The People, Process, & Progress Podcast - Systems Under Pressure | Organized Urgency vs. Wasted Calories

Episode Date: May 12, 2026

What do ICU medicine, Incident Management Teams, PMO leadership, coaching soccer, fatherhood, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and fitness all have in common?More than most people think.In this episode, Systems Under Pressure | Organized Urgency vs. Wasted Calories, Kevin Pannell reflects on lessons learned from serving as a U.S. Navy Hospital Corpsman in critical care, working in EMS and emergency management, leading PMO teams, coaching youth sports, raising sons, and training on the mats and in the garage gym.The conversation focuses on the repeatable systems and leadership principles that help people stay steady under pressure:• repeatable processes• organized urgency• clarity and communication• mastering basics• letting others lead• movement as maintenance• anchoring through faith, gratitude, and purposeA key theme throughout the episode:“Organized urgency is focused power. Chaotic urgency is wasted calories.”This is not a motivational talk about becoming unstoppable. It is a grounded conversation about sustainable readiness, leadership, and becoming the kind of person people can trust during difficult moments.Key themes from the episode:• Calm is contagious• Projects are incidents without sirens• Organized urgency is focused power• Chaotic urgency is wasted calories• Leadership follows you home• Movement is maintenance• The environments change. The leadership lessons don’t.Reflection prompts from the episode:What was your happiest moment this week?What was your hardest physical effort this month?What made you feel anchored this year?OWN your mind.MOVE your body.ANCHOR your spirit.Breathe, frame, keep showing up, survive. Godspeed y’all.

The patient was crashing and bleeding inside and out. This wasn't an episode of the pit. This was real life in the intensive care unit at Bethesda Naval Hospital. The patient had open heart surgery, then developed a sternal infection, then another surgery, then sepsis. Not good. In fact, about as bad as it gets. Before this particular crash and there would be several during his stay, we had settled

into the routine that ICU teams know well. Come in early, change into scrubs, get handoff from the previous nurse. and Corman team, check supplies, review the chart, understand the history, review medications, assess the patient ourselves, establish a baseline for the shift. Simple things, core things, done repeatedly. This happened in hundreds of times in the ICU, cardiac ICU, and critical hair division that's a naval hospital. It happens in hospitals across the world every single day. To me, this was my world. For the patient, it may have been the end of his. Own your mind, move your body, anchor your spirit.

This is Own Move Anchor with Kevin Pennell. Here we focus on practical leadership, clear thinking, physical readiness, and staying steady when life and work get heavy. Drawing from emergency response, health care, project leadership in everyday life, each episode connects real world experience to actions you can apply immediately. Three pillars, one powerful you. You can find more at OwnMoveanchor.com, and if you're getting value from the show, like, subscribe,

and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. Let's get into it. Then everything changed. Monitor's alarmed, blood pressure dropped, more bleeding, more confusion, more urgency, more people entering the room. What I remember most all these years later is this. Nobody panicked. People moved quickly. People communicated clearly.

Experience nurses directed traffic calmly. Corman moved with purpose. Supplies showed up where they needed to be. Medications were prepared. Tasks were assigned. Adjustments were made. Looking back, it wasn't some mass. magic solution that saved him multiple times, it was strong core skills, a team that had worked

together before, clear communication, calm under pressure, and a shared focus on one thing, standing between death and that patient. This time, we won. Sometimes we didn't. And over the years, I realized something important. The environments changed the leadership lessons didn't. That realization followed me from being a corpsman to EMS, to incident management teams, to PMO leadership. to coaching soccer, fatherhood, and even on the Jiu-Jitsu mats. Because whether you're on the fireground on a command post in a meeting or sitting at the dinner table during a hard season in life, the same things still matter. Calm, communication, preparation, trust, accountability, and the ability to stay steady

under pressure. That's what I want to talk about today. One thing I've noticed over the years is that almost every environment under pressure eventually relies on systems. not giant complicated systems simple repeatable processes in the ICU we had routines shift handoffs equipment checks medication reviews assessments nothing flashy but when things went sideways those basics mattered i remember working with a newer RN once who had never placed a folly catheter on a real patient before good person smart person but when the pressure hit he froze up that's not

really criticism it's reality stress tends to expose where we were prepared and where we aren't I've seen the same thing in AMAS emergency management, project leadership, jujitsu, even parenting. Pressure increases. People like to fall back on the level of preparation and repetition. That's why basics matter so much. And honestly, ego disappears pretty quickly when the patient crashes. Nobody cares about titles in those moments. They care whether the team can execute.

I saw similar patterns years later on incident management teams. Back during the UCI 2015, a large cycling race, we had daily commanding general staff check-ins that really helped stabilize the environment. A lot of strong leaders were working together who hadn't necessarily worked together before. Communication rhythm mattered. People knew where things stood, what was changing, what needed attention, and what didn't. That structure creates confidence. I think people sometimes mistake structure for rigidity, but good structure actually creates

flexibility. Without communication and coordination, teams start creating workarounds on their own. The duplicated work starts happening. People get frustrated. Siloes develop. Trust drops. Everybody starts burning extra energy unnecessarily. I started calling that chaotic energy. Organized urgency is different. Organized urgency is focused power. Chaotic urgency is wasted calories. And I think that applies almost everywhere. I'm seeing most project management office and organizational problems feel very similar to incident management team problems sometimes. Communication issues, unclear ownership, too much ego, leaders either disappearing or over-controlling. Sometimes leaders get too deep into tactical

work because they don't trust the team. Other times, teams aren't empowered enough to move towards solutions confidently. The calmest leaders I've worked around usually sound pretty similar regardless of the environment. They ask good questions, clarify priorities, reduce uncertainty, communicate directly,

and if something gets missed, they focus on solving the problem instead of protecting themselves politically. They create calm for teams. Strong executive communication really isn't that different from operational briefings. Be direct, be transparent,

Take a breath and make decisions. Projects are incidents without sirens. Fatherhood changed a lot of my leadership perspective too. As my sons grow older, I've realized I have to give them more room to make decisions. Same thing with the project managers I lead. Same thing with emergency crews I was part of. Same thing with the soccer players that I coach now. At some point, people need space to grow into responsibility.

That's uncomfortable sometimes because. is you can usually see mistakes coming ahead of time. But controlling everything doesn't really develop people. I've also had moments where I lost my cool and my son stayed calmer than I did. And that humbled me pretty quickly. This moment's taught me about ownership apologizing and course correction. One thing I've realized over time is that your family experiences whatever version of you remains after work takes its share. If we don't deal with stress, frustration, anxiety, or exhaustion appropriately,

Eventually, that spills into the people around us, sometimes subtly, sometimes not. Coaching soccer has also reinforced a lot of these same ideas. Basics build confidence, good teammates matter, people improve by trying difficult things, failing, getting feedback, and trying again. And honestly, good coaches, good captains, good shift leaders, and good fathers all do similar things. We teach the fundamentals. We create structure. We encourage effort.

and then gradually step back enough for growth to happen. Sometimes leadership requires loudness for safety reasons. Most of the time, though, confidence and calm are more effective than constant noise. Movement became another important system for me over time. Not because I'm trying to become some fitness influencer, movement is maintenance. Movement is medicine. A body at rest wants to stay at rest. But strength matters, conditioning matters, capability matters,

It helps whether you're on the jiu-s mats, you're at work, you're carrying groceries, or just general tasks in life. And movement is one of the healthiest ways I've found to process stress and stay more steady mentally, too. And for me, personally, faith and gratitude help anchor everything. I'll never believe life was random. I see too much meaning in family-nature relationships and life itself. Simple routines help too, getting up, putting my feet on the floor, giving things, Thanks, making my bed, training. Those things keep me grounded.

Because when we become internally chaotic, it becomes very difficult to spread calm everywhere else. The job is still the job. That part probably won't change much. But we can keep developing ourselves within it. Our minds need development. Our bodies need movement. Our spirits need anchoring. And the more I've lived through different environments,

the more I've realized the systems that help humans, perform well under pressure really aren't all that different. The environments change. The leadership lessons don't. Breathe, frame, keep showing up, survive. Godspeed, y'all. If this episode was helpful, share it with someone who could use it. You could find more at omnewancor.com. I'm on Instagram and X at the Kevin Pennell and on YouTube at Own Move Anchor today. If you're getting value from the show, please like, subscribe, and leave a review wherever you listen to podcasts. it helps more people find the show. Own your mind, move your body, anchor your spirit.

Three pillars, one power for you. Godspeed, y'all.