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Air Force Chief People Officer: Why Smart Leaders Keep Getting It Wrong · Mork Unfiltered

• speaker-0: question is, does your team really trust you? speaker-1: People are always telling me, well, know, is chat GPT going to take my job? Am I going to be replaced by Claude? speaker-0: One leadership aspect that you have to really cultivate is discern. speaker-1: The other context that people often miss around communication is the ability to listen. speaker-0: Culture is what you will tolerate versus no matter who the person is. speaker-1: Why do you think sometimes leaders are unable to make tough decisions? Welcome back to More Gun Filter, folks. Let me ask you something. For most of our lives, are the leaders that we looked up to were the ones who knew the most? The most experienced, the most answers, the most scar tissue. Now, what happens to leadership when that stops being the thing that matters? And today's guest... has lived and climbed the things that most people only dream about. He started with limited options, but joined the Air Force and rose to the very top of the enlisted ranks, leading thousands of people and billions of dollars in operations. Along the way, he earned a doctorate, started teaching the next generation of leaders, built his own firm, and was also named a Presidential Leadership Scholar. He has spent his life on the humid side of high-freshener organizations. So if anyone could tell us what leadership is all about... and what it becomes when knowledge is no longer the edge, it's this gentleman. Folks, this is Mork Unfiltered, and this is Dr. Jermaine King. Jermaine, welcome to the show. ⁓ speaker-0: Thank you so much. Thank you, Patrick, for having me. I'm telling you, I'm excited about what we're going to talk about today. So thank you for having me here. speaker-1: I'm super excited to have you as well because I mean, you know, it's not every day that I get something, somebody from the US Air Force on this show. So that's a first for me. That's exciting in and of itself. But before we dive into the topics today, tell us a little bit about yourself and for the sake of the audience, tell us why you're so qualified to talk about leadership because you have a lot of experience in this domain. speaker-0: think it's funny that you say, like qualified to say that. I will tell you that's one of the things that kind of feels weird about it is you're still learning about it. But Chief Human Resource Officer been in HR space for 26 years. I also teach at the doctorate and graduate levels for several universities and I've been consulting for more than a decade. have my own consulting firm. within HR and data analytics and coaching and leadership. So, and then on top of that, know, lead hundreds or thousands of people and continue to do that today. speaker-1: Okay, and you know, you obviously you sit on top of one of the most complex workforce environments anywhere. I mean, we're talking thousands of people, billions of dollars in expenditures and budget and equipment and everything else, dozens of career fields, all of it under a fair amount of pressure. And so when you look across your leaders today, what is the challenge that you find yourself thinking about most these days? speaker-0: think we talk sometimes about, I would say AI these days. It's the big talk everywhere. think for me, ironically, it's not about making decisions. I think what I typically think of is decision avoidance. Because organizations are so collaborative, teams are so data driven, and everyone wants to be consistent, consensus oriented. That I sometimes think that leaders spend a lot speaker-1: Right. speaker-0: of time protecting themselves from that wrong decision instead of creating movement. They're more worried about the cost of making a bad decision. And really, I think it comes down to the real problem is making decisions when it's too late. think when we sometimes hear that, we've heard that, whoa, you're never going to get a hundred percent of the information, but never make a decision with less than 30%. So between there, I think the problem is we're in that day and age that we've got to have so much information and so much data that we constantly take too much time to make a decision. And I think for me, I think the problem that we see within organizations and what I've seen is sometimes team members are so concerned about making decisions that affect. them instead of looking at strategic direction and making sure that you are making decisions that are right for the organization and all team members. So I think the issue that I see and that I really worry about is decision avoidance. speaker-1: Interesting decision avoid. Yeah. You know, because people always say, you know, not making a decision is a decision. Right. That is a decision where you don't make a decision on something and you kind of kick the can down the road. And, know, we all have a habit of procrastinating stuff. You know, there's things that we don't like. we're like, Oh, I'm not so sure about this. You know, I'll kind of come back to it next week or I'll come back to in a couple of weeks. And in the meantime, you know, oftentimes, you know, we have people waiting on us, right? We have people. speaker-0: Correct. speaker-1: who are trying to figure out their jobs and they're kind of in a dark space because they don't know what decision is being made upstairs or no decision is being made upstairs. And so having to make that decision sometimes is scary. Why do you think in your experience, I mean, you've been at this for a long time, in one of the most successful and complex organizations in the world, why do you think sometimes leaders are unable to make tough decisions? speaker-0: think because everyone wants to be right. think that's the, I think the concern is because being right is tied to your reputation. It is tied to your job security. And I think because of that, leaders hesitate because they don't know what their boss is going to think. And they worry more about making the wrong decision instead of being able go to your boss and say, hey, these is the factors, the variables. that I considered in making the decision at that moment in time. And what we see is change is always happening in organizations. There's always different shifting priorities, different shifting problems. And I think leaders want to be correct, not only today, but they want that decision to last a considerable time. But what they don't understand is tomorrow comes with a different specific set of problems, challenges, and when your boss gets that decision, that decision in that moment that you took may not have been the right decision at that new appropriate set of time. So instead of going to your leaders and being able to say, these were the factors and variables that I took into consideration at that time, they worry more about their reputation and that their boss is looking different on them the next day. think when we... sit back and they are able to articulate because I think that's what all leaders want. They want to know what did you consider in that time fight and how you arrived at your decision. And if leaders can remember that context, they'll come out better on the other side when they lead that office. But I think sometimes it goes back to decision avoidance. What will my boss think? How will I be perceived? And that's tied, I think, people say to job security. and wear peaknakes. speaker-1: interesting that you say that. And obviously, you know, when we talk about job security and reputation, right? I mean, you look at the news, you look at the media, you know, particularly the tech sector has shed, you know, over 136,000 jobs since the beginning of the year. You know, when I was in Silicon Valley running a workshop for a series of high level executives across multiple companies, you know, there's a fair amount of, there's a fair amount of degree of fear. speaker-0: Yeah speaker-1: It's like people are in this zone right now where we're working harder than ever. We're being told that all these AI tools are supposed to jack up our productivity. We want to believe that, but there's also this latent fear that, like you said, what happens if I get it wrong? What happens if I start using these tools and I get it wrong? How do we get people over that? In your experience, and you guys have seen a fair amount of change, right? In the Air Force, mean... You know, technology and the way we conduct ourselves out in the field is changing precipitously, right? If you look at what's happened in last 10 years, it's completely changing. How do you get people over their fear and how do you encourage them to try new tools, new weapons, new ways of working, new processes, AI, knowing that initially if they try new things, they might fail. How do you deal with that? speaker-0: think there's a rare skill that people really don't talk about these days. We talk about emotional intelligence a lot. We talk about policies and rules and stuff. think what we, leadership aspect that you have to really cultivate is discernment. And you need to integrate that into the principles of the organization. it's when we talk about AI, AI is that tool, the tool that... gives you information. However, interpretation and knowing what your organization's values are, what your people are joining your organization for, their principles, that only comes from the human element. I think the biggest piece is discernment, is being able to take those concerns, take that data, take that information, and be able to convey to your people what your current, your... current state of your organization is and what your future state is and what those changes are going to. And I think that is a focus of leadership that doesn't get enough credit right now. Everyone loves data. The more data I know, the better I can make a decision, but that's not the issue. You got to be able to take that data and go into a room and tell a bunch of team members. Why this data matters and how that's going to help the organization. But more importantly, why does that, why is that valuable to them? speaker-1: Right. Right. speaker-0: What makes them care about the data that you're producing? How does that help their families? How does that help their jobs? How does that help job security? They need to know that. I think that piece is discerning. It is a cognitive and an important piece of leadership nowadays that I think leaders want to know and want to have in their organizations. It is no longer, I'm hiring you because you're a data analyst. I can get data from speaker-1: Interesting. speaker-0: from chat GPT, I can get it from cloud, I can get it from a cloud, I can get it from a lot of spaces now. My question is, is if I give you data and I tell you that our organization was going this direction, but now we wanna go this direction, show me how I can give you that and you can make your people understand and tie it back to our values so that way there's not a lot of issues or feedback or backlash from it. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: I think we talked about the fusion of innovation where you have your laggers, your early adopters, your innovators. I want a leader that can discern that data, information, and go talk to the early adopters and be able to answer any questions they have, any concerns, and get them on board because there's a lot of people, 16 % or 23 % of the rest of the team members are going to follow those people. But if you cannot discern that information, if you can't translate it, that's an issue. ⁓ speaker-1: Correctly. That's fascinating. That's fascinating. So it sounds to me like when you're talking about discernment, it's almost like you have to explain the context. Correct. Right. It's like, okay, we now have to start using these new tools or that's changed this way of working because the context in which we're operating is changing. Correct. Right. then, then, cause one of the things that I see so often, and I don't know if you, if you see this, you know, in the air force, but people like have this feeling that they have to be moving faster and faster. Yes. And yet paradoxically, they're also getting more and more information. So we're like inundated with information, trying to move faster. When in reality, when you're talking about the sermon, it feels like we have to actually be slowing down so that we can provide context to the people that we lead so that they understand why I now have to use this new tool or why I need to now use this process. speaker-0: Because the new tool that comes out, the immediate issue that you have within team members is, it's my job being replaced. We're needy. And that's the fear. So I think typically, like you said, the data and the information in the organization moves fast. Well, if you can't within that moment, slow down enough to be able to tell your team members why this is important. If you don't have that tool cultivated inside of you, speaker-1: Exactly. Yeah, that's the fear. speaker-0: then team members are gonna feel like they're making decisions without us. They really don't want our input. They really don't care. If you can't sit back and say, well, this is what my team members are gonna be worried about when they first hear of this. I need to be able to sit down and talk to them and let them know this is a tool that is not going to impact the human capabilities that you have. But that tool and that capability has to be within that leader. But a lot of our leaders, and you know this, Patrick, is We tend to hire in our organizations those skilled workers into leadership positions. And when they get into those leadership positions, they're asked to go and communicate these changes. They're not used to that. They're used to hands-on, this is how I operate. These are operational capabilities. This is what I need to know. But hold on. You're now asking me to discern and take this data and not analyze it. communicate its intent, its purpose, and how it relates to people. Well, that within itself is a leadership issue that we're gonna see in this new era of AI. You have to have those discernment and those cognitive abilities now and be able to show your value to discern the information and the data that's coming. Yes, I can look at percentages all day. I can look at numbers all day. Why does it matter to the team members in next? speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, the interesting thing, right, is that, you know, people are always telling me, well, you know, it's chat GPT going to take my job. Am I going to be replaced by Claude? And one of the fascinating things that I find is that, you know, we always come back to this quote of human beings are not going to be replaced by machines. They're going to be replaced by human beings who know how to use tools. Correct. Right. And I, and I really believe that I think a lot of people are kind of jumping to conclusions about this, but the one thing that I've seen at AI is still not good at. is it is not good at judgment, right? It will give you the information, but if it, like you said, if it doesn't discern properly, if it doesn't have all the context, it could like give you a decision or help you make a decision without understanding the context, which given the context might be the wrong decision, right? So that element of judgment is still very much a human quality. speaker-0: because I think in anyone would know exactly what I'm talking about. If you go into chat GPT, you ask chat to give you different options for a problem. Yeah. They give you the options and then you say, no, that's not what I'm asking. What chat GPT will say is, yeah, you're right. Well, how did they not know you were right in the or they it was wrong in the very beginning. You need the human factor in there. I think that's the reason why leaders keep saying speaker-1: Exactly. Exactly. speaker-0: that AI is a tool because it doesn't understand the human elements. It does not take into consideration people's emotions, the principles of the organization. It cannot discern that information. It only takes inputs. And I think that's where a lot of individuals are worried about it. But I also believe, and I've written this before, I've written it in LinkedIn and articles, I've sat down with colleagues. AI is really changing how leadership is. It's not getting rid of jobs. It's literally asking you to take away the data that you have learned and show me the leadership abilities to be able to discern and communicate this to team members. And I think AI can be a tool for that, but I think a lot of people get it wrong. Like their jobs is just going to go away because of AI. You got to show your value beyond the data. Because now the data is everywhere. So, and again, if you Patrick was in an organization and you were my boss and I said, and now you really don't need me to get this data and do this presentation. You can do it now at the stroke of your hand. I think in the past, people held onto information because it was, was job security. So now. speaker-1: Exactly. Exactly. speaker-0: I've got to prove to you outside of that data now, because everyone has their hands on it. What's my value? Where the piece comes in, are you able to discern information? Are you able to communicate it effectively to your team? Because now as a boss, what I'm more concerned about is turnover. I'm more concerned about vacancy rates. Well, if you can't communicate that or the direction that we're going, if you can't discern that information to your team, speaker-1: You speaker-0: They're going to leave. So now what's your value to me if you cannot discern, if you cannot break this strategic information down to the operational level where they can understand its value and its intent. And if you can't do that, then I need somebody who I can bring in that can do those things. speaker-1: Right, exactly. So it sounds like one of things that you're saying, and I'm very interested in kind of like diving into this point a little bit, is in an age where everybody has access to PhD level information, right? Like you can just get on your phone, you can go and chat with GVT, can go and Claude or Grok or Geni, whatever you use, and you have access, you know, assuming you can prompt decently, which is a big assumption. But you have access to all the world's information at the palm of your hand at a PhD level of knowledge. Right. I mean, when we look at the latest benchmarks, we see that, you know, Opus 4.8 and, know, uh, some of the other, Chad GPT 5.5. I mean, they, you know, they are operating at a PhD level across every single domain in which they can be tested. And they test, you know, higher than 98 % of the human population. Right. But, but you talked, talked upon an important, important aspect of leadership, which, which I find interesting. And I wanted to understand how big an issue you think this is. Talk to me a little bit more about the importance of communication because communication, as we know, has two components, right? One is me communicating to you the orders or the context of why we're making this change, why are we using these tools, why are we going off in this direction? The other context that people often miss around communication is the ability to listen. and ask great questions. How hard is this in the context of a military organization? And you know, it's interesting because obviously, I've never worked with the military. It's very different. I come from a kind of like, I've worked in the private sector, I've worked in the public sector. But you know, how important is now, how much more important is communication? And also how much more important is this aspect of being able to listen for leaders? speaker-0: I think this question is wonderful. I think it's complex. And the thing when you're asking me this question, the one thing that keeps coming to mind is resilience and resilience. And when I say that word, everyone thinks that it is the ability to handle crime. But I think people miss underst- they miss- speaker-1: Really? Yeah speaker-0: under resiliency is misunderstood. Again, people think it's all about withstanding pressure, but I think it's more about being able to absorb the stress, reorganize that information and be able to be able to predict it, be able to understand it and be able to push it out or, or be able to communicate it and get it out to personnel faster than what the information damaged it. And I think a lot of people, and we know this, a lot of people ask questions, but they already have a preconceived notion of what that answer is. I think as a leader, resiliency is predicting that that's going to happen. Know that your team members already have preconceived notion. I think this all goes back to your organization's values. Do you believe in transparency? speaker-1: All speaker-0: Do you believe that whether it's good, bad or indifferent that your people need to know? And the reason why is because if they believe that you as a leader have these principles, it's going to lead to less stress. Resiliency is going to be there. going to hear you more because they know what values that you bring to the table and how do you do this? You got to start it off at the beginning. The minute you get in that position, you need to tell your people what your values are, how you operate. And at the same time, what information they will get firsthand. But they also need to understand that just because I know something, I may be waiting on data, but there's a fine line with that. How long you hold on to information is their perception of if you care about them or not. Well, if you knew this was going to affect my family, why did you wait a month to tell me? So having information and waiting too long on that information is wrong. You've really got to establish what your principles are and how you operate to people. And based on that, that's how much they're going to listen to you. They're going to know that when they ask you those questions, that you may either have some resistance. And again, as a leader, you've also got to take some internal views of how you communicate. Do you have a pattern of being upfront and transparent when issues arise? Because if you speaker-1: Right. speaker-0: When those issues arise, and I'll give you a general example. If you need information, you waited a month on it, and they just now found out about it. Well, the next time something happens and you try to communicate, you could reasonably expect resistance. speaker-1: Right, exactly. speaker-0: And now when you give them an answer, are they really listening to you? Which goes back to, are they really paying attention to what you're saying to them? Because it goes off of predictability, predictability of you as the leader. I know Patrick is going to give me information as soon as he can, possible. the next time there's a problem that arises in the organization, I'm looking at you as a leader and I'm like, I know I heard this, but Mork hasn't. He hasn't told us anything. He told us anything. But I it's all boiled down to I listen to you and I communicate back to you based on how I perceive your principles and ethics. speaker-1: Exactly. Right. Exactly. It's interesting that you mentioned that I was reading an article the other day from the folks at the Volcano Summit who do like one of the biggest tech conferences every year in Central America. It's the largest tech conference in Central America. It's like 4,000 attendees, VCs and family offices and top entrepreneurs from all over the place. And one of the gist of the article was around trust as a currency, right? And the fact that, you know, to your point, I mean, resilience comes to some extent as a byproduct of trust, right? If people trust their leader, they will be more resilient, right? They will be able to go the distance even when the distance is hard, right? But that trust has to be there. And so the actions that you take as a leader, that's going to tell the people whether you can be trusted or not, right? When I was at Google, we spent two years studying the highest performing teams across the company. because we wanted to try and understand, you know, what's the difference between, you know, a high performance team at Google and just a regular team at Google. And the same way that, you know, you guys have your top gun pilots and then you have other pilots, right? So what's the difference between the greatest of the greats and the others? And so we spent two years studying and it was like, you know, they released the findings in 2012 in this seminal work called Project Aristotle. I don't know if you ever came across this. Fascinating. it was like, basically found that there were five factors that differentiated the top teams from the others. And those five factors were basically one factor was impact. They knew what their impact was on the results of the organization, how they fit in. The second factor was meaning. They wanted to be part of an organization that had a greater goal or a greater reason for being. The third factor I think was dependability. They needed, you know, the high performance teams could be counted on even in extreme situations. People knew that They said they were going to do something that they would deliver. But the most important factor of the five was this thing called psychological safety. was like, it's similar to trust, but trust is between two people. Whereas psychological safety is more the space that I create on my team or in my unit or in my squadron. Right. It's, it's like, you know, I create this space where people feel safe asking a stupid question. speaker-0: Yes. Right. Yes. speaker-1: or they feel safe admitting that they made a mistake. And so it's when you want innovation and when you want people to move faster and you, you're asking people to step out of their comfort zone to do things that are hard or unlearn something that they've been used to doing the same way for years. You need to have that trust. need to have that aspect of psychological safety. speaker-0: Yes, I think we're just now talking about that topic enough. We're talking about that topic. We're talking about imposter syndrome now. Yeah. And I think when we talk about trust, everyone's going to say, here we go with trust. The question is, does your team really trust you? And you have to ask yourself, if I'm not willing to ask that question, then why am I not willing to ask that question? Am I fearful of the response that I'm gonna get that maybe someone's gonna say no, and that's for esteem. Well, you have to self-evaluate yourself, and I think that comes as a part of leadership. It's self-evaluation. Everyone wants that not there, hey, yes, I'm a good leader, I'm all this, but leadership is all about getting the feedback from people and asking them where they believe you standing, and in that moment, you have to stand in it. speaker-1: Exactly. true. speaker-0: not have a hear them and be quick to come back with a justification on why you did this. You have to really sit and hear it, take it and walk away to be able to come back because if you come back quickly, your team's gonna come across and say, this see, this is the reason why I don't try. He doesn't even. speaker-1: Exactly. Exactly. ⁓ my God. That's so, that's so true. That sounds like my ex-wife. speaker-0: I didn't speaker-1: He never listens! I keep talking and it goes in one ear and it comes out the other ear. speaker-0: So the thing about leadership and trust is you have to get the feedback and you have to sit in it and the hardest thing to do is not say a thing as a leader because again, it's your Reputations on the line and again job security. I got they're gonna think and everything I'm bad as a leader and this is something I learned a boss that I had years ago favorably I ever had she told me that Feedback is exactly that it's feedback It doesn't mean you're going to get terminated. doesn't mean in everything you're getting written up. It's just feedback. Guess what I did? I said, understood Roger that. And then came time for my feedback. And I'll never forget that she gave me four pages of feedback, front and back. I felt terrible. I felt the best boss ever. Because I started to learn that feedback was just feedback. speaker-1: That's generous. speaker-0: that you want to improve. So I think when it comes to trust, it is going in as that leader, no matter what, hear that feedback. You're not getting terminated. You're not getting, these are the people who work with you to accomplish a goal. So if you're not willing to hear what they have to say, then it goes back to what we were discussing earlier. Are you able to talk to them? Are you able to communicate with them? If your boss comes to you with an issue, are you able to discern and will they listen to you or will they be resistant because they're like, he's not transparent or she's not transparent. They don't listen to feedback. They don't listen to all these things. And again, what we're talking about here is leadership skills, not your ability to do your job. but to be able to communicate effectively. speaker-1: Exactly. Exactly. that's so, it's so true, Jermaine. mean, it's, you know, I have to, you know, was thinking about all your bonsai plants there in the background, right? And it's, and it's like, you know, I always think, you know, the importance of, of feedback to me is like feedback is to human beings. Like sunlight is to plants. If we don't get that feedback, we cannot grow. It is just not going to happen. And it's funny because it reminds me of like, you know, when I do, I do keynote speak, speaking all of the world on stage for a lot of different organizations. One of the things that always comes up is people always ask me what it was like to work at Google. And I have this story that I share with people about my first performance review at Google. And it was not bad, but it was like there were aspects of my leadership that were really not good. And one of them was like, I got this feedback from my team that I was just not good at asking questions and not good at... really listening to people. And even though it really stung, to your point, it was really painful. Your ego kind of takes a hit when you hear that. At the same time, I was like, well, thank God that we have the psychological safety on this team that people are willing to tell me that I'm a crappy listener, right? Because that's the only way I'm going to get better. So it's super interesting. And so to continue on that, in an organization like the US Air Force, I How do you go about building a culture and how do you train people to give more feedback and be okay getting tough feedback? How do you actually develop that skill? speaker-0: I in the Air Force, kind of tell you to do it, but I will tell you that when it comes to giving feedback, I think the first thing you have to do, and this is I've learned is when you go into an organization, the first two months, you don't change a thing. You don't do anything because you're being watched. And the first thing they want to do is they're going to say, here comes Jermaine. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: going to change it all over. And the thing is you have to build that trust and by building that trust means not doing anything for the first two months. And the reason why is because you don't know processes, you don't know people, you don't know team dynamics, you don't know. And I say this all the time, policy sometimes is guidance. And what policy affects a branch of an organization over here may still have that same policy, but there's certain nuances over here that's different locations. speaker-1: Right. speaker-0: cultures, everything else. So if you go in thinking that I'm just follow the posse, you don't know the dynamics. You don't know the underlying things that's going to happen. I think when you do that and you gently ease in, you're going to start building that trust. think the next thing in, and I truly believe in this is giving intent. That's how you build. The intent, not telling people what to do because again, we hired people because they proven. speaker-1: getting intense. speaker-0: and what's written on paper shows that they have the skills. I think how that feedback, it starts off with you. And it's telling people, hey, I'm gonna let you understand something that I will give you your far left and your far rights as far as what I'm looking for. I want this and it's gotta be within this timeframe. Again, I want it packaged up within a five PowerPoint slot. Notice that I didn't tell them half. Just deliver me and I told you your far left and rights. And I think a lot of people are going to have to adjust to that because they're used to being micromanaged. But how you build trust and start getting feedback is opening that psychological safety box and showing people, I do trust you. I trust you do your job until you prove to me you can. So how do I do that? I give an intent. I will only give you intent. Show me the how, how you arrived at it and show me the product. Well, I think there's some tweaks here, tweaks there. Roger that boss. But now I'm showing trust. Well, now when it comes time for feedbacks, they're more open. Boss, I think this is terrible. I think we need to work through this and go through there. I think that's an important piece. think another key piece of feedback is getting to a place where when they give you feedback, They see in everything that you're non-verbals, you're not angry because the first time that you say, I've got an open door, you can tell me anything. And then your demeanor changes, your behavior changes. It's now that barrier has been created and it's going to be hard to remove. And the next time something happens, you're going to say, well, why didn't you tell me? Well, you want me to be transparent? Of course I do. speaker-1: So true. speaker-0: Well, the last time I came and talked to you, you shut me down. You didn't do this. You didn't listen to everything else. So I think as a leader, it starts day one. You have to show trust that you trust them to do their job. If you truly gave them a clean slate, when you walk in as a new leader, then show that to them. But I think feedback has to start with your ability to take it yourself. speaker-1: Yeah. That's so true. mean, people always model the behavior that they see from their leaders, right? So if they give feedback to a leader and he or she ignores it or pretends that they get it and then doesn't do anything with it, that sends them a very clear message. There is a breach of trust there, but they also, you know, they will model that. If they see that the leader is open, that the leader is asking for feedback, that the leader is acting on that feedback, that builds the trust of the psychological safety and that also models the behavior. I wanted to switch ⁓ talks for a second because I think one of things that you've mentioned several times in the course of our conversation today is you go back to this topic of culture. And obviously, you know, when you look at, you know, the Air Force, I mean, that is a venerable institution that's been around a long time, very strong culture. One of the biggest challenges that I see in organizations, particularly, you know, some of the like scale up tech. companies that I see that I work with, you know, that go from like five guys in a garage all of a sudden, 200 people in a year is, know, they often gloss over this culture thing, right? They don't think about it. They don't build culture intentionally. So, you know, I want to understand from you, where does culture come from? Why is it important? And more importantly, what have you seen leaders do to actually build and strengthen culture. think that will be very important for our audience to hear. speaker-0: I think culture is your ability to trust the person on your left and your right. I think of course, underline that as your core values. And again, in the Air Force, it is integrity. Tell them the truth no matter what. Service before self. Others before you think of yourself. And then of course, excellence in all you do. Doing it the best you know how every single time. So if you want to build culture, be honest, be a friend, but do it in right way. And I'll tell you how you build culture. And usually you look at the leader, but I want to discuss the follower. Because in order to become a good leader, you gotta be a good follower. And a lot of people think they are good followers until you give certain circumstances. is, and again, transparency. Going inside your boss's office and you don't agree with his or her decision. Well, behind closed doors, you're free because I tend to believe that every teammate is an advisor to the boss. It doesn't matter what it is. You are the CEO, you're the supervisor of janitorial services. Well, you're the advisor to the CEO concerning janitorial service. You're an advisor. And I always say this, you are robbing as an advisor. You are not Batman. In other words, Batman makes the decisions. The robbing is the advisors. Well, your time to advise is behind closed doors. You tell your boss, This is the reason why you take emotion out of it and you bring facts to the table and you go back and forth. And let's say you gave the boss three different options, each one of those pros cons, what could happen with one, two and three? Well, you are bit out of shape. You want him or her to do number one. They decide to do number three. You argue back and forth. You open the door and when that door opens, it is we made the decision. That's how you build culture. We. made this decision. And what you tend to see is people say, I wanted us to do this, but the boss wanted to do that. You're not creating culture by dividing people. So there's a time and a place to let your concerns be known. But as the advisor, when you walk out of the door with your boss, we made this decision. This is how it's going to happen. That's how your boss starts to trust you to know that you're going to carry forward their intent. And that's entirety is doing the right thing, even when The decision that's made is not personally what you would have done. I think the second part of that building culture is service before self. And that is service before self. And again, we talked about this earlier, but it is making a decision that is greater for the team than it is for you. When you as a supervisor, when you as a manager are so concerned about how the decision will personally affect you instead of the team, you're not. culture. You're not creating a culture. Your team will want to know why was the decision made. Is an I in your response? Is a me in your response? Or is it I took these into consideration. I took what you guys worked your hours, your family, all of these things. And this is how we arrived at an answer. You're creating culture. The last piece is excellence in all you do. Now I'll be honest. Does everybody show up? giving 100 % every single day. Absolutely not. But do you give 1 % better every day? 1 % better. And I think excellence in all you do is showing up to work giving yourself 1 % better and doing 1 % more than what you did yesterday. Yesterday was you gave yourself, or you were 80%. Today, you better give 81 % and 82%. speaker-1: Right, exactly. speaker-0: And when you do that and this is you're giving 82 % to be able to help the person to your left or your right. Hey, do you need help on this? What can I take off your plate? Because I'm not doing nothing right now. I can do it. Hey boss, what's something that I can do for you? But your team member is doing the same thing for you. Hey, what can I take off your plate? I'm not doing anything. If you notice the psychological safety, it is reliance on each other. But I think as a leader, you have that responsibility to create that environment. And the question is, are you promoting integrity, honesty, caring, trust? Are you doing service before self? If the decisions you're making, you're putting your teammates first versus you and your promotability and your sustainment, it's the team. And then last, give them 1 % better than what you gave yesterday. You do those things, you're going to create a better environment than what you came into. speaker-1: Interesting, interesting. One of the favorite, one of my favorite sayings that I've heard and I was wondering what your thought on this was is that culture is what we tolerate as leaders. What are your thoughts on that? speaker-0: Culture is what we tolerate at leaders. I will, I agree, but I'll take it even further. Culture is what you tolerate, what you're willing to tolerate from bad team members that you wouldn't from good team members. I think it is in this shape or in this context. Do leaders have favorites? speaker-1: Alright. Correct point. speaker-0: Go to start that star player. can think of them in their head as you're listening to this podcast right now. Who's that superstar that I go out of office. I give them a task. Yeah, they're going to knock it out of the park. Don't worry. But that leader shows up late. What do you say? Don't let it happen again. The next time. Don't worry about it. Just don't let it happen again. What's interesting is the other teammates are seeing you do this. So the, now what does those team members do? speaker-1: Exactly. speaker-0: They don't say anything. They don't say a word. What they do is they take that card and they put it in their back pocket and they wait and they wait and they wait. And then the day that they come in, because they're not your superstar, you say, I cannot believe you're late. How dare you show up? You're getting written up. The first thing they're going to do is take out the card and say, but you didn't do that to that superstar. So, so true. So I think that culture is what you will tolerate versus no matter speaker-1: Sack them. speaker-0: who the person is because you're constantly being looked at is can you do the right thing even when no one's looking? Let's see your superstar or another team member. Is your goalpost moving depending on who it is? Or do you have those set standards no matter what? Because your superstars will understand the standards that you have and they won't be letting it. And your other team leaders, they will see that no matter what, he has standards. speaker-1: Exactly. speaker-0: So I think culture is what you allow and what the bad behavior that you allow within an organization. speaker-1: So that's That's very interesting. speaker-0: No matter what across the board, if you're my superstar, good for you. Don't be late. If you are an employee that's new to the organization, don't be late. Because again, what I'm trying to say in the standard is any boss would say this. Number one, be where you're supposed to be. Number two, don't make me look bad. Look bad is showing up late. Poor standards and work. Not crossing the T's and dying the I's on memorandums. At the end of the day, What standards are you creating in your section? Because, and I wrote a article on this, it's called The Law of Memorandum. It is, your personnel are gonna duplicate everything that you do. And the time you let people, or the people that show up late constantly, constantly, constantly, the people that cut corners, well, you saw them through your teammates. You didn't care, it didn't apply to you. The next thing you know, you get promoted. Now your name is on the door. They're going to do it. They're duplicating everything you did. If you showed up late, you showed up late. If you couldn't go on it. Why do you change now? Well, because now my name's on the door and now you're trying to change the culture. They're just duplicating what you did. So I think culture is setting standards, not being scared of maintaining those standards and being able to communicate the why and holding your superstars and everyone else. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: to the same stand. speaker-1: Exactly. think that's, I think that's really well put, Jermaine. think, you know, you have to kind of set standards and you have to hold everybody to the same standards. once you start making exceptions, your teammates immediately pick up on that. And that also causes like, you know, this cognitive dissonance on the team. It causes friction. know, people are like, well, why is that person being treated special? And I have to like toe the line all the time. You know, I had a, I had a situation, which I talked about in my book, which, which was very similar to like that, where I treated. you know, my best salesperson, you know, like a, golden child, right. And then he had like special exceptions, which other people didn't have. And it's interesting because it did cause issues. want to get back to, you know, one of the things that we talked to. speaker-0: Let me add this to it. Sure. As a professor in university, students talk to each other and the thing with the students is they evaluate the professors. So then there's something to learn. Well, the thing about it is if you, if they come to you for an exception of policy, knowing what the standard is and you crack it, you say, yes, they're just going to tell the other, other students. Now they're going to use that against you. Well, you let them do this. speaker-1: Exactly. speaker-0: The same thing happens in organizations. Yeah. speaker-1: You have to hold the line. And that's what's so hard, right? It's a, goes back to one of the things that you said earlier that I wanted to, I wanted to touch on before we wrap up today. It's, know, people always ask me like, you know, I do a fair amount of speaking for organizations and you know, so many organizations right now are going through periods of massive change, right? And oftentimes I get asked the question it's like, well, you know, how do we get people to change? Right. And some people say, Well, it's fear, you people are scared and you know, they, don't want to try this new tool because they, you know, they worry that it's going to take their job or they're worried that they're not going to do as well as they used to or whatever. And, and it's, it's interesting because the data, know, McKinsey published some information about this a few years ago. And they said that 70 % of organizations fail when it comes to making significant transformations. 70%. It's crazy. Massive data, right? And so one of things that people always ask is, well, why did they fail? speaker-0: That's crazy. Yes. speaker-1: And a lot of people often jump to the conclusion of, it's because people are too scared. So they don't make the changes. But actually some of the other data that we've seen is a bunch of people do actually start the process, but then they run out of gas. Right. It's, it's, it's like starting to run a marathon. Right. And you start and you know, the first couple of miles, you're all good. And then it gets harder and then it gets harder and then it gets harder. Right. And by the 20th or 30th mile, you're like running out of gas. And so I was wondering, you know, kind of in your experience, you know, when you're, when you're leading teams and people through periods of significant disruption and now, you know, with artificial intelligence and all that change started happening, we're changing the way we work. We're delegating work to, you know, to software eventually to, you know, to robots, robotics or whatever. Why do you think resilience matters so much? And what can we do in organizations to make people more resilient so that they can actually go the distance and finish the change that they started? speaker-0: think that the thing about resilience is no matter what, you still have to make a decision. And I think life, being in a leadership position, is all about making decisions. And I think that leaders have to understand that when your team brings to you different issues, different concerns, different problems, all of the options have legitimate downsides. Every single one of them has a downside. I think when it comes to resiliency, you have to understand that there's no correct answer. There's only a choice that you have to own. And I think when it comes to resiliency is understanding that as a leader, you have to own the decision that you make and you have to be able to communicate it in a way that produces value to your team and at a speed that if that's at a faster rate than at which the information can cause damage. And I think that you do that through experience, because being able to do all of these things that we talked today about in our podcast takes time. I don't expect a leader who just now took over being a vice president or director for them. first time in their career to understand how to discern strategic information down to the operational level or down to the operational to the frontline supervisor. It takes time to do these, but I think resiliency is practicing these things and understanding that every single option has its pros and cons. You just have to be able again to discern the information, be able to communicate the information. be able to show is valued to be team members, not to yourself. Again, it's service before self, it's them. And then being able to own that decision, that it is your decision to make. And then whether it's right or wrong or whatever, or as updates change, own it all the way through and be able to communicate why you made those decisions in the time. And that is resilience. Resiliency is something that there's no goal line, there's no finish line. It's consistent. speaker-1: Right exactly. D &D out. speaker-0: It's consistent, Patrick, and it's never ending. And I think sometimes people believe that leadership is a destination. It's not. Resiliency is not a destination. There's no end. I think resiliency comes down to ownership and understanding that it's tough. It's hard. But if you understand that there's no correct answer, you're going to be good. speaker-1: look at people within the organization that are able to start a change process, whatever that may, that might be, right? Maybe it's a, maybe it's a new job within USAF. Maybe it's a new process that they're implementing. Maybe it's a new technology that they're implementing. What characteristics of that person or persons makes the difference between a person that stays, stays the course and finishes the project, no matter how hard it is, and those who at some point quit or can't. speaker-0: So it was, it's interesting. Have you ever heard of a guy called Samuel Pue Point Langley? Samuel Pue Point Langley. You ever heard of an individual called or two individuals called the Wright brothers? Of course. Well, Samuel Pue Point Langley in 1908, he got $50,000 from the war department. speaker-1: Yeah, of course. speaker-0: to create the first plane. was all on the news, New York Post, everything else got to the Post. He said, hey, I'm going to be the first to do it. And he got the money in support. Well, the White Brothers, they report they just had their business. Whatever profit they made, they went into the plane, plane crashed. They started to do it over and over and over. And then finally, again, one day we all know they left off the field and they flew. But what's interesting about that story is Samuel Pugh Point Langley, once he found that out, he left. He quit, he walked away and you don't even know who he is to this day. Samuel P. Boyne Lincoln. And I think what you look for is when it gets tough and tough means answering all of my questions, trying to figure out the holes and saying, well, Jermaine is tough, it's hard. We're never going to get past that finish line. So you quit. I look for somebody who walks in positive every single day and... Again, it's given me that 1%. That understands that I'm the customer and the voice of the customer, whoever it is, they are going to be there no matter what. So I look for their energy. I look for their ability to keep their emotions in check, their frustrations. I look for their ability to, for attention to detail, crossing their T's and down their I's. I look for their ability to listen, to give me exactly what I'm looking for. And no matter how long it takes, they're saying, Germaine, I'm going to deliver the product that you wanted. Again, service before self that you want. And I think when we're within those people tend to falter. They become frustrated. They become aggravated. And the minute that I see that you're aggravated and I'm the customer, I no longer want to deal with you because. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: I can understand that you had issues with emotional intelligence and the ability to get the job done. speaker-1: One of the things that's interesting there, Germain, is one of the things that I've seen kind of like working with other organizations is that some of the folks who end up, I would say nearly all the folks that I met or worked with that were incredibly resilient, one of the characteristics that they had was their ability to ask for help. And from the outside, without knowing the culture of the armed forces, right? And again, probably different branch within the armed forces, you're in USAF, I'm sure the cultures are different. But you you always have this perception of the military as people who are, you know, very tough, very resilient, you know, go getters, kind of like grind through anything. Within the context of what you've seen, how important is it and how much of a difference maker is it for the people who are really successful in their career in USAF, their ability to ask for help versus those who are maybe too proud or those who think, well, you know, I should be able to grind through this because... I'm a four star general and I went to this school and I've been through, you know, whatever, Vietnam. How important is it, our ability to ask for help in terms of our ability to get through really challenging times. speaker-0: think you said their ability to ask for help. Humility. speaker-1: Yeah. speaker-0: their ability to aside their ego. I think at the same time is also their ability to say when they're wrong. speaker-1: Yep. So true. speaker-0: and to give information. I was in a meeting recently, it was earlier today, and the gentleman was asking or giving me some information. And I knew something in there was like, this information isn't right. Like this piece of information right here is not correct. And I, the response I think caught the gentleman off guard. And the response to me still wasn't right. And I was a little upset because I was like, it's not prepared. not ready to answer the questions that I have for him. And I can understand maybe intimidating the room and all in all of those aspects. But what really stood out was about 15 minutes later, I received a text message from him and he literally said, I was wrong in my response. I gave you the wrong information. I apologize. The correct information is X, Y, and Z. I apologize. I should have stated that towards the end. I didn't. But it didn't really matter in the timing. What really mattered to me is that they did it. He was able to set aside his ego, be humble, as the subject matter expert. And I think that's the problem that we have sometimes. As a subject matter expert, we don't want to see show a leader that were infallible, that were given wrong information. And it says a lot about an individual when they're able to follow up, say that they're wrong. speaker-1: Exactly. exactly speaker-0: that it was their fault and that it would happen again. And they work on that. I think I had a boss, it was funny. I was in charge of operations, I was younger and every single day, Patrick, every day, he threatened to fire me. Every single day, he threatened to me. And I remember he was getting ready to move on. Move on to a better job. And I asked him, said, boss, every single day you threatened to fire me. Every single day. And he stated this. And I said, I thought one day I was going to actually get first. He said, Jermaine, remember this. I just wanted to see if you cared enough not to make the same mistake again. So I think what we're looking for is humility in leaders. We're looking for if, will they give data that's incorrect? Will that beam for the architectural structure be out of standard? Will they be willing to walk in and say, this is wrong? We're going to correct it. This information I gave you, Patrick, was wrong. This is the correct information. And those individuals, I see time and time again rise to success. And I see the ones that really, that cannot do that. I see in everything the reputations affected, not just them, but the organization. Cause we know time and time again, it's not the individual we blame. We blame the organization. As it was in... organism and it has people in it. So I think for me it is I'm looking for individuals that admit mistakes, that do follow up, that are humble, admit mistakes and those are the people that you want around. speaker-1: That's great. That's great. I totally agree with you, Jermaine. think, you know, humility is an absolute... ⁓ differentiator, it's a major source of strength for leaders. It's a difference maker for leaders. think particularly in the age of artificial intelligence, we're moving so fast and we're like all drinking from a fire hose, all this new information, all these new techniques, all these new processes. Our ability to kind of like put our ego aside and learn new things and have to reinvent ourselves as technology changes, as everything changes is massive. So heading into the lightning round, have at the end of each show, have... three quick questions, three quick answers, and then we wrap up. So we're going to start you with our first lightning round question. Okay. And our first lightning round question is, if you had one superpower, what would it be? Wow. speaker-0: One super power, it will be this interesting. speaker-1: If you could choose one, what power would you choose? Time travel, huh? That's a cool speaker-0: through time. Be able to see how your decisions affect people for good. Be able to go back and maybe be able to change some things. speaker-1: Good? Very, very cool. Very cool. Question number two, if you could have dinner with anyone in history alive or dead, who would you choose? Okay. We've had that one a bunch of times actually. Yeah, I don't blame you. I'm a Christian. I'd be very curious. speaker-0: Funny Jesus Christ. and I wanna know. Let me know when coming back. speaker-1: And our last lightning round question, if you could give one piece of advice to a young person looking for a career of meaning and purpose, what would you tell them? speaker-0: that success doesn't happen overnight. Don't look at your parents or your mentors and think that they got where they are overnight. It took them decades to get where they are. And don't be unfair to yourself and try to judge where you are in life against them. You'll lose every single time. Go at your own pace, go at your own race, and make sure you have the right people around you. And one day you're gonna get there. and pass that information off to the next individual. speaker-1: Love that. you so much. It's been a great episode. I really appreciate your time. Really appreciate your thoughts on leadership, on humility, on feedback, on culture, on what it's like to work in the US Air Force. And to everyone listening, if they want to know more about you, about your work, about potentially a career in the USAF, can they speaker-0: Just, I'm very active on LinkedIn. Just reach out to me there, linkedin.com, or slash im, or slash dr. Jermaine, J-E-R-M-A-I-N-E, the K-I-N-G. And, and I talk to everyone who sends me an IM. So happy to talk to me. speaker-1: Fantastic. so for everyone listening, you know, if this made you rethink a little bit what leadership is becoming, subscribe to the channel, share it, you know, drops a comment, tell us a little bit what you think, what struggles you've had, what struggles you've had as a leader, as somebody who perhaps is an emerging leader. This has been another amazing episode of Work on Filter. Thank you again so much, Dr. Dureen. And we will catch you in the next episode and see you soon. speaker-0: Thank you. Thank you again. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Thanks. speaker-1: Sure, Rainn's been awesome.