Jocko Podcast - 395: Building a Powerful Culture Around Your Organization. With Leif Babin

Episode Date: July 19, 2023

Jocko and Leif recount lessons to help build a powerful culture around an organization or group.Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

This is Jocko podcast number 395 with Carrie Helton and me, Jocko Willink. Good evening, Carrie. Good evening, Carrie. Good evening. Good to be here. Echo, still not here. Still. I guess people are getting worried.

Look, not that they don't like Carrie Helton, but he's got that, you know, he's like the people's champion. Absolutely. They like the Echo Charles. Echo Charles, man of the people. And so they're kind of wondering where he's at. Don't worry, everybody. Echo will be back. He's on important strenuous business right now.

Important. Important. Strenuous business right now in Hawaii. In the meantime, let me tell you this. The colonel expected the highest level of discipline from his first of the 506 soldiers. He knew that slacking here, even when just going to the Chow Hall for lunch, could result in horrific wounds and death. Discipline in such a situation started with the little things, high and. tight haircuts a clean shave every day and uniforms maintained with that the more

important things fell into place body armor and helmets worn outdoors at all times and weapons cleaned and ready for use at a moment's notice discipline created vigilance and operational readiness which translated to high performance and success on the battlefield we sent task unit bruiser seals from Delta platoon to live and work out of Camp Corregador to train and combat advise Iraqi soldiers there and support the first of the 506 band of brothers. When the seal element arrived, they humbly took on the same habits as their first of the 506 hosts. Despite more relaxed grooming standards, seals typically enjoy elsewhere.

The seals at Camp Corregador cropped their hair short, shaved every day, and even donned the same ACU Army combat uniform camouflage of their arms. Army counterparts. And that right there is a little excerpt from a book called Extreme Ownership, which was written by Laif and me. That is from chapter four. Check your ego. And the reason we're pulling that quote today is not to talk about ego, well, at least not

initially, but more to talk about culture inside of an organization. The first of the 506 from the 101st Airborne is one of those units in the military that has an incredibly strong culture. When we work with them, you could absolutely recognize and feel the culture that they have. And there are a lot of military units that have a strong culture inside of their organization. And there's also civilian companies and businesses that have strong cultures inside of their organization. I know that in Tasking a Bruiser, we had a strong culture inside of Tasking a Bruiser. You could say the same thing that we've got at Eschelon Front. The Marine Corps, Kerry.

Yes, sir. How's the culture in the Marine Corps? Report. It is one of the strongest cultures I've ever experienced. I agree. I think that the Marine Corps has one of the strongest cultures in any organization in the world. I know that's a bold statement, but the Marine Corps has got an extremely strong culture. The SEAL team culture.

The SEAL teams actually has a very strong culture. Some of it good. Some of it not good. You could say the same thing about the Marine Corps as well. There's parts of any culture that can be negative. In the SEAL teams, we have some outstanding culture, and we also have some culture that hurts us. Sometimes they're similar, right? We don't have much doctrine in the SEAL team, the cultures that you can kind of figure it out, which is kind of good because it makes you very flexible.

But also, there's times when it'd be nice if you had some doctrine. There's a culture in the SEAL teams. of bending rules. Would you say that's an accurate statement, Leif? Definitely accurate. Now, when you went through buds, did you guys say, if you're not cheating, you're not trying?

Yes, that's a pretty common saying. And did your instructors reinforce that, or did they pull you back towards following the rules? I mean, if we're in like a Boku race and you got busted cheating, I mean, you paid the man for that, certainly. So I think there were folks who tried to push that, certainly. And, you know, I think, I would say my instructors largely tried to bash that out of us.

You know, like, hey, if you're cheating on this, you're not following the rules. I'm going to drop a hammer on you. And at the same time, you're only cheating yourself. Yeah, well, we definitely got told you're only cheating yourself. The thing is, and I think I talked about this with Ben Milligan, for sure, talking about from his book By Water Beneath the Wall's Worst title ever, Ben.

Awesome book, though. Probably one of the best, it actually is the best historic book about the seal teams, but the title, which I've been harassing Ben about since I met him, and I actually harassed him about the title of each and every chapter

that he's got, which is long, but what an incredible writer and what an incredible job he did on that. But that's one of those things where you can see where the culture comes from. And if you think about what your overall strategic goal as a special operations warrior is, we're gonna figure out a way to cheat against the enemy, right?

Like you wanna be able to sneak up on the enemy, catch him when he's not looking, suck or punch him, deceive him in any way possible. Never, never fight fair. Right, never fight fair. These are all attitudes that make sense, they're part of our culture. And you can see where if you're looking, if you're actually looking for guys that have that kind of attitude, there's some, you know, you're borderline, your borderline or you're brushing up against a criminal mindset, right?

Which is I'll break rules. I don't care. And you kind of need some of that. In a seal platoon, if you have, if every single person is a rule follower, you're not going to be, you're not going to be able to do your job at the highest level because everyone's going to look at it. problem and they're only going to solve that problem within the rule set whatever that rule set might be maybe it's just the doctrine but there but if you have someone that says hey we wouldn't need to follow these freaking rules which you you are going to have in a sealable platoon at least at least three guys that are like why would we do it like that let's do it this way let's cut this corner let's figure out how to do this let's trick them let's deceive them

they're going to cheat so that's the type of thing where it's really good for your culture that being If you have a guy that now is supposed to be following the rules of a city or a state, and he decides, look, I don't have to follow the rules. I'm a special operations dude. So I'm looking at how I can get away from these rules. That culture needs to be reined in, and you need to really kind of put some guardrails up around your culture. Same thing with the Marine Corps. I mean, can you imagine the Marine Corps of World War II?

You're like, hey, we want you to kill everybody, which is what they were doing. You're going into Iwo Jima. What are your rules? Kill everybody. Then the war ends and now all of a sudden you're in mainland China, Japan and you're doing basically security force operations, which you know you can read about in Eugene Sledge, China Marine. That's like you got to you got to be able to just pull that culture back from killing everyone to being a diplomat, a warrior diplomat. So things are good things are bad. This is the culture the culture what I'm saying is actually is the culture will be strong Culture is strong and if you don't have control over the culture it can it can definitely cause problems

You know throughout the book about face Hackworth he he continually refers back to This unit that he worked with early in his early in his career and he says this in about face for the next four years I learned my trade one year with the recon company of the tank battalion in the Po Valley and three more with Trieste United States troop trust the illustrious unit whose 5,000 handpicked members Walter Wichel called quote the chrome plated soldiers of Europe and quote we worked hard during those years long merciless days of training repeating repeating repeat repeating, repeating until we got it right. Our transformation into soldiers inspired and monitored by those battle savvy NCOs who well knew that discipline and tactical proficiency on the battlefield were direct results of discipline and combat skills instilled on the parade and training grounds.

At night it was down on our hands and knees, all of us hand waxing the barracks floors until we had enough money to chip in and buy a buffer. You could eat off those floors, just as you could almost be blinded by the brass belt buckles and brown boots that each of us wore polished every night to a dazzling finish the only way out of these activities was sick call but rarely was it used as as an excuse it took as much effort to see the dock you had to strip your bed cram your perfectly pressed clothes into a duffel bag see the supply sergeant then the first sergeant not to mention the lion's share of the month's pay you'd spend having to re having clothes repressed when you came back as it did to continue on with a normal routine punishment was meted out by a process known as NCO justice and if I ever create another hardcore band I might call it NCO justice For crimes such as a uniform of less than starched perfection a bed that didn't bounce a quarter or even a mildly insubordinate smirk the sentence could the sentence could range from 50 push-ups to double-time Double-time around the parade field holding a 9.5 pound m1 rifle over your head yelling I'm a shit head I'm a shit head I'm a shit

head until you collapsed. General of the Army George Catlett Marshall once said, Moral is a state of mind. It is steadfastness and courage and hope, confidence and zeal and loyalty, espri decor and determination. Morale, he said, is staying power, the spirit which endures to the end, the will to win. These words could have been the motto of the 15th tank

And for that matter, all of trust, a command that really did live 20 regular army years behind the times. So you can see when you've got a unit like that, everybody, I mean, he was a private soldier at the time, you know, Hackworth, and he knew what he was doing. He knew what the standard was. He knew how he was supposed to act. That's a culture. And you get culture in the civilian sector, too. Tesla. What's the culture at Tesla? Dudes are sleeping on the floor, right? Like your work in 22-hour days. Remember when

Elon Musk went, bought Twitter? He and he got rid of what two-thirds of the staff, something like this? Two-thirds of the staff later. It might have even, but more, might have three-quarters of the employees. I think it was 80% of employees. Yeah, so he was getting rid of people. And then I remember seeing a picture on Twitter and he had like this core group left and it was two o'clock in the morning and they were grinding it out. And he was. was basically like yeah the culture just changed from and everyone the culture was remember that video that floated around some girl she was like did you know workday at Twitter and it was like her getting a cup of coffee then her sitting in a

lounger then her getting a massage then her like it was just this whole day of leisure basically and it was like oh I have a meeting now and then in the meeting they were you know laughing and joking around and then it goes to Musk and in two o'clock in the morning and they're all freaking grinding and eating like they're eating a midnight pizza so they can work more. There's a culture shift. The culture shift can happen, right? And he did that culture shift there with like a baseball bat.

Tesla, SpaceX, like that's what you hear about those places. You're going to get, if you want to go work there, you're going to get after it in a big way. That's the culture. Apple, you know, culture of innovation. So you end up with culture inside these organizations. and the culture that you have is just so so powerful the culture is going to be stronger than the leader over time but it's the leader that can set that culture in motion and yet and I've told many companies and organizations this who's responsible for culture inside of an organization everybody because if you

have the E5 mafia they can their culture can overpower the culture of the culture of the the boss the middle mid level managers if they've got like a strong culture within the mid-level managers they can overpower the more senior managers just their culture stronger if it's good that can be great if their culture is bad it can it it's going to be a problem so you know we were just thinking about what do we do with culture how do we set culture how do we make it happen how do you establish a good culture because ultimately and this is this is something we've been talking about at a restaurant front a lot is culture is the ultimate form of decentralized command and if

somebody is part of a culture a strong culture inside of an organization they know what they need to do they understand what the what the mission is and what they understand who they are what they're doing how they're doing it you understand all those things from culture which is which is a pretty crazy thing I wrote that down somewhere I wrote this earlier I took a note culture is who you are what you are what you do and how you do it I never thought of that before but I was trying to think of like what specifically is culture it's who you are it's what you are it's what you do and it's how you do it that's what

culture is it's those things right there again this is a my thought today maybe somebody will expand on it maybe I'm wrong but it seems like a pretty good pretty good thing right This is who we are. This is what we do. This is how we're doing it. That's a legit statement. Let's talk about it a little bit. How do you how do you how do you how do you establish culture and I think the number one thing number one thing out of the gate is set the example like what example are you setting we just talked about Elon Musk he's working at two o'clock in the morning alongside his people he's remember when he was some there was something wrong I think at Tesla or SpaceX and they were they had pictures of them.

He's just sleeping in his office on the floor. That's the culture. That's the culture that he said. We're going to work hard. So the culture that you set, the way that you act, the example that you fall under is the way it's going to be. So when I got to team one. Oh, you want to know when that was, Kerry? When was that?

Oh, that was broken a day. So when I got to team one, as a young kid, show up there. and the culture was so strong at CEL Team 1 and it was a culture of sort of extreme professionalism. Now, was it extreme professionalism compared to the Marine Corps? No, it was not. Was it extreme professionalism compared to the, kind of compared to the regular Navy?

It was like, yeah, we kind of were on board or could compete with the professionalism of the regular Navy And we certainly were more professional in our uniforms and haircuts and all that stuff was than say Team 5 down the street or Team 3 down the street as well. It was this was a well-known thing. You saw that when you got there. You saw like all the senior people, all the Chiefs and the Senior Chiefs, they all freaking look squared away. What was it like when you checked into Team 5, Leif? What do you have going on there?

which was what 19 was it 2000 and i checked in a silty five in august 2003 yeah so yeah so the culture look there's still some of the culture but as as admiral richards explained when he came on the podcast around 2000 they started an initiative which made all the teams pretty much have the same mission around the world back in the day the seat the teams all had their own, they were geographically assigned. So back in the day, I was at Seal Team 1 and our area of operations was Southeast Asia. Nam. Now it was 1990, which, you know, just didn't meant we were going to like Thailand.

And seal team three was Southwest Asia. So they had the desert. And then Seal Team 5 was, I guess, north east Asia because they were the cold weather, Korea guys and you all had different assignments and then you you got to like stay at a seal team for a long time like there was guys that were at seal team one that had been there for like 15 years 12 years it was no big deal for a guy to be at team one for 10 years you just oh yeah I'm a team one oh when did you get here like oh 1974 you're like pay that's awesome then they made so so you had the teams were

they were more separate. And because you could homestead at a team and those people that set the examples were there for a long period of time, the cultures at each one of the teams was very different. But when you got to Team 5, 2003, so that only happened in 2000,

and then it actually started to fully take place in 2001. So when you got to Team 5, Team 5 still had the reputation of like, hey, we're laid back. We're team guys. We don't really have to comply with. By laid back, I think, I mean, they were, team 5 certainly had the reputation of partying hard. And, I mean, working hard, but certainly playing hard and maybe playing harder than the other teams down the street. Originally, I had orders to seal Team 1 out of butts.

and or at least that was what I was going to get. And because of the rotation cycle, they rejected you. Exactly. I didn't make the cut. No, because of the rotation cycle, I was going to jump right into a platoon commander tour.

Yeah. Like I would have missed, and I was already a lieutenant. So I would have missed having an assistant platoon commander tour under my belt, which I didn't want to do. And luckily I had some friends that pulled some strings for me. And over Team 5,

they're like, yeah, come on over here. We'll get you and we'll plug you in it. So they were just starting their workup cycle. So as I showed up, the first guys were coming back from the Iraq War from Steel Team 5. They were just getting bad. And they got back September of 2003. I turned over with those guys. Which you turned over with.

Yeah. So that was, but there was still very much, there was, it was Stalog one. You know, it was the definitely like, it still kind of had that reputation, even though that was sort. It was certainly, it was definitely starting to dissipate a little bit. But then, you know, I think certainly there was some real pride in team five of like, hey, we get after on the battlefield. But there was definitely a reputation for, yeah, the squared away haircuts and uniforms, it was the opposite of that. Certainly. A lot of visors and cut up uniforms.

Yeah. However we can not look military was a one of my. One of my best friends that I checked did, that went through Buds with and then checked into team one with. and you know who he is. He's like just a complete, just like a Viking freaking warrior dude. That if you could, he's like, he's on the list. If you're going to war, he's on the list.

Like he's, he's on the list 100%. And everybody knows. Like he's just a savage. And we showed up and we were going on our first run at SEAL Team 1. And he came walking out with a visor on. And Master Chief, Master Chief, Master Chief Faculty walks up to And it's just like if I ever see you with a visor again, I'm sending you to the fleet I mean we just graduated buds bro. No, there was no in brief. It was like hey, we were doing

whatever it was the the coronado run. It's like a seven mile run. We roll out there first big run with the two know now you're at a team and we're all fired up and this this friend of mine rolls out with that visor on the green faded visor and master chief just walks over to him And it's like, if I receive with a visor again, I'm sending you to the fleet. And I was like, God, okay. So there you go. We also had this when you're, when you're, it's weird how you like what you just said, you're at team five and you're like, oh, this is our thing.

And you get told that and you're like, okay, that's, that's, you take on that, that culture, almost immediately. Like it's, you can watch it happen. Like that happened with my buddy. And I was like, okay, cool. Visors are lame. Visors are weak like that we don't wear those that was part of it. There was also this Some of the older guys would say team team one it's not just a number. It's an attitude

And you'd be like yo we're one we're one you know what next question of course we're one number one That's us. That's our attitude. We're number one and you hear that and you're 19 years old and you're like well obviously this is what we're doing you know this is what it's happening So that example that you see and when you're in a when you're part of an organization that's the number one thing you do that's the number one thing you do to start establishing culture is you have to set the example that you believe the culture should be and you know this is this is what I saw with um when I got to team one and even what you're saying like you got to team five and it was like things are a little bit loose we're going to work really hard but We're not getting dressed up. We don't have to do this dumb shit. We're not doing this chicken shit stuff.

We're freaking badass team guys. Okay, that's your attitude. That's what you're doing. So certainly setting the example is important. You got to remember that people are watching you. Establishing who you are. And there's a couple different ways to do that. You know, one of them clearly is the, is the one of the many, many, many, many, many things I stole from from Hackworth, which is naming, giving your, giving your team a name.

And I can't tell you how many construction companies I've worked with now and sales teams and they've taken this and they've named their sales team and they've named their their construction shift. Like that's, this is very common. And it freaking works. So Hackworth in the Korean War He took over Fox Trot or Fox Company changed to fighter company Gets to Vietnam Battalion Commander, he takes over the hopeless And changes it to the hardcore That and then you know when I took over tasking it Bravo

Which is a lame name but changed to bruiser and and it's funny because That's not an official thing. Oh, it wasn't an official thing but it sure is official now You know what I mean like? You can see it in, you know, when we talk to the people that are still in the seal teams, they talk about it. That's the way it is. That's what it was. Pretty deep.

Just established. What's funny about that? I was, I was just reviewing my copy of About Face, which is what you gave to me as tasking a bruiser, you know, when our separate ways, when we came back from Ramadi and, you know, in the fall 2006. And you didn't, like, you just handed me a copy. of it and I had you write in it and it just says to snow from J.K.O. And the end of the day it was like January, it's January 2007. So but what's awesome about that as I was reading through that book, that's the first

time that I even, I realized like, okay, where this thing came from, you know, is this, this new identity that Hackworth had given his units, you know, with the fighter company and the hardcore ricondos. I think it's And so at the time I remember when we're like We're asking a bruiser And it was

Do you see how Lave's voice changed When he said that He just stepped up next level But you said that and we're like I mean when I first heard that It was kind of like It wasn't even It wasn't like

People weren't like Oh oh we're just getting a bruise You know it was instantly You're like Tasking a bruiser Okay it gave us an identity And it was something that just instantly we stood apart from everybody else.

And I think it's the genius of that. It was something that at the time, like I didn't really give it a lot of thought. I was like, okay, cool, we're tasking a bruiser, like whatever, you know. But then as it very quickly became like, we're freaking tasking a bruiser. Like, oh, there's Tasking to Alfa,

they're asking to Charlie. We're tasking a bruiser. And you'd get like the skipper would be like, oh, the bruiser guys are gonna come down like that. They would say those kind of things. And you'd be like, yeah, exactly. The bruiser guys are coming down. That's what's happening.

I just thought of this going back to that example thing real quick. I remember talking to General Mukayama, and he's talking about how when Hackworth showed up, and I was asking like, oh, did you guys know who he was? He's like, yeah, everybody knew who he was. And then he says, yeah, he walks in, and he's like high and tight, high and tight haircut. His uniform is just impeccable.

He's got that look on his face. He's lean. He's strong. And you could just tell. And you're like, bro. And this is Hackworth. And the funny thing is, like, you look at pictures of Hackworth. He's a pretty slight dude, you know.

But he just presented himself in a way he set the example. He wasn't even in a battalion at that time. He was just set in that example. Well, that was pretty, you followed that model pretty well, man. Because when you came over being the Admiral's aide. And so we had all kind of formed up and been together for a couple weeks, you know. And, you know, Seth Stone and I, the Del particular about her, we're good. friends we've been through buds together like you know we we we we'd known each other you know for

for several years at that point and I was excited to work with Seth but we got long you know like our hair it wasn't that our hair was it like we had haircuts but we did we definitely didn't have shaved heads that's for sure and then you know when you showed up with this like just straight up axe murder or look but your uniform was immaculate squirt you know your your head was shaved and you just like glared at everyone and didn't really say anything and uh You know, and when we met you, you were like, I'm jaco, like squeezed our hand, you know, and, and didn't say anything. And it was, but it definitely set the tone right away of like, oh, this guy's squared away. Oh, this guy's got a shaved head.

This guy has a squared away uniform. And, and you never like, hey, this is what we're going to look like. But you, you certainly brought that example in. And then so when it became tasking a bruiser, it was, it immediately gave us, like, we're unique. We're unique. We're different for everybody else. We're different. And certainly that can be in a bad way, you know, if the culture went that direction.

But for us, it meant like, hey, we're going to, we're unique, we're special. Like, oh, it's, it's too hard for everybody else. Like, we're good. We're tasking a bruiser. We're going to work harder. We're going to come in early. We're going to stay late. We're going to make things happen.

You know, it's, and it just started to immediately establish that culture. And you, you live that. I mean, it was, I just remember you totally standing out from every, we had a formation behind SIL Team 3. So the whole team's formed up. The first time the team's actually getting together. People are coming in from different units. And I'd never seen you before.

I'd heard about you. And we certainly knew of your reputation. But you instantly looked different than every other seal back there just with a shaved head and squirt away uniform. And I was like, check. I can tell you, I was, when I was at SEAL Team 1, I put it in for the Seamen or Admiral package

and I didn't get picked up. And then the other there was a the first class got picked up and Shortly after they got picked up they went to OCS and then one of those Officers that was a seal an East Coast seal he went to OCS and he came out to the west coast to team one so now I'm gonna E5 at team one and this ensign shows up From the from the from the CMA Admiral program and I was looking at him going dude what is going on with this guy's freaking uniform? He looked at He looked 100% next level squared away. And I didn't know what was happening, but if you stood him, same thing.

Like if you put him in the line with 10 other officers, then you said, which one of these guys do you want to, you know, are you going to put your trust in? You'd be to look at him and you go, I think this guy over here. He looks freaking squared away. And then I went to officer candidate school. And that's where he learned to do that.

And the freaking uniform inspections are so psycho down there. Like you wear those shirt stay things. And did you wear shirt stays? Yeah. You wear these shirt stay things and you tuck everything in and everything's tight. And you've, it's ridiculous. But damn, you look freaking squared away. And then so anyways, that's where, that's where I definitely got at OCS.

And, you know, you, you went to, you probably got, you know, I guess you might have gotten some uniform inspections in buds, but those aren't real uniform inspections, at least in my opinion. Are you differing your opinion? Well, I mean, I had spent a lot of time having uniform inspections through four years of the Navy Academy. Well, that's what I was going to say. You were, you were, you did four years at the Naval Academy doing uniform inspections, but then you went to the fleet. Dude, you're out there and you're...

Our uniforms were immaculate at Buds, man. I'm talking like, like, boot shine, like totally pressed, like, you know, the grease uniforms. Yeah. And totally dialed. And I passed every single one of those, and I got hammered every single time because I was the class of YSC. Yeah, of course.

So one person fails, which they always do. Yeah. And I thought of a funny story, too. When I took over a platoon at Steel Team 7, the assistant platoon commander, so he was working for another guy, now he's working for me. And, you know, we're having, like, our first conversation.

And he's a great dude. But, you know, we don't know each other. So he's like, hey, is there anything on, you know, we're like wrapping up at the end of the, and at the end of our first day working together. And he's like, is there anything else I need to do? And I was like, yeah, go get a haircut. And he goes, I just got a haircut. And I said, like mine.

So he said, Roger that. Good times. I think what really stands out to me, though, is like, you know, not only did you, you demonstrated this through, through, but by setting the standard yourself, but he, what it started for me and what it started for Seth Stone, and I think for a lot of us in TASCIA BRU is what we thought was cool, you know, in the SEAL teams. Like at SEALT team, what I thought was cool is the guys that like,

yeah, man, that guy's kind of, like, hey, that guy's an awesome operator, you know. And but yeah, he might have got arrested on the weekends, but who cares? Like, he's, you know, he's an awesome operator. That's what you want to be. And who cares if his uniform's not squared away and his hair's messed up. Like, we kind of take pride in that. And I think what it started to do was, that the professionalism of like, oh, it's actually cool to be squared away.

It's actually cool to have a squared away looking uniform. It's actually cool to be the most squared away looking guy in the entire formation and have your head shaved and you stand out apart from everybody else. And so that started to kind of change my mind of, and I didn't even realize it at the time, you know, because we're just meeting you for the first time. And just FYI, everybody. This is not to say that you should not be freaking the, hardest operator that you can possibly be by all means this isn't like the because

there's dudes that are super admin freaking dorks garrison freaking warriors right that are super squared away but they suck as being seals so that's not what we're talking about at all no i'm saying what it was was we're talking about both we're talking about like hey we want to be they're not mutually exclusive at all we want and and i hadn't i didn't see it that way because it almost seemed cool to make it mutually exclusive instead of looking at it as like hey no we want to be the most awesome badass operators we can be on the battlefield and train ourselves for the worst case scenario and in garrison we want to be squared away we want to have shaved heads we want to have you know we want to we want to we want to be professional and we want to be as professional and squared

away so we can possibly be in both aren't aren't aren't aren't eras yeah it's a it's a definitely a different mindset but it's real easy to see it's really easy to see the difference and you take if you take people that aren't focused on that and look there's plenty of seals that that are freaking awesome, but they just didn't never focused on that. No one ever told them like, hey, I'm gonna send you to the fleet if you wear a visor. I got told that or my buddy got told that. It's like, so we were focused on that.

And then, you know, you start to just see it that way. And if you didn't get that, you wouldn't ever look at it. It's just one of those things. If you're not paying attention to it, you're not paying attention to it. So it's not like some other seal at Team 3 at the time was a bad person. They didn't even think about their uniform. They didn't even think about it. It wasn't even a thing.

They're like, oh, yeah, I put my boots on. Oh, it doesn't really matter what they look like. Or they're just not thinking about it at the time. But when you think about it and, you know, it's not like we're competing against the uniforms or the squared away uniforms of the Marine Corps because like they would win. Like you can't put, there's no seal platoon that could beat a Marine platoon in an inspection of any kind. Like, we just, it's just not possible.

But if you're even leaning in that direction, you could do pretty good again. against the other seal platoons, because that's just the bar's low. The bar's pretty low. That's like when, when seals have to do some kind of close order ceremonial drill, they do whatever they can to minimize it as much as possible.

Like, okay, everyone, we're gonna go out prior to and be standing in formation where we need to be. Cause if we have to march out there, it's gonna be a disaster. So we'll all just go out there and stand for an extra half an hour. So that way we don't have to march out there. Um, so there you go.

Establish who you are. The other thing I was going to say, and this is, this is a, there's a little bit of risk involved here. But coming up with some kind of values out of the gate, coming up with some kind of mantra out of the gate is something that you can do. And actually, I wish I had this stoner to this when stoner took over, uh, the task unit. And he didn't really I can't say and he would he would refuse to say that he took over tasking a bruiser because he's like we're not tasking a bruiser We're not because they split up a bunch of the guys and he really only had the remnants of tasking a bruiser So he just ended up taking over a position of being in a task unit But he wrote out like this is what we're doing

And he had it on his he had it pinned up and I was like freaking legit I quite frankly I think that my personality conveyed all that shit that he had written down. Like it just conveyed it. But when I saw that, I was like, it's freaking squared away, dude, nicely done. He had the, he had made little letterhead. You know, Stoner, he'd get all crazy. He'd made little, little task unit two, because I think they had changed to the number

system or something, task unit to, you know, whatever, values and focus. And then it said, you know, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do this. And it was like, we're going to train harder than anybody else. It's like all the normal stuff, but he had written it out so it made it perfectly clear. So that is something that you can do. The only risk of it is is if you roll into somewhere and now you're just from the top, creating values and imposing them on everybody. It's going to have a better, it's going to gain more traction if it evolves over time. if it comes more organically from the troops themselves.

And even Hackworth, you know, taken over the 439th, it was like, we're going to change small things. He changed little things at a time. He didn't go and like, here's the way it's going to be now. He, you know,

he did say like, okay, anything you can't freaking travel with in a rucksack, we're getting rid of it. They're like, what hell are you talking about? That was one step. And eventually,

it's like, yeah, we travel light. You know, so you got to think about that. You got to think to the extent of which you do that. And I would say probably a good compromise or a good move would be to set out some sort of minimum aspirational ideas. Like we're going to work hard.

Like something that people aren't really going to be able to argue with without being super detailed. Because even if I, you know, if I said, all right, listen, we're going to be, we're going to look squared away and inspection ready. I can't imagine. If I would have been my leading like idea, I wouldn't have liked me. You know what I mean? When I was in E5 would have been like this guy talking about dude We're freaking seals. We're operators like who cares what we look like so but if it would have said hey We're gonna work hard and we're gonna be exceptional at our jobs You're like I can get on board with that so I think if you're gonna set up some values like that out of the gate

Or some kind of a mantra and the mantra is another thing the mantra is something that can come it's better off coming organically And so you end up with something like BTF you know you end up with something like Semperfy you end up with never quit you end up with something that comes organically BTF's a good one like that was just Tony just started saying it But it became BTF BTF BTF BTF just yeah big big tough frog man meaning It's an act it's an adjective. Yeah, this guy's a big it's a noun this guy's a big tough frog man It's a it's a it's a verb we're gonna BTF It's a motivational champ, you know, BTF, BTCF.

So, but it just came organically, but and yet it answered so many questions. It was part of the culture because the culture is, hey guys, should we do another immediate action drill in the 120 degree heat or should we call it a day? We all know the answer that. The answer is BTF. The answer is just we know what we're doing. It's BTF. That's what we're going to do. Should we

Should I say that I'm hot right now And I and I and it's very sweaty And I and I feel like it's too warm out or should I just not say anything? It's like oh, I'm gonna be TF Should when I'm freezing cold say like hey guys I'm cold Can I get in the Humvee and and wait until we hit the target before I go outside or should I just beat? The answer is you're just gonna be TF But back to your

you know you're open discussion about like if you're not you're not trying and how that can become part of the culture I mean that was very prevalent when I joined the seal teams like people were debating about like you know the the the old school years you know from the 90s of like hey we're gonna do the you know we're gonna we're gonna drop you off for the 14 you know kilometer patrol in like hey we roll open vehicles now we don't need to do that stuff anymore and there was a real there was an attitude of some people in the teams that like, hey, we don't need to do that. Like, hey, you know what? Hey, we'll just, we'll just, we'll just have a, you know, we'll just virtually say we foot patrol did and

you'll drop us off at this point here and we'll go hit in 500 yards. We'll go hit the, so we'll cut down what should be a two and a half kilometer patrol into, you know, the last 500 meters. Or a 10 and a half kilometer patrol. Yeah. And so, and we weren't even doing that kind of stuff just because of the, the largely urban focus combat of Iraq. Um, I don't think I ever did a 10 and a half kilometer patrol in, but we were doing two or three kilometer patrols and over some rugged terrain, certainly. But guys were cutting that down to where they were like,

no, no, we're just gonna, we're just gonna. On the X. Yeah, we'll just, we'll just get dropped off right there. And it was, I think for, you know, BTF answered that to say like, hey, you don't foresee a situation where we might have to foot patrol. And ironically, it was, you know, you right away were like, there was no, you know, for you, for Tony, like for the culture in the task unit was like, hey, we're not going to, we're not

going to ask for breaks. Why? Because we may actually have to full patrol in. And ironically, when we deployed to Ramadi, it was so freaking dangerous to drive on these roads. I mean, 80% of US cash is being inflicted by IEDs or roadside bomb. So we would, we would drive to the nearest, you know, safest roads we could get to like the nearest combat outpost, the, and then we would foot patrol into these areas because you couldn't drive into them. So, so, so we would, We did a hell of a lot of foot patrol all the time, carrying a ton of weight on our backs. And if we hadn't have done that,

we wouldn't have been prepared for it. So, and in fact, even still, I don't think I was as prepared as I should have been because the first patrol I went out with the Marines was just kicked my ass on that patrol, trying to, you know, carry the gear I needed in water and ammo and stuff for 48 hours, you know, around Firecracker Circle up there with Lima Company 3-8 Marines.

So I think those, But that BTF mantra, you know, was like, yeah, we're not going to, we're not looking to cut corners. We're looking to train hard. We're looking to push the standards higher. And that was part of that unique identity of being, being tasking a bruiser. We're different than everybody else. We're not, we're going to push the standards harder. Oh, they, they, they wanted to get dropped up near the target.

We don't. We actually, can we get dropped off further away so that we can actually train ourselves and push ourselves harder? Dude, I went to a couple debriefs with trade at. So at the end of a training block, we would go to trade at and trade at would debrief the skipper and us on like performance. And but before that, we would debrief trade at on like how the training was and what, you know, what could be better and what could could be improved. And like I'd go in there. And unfortunately, like, especially one of the other tasks. units would be like there when they say well they'd give their feedback and it would be like

literally it would be you know there's no there's no Wi-Fi hot spot at the thing and we need better like access to hydration you know after our I ad drills and you know also we thought it was a little bit too strenuous to work late and then get our mission taskings early in the morning like They would unfortunately legitimately give those feedback points and they'd get to me and I'd be like it was outstanding. You know, it would everything that they complained about, they would maybe think I was going to double down. But I couldn't do that because I didn't feel that way at all. I felt like, yes, work us until late. We will get up early in the morning for mission tasking. Of course that's what we're going to do. So what's the correct answer? The correct answer is good to go. We're freaking good to go. But you did that from a detached position of like, what does that look like strategically? What does this look like strategically? And I think that to me was, you know, when I think about the culture of tasking a bruiser, you know, even the appearance, we were talking about uniforms and being squirt away,

that to me is like we took pride in, you know, seals take pride in wearing whatever kind of crazy uniforms. You've talked about it a ton on the podcast here. Hey, we're going to wear off the shelf camouflage. And some guys have woodland tops and desert bottoms on and I've always thought in the book in the book blood meridian They talk about the Comanches and the Comanches are out just like killing and stealing and and So Cormac McCarthy rest in peace He just just just passed away never got to talk to him but he's like describing them as they're approaching and it just it sounds like a seal to Like people are wearing like top hats and this guy's wearing like a dress and this guy's wearing like a vest and this guy's wearing a cowboy hat and they just all look freaking crazy and different and whenever I'd read that I'd be like that's basic seal of tune right there

Basically that's what you get you know like I'm gonna wear jeans I'm gonna wear a freaking whatever just just whatever random I got a got a new Cabela's you know Cammy shirt and plus I got some you know old Vietnam whatever and there's going down the list of what random stuff they're So yeah, it gets pretty wild. And that's it and that's we almost took we took pride in that as long as we're able to go and perform on the acts and you know accomplish our mission like who cares. In fact, you almost take pride in how crazy you look. So when you you approached us in tasking a bruiser about like about this issue and about like, hey, should we try to look uniform? And so in the, in and how that came about was like when you first kind of brought the subject up like, hey, let's all try to look uniform.

Seth Stoner, I thought you were totally insane. But I was like, this is totally crazy. You know, we are new guys at one platoon and, you know, under our belt. You know, as the platoon commanders know, but like there was massive pushback inside the platoon. Like, what do you mean we have to, I have to set up my op gear that looks like everybody else and Charlie Batoon has to look like dealt. What are you talking about?

This is insane. So we actually, we came to you. I remember this conversation, well, in your office, this is the, like during the workup cycle, we came to you in your office up there in the SEAL Team three headquarters with the little task in an office and we're like, hey, we both like had talked about it like, let's go set Jock straight. I mean, it wasn't, uh, it wasn't that we were going to come set you straight, but like, hey, let's go, let's go push back against you.

Yeah, we're going to push back. Obviously there's some things that I'm not worth standing up from my respect. This doesn't make sense. We're getting a lot of push back. So we think we're like, we're to take care of our team. And so we walk in there and talk to you about that and you're, you just ask us the question, you're like, how freaking cool would it be if we all look like stormtroopers? If everybody looks the same, everyone looks exactly the same.

And when you said that to me, I was like, that would be freaking cool. Yeah, especially it's like, hey, you know what the other task units look like, right? Yeah, you know how they all look all like a bunch of Comanchees running around? Yeah. Imagine if we all are completely uniformed. We all look the same like stormtroopers. That was pretty much how you said it. And what was interesting to me there is like in about a 30 second question that you asked.

And it wasn't you were like demanding that we do that. You simply asked us the question which allowed us to reveal the truth to ourselves. Stoner and I left there like, this is freaking awesome. We're all going to look the same. It's going to be different from everybody. And it gave us that unique culture. And when we put it out that way to the team, it wasn't like, hey, Jacko you know saying this it was like hey this is the way how awesome is this gonna be and it was and people took and ran with that it was it was outstanding yeah there was also

wanting to be able to PID and not wanting to be mistaken as a Mujahideen fighter is a huge part of that as well and also now that we're talking about uniforms I remember I think it was stoner that was wearing like one of those like Mujahideen scarfs what are those things called We're actually called the kaffia, but what do we call him a? Shamog. Shamag. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we get out to our desert training place and here comes stoner rolling up and he's got one of those things on. And I'm just like, I'm like, oh, are you moose?

And he's like, no. And I go, fuck you wearing that scarf for. He just like took it off and was like, chat. He took it off and never wore it again. And I think we all got the word on that too because no one in Taskinga Brewers are those things. But what was what really stood out to me on that is like it it made it cool like it made it cool to be like hey we want to look all the same because it's going to set us apart from everybody else. It's going to we're going to look professional and and it just like it was it was instantaneous for us to take that from like, hey, we think it's cool to all look different and do different stuff and it look like just a bunch of renegades out there that don't look military to like, hey, we actually look military.

Hey, we're part of a gang. This is what we are. So watch out. This is how we roll in Tastard Brouser. Now, we did take that to an excessive level when we spray painted Punisher Skulls on our, on every single vehicle. And who is who the general came out to see us. Was it? I think it was.

I think it was him. And you were like, take this off. No, it must have been earlier than General Brown because General Brown came out pretty late. I don't know who it was, but to me it was P-I-D. Like, it was P-I-D, you know, this is like not a good thing where you're rolling around and you're advertising like, hey, this is us, here's our mark. It did look cool, though.

It looked really cool. And there had been a lot of time and effort on, you know, every single, like, gun truck had the Punisher's skulls on them. So, but then we just put them on our uniform. Yeah, yeah. The stencil still came in handy. We took it off, we took it off helmets and we took it off the, uh, the humvees.

Yeah, it's freaking legit. And, you know, that's one of those things where, you know, as I'm, hey, so it looks, looks fine. I'm not worried about it. You know what I mean? It's like, it's one of those things. Where do you, where do you hold the line and where do you let it slide? And it's like, hey, man, we got a badass bunch of troopers here. And this is actually a uniform now, so we're going to roll with it.

And it's also a lot harder to. Identify like a vehicle. It's pretty obvious what that is I think though the questions we get from you know from from from leaders and we were just talking with a bunch of leaders up at the council about this You know about how you set culture for the team and You know we we had some some some leaders of some some fairly big construction companies up there that were Talking about like hey how do I get my people to have their job site squared away? You know or make sure they all have safety gear or to make sure that they're The trucks are cleaned out at the end of the day. And I was telling them about that.

We were using this as an example of like, you've got to make it cool. You got to make it cool. Hey, think about what everybody else looked like. The question you just asked, what does everybody else look like? You know, they've got stuff, you know, it's not squared away. They don't have, you know, they don't all look uniform. There's trash laying out on the job site. Wouldn't it be cool if, how badass would it be if you showed up on our job site

and it instantly looks different than everybody else? It instantly looks squared away. It instantly looks free. You're like, hey, these guys are professional. These guys are freaking awesome. And I think when you threw that out there, it just, it creates that culture where you don't have to go around and tell people to square their uniforms away because we're all doing it because, hey, you got to look like everybody else.

Why? Because it's important. We got to look professional so that we can go out on the battlefield and actually have an impact, close with and destroy the enemy. And we're going to do that all looking like a bunch of stormtroopers. They all look at the exact same. that I can go out there and have a huge impact. So I think that's as leaders trying to set culture for the team,

you've got to make that we're unique, we're special, we've got a different identity, we're going to outperform everybody else and that matters. And if you make that something cool that people are striving to do, then you've got a team of people that are holding themselves accountable and you've got that peer pressure to get squared away and get on board with the standard so that everybody goes out and kicks ass

and outperforms the other teams out there. Yeah, the gang polices itself. You know, once you have those standard set, the gang polices itself, they don't let no slack occur. Then when it comes to that, you know, the behavior of other people when you're trying to establish culture, establishing culture, that means you reward behavior that is within the culture and you punish or at least mitigate behavior that's not within the culture. So, you know, you use carrots and sticks, basically. And, you know, we prefer to use carrots, right? We prefer when somebody does something that's super squared away, that's what we prefer to focus on. We don't want to go like, oh, you're, you need to wear a different uniform.

Like you said, I didn't really do that. But the E5 Mafie would tighten some fools up. That's for sure. But just carrots and sticks. And so if you're in an organization and someone does something, they, you know, you have a, you're the, you're the, the, client the customer's always right great okay customers always right well when one of those cashiers goes out of his way to you know take care of a customer that was having an issue and they needed to help carrying stuff to the car so they locked up the register

and went carried the stuff to the car and took care of the customer and whatever like then you you reward that person and you tell that story so people understand that they will be rewarded for these behaviors that support our culture that we have and when someone does something stupid look and you got to be careful about making the example out of people and you don't necessarily have to name them, but if somebody does something that doesn't support the culture, then you call that out as well. And again, am I looking to call out individuals and make them look like idiots? No. But to say, hey, you know, this really negatively impacted our company because we had a bad Yelp review. Why did we get a bad Yelp review? Because we

treated a client, we treated a customer bad. And here's what happened. And now we got to go and we're going to give that person, you know, a gift certificate or whatever we're trying. But why are we doing that? Let's not let that happen. That's not what we do here. That's not who we are. That's not what we do. That's not who we are. That's not how we do it. You violated one of those, right? So think about rewarding the positive support to the culture and punishing or mitigating or calling out things that are not in support of the culture. I don't know if I mean, I'm trying to think about like I don't remember any like I guess there were some punishments, you know, meaded out for folks that got in trouble before we deployed. And there were some, there was some uniform inspections and things like that, and TAScan and Bruiser.

But that was minimal stuff. And none of that came from you. It came from the, you know, the NCOs that were trying to hold the line. And it was, uh, um, but I think for me, like there was a lot of, there was,

it was an opportunity to educate people about why this is important and how it's going to impact us. So like, so not knowing, do we have to look squared away. We actually have to treat the soldiers and Marines that we engage with with professionalism and respect. And if we don't do that, then we're actually going to, we're not going to actually go out and be able to operate in the battle space. They're going to assume we're unprofessional. They don't want us here.

And particularly, we had so many examples of special operations units that had treating them unprofessionally and caused some bad blood between, you know, conventional army and marine units and special operations units. So we had to overcome or actually digging ourselves out of a hole. And even just even walking up to a senior officer or NCO and just treating them professionally and talking to them and addressing them by their rank and, you know, it just that right away like immediately set us important. I think you did a great job of educating us about why, about why that's important and how that was going to impact our ability to go out on the battlefield and conduct operations and have an impact. Yeah, it might sound crazy. So if you're a civilian and you're listening to this, the way it works is you have geographic areas. And the geographic areas are controlled by conventional forces. So for instance, the city of Ramadi overall was controlled by an army colonel. And then it was broken up into smaller sectors that were controlled by either Marine Corps battalion commanders or army battalion commanders. And then those sectors were broken up into smaller pieces that were controlled by Army or Marine Corps company commanders They own that real estate. They literally own that real estate if you want to go into their real estate You have to ask them permission to go in you want to go to a party at their house

You've got to ask them you can't just barge in there you can't just go all on the seal I'm gonna go party in this house you can't do that It's their house. It's their land So you have to actually be invited or you have to ask permission. So if you act like an idiot or a jackass or an arrogant person, why would they let you in there? You're just going to cause problems. It's obvious. But if you show up and you're respectful and you treat them with respect and you listen to what they have to say and you talk about and explain to them what you're going to do at the party, how you can help the party, like, hey, I have the capability to set up a DJ booth and play music for the party.

can help out here. They're like, oh, okay, that sounds good. You seem like you, you just don't go in there and start kicking indoors and blasting music. Doesn't work that way. So, yes, we had to build good relationships. And yes, your mom taught you in fourth grade that you don't get a second chance to make a first impression. So what's the first impression of a battalion commander that's been in the army for 19 years, what's the first impression he gets from you? It's your uniform and it's your haircut and it's your shave. Period. End of story. Period. End of story. You can't help that. You cannot help that. Even though they might know that that stuff really doesn't matter. And we've all been taught this stuff. We've all been taught that no combat ready unit has ever passed inspection and

no inspection ready unit has ever passed combat. We all know Murphy's laws. We know those things. but there still is an inherent judgment that's going to take place when you show up. And if you show up looking like a jackass, you're going to get treated like a jackass. So be professional. And yes, that's what I explained to the guys. Like, hey, we've got to show these guys respect. And I also distinctly remember saying, listen, this company commander that you're about to go talk to has probably been in Iraq for 16 months right now. He's a company commander.

This is his second tour in Iraq and they're doing one year tours in the army. So that's who you're talking to. And by the way, you know, Lieutenant J.G. How long have you, how much time have you spent in Iraq? Four days. How many times have you shot your weapon? Zero. So these guys have been in serious combat for extended period of time and treat them that way. Give them some respect. I remember talking to main gun, Mike Bima, who was bull, bull, all company commander we worked super closely with from bravo he was the commander for bravo company for uh one three seven uh of the ready first brigade first armored division and uh i was like i had three combat appointed points to iraq i think i spent a total and uh he he spent 37 months in iraq well he had done i i i want to say and you can correct me if i'm wrong but his first deployment to iraq i want to say was 14 months And it was like, you know, 2000, it was fighting 14 months straight. Then he went home for a year, took over a company, and now he's back.

And he'd been there already, I think up in Tala far or something for already six months. So he'd already been in Iraq for 20 freaking months in a leadership position the whole time. So and then you talk about the battalion commanders. You know, you talk about those company commanders. You know, I remember going over to Corregor for the first time and I'm meeting the company commander of gunfighter and you know he's already like been there for five months and he's lost a dozen guys you know like these guys have been in serious sustained combat I mean I'm here to learn I'm here to support we're here to help you what do you how can we help you and it's it's

bizarre to think that that might slip by you but you know when you're in the single teams you kind of isolated you know you're you're you're in a little bit of a vacuum in the SEAL teams you even my first deployment was a little bit of a vacuum where we're living on our own little camp we don't have to leave our camp for anything we're basically going out and conducting operations wherever we wanted to all we would do is as I said earlier checking with the battle space commander we would leave go back it's just us debriefing like you get it then we go back we do we come back to America we do a workup by ourselves we do very little interoperability with other military

units and you just get a little bit isolated so if you on your second deployment and you roll to Ramadi and you're like kind of like I'm kind of a badass you know I've done 38 direct action missions it's like bro think about what these other guys have been through think about their perspective. There was a there was a seal I worked with who was rolling out with the Marine unit and kind of the latter part of the Fallujah the Fallujah battle and so he gets in the Humvee and there's a Marine man in the 50 gal and he was like he was like you know he was like have you had space and time this thing like he asked a question the other seals in the vehicle were like you know man you're you

know we got we got like a 30 minute class on how had a headspace and time of 50-count. Like, you're asking a Marine machine gunner if he knows how to headspace is down vehicle. Day 12 of the Battle of Fallujah. Yeah, that guy has done that thing 10,000 times. Like, he'll know more about that weapon you ever can even imagine. It's, it was, uh... He can headspace and time it with his pinky.

Exactly. Yeah, it was, uh, it was not a good look for the SEAL teams. That's a bummer. But the folks around him, I think, uh, administered some, some corrections. But, you know, the, back to the culture stuff, though, I want to make clear, man, like, You know, we wrote an extreme ownership chapter two. Like, it's not what you preach. It's what you tolerate.

So certainly if people aren't performing, you know, holding the standard or performing the way they should. Or, or then, yeah, you got to, you got to hold them account. We've got to make an example out of them. But you never, it wasn't, it wasn't like a, you know, this wasn't like you beating us down and saying like we need to be squared away. It's, you actually took extreme ownership of explaining, hey, I got to explain. to you why this is important. And I think for the leaders that are listening to this, when you want to build a culture of a high performance winning team, you don't go beat people down if they're not their job site isn't squared away or they're not looking. They're not

as professional as they should be on a call with a client. You actually need to take that as an opportunity to, you know, holding them accountable doesn't mean you just smash them over the head. It means that you take ownership of not explaining why this is important. So they understand how it's going to help them. If they fall short of those standards, it's going to hurt the mission. And it's ultimately going to hurt them. And back to the construction site example where, you know, when we're talking to leaders, then I will obviously if our job site doesn't look good, that's going to affect our ability to, you know, to win other bids, you know, for the for the next, next job. But the front line troopers don't, they don't see that. The guys that are out there working,

they don't see that. So you as a leader have to take ownership of educating. them, of training them, of helping them see why this is important, how it not only helps the overall mission, but connecting that threat of why back down to them and how it's going to create more opportunities for them to win the next bit if you have a square-away looking job site. So I think that's just an important point to make is this isn't beating people down. And I was never like, oh, if we don't do this, Joe's going to yell at us. You never yelled at us. You explained why it was important. And then you didn't have to explain anybody else because I was explaining why it was important to my team

and they're explaining to each other. Some new guy shows up that plugs in as an augmentee. We're letting him know like, hey, man, your uniform. He's looked like everybody else's. Here's how you set your gear up. Yeah. So explaining the why, always critical. And then it's also an alignment check.

Because if I say to Lafabin and Seth Stone, hey, we want to look squared away. The reason why we want to look squared away is because the Army and the Marine Corps owns the battle space and we want to do a lot of operations in their battle space. Therefore, we need their respect and trust and the first impression that we give them is our uniforms. Do you guys want to conduct a bunch of combat operations? The answer is 100%. Yes. So as long as we're aligned, you're like, oh, this is going to get us to conduct operations? Cool.

We're in. That's all it is. If I don't have a why, then all of a sudden you're like, well, why are we doing this? Well, because it looks better. That's not a reason. Or because I said so, that's not a reason. Or because, you know, even if I refer back to doctrine, which in this case is because that's the military uniform, even if I do that, it's not an answer. That's not a why.

You know, because the book says so is not an answer. Because I outrank you is not an answer. Because this is the way I've always done it is not an answer. None of those are answers. the why actually has to be a valid reason. And then it makes sense. And then you then I don't have to worry about it anymore. I don't have to worry about it anymore because you got it.

You understand. We're aligned. We want to go kill bad guys. This is going to help us go kill bad guys. Period. End the story. That whole thing I've talked about the Trump card. You have that Trump card of alignment.

It's like the Trump card of alignment. Do you not want to do missions? Because if you look like a jackass, you're not going to do missions. No, I definitely want to do missions. Cool. Don't look like a jackass. Make sense? Yes. There you go. Another thing for culture is history.

Like making sure people understand who you are where you came from, right? The who you are part also entails where you came from. Look, it was amazing to me that the other military units, the 137, you walk into the The 137, this is their temporary tactical operation center in Ramadi Iraq. It's a freaking crappy old dusty blown out building that they squared away and you walk in there and they've got their, they've got articles hanging on the wall from World War II that they went on deployment with to show what they did as a battalion in World War II. Same thing with the first of the 506 the three eight Marines they are saying this is who the battle streamers are there in combat with them That is a source of pride. It's a source of history and yes, it is a source of culture It allows you to see where you came from if you know where you came from this is like when people look up their

23 and me you ever seen that thing where The dude, like, looks at his readout, and he's got 0.002%, you know, Nordic Viking. And then they just show him in his front yard. He's got a broad sword and a Viking helmet, like, yeah. That's, it's actually the point is you can take that thing where you came from and you can transfer it into how you're going to behave right now. So when you know about these things, like, you know, when I got to SEAL Team 1, you walk into SEAL Team 1, the quarter deck back in the day. Medal of honor recipients there's Mikey Thornton that's that's the goal that's the that's the that's the that's the model that's what I'm going to be that's what I'm going to try and be I'm not

going to be that because I'm not definitely not going to be that but I'm going to try I know what the example is the example is you risk your life for your freaking teammate even when people are telling you he's dead you still do everything you can that's the example so that's the culture that's the seal that's part of the seal culture is you don't let your teammate down Mike Thornton that's the story Mike Thornton the the Vietnamese seals come back to him and say the lieutenant is dead he's dead we need to leave and Mike Thornton says negative I'm going to go get him and saves his life so what better example of you don't leave your teammate behind there you go that's it that's the culture

So when you have a company, when you have a business, where'd you come from? Who started the company? Why did they start it? What did they overcome? Did they make it through the Depression? Did they make it through? You know, what's interesting is nowadays, we talk to companies that made it through 2007, 2008, the economic downturn. They went through a war for them and they made it.

And that's part of their history. I worked with a company in Austria that was over 500 years old. They work with metal now, but back in the day, they made, they made armor. They made suits of armor. And now they make chains and cables. But they've been in business for over 500 years. There's some pride there, right? Like, you're doing something.

So if you want to establish a strong culture, then you need to figure out what's your history. And you don't need to be, you don't need to be like this, this ancient culture. company, that's a cool example of someone that's been around for 500 years, but it's also a cool example of someone that's formed in 2003 and they made it through the economic downturn and they kept people on board and they had to scrap and they had to take pay cuts and they had to furlough people, but they made it. That's part of the history. It's part of the story.

Tell people. So they know where they came from. If you know where you come from, it's an indication of how you should be acting. You always talk about propagate the story and I think it's a super powerful. powerful concept and always you know when I was teaching the junior officer training course you know when we got back from Ramonite I went to the to run that course for two years every single seal officer graduated from our training pipeline the mandatory reading for for all those those officers was was Bicillovacs UD T seal operations at Vietnam and then

the Naked Warriors about the underwater demolition teams in in World War II and I think there, that to me was like just giving, you know, and now obviously you could add by water beneath the walls, which is a fantastic book that captures so much of our history. I always felt like, one, if people understand that, they realize it's not, it's not just about them. It's about this legacy and heritage that we've inherited. So if you go out and get drunk on the weekends and, you know, and arrested and give the SEAL teams a bad name, it's not just about you or your platoon. are the current seal team you're part of, but the entire legacy that you're part of.

And I think it also, you know, it also just gives you, like, there's been so many incredible seals that contributed to this legacy. And particularly by water beneath the wall, some of those things that, you know, I've talked to Vietnam SEAL friends of mine

that were blown away by some of the history that they didn't even know about that they read in that book. And when you realize, like, these guys just, you know, went into China. and figured out like, hey, how can we, what can we do to actually go and attack the Japanese and offer a solution here to go and close with and destroy the enemy and, you know,

create this indigenous army running around. I mean, all, just some of those operations, I always found that to just be a fascinating way of giving people not only pride in their heritage and where they came from, but then how can I actually contribute to this? And then how could I make sure that I, I don't tarnessed. that legacy. The things that I do, you know, could contribute negatively and impact our, you know, our heritage. 100%. I mean, I've talked to young seals and, you know, I'll see young seals at, let's say on Memorial Day, see those guys young seals up at, up at Mikey's

grave, up at Mark's grave, up at Seth's grave, you know, and I'll talk to him and say, hey, you represent these guys now. Like, I don't, I'm retired. No one cares about me. You, you guys represent these guys that sacrificed their lives for their teammates, you represent them now. So what you do reflects on them. They're not here to, they're not here to do anything else. They made their sacrifice and now it's on you. So represent them well. That's absolutely true. Absolutely true. And yes, propagating the story is propagating this, making sure you remember that history And then when things occur, when you're inside of an organization, it's sort of like what I was saying earlier about rewarding, but not just reward. But how do you capture that information and let people know what you're doing inside the organization?

Because culture is for internal, right? And look, culture will bleed over and people on the outside of the organization will see and they'll appreciate, hopefully, if you develop a good culture, they will understand the culture inside of your organization. but the focus for culture is inside the organization. So propagating the story and making sure that people inside the organization understand what we're creating that history right now. If you're part of this team, you're part of the history of this organization. If you're at Eschlam Front right now, you're part of the creation of the history of Eschlam Front right now. So what you do matters and what you do is going to leave a mark. And when you do something, when you get this client,

and you turn them around and they start outperforming anything that they've done in the past. That's part of the history of the company. You did that. That's you. You're part of it. So propagating that story is absolutely important. I was just thinking about this in the context of, you know, Tasking a Bruiser and our operations, Ramadi and, you know, for so long in, particularly in the Iraq War, right?

It was seals and other special operations used going out at nighttime doing these capture kill missions at nighttime coming back before the sun was up. And so that became like, oh, that's the special operations mission. And so we got some criticisms for going out and being out in the daytime because that's when the, that's when the enemy was actually moving around. That's when we were able to engage them. That's when we can engage the local populace, you know, as well. And that's we found that we could have the most impact on the battlefield.

We'd go in at nighttime, set up the sniper overwatches, but remain over day when the enemy was actually moving around and has. thought they had freedom of movement. And so that's when we could do the most damage to them and have the most impact. And it was interesting to me as, you know, as we received some of those criticisms because we were doing something

that was different from what a lot of the other special operations units were doing, it was very similar to underwater demolition teams in World War II, where they were doing these nighttime reconnaissance, beach reconnaissance. And then Draper Kaufman,

I think, was one of the, you know, the father of the underwater demolition teams. he came from the schoolhouse, and I think it was it, was it, was it Sipan, maybe it was his first, I think it might have been his first operations in, in the Pacific, as he left the schoolhouse to go out there.

It was either Guam or Sipan, I don't remember, I believe it was Sipan, but these huge operations, you know, to take these Japanese held islands back. And they're doing it in the daytime. And he was like, this is crazy. Like, how can we do this in the daytime,

you're going to get killed? And then the seals that are, or the, the frogmen, the underwater demolition team that had been conducting this, realized like, hey, we can go out and we can do this in the daytime. They almost, almost no casualties as a result of swimming off the beach. It was minimal, but they were able to do a much better job of the reconnaissance and come back. And then, interestingly enough, in Vietnam, it was the opposite.

So you didn't go out at nighttime. Charlie owned the night. And so you didn't go out at nighttime because Via Kong, we're going to ambush you and kill you. And so U.S. forces would just kind of hunker down, you know, overnight in their defensive perimeters. Well, Seals figured out, you know, pretty early in the war. Like, hey, we can go out at nighttime and actually have some impact. And so that seemed crazy to a lot of people.

But it was part of, I felt like we were part of that legacy and tasking a bruiser of like, hey, where can we have the most impact on the battlefield? Where can we contribute most to the mission? We were certainly take, are we taking some more risk to be out of the daytime? I'm sure. But there's ways of mitigating that risk. Which is exactly what we did just as the just as the frogmen did and just as the seals in Vietnam did Yeah, and I look at that as my fault and this is when we talk about propagating the story

I didn't do a good enough job of explaining broadly what we were doing but more important why we were doing it because You know when when we got back and I actually would sit down with someone and be like dude, why are you going on the daytime and I'd say oh here's the reasons and you go oh well we had to work with Iraqi troops Iraqi troops didn't have night vision Iraqi troops had one flashlight per four guys and we'd give them more but Even that wasn't really sufficient they didn't know how to use that one flashlight Yeah the enemy was only out the enemy didn't come out during the night at all which means you could go out walk around all you want But did you're not gonna have any impact because there's nothing there and once I kind of Oh and the the conventional forces that we're working with they had to push out and they had to control areas and you have to control areas Not just during the night you have to control them during the day too. That's why we did it and guys would go oh

okay, yeah, that makes sense. I didn't do a good job while we were on deployment or even when we got back of explaining what was going on what we were doing and most important, why we were doing it. I should have done a better job of that. And then some of the folks would have gone, oh, okay, I get it. And there was a couple times, like I had one friend that was in Baghdad and he emailed me like, dude, what are you guys doing? And I emailed him back like, hey, bro, let me explain it to you.

That should have been an indicator to me. but I didn't, you know, I didn't catch on that, oh, some people might be saying, what the hell are you doing? And again, too bad I wouldn't have read Ben Milligan's book because I probably, if he had written it faster or I guess he couldn't have written it at the time. But if that kind of book with that kind of information would have been around, I would have known, okay, I got to propagate this story a little bit better. I got to do a better job of explaining what's going on because otherwise people look

at it from a distance and they go, oh, that doesn't make any sense. Like you said just like they said to the the the frog men and just like they said to the seals in Vietnam like what are you doing going out at night? Charlie owns the night. No, we own the night and we owned the day in Ramadi as well like we owned it So yeah those are good points Language the language that you use creates a culture I'm gonna go to a little bit more about face right now Here we go the men of the 439th had no unit identity and no pride in themselves as a first step toward rectifying this I decided to call my hard luck

battalion the hardcore and the troops recondos the latter being part the latter being the nickname of the first brigade ninth division of which the 439th was apart just as I had in three in the 3 3 3 at Fort Lewis I insisted on a airborne all the way greeting between 439 soldiers and their officers so when he He was at the 3-3 and 4-Lewis, he would, the enlisted guys would say, airborne, and the officer would say all the way. When a soldier, but in the 439, when a soldier saluted an officer, he said, hardcore ricondo, sir. And when the officer responded, it was with a heartfelt, no fucking slack. At first, my cynical hippie-troops sniggered over what they considered G.I. Joe bullshit.

But it didn't matter. I knew the time would come when it would mean one hell of a lot to each and every one of them. So, the language that you use starts to form your culture. The BTF is a great example. All Navy all the time, remember saying that?

I did. I've had, and I always have this stuff in my platoons. Like, we'd have platoons, and we'd have these things that we'd start to say, and it would become part of the language, right and tight. Like, I was in a platoon at Team 2. We said right and tight

47 times a paragraph, you know, get your shit right and tight, boy, hey, is that the right and tight over there? Like, we just said it all the time. And guess what? When you're saying right and tight all the time, that is what you start to behave like. When you say, like I already explained about BTF. That's what we're doing. Are we complaining? No, we're BTFing. Are we taking the easy road? No, we're BTFing. Are we going to be soft? No, we're going to BTF. That's what we're doing. So the idea that the language that you use is going to also formulate your culture is absolutely true. I remember at first the 506th, like at the end of the meeting, the battalion commander would say, you'd say, Curry, and they'd all go, stands alone. Like, that was everything. And you're like, dude, this is awesome.

But just like he says, he's admitting. Hackworth is admitting. Like in the beginning I knew these guys were like this is freaking bullshit But after a little while you're like no fucking slack that becomes part of the way you function and operate That becomes part of the way you function and operate So the language that you choose to use and the language that you choose to propagate inside your organization It becomes the way you operate at Eshlam front Relationships are paramount this everybody says that relationships are paramount

What does that mean? That means relationships are paramount. That means if you're interacting with somebody and there's something straining the relationship, you're going to prioritize the relationship. That's what we're doing. That's how we operate. That's what we're doing. It becomes part of the culture.

So think about the language that you use inside your organization. I think it has massive impact. It's massive impact. As I read that statement for the first time in that copy of Aboutface that you gave me in January 2007, It really stood out to me because it's very much my experience in tasking a bruiser. You know, I'm sure there are people that are like, uh, that kind of rolled. Oh, no, there was definitely haters and friends. Like I, friends of mine at, at team three that were in other tasks you to be like, bro,

what's up with you guys, dude? I was like, hey, bro, you know, we're just BTFing. What can I tell you? They were like, like, making fun of us, jabbing at us. And at the same time kind of being like, damn, we're kind of cool. For sure, for sure. And I think that what's interesting, though, is I think a lot of the guys who might be, there was some complaining going on.

Hey, we're, you know, why are we working so much harder than everybody else? I didn't, you know, we're going in earlier. We're staying later. Even when the instructors had said, like, hey, you guys are good to go. I mean, I remember multiple times we were like, hey, you would just ask a question like, hey, do you think we're ready for the worst case scenario on the battlefield? And we look at each other and be like, let's do another run. You know, and we would do that where other other task units were not doing that.

And so that hadn't been people's experience previously. And so there was some complaining about that initially going on. Oh, we don't get enough sleep. We don't get to go out of town. You know, we don't get to do all these other things that they wanted to do. And the other task units are doing them. But the moment that like the moment that we started outperforming everybody, you know, as that outperformance became very apparent and those other guys were kind of looking in like,

hey, what are these guys doing over here? And the training, you know, detachment instructors are like, dang, man, you guys are the best task unit. I've seen come through here. You know, those, when we started to hear that kind of stuff, those complaints just, those complaints went away pretty quickly. Because people took pride in being a part of a unique unit that was able to outperform, you know, everybody else. I'm like, hey, we're bruiser. We do things different. We do things better.

And that translated directly on the battlefield. I mean, that turn, the turnover that we got of like, hey, Don't go into these areas of Vermont because you're all going to get killed. You know, and we're looking at how can we get in there? How can we actually get in these areas? Yeah, we don't all want to get killed. We're going to have to take some. We took tremendous steps that we could and to mitigate the risk to our forces.

But if we knew that if we went into some of these areas that nobody else could get into, that we could actually have some massive impact on the battlefield. And so we took pride and being able to go places that other people couldn't go. Yeah. Two things. Number one, this is our perspective, right? And here's why I want to point this out. You can hear what we're saying.

You can hear Leif saying like, dude, we were tasking a bruiser. We were better. We were working harder. That's our perspective. Look, were the other tasking is working hard? Hell yeah, they were. They were freaking getting after it. And let's say they were working harder than us, which they weren't.

But let's say they were. Let's say they were. Let's say they were. There was some other freaking, outstanding freaking dudes in those other task units, 100%. No doubt. Just freaking outstanding guys.

Even if they were working harder than us, guess what we thought. We were working harder. Like we were inside our world, we had a strong level of confidence that we were outworking and outperforming everybody else. So that's a positive thing.

What are we going to watch out for? And what did we watch out for? Freaking arrogance all the time. Like letting that task unit bruiser thing become a, hey, we're better than you is what you have to watch out for. Because if we're better than you and I think I'm better than you, that means I don't have to work as hard as you. That means I don't have to train as hard as you. That means we don't need to plan as much as you. That means we can just make things happen because we're a bruiser.

No, it's not like that. It's actually the opposite of that. It's we're tasking a bruiser, which means we have to work harder, which means we have to prepare more, which means we have to plan more, which means we have to do extra. It's because we're tasking a bruiser that we have to do more. It's not the opposite. So be careful and you know we were talking about this and I've actually used this I've been talking about this a bunch now this this idea of being in stressful situations and how you prepare for performance and how you got to prepare you plan you rehearse you visualize you for you you don't worry about things that you can't control and ultimately at the moment of just before the moment of execution you have to get a little bit cocky. You have to get a little bit cocky. You have to get a little bit cocky. And that's the way that I operate. It's the way I've always operated. As humble as I can possibly be until I put my night vision goggles on or until I lock and load my weapon.

Then watch out because I'm a bad motherfucker and I'm coming to get you and you're not going to be able to do anything to me. That's what's happening. Or like, jiu jihitsu, like I'm training my ass off. I'm training my ass off. When you look at me like, hey, let's roll and we clap hands, all of a sudden I'm going to get you. Like that's what's happening. I'm not nervous. I'm not scared.

Like, oh, what's going to happen? So having that humility that then you can lean into all right. It's go time and now we're confident and that's what you're doing. You used to do that with fighters. You get that fighter. You're getting them ready for a fight. They're getting their ass kicked in the beginning of training camp. You're making sure they're getting their ass kicked. You're making sure you're bringing in fresh people. They're kicking out. They're getting their ass kicked. They can't get up. They can't get off the ground. They're striking sucks. They're behind. And then as you get closer and closer, they're doing better and better. time you're a week out they're kicking your ass whether you whether they can or not honestly and I'm not sure I look I'm out of the business now I'm not training fighters anymore but you don't want to kick a guy's ass three days before he gets into the

cage against a world-class dude because his confidence not going to be there so you're gonna you're gonna let them build that confidence back up just like a dog you know a working dog when you have a working dog an attack dog an attack dog never loses a fight in training they never lose a fight they don't even understand what that means when that freaking benj belgian malmaw comes at you it is when it's coming to get you it has never lost a fight before ever it's coming it knows 100% in its mind it can win when you come to my house and i have odin my german shepherd that weighs 120 pounds he's never lost a fight before he's never had a bite that didn't take someone down and stop them he doesn't understand you have a gun a loud gun he

He's been through that where that's not going to stop him. He's heard that loud bang before. It's not going to stop him. So what you have to do is you have to be prepared to die because these animals, they've never lost. So as you're going through that mental cultural formation, you want to have them humble. You want to have them work. But then you also want to teach them, hey, look, we win. That's what we do.

Clutch time. We win. What happens when a player or an individual gets the reputation of like they're a go-to guy in the clutch snare? Michael Jordan. He's, oh, who are you going to give the ball to? You give it to Jordan. When he's feeling good, what are his chances? They go up astronomically.

When he's feeling bad or if he missed a couple shots and now his game is off like, I mean, Jordan's the wrong person to say this about because what Jordan does is, ah, I blew that one, but watch this. He'll refocus. He learned how to do that to go, oh, I blew a shot. Cool, watch this. We used to see this, you know, you can see somebody shooting headplates, right? Standard drill, you got to shoot six headplates. You're going against me against Laif.

So beep, the timer goes. I pull out my weapon, crack one, crack two, I miss a shot. I've been shooting headplates all day, and I've been shooting headplates for 15 years. I miss a shot. Oh, damn, I missed it. Oh, no, Laif's going to beat me. Miss another one, miss another one, miss another one. When you miss a shot, you got to just be like, whatever.

I meant to do that. Crack. So getting your culture to have that nice level of humility all the time, but then also being able to flip the switch and be able to execute as a team, extremely important. Extremely important. You actually want to have, you can actually work with a team where, you know, know like starting up the vehicles there's something about that I always found when

we'd say starting vehicles in three two one start them up and all the Humvees would start at the same time you knew at that moment in time you were an in sync organization that was about to go just do whatever we got to do to win because it everything everything for you've been running around you got planning you're doing this you're looking for your radio all this stuff is going on and then you get in the vehicles everyone's loaded up mount up mount up in three to one start them up and it's like a mental thing that's going on and everybody feels it so think about what you can do with your team

where you can activate their confidence where you can tell them it's go time you get done with a brief and what's the last thing you say to them that's going to get them in that mode where they're going to overcome that's what we do I think those things are directly related and I'm getting fired up and you're talking about starting the humbly I mean it's just that there's nothing like when you got a uniform group and everybody's in sync um you know and we talk about the dichotomy right of balancing confident but but not cocky you got to be confident but you can't be cocky and so when you're talking about uh whole you know like never getting arrogant and thinking like oh we're the best um I actually I think that what gives you the confidence to go and execute

when it's go time on a combat operation, and I've never, you know, I've never fought me UFC or been a professional MMA fighter, but I've got to imagine it's a similar deal, is that you have put in the work. You have challenged yourself, you know, and I think what made us good at Tasking a Bruiser was that we were, we would critique ourselves harder than anybody else.

And, you know, when I was used to the training instructors really picking us apart, you know, going through the workup cycle of like, yeah, you need to fix this, you need to fix this, you screw that up. They didn't have a lot to say when we were done debriefing ourselves because, you know, for the most part, because we were just eviscerate ourselves about all the things that we actually needed to work on. And so that was, that enabled us to push the standard. We're always looking to get better in everything that we did. And because, you know, that's why we talk about humility is the most important quality leader, constantly scrutinizing

ourselves about like, hey, are we actually ready for this worst case scenario? Can we actually get better? Can we improve? And because we pushed ourselves that hard and because we were humble, and because we put in the extra time and the extra work and the extra preparation, it gave us the confidence to go and execute in a way that I think those are directly related. So, you know, one of the things that really stands out to me is I mentioned earlier, like the training instructor said, you guys are the best task unit I've seen come through here. And so, You know, when you get assigned a training attachment, this is what, like a three-year tour, typically, two or three-year tour for most of these guys. So they've seen a bunch of different task units come through.

And I remember very mistaken, they say, don't ever say that again. Don't ever say that again, my guys. Yeah. And you didn't take that as like, oh, thank you for saying that. I appreciate it. You actually were upset because you knew that that's the kind of thing that would make us cocky, and now we think we're awesome. So we don't have to train hard. We don't actually have to push ourselves hard, which is then going to make sure that.

We get our, that's going to set us up for failure when it's time to actually roll out operations for real. And, uh, and so I think those things, the harder that you're pushing yourself in training, the harder that you're preparing, the more dis one that you have, um, you know, in those training procedures, it gives you the confidence to go and execute well. Yeah. Yeah. You can definitely set those things up properly where you can learn to flip that switch. You can learn to become a little bit cocky.

in just a moment before execution. And it's something that I, and when I remember telling you about it, oh, because I told you about it at Total Archery Challenge, right? Because here we are at Total Archer Challenge. I'm shooting my brand new bow, which, you know, you got to get used to a new bow, right? You got to get used to it. It's a little bit, you know, feels a little bit different. And so you're getting used to the new bow.

And this was only like my third time shooting it. Which is insane. Yeah. If you don't think about a total archie challenge, it's freaking awesome. It's an incredible experience. But it is, I mean, you're making a, the first, the first shot out of the pipe for us on day one, on the, the course that we shot was 117 yards. So, I mean, this is a, that is a, that's like a thousand yard rifle shot. Yeah.

And you're taking, you're going out of the pipe and you've only shot this bow just a couple of times. Now look, what, 20 yards? Yeah. And now look, Dudley, you know, this bill is bow is built by one of the premier guys in the world. So we're getting a high quality item. But still, it takes reps. And I'm not, you know, I've only been doing archery for five years. So I'm not like some stud at this stuff.

But I had just done this podcast with Echo on the underground talking about and someone had asked like, how do you handle, what do you do to get ready for stress? And I talked to this whole thing. You got to prepare. You go to and then I said, and you know what I do at the moment just before execution? I get a little bit cocky. And what made me think about that was like shooting headplates, you know, back in the day. You're going up like I would never be the best shot, but I might be like fourth in the platoon, you know, depending on the run.

Maybe I'd win one thing or two things, but I wasn't going to be like there's always going to be a guy that's just freaking awesome shot, right? But, you know, when I was, time to walk up, this is calling it competition. I just almost called it competition. But it is. You're like competing like okay you me Leif and I at that moment I'd be like cool I'm gonna kick your ass like Like a lief sucks like I'm gonna and that would just be that enough to be like just it's enough to let go of the The of the pressure and just like I got this so we're at total archery challenge and I had this in my head the whole time so every time and these are freaking

Stupid shots hundred yards freaking Freaking 70 what was that 73 yard freaking white rabbit like and you and me both hit that bad boy But like I'm walking up to the line like watch this like step aside and it really did help There's the best I've ever shot at tack and it's the least prepared I've been The Lee it was the least prepared I've been at tack and the and the best I've ever shot and it's because I consciously now was telling myself Watch this. Oh, you got this. I'm gonna smoke this thing Lief's gonna look like an idiot when I get done with this like What do you got? Dudley like just all this and you know what you can see Dudley do that too You can see Dudley has a little switch that flips where someone will talk shit to him and all of a sudden he looks like a little bit different and you're like oh

He's gonna murder this target I had a guy that was a I was on a ship with and You know I was a radio man this guy working radio in radio radio room and you know one we're talking because I'm building relationships. I'm talking about you said yeah, you know I played I played I play double A ball or triple A ball which one's higher He was like just underneath the major leagues and baseball I forget which one is triple A double a double but he was just underneath the major leagues in baseball.

And, you know, in the Navy, I don't know if it's like this in the Marine Corps, but in the Navy, every, just about every dude could have been, you know, a contender, you know, could have been a professional, could have, you know, had scholarships, but blah, blah, blah, blah. So I'm figuring he's one of these guys. And he's like, yeah, you know, he's like, I'm going to try again when I get back. I'm going to try and make another run at it. He's like, do you, can you catch for me?

And I was like, well, I was like, dude, I suck at baseball. But, you know, I got a buddy. And as a matter of fact, it's the same buddy. I was talking about earlier, the visor wearer. I was like, hey, one of my buddies is a sick athlete, and I'm sure he'd do it. And so he goes, yeah, meet me up, and I hooked them up. And the guy traveled with a catcher's mitt,

just so he could pitch because he's a pitcher. And so I walk up with my buddy because this guy's going to meet him on the flight deck and pitch to him. And dude, this guy's kind of a dorky-looking radio man like stuck inside all day, pale white. And he comes walking out, got like a baseball hat on and the fat dip in and he looked like a totally different person and

I was like oh this dude's this dude's a badass and sure enough like I couldn't have caught the pitches that he was throwing he's ripping those things at 90 miles an hour so that little bit of confidence at the moment of execution is a powerful thing and it lets you get into the mode of it I think it lets you let go of worry right because you're like oh what if I blow this shot again freaking Leif's gonna make fun in me and Dudley's gonna think I'm an idiot and the freaking photographers here like all that stuff could be going through your head

or you just be like are you filming because you're gonna want to catch this you know what I do? Here's a free lesson shooter McGavin's stuff yeah so that's a good thing and it doesn't just work for you yeah

you let me in on that little secret right after you made this ridiculous shot I think it was like a it was like an 84 yard bomb through like two trees and I think I just shalacked one of the trees and uh because everyone's like talking smack over my shoulder because that definitely gets in your head and you you got up there and there was smack talk coming to you too and you just you just slid it right in there and freaking nail the target and I was like that was a freaking money shot and you you said I got to let

you in a little sick and as I thought about that I'm like that's that's a really powerful thing because it really there there is something and when you're when you're when you're second guessing yourself at the moment of execution, it does not help you at all. Terrible. Second guessing yourself about whether or not you're fully prepared in the weeks and months up to something. Sure, that's great. Push yourself hard.

But in that moment of execution to be able to clear your mind and execute with confidence, I think it's a really powerful tactic to employ. And for instance, right now I could be like, yo, I shot so good at tack. You know, I'm freaking good to go. that's the disease of victory, right? That's like, oh, I'm good to go. That's what I, I will not do that. I'm going to shoot even harder than I ever have,

because these are sort of like my mom's getting ready for September right now. I could easily go, you know, I'm freaking kind of dialed this year. You know what I mean? It'd be so easy to do that. But then what will the results be? The results will be freaking a disaster on game day. So don't, you got to, once you switch that on, when you're done, Cool go back to just like we go on an operation we're confident going out there maybe even just borderline a little bit cocky

We get back what do we do what can we do better? What mistakes do we make? How can we improve? So you got to flip that switch a little bit of a little bit of confidence Up the confidence a little bit as soon as you get done go right back to where you were humble Start working I think this is the last thing I want to talk about when it comes to When it comes to culture and that is what I call material items and we've talked about it a little bit already these are like these are the t-shirts these are the patches these are the the the uniforms the material things that represent the culture and unify the culture and I got another piece in here from hackworth and you know this is a part of it's a part of about

face that I haven't talked about too much and this is when when hackworth is in Vietnam he stood up an element that was called the tigers and there's a bunch of controversy about them they ended up with like war crime charges after he left I haven't gone into much detail on my bottom but they're a huge part just it's just one of the many parts of about face that there's you know 850 pages in there and I just haven't covered it all in the podcast but in one of those things he talks about this this he was also very fond of snipers which is where I got all my fondness for snipers so he he had set up a sniper program in one of these battalion

He says this as with night hunter the daytime sniper program was tremendously successful the result of it all was that the snipers like the tigers before them in the one three two seven became my pets I called them my little babies and showered them with attention and recognition for their contribution to the battalion's efforts I even gave them their own uniforms camouflage tiger stripe with the added touch of black berets with a They read Recondo Patch sewed on. So what are you doing? Why is Hackworth doing this? Why didn't Laif in his little arguments to me with Seth when they'd go? Why didn't they pull it?

See, if I'd give them about face, they'd be like, hey, Jocko, Hackworth said Patch is good to go. I would have been like, you know, good point. Let's do it. But, you know, they didn't quite get there. But that's the thing. And, you know, we also write about, hey, it's not about what you hang on your wall. It's not about the PowerPoint that you make.

But you have to remember that these material things are not just words they can become part of your culture They can absolutely become part part of your culture so things like T-shirts things like baseball hats things like patches Things like coins I mean there's people that are obsessive with coins or with patches or with baseball hats or with t-shirts all these things and you can make them mean something you really can My kid, my son went to a camp. It doesn't exist anymore, unfortunately, because it was freaking outstanding.

J. Rob intensive wrestling camps. And at J. Robb, you would, the whole goal is to get this shirt. Get a T-shirt, a freaking T-shirt that says, I did it. That's what it says. You get a T-shirt that says, I did it. You're not guaranteed that T-shirt. And they have, they grade you the whole time. There's demer.

You get you have to you can't miss so so-and-so stuff like it's it's it's it's hard to get the shirt I don't know what the percentage is but it's you're not guaranteed the shirt at all My kid had a like a badly sprained ankle Going there and it didn't get any better while he's wrestling three times a day and doing conditioning So the last thing you have to do to get the shirt Was you have to do a 12-mile run and there's no time limit but you just got to complete it and so I was talking to him and his ankle's been hurting the whole time and he's been taping it up and everything and trying to push through and now he's got to do a 12 mile run on a bum ankle and I'm talking

to him at night and I said you know how are you doing and he said oh I'm doing okay and I said how's your ankle and he says oh it's hurt bad and I said what are you going to do and he said I'm going to tape it up so it can't move and I'm going to do that fucking run and sure enough he went out there you know, whatever, and knocked out that 12 miles on that, on that bad, bad, uh, leg. Why? Because he wanted that t-shirt. He wanted that t-shirt. And so what are you doing? What's your culture? What are you, what are you doing inside? I mean, think about getting a trident. Like, it may not seem like a big deal, you know, but when you were young, man, like that's a big deal. you get your trident?

Eagle Globe and anchor? Oh yeah. What's up with that, dude? Yeah. So all through boot camp, you can't wear the Marine Corps insignia on your uniform outside of the one that's stitched on the cover. And on graduation day of boot camp, your drill instructor hands you your first Eagle Globe and anchor that you can wear on your uniform.

And it's a big deal. Do they give that after the crucible now? I believe so. I think they've changed it up since. Because I seen a bunch of muddy d'clock. dudes with tears in their eyes. Get that EGA, boy. I'm not opposed to that.

The Crucible, I think, was a week or two before you graduate boot camp. So it's right there at the end of the line of training. So, you know, that seems appropriate to me, too. Plus the level of like just in the game you are after the Crucible, too, I can definitely see that. Yeah. Well, this is like, that's the call, right? Yeah. You get them.

You got them freaking. broken down, you got them fatigued, sleep deprivation, emotionally freaking at their lowest. And then you roll in it with that EGA and a hand salute. Bro. Yeah. You're ready to rock and roll. USMC. Semperfy.

I will say that at graduation, when I got mine, it was pretty powerful because you've got your platoon with you. You've got the people in the stands. You've got family there and stuff. And it's pretty powerful that way, too. I will say. Yeah. Yeah, pretty legit.

So, what are you doing? Are you making patches? Laif Bablin's over there making freaking patches for tasking the bruiser. I mean, I think if it means something, right? If they just handed you an Eagle Globe and anchor, it wouldn't really mean anything. But you know you actually,

hey, man, you went through the toughest boot camp, you know, of any U.S. military service. I think that's pretty generally widely accepted that Marine Corps boot camp sets the standard there. So it means something. But man, you go through buds, you know, and then SQT and graduate, get your try-tum. I mean, it took you a year and a half to get that thing, you know, with a 70, 80% attrition rate, like it means something. And I think that when you create something around that, it's part of that unique identity.

It's part of that unique culture. It gives you some idea of like, hey, we're different. We're separate. I think that's what it was for us for the patches, really. That's why we violated your order. There's not too many direct orders I've gotten from Jock. ever and they're certainly not not uh i don't recall any other time where i've directly violated order that you told me but when set and i came up you know with uh this idea of like hey we should

get some patches made you know when i threw it out there to him as an idea i didn't actually know what he was going to say i thought he might be like dude chalco said no man we can't do it you know and and it's and he was like dude we got to freaking do it and and we did it because you know if i think about i never really i didn't really give it a lot of thought at the time about dissect why that was important to us. But it was important to us because we knew that this was a unique and historic unit that we were a part of. We wanted to have that identity. We wanted to actually go have some impact on the battlefield.

You know, and I felt like a unit patch would be really important to that. So I think, you know, when you're thinking about building the culture of your team, you know, what are those things that you can do? We've seen some of our clients, you know, where they've got stickers for their hard hats, you know, that they're, and you got to earn that extreme ownership sticker. You got to earn that cover move sticker. You know, when you actually do something that sets a standard, it means something, and you get recognized in front of your peers and put something like that on your uniform. I think that gives, that just creates part of that culture so that people know this is what the standard is.

This is what good looks like. I want to aspire to actually get that. And I think it's a very powerful thing. I don't remember the exact quote by Napoleon. But he said something along the lines of, it's amazing what a man will do for a worthless piece of cloth. When he's talking about a ribbon that's being awarded to you, for your valor on the baffle,

you went and put your life on the line or even, maybe even gave your life, and you're getting recognized with this kind of worthless piece of cloth that actually costs nothing. And yet this is the public recognition of, hey, here's what I did to actually earn that thing. I want to earn that thing. I want to actually be special.

I want to be unique. I think there's something really powerful in that. Yeah. And this is the cool thing. You can create this. You can create these kind of things inside your organization. And all these things that we're talking about will help you create a culture, a strong culture. It will help define who you are, what you do, and how you do it.

And if you have a strong culture, it is one of the most powerful things. that you can have inside an organization. So build it and protect it. That's culture. Speaking of building, we're trying to build up, right? We're trying to get stronger. Always. Always trying to get stronger.

If you need to get stronger, you're gonna need the right fuel. We recommend use jaco fuel. Get yourself some mulk. Get yourself. Some energy drink. What flavor you got over their life? I got a little sour apple sniper right now.

Represent for JP to know. That's the, yeah, sour apple. I'm on the tactical tea train, which Kerry has entered the train. You're on board the train. I'm on board the train. What happened? So I've been going through kind of cycles. I was on the orange train for a long time.

And then I got on the pink mist train for a while. I can see that. Yeah. And now the wave is the, the 50-50 technical. Underrated, under-recognized. Under-recognized for sure.

Yeah. And it's because we made the flavors better. And like I loved the old one, but some people didn't love the old one. And maybe they shied away from it. But if you like, if you like that Arnold Palmer, and let's face it, bro,

let's face it on Arnold Palmer, whew, a good Arnold Palmer. It's summertime. I think that might be playing into it. It's July. Yeah. July we're going summertime Arnold Palmer salute to Arnold Palmer salute he was like hey

give me some tea put some lemonade in it that's what we're doing so good call but I said yeah that's what that's if I'm out when I'm drinking when I'm drinking that's what I'm drinking like if Leif's like hey let's go get crazy tonight I'm like cool I have an Arnold Palmer at the bar right tastes freaking good man actually what you normally order is iced tea unsweet and iced tea with a shot a little just a shot just a shot shot of lemonade I got to say though man the 50-50 tackle is tasty obviously citra psycho is my flavor and that's my go-to but I love to mix it up and uh it's uh that's that is a close second there I usually rotate between that fit the 50-50 tactile citra psycho and like pink pink mist yeah and the the deck savage is always good too these are all good

man and it's nice like you could probably figure out a rotation like working out where you're Like, look, tactical tea, tactical tea, tactical tea, tactical tea, tactical tea, tactical tea, Citra Psycho. Like, you can figure out a good rotation where you're just... In Texas, it's been freaking 100 degrees. So like the ice cold, 50-50 tactical is good. I tell you what else is good. Ice cold is the tropic thunder.

Yeah, it's really awesome. It's just freaking tasty. Yeah. So anyways, joccofuel.com, get yourself some mulk, some RTDs. God, those things are good. And they're, look, honestly, they're a little too convenient, right? They're a little too convenient because you got that RTD and you know you can get 30 grams of protein in 14 seconds. Just get jacked.

You're just, let's go. There's a little bit, when you have to work for it a little bit, when you got to get the shaker, you know, when you're doing that whole gig, maybe you, but when you got that 30, 30 grams at a cap twist, boom, it's going down the hatch. It's awesome, but it actually, I mean, man, if I've been trying to. tracking the macros and it's unless you're just going to eat freaking ground turkey and bison all the time like it's it's hard to hit that you know it's hard to hit that freaking 200 grams of protein uh and those RTDs are awesome for that just hammer one down post jujitsu roll or coming out of the um it almost the crossfit gym it almost feels like cheating you know because it's supposed to be harder to get protein yeah that's true right that's true meat mixing up the

milkshake it almost feels like it should be harder It's weird. Have you ever done? Because this is sort of become sort of protocol for me. Get done like on a Saturday Sunday, wake up, lift, run, come to Jiu-Jitsu. Go on the way to Jiu-Jitsu, which I know is technically cheating kind of, maybe a little bit. Get there, train, get done. Mulk cookie, mulk.

There's 44 grams of protein. Done. Like, we're done. And you know what's interesting about that is then you're, you feel full. You don't feel. And this is after a workout. out, run, and then jujitsu. Like, this is a lot of

energy expended, so you're going to be hungry, but you go and get that much protein in you, and you're like, oh, I'm good to go. Which means the afternoon, you're not like just food coma from a freaking slab of meat in a bunch, whatever. You know what I mean? That'll put you down. You'll be like, yo.

You're like Sunday after Saturday afternoon, Sunday afternoon. You got podcast to prep, and you're like looking at the freaking computer and it's certainly like the eyes are getting heavy because you just ate whatever a pound and a half of freaking meat no you're feeling you're just like light stomach boom 44 grams of protein good to go that's that's my recommendation that's my recommendation out there uh yeah joccofuel.com

go get it we got everything that you need you got joint warfare super krill vitamin d3 cold war dude time war time war I got being out on the road jocco live got a lot of reports on time war just that that redirection of life, that being on step, that I feel good now, which is a very broad statement to make. And I can attest to it. Like, oh, I feel good now. That's what I feel like.

So check it out. We got it for you there. Wawa, you can get it at vitamin shop, GNC. We're in the military commissaries. I was telling some military folks the other day, just grab one. We're going in the exchanges right now, like the NEX, which is a big deal.

Because I know all you freaking 24-year-old Marines, you're not shopping at the commissary. All you 18-year-old soldiers, you're not going to the commissary. That's too much planning. But you're definitely stopping by the exchange. You know, 21-year-old sailor coming back from a three-week exercise, you're not going to the commissary.

That's like a big deal, but you're going to the NEX. So we're in there. A-fees, Hanifer, dashed door. in Maryland Wake Fern shop right H-E-B how we represent in H-E-B represent strong in H-EB Tejas good times yeah like uh end caps and stuff like it's on so the reason it's on the reason that we're we're able to do that in H-E-B is because you all down there in Tejas are just getting after it so appreciate it same thing with Meyer up in the Midwest same thing like you guys are crushing it so that's a huge deal Harris Teeter another

one appreciate it lifetime fitness shields and and by the way small gyms out there jiu jitsu gyms crossfit gyms if you want to if you want your people to get better and give them every advantage you can email jf sales at joccofuel.com and we can we can hook you up you can start to sell stuff inside your store that's there you go joccofuel dot com check it out that's actually uh both still jiu jihitsu our jitza gym and well is crossfit second wave our crossbid gym they got it they got all the Jocko products right there. So you get done pre-workout, get jump on the train. So the molek train post-workout.

It's awesome. So we got this is Leif Babin protocol. You got CrossFit second wave, which is in Dripping Springs, Texas, right? That's where you're training your physical fitness. And then you've got stoic jiu-jitsu, which, by the way, we just did a podcast with Ryan Holiday. I didn't even mention Stowe. I talked to him about it, but it wasn't, we weren't recording.

Correct. this was after the podcast or we already wrapped it up so stoic jihitsu also in dripping springs is it in dripping springs? Yeah, and dripping springs So you can you can train that jihitsu You can train that crossfit

Go get a fram together Go get an Anna together Go get a grace together Go get one of those workouts Go get it And help yourself You know Lefhe I know you've gone through Some like injuries

For sure And you know you and I have talked about that And the attitude is when you hurt, when your back is hurt and you can't deadlift, the idea is, and I can't deadlift. The idea is I have to get back to deadlifting. When you hurt your shoulder, the idea is, oh, I can't do shoulder presses. The idea is I need to get back to shoulder. Get out the PVC. I'm no stranger. I was talking about this with Bert Soren. Like, I'll get out the PVC all day. Oh, I can't, I can't do an overhead press right now with any weight because my shoulder's

tweaked. Cool. Where's the PVC? I'm going to try and keep. that mobility up. And this is something that I need to focus on right now because my mobility right now sucks. And so I've been trying to open that game back up. Then it takes a while. You blow it off and I'm I'm the worst. I have the worst attitude. Stretching bores me. It makes me mad. I don't like it. I'd rather throw something, hit something, choke something. It's so far down on my list of pleasure in life. But it's what I need to do. So that's what you got to do. You got a little issue. Work through it do what you can and that's the cool thing about crossfit you can you can adapt to what's happening Oh, you can't do a heavy deadlift right now. Okay, that's cool. You can do burpees instead or you can't do an overhead press right now because your shoulders tweaked

That's okay do a one arm snatch with the other arm that's working So that's what you got to do you got to scale these things but the worst thing you can do is get off the bus and stay off the bus same thing with jiu jitsu same thing with jiu jitsu you Look, sometimes you got to get off the bus, right? You go on, I just did, it was two weeks ago. I was gone for like four straight weeks off the bus. Like I didn't train. I was on the road. I think I trained twice.

And then I came back and it was like I got back on a Friday night and I know what I was staring at because Saturday, you know what's on Saturday. So I'm like, okay, I see the bus and there's all kinds of reasons not to get it back on. Because, you know, you haven't been training and the guys are. already and you're freaking tired and you've been on the road and all these excuses to not get on the bus. I'm going to tell you right now, get on the freaking bus. Get back on the bus. Same thing with your whole workout program. Oh, you couldn't do something as you were tired. You were hurt. You were sick. You were hurt. Cool. Get back on the bus. Dude, my back's tweaked right now. Today I posted

dealing with it. I'm sure people have no idea what I'm talking about. You know what I did? It freaking did what I could. I couldn't do my normal workout, but I went in there and did what I could. That's what I'm going to do. And it's not like, I've got some major back. You've got a freaking little tweak. I'm not going to tweak it worse, but I'm not going to sit around and just let it freeze up and lock up and let the clock keep ticking. So that's what we're doing. What do you got?

And nobody cares. Nobody cares if you've not been on the bus. Nobody noticed. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's you in your brain thinking somebody cares about you not being on the bus. Yeah. Nobody even noticed, bro. Yeah.

Yeah, there's two ego things going on. Number one, oh, now I'm going to get tapped out by freaking. Fred because he's been I've been gone that's part of your ego the other part of your you think Fred cares you think that Fred's been watching and plotting on you she doesn't care Fred's worried about Fred and I'm worried about you so get back on the bus people that you know you mentioned me having a bunch of injuries and I think that's the the worst thing that you can do is the not not train I mean I think you know the do what you can like you were just talking about with with Peter T on the podcast that he was on with you I think that's you got to do what you

can and that's been something that's game-changer for me and it gets me back in the gym and if I got to scale it or I got to do something different to work out like cool no no big deal I got to tell you man to speaking of jaco fuel products though if if I'm you know if I'm hitting that krill oil you know or the joint warfare stuff that makes a massive difference I noticed that's so much when I'm off of it and it is something that just it enables me to keep going to get after it and and just to stay on the path that's that's been a huge a huge one yeah those those products you can those are some of our most highly subscribed actually joint warfare is our most subscribed product so people that just are going to

be they're on that they're on that train there's a reason for it it's exactly what you said when you go off of it you feel it so get on the bus get on jaco fuel let's go rock and roll also origin usa.com we're making stuff in america and this it was very interesting talking to Ryan holiday about this and what happened with American apparel. And, you know, he understood so clearly the idea of greenwashing. You know what green washing is? I know.

So greenwashing is, hey, we have a company. We make shirts. And we give 1% of our profit or 3% of our profit to environmental causes because we love the environment. And you go, oh, wow, that's really nice. Where do you make your shirts? And they're like, oh, we make them in China. We make them in Bangladesh, wherever.

We're at a place where there's no environmental protection whatsoever. That's what they're doing. So they destroy the environment and then throw a little 1% band-aid on it. It's called greenwashing. It's lies. That's what it is. And we're not doing that at Origin USA. And they do the same thing with their workers.

I read some freaking little little catalog, online catalog. And it was like, and our workers earn a fair wage. According to who? According to Mount Satan? Is that what we're doing? Is that who is according to? You know, a fair wage. Bullshit.

You're liars. And then you call and you try and make it sound like you're doing the right thing. You're not. You're full of shit. If you really truly, this is the facts, if they really truly wanted to do the right thing, if they really truly cared about the environment, if they really truly cared about people and workers, they would not manufacture that stuff overseas. Period.

end of story. Period. End of story. They would not do it. They don't give a shit and they try and make like they do. They're liars. We actually care about workers. We care about America.

We care about the security and national security in this country. And we care about the environment. That's why we make it 100% here in America. So go to origin USA.com and get workout gear. Get jiu-jitsu gear. Get hunt gear. Get blue jeans. Get rash guards.

T-shirts. Boots. Get what you need. But get it from a place that is actually backing up and doing what we talk about, not throwing 1% and virtue signaling that how great we are because they're full of shit. So that's origin USA.com. Go. It's national security, by the way. It's national security. You buy a pair of jeans.

You want to help? Oh, you want to protect freedom? Cool. Go buy a pair of jeans. That's not, that is not a stretch. That is a fact. You are helping the national security of this country. You're helping the freedom of this country.

You're helping people not be in slavery around the world. So origin USA.com go get some. Also, if you want to represent on the path, go to jocco store.com. Get yourself some discipline equals freedom gear. Check out that shirt locker subscription. We got a new shirt every month coming out with different layers. portrayed by Echo Charles. Those shirtlocker, those shirtlockers shirts are legit, man.

So those are awesome. And there's a little cultural activity going on there, right? There's a cultural activity. When I was at Jago Live and looked out and just see Sherlockers shirts, people representing on the path, that's what we're doing. And you know, you know you can't have that discipline equals freedom t-shirt and miss a workout. You know you can't do it because it's a little peer pressure from us, from all of us.

We're in the game. Get in the game. Jocco store.com. Go get it. Is this a material item? It's a material item 100%. Reenforce the culture. Yeah.

Reinforce the culture. Yeah. Bond with your teammates. What team are you on? We're on the get after it team. Defcore. Yes. We're on the DefCore team.

What team are you on? By the way. Are you on the Slack team? Is that the team you're on? Because we're over here on the DefCore team. Get in the game. JoccoStore.com. Subscribe to the podcast.

Subscribe to Jocko Underground. Undergone.com. Subscribe to the YouTube. We got Eschlam Front YouTube channel. We've got Jocko podcast YouTube channel. We got Jocko Fuel YouTube channel. We got Origin USA YouTube channel. They're all different stuff.

You want to know what's going on inside of these various worlds. Check them out. Flipsidecanvass.com. Dakota Meyer. He's making cool stuff to hang on your wall. He's making material items to hang on your wall to keep you on the freaking path. We got a bunch of books. You know them all.

If you need books, get them. And get those kid books. Get the books for the kids. I signed so many kids books at Jocko Live. And there was probably, I don't know, maybe a total of 20 warrior kids. A ton of warrior kids. That showed up, asked questions, freaking legit, outstanding. You can tell that these kids are going to do better in life because they are on the warrior kid path.

100%. I guarantee it. I guarantee it. So get those books for your kids. kids, Hackworth, we read a little extreme ownership today, dichotomy leadership. You know the books, go get them. Ashland Front, we have a leadership consultancy. We solve problems through leadership.

That's what we do. We go inside your organization. We can help you build culture. We can help align your leadership. We can help solve whatever problems you have. Hey, what am I talking about? What do you mean, Jocker? You can solve whatever problems we have.

How can you do that? We can do that through leadership. Because whatever problems you have, it's a leadership problem. So go to eschlamfront.com if you need our help in whatever organization you're in and whatever problems you're having. Also, we have live events. Next one, uh, we have the muster in Dallas, but it's sold out.

Yes, sir. We just posted. It's sold out. So Dallas muster. Next one's gonna be in San Diego, right? Daigo, we're coming back to the to Jocco's A.O. My area of operations. If you wanna come to one of those musters,

Check it out Eschlonfront.com We also have the FTX JP's running a bunch of those Back to Back down in Texas We have Battlefield coming up I think it's sold out You can check

There might be a couple spots left For a little big horn Checking out that battlefield A lot of lessons learned there A lot of lessons learned And then also we have the women's assembly We got Jamie Cochran The CFO of Eshalom Front

She is running a women's assembly in September, September 14th through 16th in Phoenix, Arizona. And if you didn't hear her on the podcast, when she initially said she wanted to do this, I was like negative because the principles are the same. But what I realized, I looked at it from a jiu-jitsu perspective, and there have been many, many, many women over the years that didn't want to get on, they didn't connect with what that jiu-jitsu thing was. They didn't want to get on the freaking mats with Carrie Hilton or Jocco or Echo or Echo or Lai

that look like I don't know what's going on but I don't think that looks that's not that's not for me But that women's class also like okay I see that I see what's going on. Oh, there's something you can learn techniques. Okay and then once they come in the women's class then they start to understand Jitsu it opens the door next thing you know they're choking carry help yes sir that's what's going down So same thing here an opportunity to check these things out from Jamie Cochran's perspective She's an outstanding leader across the board in her own right so you can go learn from her and some of the other women on the echelon front team we also have an online training academy extreme ownership dot com these are skills leadership is a skill and it may not seem like it

and if you're it may not seem like it just like it may not seem like it may not seem like fighting as a skill like you think oh i can just when i see red no one can beat me no they can beat you a matter In fact, 140-pound dude that knows Jiu-Jitsu can beat you. But I'm 210 pounds. Yep. Then you'll get beat. You'll get choked out. These are skills.

Leadership is a skill. And it's a skill that you use in everything that you do. It's a skill that you use, even if you're the lowest-ranking person in your organization, you're still in a leadership position because you have to interact with your peers and you have to lead your boss. And even if you're the lowest-ranking person in your organization, guess what you still have. A girlfriend, a boyfriend, a wife, a husband, a couple kids, a little league team, the parent teachers association, you're interacting with other people. That's what you're doing. And it is an actual skill to do that.

And if you don't have these skills, you don't know what you're doing. And you're going to get choked out by a 140 pound individual. Don't let it happen. We've got two new courses on there. What are they? back and the debrief with you and Carlos Mendez. Okay. There you go.

Two new courses. And listen, I said this on the last one. At a minimum, at a minimum, please, go and take the free courses that we've got on there. Go and take the extreme ownership framework. Go and take that course so you can understand. This is going to help in everything that you do, in everything that you do. This is like, I'm going to give you $6,000 cash right now. What if I was like, hey, Kerry, is it going to help you if I give you $6,000?

cash? Yes. Lay, can I give you $6,000 cash? Is that going to be helpful to you? Break it on. Is that going to help some part of your life? You go and take this free course. Just take $6,000 cash, put it in your pocket because that's what it's like.

All of a sudden, you're going to get help. You're going to be able to help with the things that you do. Your life is going to get a little bit better. It might even get a lot better. There's people that have, there's people that when they see extreme ownership and they actually comprehend it, there's people that it doesn't just change. their life a little bit it transforms their existence I just met 30 people like that during the live events 30 people that came up to me and in 28 seconds

said that this information transformed their life transformed the way that they are living their life they got promoted they kept their marriage together they got a better relationship with their kid on and on and on and on so at a minimum just go take those free classes they're on there please I'm giving it to you. Please take it. Don't want anything else from you. Just go take that because it's going to make your life better.

Extremeownership.com. Go check it out. I think one thing I love so much about the Extreme Worship Academy, these online courses, they're interactive, you know, and they dive so deep into these principles. People, you know, love Extreme Ownership and these concepts that are in there. And yet we break down each chapter, you know, with a course there and all the other courses that come about, the debrief course,

you know, and the relationships, course, all these other courses that the readback, the course that we released, it's breaking down some small detail that got mentioned in the book, but really expanded on that and going deep and then talking about how it applies in a real world scenario. And we do those role plays where we talk about what to do and what not to do, which is sometimes the most helpful thing to learn. So I think those courses are, I have been deeply impressed by the amount of information that can be conveyed and how you can actually test someone's knowledge about whether or not they

understand it, you know, through these courses. So definitely it is a massive resource. As you've said, it's probably the best kept secret we have at Eschlonfront, that Extreme Leadership Academy is, this is something that can absolutely change the game for you to help you understand these principles and how to apply them in your life. Yeah. Extreme Ownership.com. Go check it out.

That's all I'm saying. And if you want to help service members active and retired, you want to help their families You want to help Gold Star families. Check out Mark Lee's mom, Mama Lee. She's got an amazing charity organization. We know, like everyone at this table right now, Carrie, Laif, myself, we know personally people that have gone through Mom and Lee's programs

and it has transformed their lives. So if you want to help a veteran, go to America's mighty warriors.org. and donate or get involved however you can. And also don't forget about Micah Fink. He's up there with Heroes and Horses.org. What's the latest report? I believe Micah did a flying backflip off of a cliff edge

to spear a grizzly in the back of the neck to save a couple of children on the trail. Okay, so this is like a normal day for Micah Fink. He's just out there doing what he's doing. Seriously, he's up there taking our veterans and first responders up into the wilderness and they are reconnecting with their souls. It's an incredibly powerful thing. He's an incredible guy if you want to help him out, heroes and horses.org.

And if you want to connect with us on the interwebs, we're on there. Laif is on Twitter at Laif Babin. He's on the gram at Real Laf Babin. He missed out, huh? You blew it. You're a little late, a little late to the game on the gram. Actually, I think, I actually think that back in the day when, when you were viewing against social media and my wife, Jenna and our now CEO, Jamie Cochran, conspired to launch your, to launch your social media for you. And even though you're viewing against it, I think that there was one launch for me at that time on the gram as well.

And you lost it. Which now no one knows the login. So I'm real life babin. So you're at Real Lafabin on the gram. Are you on threads? I'm not. Okay. Carrie, speaking of late to the game.

Carrie with the underscore. This is like both you guys. That's like a, that's the red badge or the scarlet letter, right? The real Laf, real Lafabin? That's scarlet letter. underscore scarlet letter. I'm over here talking. shit. I am because guess what I got? At Jocco Willink. That's it. You can't even mess with me.

You can't mess with me. I got it. I was in the game and I wasn't even in the game yet. So there you go. How you like them apples underscore. I'm officially putting out the word at Kerry Hilton. I'm coming for you. So I'm not taking this from Jock. So do you think at Laif Babin actually exists? It does. Yeah. And you think you might have it. I got at Jocco Willink. You must have got Yeah, Leif Babin. I think it was launched at the exact same time, but it was, uh, it was too difficult to recover. Yeah. Uh, are you on threads?

Yes. Okay. So we got in the game, are you, are you underscore? Yes. It's connected to the Instagram profile. So you're connected to that underscore. That's got to be a bummer. It is kind of a bummer.

Yeah. Just always having to throw that in there. Just eats it. constantly reminded. So you're going to try and you coming at Carrie Hilton? I am. Do you reach out? How do you do it?

The last time I just DM the guy. Did he respond? Nah, because he hadn't been active in like, you know, years on it or something. So maybe he just left it. Just squatting on your soul. Dude, keep that underscore, bro. It gives you character.

Yeah. Sure. Nope, you can't make it cool, bro. You can't. All right. Yeah, if you want to connect with us, that's where we're at. Just be careful because as Leif pointed out, I used to be vehemently anti-social media. And I still kind of am because I recognize that there is an algorithm in there that's powerful.

That's that the smartest group of engineers they could assemble get together every day and figure out how to make you spend more time on that thing. That's what they want. That's what they're begging for. That's what they're manipulating you. That's what they're doing. So it works. We know that people get addicted to it. We don't want that to happen to you.

So just be careful. Just be careful the algorithm. Keep your, watch your six. Because the algorithm is sneaking up on you. And thanks to all the troops that are out there in uniform right now, holding the line. Thank you for what you do to protect us. And the same goes to our police law. enforcement firefighters paramedics EMTs dispatchers correctional officers border

patrol secret service and all you first responders out there thank you for holding the line here at home and to everyone else out there just remember that the way you act and what you do is who you are who you are is your culture your personal culture that's how you live your life so be someone you can trust be a fighter don't allow any slack let that be your culture let that be who you are let that be what you do and let that be how you do November Foxtrot Sierra this is Laif and Kerry and Jocko out