because the more people know about you for the things that you can do and how you how you work with them to do that, you get more opportunities. I think life opens up doors in many ways. Great answer.

SPEAKER_01 26:16

Yeah, I think your humility, which is obvious and inspiring, that is what allows you, you know, every day to be a school day. You're you stay curious, you know, there are still things for you to learn. And and that is why you have had so many opportunities, so many cool opportunities, right? And you get to share those with people. We like to talk to people who have done cool things, but they're humble about it, you know. And so I just when I saw that list, I was like, that is a crazy list.

SPEAKER_00 26:43

I love that. Yeah, it's really great and really inspiring too. It made me think about like I I need to probably do some more stuff. I had uh a gentleman who was equal to a grandfather to me, and he's past now, but he did um ham radio stuff and he was huge into it, and it was, it was, it was a passion of his. And so when I saw that, I was like, it reminded me of him, and that that was a good memory to have. So that's really interesting. I like that a lot. All right. So we have two more questions for you. These two questions we're gonna ask everybody on the podcast. And one of the reasons that um we collaborated about this and chose to do this is because everyone's experiences are different, right? And everyone looks at things a little bit differently, and everyone has been through different leadership styles with different people. Um, and so we we kind of drilled it down to these two questions to ask everybody to kind of get a broad perspective of if everybody answered the same question, what would their answer be? Um, so I'm gonna ask you the first one. Sloan's gonna follow up with the last one. So the first one is name a leader that you admire and share briefly why that leader has influenced you.

SPEAKER_02 27:44

I started thinking about that sometime over the last few months, just looking back at the things I've done. Um, so that's an interesting question. The name I can tell you right away is a Navy captain named Drew Beasley. The reason I remember that name so well for the applicability to what we're talking about today is it was the last assignment I had in the Air Force, and it was it was on what they call a joint program where you have all the services involved. So he was a Navy captain as our boss. I would never had anybody then other than Air Force leadership before. We had all the services involved. It was not on a military installation, it was in a research park. So we were isolated, you know. For me, the nearest Air Force base from the Orlando area was Patrick, which is out on the coast. So your normal services like the BX and all that stuff, it just didn't play. You were in the community, which was really cool. He understood that, he understood that well, and he had been a um like uh they had these really cool boats in the Navy. I don't even know if I'm allowed to call them boats. He might because I remember talking about ships, and one time I called it a boat, and he didn't like that. So anyway, he he was a commander on one of those, but he knew how to lead teams, he knew how to be dynamic in his emotions, he knew how to be connected to the people that work for him. He knew what his customer wanted, he knew how to set the vision for the team, and he had an interesting philosophy once that he he put on us. You know, you can see a person and every now and then they'll blow up, especially leaders. They will all of a sudden in a meeting, they become that almost a little bit scary, angry person that you don't usually want to hang around with too much. But he had a he had a philosophy that you get in any assignment in the military. And I guess you could elaborate and you know make that into how you get hold up the fingers, right? You get you get three mads. So what are mads? It's those instances where you you put your foot down and you maybe pound the table a little bit. He said you get three of those, and the reason you get three of those is because sometimes you need those many, but when you go beyond that, you start to become not the servant leader, you start to become not the boss you want to follow, but the one you want to start to fear. And that's when teams start to cover things up and keep them things to themselves, and the communication breaks down and the trust breaks down and the whole thing breaks down. So I would say, Captain Drew Beasley, thank you for that wisdom. And uh that's the one I'd name it.

SPEAKER_00 30:15

That's wonderful. I love that answer. It's so good. And I I love that too, because yeah, I think after that amount, right, um, we're gonna start changing our character, right? We're gonna start changing the posture of our heart, and it's really gonna start beginning to change who we are. Um, and I can remember a situation many, many, many years ago when I was the boss and I had a really young guy working for me, and I just loved him to death. He was just so fun and so full of life and so intelligent. Um, he got himself caught up in a situation and he ended up, I ended up having to write him up and I didn't want to. And I told him that. I said, I really don't want to, but this is like too many times and I can't deal with this. And he ended up getting irate and it was a whole thing, and I ended up having to let him go because he he used some language with me that I couldn't. Well, there is a bright side to the story because a couple of years later I was hiring again for for a position, and he came into my office and he said, you know, he said, I was really wrong and I was in a bad place and things were, you know, I was in some things that I shouldn't have. And he said, I first of all, I owe you an apology. And I was like, Well, thank you. You know, I appreciate you humbling yourself and being able to do that. It's important. He said, Well, would you ever consider hiring me back for this for this position? And I said, Well, let me think about it and pray about it. I said, I don't know. I said, I really, really need to give it some thought. And I did. I gave it a few days and then I called him back and asked him to come into my office. And I said, Hey, you know, I think I do want to give you another try. I think we, you know, there were some things going on at the time, and let's let's give it a go. And so I put him on a probation period. He ended up being my absolute best employee that I ever had. He was besides Sloan, of course, but he was he was phenomenal. He did amazing work. He was so grateful. I was so grateful. And so I think sometimes, you know, we do have to have that moment. I don't know why. I don't know all the ins and outs of it. I knew some of it, but I also think it's important that you know we give people another chance. Um, and it certainly sounds like that that was a case where you had a leader who allowed people to be human beings because we are human beings, and sometimes we are faulty, even when we try our best. So that is a great example. I love that. All right, that is I'm gonna use that. You get three mads. Three mads. That's it. I like it. That's it. I like it. I'm gonna use that with my kids too. You get three, that's all you get. Yeah, you use can you clarify for us like what's the time period on that? Is like forever.

SPEAKER_02 32:31

Well, no, well, I mean, you know, he said it during a military um assignment, which you know, in our world was three to four years. So, you know, space them out.

SPEAKER_00 32:40

Better use them wisely then. Like that's I think that's great advice, though. Like, what if we all live by that? Because we would probably use them much, much more carefully, right? We would say, Oh no, this this particular situation is not worth one of my three mads, right?

SPEAKER_01 32:56

That's right. Yeah, that's um more hardcore than three strikes, you're out. If you only get three mads in three years, wow. I don't know. Maybe I won't start using that for other people. I don't want them using it for me. I've got a last question for you, sir. When you think about your legacy as a leader, what lasting impact do you hope it will have on people or organizations?

SPEAKER_02 33:16

Good question. My legacy as a leader, I don't even think of my legacy. Like, uh, yeah, I remember Mike. He was now fill in the blank. I hope, and if I'm not, and any of the folks that I know, if you're watching this, I don't mind a little prompting. It's you need to do this a little better, that a little better, because every day's a school day. Okay. So what do I think it would be? Is I was good to work with. I was fun, I was efficient, I was nice to them, I taught them some stuff. I was always available, I was dependable. And I was, you know, if you want to use the term servant leader, yeah, that'd be cool if somebody said that about me. But I have to earn it. So I think that kind of wraps it up. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 33:56

Yeah. And before we came on here, Mike, I told someone, I said, You're gonna love Mike. He's super fun. He's a really, really nice guy. And so, just so you know, I think that about you already. And I think through our interactions and through things that we've interacted on LinkedIn and things like that, I can only imagine that you are a pretty great guy to work with. So I don't, I don't think your team members are suffering with you by their side. Well, Mike, I want to thank you so much for the opportunity of having you on here. The honor is truly ours. Um, like I said in the beginning, you are you've done some amazing things and it's pretty incredible. And you're very humble about it. And I think that you speak volumes to what a good leader is because it takes a lot to be like that. It takes a lot not to use your three strikes. All right, so let's tell people again about your newsletter. How can we find it? What's the best way to get a hold of you? Um, if they want to connect with you, let's just speak a little bit to that before we close up.

SPEAKER_02 34:49

Yeah, sure. The easiest way to find it is go to the LinkedIn profile. And under the picture in the little banner, there's a thing that says check out my newsletter or something like that. The other way, if you really wanted to just instantly do it, there's a website, uh, the platform that I use for the new newsletter called Beehive.com, and that's B-E-E-H-I-I-V dot com. And then you could put a space in then Mike Fasco, it's probably going to pop up. The name of the newsletter is being a project manager, because that's the stuff that I'm trying to talk about. It's sort of like, hey, this is what being a project manager is like. So that's how I can do that.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

All that stuff in the links in this video, there'll be links to everything, and we'll try to go back and make links to all the stuff that we've talked about here, all the all the different um collaborations and everything. So thank you. Thank you so much for being on with us. We appreciate you so much.

SPEAKER_02 35:40

Well, thank you. I appreciate that. Amanda and Sloan, it's been great talking to you.

SPEAKER_00 35:44

Thank you.