Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to Cut the Tie podcast. Hi, I'm your host, thomas Helfrich. I am on a mission to help you cut the tie to whatever it is holding you back from success, and that success does need to be defined by you and no one else. Otherwise, you're chasing someone else's dream and you won't know what ties to cut. And today I'm joined by John Teichert. I hope I pronounced that right, john. How are you?

Speaker 2: 0:18

I am doing great, thomas, thanks for having me. This is going to be fun. I appreciate you coming on Easy enough. Take a moment, introduce yourself and what it is you do, absolutely. My name is Brigadier General Retired John Dragon Tigert. I was an F-15E fighter pilot, an F-22 test pilot. I led in various places in the United States Air Force and two years ago I retired to jump out of that world, to jump into leadership, development, to help people in our nation become the best possible version of themselves, and that's what I'm doing now in Lebanon.

Speaker 1: 0:48

Listen, that means our mission's aligned to some degree. You know I'm RAF, you're US Air Force. So you know, it sounds like you're going Mach 5 to get there. I'm going to stop. I'm going to stop with the air jokes right now.

Speaker 2: 1:04

It's all that I know. Keep using that terminology and I'll actually understand you. What is your call sign Dragon? It is Dragon. I got it in 1998. I don't tell people why. It's usually based on a story of something stupid you did, but it's got to sound cool. The only thing I tell people it has to do with Zergos of Spain and nuclear weapons, and I'll leave it at that.

Speaker 1: 1:27

For you to get Dragon, though most of them are not that cool, so you must have done something epic where someone's like we got to go Dragon. We want to call him Squirrely Unicorn or something, but we have to go Dragon. It's too cool.

Speaker 2: 1:40

It was pretty epic and because nuclear weapons are involved, it has to be magnificent and it was.

Speaker 1: 1:46

I love it. I love it. Does anybody confuse you with Tom Cruise? Occasionally.

Speaker 2: 1:50

I wish that I could be considered his doppelganger. I am not, but I fly as cool planes as he's ever flown, even in the movies.

Speaker 1: 1:59

The thing that I found funny is, you know, so I didn't serve. I did a couple of years at AFNAC or Cyber Command as a contractor, but when it was at Barksdale where the nukes were, I spent some time in those lower areas of that base and during that time I learned some things about the Air Force. I can't share, obviously, some of them, but what I did find out was that that is the smartest branch of the Air Force. They make fun of the intelligence side in the Army and they're like, yeah, but they're not that smart.

Speaker 2: 2:32

We've got a lot of smart people on our side, Thomas. I love the fact that I've gotten to work with several of them and they put up with me.

Speaker 1: 2:39

You are so nice, you're well-conditioned, not to take the bait on me. That's the other form. I love you for that. All right, hey, tell me a little bit. Why are you in your endeavor? Why are you the guy, though? So I always ask that kind of initial question of like why should someone pick you to work with in your new mission?

Speaker 2: 2:58

Thomas, I've had the fortune of being able to apply leadership lessons and I've seen them work, quantifiably work. And the story I most often tell people is one where I showed up to lead Edwards Air Force Base, a place known as the center of the aerospace testing universe. It was a bureaucratic quagmire and in six weeks we changed the culture to be an innovation juggernaut, to have more innovation activity than the rest of the Air Force combined. And it's those types of leadership principles that I love to share with people so that they can apply them in their own context and break barriers, challenge convention and ignite innovation.

Speaker 1: 3:36

How did you do?

Speaker 2: 3:36

that it's a whole series of traditional leadership techniques with a little bit of flair, and, frankly, a big part of it stems from cutting the tie and getting away from any concern about myself or my own career progression and a firm desire to help the people around me become the best possible version of themselves, and I just saw individuals blossom and the organization thrive as a result.

Speaker 1: 4:02

And you're describing leadership right as the core of that, and leadership plus a philosophy. So people are in leadership positions that aren't leaders, and it sounds like when you were born to be a leader and were in the position of doing that. In your own journey, though, did you ever have a mentor pull you aside and say hey, you need to cut this time, you need to start or stop doing this? Have a mentor pull you aside and say, hey, you need to cut this time.

Speaker 2: 4:25

You need to start or stop doing this. There was actually something that happened to me, thomas, that wasn't at the bequest of a leader, but it was, to somewhat extent, in a response to toxic leadership. I was the commander of the F-22 test unit in the Air Force, there at Edwards Air Force Base, 11 days on the job about a 700 person organization and my boss brought me in and he sat me down and he said Dragon, you're not the guy. And I said, sir, what do you mean by that? And he said well, you're not the right leader for the organization You're going to do horribly. I asked him well, that means you're firing me, right? And he said no, I'm stuck with you.

Speaker 2: 5:09

And then he sent me out of the room and I went home and I talked to my wife and we thought about it and we prayed about it and really the tide that was to be cut at that moment was I had an opportunity to be the type of leader that my team needed. Before he fired me, I didn't know whether he was going to fire me soon and really that meant my career was over, but I could focus on being the right type of leader that they needed. Being selfless in my leadership and during the next two years of his toxicity, but my repetition in selfless leadership, it created in me the right type of leadership philosophy that I've carried with me ever since.

Speaker 1: 5:40

I mean and maybe in that, so this actually I don't usually ask this question this way, but I think it'll be important here how did you define success before that? And then, how did you define success after that?

Speaker 2: 6:06

going to help me springboard to the next position. That's selfish. And then there was a little bit before that of how can I help the people on my team become the best possible word of themselves. But the good thing about what he did not because this was his intent, but because it was the result was that I realized that likely my career was over and now I could fully focus not on myself and my own promotion but on the betterment of the team.

Speaker 2: 6:27

And now I call it lethal weapon leadership to some extent, if you go back to that series of movies Lethal Weapon and Mel Gibson and Danny Glover and I think Mel Gibson's character was Detective Riggs and he was reckless but he had kind of given up on life and was very efficient at getting the job done because he didn't care about himself. And I think leaders in our community or society could do a lot better job in making a lasting, sustainable impact If they set themselves aside, they cut that tie of selfishness and they move on, and not a reckless way but a selfless way, so that they can make an impact on the people in the organization they've been entrusted with.

Speaker 1: 7:09

I a hundred percent agree If, if, if people focused on the outcome and less so their legacy in it, I think we all move faster further, because then you're doing your part without you know, with, with an altruistic mindset as opposed to me, me, me and it's hard, I mean, we all struggle with it every day, but you're doing an acting and that's how you've turned it around with it. And if you really describe, is that the moment, though, where you knew, was it with your wife, when you were praying and you're like I'm gonna become this, or was there another moment later that made it make sense, like the aha moment?

Speaker 2: 7:41

No, I think that was the aha moment.

Speaker 2: 7:43

I went to bed, I was a little distraught, I was thinking that this very promising career was over.

Speaker 2: 7:54

And then I woke up in the morning with this piece that I have an opportunity now because none of it is to be about me to do right as a leader. And you know, I'd grown up watching leaders and I'd seen far too many of them become toxic or become selfish and not care for their team. And I woke up and I realized this was an opportunity for however long that I had. And you know, the amazing thing, thomas, is this that I actually got promoted early to Fulberg Colonel out of that position, not because he changed his mind, but because the organization did so well as a result of that type of leadership that I don't think anybody could deny that things were working based on that climate and culture. And so the aha moment was waking up the next morning with a piece about it and the situation and going into work and getting the reps in for the next two years. That it's never about me, it's all about them. And the organization and the individuals in the organization thrived as a result.

Speaker 1: 9:21

Surprised me a story During my small time as a contractor. I got a coin from a three-star over DISA. So you know, the Department of Information Security, whatever, the they run like the infrastructure of whatever. So you probably know more than I do. All I knew was I was out of my element and the general's coming by each little booth. I'm thinking, oh, this is dog and pony, there's all these cameras, his people, his hand, whatever. And he comes at the booth behind it, beside us, and this guy tells him what he does. And the guy's just an arrogant. We didn't need this crap. This is the stuff. I'm like oh God, this is legit. Like this guy's like legitimately evaluate, he does ours. Hey, our team built something for your warfighter to help you get, you know, tactical administration of the grid.

Speaker 1: 10:07

While a deer I'm giving you a summary he's like how'd you guys do that? I was like well, that guy, I go. He built it. I go, I'm the mouthpiece. I don't ask him. He gave me a coin. I had no idea what this was and I was like hey, Jeff, my teammate, this is yours. And he was like and he was from Air Force. And he was like are you kidding me? You're giving me this. I was like what do you mean? He's like are you kidding me? You're giving me this. I was like what do you mean? He's like you have no idea what he just gave me and he and it's like I can go to almost any bar now.

Speaker 1: 10:38

It's like except for a presidential coin, there's not a very many that you're higher than this corn. I remember that. And he, I, it was like I, I was like, truly like, in that moment, Um, I had a moment you described me. I was like I didn't care about what I thought. I was like this is the guy that built it and this general loved it. He was just too afraid to talk. That was funny, I think. My point being is, if more people were selfless like you just described, because downstream from that, the teams rocked it for the next, like for the rest of the time I was there because because they were appreciated and they were felt, and I also didn't care about my career at that point as well.

Speaker 2: 11:16

Well, thomas, I think commendable on you for realizing that hey, let me deflect the credit to somebody that maybe more often deserves it. You know, often leaders are told own the blame and share the credit, but they do the reverse. And you did exactly what you should do, which is deflect the praise and the credit to somebody else. And when you create that at scale in an organization, then now it becomes a magnificent multiplier of effectiveness of that organization and the people that grow up in that organization.

Speaker 1: 11:45

So I think you're. I want to. I always try to extract a lesson for listeners out of some of the stuff I think. When people think of their career, they think in so much in terms of me, me, me. That ends up not where they wanted to go and as soon as they pivot to, I'm just going to make my teams awesome and everyone around me. This selfless behavior is the way to get the career that you want, because you didn't even have a good boss ahead of you to help you pull you up, but the organization felt it and they had to reward and I think your own self-sufficient sense of worth, fair enough to say, felt much better doing that every day than showing up wondering, well, I'm going to get promoted, I'm going to get something.

Speaker 2: 12:22

No, you're right, Thomas, and I think it was Ronald Reagan that said something like it's amazing how much you can get done if you don't care who gets the credit. And I don't know why. I've kept stumbling across this important truth multiple times in my own leadership study. But the idea is that if all of us add value oversized value to our community or society or organization, then it's super good for society. But guess what? It also is good for you too, because people are going to know hey, this guy or this gal gives value, adds value, provides selfless leadership, and when you do that, you now become in demand. But, more importantly, your team, its talent and its skill set is unlocked in a way that never would have happened otherwise.

Speaker 1: 13:07

You know who else used to talk about this. A lot was Jesus. So you talk about prayer and we go down and listen and a lot of people who are entrepreneurs and people who are out there trying to make it, they have a lot of faith base and you said you prayed around that and if you backed up a few years ago before I kind of started a faith journey, I would have just kind of dismissed that as, whatever I get that because that's truly some of the teachings from the Bible is to be selfless, lead without resolve yourself, have effect on as many as you can in a positive way, even at cost of your own life, and I think that's what you just applied. Some teachings, and maybe you could talk about that a bit too, of where that? Is that a part of gratefulness, or where does that come from? From a core for you?

Speaker 2: 13:51

Well, thomas, to me it goes back to the world's best leadership book, which is the Holy Bible. And you watch the example of Jesus very specifically spelled out in Matthew, chapter 20, where if you're great or you're chief, then your responsibility is to minister and to serve. And if you look at the stewardship of our lives, the ability to truly make a multi-generational, lasting impact, then the only way that we can do that effectively is to follow those principles that are biblical, and Jesus shows them perfectly by pouring ourselves into other and raising them up to become the best possible version themselves. And if you set your own prerogatives aside to do that, like he did so brilliantly, then now you see that investment in others bear fruit in all different sorts of ways.

Speaker 1: 14:41

Love it. For the purposes of what's this called For a short clip, so we have it. Give me the lesson for the listener. What is your one piece of advice if a listener they're locked in. They want to hear it. What is your one piece of advice if a listener is they're locked in. They want to hear it? What are you going to tell them?

Speaker 2: 14:56

Set yourself aside and add value to the people who are around you, to your community, to your organization, because when you do so, it gives a massive boost to the environment in which you live and work, and you'll become the guy or the gal that people are going to tap on the shoulder and want to be a part of their team, because they know that you are there to add value to others and not yourself.

Speaker 1: 15:23

Yeah, what are you going to be remembered for? And I think you'd rather be remembered for giving to a community and those around you than how much money you had or how many trips you took or whatever. Whatever the selfish things that you know, because that's beautiful Rapid fire for you. What is the best business advice you've ever received?

Speaker 2: 15:43

Herb Keller was the founder of Southwest Airlines and he said you can tell the value of an organization, the values of an organization, by looking at two things their calendar and their checkbook. How they spend their time, how they spend their money is a true reflection of their values, not just what they write on a wall and put up as a mission statement.

Speaker 1: 16:01

I, like you, practiced that. Who gives you inspiration?

Speaker 2: 16:07

My family. We call ourselves Team Tigard. I've got an incredible wife who's a chemistry professor at the Naval Academy, three great kids, two of which are serving our country, one of which plans to, and I just love serving my country and people around us together as a part of that five ship that we call Team Tigard.

Speaker 1: 16:26

One of our good friends, their daughter, just got in the naval caddy. She starts in the you know soon, obviously in the fall, so she could be a chemist. She's on that path. She's probably going to run into your wife.

Speaker 2: 16:38

Well, you know, my wife teaches plead chemistry, freshman chemistry next year, first semester. So maybe she'll be in my wife's class.

Speaker 1: 16:45

We'll take that offline, I will. I will see if that happens and you can be like, how's she doing? I'm like, yeah, I talked to her chemistry teacher and, uh, her husband's upset with you, um, what's the what? What is your? You know, the must read book.

Speaker 2: 16:58

The Holy Bible we talked about it earlier Thomas. All of the life's lessons, all leadership lessons are contained in that book. I do like to give a secular analog, if you will, my favorite secular leadership book, which is American generalship, which goes through four-star generals since World War II. Each chapter is a different characteristic and how that characteristic was embodied by those leaders. The subtitle is Character is Everything, by the way, which is a great example of what that book's worldview is all about.

Speaker 1: 17:26

I love it. You know about what are the challenges, and those are rapid fire. We have a little time here. I've struggled with how to functionally read the Bible because they are different. They're basically sub books within the stories. How do you recommend somebody who's really never read the Bible? With the idea of leadership in mind, how would you approach reading?

Speaker 2: 17:46

it. Thomas. I'm actually doing a study this year where I'm, during my morning devotions looking at leaders and deep diving about those biblical leaders throughout the Bible and I've gone through Daniel and I've gone through Joseph and I've gone through Esther and I've gone through Rahab and I think if you take a look at any online tool and say I want to learn about X leader in the Bible, where the verses or the chapters that can take me there, then I think that's a great example and of course, jesus is the prime example of all of that about how we can take those real, time-tested principles and apply them to our lives by looking at the individual examples of individual biblical leaders.

Speaker 1: 18:26

You know, I look back on, like you know, humans around about 100,000 or so years, the kind of the state we're in. Maybe I'm off the math, but it's not a long time, and to me it's amazing how fast. Like you know, that means basically we've had 5,000 patriarchs, grandfathers, if you will, and only like two have probably interacted with technology. Just look, you will. And only two have probably interacted with technology. Right, and if we look at how well and how fast we dismiss thousands of years of people studying, let's say, meditation or mindfulness or Buddhism or even religion, how quick people dismiss that as whatever people, the old, but they didn't have all this tech to distract them. That's what they did for hours.

Speaker 1: 19:04

And I think people really need to look sometimes backwards to see what mattered, because we're not that much smarter if not, we might even be dumber than we were back then because people read, they studied, they interacted, they conversed. They also had to worry about getting murdered more often. But anyway, the point being is, I think that's a great place to start, just because my perspective here, as I've gotten older, is like, wow, those people really had to think a lot and they had a lot of thinkers around them that talk, and that's how they transferred the knowledge, because books were rare, anyway. So I don't have a question with that, except I think that's a great story.

Speaker 2: 19:33

No, I've actually got a follow on to that, if you don't mind. No, of course not. I think there are two fundamental elements in human nature that everybody is looking for they want to be loved or cared for and they want to be part of something greater than themselves. And as I study leadership throughout history, all the way back to thousands of years ago, the good leaders tap into showing how they care for people and how they connect people with something greater than themselves. And whether that's ancient Greece or biblical times, or our founding as a nation, or present day, it's not about technology. Those are leadership tactics. It is about finding a way to fulfill those two innate human needs of the human condition. And if we do that well by studying leaders of the past, then it makes us more effective today.

Speaker 1: 20:22

You're 100% agree with that, and it's actually that data is supported by blue zones in the world. They have high community and they have high sense of purpose and which, which is a form of love, right Of like hey, I serve others and if you look at blue zones, there's nothing else that there, there's no like, there's nothing to say. The same foods, and it's that. Those are the two factors that are zones in the world. That single data, well, those two data points. I think that's amazing. All right, if you could go back in time and do anything different, what?

Speaker 2: 20:53

point of time would you go to and what would you do differently? Thomas, I would go back to the start of college. I think in the first 10 to 15 years of my adult life I was way too focused on heads down in the trenches being really good as a tactical expert. But I think you can be better even as a tactical expert by lifting your head up more often than I did, looking around and understanding the context. I call it, or I've heard it called, environmental scanning, and I think I started that really well in the middle of my mid-30s about being intentional and looking around. But I really wish I would have started as a 17 year old freshman at MIT, spending more time looking up on occasion, looking around and understanding the context in which which I operate.

Speaker 1: 21:36

Yeah, that would be. If we could find a way to transfer wisdom instead of knowledge to the youth we would have. We would be wow, we would really advance quickly, but students for sure. Final question for you and, by the way, thank you so much for coming on. This is awesome. If there's a question I should have asked you today that I didn't, what would that question have been and how do you answer it?

Speaker 2: 21:58

Hey, Thomas, you're a guy who's known for dad jokes and you didn't ask me about dad jokes and I haven't heard a dad joke from you. So I would ask you for dad jokes. I'll give you a couple if you don't mind. You know, I just came back from a Disney cruise and I had a great conversation with a dolphin. We just clicked.

Speaker 1: 22:16

Yes.

Speaker 2: 22:17

Or you know what's the best thing about living in Switzerland, do you know? I don't, I'm not really sure, but the flag's a big plus, it's a big plus, yeah, hey so you got one for me.

Speaker 1: 22:33

I do. Well, maybe discreet, but there's really three types of people in the world. There's those that can count and those that cannot.

Speaker 2: 22:38

I love it, thank you, and it's a math joke. I'm a STEM guy, so that's perfect.

Speaker 1: 22:41

I was going to throw a little nerdiness in with that, just the. You know there are other sides of jokes I do like, which, like you know, dark humor is not. You know, it's kind of like booed. Not everyone gets it. See, he didn't laugh at that one. That tells you.

Speaker 2: 22:56

It's a little dark, a little like dad jokes Yep.

Speaker 1: 22:59

So if you, but this is my advice to the listener.

Speaker 2: 23:10

Start with one of those two jokes. If you're going to do a comedy set, and just see who laughs, you know where to go, where to take it. By the way, I've found that dad jokes are a leadership technique. They're a good leadership tool. I was forced to dress up as an elf earlier on in my leadership journey at the Christmas party of our organization, and I decided to torture the people around me by telling about three dozen elf dad jokes throughout the night, and I found out that it really opens up doors and maybe creates relationships or vulnerabilities that people wouldn't otherwise attribute to you, and so I actually have incorporated dad jokes into my leadership repertoire. Uh, and you know, once you become known as the dad joke Keller, people give you material, so it's easy to self-sustain.

Speaker 1: 23:43

We can take that offline. I'm a huge dad joke groupie. I'll say it that way. I'm a groupie. I am, I'm a groupie. I watch dad jokes. I love the pun of it. It's just anyway. So shameless plug time for you. Who should get a hold of you and how do you want them to do?

Speaker 2: 24:02

that, yeah, thomas. Johntykertcom is my website. You can sign on there for a free newsletter. I'm prolific on LinkedIn and I do a lot of keynote speaking on five topics leadership, innovation, national security, international affairs and advanced technology. If there's any of your listeners out there that are interested in hearing somebody speak from experience about any of those, have them reach out to me via my website.

Speaker 1: 24:27

Awesome, John. Thanks so much for coming on today. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 24:29

This has been a ton of fun. Thank you, Thomas.

Speaker 1: 24:31

And listen anyone who's still here. I really appreciate you getting to this point in the show and if this is the first time you've been here, I hope it's the first of many If you've been here before you.