Are You Ready For The Responsibility? Young Officer Leadership

Are you really ready for leadership in the fire service… or just the position?

In this Season 1 Finale of Wind The Q — The Stories Behind The Sirens, Lt. Dodson sits down with Lt. Adam Sambor for a raw, unfiltered conversation about fire service leadership, promotion, and the true weight of responsibility.

This episode goes beyond rank and title. It dives into what it actually means to step into a leadership role in today’s fire service—from young officer challenges and earning credibility, to decision-making under pressure, leading your peers, and the reality of being accountable when everything is on the line.

If you’re a firefighter, engineer, or aspiring officer, this is the conversation you need to hear. Whether you’re preparing for promotion or already wearing the rank, this episode breaks down the difference between holding a position and truly leading.

Topics Covered:

• Fire service leadership and officer development
• Transition from firefighter to officer
• Fireground decision-making and accountability
• Leading peers and building trust within a crew
• Confidence vs. liability in leadership roles
• Common mistakes new officers make
• What the fire service needs from future leaders
• The reality of responsibility in the firehouse

This Season 1 finale brings together everything discussed throughout the series—culture, training, mental toughness, accountability, and leadership—and challenges you to ask yourself one question:

👉 Are you ready for what comes with it?

🎙️ Wind The Q — Real conversations about the fire service, firefighter leadership, training, and the culture behind the job.

Apple

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wind-the-q-podcast/id1890605910

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https://open.spotify.com/show/2NwJHtyLmDdv4rrAssRJUY?si=vd600rTcSn-k2WEJUgnbbA

YouTube

https://youtube.com/@windtheqpodcast?si=qtbDcvImIf50Xpd7

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This episode Includes dynamic content. If you feel impressed to help support the show, follow the link below. If not, please continue to like, share, follow, and subscribe for more great content!

https://www.buzzsprout.com/2605628/support

This episode Includes dynamic content. If you feel impressed to help support the show, follow the link below. If not, please continue to like, share, follow, and subscribe for more great content!

https://www.buzzsprout.com/2605628/support

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:19

You wanted the promotion, you studied for it, you worked for it, you finally got it. And then one day you realize something. Nobody told you what it actually feels like when it's your responsibility now. No one told you what it's like to make the call when there's no one left to ask. And the truth is, that's where the job really starts. So the question becomes, how do you know if you're ready? This podcast is about real conversations in the fire service. It's about the jobs, about the culture, and what it actually takes to lead when it matters most. So this is episode 15. This will be our season one finale. And that's a big milestone for us. Uh there's no better way to close this out than talking about leadership. Not the idea of it, not the title, but the weight that comes with it. So joining me today is Lieutenant Sambohr. Go ahead and introduce yourself. Tell us who you are, how long you've been in the fire service, and what your current role is. Good morning.

SPEAKER_05 1:46

My name's Lieutenant Adam Sambohr. I've been in the service for roughly about 12 years now. I'm currently a lieutenant with our department that we both work at.

SPEAKER_01 1:56

All right, so let's jump right into it. So do you remember the moment you realized the job was different? So you get promoted to your current role as lieutenant, and then all of a sudden, one one call or one shift, whatever the case is, you realize, wow, this is this is different.

SPEAKER_05 2:13

You know, not I can't think of a particular moment that I had that realization, but I will say on calls, especially, I mean, you know, you take on that responsibility of your crew, these guys are relying on you to make these decisions, and sometimes, I mean, you honestly on a personal level, you just don't really know what to do in some situations. I mean, you have to take input from your guys and everything, but you still have to maintain a level of visible confidence that you know gives your guys that trust so they don't feel scared or they don't feel intimidated by a situation. So even if you still don't know what to do, you still have to I I don't want to say pretend like you know what to do, because that's never the case, but you have to maintain a level of calmness during those situations.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

Absolutely. Sometimes perceived confidence is just as good as confidence itself.

SPEAKER_05 3:04

That's a big thing in the military, too. It's just uh manufactured motivation, is what we always called it. Yeah. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 3:13

Uh so you didn't really call out a single moment where that happened, but uh through this first how long have you been a lieutenant now? Since probably about four months. Okay. Um has there been points where you have felt totally ready versus points where you thought, what am I gonna do with this?

SPEAKER_05 3:39

Absolutely, absolutely have. I think you know it's funny, you know, we do so much training, especially for structural firefighting, that I I've told the guys before, I honestly feel more comfortable pulling up to a you know, single-story residential structure fire than I would going on like a gas leak. Yeah. So because it's just the ins and outs of it, you have a little more time to overthink things. On a structure fire, you typically go just pure instinct. Yeah. And we train so much on it that you automatically know essentially what you're gonna do for almost every fire. You know, obviously there's some differences and some details that arise from that, but that you can make some changes with operations, but it's just some of the the smaller things, the smaller calls that are more frequent and less dangerous that actually intimidate you a little bit more.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

Yeah, I I see that. We we have this, like you said, every structure fire response, for example. All of them are different, but we still have this basic game plan of how it's gonna go down.

SPEAKER_05 4:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:47

Um and we have to be able to adapt, of course, but um that initial game plan is usually where we start. But um, I don't know, leadership it don't just start when you get promoted, it starts the moment the responsibility becomes real to you. Uh and we've talked about this before and we may touch on it again in just a little bit. It you don't have to be an officer or have rank to be a leader. You can do that as a rookie firefighter. Absolutely. Um it all depends on your drive and your confidence level. Um why why do you think so many people want to promote but they're they aren't ready when it happens? We have we have months, um typically a month at the least, knowing okay, promotions is fixing to happen. And we've got that time to prep. But if you think you're gonna pr promote down the road, then you may have two years to pr to prep if that's your game plan long term. So why do you think that is?

SPEAKER_05 5:59

I think that for the most part, I do feel like a lot of people promote for the right reasons. So the reason I wanted to promote, and this is what I told them in our our uh interviews, is you know, I just want to be in a position that has more influence in order to help our guys more. Yeah. That was my number one priority, and I said that a million times during the interview process. I want to get to a level in which I can just have this extra influence to go, you know, talk to admin if I need to get something done for one of my firemen. I can go over here and put together training if I see there's an opportunity, and it's a little easier once you get some rank and you just have more influence. That's the reason I wanted to promote. And I honestly I do feel like most people have that drive in them to get promoted. They want to be, you know, running things so they can make sure the best outcomes are happening with their guys, the best outcomes are happening with their fellow officers, things of that nature. As far as getting there and not being ready, I think that sometimes the drive and the passion and the motivation to be in that position tends to go a little bit further than their actual readiness. Yeah. Which I mean, I think we all at some level have that. I mean, I know I did, you know, I I promoted with this super motivated uh personality where I just, you know, I wanted to come in like a just a bull in a china shot and just start helping as much as I could and you know, getting these guys to be like the perfect firemen as much as I could, just make them super, you know, aggressive and motivated. However, you know, it's some little things that, you know, you start to realize once you get promoted, where you're like, oh my gosh, I don't know what I'm doing on this scene. And, you know, but in that you still have to maintain that level of humility where I don't mind going downstairs and asking Chief, you know, hey, what can I do different? What would be what would have been the right answer in this situation? What, you know, what can I be doing that's gonna help my development development as well. And I think that, you know, unfortunately, I think some people, you know, in the service, you know, we tend to hire these alpha personalities where, you know, to admit weakness or to admit that you don't know something is is sometimes embarrassing and sometimes a blow to their pride.

SPEAKER_01 8:20

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 8:21

But I think that, you know, you just have to kind of you have to suck it up and just you know, you have to ask questions. I mean, I've asked some of my firemen questions before. And you know, I'm never, never scared to tell them that I just don't, you know, I'm like, I don't know. I've said it before, you know, I had a r we've got a new rookie now, and uh, of course he's you know super nervous, you know, for everything, even like a lift assist, he's super nervous for, even if he doesn't want to show it. But he asked me about that, you know, how do you, you know, how do you calm down the nerves and all this stuff? And I was like, because his big thing was just not knowing what to do on scene. Yeah. And I told him, I was like, man, just know that there's three or four of us on this rig right now. Between the four of us, we will figure out what to do. Yes, that's right. If I don't know right off the rip, we'll work together and we'll figure it out. Yep. You know, worst case scenario, I can give I I'm one phone call away from my battalion chief.

SPEAKER_01 9:15

That's right. Um You had mentioned going downstairs and talking to Chief about expectations or how to how to handle a situation. Absolutely. Um it's it's crazy because we have three shifts, A shift, B shift, C shift, five stations, and how m how different things are from one shift to the next. Yeah. And officers' expectations, how much they're changed. Now our our basis is the same, but um yeah, like across the three battalion chiefs, their expectations are all a little different with personal influence and uh whatever the case may be. So yeah, I mean it's perfectly acceptable to say, I don't know, but hang on, I get an answer. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 9:58

So you just can't you gotta swallow your pride. I mean, you just that's the first thing you need to admit to yourself is I don't know everything. Yeah. There's plenty of people around me that are wanting me to succeed and wanting me to, you know, fulfill the job duties. Yep. I mean, so they're gonna answer your questions. I mean if anything, you're gonna make them feel better because you're coming to them asking for their advice. Yeah, that's true. Win-win.

SPEAKER_01 10:22

Yep. Everybody everybody wants the position until they feel the weight that comes with it. We see this with because we have firefighters and then we have relief drivers or FAOs, and then we have sergeants. Uh and we've talked before about how those positions step up due to staffing or whatever. Um a sergeant is their primary job is driving the truck and pumping the truck and operating. Um and then all of a sudden the officer's off that day and they have to step up and ride the seat, which is totally different. Um that's that's where that weight usually sets in. The driving and the pumping, they're prepared for. Uh, but it's that making all the decisions, be in charge of especially here at this station, in charge of an engine company and a truck company. Uh that's a that's a big change from your normal position of just driving. Um what what changed the most for you going from firefighter to sergeant and sergeant to officer? Because you did it in a pretty quick time frame.

SPEAKER_05 11:26

Yeah, you know, I from the moment I got hired here, I tried to really just work as hard as I could and be an asset. I mean, that was my biggest even as a fireman, you know, I tried to go in there and I tried to do as much possible as I could, clean the station without being asked, um, try to do as much training as I could, always participate in training when other guys wanted to put it on. Uh when I got to Sergeant, which was one of the the most nerve-wracking uh assessments of my life for some reason. I'm not really I I got so stressed out about that assessment. But uh when I got promoted to sergeant, it was almost like I just wanted to it's the same mentality I had as wanting to get promote get promoted to lieutenant where I've just had this drive to make the guys better. And fortunately for me, I was put on the truck company as a sergeant, so I was able to do a ton of just truck company operation trainings. Uh, really try to make sure these guys were just you know super fluent in anything truck operational. But I was just I was just very motivated at that point. But then, you know, I've got I got a taste of having that influence, and I know that kind of sounds that kind of sounds bad, but I got a taste of that influence, and I was thinking, I was like, man, I could I could do even more for these guys, you know, if I got promoted to officer.

SPEAKER_02 12:51

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 12:51

And as soon as I got promoted to officer, I mean that's one of the first things I did with my first crew that I got put on, is I tried to sit down with everybody, have one-on-ones with them, get their expectations of me, my expectations of them, and just immediately address any career path concerns. Yep. And that was one of the things that I was super passionate about when I got there is just you know, essentially just catching everybody up to where they needed to be. And really just laying out a plan and a path for them actually to succeed as much as they want to succeed.

SPEAKER_01 13:27

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 13:27

Of course, you got guys that just they may be one they may want to be a fireman for 10, 15 years, and that's fine. I mean, we can find external classes that you know can help you dial in your performance as a firefighter, and then some guys want to come in and be battalion chiefs one day. And that's the ones that we focus on would just go into these officer style classes and gypstick and all that stuff to just get them on the right path.

SPEAKER_01 13:51

Yeah. My I I do feel bad that you got such a terrible officer your first year as a sergeant.

SPEAKER_05 13:59

Yeah, he's terrible. All he wanted to do is his podcast all the time. I'm I'm just joking. No, no, no. I think that I think that you uh I really do think that and that that goes into another component is molding to your personnel and really helping them changing your output in order to help them develop, which I think you did very well because I think that when we got put together, I think you saw that you know I was motivated and I want to do a bunch of stuff, and you allowed me to do that. You taught me how to do training, you taught me how to do all these things, and I think that that's I think that was great, you know. I think that that's something that the an officer has to do in a leadership position has to do.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

You have to because we swap people around uh yearly at a minimum, you know, and then if there's promotions and things, we we do it more than that. And it can be really, really hard, but you have to be able to adapt to your crew. Yeah, absolutely. Um everybody's different. We've talked about it before. We've we live together a third of our life here, and sometimes you don't like everybody. Yeah. Sometimes you get on each other's nerves, or people learn different, or people have different motivations, or whatever. Um and sometimes it's hard to be over two crews or two companies and you can't make everybody happy, but try to mess yourself with how everybody else is. Yep. Uh it's hard. But um throw a quick story in. So when Sambohr started, I was still a sergeant at the time, and me and a fire another firefighter was on the tower, and we actually caught a chemical fire. Uh and Sambohr had all this prior experience and stuff. And uh we get out there and he was still in his orientation period. So they wouldn't let him do anything but but observe. And he was the best water hander outer I've ever seen in my whole life. I was a heck of a uh LDH loader too.

SPEAKER_05 16:00

I loaded a lot of LDH that day.

SPEAKER_01 16:03

Oh man, we fought fire, we turned into a hazmat scene. He just handed out water.

SPEAKER_05 16:09

That was my introduction to the our our department.

SPEAKER_01 16:12

Yeah, yep. That was probably not not heat like inside fire, but just in general outside. It was it was probably over a hundred that day. Oh yeah, absolutely. And middle of the day, I was terrible.

SPEAKER_05 16:27

God felt so bad for the when they had to start putting them level A suits on. I was like, oh my gosh. It was awful. Terrible, terrible.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

Alrighty, so what what does it feel like to make decisions in an officer's role knowing everybody there is watching you? They're dependent on you to make not just make a decision, but to make the right decision that's gonna get them home. It's gonna make the scene go the way that it needs to go. I mean, that is a lot of pressure. So what does it feel like in your position making those decisions?

SPEAKER_05 17:10

I mean, don't get me wrong, it's it's definitely pressure inducing. I mean, you certainly have a lot of pressure on you. Just for I mean, uh for the obvious reasons, for life safety reasons to make sure everybody is fine, injury free, everything. However, there's also social pressures.

SPEAKER_02 17:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 17:29

I mean you've got a lot of your peers, a lot of your superior officers looking at you to make the right decision. And I think that a big component of that kind of goes back to what we were talking about earlier is that humility portion of it. Yeah. You know, if I go in there and I got my chest, you know, inflated up and I'm like, oh, I know everything, blah, blah, blah. I don't think that I feel like people can just see through that for the most part. Yeah. And that's why just the humility portion of it is if I'm on scene and I there's a something questionable or something that arises that I'm like, I have no idea what to do here, then I will quickly ask my chief or another more seasoned officer, yeah, you know, what am I supposed to do here? Yeah. And you know, I've had that the opposite way too. I've had other guys ask me what to do. Yep. And just, you know, not calling them out or not, you know, making fun of them for not knowing what to do and stuff. You know, it's more of like a one-on-one, hey, you need to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, you need to do this, do this, check for this.

SPEAKER_02 18:29

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 18:29

And just not really embarrassing them because I mean, we're not in rookie school anymore. We're talking about extremely important decisions. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

Yeah, it's not just making one little bad decision and getting smoked for it. It's it's big stuff.

SPEAKER_05 18:41

Absolutely. And we're not just there to just browbeat and, you know, bully them and stuff like that. There's a time and place for that, don't get me wrong. Yep. But not in the situation of the heat of the moment where there's potential life risks.

SPEAKER_01 18:53

Yes, that's exactly right. Uh so we talked about the calls and we talked about the decisions that have to be made. And um, there's been times that I've you know, we've run a call and whatever happened and whatever decision was made, and then we get back to the station and I think, man, I'm glad that went good because there was the potential for it not. And based on the decision I made, I'm I'm glad that really worked out. Yeah. Because it could not have. So with that in mind, what what sticks with you longer? Is it the call? Because it we're not just talking about structure fires. Yeah. Any call in general. Would it be the call or would it be the decision that you made?

SPEAKER_05 19:33

I think it's fluid, it changes, but I think it, you know, at this point, it's more of the decision that I made. Yeah. You know, because obviously some things stick with me for you know years and years as far as like the the details of a call. However, now on the short-term part of it, coming back to the station, it's definitely the decision making because as a newly promoted officer, I sit there and think, I'm like, my God, I try to, I it's I map out every potential outcome in my head, especially when I get back, I'm sitting on the computer doing the report by myself, and I'm like, oh my God, what if I would have you know what did I not get all the information I needed? Did I not see something that I needed to see? You know, I I definitely question, but on the flip side of that, I think that's honestly, I think that's a good thing for an officer to do. Yeah because I mean I think it makes you explore every potential outcome and opportunity that you had on that call. So next time you go on that call, I mean, you're looking for those things. That's true. They stick with you.

SPEAKER_01 20:30

Good answer. So the hardest part of this job is not always the call. It's it's like Sam Bohr said, it's the making the decisions, standing by your decisions, and then when you get to your quiet place, whether it's doing the report and you're going back over details, or you get home going over the decisions that you made and being okay with those. Yeah. Uh and we've all run the calls where we get home and think, well, you know, maybe there was a bad outcome on that call. Yeah. And you think, man, I'll maybe I could have done something else, like you said, or yeah, whatever. But sticking by the decisions you made in that moment. Um sometimes it's not always easy, but like that's that's the hardest part of the call. Alright, so let's let's uh let's shift just a little bit. So you get promoted, and like I said, you got promoted to sergeant and then to lieutenant fairly quickly, but you did have prior experience, so it wasn't you wasn't new to you either. But how do you lead people who used to be your peers? Yeah. That's uh typically when we are promoted, we change shifts or at a minimum change crews. Yeah. Um how did you do that transition? Because you kept a couple of guys.

SPEAKER_05 21:48

Yeah, I got essentially I got promoted in the same with the same crew. My first my first uh assignment. Yeah. Um same shift, same crew. They moved the uh previous officer just to another station and they just essentially set me there and gave me a new sergeant.

SPEAKER_02 22:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 22:05

Um that you know it it I it's it is tough. I will say that. I'll be completely honest. It it is tough to do that because I mean you know you know me pretty well, and as a sergeant, you can give Away with a lot more as far as just messing around the station and you know just joking around and stuff, wrestling with guys, you know, whatever it is. Yep. I remember. Yeah. And going from that sergeant position to an officer position, especially with the same group.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Can you be both friend and leader? Because we go through this thing, and I used to work for Sears a long time ago. Yeah. Long, long time ago. And there was always this thing where if you were in a management or supervisor position, you couldn't hang out with the guys. Yeah. Uh and it's kind of that way here. Once you get to a certain level, they want you to back off hanging out with guys because you lose they you lose their respect and stuff like that. Or you get too close to them. I don't fully agree with that. I think if you continue to spend time with your crew, maybe not with all of the the goofy stuff that used to happen, but um spend time with them, eat with them, talk with them, sit with them, watch TV with them, whatever. Absolutely. Then it strengthens your whole crew together, and I think that helps with respect. Yeah. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 23:33

I think that there's certainly a very fine line that you have to withhold. I mean, that you have to uh just uh essentially keep throughout your your uh officer career. I think that obviously, like we said before, you can't do the same level of messing around, joking and stuff that you were able to do as a sergeant. But I strongly disagree with the notion that you have to separate yourself from the crew. And I I you know, I I just I do not connect with the leadership style of just sitting in the office all day while your crew does everything else by themselves. I one of my biggest things is training. Yeah. So one of my biggest things with us training is that I I try my absolute best to always participate in training with the guys. You know, I there's some times that I get pulled away where I whether I have to have a meeting with the battalion chief, whether I have to do some sort of admin stuff on the computer, whether I have to do anything else. You know, I I hate that, but you know, obviously those things have to be done if you're an officer. But just going downstairs and training with the guys, even simple stuff. Like I think next shift that you know, me and my firemen were planning on doing a massive spaghetti drill in the bay. Yeah. As an officer, I mean, I'll be honest with you, I don't have to do that. Yeah. But I think it means a lot to the guys, and it m means a lot to me too to go down there, gear up, you know, just start training with them. Yep. I mean, I can stay up a little later that night and do my paperwork if I have to.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 25:12

Don't ask people to do something you're not willing to go do. Absolutely, because that's one of the easiest ways to lose respect from your crew. Yeah. Um but going back to the friend thing, uh as far as that fine line, I think that w when you get promoted on the same crew and you have developed this rapport of being like joking around and you know, just messing around all the time. I think that once you make that transition, the easiest way to get out of that loop is to just have conversations with guys.

SPEAKER_02 25:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 25:48

Develop that expectation because you know, if you get with them the first shift that you're promoted, they're like, wait a second, this this guy's gonna be, you know, uh he's just gonna be like a micromanager now. He's gonna want, you know, all this stuff. But if you sit down with them and like, hey guys, nothing's gonna change. You guys know this officer position is gonna have things a little bit different. However, you have any questions, you have any expectations, you have anything you want to talk about, I'm still willing to talk about anything with you. Now, I might not be messing around, I might not be wrestling on the recliners or, you know, just sitting there playing Call of Duty or whatever. You know, I might not be doing that as much. However, I'm still the same person. I'm not gonna let this change. I've just got more influence to look out for you now. That's right. Like I just want to, I have more, I don't want to say power because that's kind of a it sounds bad, but I have more power in order to get you in the classes, get you in front of the you know whoever you want to meet with to actually talk about your career. You know, I've got a lot more of that. So obviously we have to maintain, you know, a little bit more professionalism between each other. Now we can still joke around. I mean, don't get me wrong. Yeah, we can joke around and stuff, but as long as you just put that line with in between and you tell them the expectation, like, hey, I'm no longer just a you know, guy that's just gonna mess around all the time. I've got all these extra responsibilities and duties now, so we're gonna have to treat each other with respect and understand what each other's roles are now.

SPEAKER_01 27:20

Yep. That makes perfect sense. So let's let's talk about we mentioned confidence earlier. Yeah. Um and how important it is to be confident but at a minimum be perceived as confident. Uh we talked about that, and we've we mentioned this in interviews in the last episode. Uh, and there's a fine line there of walking into an interview confident and walking into an interview arrogant. Yeah, absolutely. Um you have to walk in there with some presence and some with some confidence, or they're not gonna take you serious. With that being said, let's talk about confidence versus liability. Yeah. Which is kind of the other side of that. So when does when does confidence become dangerous?

SPEAKER_05 28:11

Confidence becomes dangerous whenever an officer loses that ability to look inwards of themselves and know that they don't know every single outcome. Yeah. They don't know everything. No officer in the entire universe knows every single outcome of everything and knows exactly what to do for every single situation. And that's where that humility component comes back in. You have to be humble enough to understand that I trust me, I'm I'm extremely confident when it comes to structural firefighting, things of that nature. I feel very good about my abilities to run a scene if I had to to do operational stuff. However, I know that there's a million different outcomes in which I don't know what I would do and I don't know what to do. Now, I'm you know, I'm hopeful that in the moment I'm able to figure it out, you know, just from experience and from training. But I know that for a fact that there are guys that are gonna think differently than me and they may give me a better outcome, better answer. Yeah. And I just I have no issue with asking that. And I think that's what the the true definition of being a confident officer is, is you know, I feel extremely comfortable in these situations. I I feel like I can do the best for my guys. I know exactly what to do on scene, but if I don't, which we all have that, you know, whether we want to admit it or not, we all have that moment where you're like, I don't know what to do. Yeah. But asking for help. And I know I keep beating that same theme throughout this, but I think it's extremely, extremely important for these guys to just understand that they they don't know everything.

SPEAKER_02 29:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 29:50

You know, and I'm not saying anybody, you know, nobody specifically, but it's just you don't you can't you can't know everything.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

It's impossible. That's right. We've we've talked about before. If we roll up to a structure fire and we get out and you see something that's an issue, tell me. Because I've got so much stuff going on, I'm coming off the truck and I'm doing a 360 and I'm doing all of this stuff. Absolutely. And if you see something that is an obvious problem, tell me. Yeah. Like I'm not so big that I I'm gonna say, I shut up, I don't want to hear what you got to say. I told my guys the same thing.

SPEAKER_05 30:26

I've told them the exact same thing. Like, hey, even if we're on something simple. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you see if we go to a public assist and we're just doing a lift assist for some older or some geriatric patient, like tell me if you see something. Because I I can't see it all.

SPEAKER_01 30:41

Yeah, that's right. 100%. So we've talked about real leaders. We talked about having nothing really to do with rank. Uh it's more your confidence in your personality and uh your motivation. Yeah. So what do you think separates real leaders from rank? Because we did talk about earlier also that sometimes people get promoted to positions and they shouldn't be there. Yeah. Uh and they they try their they try their best to be a good leader, yeah. Um and do everything wrong. Yeah. Uh we've we've seen that. But what's the difference in real leaders and people who just wear rank?

SPEAKER_05 31:23

I I really think that at a subconscious level, and there's no way you'd be able to prove this, but at a subconscious level, I think it's just what your your motives are, your motivation. I mean, i your motives to get promoted to an officer, it shouldn't be just time. It shouldn't be just the rank, obviously. It needs to be trying to make a positive difference. And I know that may sound corny, but I think that you asked about the true leader versus the rank. I think that honestly, one of the biggest components of being a true leader is coming in with a consistently positive, forward-thinking outlook. So if as a fireman, I always tried to come in positive. As a sergeant, I always tried to come in positive. I may be having a terrible day, but I tried my absolute best to maintain a level of consistency and positivity because we've all had that officer that comes in and just hates life. Yeah. They hate life, they don't want to talk to anybody, they just don't, they want to go sit in their office, blah, blah, blah. And that, man, that's just a terrible, terrible motivation killer for your new guys. And especially especially new guys. But it's a it's a motivation killer for everybody. I mean, that's why when I come in, I immediately, hey morning, guys, what's up? You know, I try to start joking around. I try to start, you know, it just lifts the spirits of everybody. And it right off the rip gets them in a progressive attitude to where, hey, we're gonna do some training, we're gonna do, we're gonna kill it today. We're gonna have fun today, you know, we're gonna get our stuff done. We're gonna be the best crew in the whole city. That's why I try to instill in my guys. Yeah, like that's what I tell them. I want them. That that's my motivation. No matter what shift I'm on, no matter what crew I'm on, I want that crew to be the best one in the city. Yep. And that's why I push training so much because not only is it good for your skills, obviously, dialing them in, but it's it's a cohesion thing. Yeah. You work together and you know exactly what everybody's gonna do, and it just builds that camaraderie to where, I mean, it's almost like you're just you're hanging out, doing a workout, but you're really perfecting your skills. Yeah. I mean, for instance, yesterday was Saturday, and we came in, and I'm me and one of my fire, my uh one of my motivated firemen was like, you know, what are we gonna do today? I was like, dude, let's just go out and throw ladders, you know. So we went out there and we just did like a round robbing of just throwing the 24 and extending it fully. I think we did like 10 times a piece.

SPEAKER_02 33:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 33:57

And we just just hanging out and talking, joking, and then after that, we, you know, keep perfecting that skill. Then we try to start doing new things. And that's where that humility component comes back into play. Is, you know, I've got an extremely motivated fireman on my crew that takes all these external classes. He does all this stuff. I'm very proud of him. Um, I mean, he's he's absolutely killing it. And he always brings something new to the table as far as a technique, an operational, you know, thought process. And I always hear him out. I don't ever shut him down. I don't, even if I disagree with it, or if it's something that I particularly can't do because of my physical limitations or because my whatever, you know, I always embrace it because you never know who's going to be hearing him. And they that might be perfect for him for the the person listening. I mean, we've got a brand new rookie, and that's one of the first things I told him was we'll go out there and train. And you know, I'm saying there's not there's not a definite right way to do any of these skills. Yeah. It's what's most efficient, what takes the least amount of effort to maintain that efficiency, and what gets the goal done.

SPEAKER_02 35:07

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 35:07

I mean, that's the number one.

SPEAKER_01 35:10

Yep, that is exactly right. We all do things a little different. Oh, yeah. Uh we talked about I mean search searching. I think everybody has, you know, there's there's the the normal standard techniques, but everybody has to figure out what works best for them. Absolutely. And what the way that I search is different than the way that you search. But uh same outcome. Yeah. Still a a positive outcome with a positive experience, but we all do it a little bit different. Yeah. You just got to figure out what works for you. And the only way you're gonna figure that out is to do it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:43

And don't shut down ideas. Yeah. Do not shut down ideas. I've seen it so many times, especially at my previous department, where you get these old, salty dudes. Yep. I mean, these guys have been in there 30 years, you know. But they'll shut down a new idea because it's not what they were taught or not what they've learned, you know, such and such. But that's one of my biggest things that I learned through that experience is these brand new guys coming out of rookie school may teach me something. Yeah. And I have, you know, no issue in hearing them out or even trying it with them. Now, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work, and we'll make fun of them. Yeah. That's true. But yeah, but we're still gonna try it, and we're still gonna see, you know, how well it works. I mean, heck, it may be it may be the new way of the the service. Yeah. I mean, you never know. That's true. That is very true.

SPEAKER_01 36:32

All right, so let's shift gears one more time, get a little more um, go ahead. Maybe some more controversial topics. Oh. Nice. Um so everything that you just talked about. And we did a episode on the first ten minutes. Uh how important it is to come in motivated and come in with your spirit high. Absolutely. How that bleeds off to everybody else. Because, like you said, we've all seen the ones who come in and there's like somebody kick their dog. Like they just I don't know, and it bleeds over to the whole crew. Yeah. And it and it that first ten minutes sets the tone for the whole shift. It really does. Um, as important as that is, and taking all of that in to mind, let's talk about morale. Um it is so easy to to hurt morale, yeah, or to lose morale, or lose the support of the guys, or whatever the case may be. Um what do you think the fire service needs right now from a from a morale standpoint? Because we have heard different things like and and we are uh truly blessed here. Yeah. With we absolutely are great facilities. Yes. And new trucks, the the best of the best, and new equipment. We're always getting new equipment, and we're hiring and we're doing all these things, and that is awesome. Like there is so many departments 20 minutes from here that don't experience that. But is how big a role does that play in overall morale? I think it's so much deeper than that.

SPEAKER_05 38:16

It's it it's certainly it's tough. It's tough because there's there's a multitude of answers that you could have for that. Because obviously everybody's motivation is gonna be different or everybody's you know perception of the morale is gonna be different. But I will say that I think that a big thing that affects morale that we almost have to take an inward look at is perception.

SPEAKER_02 38:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 38:43

I think a lot of our guys and not uh I shouldn't say our guys, but a lot of firefighters in general in the service, no matter what department they work for, I think that they tend to look through a just a three-inch window.

SPEAKER_02 38:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 38:58

Like I think, and I I've been I've I've done that before. I've certainly done that before. But I think, and this is you know, where you go back to the promotional part of it, once you get more rank and you start to get up, you start to get exposed to more of the behind the scenes things that go on. And I think a lot of our guys, you know, they they don't see what's happening behind the doors downstairs. Yes. You know, and I think that what they'll do is they'll either hear a little something or they'll hear a rumor or some gossip or something like that, and they'll I they'll either just run with it and just not question it, or they'll evolve it and they'll just make their own version of it. That's right. Um but I think if they were able to take a step back and, you know, actually be able to see the forest through the trees, I think that they would understand that these things that they perceive as affecting, negatively affecting morale either aren't true or they just don't understand it. Yeah. And I think that because I, you know, it there's always a every single department in the country, there's always going to be like a, you know, well, my, you know, my chief ain't doing enough, he's not doing enough, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, I can tell you, I mean, a few shifts ago, I I'm we're fortunate enough to have a very open-minded, very open-door policy fire chief. And I went in there and talked to him about something not related to this, but you know, he sat down and actually took me through, you know, how to how he's doing the budget for the department, yeah, what he's going to city council with, what all these things are. I mean, I was extremely fortunate because he's trying to give me a learning opportunity. Yeah. Because I think he he kind of sees what my motivations are, what my what I want to do in the future. And I mean, he's just asking for the moon for us. Yeah. I mean, he really is. He's going out on a limb. But I mean, you know as well as I do, there's only so much that they can do. Yeah. I mean, we have we uh rely on so many external entities that control the the direction of the department. Yeah, that's true. But you know, and that's a long way to go around to the morale thing, and what happens is people start to see, you know, they're like, oh well, why we why didn't we get like a 40% raise or something like that? And it just, you know, they they tend to think that way. But I think that perception concept is is in dire need with some groups. Yeah. I mean, you just you have to look outside yourself. You have to look out of outside of the room that you're in.

SPEAKER_02 41:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:35

You know, you can't just think that, hey, what I'm seeing directly in front of me is that's exactly what's going on. You have to think that, you know, these guys probably are trying to do the best for us as they can.

SPEAKER_02 41:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 41:47

But they can only do so much. Yeah, they can only do so much. And now, uh a different answer that maybe talking about the controversy thing, a different answer is fighting fire. Yeah. I mean, that's that's the biggest, you know. Obviously, I don't want anybody in the world to lose their possessions or definitely not lose a family member. I mean, that that's I would never wish that on my worst enemy. However, you know, controversial, fighting fire, I mean, that is such a morale booster. Yeah, it is. I mean, if we fought fire every two weeks, we had like a ripping structure fire. I mean, these guys would oh my god, the cohesion, yeah, the m motivation to train. I mean, it would skyrocket. But I mean, again, obviously you can't put that in motion. I mean, we're just, you know, reactionary to that, obviously. And we don't want anybody to lose their possessions or anything like that or lose their family or anything. But if something happens, we want to be there. We want to be there.

SPEAKER_01 42:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 42:44

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 42:45

We uh and and I've mentioned it before, we don't fight a ton of fire. Yeah. Um, about nine years ago, eight or nine years ago. We went through this little stint where I was on a shift at the time, and I think we had six shifts in a row, we had a working structure fire.

SPEAKER_04 43:06

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:07

Uh now there was some some stuff going on that caused that. Yeah. Um but yeah, and it and even being here as long as I have now, when a structure fire bangs out your heart rate still goes up. You still get excited. Absolutely. Because that's what we're here for. And in that in those six shifts the exposure was so much that it it changed that. Like my heart rate would still go up, but you didn't lose yourself to adrenaline. Yeah. Like you could get on scene and you just did your job. And it was like just it's just another day. Yep. Absolutely. And that f I remember that feeling because we went through a stint earlier this year, late last year, where we had I think we had four shifts in a row. Yeah. Um but it was such a good feeling to just show up, do your job, knew what had to be done. Yeah. No issues, and you were calm the whole time. You know, you know. And that comes with exposure. Exposure is what is the basis of everything, and then that leads to experience. Yeah. Um, so yeah, I don't know. That was uh that's just something I remember from years ago. Because like I said, we don't run a ton. Yeah. But that was a lot of structure fires in a short amount of time, and it it was awesome. Like I'll never forget that little stint.

SPEAKER_05 44:29

It is so weird. I mean, like the my previous department that I worked at before I came here. I mean, obviously, you know, it's it's much bigger, much busier, all that kind of stuff. But I mean, we fought like a a very, very good amount of fire down there. Yeah. And it does. It's almost like it turns into like a, you know, I'm coming in and doing this this PCR on a patient. Yeah. I mean, I'm just it's it just becomes a regular thing. And honestly, I mean, that's how that's the best training you're gonna get too. Absolutely. But I mean, you come back and, you know, I obviously there's the you know, I'm kind of building it up like I'm excited about it. Because I am. I'm very I love to do stroke I love to fight structure fires. I love it. But at the same time, you have to balance that with the the loss that that is associated with that.

SPEAKER_02 45:13

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 45:14

And you know, it it as sad as it is that someone lost something, we have also developed a a better response ability. Yeah. So I think that we've we've developed by fighting that fire, we've gotten better at it. We've gotten, we've learned things, we've you know, just come together as a crew to fight this this terrible thing that's happening. And I think it's almost psychological, it it's it's a trauma bond too at some level. Because it's associated with a an extreme sadness for someone else, but also we're all on the same page as far as the adrenaline rush. Yeah. And I think we're we're bonded by that. And I think it makes us come closer together, to be honest.

SPEAKER_01 45:59

Yeah, I believe that too. I was thinking while you were talking, um maybe a little different direction, but it's something I thought about. Yeah. Um, when we're on the scene of a fatality fire, yeah, or um a a medical call on somebody's deceased or a car wreck or whatever the case is, everybody looks at us and thinks, man, them they're cold. Yeah. They have no feelings whatsoever. And that is the farthest thing from the truth. Because um we had a structure fire a few months ago with a fatality. And it was a it was terrible. You know? Uh and then the family got there and it just emotionally it got worse. Um a lot of that is we look stoic and we look like we're emotionless. That is us in in a in a way that is us being respectful. Yeah. Uh because we've talked about the dark humor before and it is so second nature and easy for that to kick in. Yeah. And but we try our best to do that when we get back to the station. Yeah. Um and it it would be easy to address that trauma on a call and the timing not be right. Yeah. Uh so a lot of times we just look like we're just cold and we're standing over there and it is what it is another day and but we're feeling it on the inside. Yeah. Uh that call when the family showed up, I'll never forget. How you know, the reaction of the family and everything. Um and I just I thought about I know it's kind of not on topic, but I kind of thought about that while you were talking.

SPEAKER_05 47:38

Well, I think that ties directly into to the officer thing. Yeah. I mean, you have to have the perception of strength. I mean, even to the public, you know, we are perceived as the strong, you know, come in save the day people. I mean, as corny as that is, you know, we have to maintain a level of stoicism. I think that that's a a perfect way to put that. I mean, because the last thing you want, the last thing I want is if I call 911 and I see a bunch of people pulling up that are just, you know, freaking out or just panicking. They don't, you know, that kind of thing. And I think the the holding your personal emotions back is just as important too. Yeah. Because I think that it it shows a level of strength. Now, you know, obviously, like you said, with the the dark humor, obviously that's the worst case scenario is if you get on scene and you're starting you're laughing about some dumb joke somebody made when someone's poor, you know, grandmother has has passed away. But you know, it it's there's a time and a place for that. Yeah. And I think that that's a misconception with the the public as well as they don't really understand that. Yeah. But you see it so much, that's the way we rationalize it.

SPEAKER_02 48:49

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 48:50

I mean, that's the only way you can rationalize it. Because I mean, if you don't joke about it and if you don't like try to point out tiny little details about funny, you know, whatever it is, yeah, I mean, we'll go insane. I mean, we'll sit there and be depressed thinking about that reoccurring. You and I both have had experiences that just I mean, it just sits in your mind for years, and it's just it beats you down. But if you're able to talk about it and as alphas, you know, typically most of us are gonna be like alpha personalities. You know, that's the best way to talk about it. Yeah. Instead of me coming in here and just, you know, crying about it and stuff like that, yeah. You know, it's much, much more comfortable and socially acceptable in our culture to just laugh, talk, you know, but you still get the information out and you still get that off your chest. Yep. So it's just a it's a different way of expression that that we have come in a culture to to normalize. Yeah, that's right. But of course, the public, you know, that that those are conversations that probably don't need to be mic'd up though. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 49:55

Absolutely. It's uh it's weird too because sometimes we end up on scene for an hour. Yeah. And we we stay over to ourselves, and it may be a conversation that is absolutely not related to the call at all. And somebody says something funny and we chuckle, and somebody, the family or whatever sees that and perceives that as well, they're they're making fun of us, or they're and it and in reality it had nothing to do with the situation. Yeah. Yeah. Uh so yeah, we have to we have to be careful about that type stuff.

SPEAKER_05 50:29

Yeah, and I hate that. I try, you know, it your instinct when you get a great knockdown on a fire, you're amped up, your adrenaline's just flowing, you guys are like just killing it on scene. Your instinct is to come out high five, be like, yeah, yeah, you know, yeah, man, look, we did it, blah, blah, blah. But then you gotta you have, and again, going back to the officer thing, that's gonna be my instinct as well. But from years of service, I've learned that we can do this when we get back to the station. Yeah, I mean, because you never know. There may be a ring camera across the street that's seeing a bunch of firemen high-fiving, laughing, you know, chest bumping, whatever, and someone just lost their lives in that that and it has nothing to do with that. We still feel sadness for that, obviously. We still feel a a great deal of remorse for that family, and I always do. But in the moment, you know, your adrenaline's so high, you're not really thinking about that kind of stuff. So as an officer and as a as a good leader, you have to uh ensure that your guys maintain that level of of professionalism. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 51:34

All right, let's change directions one more time. That got that got kind of dark. Let's pick it up just a little bit. So for somebody who is wanting to promote, what and and it doesn't really matter the time frame. It may be a year from now or two or five or whatever, but uh for somebody who is wanting to promote what should they start doing right now?

SPEAKER_05 51:59

Obviously, so there's the obvious and then there's the more uh unobvious. So the obvious component of it is to just really dial in your career path. I mean, just just be super, super aggressive with taking these classes. I mean, that's the it's laid out for you. Yeah. I mean, our department is is very organized to where they lay out what you need to do. That's right. I mean, that's the the number one thing, obviously, hit those. The more unobvious component of it, and I think that again this a little bit controversial, but you cannot listen to the naysayers. That's right. That is one of the biggest things that it's so easy to fall into that pit of people, you know, I've heard it so many times. You don't have enough time to promote. Yeah. You don't have enough experience to promote, you don't know what you're doing, blah, blah, blah. You have to stop listening to that. That's right. Because those are people that don't have the humility to understand that or they're either jealous, they're either uncomfortable with their own abilities, they're either, you know, whatever it is. And I'm again, I'm not bashing those people at all because you never know what people are going in, you know, you you never know what they're going through.

SPEAKER_02 53:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 53:12

They may be going through some family issues, blah, blah, blah. And so you can't judge those people for that. However, on a personal side of that, you have to just not let you have to tune it out.

SPEAKER_02 53:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 53:23

Because there's always going to be people that question your ability. They're going to question something you did and it's going to stick with you, blah, blah, blah. But in your heart, if you know that you're motivated to make things better, yeah. That should carry you through any of that stuff. That's true. And that's what that's what's always carried me through it. Because, yeah, people, I mean, you know, of course, people have told me the not enough time here thing. I've heard that a million different ways. However, I've worked my absolute butt off for the last four years going and doing all these things. And I'm I I truly want to make this department awesome. Yeah. And I think all officers should have that mentality. Absolutely. I want to make things better for the guys. I want to make things, I want to make them better. I want to make them successful. I mean, one of the biggest things, and my chief, uh, my one of my chiefs told me this uh previously as well, is something that something that motivates me a ton is if one of my firemen gets promoted to lieutenant or officer. I mean, that is so that pumps me up. That's almost more exciting for me than me getting promoted. Yeah. Because I just I I love to see that success that that person and I helped. I helped him a little bit, you know, may have guided him, but he's done so well. He's gone through all this stuff, you know, they've they've just done all the right things, they've kept their nose clean, they've done all this stuff, and it's just it's a very prideful thing for me. I mean, I mean, you're a father as well. Yeah. I mean, you know, it's it's almost like a father figure kind of thing. Yeah. That's that's one of the happiest, most proudest moments is when I see my guys succeed. And so especially when I see them motivated. I mean, I try to feed into that as much as I can if they come in super motivated and super hyped up. I just try to I try to just throw gas on that fire. Yeah. Because I mean, they're there everybody needs a cheerleader. I mean, and and I've been fortunate enough to have you as an officer. I've had other people as officers that have really, you know, just essentially helped me when I needed it, you know, facilitated any sort of extracurricular thing that I can do to make myself better. And I I've been very fortunate and I really want all all officers should be that person.

SPEAKER_01 55:39

Yeah, absolutely. Uh motivation is not constant. Yeah. Uh sometimes it comes in these waves. Oh, yeah. And when it's when it's on the up and they're really motivated, we want to keep that going and do what we can to help them. So absolutely. All right, I didn't throw this in earlier. Um so for those who don't know, Lieutenant Sambor is a Guinness Book of World Records holder. Uh and I'm I'm actually gonna tie this in. Okay. Give me just a second. Okay. Uh so he was supposed to be on episode two. Uh, and he holds the world record for diverting this more than anybody else. Uh so now it is episode 15 and he's finally made it on. So yeah, there's that. It's kind of a big deal.

SPEAKER_05 56:28

I mean currently, on a personal note, I am uh I'm currently moving. Currently moving, and I've got two small children. I'm attempting to get my master's degree right now. I've got about three weeks left into that, and also simultaneously trying to do as much of the career path as I can. Yeah. So I've been a little busy. I've been a little busy, but I appreciate that a lot. I I do appreciate you, you know, me coming to mind when you wanted people on here, though. I really do.

SPEAKER_01 56:58

Yep, and none of that is valid excuses. I don't I'm just kidding, man. It's it's uh we've said it a lot, family first. Yeah, I mean, I love the job. I love this, but I spent so many years devoting way too much time here, yeah, and not with my kids who are now getting married and moving out. And I I think about man, I've lost so much time.

SPEAKER_05 57:24

Absolutely. And that that's a whole nother component of the job. I mean, just especially the kids thing. I mean, it it's it's it definitely impacts you much, much more when you have your own children.

SPEAKER_01 57:36

Yeah, absolutely. All right. So let's change gears one more time. Uh so let's let's divert totally away from everything we've talked about today. Gotcha. Um, this is just personal, nothing related to anything we've talked about. So what what artist or group or band are you into right now? I know you're all over the place. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 58:01

Yeah, you know, my my one constant there's not a particular band, to be honest with you. My one constant probably is is metal, like hard rock. You know, we've got a couple of guys that that listen to the screaming stuff. Ever since high school, I've been into that. You know, I think you and I are roughly the same age, and back when I was in high school, like some of the the popular bands like corn and uh slipknot and all that stuff, you know, I was I was into that stuff when I was in high school, and it kind of just carried throughout. But I mean, I I'll listen to anything. I mean, I've got my playlist for every single emotion that I'm feeling that day.

SPEAKER_01 58:39

I got you. Okay. Good deal. All right. So other than this fantastic podcast, what other podcasts are you into?

SPEAKER_05 58:47

I love a good conspiracy podcast. I know you do. I love them. You know, I d we were just talking about that yesterday. I know we're talking about podcasts, but uh movie-wise, I told uh one of my firemen yesterday, I was like, you know, I can't even remember the last movie I watched that wasn't a documentary. Yeah. I just get so enveloped in those things, especially like you know, some of the alien conspiracy stuff, some of that stuff. I love that stuff because it's just I don't know. I think it just kind of broadens your horizon a little bit. Makes you think outside the box on some things. But just oh god, I don't know. I when I'm driving around, I rarely listen to music anymore. I mean, I've got about 30 podcasts in my my queue that are always coming with new episodes.

SPEAKER_01 59:31

I got a I watched a lot of documentaries too, but my my niche is small. Yeah. Um like I got into it drives me to insane. The chemtrail stuff. Oh, yeah. Got into that.

SPEAKER_05 59:43

Now it's good, that's some good rabbit holes you can go down and kill your man.

SPEAKER_01 59:47

And now every time I look up and the the chemtrails are crossing in the sky, I'm thinking, well, they're crop dusting us today.

SPEAKER_05 59:52

Yep, absolutely. God, there's so many good rabbit holes you can go down with these podcasts.

SPEAKER_01 59:57

Yep. And I'll do it in a car and she'll say, Man, you just I need to start. I need to look up, see if there's like a firefighter conspiracy podcast on the YouTube channel.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:06

Surely there's something. Yeah. All right. Anything else on your mind?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:10

Anything you want to talk about?

SPEAKER_05 1:00:12

Nah, you know, the only thing that I kind of want to talk about is just the how do we say this? I don't want to get dark or anything or sad or anything like that, but something that I have, you know, especially in my adult life, especially having children, is you know, we run a lot of gnarly stuff. Yeah. I mean, just really, really bad stuff that you just never want to see. I mean, it's worse than any horror movie that you can watch. Yeah. And I think a big thing when I first started in the service, I was in my early 20s, and I had a bunch of, like I said before, I had a bunch of salty old dudes that just, you know, you never saw them have emotions unless it was anger or happiness. Yeah. You never saw them sad or anything. So when I was first coming up, I've I really safeguarded my emotions. Yeah. And really it wasn't until I had my first kid, you know, I I've I've got a beautiful five-year-old daughter now. And when she was first born, it's like something clicked in my head. And it was just a a level of openness and a level of humility that I had never had in my life. And I know again, I know you're a father of daughters as well. And something about that, man, just really made me swallow my pride and open my mind. Because I think that a lot of us, especially these young guys, no kids, super aggressive, fire under their butt, you know, they just think that none of this is ever going to catch up with them. Yeah. And I thought that too. I mean I was full of it. I mean, just just hard nose. Like I thought I was the toughest dude in the room when I was 26 years old. Yeah. But you know, the more stuff you run, the more stuff starts to just build up and build up and build up. And anytime I talk to these new guys, you know, and I know you I know you're familiar, you probably already know where I'm going with this, but you know, I I tell these new guys all the time, man, don't, you know, don't be scared or don't be intimidated or embarrassed to ask for some emotional support, man. I mean, you know, I I happily admit that I've been seeing a counselor or therapist, you know, for almost two years now, just to explore different things and y you have to talk that stuff out. Yeah. I mean, the dark humor and stuff goes so far, but when you run, you know, uh just some of the the sickest stuff that you'll ever see, it's just, man, you you gotta get it off your chest. And I mean the the cause that and I I don't want to get you know crazy specific, but I mean, you know, last year or a year and a half, and I, you know, I I I try to talk about this a lot, especially with new people, because not only is it cathartic for me, but it also helps, I think, I think it opens the mind of of newer people a little bit too, because they understand even a 12-year person that's been in the service for a while, that's you know, had countless fires, done countless things, you know, they think we're like invincible emotionally. And that's so far from the truth. It sure is, absolutely. But I mean, even, you know, it last year, I think, or a year and a half ago at this point, you know, I ran a murder suicide of a mother and a daughter. Yeah. And that call was the roughest call I've ever had in my entire career. Sticks with me all the time. The little girl was four years old, my oldest daughter was four years old at the time. They even kind of look similar. I mean, it just it just crushed me. And you know, obviously the initial reaction to that is to go home, you know, and I know that we're family friendly, but you know, go home, you know, hit the bottle, whatever, numb your feelings, yeah, that kind of thing. And man, it it's just that doesn't that it doesn't accomplish anything.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:14

I mean, I think that the moment it happened, when I left that call, you know, I had to go see the chief of the department I was working for. And uh, you know, of course the chaplain was there and they were trying to help. But immediately when I left that scene, I I called you. Yeah. Because, you know, I know Derek is is one of our uh peer support guys here at our department. And I called you and you know, just kind of told you that I mean it was it was my like, you know, instant reaction to it. So of course my thoughts were all jumbled up and you know, I had it just going a mile a minute in my brain. But I called you and you know, you helped me out and you talked to me about it. And you know, after that it just it kept wearing on me. I mean, I kept thinking about it. I mean, I you know, I don't know how many people have told, but you know, I actually went, I actually looked at her obituary and found where she was uh put to rest. Yeah. And I went down there and you know, I paid my respects to her by myself, you know. I just I went down there and paid my respects, and you know, of course, as tough as we want to seem, you know, I was tearing up like crazy. Yeah. I mean, you it just it's the saddest thing in the world. And um, but the whole point of it is, man, after that I started seeing a therapist that helped me a tremendous amount. I started opening up about it with some of the guys that you know are more emotionally equipped to you know talk about those things. And that's like one of my biggest PSAs with these new guys, is just man, don't be scared to talk about that kind of stuff, dude. I tell my guys all the time, we run something horrible like that. We'll sit in my office and talk about it for hours if you want to. Yep. I mean, I'll tell you stories, I can just sit and listen. I mean, I can whatever you need. Yeah, I mean, I can try to go back and forth with you, anything. You know, it's just a it's a it's a very, very frowned upon thing that sometimes we're extremely vulnerable. Yeah. You're right. I yeah, I just I I I I don't like I hate that stigma. I hate that stigma because full circle that goes into the humility thing. It does. Yeah. I mean, we're not perfect. We're not the strongest people on this planet. Yeah. I mean, seeing a a deceased kid is gonna affect anybody with a heart. I mean, it should, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:30

Yeah, it should.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:32

It's uh it's which I told you about all my stuff late last year and early this this year, and uh it took a toll on me. Um and building off of other things that I had run in the past that you know triggers are real. Yeah. Some triggers we think that's dumb. Yeah. But they're real. And a lot of times when things build up and it starts causing you an issue, it also leads back to things that happened a long time ago. But like Sambor said, I am part of our peer support team. And it was hard for me to go to the peer support team and sit down in a meeting and say, All right, look, I know this is what we do. Yeah, but I'm I'm dealing with this stuff. Um like that was hard because we're supposed to be this level of, you know, bring it on. I can take whatever you whatever you need to put on me to help you, I'll take it. And then we get to the point where what are we supposed to do with our stuff? Um, so yeah, it's it's it's hard. And uh as I mentioned it in other episodes, the whole peer support and emotional health and all that stuff's still pretty new in the in the grand scheme of things. Last five years.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:45

Well, I th I think that you gain more respect by having the humility to understand that you can't deal with that emotionally. Yeah. We're not talking about operational performance on a fire scene. No. That's a completely different aspect of it. We're talking about when I go home and my kids go to sleep at night and I'm sitting there awake thinking about something terrible. Yeah. I mean, there's nothing who I mean I think that if if you came to me and told me something like you needed help or you needed to talk something out, I would have a tremendous amount of more respect for you than if I saw somebody just holding it in and taking it out on everybody. Because I mean you and I have both seen that with a bunch of people. These guys, you know, they think they're the toughest dude in the room and they can't talk about that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:32

And man, it is just it's it's disappointing because I know they'd be stronger afterward. Yeah. But it's just a I mean, a culture that we've we've built over the you know, a hundred years or whatever. I mean, it's just we're the tough dudes, but that's right. You know, you gotta there's a time and place for everything.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:49

You're absolutely right. Man, that's good stuff. I'm glad you kind of close that out with that. Yeah. Uh and with your story, because yeah, I remember all that happening. And um yeah, if that don't affect you, yeah, you you got some problems.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:04

Yeah, that's a different conversation we have.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:06

Yeah, absolutely. Um, you know, and and we're all we're all just still human. Mm-hmm. We all people think we come in and we're these robots, but we got families. And we, you know, everything things affect us too. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:20

And once you have a family, I mean, there's nothing that I would not work on myself for for them.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:25

I mean, if it's gonna make me a better father and a better husband, you know, I I will gladly go see a therapist for whatever and talk about anything. Absolutely. And that goes for our guys too. I know you're the same way. Yeah. My guys have any issues like that, you know, gladly have them come in and talk through everything.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:45

100%. Well, good deal. So I mentioned to you that this is episode 15, season finale. Uh, this season we've talked about mental health, we've talked about training and culture and leadership and covered a lot of awesome topics. And I want to leave a question for everybody that's listening, and it's in relation to promoting. We talked about that a lot today. So if you promote and you aren't ready, what happens? That is just a general question for whoever's listening to think about. Uh, and I think that that will shape how you prepare for promotion. Um, so if you're wanting to promote that if you promote and you're not ready, what happens then? So keep that in mind. Think over that question and know how you're gonna proceed through that. So season one of Wine the Q has been about understanding the job. Uh our whole purpose when we started this was not to just be another fire service podcast, but to look at the real side of the the fire service. Like I said, we're not robots. Uh we have emotions, things affect us, whether it's mental health and uh we talk about training and leadership and culture. Um we just want to look at that real side of it, how it affects us, how it affects our families, our departments, the fire service in general, and uh perceptions by the public. Uh so we've covered a lot of that this season. Um we've got awesome stuff coming up for season two. Uh so this will be episode 15. So week 16, we won't be releasing a new episode. We're gonna take that time to kind of reset, get some new ideas, go on, spend some time with our family because this gets consuming. Uh so we'll take a week off. I will do some uploads of some other stuff, but uh won't be a new episode for 16. So um like I said, this is the finale, um, and it's about understanding the job, what it takes to get here, what it feels like. Um, and ultimately what it cost to stay here. There is a cost with it. And I I do want everybody to understand that, especially if you're thinking about getting in the fire service, there's there's a cost and there's sacrifice. Uh, but every one of those comes back to leadership. But the truth is, through this whole season we've only scratched the surface of what we're trying to do here. So season two, we're we're gonna dig deeper. Uh we'll be talking about things people don't usually say out loud. We'll talk about real stories, real struggles, and the side of this job that you don't see. So if you think you understand the fire service now, just wait. You don't understand it yet. So thank you for listening to Wine the Q, the stories behind the sirens. Stay safe. Take care of your crew, take care of your family.