0:00 · Introduction and Greg Warden’s background

[0:02] You're listening to Lessons in the Field. [music] I'm Nate Bennett and today I'll be hosting the conversation as we continue sharing stories from people who've lived our work firsthand. Our guest today is Greg Warden who I've personally ran global operations with for years. Um, Greg is a former US Army infantryman with multiple deployments and former Department of State WPS contractor in Iraq and Afghanistan. He's also a close quarters been a close quarters combat and small units tactic instructor for both the military and law enforcement and has served in corporate security roles as an agent, team lead, manager and director for Fortune 100 companies, ultra high net worth individuals and recently private family offices running global operations. Greg is an absolute stud who I am happy to have on this show.

[0:56] Great to be here. I want to preface this with never been on a podcast before. No prep work done. So, this is going to be shooting from the hip and live.

[1:04] Oh, that's good.

[1:05] So, it's going to be authentic and raw

[1:07] cuz we got you. It's us. Well, let's do uh let's go a little bit just kind of your background, like how you grew up,

1:13 · Growing up in Ithaca and choosing the Infantry

[1:13] you know, where you come from. Um, keep it brief so we can get in the nitty-gritty stuff.

[1:18] Yeah. So, I grew up in a small town, Ithaca, New York. The only thing it's really known for is Cornell University being there. Very liberal town. Um, yeah. Not too much more to say. It sucks in the winters, it's beautiful in the summers, and it's New York at the end of the day.

[1:34] So, like what what kind of like led you into, you know, even getting to where you went, which was the army ultimately, but something that maybe ticked like for me, for example, you know, I talked about just like this fiery passion burning that kind of led you to where you are now, but you know, joining the army, family in the army. So, my grandparents, they were military, World War II era, and that definitely kind of shaped my decision in some ways. Um, but really, I was just kind of a kid that had no idea what they wanted to do. Uh, wasn't like the academically minded person. So, college wasn't going to be a success for me, I don't think. And so, I decided that might as well play with some guns and figure out what I want to do in life and not rack up massive debt and go to college for something that I might hate doing. Yeah. No, totally get that for sure. So then leading into the army though, it's kind of one of those things where it's like you a lot of guys have an idea of what they want to do, have an idea of where they want to go. Like what made you just go, "Hey, I'm going to be an infantryman."

[2:39] Um, so when I took all the testing, the ASVAB and all that stuff, I scored high enough to get like military intelligence. But me being the genius 17-year-old kid that I was, military intelligence just sounded boring. And I didn't think that it was going to be the right path for me. In hindsight, I had no idea what military intelligence actually was. And so I was like, "Nah, screw that. Put a gun in my hands. Give me infantry. Give me, you know, the fun stuff. All the stuff you see in the movies and everything." I got exactly what I asked for as a 17-year-old kid.

[3:09] Yeah. And it it's you were in around I think the same time that I was too.

[3:15] Yeah, I got in very early ' 06.

[3:18] Yeah. So I started Marine Corps 07 and that was an interesting time as well. So like deployments and everything else like you went Afghanistan and Iraq, right?

[3:27] Iraq then Afghanistan.

[3:28] Okay.

[3:29] Yeah.

[3:29] In that order.

[3:30] Yep. So we did a long one in uh Iraq first. That was around the surge time into Baghdad. Taking that over. Um that was with the Strykers, second infantry Strykers and then immediately after that got reassigned to Fort Drum and got sent to Afghanistan with the 10th Mountain. Do you think like leadership wise so there's a lot of individuals in the military for me where it was like it was an up and down like I had just a terrible time with one unit and it just it just did not work out and it literally left a bitter taste in my mouth. But there was one there was one where it's like those guys are still close to me. Like we still keep in touch like we go out and visit you know people that passed away out of Arlington almost on a yearly basis. I did my first one last year talked about on the last podcast. Did you have anything like that that just kind of kept you like flowing and moving and just staying motivated to be in or was it kind of like I'm getting out cuz this is just not for me? the people that I served with. Uh I don't keep in touch with as many of them as I probably should. You know, it's very few and far between, but we'll jump on like monthly calls or every other month or something like that. I haven't seen a

[4:39] lot of them in a long time. Um probably need to fix that. But yeah, there was definitely um you know, my first deployment, it was a great unit. We had some really awesome guys. We lost a lot of amazing people. Uh but that one kind of kept me going in the military. And then I got to 10th Mountain and it's another great unit, but I noticed like a big shift in leadership. And so like the people that I was serving with, we had good and bad leaders. And it was really like the the lower enlisted that were what keeping me going. Uh some of the leadership there was just god awful. Everybody was just pissed off to be in upstate New York in Fort Drum. It snows in the month of May when it should be beautiful and we're out in the field and stuff. So everybody was just always pissed off it seemed like. And then the deployments came and that's when like the real bad leadership or good leadership came into play. And so you know you had some really awesome NCOs and officers they kept things together and then you had the NCOs's that really had no idea what they were doing and that made it very apparent that it wasn't the best unit to be in at certain times. And so you kind of get the best of both worlds,

[5:47] but it helps you develop your leadership style of like you take a little bit from even the bad leaders of like, okay,

[5:53] I hate this guy and this is why I hate him. I don't want to be that guy. And so you take the pieces of that and put that into your leadership style of like mental note of don't be that guy.

[6:03] Yeah. And I mean, you're also probably never going to get it right, too. Like you can take notes all day and then

[6:08] try to be everybody that you don't want to be and then somehow you reflect and remember how they were and then you do something the exact same way.

[6:15] Yeah. And then you look back on it and it's like damn

[6:17] I am that guy right now.

[6:19] Well, how about I mean the combat piece like what was your without going into

6:24 · Early deployment experience and people skills

[6:24] too many details or you can if you want but like where was like the first moment where you're like

[6:30] oh [ __ ] like this is real.

[6:32] That was this is happening. my first days in Iraq. So, I got there uh a little bit late. Um I was one of the last uh main party to go over. So, the unit that I was with, they had been there for probably about a month when I got there. Um and it was just like a full battalion movement. So, it was trickling in and everything. So, I immediately after training went right over. And so getting geared up, my very first day out in Baghdad, uh the truck in front of me got hit with an EFP and that was like the oh [ __ ] moment when the ramp is dropping a

[7:08] uh explosively formed projectile.

[7:11] So for everybody that doesn't understand what that is, it it literally it's a shaped projectile. So explosive deliver it. It forms and it penetrates through

[7:20] all armor, all engines, disables vehicles, kills people

[7:24] sometimes all the way through and then through what's beyond.

[7:27] Yeah.

[7:27] Yeah. They're they're nasty.

[7:29] Yeah. So that was my welcome to Baghdad. And the oh [ __ ] moment was

[7:33] as soon as the truck got hit, everybody is just in full chaos mode now. Radios are going crazy. And then all of a sudden the ramp in the Stryker starts dropping and I realize I'm the first one to go out. And this is like day one or two going out in Baghdad. I'm like, [ __ ] where do I go? What do I do? I don't know what I'm doing with my hands right now. And I just see like a kind of recessed doorway and I just mentally was like, I'm making a beline over there. The ramp hadn't even dropped yet, I don't think. And I'm out the door [clears throat] running to the doorway and I realize I'm the only one going to the doorway. Everybody else is going around the building yelling at me, but I didn't really hear it for a minute because like the adrenaline's pumping. You don't really have anything like situational awareness for a couple of seconds cuz you're just so focused on that. And that was the first time that I'd ever been in a situation like that. So, I wasn't sure how I was going to react or anything. I just knew like, okay, get to that doorway.

[8:30] I mean, were you going to like a known or you going to an unknown at that time? because this was a IED or the EFP hit uh in route to where we were supposed to be going

[8:39] and was everybody kind of like going around because they knew better not to go in.

[8:43] Well, we were getting shot at with a machine gun nest. So, they were going around to have some cover and try to do a little flanking maneuver.

[8:49] Damn.

[8:49] And so, I'm in the recessed doorway and I'm looking around and nobody else is around me. I'm getting yelled at from all different directions and I just see people going around the building. I'm like, damn. Now I got to go back out there and go around and it's the adrenaline is just kicking in. So you don't even feel anything. You don't hear much. You're just kind of like target fixated at that point. And eventually I found way back to the guys and we were able to, you know, suppress the fire. We were able to go clear the houses and make sure everything was good. And uh yeah, that was my welcome to Baghdad and my oh [ __ ] moment of like, okay, this isn't training anymore. This is like

[9:26] you get hit here, there's no reset button.

[9:30] Those things are definitely um

[9:32] kind of like that fight orflight moment where you just don't really know how you're going to respond until something happens and then

[9:38] like you feel like you you freeze a little bit.

[9:42] I don't know if I froze. I mean, I definitely did in the doorway, I think, cuz I was like trying to figure out what was going on, where stuff was coming from, where is everybody else that I thought was going to be right there with me. So you have that like little moment of pause and then was like, "Damn, I messed up. I didn't go the right way."

[9:58] Yeah.

[9:59] Because I didn't hear like any directions. I didn't hear anybody say like, "Okay, flank around or go to this side of the building or anything." I just had it fixated on like, "I'm going to go here." It dude it just it translates so well though in those moments of just absolute and [clears throat] utter chaos of like now like kind of what we're doing and what we've been doing in you know the private security industry and translating those exact things where you know you're hiring based off of backgrounds.

[10:26] Yeah. or you try to. So we try to grab guys from former law enforcement, girls from military, intel, like people that have seen, heard, been a part of, been in vicinity of or just have dealt with actual real world chaos or at least, you know, understand like the terminology of like a tick, which is, you know, a moment of chaos or something's going on and like how long that translates to. Well, it's just gonna be on the bad guy at that moment. But, you know,

[10:58] yeah,

[10:59] it's important to be able to have those kinds of experiences, I think. And there's a translation in the industry, which we've talked about a lot before, but it's like, you know, do you still pull from those backgrounds and do you still try to grab those kind of people? And do you now try to give

[11:15] more people a shot that don't have it? But what we find is

[11:20] we've definitely taken some chances on multiple various backgrounds. I mean, you and me hiring together, yeah, you look for that high threat background just because it's always in the back of your mind like we are in security. It's you're essentially there for the what if. If this happens, are we going to have the right people around that can respond accordingly?

[11:38] Yeah.

[11:38] But the thing that changed for me, I guess, is not everybody that does high threat security can do what we do. Not everybody can do I don't want to call it low threat, but less threat for the environment that they're in. It's a different ballgame for sure.

[11:54] Yeah, they got to have those people skills. They got to be able to adapt and, you know, not always be the brick wall badass hard guy that's like thousand yard stare or whatever. They got to be personable. They got to be able to interact with these people that are, you know, maybe a little bit gunshy or socially awkward because they spend most of their time behind a computer or whatever they do and they don't really have the same communication that the military does. like, you know, the same stuff where like you and me, we can go back and we can give each other crap all day about whatever. We can call each other whatever name and at the end of the day it's like, okay, cool. I'm going to throw it right back at you. And that's just how the friendship works. Some of these people, they take it to heart. And you know, how you talk to them, how you approach them really will make or break if you're going to be successful working for them. Uh, and some people in the high threat, they just have that mindset of, you know, like, oh, I I've heard this word for word before, like, oh, this person asked me to go get them a coffee or a bagel.

[12:48] I'm going to tell them to shut the hell up and remind them I'm not here for their errand boy. I'm here to protect them. It's like, well,

[12:55] you're kind of both

[12:57] sometimes, you know, like this, you're not doing anything right now. Go get them a coffee. And it shows value for you to them at that point. And that's going to essentially make your work life a little bit easier because they're not going to look at you as just the useless guy that we pay way too much standing in a corner for if this happens. That's then that you become an asset and the people that work for them are using you, relying on you to do the stuff that maybe they don't have time to do, but since you're not there full-time to do just the security stuff, like 90% of the time, you're not going to be preventing an attack. Probably more than 90%. But you got to show value and you got to show them that like you're the team player. You're going to be helping and making everybody's lives easier.

[13:39] Yeah. It's like well depending on, you know, who you're doing it with, who you're doing it for. Like there's that translation we'll get into, too. But it's like the family office versus corporate.

[13:51] Yeah.

[13:52] You know, corporate east coast, west coast, you know, middle America versus big tech, new AIdriven stuff like it. It's all different. It's different cultures, different mindsets. Like they literally hire on cultural attributes where you need to be a good fit first.

[14:10] And a lot of our community and a lot of our people, it's like you're only successful if you can adapt.

[14:15] Yeah. And you know there's that really there was an article that came out a long time ago and you know they'll remember who wrote it but it was basically like EP chameleon like a chameleon analogy of you know social chameleon just operational chameleon whatever but like you're changing your colors your shape your texture metaphorically to just blend into your environment. And that's that kind of full circle background piece where it's, you know, you need some sort of foundation to understand structure because we still work within a militarized law enforcement like team mentality, at least at really high level, but at the same time, you need to be able to adapt and you need to like let that wash away and go away. And I think, you know, some guys that spend too long in the military, it's hard. it's hard to then adapt.

[15:08] I don't think just the military like if you spend too long in one place in general, whether it's law enforcement, military, you know, whatever you're doing, there's a point where it just becomes second nature to you and the adaptability just gets a little bit harder at that point because this is all you've known. So, this is what you revert back to. And so I found it, you know, with some law enforcement guys and federal law enforcement guys, military guys, special operations, like across the board, when they spend a certain amount of time in those things, it's really hard for them to transition out and become as adaptable as they need and they do have that mindset of, you know, like, oh, I'm here for security. This is my one lane. I'm not going to deviate. And I think COVID actually really put a spotlight on that because I was here in California for COVID. Everything was shut down, businesses, everything. Like you had to have a piece of paper saying that you were essential personnel just to be able to drive on the roads. And you know, we had clients that they were scared to leave their houses. So essentially at that point, we were the errand boys. We were doing everything that they would normally do on their

[16:11] day-to-day and we'd just be with them at and now we're turning into we're taking care of all of your errands. we're taking care of your grocery shopping. We're taking care of all this and that. And that really made the the it clear that you're more than security because you're protecting them in their eyes by we don't have to go out in public and be exposed to this virus.

[16:31] We're going to take that we're going to take that bullet

[16:33] so to speak for them.

[16:35] And a lot of people had to adapt to that because you had to humble yourself like now I'm your errand boy,

[16:41] not just your security that's going to be here. Yeah, COVID was a really interesting time and I'm actually surprised that hasn't gotten brought up so far in these first few podcasts, but like if you really get down to it, there was teams fully functional and working principals throughout this entire process of COVID they're still moving around.

[17:00] Teams have those essential letters. There's, you know, medical capability. We have testing capabilities. We did that.

[17:06] Yep. Um, but it is it's like the the biggest piece of that was now we're exposing ourselves further to this new different element and risk level which was just health and welfare.

[17:17] Yeah.

[17:18] And we're going to go out and potentially get sick and however you believe in COVID like whatever. But we would like we'd go do the shopping, we would go do the errands, we would go do all those other things. Yep.

[17:29] In order to limit risk for them and to decrease exposure, which was kind of a big deal. And then for me too, which is interesting, and we got to go into like our COVID time like post, but like I got locked down in in uh Montana for the start of it. Like restrictions are starting, grocery stores, everything. They're everything's gone. Like people are just hoarding.

[17:57] Yeah. Just stockpiling up water, toilet paper, everything. and principals still want, you know, to eat a certain way, to be on a certain diet, to have the certain creature comforts, and we're still figuring out how to make that work for them.

[18:11] Yep.

[18:12] So, it's understanding that. And that was a time too where I saw some individuals just kind of like we all kind of caved under a little bit of the pressure cuz it was new and all the direction and instruction from, you know, the World Health Organization and like this letter comes out and now we can't do this or this town's now restricting and a sheriff in like Montana's saying, "Oh no, you guys can't actually be out even with your letter." Just like layers and layers and layers and layers and layers and layers and you just have to figure out how to work through it. All we're really trying to do is just take care of the health and safety and welfare of principals and make their life more comfortable through a tough time

[18:48] and at the same time facilitate the stuff that they wanted to do.

[18:51] Yeah. The logistics piece too.

[18:53] Yeah.

[18:54] Commercials flights stopped.

[18:56] Yeah.

[18:56] I mean those empty planes were great.

[18:58] Yeah. But if you're going to go run an operation to a location that you can’t get to, like we had gone out to the Middle East and during COVID via private jet.

[19:09] Mhm.

[19:10] Right. Cuz well the restrictions were different. You could kind of guarantee

[19:14] who's getting on, are they tested? Do they have the right documentation and paperwork and then just, you know, deliver a protection package abroad. And now you're working in a new environment, a new country where you're like, "Oh, well, they're not doing it the same way we are in the US. We can operate a little bit more freely." But

[19:32] some places, some places it was like, "Oh, we're even more restricted here."

[19:35] Yeah. But now you're, you know, a bunch of foreigners and Americans potentially working in a location where all the tourists are off the streets. They're gone.

[19:45] It was crazy. I mean, just here in California, driving down 101 and not having to hit traffic,

[19:49] that was probably the craziest thing. You can go as fast as you want because you know there's no cops out.

[19:54] Yep.

[19:55] That was great. That was one of the best things about it.

[19:57] It was like but not restricted at the same time.

[20:00] We were with a client and you know they had a big family. They wanted to do an outing. They wanted to be socially distanced and stuff from people. And so they decided that they wanted to go to the beach to have a picnic like in that area. And we actually had law enforcement come up and be like, "Yeah, if you guys don't live in this county, we're going to fine you for being in this county." It's like, "Well, you can't do that. That's just not right. We'll fight that.

[20:23] And had to talk this law enforcement officer out of giving a family of five just trying to have like a little outing to get out of the house after months of being cooped up. $1,000 each ticket. And these are like young kids, mom, dad, everything. I was like, but you really can't give them a $1,000 ticket just for driving out to be away from everybody in the middle of nowhere in the beach where nobody's around. It's like, what are you doing, guy?

[20:49] Yeah. And funny part about all that too is just think about the realities that we probably were in, which we were, but you're privy to a lot of information and a lot of very interesting people talking about stuff at a extremely high level. And you get to hear a lot about what's really going on.

[21:09] Mhm.

[21:10] And who's restricted and who's not, who's abiding by the rules and who's not. and you start to realize that like again like I don't want to bring up like my last thing but like red tape or restrictions it it's all just a gray area of

[21:25] you know money bypasses rules and restrictions no notoriety bypasses rules and restrictions

[21:32] yeah there's definitely the the ways to navigate the gray area depending on who you're with

[21:36] countries will wave entry because they want to you know maybe have a conversation later with that said individual and you have to navigate those problems. Yeah.

[21:45] Yeah. That was a

[21:47] navigating the international travel was probably one of the biggest pains just because of the country requirements that we had and everywhere we went had different country requirements for the most part. And I just remember like we'd be at the ticket counter at LAX checking in some check bags and it'd be like me and the team going out to head to the next location and we were a little bit behind with our COVID testing and just pulling out one of the Q readers or the Aculas right there at the desk and the whole line getting pissed off cuz I'm just swabbing people's noses getting the test done immediately being like, "Yep, here you go. He's good."

[22:20] Yeah. Doing things in real time when

[22:22] no one else had the resources just because we were proactive and thought about it. Well, let's get there for sure. The whole protection piece and you know that kind of like linear story for you specifically, but backtrack a little bit. Go Army.

[22:36] Mhm. [clears throat]

[22:38] When did you get out?

[22:39] 2010. End of 2010.

[22:41] And then what was the transition piece after that?

[22:45] So, it was kind of a a slow transition for me, I guess, in some ways. Um, I was dealing with some family stuff, uh, my sister being sick and everything. So, trying to spend time with them and be there for them, but at the same time figure out what I wanted to do with my career.

[23:01] Yeah.

[23:02] And, you know, I was weighing the options of reinlistment. I was weighing the options of, you know, government agencies and stuff like that. And then I had some friends that were doing the contracting thing.

[23:11] I was like, "Oh, well, you know what? maybe I'll just jump over there for a rotation or two and that'll maybe give me some clarity or give me some more time to think while I'm at least bringing in some money and ended up doing that on and off for a number of years um with various companies over in the Middle East.

[23:27] Yeah. What what year did you start right

[23:29] contracting piece?

[23:30] Uh 2011, like Q1 of 2011 is when I had my first uh training date.

[23:36] See, which is wild because I was just getting out of the Marine Corps and then transitioning and like moving abroad to Thailand. Yeah. So different. Like we were both going abroad, but you had the fun time.

[23:47] Yeah. Yeah. No, I remember I remember like looking at your resume when we got on that same team together, which is I want to definitely touch on that piece. But no, man. Contracting though, I mean, did you just do it because you wanted to do it or did you just feel like that was the best option at the time? I felt it was the best option at the time to, you know, make the decent amount of money, still have the rotation to be able to be there for the family. Um, college was also on my mind, but again, I just wasn't really ever academically inclined. I'm more of like a hands-on learner, not sit in a classroom and try to learn stuff that way. I don't like I was never really good at retaining information by the book, like getting out there and doing it, getting my hands dirty. That's always how I learn best.

[24:31] Oh, dude, you're a trailblazer. [laughter] You might not not to like you know talk you down a little bit like might not be the most books smart guy but like you solve problems like you figure it out like fast quick and in a hurry faster than me most times which is great.

[24:46] I just try to think of things logically like if the pieces fit it's a puzzle like you know the piece fits

[24:52] probably the right answer and obviously there's times you got to deviate from that but like I just never understood the learning from a book and obviously there's certain things that you have to learn from a book and everything. I just those are my weaknesses I think of like the coding, the equations, like the numbers and all that stuff. Like I can use a calculator but much beyond that I'm counting on fingers and toes which is funny cuz you now write SOPs and policies and you know navigate dynamic legal situations within family offices to get what we ultimately need which is just an ask and and goal.

[25:23] And it wasn't the easy road to get there. It was just like okay I got to really focus on this. this is what the client is needing or wanting. And so looking at it from that aspect other than okay, I'm just getting a little certificate or a piece of paper. Kind of gives it more of a purpose.

[25:38] Yeah.

[25:38] You know, like we talked about uh you know, scuba diving. We both like to scuba dive. It kind of got boring for a while cuz I was just down there floating around looking at the fish. And then when I started doing like lobstering, spear fishing and all that, you're kind of there doing something for a purpose, like I'm making or I'm getting dinner and you know, we're going to get as many lobsters as we can. We're going to spear as many fish. We're going to hunt some lion fish and everything. And like you're down there with a purpose. And academics for me was always kind of the same way. It's like I can go to college, I can go to class, and I can just kind of float around, go through the motions, and get the little thumbs up, you did a good job, and graduate. where you can actually be there for a purpose, which for me is like the client needs and the job needs. And it just kind of gives me a little bit more focus of like this is the end goal. I'm going to get there the most practical way possible.

[26:26] Mission driven.

[26:27] Yeah. Very mission driven.

[26:28] And I think we all get really attached to that same mentality of like everything was always like bigger than us, greater than us, higher purpose, higher calling, passion, blah blah blah blah blah. But it's true. And like you get attached to this need to like do more or to feel like what you're doing is valuable, important down to like the simplest of things of you know it's a servant industry. You know we really are servants.

[26:58] Yeah.

[27:00] Like go back to medieval times and what was like protection and a bodyguard.

[27:04] You know they're inner circle servants. Mhm.

[27:08] Like watch an episode of Game of Thrones and you know a knight standing you know looking all sexy in the background but at the end of the day like there that guy's there and just knowing in the back of his head that like I am the protection like I am the piece that's supposed to just make this all function and you get really kind of wrapped around like who you're working for. And that was a big thing for me too like our last team like you start to realize like what are they doing? What are they involved in? Can I wrap my head around it? Am I okay with this? Is it something that brings value to my like my drive and ambition and passion and mission? Like, do I feel like I'm doing the world of justice by taking care of this set individual or this person or this program or these people? And I think that's a really unique piece.

[27:55] Yeah. And I think you had a a better grasp on a lot of it for our last client with like the crypto stuff and everything because that's still lost on me. I can throw money at it all day, but I don't understand it. Yeah,

[28:07] definitely can't go into cryptocurrency right now. I can go off. But

[28:11] no, that's good stuff. WPS though like so for like kind of everybody listening like Greg and I's relationship we you know we have similar tracks and at one point we didn't know each other there but we were on the same team like we we were rotating through and filling holes and slots on a high threat protection team in Baghdad Iraq working for you know the US Department of State based out of the embassy doing red zone, green zone, like whatever they threw at us. But that team 32 was high profile.

[28:53] Yeah.

[28:53] Like there was a couple of them, but at that time like it was still, you know, once you leave the wire is pretty intense.

[29:00] Yeah, that was still one of the only at the time the only high threat team that we had in Baghdad. So we got all the red zone movements for the most part. Um you support the ambassador movements. uh in the green zone. Those are like days off essentially because we're just doing like small one vehicle movements, maybe two depending on how many people you're driving. Um but yeah, WPS that was definitely a fun time. You know, you meet a lot of good people and it's crazy that like our resumes when you stack them up to each other, it's like they almost read identical just at different timelines.

[29:37] Yeah. Um, obviously you were marine, I was army, but that might be like the biggest difference in our resumes because like you were on 32 at one point, I was on 32. We both worked for the same client over in the Bay Area for a number of years at one point or another. We just kind of always were crisscrossing, but never at the same place until we had our last client.

[29:58] Yeah. Um, you know, my my piece was kind of back and forth where I I I chased that program like I chased the WPS program because I just wanted was like I'm going to check this box.

[30:12] Mhm. [clears throat]

[30:12] And actually didn't let me in for a while but it got there and then checked the box. did it did it for a year then left but I came from doing like more similar but not but also private but not

[30:27] in semi-private

[30:28] in Central America for you know a couple years and then before that I started an EP up in Seattle and so like I got there and you'd already been there and doing it for years which is interesting too and like you know one of the big questions I have for you on that time is

30:44 · Overseas contracting: patience and professionalism

[30:44] like what is the biggest misconception people have about like WPS programs or like what the work really is.

[30:51] I think one of the biggest misconceptions there is like everybody in WPS is special operations. Everybody's like that Navy Seal special forces or whatever and it's all action all the time because that's all that gets publicized is you see the convoy driving, you see an explosion or you see a gunfight break out or something and that's all that's publicized. And I can honestly say the entire time as a WPS contractor, I maybe pulled my weapon out a handful of times at most. Maybe.

[31:19] Yeah. Crack a few doors in a convoy and scares people away basically.

[31:23] Yeah. Or you have an explosion and you know like one of the gates got a V-bed or something like that. A vehicle born IED and I'm in the shower just getting out of the shower. So grab your pistol, run topless and shorts to go make sure that everything's okay. And it's not action at all. Like you're sitting around waiting for diplomats most of the time. You drive them from point A to point B and then they're kind of like, "All right, we'll see you in a little bit. Bye-bye." And then hours later they come back out and you drive them from point B back to point A. And I would say that's the biggest misconception is it's all action all the time. But we're essentially just high threat Uber

[32:00] for the most part over there.

[32:02] But But did you not at one point think that you were getting into that.

[32:10] Oh, absolutely. When I first started, like that's all they show you in the training. That's all they show you. All this stuff of like

[32:16] you're you they make it look like an action movie, you know, and obviously like the Hollywooded up stuff that they have in movies and all that that doesn't help to the narrative of what's real. Sure, there's stuff like that that happens like occasionally like, you know, the stuff in Beghazi and everything like that. Those guys are total badasses and they were in an incredible situation and performed incredible. Um, but like overall for the most part it's a lot of sitting around. It's a lot of waiting. It's being as diplomatic as you can with the people that you're working for because at the end of the day they are essentially diplomats, government employees, different agencies and stuff. But it's again the people skills that you have to make you successful over there because you're not going to be running and gunning every day.

[32:57] No, not at all. And what do you think like the biggest mis I mean well not miscommunication but communication period like comm's there versus here and like how we do it in the states versus at such a high level that's so integrated and at systems are going off and like everybody's really connected and there's QRF running around. It's dynamic. It is right. But you live in your own little bubble of like what we're doing today and how we're getting there and what our advanced team's doing and whatnot. But how do you think that comm's piece translates to like how we do things in the private civilian world where you maybe take a little bit of it, leave a lot of it behind cuz it's just it it might be just useless.

33:42 · Communication across different protection environments

[33:42] Yeah. I mean, in the high threat environment, the comms is totally different because there's so many more pieces involved for the high threat. Like, you know, you do have the QRF team, you have all these people that are needing the constant updates of like, okay, are you guys okay out there? what's going on, when are you going to be back, like everything there. And you still have the communication on the civilian side and the private side. But it changes a little bit because there's so much more that's left open, you know, like for WPS, we had timelines, you know, like you're signing out for this window of time. You got to call up to get extended like permission to be out there longer if the people that you're escorting need it.

[34:23] Here it's like at the client's whim. Like there's nobody checking on you. It's not like, "Oh, you have to be back by 7:00 p.m. Any later than that, we're sending a search and rescue team out for you guys."

[34:31] Yeah. We could pull the plug.

[34:33] Yeah.

[34:34] We can say, "We're leaving. We're going." And you have, you know, shift leads, team leads, AIC's that would just say, "Hey, like we're done." Kanked.

[34:40] And you got you got guys going into

[34:42] like Iraqi government facilities and pulling out of principle and be like, "Hey, sir. We're we're leaving.

[34:47] Yep. Time's up. Party's over."

[34:48] They give you grief and you're like, "No, we're going. Like, this is

[34:52] this is it's coming. [clears throat] it's coming above you and we got the direction and like you're not going to fight this. We just have to go. The timeline extends and then those are such strict regimented timelines for real good justification and reasoning.

[35:06] Yeah. Here it's completely at the client's whim. I mean they might have a business meeting they're telling you it's going to go from 1 to two. All of a sudden that turns into such a good meeting that they're there until 6.

[35:16] Yeah.

[35:16] And you're just there and when they're ready to leave they're ready to leave. the event that I did a couple of nights ago. It was supposed to end at 11:00. We were there probably like an extra hour just because the client was having a good conversation and we're just watching people close down the venue, try to reset for the next venue and it's like, well, I could go over there and tell them like, hey, time to go, buddy. They're just going to look at me and be like, uh, who are you? And no, you wait for me.

[35:43] And so you're on their schedule at the end of the day. You're making their dreams come true. and you know whatever they want that's what you have to facilitate

[35:51] and that ties directly back to you know where we started this conversation.

[35:56] Mhm. having a foundation and understanding and like regimented background to get when things go bad, how to deal with situations. But at the same time, now you're dealing with personalities, executives, and highle officials and ultra high net worth individuals that you know don't care and you're not going to tell them no. So jets on the tarmac,

[36:21] it's almost like the other

[36:22] you're on a strict timeline and you're telling them let's go. like, "No, no, no, no, no. I'm okay." Well, what's the right answer? You're calling and figuring out on how to move that time hack so that they can get off the ground with the private jet and to move things around based off of they're just not ready yet.

[36:40] Yeah. It's the other side of the coin, you know, like going from the contracting where it's like, "Okay, we're out here, time's up, let's go." You pull them out versus this side where now you're dealing with the other people around that are trying to get them out. So, like the venue security or the venue and event staff. Y

[36:55] it's like no no just give them a little bit of time and you're then like convincing these people to give them more time there instead of dealing with the client and pulling them directly out. You're just facilitating them being able to linger around a little bit longer and having to convince other people that it's okay that they be there while maybe it's not oper or uh ideal or there might be in a little bit of the way while they're trying to reset a venue or reset something or close down a a restaurant or a nightclub or something. You're just creating that space for them to do what they want to do.

[37:24] Yeah, exactly. Behind a bar counter smoozing with some, you know, random nightclub manager. The lights are on, everybody's trickling out, everything ready to leave yet.

[37:33] They're just not ready to go. And you're just trying to make it work.

[37:37] Mhm. And you can't get wrapped into that like demanding it's my way or the highway or getting well how would you describe it where somebody rides on the coattails of their principal. Um I mean riding on the coattails is a good one but you just have to be willing to for lack of a better word be the [ __ ] like

[38:04] you're going to be the person that people are looking to and they're like, "Oh man, I hate this guy. He's making us do this and all that." But you're protecting your principal's, reputation, and image at that point by putting it on yourself cuz they could just be like, "Oh, it's so and so over there and he's making us stay here later and all that, but you take that of like, hey, like schmoo them a little bit like I know it's an inconvenience. Like we'll we'll take care of it. We'll get them out of here as fast as we can." You know, they're just having a good conversation. and you just had to have those people skills to let those people want to give you what the principal wants and what the client wants. And sometimes that's like slipping them a couple hundred dollars. Sometimes that's just talking to them in the right way and getting them to understand from your standpoint, but ultimately sometimes it turns into you just have to be the guy that they hate.

[38:49] Yeah. Or you do a quick business deal.

[38:51] Yeah. where it's like, "Hey, I'll try to push us coming back here again next weekend if you know it works out and that's going to, you know, help me help you tip."

[39:00] Yeah. Pay homage to everybody else that's working cuz, you know, the boss tipped Helen how well.

[39:05] Yeah.

[39:06] You know, and that that's a good thing, too. Well, let's circle back again. We we get a little sidetracked, but at the same time, it's good because we'll get into the nitty-gritty details. But when you actually started post WPS,

39:19 · Moving from overseas contracting to Bay Area protection

[39:19] Mhm. you know, like what was the transition piece and also like why did why did you leave after those years doing that and both because you were on the program in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[39:29] Yeah, I started in Afghanistan. I transitioned over to detail in Iraq for a while and I was actually in Baghdad uh when I was taking my interviews to go work for some companies here in the Bay Area. And I think at that point I just was kind of thinking that I've spent a lot of time over here. The contractor lifestyle is one thing. It's cool to do for a little while, but it's not a career path.

[39:53] Traveling in between rotations to cool spots. Yeah.

[39:55] And just like, you know, making money, blowing it all, coming back broke and everything for another rotation. It's not like a sustainable lifestyle for me. Some people they make it work and more power to them. But for me, it was like I need a little bit more longevity. You know, in WPS and the contracting world, I don't think I ever saw a pay raise. All I saw was pay cuts. And it got to the point where like is this really worth my time to be over here and doing this stuff when I'm just getting paid less and less and less. And so when I started looking into what else is out there again, I was kind of like at that crossroads of I don't know what the hell I'm going to do. I don't know where I'm going to go. Uh I just had some again some friends that were getting into the EP world and they put a couple of good words in for me. I took some interviews and next thing you know I'm on a plane to California directly from Baghdad and

[40:45] Yeah, it was the same for me. Straight straight straight here.

[40:47] Landed here. Never been to California before.

[40:50] Yep.

[40:50] And figuring out the Bay Area. I had in mind like, oh yeah, this will be great. I'll move to California, maybe buy a house, settle down, like put down some roots and like make a run at this in the long term. That lasted probably about 10 minutes of landing. I was like, I'm never going to be able to afford anything out here. At least not in the area that I want to be in cuz I hate commuting. I hate the traffic and everything.

[41:11] Yeah, it's tough. Thanks, California. That's for sure.

[41:14] I just I didn't want to be one of those guys that had like a three-hour commute in like some of the guys I was working with. And so, I chose to spend a little bit more on the tiny one-bedroom apartment that was at least close to work, so I didn't have to worry about the commute. And like, you know, [clears throat] once I'm off, it's just a quick drive instead of like a whole another work shift going back home. Um, so it was a a big transition coming from that world to this.

[41:38] You were like me too cuz you you showed up and it was like full utter commitment.

[41:43] Yeah.

[41:44] It's like this is what I'm doing. So like work was the whole reason you were here.

[41:48] Yep.

[41:49] So it didn't matter how long you worked that day. It didn't matter like what was going on. Like you were still tied in postwork before work. Like it was all about like how do I make tomorrow successful because I'm here for that. So really, it's like you're just putting yourself back on another deployment, another rotation, you know, another hard commitment to then just dedicate yourself to, which I think maybe that's what helps people progress.

[42:13] It definitely made the adjustment.

[42:14] Understanding that level of commitment

[42:15] like putting it into those perspectives of like, yeah, I'm on a deployment here made it a little bit easier transition because again, that's like all I knew. But yeah, you're right. Like I would focus just on the work, just on making money. There were times where I would be working two details in the same day, two 12 hours and I would be on for like 24 hours plus sometimes uh just you know to make as much as I could and because let's be honest, California is not a cheap place to live.

[42:39] No, not at all.

[42:40] The more money that you got coming in, the easier your life is going to be in some aspects.

[42:44] Well, and then also too with that very thing like you move up the ladder where you're running things and you're making hard calls and decisions and you have to start thinking about the degradation of like manh hours.

[42:54] Mhm. and how [clears throat] how long guys are actually putting in and like what that's going to turn into as far as like product moving forward if you're burning people out.

[43:02] Yeah. And you know the burnout stuff I never really had a grasp on it for a while cuz um I was kind of like just go go go and I might have been getting burnt out but I just didn't let myself realize that. And then the detail that we were on that's where the burnout kind of like really set in. We were always jet setting. We were always going from one country to another. you were really never going to the same location twice most of the time. And the stuff that we were doing, like I would say the fashion weeks especially, that's where it really got to me where we're up at 9:00 a.m. and out until 7 in the morning partying and then get two hours of sleep, rinse and repeat, doing it all over again. And you do that for a couple of weeks at a time. That's like you saw me when we slapped hands and switched out one day. I didn't even recognize you. I was just so fixated on the client. I was so burnt out in zombie mode. You were, it was, we call it zombie Greg, like just dazed.

[43:56] It's like you got out of a combat zone, which is funny because like it literally looked like you just rolled out of like chaos. And all it was is all the logistics, all the planning, all the success stories, all the micro wins, the macro wins. But we live for those types of things. Like you you get energy and you get, you know, these adrenaline dumps of seeing your scope translating into like increasing the productivity and capability of like whoever you're taking care of to get to like whatever goal and that could just be like personal time

[44:33] like how successful that family trip was. Like they had such a such a great time. But now you think in longevity in programming, longevity in like client relationships, longevity if like you're on the vendor side and it's a partnership and you're continuously producing like that's a part of the product.

[44:49] Yeah. Yeah, I think that was the first time that I had a client actually apologize for the lack of sleep cuz he was going through the same thing too like he he was in full party mode but you know before and after his schedule. You still have your prep work, you still have your wind down, your AARs, you still have all the stuff that you have to do and then try to set yourself up for success the next day like you said. So you're getting way less sleep than them because on the front and back end of their schedule, you have your stuff that you need to do which you're not going to be able to do on their schedule. So you have to wait until they're done.

[45:20] Yeah.

[45:21] And so that just made it even more difficult. But yeah, the full-on zombie mode was that was not fun to go through.

[45:26] Staffing comes into play and then you start having your team members, you know, you're technically employees at that time

[45:33] figuring out how to take care of you cuz they're seeing that like, you know, you're getting ran to the ground and then they step in and it just turns into like a really cool dynamic when things are functioning really well. They almost turn into your assistants at some point because if you're the primary on the principal and there's no real place for them as a supporting cast to get into a venue or you don't have another ticket or something like that, they kind of turn into your helper at that point of like, all right, what how do we support you being inside or what do you need set up for you when you get outside or how do we get to the next venue and get that set up for you? Um, and assistant is probably a bad word, but I don't have a better one at the moment off the hip. No, I mean, but you're you're spot on in many different ways because, you know, your team members and your teammates and your guys and girls at the same time are layers of like the daily success story.

[46:24] Mhm. like [clears throat] their eyes and ears on the outside of a venue or maybe their eyes and ears on the inside while you're outside. But it's this constant translation piece of, you know, everybody talks about the concentric rings of security, but like if you actually have them like all the layers in between should be taken care of because always someone's always looking out for everybody else that's playing a different role. So you can just like ease through and transition, you know, from the mobility piece of getting to from one location to a next to that advance being set up, that handoff happening smoothly, then the reset where you go take control inside, they pop outside, and then now they're making sure they're eyes and ears. When vehicles are moving around, there's chaos. It's like it it's dynamic and there's so many little tiny little layers and pieces.

[47:06] They're just logistics. It's not even security at that point. It's just like logistics and support and movement, mobility.

[47:12] Yeah. You're facilitating again the client's lifestyle, the client's wants and needs, and you're just the conductor moving the pieces around. Like, it's a chessboard

[47:21] of just moving pieces to where they need to be to set everybody up for success and to have the client a seamless movement or, you know, event or whatever the case may be. And like when it goes smoothly, you look at it and you're like, "Oh, damn, that was that was awesome. That was sexy the way that we did all that stuff." And the client, if they don't even notice, that's when you're successful. If they're like, "I had no hiccups. I was in from one event, into the vehicle, into the next event, into this, into that with no hiccups, no delays, no nothing." That's what they're expecting. And so they're not even giving a second thought. They're not like, "Oh man, my security team's [ __ ] hot." Because we just had that. They're just like, "Oh yeah, this is what I want." But for us, like looking at it from that management director standpoint, when you're running the operation, it's like, "Oh man, these guys are spot on." Like they're making this look good. They're making me look good. And then there's no recognition, but that's the success at the end of the day.

[48:15] Yeah. We have highlight reels.

[48:16] Yeah.

[48:17] Principals have no idea. It's just like it that's how it was supposed to go.

[48:22] Yeah. like and it should go that way and it should be successful and it should be fluid, but at the same time like we're looking at it and seeing which we'll go into the the the crazy story that that you had with you know the music festival thing.

[48:37] Oh yeah, I was about to ask you what do you think your hardest one was? Cuz that was definitely one of mine hardest. No, I kind of want to like tap into a little bit more of like, you know, you got your start in the industry coming to California, but you were also doing other things too to get there. Like you were doing the WPS program and for that for a bit and then at the same time you were also instructing both law enforcement.

[48:56] Yeah.

[48:56] And you know, military and close quarters combat and just like some other unique stuff. Was that like a an ad hoc like separate gig or was that attached to guys that you met overseas?

[49:07] So it was actually attached to a vetting course I went to for a company. Um, it was a

[49:11] Are you talking about like the Did you go to one of them once for like the next tier up?

[49:16] Yeah.

[49:16] Yeah.

[49:17] So, it was supposed to be like the next tier up. They were going to be doing government and private contracts. Um, it was a vetting course to get us certified in like everything maritime. So, ISPS, STCW, all the maritime stuff like they were trying to have their hands involved in everything

[49:31] which is like what? Like that's more of like the visit board search and seizure like

[49:35] Yeah, that's like aboard the freight liner security type thing. So you know uh STCW is standards of work or standards of training work and something or other I can't remember on board and ISPS is international ship protection.

[49:51] So checking checking the right boxes to qualify and certify to be able to do that kind of work. Yeah.

[49:55] But they were having their hands in everything. So I met a bunch of these guys um and a lot of them were former SEALs, former recon marines, former MARSOC, all that. And I was the lone army guy in this course. So when it came to like pool training and everything and all the water stuff, they were just like huddled around me of like, can the army guy even float? So we were messing with the instructors and we went to Walmart on the way to the pool and just bought every floaty that we could and I just come waddling out with all the floaties on my arms, something around my waist, a swim cap on, bug just to mess with them.

[50:26] That's funny. [laughter]

[50:28] And then the first thing they had us do is like the treading water for a couple of hours or something and everybody was just like in a circle around me. They obviously made me take the floaties off, but I mean it was just good training, good guys, stuff that I hadn't gone through before, so I didn't know how I was going to do treading water for a couple of hours. And it's more exhausting than it sounds.

[50:47] Yeah. Well, one of the big things that, you know, I wanted to bring up too is, you know, there's where you came from and where I came from too with like the contracting world, there's there's layers and tiers and you're only going to get to certain tiers and certain levels with certain backgrounds.

[51:04] [clears throat]

[51:05] And it's kind of a hard pill to swallow at some points, but like we've got buddies that are OG's that have done, you know, all the way back to the Blackwater days.

[51:11] Yeah.

[51:11] You know, guys that got into some unique stuff, guys that are working for me right now, you know, have way more experience in all of that world than me,

[51:19] right? So you take that time and you know those individuals that you're around on those teams and the coolest coolest part that I always like to tell everybody especially from like a mentoring perspective is get used to asking a lot of questions and learning from everybody else's experiences around you because there's always these hitters that have done some really really really cool stuff and if you don't pay attention you don't listen to them then like you're kind of just like leaving like knowledge and like experience and on the job training on the So attach yourself to these people, learn to do these other things. And you're kind of describing that thing where it's like the two levels you could go from like being a WPS contractor is well three. Just go back to doing whatever stuff like I know [clears throat] one guy that he's like I'm just going to go do carpentry work after this. I think he's building houses.

[52:09] Yeah. I mean everybody has a timeline.

[52:11] Yeah. or you level up. And to level up, you have to have time certain locations and you have to have different time and service. And you have to have a background to be able to get there. And if that's something you want to do, you have to vet in.

[52:22] You have to know people to get a recommendation to get in to vet

[52:27] or private.

[52:29] And so we both kind of just came private. And I mean, back to your point, like tapping into the knowledge and everything like that, I've said it a bunch of times to guys that have come to me asking for advice and stuff, and they've always asked like, "If you could give me one tidbit just to take away, what would it be?" And I usually will say, "You can learn something from everybody." Like, it doesn't matter if they're just starting out in the industry. It doesn't matter if they've been in the industry for 30 years. Doesn't matter if they have no background, best background. Somebody or everybody is going to be able to teach you something from their experiences that you might not have experienced or you might have looked at a different way than they do and they have a different perspective on it. And so I you can't discount anybody because they might be the perfect fit in certain situations or they might have the knowledge that you don't have for this, but everybody can teach you something.

[53:19] Yeah.

[53:19] And with the contracting world, you know, we used to have the peer outs. So, it turned into kind of like a social structure as well of like, do you want to work with this person regardless of their background? Obviously, the background helps. It'll get you into the door, but it's not going to get you fully through the threshold. Like, you got to still be that guy that people aren't looking at like, "Oh god, he's back." Yeah. Like, I don't [clears throat] want to work with him.

[53:42] You got to be that team player. You got to be the guy that people want to rely on and want to go to for certain things and not just like, "God, I got to deal with this guy again." like you know you know my sentiments on certain people that we've worked with in the past like

[53:57] oh man

[53:57] we can we can hit them too [laughter]

[54:00] not too hard but

[54:02] no I think so if you take all of that experience and all those different types of people like the different levels of where everybody's at and then like people you've worked with even since but like even with the WPS and then the instructing and then being attached to other guys and the military like what do Do you think everybody or what did you learn about like dealing with stress from all these other people like cuz combat experience is different from everybody? You know what I mean? Everybody did did different stuff. It's like if I go back on my own, it's like it's almost non-existent, right? So, you have to learn even from your background and where you're at and like what you know your capabilities are or the new stresses you've dealt with. But these guys always and gals have this level so far superior sometimes that if you can tap into that and learn from it and get a little guidance, it's just it's huge. And so what do you feel like you learned about like stress management like within industry like within this field just from the people around you?

[55:05] Nothing healthy.

[55:07] Well, yeah, that's that's true too. I guess dealing with stress, it really just depends on the situation because like there's operational stress and then you have like the backend stress of like dealing with your employees, dealing with people and it's stress at the end of the day, but it's very different because one is like everything is so dynamic in the moment. Go, go, go. You're stressed out because you don't have full control over something in the moment. an uh on an operation that you're running. Everything is relying on you to put the pieces together, put the people in the right places and hope that certain things work out in your favor.

[55:44] Yeah.

[55:44] And then you have like the backend stress of everybody's always going to have something come up as you know running programs and dealing with people of like you know the family's sick or flight delays. We can't get people into place at the same time. So there's a different level of stress where uh with those types of stress, it's like I just got to take a step back for a second, take a deep breath, just look at it from like a logical standpoint of this is out of my control. It's not catastrophic. It's not the end of the world. What other pieces do I have in my back pocket that I could use to fix this rather than the operational thing? it. I put it more on myself, I guess, in a lot of situations, uh, when things are going wrong in the field of, okay, I'm the one that has to fix this in the immediate. It might not be pretty. It might not be the best way, but this is just the most logical way to fix it at the moment, and we need it fast. So, you don't have that moment of pause necessarily all the time to just jump right into full-blown and try to get the problem fixed. Yeah.

[56:43] Whereas like the backend stuff, you can actually work a problem. You can move the pieces. You can kind of de-stress yourself by figuring out the solution because as you figure the pieces out and fit them into the right place, you can kind of feel the stress melting away of like, okay, I got a handle on this rather than the initial shock of like, damn, what am I going to do here? Well, and then you translate now from, you know, jumping into corporate security and you were, you know, an operator, an agent, then a team lead, then a manager, then a security director, and then now technically like translating that all into, you know, like ad hoc consultancy.

[57:30] Yeah. where you've built relationships with people and they're keeping you on in order to just get that information and that subject matter expertise because you just nailed it up until that point. And then now looking not necessarily for the next thing but with all of this though like where do you think it was the most difficult to move from like operator to leader and you know some guys want to stay on operator like some no one no one really wants to trans some people they Before I say something stupid,

[58:04] there's individuals that feel that they're supposed to be in leadership shoes.

[58:09] Yeah.

[58:10] They feel that they're supposed to be managing. Their ego is so beyond what they can even comprehend that they screw up for everybody else. And then there's the other guys that just know like I'm I'm good being a team guy. Like I'm good being an an agent. like I'm good just doing this rotation licking windows and for everybody else like licking windows is just a terminology for just somebody else in the vehicle or we would call like a shooter overseas where you know your job is just to diminish situations and to be available because we need the numbers but the transition between agent to team leader to manager to you know director like where where was your head that.

[58:57] So I didn't

[58:58] going in between

[58:59] I didn't necessarily want to in the beginning be in leadership. Um we were on a small team where at the beginning we didn't really have a leadership structure but there needed to be one. And everybody was kind of on the mindset of like well I don't want it. I don't want it. And so eventually they were just like hey you're it. It's like cool. I don't know what I'm doing differently here. uh until like the workload started getting thrust on me and it was like oh damn this is what it means. So then all of a sudden I'm doing the scheduling, I'm doing the admin stuff, I'm helping with SOPs, I'm in all these meetings with higherups and all that. And you know, it changes a lot of things because you're kind of getting slowly

[59:40] as you progress more and more, the door opens up more and more into like the back end, the business side, the overhead stuff, like the stuff that normally you just don't see. When you're just a window licker, when you're just uh, you know, like an agent or doing the team stuff, it's great. kind of at work, off work, not really anything in between. You're one of the guys. People look at you as like a friend and a co-orker instead of a boss. And you get in a lot of ways more genuine

1:00:11 · Leadership roles and distance from the team

[1:00:11] personalities because they don't have to watch their mouth or anything.

[1:00:14] Yeah.

[1:00:15] And they can tell you the dirt.

[1:00:17] Yeah. You're probably involved in most of it.

[1:00:19] Yeah. you know, um, but then you get into the leadership and then you kind of get looked at a little bit differently as like a team leader because team leader you're still one of the guys you're just now in charge of a little bit more and then you get into management and you're just one more step removed from that where it's like all right you're not going to know what's going on with these guys off work sometimes or like even on work when they're on their off shift or something like that depending on the team that you're on and then you get into the director role where it's like people are really just putting smile on to make you happy

[1:00:51] sometimes because they're scared of what the consequences could be.

[1:00:55] And so you kind of got to really have that good relationship, those again people skills to be able to read through it because people aren't going to necessarily come to you with their problems for you to help fix even if it is something that's in your scope. They don't want to portray themselves as weak or, you know, having issues or being a problem child or anything. They save that for like the team leads and for the other agents and everything. And you know that's a very military way. Like you're gonna [ __ ] and moan to your other soldiers or marines and everything and then when it comes down to it, you're gonna still get the stuff done, put on a smile maybe, but you know, you're going to [ __ ] and moan the entire way. The bitching and moaning just doesn't always get up to the top.

[1:01:34] No. But, and correct me if I'm wrong, but operational effectiveness comes from, and I'm going to give a huge shout out to the new Well, it's not new. I think season six just dropped, but Shoresh, [clears throat]

[1:01:50] the hockey show.

[1:01:50] Yeah.

[1:01:52] Season six, he he he's talking, you know, to his guys and whatnot. And it's just hits home so hard. But I just love that show so much cuz it's so belligerent. But building a winning culture.

[1:02:04] Mhm. [clears throat] And I think where a lot of guys deviate is, you know, they get in a seat and they get in a leadership role or they become the voice of reason to a principal or they're the educator. Now, educating individuals and ultra high net worth people on what they should be doing for their security, but that's a piece in and amongst amongst itself, the director level, you know, inside of a family office and whatnot that you just did. and you know that we did, but also there's the team.

[1:02:38] Mhm.

[1:02:39] And if everything is getting siloed and isolated and it's not running up the chain of command and you don't have the full picture and you don't have a winning culture to where people are willing to share and you know team together and you can go into like education and you know terminology like dynamic teaming and like letting people have a voice and letting people be able to share their their ways of looking at things. And if things get too team and then the management is just managing and then when you try to lead it's more so just giving direction and there's not full understanding of like everything in between. I feel like it's a fail cuz you need to build like this culture of

[1:03:21] making the team feel safe to say the right things and the hard things and then to tell the dirt and you know to [ __ ] moan and complain so you can form and fabricate and build and make the right decision and then hold yourself accountable to the decisions that you're making for the organization and not put it on them. Meaning like snowballs roll downhill, right?

[1:03:45] Yeah.

[1:03:46] I mean, my approach has always been

[1:03:47] [ __ ] also rolls uphill and it should

[1:03:50] and you should be able to protect and absorb and I talked about this with me. It's like the absorption piece. It's like leadership is huge on just absorbing, you know, all of everything because you've either experienced it before, you have the repetition, the time and consistency, or you're just in the position to be able to take care of people. And I think people get too wrapped up in like the role with a title or I'm so and so and I'm working for so and so and now you just lose sight on like everybody else that makes you successful, which is team.

[1:04:21] Egos are huge in this industry. I mean,

1:04:23 · Transparency, team input, and accountability

[1:04:23] you've encountered it. I've encountered it. I'm sure at some point I've had a ego that I shouldn't have had for something that I didn't deserve. But the way that I try to approach it, especially in the leadership roles that I've been in now, is just be as transparent as possible with the guys and girls. Uh, you know, give them all the information that you have so there's no question. And, you know, sometimes you don't get all the information. Sometimes you don't get any information. And you just got to be transparent of like, look, this may be a [ __ ] show. I don't know what's going on. this is literally all that I have. So, let's figure out the best way to approach it as a team. And I think we did that really well on the last detail where we incorporated a lot of input from the guys. Obviously, we had the final say, but we incorporated the input to give them a little bit of ownership into the operations that they were on. And obviously, there's a threshold for that of like, okay, time to go. We're going to go with this way. And as a leader, you have to make that call. But sitting around a table having the guys talk about how we're going to approach something and getting their input

[1:05:26] because again you can learn something from everybody and all the different backgrounds that we had military some like just training some didn't have any background I mean everybody has life experiences and so they're looking at things a little bit different than you and you just take that information as a leader and try to make the best decision possible but include everybody into that decision-m process but let it be known that ultimately it's your ass on the line because the client's looking to you as a leader so you're going to make that final call of how it's done.

[1:05:59] Well, when you get to the top also like what what does a good agent look like to you? Like what is a good protector that's just like trying to get their start? Now you're running a program, you know, we're hiring, we're looking through resumes. Uh you talk a little bit about the fact that like that big big program that we ran, we had a vetting course. We would bring people in and they would work integrate with the team. They live with the team. Everybody would know kind of like what the expectation is is like we're trying to see who this person really truly is.

[1:06:33] Yeah. So you have the lowest level, you know, going out and grabbing drinks with them after operations are done and then they're coming back to the team house and now like leadership's there and we're all like, you know, talking operations and kind of seeing how they act, if they're going to ask questions or if they're going to integrate and then you put them out in the field, but you put them in positions where they're going to be successful or at least they're set up for success with somebody else a little bit more senior with them. Mhm.

[1:06:58] But for you, like what what was the deciding piece on like who was a good agent, who was a good teammate, who was a good team type individual? So, I mean, anybody can put anything down on a resume. You know, you can make yourself look like Captain America on paper. You can nail an interview. You can talk the talk. What you're talking about is we actually made him walk the walk afterwards and we weeded out a lot of people that I would have figured would have been shoeins and it was eye opening the lengthy process.

[1:07:32] You remember you remember some of the backgrounds too?

[1:07:34] Yeah. A lot of special operations, a lot of OGA, GRS, like we have some

[1:07:39] Secret Service. Yep.

[1:07:41] FBI.

[1:07:41] Let's not get into the Secret Service.

[1:07:43] We don't have enough time for that. Well, the funny thing too is at that same time there was actually a couple people that crossed our desk

[1:07:49] and they were also people that came from contracting world.

[1:07:54] Yeah.

[1:07:55] And there were immediate nos for some of them

[1:07:58] had told me no at one point to get to that like next level of like what I was trying to do.

[1:08:04] Yeah.

[1:08:05] And it was funny now that it came full circle. It's not really funny, but it's just like the world works in unique ways where it's like our private security market at the level that we're trying to do and the level we've been doing it for you nearly two decades is it's different, right? And you have to understand those transitions and we started to realize like who works within it. Now a lot of our old team was made up of everybody.

[1:08:29] We had a very diverse team, a little marine heavy but diverse one nonetheless. But back to your question,

[1:08:34] slightly partial to Marines, but it's okay. I mean, I have nothing against Marines. We

[1:08:38] Yeah,

[1:08:38] we all love the Marines.

[1:08:39] They're either good or they're really bad.

[1:08:41] Yeah. Um, but what is the good agent? I would say the no ego is a big one. And coachable, understanding that you're not going to always know or have the best answer, but being able to rely on the teammates and your leadership and everything to even if it's not like come to me and tell me how to do it, just a collaborative effort of brainstorming. um being adaptable to different situations. And I think the last program that we were on, it was a very unique one because it's not like when you're on shift, you're off shift and you go home and you're just away from the team. You're living with these people. We had team houses where you're living there for 20 plus days at a time sometimes. And so you're off work, but you're still living with these people. And so we had to really focus on the team dynamic and the personality meshing. Yeah. Not necessarily like, oh, this guy's got the resume. He's a badass. We want him. But how does he fit in with the rest of the team that's not going to cause us problems in the long run? And I'm not going to say we sacrificed on resumes or anything like that because we had such a diverse team that it made every situation easier because we always seemed to have a guy that had an

[1:09:50] experience that would be relevant for whatever we were doing.

[1:09:53] Yeah. Remember our boat guy? [laughter] like just out of out of the blue, we just decided that like, okay, how do we add to capability and dynamics within this this team based on what we consistently did and it turns out, you know, like shout out to this dude and I hope he hope he listens, but he turned out to be a stud and he pulled some rabbits out of hats and, you know,

[1:10:17] he spent a little bit too long fishing a couple of times.

[1:10:19] Yeah. But, you know, materialized some some boats and, you know, even even bailed me and the principal out of a unique situation where, you know, engine goes down on a on a dinghy trailing a yacht and we're stuck out in the water and the guys make an executive decision to go basically commoder a boat with a quick high five and a cash transaction to get out there. But he knew how those guys knew how to operate that boat.

[1:10:50] Yeah. And I mean that's the versatility that we had on that team.

[1:10:53] Yeah. The swick capability and and you know even the licensure too like it was it was legal. It was legitimate. It was done well but it was hasty fast and it saved the day

[1:11:02] because we just plan to staff to the operational capability we wanted to be at just in the event of in a proactive way versus a reactive like oh we just need bodies to do EP. It's like, no, no, no, no. We're we're pretty dynamic on a daily basis, so we need to be able to, you know, keep up.

[1:11:20] But I think like the hiring process for us also shifted because in the beginning it was like a mad dash to get bodies on and, you know, get that core group that we're going to be able to be versatile with and, you know, run the day-to-day, but it might not be specialized skills necessarily yet. And then as the hiring process progressed and we were filling the slots up and we're reaching our threshold for what we were allowed to have, then we were able to really pinpoint of like, oh, we don't have this kind of capability here. Let's show more interest to this guy.

[1:11:49] And like, oh, this guy just put his resume in. We don't have one of those backgrounds. Let's take a look at this guy and see if it'll be a good fit. And then we're just enhancing our capabilities even more by adding these people on that we may have overlooked in the beginning of the hiring process, you know.

[1:12:03] Yeah. No, I mean there's some people we overlooked. I mean on that team too, like this is this is a good like hearty thing to just kind of like bring out, but you'll remember we had a vetting course and we brought some some individuals on and one of them we didn't choose to hire and it's like something that still weighs pretty heavily with me is like you know they ended up killing themselves. Yeah, that one was

[1:12:30] soon after and I had worked with them on another team before briefly and we'd also brought them on as a contractor and they'd you know run operations with us on multiple occasions overseas and in that process they already had the in. We already liked them. We already knew who they were. uh we wanted their capability because they were extremely capable, but for some reason other people just stood out more and had a better team fit and then the team gave the recommendation of like

[1:12:58] this is who we want to work with. not more, but like we just think this is going to be the better fit and we didn't choose this individual and sure enough turns into a really hard pill to swallow when you're like did our decision and as leadership and did our decision not picking this individual ultimately kind of like you know be the straw that broke the camel's back but you can't really put that ego on yourself but at the same time it's like

[1:13:24] it hits it feels pretty heavy. That was a rough one especially hearing that because like yeah you're right your mind does go to like would it have turned out differently if we did hire him on instead of this guy or something or you know if we didn't hire this other guy would he be in the same boat and he I mean we had so many so many qualified people and candidates that it was hard to really pinpoint who we were going to hire because those vetting classes are like we brought people down and we would have one-on- ones with them. we formulate relationships with them. We'll, you know, build that rapport and then it's like, okay, who's going to be the best fit? And you think you're making the best decision for the program, which is what I think we both had in heart. But then you don't think about the personal aspect of like what's this doing to the other person? And like if we could hire everybody, we would, but we have a limited number of slots to to fill the family office or the company that you're working for, they're not going to foot the bill just for everybody.

[1:14:21] Yeah.

[1:14:21] And so you got to make those tough decisions. And when it turns out like that, unfortunately, like that was a hard one. I know we talked about it a lot of getting the news on that, that was like, damn, did we make the right call? You second guess yourself a lot. Yeah. And then there's there's impact as well. Our community is really small. Um, and there's well, let's just call it what it is. There's a tendency to hire people that you know and there's also a tendency to hire people that you've worked with, people that are loyal. People want to build a good loyal base of trust around them. But that can go bad and good in many different ways. We've seen it many times over, right?

[1:15:02] Yeah.

[1:15:03] But guys on that team knew this individual. Guys on that team, you know, had previous relationships. I had previous relationships with other teams and friends that knew and were currently working with them on another program, another project. And it just then then now you have that weird element where it's like that team was so unique because it felt like we were back in service or back on like a WPS program cuz it was tight. It was super close. Like everybody knew everything about everybody and it that's how we functioned and work and that's how it was so successful. However, incidents like that then kind of like snowball and then they turn into like the next two, three months where it's like you got to check in on people and be like, "You doing good?" Like, "How do you feel about this?"

[1:15:52] There's that gray cloud over it, so to speak. But, I mean, all throughout the hiring process, like I would say overall it was a fairly smooth process. Yeah. We turned a lot of people away. We had thousands of applicants that we sorted through resumes and everything to decide who we were going to give a shot. And you know, I'm sure we overlooked some people and I'm sure that you know, we could have had a very different team, but at the time like that was the team that we decided was going to be the best fit. And I mean, I know you were recommending some people and I shot down some of your friends, I shot down uh you shot down some of my friends and everything that, you know, we each thought that they would be good fits and then either they interviewed badly or it was just we don't have the slot or, you know, something. I know we were talking about it uh at one point and it was like, "Oh, you don't want him?" Well, I don't want him then. And it was the draft all over of like it's like the tit for tat thing in like a joking way. Uh, but I think at heart we both had the best interest of the program at the end of the day and made a honestly incredible product

[1:16:53] and I think that's the thing that kind of gets left behind is

[1:16:57] it's a business at the end of the day and now where we're at we're running it as a business but at the same time like the strategy behind the hiring decision, the strategy behind the staffing, the strategy behind which agents you're looking at and why it matters long term in the whole building a winning culture aspect of things and then also you know why are they going to be best for the principal? Why are they going to be best for the program? Why are they going to be the best cultural fit for corporate? What is the capability that they're going to bring to get us to our end objective which is like operational success and fluidity? And that sometimes gets lost too when people are just wanting to bring their buddies in.

[1:17:39] Yeah. And I mean I think we had a good mix. You know, we hired some people that we both knew. Uh obviously nothing in the hiring process is ever perfect. We had some people that definitely fell through the cracks and maybe weren't the best decision after all, you know, in hindsight. Uh but at the time it was the best fit and at the time it was, you know, the people that we thought were going to be the best for the job. Yeah.

[1:18:01] And the best culture and like, you know, it developed the culture cuz it again, it was a unique detail of you're not going home at the end of the day. You're still living with everybody. You still have to interact with these guys. And it was so cool to see like the friendships and everything built. Like I'm still in contact with the majority of people on that detail. I golf with some of them all the time. Uh you know, we're all on group chats. We all keep in contact and

[1:18:26] other guys are doing really successful things and they kind of

[1:18:29] went their own way and they're they're doing great work. And what's funny too is that you know you get back in that like trying trying to find your next thing phase and after that all ended for us we were in the same we were in the same boat.

[1:18:44] Mhm. And that's a big thing too for you know everybody like trying to break into the industry or transition to certain places is it's hard to describe too to the outside world what our inside world looked like inside of that specific program and that one in particular because people go you know you know filling out a job application and it's like were you part-time full-time contract and it's like no I was about 20 hours a day

[1:19:10] minimum I mean when you were on

[1:19:11] 20 plus days a month

[1:19:12] more than that

[1:19:13] and then remote the rest of the time. Um, so

[1:19:18] the amount of experience those guys got and a lot of them are running their own programs, running their own teams now, they've progressed amazingly and it's really cool to see that. But yeah, they're it's hard to translate on a paper the amount of experience they got because our ops tempo and our travel tempo was like insane. Yeah, because three years on that program and could translate to, you know, seven, eight years of experience at a slower paced, minimal travel schedule, just kind of like Bay Area going about your business, taking the boss to work. It's completely different ballgame and the dynamics were astronomically different.

[1:19:54] You're almost a contractor at that point, like back being on WPS where it's like shorter rotations,

[1:19:59] but you're fully immersed when you're on and then when you're off, you're off. Except for the leadership obviously cuz for you and me it was you were off but then I'm still supporting you on the back end while you're focusing on ops and when you're off you're doing the admin and stuff while I'm focusing on ops and so it was a little bit different as you progressed up in that uh that specific

[1:20:20] program. But yeah, the guys they were I mean probably the closest team since the military that I've been a part of.

[1:20:29] Yeah. No, it was a real team team. amazing one, too.

[1:20:33] Yeah.

[1:20:33] Sucks it all went away, but at the same time, it's like, you know, everybody's done really cool stuff since.

[1:20:37] Yeah. And I mean, you know what? We're all going to be getting together very soon for different events and stuff coming up, so that'll be really cool to, you know, get [clears throat] with the guys. I saw some of them at IPSB and see how they're doing and stuff. And, you know, I don't necessarily agree with some of the stuff in places that they're at, but that's not for me to say here or there. Like, if they ask for my advice or my opinion, I'll give it to them. But, you know, I it's just cool to see that everybody is successful at this point.

[1:21:05] Yeah. 100%.

[1:21:06] Cuz there was that question mark, I know, for you and me, cuz we were on the phone for hours about it when we found out that the detail was going away of like, okay, where are we going to find places for all these people and try to keep people together cuz this is the team that we want to work with. And so, luckily, a lot of them ended up in the same place. And, uh, that's awesome. But eventually, we got to figure out a way to get everybody back together. Yeah,

[1:21:29] we got to have a another tour going.

[1:21:31] We got some ideas. All right, so let's

1:21:34 · From early friction to a working partnership

[1:21:34] go into um what I find pretty funny, but I brought it up in my last podcast. Um so for everybody listening, um our relationship goes back quite a ways, but it started pretty rocky to say the least. I brought up previously, you were the guy that I mentioned that I got onto a team with and had to co-lead with and I just did not like you. I didn't like you at all. I'm not very likable.

[1:22:02] No, you are. But it was it was one of these things where full transparency for me is I had left something good and gotten somewhere great and I was excited about what we were doing. Like I I hunted it down. I heard about it. I found out about it. They're starting this new big program. It's going to be based overseas. It's dynamic, big team, big structure. Uh, cool capabilities. We're do everything from like covert, low profile, high-profile. Um, the principal's notable, going to be interesting to work for. There's a family office structure, so you're not really dealing with too much. And then it's like, oh, it's going to be siloed, so we're doing our own thing. Like, we make it work. And I was like, "Hell yeah, I'm in." And I got there and I just thought that again, like, you know, everybody's got an ego and I had one.

[1:22:55] I did, too.

[1:22:56] Yeah. And we buted heads pretty hard. And I thought that I was supposed to be doing more. And it turned out I was doing the same thing as you and we had to do it together. And even the first operation just pissed me off because I show up to this Caribbean island and you had already been there for a few weeks. You know, you you knew better. You knew what was going on and you were put in the position by who was in charge at the time to staff this trip and to get us going. And sure enough, like Nate shows up and I get put on night shifts by who other than you. Correct. And then, you know, I even made a mistake on that one trip, too, where it's like one of the guys that we're really close to. Um, he was the one I was supposed to be relieving. And it's like my second shift, I think. I I I was just running late and like we were self-driving. So, you're coming across town, driving, you know, on the island and whatnot. and like getting to the location where all the principals and the friends were at and I showed up late and then me and him started butting heads to to some degree. But the funny thing too is it's that you don't always have to like who you're working with right away. You need to figure out how to get to an end goal.

[1:24:18] And the goal needs to be, you know, again, background. We're driven off of mission success and driven off of being bigger than ourselves and like focused on more in a servant mentality industry where we're supposed to be protecting and focused on somebody else. And if we're discombobulated and disgruntled and having a hard time getting there, then we're not going to get there. And so we sat down.

[1:24:44] Yeah. I remember I think it was one of the first nights that you were there. We put the other guys on shift so that you and me could just go sit down, have a drink, just get to know each other because like I'd heard your name throughout the industry before. And I think you said that you had heard about me a little bit before. And so we just got a couple of drinks and we were just like, "All right, how are we going to make this work?" I think one of the first things that you said was like, "Yeah, I've heard of you. Pretty a real asshole."

[1:25:11] Oh yeah, I am. But you know, at the end of the day, we are here for a reason. We both kind of have somewhat of an idea of what we're doing. So, we got to just find a way to make this work.

[1:25:20] Yeah. I think the conversation literally

[1:25:25] was correct me if I'm wrong, but I think I actually said we have to just figure out how to make this work together.

[1:25:33] Yeah.

[1:25:33] And I'm realizing now that like I've got to get out of myself. And I was pretty transparent and like called myself out and I'm like I don't know why I feel the way that I do, but I feel like I just just don't like you. But I realized that we have to make this work together and the only way we're going to do that is together. And since that moment,

[1:25:50] like that was like the moment we continued to butt heads, but it was all business.

[1:25:55] And I think that was the common thing that we had that like kind of solidified that this was going to work is like we realized that, you know, you might not like me, I might not like you. Let's put that aside and let's just focus on the common goal of making this an incredible program. And I think that just focusing on that, the personal relationship formed after that because it was like, okay, I can work with this guy and oh yeah, he does know what he's doing. I don't have to worry about when I'm off and he's on if he's doing the stuff that I wouldn't agree with or, you know, we were constantly in communication and it was all business. And then somewhere along the lines, it turned into like, okay, this guy's okay, he's cool, we can, you know, coexist. We can have a good relationship outside of work and stuff. and like actually have a friendship. But yeah, it started off on a very professional rocky path of like you're here, I'm here, you stay in your lane, I'll stay in mine, call me if you need me, but essentially go away after that.

[1:26:56] Or I'm going to run operations my way, you're going to run operations your way. And then well, the problem with that was

[1:27:03] it's two different ways and the client's not getting the consistency.

[1:27:06] Yeah. and the teams not being able to kind of overlap and stay consistent together, which is another big thing we've ran into in these type of travel programs.

[1:27:14] And nobody's ever going to do it exactly the same way as somebody else. You're always going to have those little subtle differences and stuff. But overall, trying to find that consistency of like adapting the way that you do certain things and you adapting some of the way that I do things and like bouncing ideas off of each other, I think made it really successful. And then made it more consistent for the team and the client, but it made it easier for the team to be like, "Okay, I'm working for Greg now on this rotation. I have to change everything that I did from Nate to him." instead of the way that it turned out. It was like, okay, I can still do the stuff I was doing for Nate, maybe tweak a little bit, you know, maybe the comms are a little bit differently or something like that, but I can generally just do the same thing. And I think a couple of the employees really made that apparent a couple of trips. They were like, yeah, this is how we did it for Nate and it worked. It's like, okay, you know what? Let's run with that.

[1:28:03] Yeah. And the same thing, too. We we would talk on the phone.

[1:28:06] Mhm. And it got to the point where we would call each other and you just got done and we're trying to create some sort of like continuity in operations. Keep it consistent. Keep it the same or close to, right?

[1:28:20] Yeah.

[1:28:22] Phone you up. Hey, Greg, here's what I'm dealing with. Here's kind of what's going on. Um, it's pretty hot, fast, and in a hurry. I think we're good. Um, one, where'd you leave it? and how would you have gotten to where I'm at right now if you were still here? Because that was important. Because now if I can take what you're gonna tell me and run with it and add my little spin and tweak or maybe like move the guys around in a different way that makes sense to what I'm seeing, what I'm feeling, and what I'm dealing with. We're going to create some good fluidity and continuity and just like get to the point where we want to go. And then that's how we ended up operating is just

[1:29:00] and our passdowns like from the beginning we would do maybe like 15 20 minutes on the phone of like yep this is what happened this is how we're [clears throat] doing it good luck see you to like hours long of like just spitballing ideas of all right we got this coming up who are we going to put on how are we tweaking the schedule what do we got to do and it turned into like less of two individuals trying to do the same job and more of just us coming together to realize that everything is going to be so much better if we just sit down, put the differences aside.

[1:29:33] Yeah.

[1:29:33] And

[1:29:34] get the job done, and then at the end of the day, if we don't go out for a beer or whatever, you know, we still are like just go away. Don't want anything to do with you, whatever. At least we made a good product.

[1:29:45] Yep. And it was all about, you know, end goal program and [clears throat] like doing the right things that were going to stay consistent because of who it was affecting and impacting. And that's a kind of that like principal driven approach. And I remember trips where, you know, you and I both would be like pretty

1:30:02 · Fatigue, relief, and handover continuity

[1:30:02] burnt out, like pretty exhausted and just trying to figure out

[1:30:06] like what's best for this handover

[1:30:10] and like the zombie Greg moment. I mean, that was one where it was like, you're getting off a train, carrying bags, yours and others, and I'm literally receiving multiple packs, principals, individuals that we were taking care of, and now taking charge and then doing the moving operations and then getting them to where they needed to go and then I'm taking over and and the team is

[1:30:34] and I'm headed to the airport.

[1:30:35] Yeah. And it the look on your face was everything that I needed cuz we were pretty good at that point and we've been working pretty well together and you it just it was a look of like I'm out [clears throat] and it was a knuckle bump or like a shoulder pat

[1:30:51] I think you had to like grab my shoulder cuz I didn't even recognize you.

[1:30:54] I was in such like a fixated thing of like the clients are over there. I'm just making a beline

[1:30:59] to be with them get their bags and all that and I think you had to grab my shoulder like what's going on? I'm here.

[1:31:05] And then understanding that it

[1:31:07] how refreshing it is when you're on the other when I would be on your side of that

[1:31:11] and I'd hand off to you

[1:31:14] and it was one of those times where you're like just go home.

[1:31:17] But then

[1:31:18] there's other times too where we would make a conscious decision to overlap.

[1:31:22] Mhm. to stay and to connect um to talk to the team, maybe like take people out and like sit down with the guys and figure out like what's going good, what's going bad, like how do we get better together or us just to connect and like you know talk shop and you know figure out the next three layers cuz we were always working.

[1:31:40] We were trying to be like five steps ahead. Dude, we had the now, which was the operation we're running currently, but we always had other things coming up that were dynamic like

[1:31:49] flights are involved and vehicles and contractors and vendors and sending people ahead and being short staff one spot, over staff the next spot, but planning because we knew that there was more leapfrogging to happen. And

[1:32:02] I think that was a good balance that we figured out though of like let whoever's on focus on the operational here and now and whoever's back home and off or doing like the little overlap that we would sometimes have focus on the upcoming and just getting the groundwork laid out to make our lives easier down the road.

[1:32:19] Yeah. And that's now kind of like where I've gotten to, you know, with like Rescore Group is, you know, when you're trying to describe and, you know, others talk about like educating principals and clients and potential customers is explaining the reasoning and justification behind staffing sometimes because if you take a corporate environment for example, and then you have a family office, like they're going to work two different ways. Mhm.

[1:32:43] Corporate's [clears throat] extremely staffed, heavy, capable, dynamic, a lot of different departments, a lot of help, a lot of assets. Um, we know people working within big corporate techie structures that, you know, their executive protection and their leadership and management, but they have all the resources in the world to make them successful.

[1:33:05] Yeah.

[1:33:05] We had nothing.

[1:33:07] Yeah. We had a family office that was driving operations, a vendor company we were working for that like trusted us to take care of what we were taking care of and then we just would run and do it with like minimal and little. So we

1:33:20 · Program fit, budgets, and stakeholder expectations

[1:33:20] needed staffing.

[1:33:21] So model is never really going to translate in a perfect way and people get this idea in their head of like a model.

[1:33:28] The cookie cutter doesn't work.

[1:33:30] Yeah. And that's one thing I wanted to like hear your thoughts on is like talk about standards and models and you know uh RFP process and for everybody listening you know everybody comes and ask has an ask if they want to build a protection program and they have an idea how it looks but depending on who's making that call and who's making that ask they might have an experience doing it or they might just be in charge of getting it implemented. And now you have to navigate like what's the right model, what's going to work and it's all driven and built like a customtailor suit to specific individuals and everybody differently.

[1:34:12] And that's why it's hard to just describe a standard because you might not want to pay for, you know, being a director of a family office. You might say, "No, like we it's not in our budget. It makes perfect sense operationally and like risk management from a risk management perspective, but it no Yeah, you got to weigh it out of who you're working for, what their appetite for security is, what their risk level is, and then from there you can kind of generate what your idea is to present to the client of like, and for me, I always try to come with multiple options, you know, and all of them are functional. Just you go with best, middle of the line, bare minimum.

[1:34:54] Yeah. Maybe a little bit above bare minimum because you're not trying to just screw yourself over right out of the gate, but functional would be a better word for it. I guess we can get away with this. Yeah. Baseline.

[1:35:04] Yeah. What what's going to diminish risk but not be optimal.

[1:35:08] But the cookie cutter effect, and I've seen this plenty of times where it's like, okay, well, what worked for this is going to work here, so we're just going to take that cookie cutter and put it over here, and we're going to have the same model. We're going to do the same things. It's just going to be different faces. And for a startup, I think that that can be a good model, but you have to adapt it because yeah, what worked for one may have some things that will work for the other, but it's really about feeling out the client, feeling out the principal, and then like you said, making that custom suit. You always start with a big piece of pav fabric and then you have to tailor it down to their size.

[1:35:41] Yeah. And you also have to educate and explain and, you know, delineate between right and wrong and what works and what doesn't work. And you have to make that make sense to a bunch of different stakeholders

[1:35:51] that don't understand much or anything about the security industry sometimes.

[1:35:55] Yeah.

[1:35:55] And those are the decision makers that you really got to focus on.

[1:35:58] Some people want control. Some people take control. Some people

[1:36:02] micromanage

[1:36:03] micromanage and limit control and they don't understand the fact of subject matter expertise in and amongst our industry where we're just trying to do the best thing possible. And yeah, when it comes to a business sense, it turns into dollars and cents. Yeah,

[1:36:18] but right's right.

[1:36:21] And if it's fixing the problems or if it's minimizing the risk or if it's putting a model and a program and a preddecided and conceived standard on top of the task at hand. And that's the goal is to give them exactly what they want, but then to be able to apply it and mold it and kind of scale.

[1:36:45] Yeah. And you know, you got to have the adaptability and versatility because you might create a great program. Then, you know, it's exactly what the client wants today and a week later something changes in their life or something and all of a sudden you're back to square one of like figuring out how to mold it again into what they now want.

[1:37:05] Yeah.

[1:37:06] And you know, like with my current client, luckily, uh they had a a really open mind to the stuff that I was trying to do. They loved security. They wanted it. It wasn't like some of the clients that I've had where it's like security is mandatory. We don't want you here. You're just a nuisance.

[1:37:24] Which is tough to deal with.

[1:37:25] It's very tough. You don't get any information. But luckily with this one, it was like we want you here. We want your ideas. We want your input. How do you want to do this? Which is rare. It's not very common in this industry. But again, we still had to adapt multiple different times for changing things in the life. you know, like a death in the family or something that changes our protection structure because we had a detail for somebody that's no longer with us. What do we do with these bodies? How are we going to still employ them and keep them useful on the detail? We got to adapt to a different tactic now of where do we put them and our rotation changes? And you know, unfortunately, sometimes you got to get rid of some people when certain things like that happen, but it's business at the end of the day. Um, so the cookie cutter effect or cookie cutter model really doesn't work in this industry in the long run. And a lot of the places that are trying to adapt that and you know a lot of corporate security places are trying to do that of like we have multiple executives. You're going to get the exact same package just with different faces for principal A, B, and C. It's like well that's great but

[1:38:29] principal A is totally different. They might be single, family on principal B, like totally different lifestyle on principal C. And you can't have that cookie cutter. You have to mold it and find the personalities that are going to mesh with the client because at the end of the day, the client has to be comfortable

[1:38:45] with the people that they have

[1:38:46] all all day every day.

[1:38:48] And you don't want that revolving door of people coming in and out trying to find the perfect fit. You just have to be able to read people. You have to understand the personalities. And you have to be able to find the people that are going to mesh well with them so they want to come to you for certain things.

[1:39:01] Yep. Now, you take like the there's companies out there and like let's just talk in like a vendor approach because we both worked that sides of the house and building and managing and scaling programs to all sorts of different people. But there's people out there and there's companies out there that are so regimented and controlled that they just are they're not going to take on a customer or a client to build a program because they're not meeting their standard or they're not like for example um a lot of residential security aspects of many different things might result in guys and gals sitting in a car outside a residence 12 hours a day, California labor laws, and you're dealing with all these like nuances of like break times and meal times and like not how many bodies, but budgets constrained. And there's other people that would go, "No, like we're not going to do that. They need they need a a a CP or like a command post, a room to work out of, like it has to be this way. You have to have this, you have to have that." And I think we're kind of like leaning now towards this industry standard of changing the standards and building and molding and tailoring versus being regimented and

[1:40:22] controlled. And I think those types of mentalities when you can't mold and blend and bend your own discomfort to make it work for a principal, it's, you know, it it's changing for sure

[1:40:37] it is. But I mean on that, you know, nobody wants to sit in a vehicle for 12 hours a day on shift. No,

[1:40:44] it's not it's not comfortable. It's not glamorous. It's not anything. Like it sucks.

[1:40:48] I've been there, done it. Can't say I ever want to do it again. Um but from a budgetary standpoint, like some of the places that these principals live, cuz some of them they don't expect, they're not like buying a house planning like, "Oh yeah, one day I'm going to have a security team." They're not thinking about that. They're trying to make their family the most comfortable. they're trying to be in the area that fits for them, we have to adapt to that. So, if that means putting a vehicle post out there, if it means like, you know, doing the uncomfortable to get the job done, then we have to adapt to that. If they have the appetite for it and they're like, "Yeah, let's make you guys more comfortable. We'll build you a CP. We'll build you all this so at least you're like comfortable." Great. I've seen that a couple of times, maybe, but a lot of the time it's just work with what you got. Yeah. not build what you need.

[1:41:36] And I think if you get too wrapped around the axle on like what you want versus what you can make work.

[1:41:43] Mhm. [clears throat]

[1:41:43] It's just not setting things up for success.

[1:41:46] Yeah. You got to be adaptable. You really got to look at like anything that you have around you. And look at our last RST.

1:41:52 · Residential realities, development, and the Glastonbury story

[1:41:52] Like how many times did we go back and forth like cuz I felt bad for those guys.

[1:41:56] The residential security team.

[1:41:57] Yeah.

[1:41:57] Yeah.

[1:41:58] I felt so bad for those guys. We had them out on the beach for 12 hour shifts in monsoons and you know rainy season and stuff like I felt so bad for those guys and like I know we had so many conversations about like okay how do we make this more comfortable? How do we at least keep them dry like how do we do all this stuff without standing out so the principal is not like what the hell is that? Like why is there a new structure out here?

[1:42:21] It needs to make sense to everybody.

[1:42:23] Yeah. And those guys were studs. Like they Yeah. rain, shine, night, day, they were out there. I mean, there was plenty of complaining and stuff, rightfully so. But I mean, my mindset was like, "Okay, I know this sucks. I've been in your shoes." Maybe not identically like in the same location, but how do we make this a better work environment for them so that when it is raining for days at a time, they're not coming in miserable, sick, like all that? So even in that piece too, it's like what would you say to individuals going from that like residential security and and that was that was a tough spot like those

[1:43:03] Yeah.

[1:43:04] those people were the foundation of our program. They

[1:43:08] they did the work.

[1:43:09] Oh yeah.

[1:43:10] The guys day in day out the executive protection team is you know back at a team house feet kicked up at a pool posting pictures on group chats. Like there becomes this like disgruntled team dynamic between like both sides of the house. Everybody's living together and it feels like they're getting, you know, the crap end of the program.

[1:43:29] They absolutely were.

[1:43:30] They are. And then they're also doing, you know, the hardest work for the most part, but there's so much that goes into getting to the next level with with the background and the training. And that's one thing that you know even we're dealing with right now in like scaling a program is certain individuals want to do it but and this is going to segue kind of into some some topics and asks about like dynamic operations and difficulties of you take somebody that wants to do it and you give them an opportunity but you have to also set them up for success.

[1:44:07] Mhm.

[1:44:08] And if you don't it could be a detriment of everything.

[1:44:11] Yeah. So, you take a residential security agent that's done a year or so doing residential security. They're awesome. They've integrated with executive protection and they've kind of like done a little bit of mobility offsite, on-site. They've traveled. Um, but you got to get to a point where you're ready to just like take the chains off and say, "Okay, now you're in advance on an extremely difficult trip and I can't necessarily put you there and you're having to have a hard conversation and say like, it's not that I don't think you could. It's that we can't take the risk on you not being able to. And I need to figure out how we can get there." And there's really no direct and right answer to level up because we also dealt with situations where my ask would be what do you think was one of those moments where it was like it's so dynamic and so difficult and so hard and yet it just it works but it would not have worked unless the right people were there to just make some really really really difficult decisions to make it functional.

[1:45:17] Yeah. I mean, sometimes you got to just put the faith in the person. We had the luxury on that last detail again of just having like a completely amazing team at every level. So, when we were trying to bring those guys up, there was usually a place to put them with one of the more senior guys that had done it to show them the ropes. And then it really just became about seeing their decision-m and how their thought process goes through attacking a situation and then making the minor tweaks or sometimes major tweaks on their decision-m and getting them not to second guessess themselves on certain things because they understand the gravity of the situation. They understand that it's all falling on them at this particular moment. So don't second guess yourself. Go with your gut instinct. You got good instincts. Run with it. And so getting those guys out of that mindset and into like, okay, I can do this. And like doesn't matter what gets thrown at me, we're going to do it this way. And just run with your decision. We can always fix a bad decision when we tabletop it later, but just make a decision.

[1:46:15] Break down an op like a trip.

[1:46:19] Okay. And I'm I know you know the one I'm probably thinking of, but um and you know like long form, short form, try to keep it short form, but at the same time like from start to finish and the key players involved without too many details, but at the same time like that was dynamic and that specific one could have gone every wrong way.

[1:46:46] You mean why I have gray hairs right now? Yeah, that that that specific one and it you know at the end of the day there was no like there was no risk. The risk was failure of logistics.

[1:46:57] Yeah. The threat level was not that high.

[1:46:59] Exactly. Like we weren't worried about bad guys. You're just worried about

[1:47:02] backlash from the client being unsatisfied.

[1:47:05] Yeah. Or delays or being stuck in locations where like there's nowhere to stay. Everything's too far off of the X which is the location we're currently working. like it's just it turns into something really bigger and greater and more complex when everything falls apart.

[1:47:23] Yeah, I'll try to keep it short, but there's so many different moving pieces for this one, which is the Glastonbury Music Festival that we got less than 24 hours notice of going to. And so it started out we were in Europe and uh different country from the festival and it was a text message essentially saying hey tomorrow I want to go see so and so perform at this music festival. Cool. What do I do now? So we're scrambling because it's like okay the logistics part of it. This is in the middle of nowhere. It's not like there's an airport within driving distance comfortably for the client. So, we're looking into helicopters. Okay, shouldn't be a problem. Except there's all these other events going on in the area. So, every helicopter that's licensed to fly in that country is booked up. And we're calling in every favor. We're calling everybody we know.

[1:48:14] We finally found one helicopter, which wasn't going to be enough because it's going to have to do two trips like a down back down back

[1:48:20] with a lot of passengers.

[1:48:22] They kept on they kept on inviting more and more people. We had a full plane

[1:48:24] and the more people are who

[1:48:27] the more people were friends. they had another security detail with them and everything and so

[1:48:33] and and high up individuals from other locations around the were

[1:48:38] like people that could impact a career by failing in that moment.

[1:48:44] Mhm. So ideally we would have two helicopters for this. The clientele that we had ideally we would had three probably just to make it more comfortable but we're crammed everybody into this uh helicopter. This is also when strikes were going on at the airport that we were flying out of. So, we're sitting on the tarmac getting delayed while they're having a little champagne party in the back. And me and the other security team, I'm setting everything up. I have our guy on the ground. I sent them out immediately to advance. Got some local connections and everything. They're getting all the passes. They're getting all the vehicles set up. They're doing everything on the ground ahead of time that they need to do and killing it. Like keeping in contact. I was on the phone multiple times helping as much as I could from behind, but I still have to focus on the principal on the ground in front of me.

[1:49:31] Yeah. And getting everybody to and front.

[1:49:33] Yeah.

[1:49:33] While we have

[1:49:37] just to paint the picture like the assets involved meaning like the people who are decision makers putting this all into place were minimal. Yes,

[1:49:45] we had support from our vendor company, high up guys that, you know, have a lot of contacts and connections that could help set us up, but it it's a tea ball game. They're just putting the ball on the tea.

[1:49:57] Yeah.

[1:49:57] So, like, hey, here's a number like make that work and then who has to figure it out? We do.

[1:50:01] Yep. So, we're coordinating every

[1:50:02] family office that's coordinating with jet teams and helicopters and and the private PJs, private jets.

[1:50:08] I don't even think they were coordinating with helicopters. I think that was all us at that point.

[1:50:11] But, it's all just a few people. It's not departments. It's not a corporate organization with like access and pull. It's like you're making it work by networking, connecting, and and like delivering.

[1:50:23] Yeah. So, the advanced team is out there and they're doing a great job. They're giving me all the information they can, but it's such a short advance for such a big event that you're not going to be able to get the ins and outs of every little thing. So, I'm dealing with the security team on the plane and we're looking at numbers for the helicopter and stuff. The plane once it lands is going to have to reposition at a different airport. I have to coordinate a vehicle for another security team because me and them were going back and forth. It's like, "Look, guys, I have my guys on the ground setting everything up. I'm going on the helicopter. You guys are going to just have to take the plane to the next location. I'll keep you guys updated when we're coming, going, doing whatever you guys need."

[1:51:02] Which

[1:51:02] But I'm there. We call like the ladder.

[1:51:05] Mhm.

[1:51:05] Like [clears throat] what peg are you on in this operation? And like when you're at the top or it's like it's your event, it's your invite, it's your VIP booth, it's your your hosting, it's your house, like everything else is kind of like everybody needs to understand and we understand that like taking like a back seat and running in unison or you know behind because well they're primary and we were primary.

[1:51:31] We were primary. They were not happy about it. They were like no that's my principal. I can't leave him without him. And I was like, "Well, then you're going to have to hang off the skids of the helicopter cuz we don't have a seat."

[1:51:40] And a big individual as well that has to then, you know, whatever conversations they're having, they're probably needing to justify like why I'm okay with dropping my security team. And then maybe I don't know if this happened on that, but having a principal that goes, "No, my guys are awesome.

[1:51:55] You're good."

[1:51:56] Yeah. And that did happen.

[1:51:57] You're good.

[1:51:58] Like when we were discussing it, then the principals did get involved and they were like, "Yep, Greg, you're going. He's going to just be with the plane. we'll see you when you get back. And then his security team was like, "Just keep an eye on my guy." So, yeah, don't worry.

[1:52:10] We got him.

[1:52:11] Which is a tough handshake to have cuz you're relinquishing control to somebody else's team.

[1:52:15] I would have hated that.

[1:52:16] Yeah, exactly.

[1:52:17] Um, so we're on the ground. We get the helicopter in. It's doing the down and back and everything. The two drops. We have all the vehicles in place and we figure out real quick that in this particular location, everybody who lives in the place is trying to make money off of it. So they're setting up like their own makeshift tolls and we didn't have all the correct passes until like

[1:52:36] checkpoints, road closures.

[1:52:38] And so I got guys, we're rolling the windows down in the vehicles coming from the HLZ, the landing zone, handing me a pass to put in our window while we're driving through a checkpoint. And then they're leapfrogging ahead to hand me the next one to get in. Then we're in the concert finally. We're in the VIP area on stage. That's not good enough for them. They want to go down to the pit right in the front. So, we have to coordinate with the event security to get everybody down there

[1:53:00] and people are trying to jump over the fence. The event security is forming a chain essentially while this dude's performing and

[1:53:07] it's just like one thing goes I'm looking at the clock. Yeah.

[1:53:10] Clock's ticking.

[1:53:11] It's like when is this going to be done? And the event security was awesome. They were like, "Look, here's the music bill. Here's the list in order once you get to this song. Maybe start trying to get them out." I like not going to be able to get them out. They're trying to see the whole thing. They want to meet them afterwards. like they're trying to do a meet and greet. This is all while aerospace is getting shut down

[1:53:31] flight

[1:53:31] at the end of the concert like you know we're trying to go and I'm like maybe we can make it and they're like no

[1:53:36] we're going to stick around for a little while and chat. So luckily we had two flights so we got half the people out. We didn't realize that the passes to get into the event are one thing passes to get out are a whole different thing. So we had to scramble around to get the passes out while they're doing the meet and greet while the airspace is shutting down. It's still a 15-minute drive through foot traffic of these thousands of people that are going from concert to concert and to their houses or hotels or cars, whatever. And we finally get to the last minute or two where they're allowing helicopters to fly. And off in the distance, I just hear the rotors. Finally got through all the checkpoints. We had to get escorts and stuff. I don't know how much money we paid for these people to just escort us with their unlimited passes. The advanced guys, they were running around like crazy trying to figure out who's going to be able to escort us and get us to the HLZ because there's no way we're trying to spend the night there. There's no hotels. There's no setup for anything

[1:54:30] and nothing's in good distance.

[1:54:32] No, nothing at all. And so we finally hear the helicopter while they're picking up all the chem lights and like the HLZ stuff and it lands. We get everybody on and they try to come over and tell us you guys can't fly

[1:54:42] cuz it it's it's not a normal landing area.

[1:54:45] No, this is just on a hilltop. It was ad hoc put in place to kind of get extra high-profile individuals into this area.

[1:54:51] I think we were the only ones, actually.

[1:54:53] I didn't see any other helicopters coming in or out. I think we were the only ones. And so these people that are controlling the HLZ are coming over while we're loaded up into the helicopter saying, "You guys can't fly. You're stuck here for the night." And I just looked at the pilots. I was like, "I didn't hear anything. Go." We lift off while these guys are screaming and waving their hands to tell us not to because we're technically like three or four minutes after the airspace is shut down.

[1:55:17] We get to the new airport where the other security team is waiting to greet. They're already on the plane. Then we reach another three-hour delay because there's a shutdown at the um arrival airport. So again, they go back to their champagne party blasting music. I get calls from everybody that was helping coordinate and stuff and was like, "Yeah, I think that's just like 10 years off of my life, but we're good. We're on the plane waiting to go. I called the advanced team. I was like, "You guys need to go get some drinks, some food, whatever you guys want. Put it on the company card. Enjoy yourselves. Amazing job. I'm going to hopefully not have a heart attack here from the stress that this has caused." Yeah.

[1:55:53] And again, this is why I have gray hairs now because of the stuff like that because you're just so worried about like it probably wasn't a make or break moment for the success of the program, but it felt like that in the moment of like if we can't pull this off, the client's going to look at it and be like, well then what do we have you guys for? I got all this money and you guys can't even get me to a concert.

[1:56:13] Yeah. And then that's why we make things work.

[1:56:16] Yeah. and the individual we had on the ground at that time. And like my brief perspective is I'm now the director and you're my right hand, me when I'm not there and you're doing it and there's only so much I can do from chat groups and seeing the comms come through and the flight teams and everything else and then the delays. So when things pause on the field, there's a tendency for a lot of individuals to like wonder why there's delays or like why nobody's communicating or want information from a back seat or being a keyboard warrior sitting back and like expecting information or like a corporate G-SK like what's happening? You know, people are getting too involved and want information. For us, for me, it was like we've got our guy on the ground, our advance at that point, who was being an absolute stud and performed beyond anybody's expectation to a degree where it was like he became like

[1:57:20] he was a go-to guy after that.

[1:57:22] Go-to.

[1:57:22] Yeah.

[1:57:23] Yeah. And it just And that set him up for success, too, cuz then he realized, I can do this.

[1:57:28] Yeah. I think it gave him a lot of confidence in his ability there.

[1:57:32] Yeah. And I mean, he absolutely crushed every aspect of it. He found the problems before they became problems. And as much of a pain in the ass it was to deal with cuz like I'm keeping an eye on the principal. People trying to jump over a security line where my client is, I'm also answering the chats of like, hey, bad news. Those passes that we got, they're only good to get in. We can't get out. It's like, okay, who do we got to call?

[1:57:56] And then you're passing critical communications and it's minimal and everybody feels and reads it a certain way.

[1:58:01] Yeah. So me from afar back home watching all this happen in the middle of the night cuz you guys are in Europe and the hours are different. It's like things go quiet and there was a moment on that specific one where I was like you're there and our other guy was there and then it was layered and we had every area covered. Everything was just falling apart. But no comms and no communication was good. It means everybody's working and they're working so hard they don't have time to jump on a text message and update everybody on everything.

[1:58:37] It's changing so fast.

[1:58:38] You just have to trust it's flowing and it's going and it and it turned out to be like a great success and people brought it up afterwards.

[1:58:46] Oh, that was definitely one of the most memorable ones on there. And you're right, like it's nerve-wracking, especially from your position as a director on that one of like, okay, why aren't they talking? Why aren't they communicating? What do

[1:58:56] trust, man? It's just that build a winning culture. But it's rare because like I've been in situations where like you know we still have a dynamic situation unfolding a shooter or something like that and you got these clowns calling from different states trying to get a sit rep before bullets are even done being fired and it's like all right why are you clogging up comms let me deal with the situation and then you're non-essential at this point let me deal with the team on the ground and then we'll go give you guys the sit rep so you can feel good pat each other on the back for a good job well good from a different state but if you're not going to be able to help out in the immediate and respond ond like let us deal with it

[1:59:30] and that's where

[1:59:30] and that's a leap of faith, you know, it's rare.

[1:59:32] We're dynamic organizations that truly get it and truly understand what we do and allow us to do it in the way that we know how to do it best.

[1:59:40] Mhm.

[1:59:41] But it goes to the culture.

[1:59:42] They're not asking for information. They're just waiting to get it

[1:59:45] and they want to be the ones to have the information first.

[1:59:48] Yeah. Or control it.

[1:59:50] Mhm. [clears throat]

[1:59:50] Or expect that they're supposed to be getting it before somebody else. And it's like, no, I'm sorry. But like for example, if you're the executive assistant and like the main person in charge of being like the number two to the principal, you're not on the ground. We're in control. Like it's our game. It's our show and we're going to do it in the way that we need to do it because like input at that point. It's not it's not about personalities or like who thinks what's right and who thinks what's wrong. It's about what's going to be effective and operational and consistent.

[2:00:24] Yeah. Yeah. And it it wasn't the best way to do things. I'm sure we could have done it certain things better, but that's why we have a AR so that the next time it comes up, we approach all those subjects and we figure out like, okay, this could have been better. Let's do it this way next time. Let's, you know, tweak this communication. Let's, you know, sit down and actually pinpoint everything that we can improve and sustain

[2:00:46] instead of in the moment of like, why are you guys doing this and try to change things immediately on the ground. And we had a bunch of instances on that detail where it was like, "Okay, operations are already going. We have the plan. We're going with the plan. We'll change it later on for the next one." But you're just going to disrupt things and make it not a smooth flow for anybody, the client, the friends, the other agents or anything. The time to change it would be before or tweak it after.

[2:01:13] Yep. You have to stay dynamic

[2:01:16] and you have to be able to just like go with the flow. Have guys that can run and gals autonomously.

[2:01:22] Yep. Change on the fly as the situation dictates, but try to stick with the plan.

[2:01:25] Yep. Make hard calls and then have leadership in place that are going to help justify your call and support you versus throwing you under the bus because it makes everybody look bad because we failed. But it's like no, the right things were done. It just wasn't going to succeed in many ways. And like being able to take those consequences.

[2:01:42] Well, let's do the uh rapid fire

2:01:45 · Rapid fire: humility, learning, and professional habits

[2:01:45] session. just going through some

[2:01:47] some specific questions and like kind of seeing what you have input on and and what you got. But

[2:01:53] to caveat of what we just talked about,

[2:01:55] that's just, you know, what 20 30 minutes of one story and we've got hundreds.

[2:02:02] Yeah, I tried to keep it short there, but that was such a crazy one.

[2:02:04] And it there was other ones and Oh, yeah. You're talking like stories from, you know, Europe and Africa and all over

[2:02:13] every corner of the earth.

[2:02:14] All over Asia, like all over all over the world.

[2:02:17] Yeah.

[2:02:17] Consistently over and over and over again.

[2:02:19] Yep.

[2:02:20] Working as a siloed team, selfunctional, self-consistent with everything down to, you know, medical direction and programs with you par rescue men that were working for us that were carrying narcotics and we could really just truly treat.

[2:02:34] I think some of them went missing if I'm not mistaken.

[2:02:36] Yeah. No. Well, yeah, [laughter] we won't talk about that, but All right, here we go. So, what are three rules you live by now that you didn't when you started? Everybody has something to offer, so don't discount anybody. Leave yourself a buffer, whether that's car rides, plane rides, whatever. Never take the first flight or the last flight. Give yourself room on either way to adjust.

[2:03:05] That's good. Um, eat when you can because you never know when you're going to have those 18 hour days on the go and you just don't eat and you're cranky as hell and pissing the team off because you're just hangry as hell.

[2:03:17] Yeah, we all we all uh despise the team guy that's you food focused and driven.

[2:03:24] How many times do you think that the team had to go bring you food cuz we just were stuck doing something and you just like

[2:03:28] all the time

[2:03:29] caveman style. Grab a steak and just bite into it.

[2:03:32] Hey, build a winning culture. Yeah,

[2:03:34] team was taking care of us because we were taking care of them by, you know what I mean? Like it's a good thing. All right. Most underrated skill and protection,

[2:03:42] humbleness.

[2:03:45] You know, the egos, like we talked about, everybody has an ego, but being able to put that ego aside for, you know, whether it's dealing with another agent, leadership, client, anything. Like the end of the day, there's so many badasses in this industry. They've done a lot of stuff and they have every right to have the ego about them, but you just got to put that aside for the betterment of the operation for the team and everything and like you're not always going to be the badass. You're not going to be the shooter. You're sometimes going to be getting the coffee or be the errand boy and stuff. So being able to put the ego aside and you know humble yourself to this is my role and understand that the end of the day this is just one errand. You know, tomorrow maybe I'll be doing something else. But just not having that ego about you that nothing is beneath you.

[2:04:30] Oh yeah, I got a really good one I'm going to add to that too. So

[2:04:34] yeah,

[2:04:34] like if you've been a GSOC manager for example, like kudos, good stuff, but great. That [snorts] doesn't make you executive protection. If you transition to an advanced team that does a little bit of advanced work, but it's, you know, minimal, not that dynamic, that doesn't make you God's gift to the industry.

[2:04:51] But it again goes back to you can learn something from everybody. So,

[2:04:54] you know, humble yourself to the stuff that you don't know. Pick up what you can from the people that are around you, whether they have more or less experience

[2:05:02] and realize that where you're at right now might not be where you're at tomorrow.

[2:05:06] And be a good [clears throat] teammate.

[2:05:08] That's a huge one in this industry,

[2:05:09] no matter what level you're at.

[2:05:10] Yeah.

[2:05:11] Like it is a start to finish. Every level is involved to make it successful. And if you don't appreciate the valet, the valet guy, you know,

[2:05:21] they might screw your whole

[2:05:23] CSO at the organization like it's gonna fail at some point unless you're just trying to be a team player. Play up, play down,

[2:05:30] play every position and understand that you should be able to. Um, there was another guy too that came out recently. I don't know if you know who they are or whatever, but it was an interesting podcast that popped out and I just wanted to flag this one because I meant to last time, but they described it like you're not actually doing executive protection if you're not making up to like $250,000 a year. And it's like,

[2:05:56] you can't measure it in money.

[2:05:58] Individuals need to stop acting as though they know everything to do with anything. Cuz I'll sit here all day long and say, "There's so much I want to learn. there's so many guys I want to talk to. There's so many areas that I need to get better at. But acting as if if you have the answer, you know the answers or using your platform to then talk about things from a perspective of being a subject matter expert and then you get vetted out of that. Like everybody will go, "Oh, no, that I know what you did. You worked for me and you know, you only did so much." Like you can't you can't speak on it as though you've been doing it for a long time and understanding the dollars and cents behind things. And it's also so client driven because, you know, you might be a subject matter expert because you've been with your client for 10 years, but come over and work for my client and you're not going to know what the hell you're doing because you have no idea about them, their likes or dislikes or anything like that.

[2:06:46] Yep.

[2:06:47] So, you know, you can't really ever consider yourself an all-around subject matter expert in this industry because you haven't worked for everybody. You don't know what everybody likes as a principal, as a client, as a company, or anything. You can have ideas that have worked for you in the past to bring over, but again, you got to adapt and change,

[2:07:03] which is all of us. And you brought it up like remove the ego.

[2:07:05] Yeah.

[2:07:06] And just remove it and like

[2:07:07] we've all had humbling experiences.

[2:07:09] Yep. Try to be a good good team member and a good leader. And if you're going to mentor people, mentor them from a perspective you actually know better. And if not, pass them off to somebody that does.

[2:07:17] Yeah. And you might not always have the answers as a leader. You know, [clears throat] you're always looked at as like, okay, I'm going to this guy because he knows it all type of thing. When you're going to a manager, a team leader, a director, you might not know it all. You might have to defer to other people and, you know, humble yourself in that aspect of ask for help.

[2:07:33] Yep. Okay. So, a moment you're proud of

2:07:36 · Reflecting on Glastonbury and quiet successes

[2:07:36] because it was done right, not because it was dramatic or there was anything else involved. It just like it felt good.

[2:07:42] I got to go with that Glastonbury one again. Getting on that last helicopter ride after getting all the clients in out and all that. It was just like you can breathe. [clears throat] You get all these people calling you up and it's like you're reflecting on it and everything and it's like damn, we actually pulled that off somehow. There's a there's a few of those too where it's you get that like the head nod or like the looks or like the friends comment and they saw it and they understood it because they've been in that environment for a lot. They've seen EP teams or whatever and they just go, "Man, like

[2:08:12] they pulled it off." Like how do they do this?

[2:08:14] We got a few of those comments too where they're like, "You you guys are these guys are good."

[2:08:19] Yeah. I mean, another one would be like, you know, you pull off all the the last second stuff because you're never going to get the amount of time that you would hope for when you get a spin up. So, my client's a golfer getting them onto some of these crazy golf courses around the world on a last second where they're booked out for 6 months to a year sometimes and finding that way to just squeeze their tea time in.

[2:08:40] Y,

[2:08:41] like that one's a proud moment there for some of it. And I have an amazing client now that sometimes even invites me to play on those courses with them. just a lot of fun,

[2:08:49] which is a different dynamic when you step into shoes where you're, you know, you're having the conversations and you're just being a normal individual with them because you're responsible for a segment of their business

[2:09:00] and then you have to figure out how to work those dynamics too.

[2:09:03] Yep.

[2:09:03] But draw that hard line.

[2:09:04] And we didn't even go over any of the like the real incidences like the actual high-risk situations, the medical incidents. Like this is just all facilitation and logistics.

[2:09:14] Yeah, those situations they're dynamic in themselves. They're a little bit more chaotic, but yeah, like you know, making the call to do a medevac or something in a third world country for somebody that's sick where they don't want to go and you have to make that decision of, okay, what are we going to do? or you have a shooter show up to campus and everybody's panicking because there's bullets flying and stuff and you have to be that calm, cool, ahead of reason that people are looking to to like take a key off of, okay, evacuate over here, get away from it, and you're still like putting yourself into a dangerous area

[2:09:45] because we didn't hit on it, but you were at the YouTube shooting in the Bay Area,

[2:09:50] you know, and evacuated people out of that and had to deal with some dynamic stuff um for another day. Yeah, we'll have to continue that. That's an even longer story.

[2:10:00] Maybe your next one. Um, one habit, one specific habit normal people can build for safety without becoming paranoid. So, think of advice you would give a new customer, new client, new principal of just like, hey, let's maybe change these things we're doing daily to just get a little bit more risk averse.

[2:10:21] I think a lot of people, they're creatures of habit. And so, you know, making it a little bit more spontaneous at times of like you don't always take the same route, maybe you don't stay at the same hotel, maybe you don't do exactly the same routine every day. You change it up a little bit. But also be aware of your surroundings. If something feels off, then more times than not, it probably is off.

[2:10:44] Whether it's like a active shooter or just something feels off with the weather, like that varies the the level of it. But if something's off, it probably is. So, be aware of your surroundings and just vary things up from time to time.

[2:10:58] Yeah. Check your friend group's postings on social media while you're with them because they might be flagging you in locations that

[2:11:05] the geo tagging is real.

[2:11:06] Yeah. You otherwise wouldn't. All right. So, let's kind of like wrap everything up a little bit. This has been a really good conversation. I'm excited to see, you know, what you bring to the table next time with interviewing somebody or

[2:11:19] Yeah. I have no idea who I'm going to

[2:11:21] you can make that happen.

[2:11:21] Figure out who I'm going to bring down here for.

[2:11:23] Make it weird. Make it interesting. So

2:11:25 · Entering the field, industry change, and life beyond work

[2:11:25] if someone's if someone wants to enter this field though, like what should they do first and what should they avoid?

[2:11:32] So this is again an ego-driven industry. Be cognizant of who you surround yourself with. Like you can learn something from everybody like I've been saying, but there's definitely people that can lead you down the wrong path and it might be the right path for them, but it's not necessarily the right path for you. So take with it what you can from everybody, but also forge your own path. Go to a good school or two or something like that. Network as much as possible. expand your whole network as big as possible so you can get those differing opinions and don't just stay like, "Oh, so and so said that this works, so you're saying something different. No, I'm going with him." Develop your own way of doing things based on your experiences and based on other people's experiences that they're sharing with you because what works for me doesn't necessarily work for you.

[2:12:22] Yeah.

[2:12:23] Okay. So, what do you hope changes in the industry in the next few years? I want to see a shift in the industry from again that cookie cutter thing of like, okay, this is we've been doing this for 15 years. We've been in the industry all this time, but we never really adapted. Like, I want to see a shift in the industry to incorporate these new ideas that some of the younger generation in the industry have because

[2:12:51] it's always changing. Like this industry changes more than most. I would say I'd say maybe technology faster pace change, but the industry has to adapt with that because we work for those people. And so I want to see some of the new ideas incorporated at a higher level and how to build out the programs, not just like, oh, okay, well, it work for them, it'll work for us.

[2:13:13] Yeah, it's a very good point. Um it's becoming more and more and more fast-paced where it almost feels like we have to keep we have to keep up

[2:13:21] and the technology that we use changes constantly, you know, the tools at our disposal are really awesome now.

[2:13:28] The 1980s 1990s book written by the old heads of, you know, how to do protection work is it's becoming different and more dynamic. The fundamentals are still there for sure.

[2:13:38] Yeah. But you're not going to be wearing the suit and tie with the earpiece looking real secret service and useless.

[2:13:43] Yeah. these days. Like how many times did we wear a suit on the last detail?

[2:13:47] I mean,

[2:13:50] one,

[2:13:51] I think one. Yeah. Other than that, like the majority of it, we were in board shorts and tank tops and flip-flops, like blending in and everything.

[2:13:58] Not wearing the body armor, no earpieces, comms were horrible down there, so we had to adapt to different stuff.

[2:14:04] Yeah. Not running around in this armored suburbans and multiple car packages, getting away from screening and blocking roads to move around.

[2:14:12] Yeah. transitioning into,

[2:14:14] you know, ripping around in a, you know, a Jeep Wrangler and a side by sides.

[2:14:19] Those are fun, by the way.

[2:14:20] Yeah, they're real fun.

[2:14:21] I hated keeping up with them, but they were fun.

[2:14:23] So, is there anything like we didn't go over that you kind of just wish people understood about like our work and, you know, what we do in a short couple sentences?

[2:14:32] It's not glamorous all the time. Like, you have those glory moments where, you know, you're at the fancy event with the client and everything's going good. and you feel like, you know, yeah, I made it. Then there's also those times, the majority of the time where it's just sit around and wait, bored off your ass. Um, you know, when you get into like the leadership part, there's not as much of that because there's always some admin thing or something to keep you occupied, but then you drop it immediately for an OP or something.

[2:15:01] Yeah. The last time I get to look at a schedule is probably the retirement days.

[2:15:07] Yeah.

[2:15:07] Like spreadsheets. It's always something going on, but a lot of it's just like the boring behind the scenes setting yourself and your team up for success down the road. It's not the running and gunning and not the Hollywood the movies or whatever of like the bodyguard doing whatever. Like you're there's so much behind the scenes that's just not glamorous. It's not glorified or anything, but that's what really makes it successful.

[2:15:30] Completely agree. The final thing is, you know, let's take it just back to personal real quick. And then, you know, like what's going on in your personal life? For example, for me, you know, I'm getting ready to marry, you know, the girl in my dreams. Absolute gorgeous, stunning. I'm definitely not good enough for her. Um,

[2:15:52] I know we're going to have to grab drinks later and I'm going to sit her down and be like, "What the hell are you thinking?"

[2:15:56] Yeah, I know.

[2:15:57] But,

[2:15:57] no. and like those getting ready to, you know, start a family and get married at the end of the month and kind of like take that next phase and step and like I'm really looking forward to stuff like that beyond, you know, the work and then like figuring out that balance in between and you know, we've talked a lot about that too.

[2:16:14] Yeah, it's a hard thing to do the work life

[2:16:16] and what you're excited about and like that's my whole life. Like she's my whole life and I'm just like that's my next step and I'm trying to just do this better to get there than now thinking like kids and family and whatnot. It's like what's that for you?

[2:16:29] I think the first big step for me um I just recently put my resignation in for my current client to start exploring some other stuff and you know see where that leads me. I don't know if it's going to be jumping right on to another program, if it's going to be working like the back end on some things, do more consulting or whatnot. Um I kind of am leaving the door open for quite a bit which is nerve-wracking at the same time is exciting.

[2:16:53] It always is. Um, but I think the biggest first step for me right now is getting back home, moving back home, not living outside of the area for a little while and actually just, you know, focusing on me, my relationship and everything for a little while and getting my life to where I want it to be and then I'll focus on the next aspect for work after that. But, you know, this industry, it's all about timing. Right place, right time. Sometimes things just fall into your lap and it's like, oh yeah, this is the right fit. You don't have any control over it. So, I say I might want to take a couple of months off, but that might be a a dream at this point. We'll see.

[2:17:26] Other times it just slaps you in the face and like next thing you know, you're kind of like running and gunning and going again.

[2:17:31] I know. And it would be nice to have a little bit of a a break to recharge the batteries. But, you know, you can't control when things happen sometimes. They all happen for a reason.

[2:17:40] Yeah. My like final piece to all this would be, you know, there's really good people out in the industry and this platform has been cool for me to be a part of just because it's all about like getting different voices out there that aren't doing it all the time. Yeah.

[2:17:53] You know, we don't do this. We've been silent professionals in the background trying to do the best job that we can every time we do it to the best of our abilities. All the drama, BS, bureaucracy, and politics involved in, you know, in between. But there's so many good people that are out there that are doing it that way. And there's so many good people that everybody would be extremely fortunate to have and you know me working with you and you know our relationship and friendship is helped me grow astronomically and so I appreciate you for that and for jumping on here and like this has been cool.

[2:18:27] Yeah. I don't think there's very many people I would have been jumping on a podcast for. So

[2:18:30] yeah, we were both really hesitant to do it but yeah, now we're here.

[2:18:34] No, I'm glad I did it. This is my first podcast, so you know, it was fun. It definitely was an experience and everything, and I'm looking forward to doing more, especially collaborations with you.

[2:18:42] Yeah, absolutely.

[2:18:43] And like you said, there's so many good people in this industry that would be awesome to have on this and hear their story and get that out there. Um, and we've had the pleasure of working with a lot of them and there's a ton that we haven't worked with. Um, so yeah, it's it's a very awesome platform and you know, got to thank the people putting this on for inviting us on here and getting everybody a little bit of their screen time to share their story.

[2:19:06] Yeah, thousand%. It's been good.

[2:19:09] Well, brother, that's it.

[2:19:11] All right,

[2:19:12] we're done.

[2:19:21] [music]