My personal story
I grew up on a large dairy farm in upstate NY which means that from as early as 5 years old I have held a full-time job. Having to find the balance between working on the farm and going to school was interesting but a perfect way to perfect life-work balance skills. I did miss a lot of school growing up however with only a small fraction of it actually due to illness. My absences were usually because I was working with a parent to get something done on the farm. Thankfully, I was a good student and was able to make up my missing work with little difficulty. In high school, it was a natural transition for me to get involved in the Future Farmers of America club at school or FFA. It was there that my real leadership story began.
Everyone has that one teacher that really influenced them and helped change the course of their life. Mine was the high school Agriculture teacher and FFA advisor. He really helped to steer me down my path and pushed me to enter all kinds of leadership contests. I ended up taking FFA as far as I could, winning several national competitions and was named an All-American farmer. This meant I earned an American FFA Degree, something given only to those members who demonstrated the highest level of commitment to FFA as well as made significant accomplishments in supervised agricultural experiences. The American FFA Degree is awarded at the National FFA Convention & Expo each year to less than 1% of FFA members, making it one of the organization’s highest honors.
After high school, my plan was to stay in dairy farming which I loved despite the constant hard work it required. With that in mind, I enrolled in SUNY Cobleskill College of Agriculture, majoring in Agriculture Engineering and Power Machinery. My plan was to take the knowledge I learned there and apply it to helping run the family farm. Yet a negative realization came along with the knowledge I had learned in the FFA and college; I began to see that my father was not only a bad farmer but he was also a poor small business owner. This began causing a lot of conflict between us as he was not open to suggestion or any criticism to the way he did things. I was beginning to pull back from the idea of working with him on the family farm and striking out on my own when a major event changed my life forever.
I had just finished earning my Associates degree and had just begun my junior year towards a Bachelor’s degree when the terrorist attack that took place on the World Trade Towers and the Pentagon happened. Being from NY, the attack perhaps struck me harder than it may have those who lived on the West Coast but I felt compelled to do something, I just didn’t know what. The answer to that question came in November 2011 when I enlisted in the Marine Corp. I expected to leave right away but realized soon after that they couldn’t just send a bunch of kids and new recruits to boot camp all at the same time. Instead, I waited and ended up going to boot camp on April 9, 2002, and began the biggest leg of my leadership journey.
I was in the Marine Corp for 10 years and worked with a wide variety of great leaders as well as quite a few bad ones. I first was stationed at Miramar in San Diego, CA working as a mechanic on CH-46’s. While there I did two deployments with the 11th MEU, both times straight to Iraq. Later I received orders back to the East Coast to work for HMX-1, the Presidential Helicopter Squadron. About this time, I got married and thought that being in a non-deployable unit like HMX-1 would be good for the formative years of my marriage but I was wrong. Being a part of HMX-1 meant that I went everywhere with the President. Where he went, I went and he traveled so much that in reality, I saw my wife maybe one weekend a month. After 5 years of non-stop traveling around the world, I decided to get out of the Marine Corp and put down some roots here in Fredericksburg.
Having already begun earning a Bachelor’s degree I felt that I should finish it and be the first one in my family to earn a college degree. So, with the help of the GI bill, and the support of my wife, I finished my Bachelor’s degree in Aviation Business and Maintenance Management and got a job doing logistics for the Marine Corp. It was during this time where I was working as a civilian Marine that both my daughter were born and I came to realize that to take care of my family I needed to move up in the business world. This realization, along with help from the GI Bill and a ton of support from my wife, is what set me on my latest leadership journey of earning my MBA through Mary Washington University.
Who do you want to be as a leader?
Within the Marine Corp, there is no leader more revered than the Marine legend Lewis "Chesty" Burwell Puller. Aside from the ideals that the Marine Corp instills in you, I have always found his leadership style fascinating and have strived to emulate him. While many Marines honor Chesty Puller for his courageous combat, I tend to be drawn more towards his interactions with his men.
He was hard on his men and demanded a lot from them, but in turn, he always did everything in his power to make sure that they were taken care of. From the historical accounts I’ve read, Chesty had an innate understanding of his men which enabled him to unite them as a unit and treat them with respect while simultaneously disciplining them. His superiors were incredibly impressed not only with the unity of his men but also by his commanding presence on the battlefield.
In one bloody battle, Chesty was wounded and laid bleeding and crippled in a foxhole and yet continued to call in airstrikes all night. He refused to be moved from the field to tend to his injury until all the Marines that had been killed and wounded had been picked up first. Puller truly believed that his men came first and lived out that belief no matter the circumstances.
Every day while deployed Chesty would make daily inspections and insist on clean and ready weapons, alertness while on watch, and care of the feet. Violations of these simple tasks were promptly punished but he always made sure his men had the resources needed to complete these tasks. He also always arranged for the comfort of his men before his own, making sure that the other officers in his charge did the same. Chesty would always be the last to get his food and made sure there was enough for the troops before he ate his. One of the Chesty Puller rules that I still practice today is that when it comes to eating, the most junior among the group gets to eat first.
He practiced what he preached when it came to leadership. Visit all of your men frequently. Talk to them. Be sure they know what you want them to do at all times and where you can be found if they have questions. Never be cruel, even to the enemy because it undermines the natural courage and manliness of the perpetrator. Be respectful to a dead friend, or foe, and bury the dead quickly. Make sure your men get enough rest or downtime and avoid unnecessary harassment, such as "standing by," meaning don’t give people busy work for the sake of giving them something to do.
Chesty was not only a great leader himself but he was responsible for training new leaders as well. He always stood behind his men’s attempts to lead, standing back and allowing them to lead. If they began to falter, he would work to convince them they were capable of leading. The key leadership traits Chesty believed in were: over the top and continual combat training and discipline, cultivating loyalty and commitment among his Marines, leading from the front and participating in training and combat even when exhausted, set a courageous example, and speak out when you see something, no matter the consequences.
Who are you as a leader and why?
Although I am not leading Marines into combat, I believe that adopting Chesty Puller’s leadership example and applying it to the civilian section is easily done. I have been able to adapt and relate almost every one of Chesty’s leadership ideas to a leadership skill I use today. I try to be fair but firm, and try to take the time to get to know my employees, taking note of their interests, hobbies, and families. I strive to make sure that they have the resources available to them to be successful and I always make sure that they understand that I will support them when they need it. There are clear paths in my life that made me into the leader I am today, beginning with the leadership completion in my youth and becoming more honed and defined in my time in the Marine Corp.
What will help you get there?
I hope to reach my leadership goals by constantly growing in my experience and education. When they say that education is continual I believe it because it has never stopped for me. I believe that once you stop learning, you stop growing as a person and a leader. I am also aware that the best way to grow as a leader is to make mistakes and learn from them. Ultimately then I believe that what will help me reach my leadership goals is actually a process of trial and error.
What parts of this class changed you, molded you, enhanced you, and challenged you?
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