Col Matt Allen
EPISODE 42
LISTEN ON APPLE PODCASTS | GOOGLE | STITCHER | SPOTIFY
These show notes are a very brief overview of the Podcast episode. So if you want to hear all the details, be sure to listen on your favorite player or watch on youtube.
IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER:
THE VIEWS PRESENTED DO NOT REPRESENT ANY OFFICIAL MILITARY ENTITIES. THE INFORMATION ON THIS WEBSITE IS FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. FOR ALL WATER CONFIDENCE EVENTS, DO NOT PERFORM ANY WITHOUT A MEDICAL KIT AND A BUDDY WHO IS CERTIFIED CPR/FIRST AID. ANY ATTEMPT AT PERFORMING THESE DRILLS FOR ANY EXERCISE IS AT YOUR OWN RISK. ONES READY LLC DOES NOT ACCEPT ANY RESPONSIBILITY FOR DAMAGES OR LIABILITIES, PERCEIVED OR REAL AS A RESULT OF THE INFORMATION PROVIDED ON THIS WEBSITE. BE SMART.
IF YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT LEADERSHIP, WE’VE GOT IT. ON THIS EPISODE THE COMMANDER OF THE 24 SPECIAL OPERATIONS WING SITS DOWN WITH THE ONESREADY TEAM TO DROP KNOWLEDGE BOMBS AND TALK ABOUT HIS EXPERIENCES AND PHILOSOPHY.
INTRO
Intro 0:02
You're listening to the Ones Ready podcast, a team of Air Force Special Operators forged in combat with over 70 years of combined operational experience, as well as a decade of selection instructor experience. If you're tired of settling, and you want to do something you truly believe in, you're in the right place. Now, here's your favorite CCT personality, JTAC extraordinaire, embracer have a ridiculous face, and like the shortest operator you'll ever meet, Peaches.
Peaches 0:28
Well, boys and girls, ladies and gentlemen, we have quite the episode for you. So welcome to the Ones Ready podcast. We're happy to have you in the room and we have a special guest today. We have Colonel Matt Allen or better known as TMA, The Matt Allen. He is the 24 Special Operations Wing Commander, a dear friend of mine as well so I'm really happy to And, again, to all the listeners out there, we want to say thank you for supporting us, please go on the Apple podcast, Spotify, YouTube, subscribe, leave us review and comment. Let us know how we're doing. And again, if you have questions, let us know what they are, and we'll answer them as best we can. So, Sir, thanks for joining us. We're really happy to have you and like I mentioned you and I go back quite a way which, you know, I'm going to bring up later on the podcast I don't want to I don't want to jinx it. So, as we as we kick it off, why don't you give us a little bit about your background and tell us about yourself?
Col Allen 1:42
Yeah, thanks Peach, Aaron, Trent. Really appreciate the opportunity to get on the podcast here. Certainly, to Brian, we're missing you, buddy. But Congrats. You're going through this process here as a family. And then of course to your listeners too. Thanks for taking the time out to learn a little bit about our culture about who we are. Within the AFSPECWAR community and that's specifically today within ST. So, I've been the Wing Commander, the 24 SOW for the last year. Really enjoyed my entire career there. But I started I guess, as a military brat. So, I bounced around, you know, as an Air Force brat went to the Air Force Academy. Correct, graduated in 99 and opted to come into this special tactics training pipeline was something I was really interested in doing and so ended up progressing through the community served multiple squadrons, you know, and then most recently, before coming here came to 720th Special Tactics Group, and now I'm at the two for sound And much like, much like you all have had multiple deployments over the time. I think I'm at 10 right now, but just excited to be a part of this community, not just because what we do, but people that comprise this community. It's a really unique organization.
Trent 2:56
That's awesome. No, I mean, it is unique but as you know, sir, I think going back to the very beginning, most of our listeners are either pre career in the very beginning. And so, we want to talk about, you know, I know nothing about being a Plebe at the Academy or anything else like that. But is there anything that you wish you would have known in the very beginning process of your crew coming in? questions that we could have answered?
Col Allen 3:46
Yeah, I guess the. At the time, there wasn't a lot known right. There wasn't a lot of information in the in the late 90s. About ST is a capability and then specifically the career fields that were that were involved in. I think that's probably a similar look across the community. And as people wrestle with the decision, but what I'll tell you is, you know, the challenge that is associated with not only deciding to come in and preparing to do that, and you really have to be able to prepare to go through that. But then going through the training pipeline itself was incredibly rewarding. And I just, I didn't know the amount of reward that I would get until I went through the first couple of courses. And then I realized, man, these are, these are exactly the kind of people that I want to spend time with. So, it does take a lot of hard work to get prepared for it. And so, take it seriously. But, but at the same time, there's an awful lot of reward that comes from that as well.
Trent 4:38
Right? I think we punch that all the time. Right? Like it's, you got everything that's worth it comes with struggle. And I think that's something that's out there in the social media sphere coming from all directions these days. And, you know, I don't think we're any different follow up question is, why was the 321st your favorite assignment with most of the Ones Ready crew, you know, and how many Article 15 came out.
Col Allen 5:07
That's perfect. That's exactly right. So, the good I mean, so I, I've enjoyed all the different assignments for various reasons, right? I don't want to I don't apologetic my way through this one. But the 321st was really unique from my perspective because you get to get involved in the theater Special Operations Command under SOCEUR. And now your far left of conflict and you're doing partner nation work here. You're establishing relationships, you're setting environmental conditions for us if we ever had to go to war to be, you know, wrapped in a majorly successful. But there were an awful lot of great training ships that were associated with that one.
Aaron 5:43
So, Sir, as you moved on out of the squadron level, and you started getting more and more under your umbrella. Right You started off kind of as a Flight Commander and then moved your way up to DO and now Commander, speaking specifically about the support AFSC so you command What is it? Is it 19? Different AFSCs 21 under your command now?
Col Allen 6:15
Actually, think it's around 50 when you include all the medical capability as well. So, there's, there's an awful lot of folks here. And that's actually a great point.
Aaron 6:27
No, that's but that was the exact question. I wanted you to talk about what it's like and I had no idea it was even that scope. I knew it was, you know, always around the squadron we say 17 or 20 or whatever. But what's that? Like? How, how is that different? And how is that a challenge to you even as a special operator?
Col Allen 6:41
Yeah, so it's great, right? So, you have to realize early on that the special mission sets that get assigned to the individual operators, the teams, the flights that are out there, like you can't accomplish any of those things without the robust support system that we have in the organization. You have to rely upon your teammates, it's just it's not just the folks that are on the opposite side. Clearly, some of the best folks I have worked with in the organizations have been our combat mission support type center there. But with every single Air Force specialty code, right, so the different jobs that are out there, whether that's supply, whether that's radio maintenance, whether that's our logistics readiness capabilities, there's a different career path and progression that they have to be on. So, you want to obviously, you know, pull the unit together towards a towards unified action and get after the mission set or problem set that you're looking at, you want to do that, and really use all of the talent that you have in the formation. But what you also want to do is professionally develop everybody within the organization and not just focus on one side of the squat or one portion of the squad are in there. And so there's some great professional lessons that I have learned over the years of making sure that who I need to talk to you to find out okay, how do I really do the right counseling for psych Doc's or how do I do the right counseling for our radio maintenance, folks? folks that are out there, or Comm officers are now we're going to get logistics readiness officers into the squadrons as well. How do we how do we make sure that we're taking care of them so they can contribute to the mission set, and then be part of the broader Air Force team as they as they move on. So that's, that's kind of neat. And then, of course, within CMS, of course, you get some wicked, talented, wickedly talented people that you want to maintain within the Special Tactics or Special Warfare enterprise writ large. And so now we're actually I'm grateful that we have a new AFSC that's aligned for our combat mission support Superintendent type. So, we can designate people early on to roll in. And we are at the Air Force HAF-level, trying to align a special duty assignment pay for three or four of the AFSCs for the jobs within our units on the mission support side. So, it's just as important of a function. And I think for young operator folks that are coming into the organization or young leaders, if you forget about that, you know, you'll be quickly reminded when portions of your mission set fail but, but you're doing so at the cost of your own team's effectiveness and your own mission space. So, thanks for bringing that up.
Aaron 9:11
Absolutely. I think it's one of those important things that it tends to get overlooked. It tends to get glossed over and you can always put this out there but you have it every single Squadron, you have that one person that you go to you can walk into their office and it doesn't matter what they do. And guess what that person is always from one of those combat missions support career fields. Always. It's always the you know, the front office person that's supposed to be doing A1 but they take on every single important secondary duty. That blue person that runs that Squadron like I'll tell you right now, you may be OAF you may hashtag it up all day and look good and your quad vision night vision goggles, but you do not run that Squadron that that belly button runs that squadron. And so, and it's important for me for people to hear too if you want to be part of the ST community if you want to be around these teams, but these jobs just aren't for you. Come on in. Be us be a Rockstar vehicle guy, watch what kind of training vehicle guy or gal what watch what kind of extra training you get to go on and driving courses and team stuff. So, I know at our organization, we have people that are our representatives for each flight. So, I have AFE person, I have an Intel person, I have a vehicle person, and we take them and integrate them into our training. So, it's another great opportunity that ST has, it's just outside of the for-career field. So, I thought it was important about I wanted to talk about it, Sir. So, I just use us. Well, better, a much better sounding pivot point to talk about CMS.
Col Allen 10:33
That's good. Thanks. Appreciate, yeah, critical, critical portions of the theme and dynamic that you get, right. So, you're living in austere places, unclear uncertain circumstances, you have to rely upon the strengths of the entire team that around you, and you have people whose significant specialties align with what you're trying to do. So, it's a really big portion of who we are within St. Anna. I'm proud to call on teammates.
Trent 10:58
Yeah, and I think that expectations for those people are just as high. You know, as everybody else. It's, I mean, not to keep beating this horse. But I remember as a young guy and you see young guys sometimes may not value it as much as you go throughout your career and you look back at all those missions support folks and everything that they do for you, it becomes more and more clear. Just how critical that is. And that I think Aaron started it. I had to jump on my soapbox to you and I'm sorry
Peaches 11:27
Yes. Save rounds. Yeah, sir. Just so you know, we've been joking about you know, what's going to be my thing once I once I pin on Chief and I haven't been issued it yet. But I'm still waiting. We're thinking it's going to be haircuts, maybe uniform infractions or something like that. But kind of like no matter what, no matter what, there's going to be a lot of knife hands.
Col Allen 11:59
So, I Kind of Academy division knife hands, a lot of energy, a lot of a lot of energy coming down, which would be good. I'm excited for it. Actually, I'm pretty stoked for you as we go through this process.
Trent 12:10
We know Peaches leadership philosophy that the base level of it the core, is the knife hand, a strong knife hand is his leadership, philosophy. So, sir, what would you say your core leadership philosophy is? And what do you think have shaped that throughout your career? And has it changed?
Col Allen 12:26
Yeah, it's really clear for me, it's trust in your people really, really clear. Like you have to be able to establish, that right? So, it's not only trusting yourself, clearly, you know, to have the right expectations. You know, I haven't been trained the right way to where the right equipment or the right leadership and guidance, the team that you're working in that team environment, can I trust somebody else on either side of me to make sure that they have my best interest, I have their best interests in mind and we hammer that home and the training pipeline, and the philosophies that are central to who we are because you're putting your life in someone else's hand and they're putting your life you know, their lives, and your hand as well. But then as you as you increase in responsibility and rag, you realize the wicked level of talent that we have within the organization and you have to be able to trust and empower the people that you have to do the jobs that you have given them an orient them to, is that right? You have to you have to be able to verify that right, you have to go through your own checks and balances system, the Air Force has processes and ST processes as well to get through that piece of it. But fundamentally, it's Can I, you have to be able to establish that rapport and the trust. And that's, you know, that's a two-way street, right? Like, I have to earn that trust as well. I have to earn the trust of the folks who I get to work with and have the opportunity to be in the same unit with and they have to earn that with me too. But the faster you get to earning that trust with your teammates, with your boss, with the folks who are working, you know, within your organization, the more effective the organization is, and if we if we pull it back just a little bit more It's easy to talk about trust and the aspect of Can I trust you to do your job? And can you trust me to do my job? But I think the hard piece of trust is, you know, can I trust you enough to still respect me as a teammate? If I call you out on cell phone, and I say that, hey, I think you're doing it wrong. I think you need to do it a better way and can Firstly, can I trust you enough as a teammate to tell you, Hey, man, I'm having a hard time. I'm having an issue. I'm not running. Not 100%. Right now, I got some issues. And I'm going through this with as part of the humility that I think we learn and really reinforce during the training pipeline, of course, I do care about people's ability to achieve physical fitness standards. But I also care about, like, everybody has a breaking point, right? There's, it will always happen. It just turns into how do you talk about that with your team that's around you. And then what's your threshold for that, you can always go a lot longer than then you're in When your body tells you, right, it's just your mind driving you through those pieces of it. But those are the aspects of trust that I think are really valuable. And I think fundamentally, leadership is a people driven, people driven enterprise, right? It's not just about it's not just about the implementation of different designs. And it's not just about a I've got to achieve specific mission sets. It's about how do you how do you inspire and direct your people towards getting after what you're asking them to do? So that, you know if you're going to ask me in one word, what the leadership philosophy is trust.
Trent 15:33
Right. I think that's one of the reasons we call this the Team Room. Right? Because I think the Team Room is that the Nexus where leadership and followership and brutal honesty meets, and that's where we all develop those, those characteristics. And, you know, which allows our community to move forward because that's where you, you know, you handle your problems, and then you move out, and then that that trust is, you know, we can treat each other like people but when you tell me to go, I'm going to step out, move smartly and do my job, right. So, I think that's pretty awesome. We
Aaron 16:01
We shy away from it? Because we hate the word, but really, you know, we're looking for trust. And then on that next level, is that intimacy, like, Do I know you so well that I know exactly how to say a very, very mean thing to you to where, you know, hey, it's coming from a good place. And listen, I know this things, but, you know, it's because I love you and I want to be better with you. Once you get to that level of intimacy, that that team room thing really does, because you can be like, that was the dumbest thing you've ever said in my entire life. And, you know, that's, you know, not malicious to somebody else, but you walk out of that room, and it's like, that comment just floats away. You know, as soon as the echoes are done, you just walk away and it's like, Okay, well, I did just call my friend stupid, but he was kind of being stupid. So
Col Allen 16:38
It's a good point that you bring up the right so that I think there's internal barriers like we work in a community and really the DoD at large where we're willing to, we're willing to die for one another right? Like you're willing to go in a battle space and, and cover up your team and make sure that you're taking those the more dangerous aspects of the job but how challenging is it then to go back into the team room track exactly what you're saying. And then they call out your teammates for saying, Hey, man, like, I don't think you're doing it the right way and then be able to receive that kind of criticism as well. And that's a really important part of it, too. And that's, and that's across the board. And that's up and down the chain. And if you're not, if you're not cultivating an environment where you can trust each other, where you can both give and then receive that critical feedback, and you're just limiting, you're limiting yourself and your limiting your organization from being able to achieve great things.
Trent 17:31
Awesome. Do you have any books that have helped you along the way that have kind of shaped the way that you would do business? I think everybody has a couple books that have hit home.
Col Allen 17:41
Yeah, so I've got I've got a couple that I always hammer home on and I know you guys had Chief Guilmain on already. So, you're going to hear a couple of repeats here, right? So, Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl, Viktor Frankl, hugely informative to me. I love reading the book. And in fact, my wife and I went through a cancer scare a couple of years ago, right where she ended up getting diagnosed with a pretty aggressive cancer in an advanced stage. And it was one of those things that she and I talked about often and that and that book helped me to reflect upon not only the most valuable portions of life, but what do you do? When the unimaginable happens? What do you do when really challenging circumstances and scenarios present themselves? The first time I read that was, you know, shortly after the pipeline, and I was going through the mentality associated with how do you how do you approach really hard problems? And there are so many parallels that were out there so many great lessons learned a big fan of Legacy, I pass that out to all our squatter command teams, big fan of you know that the first principle of sweeping the ship and the humility associated with that from a leadership aspect really, really valuable, and go through that. I really have appreciated Secretary Gates' books, you know, the one that hit home for me the most was duty. I thought that was a really good, really good read as we went through that. I think, you know, there were man's sorry Once an Eagle by Anton Meyer, a big fan of an Endurance by Alfred Lansing. So both of those are leadership and small team environments Once An Eagle talks about an army leader that progresses through the ranks, some of the challenges that he saw, and it has examples of great leaders and examples of really poor leaders and then Who do you want to be in your lives because you get to choose what you stand for in life. And then and then stepping into Endurance. It was the expedition in the Arctic that went to the went south with Shackleton, and then how did he lead through that? Through that environment? So, you see Antarctic so let's get ice. Those are the ones that I got. We can we can edit that later.
Peaches 20:24
So, Sir, I don't know if you're aware, though, this is not a security breach. But a, the ST 2030 vision has is out there for people's, you know, consumption out on the internet. Yeah. The problem with that is that people they see it in black and white and they expect that that's going to happen and they don't understand that that is a living, breathing document that constantly evolves because that is one of the benefits of being SOF is that we provide that you know, rigid state of flexibility and that it that ability to move And change on the fly almost a lot faster than the services. So, what changes? So, it's kind of a two-part question. What, what deviations have we taken from that as a point of departure? And what is the future for AFSPECWAR?
MISTAKES IN PREPARATION
Col Allen 21:19
Yeah, so good, good questions. Clearly, I think I think part of the ST 2030 Vision really wanted to establish, you know, force structure in in two main locations. And then and then really start to build on really a high level of kinetic activity and what we're planning on doing, but really, that that document came out and subsequent to that we've seen the National Defense Strategy change, right. And so, and then we've also seen a correlating decrease in the amount of kinetic activity in the current theatres that we're fighting in. So, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and then places within Africa. And so this so we realized that as a SOF entity right AFSOC at large, but then specifically within Special Tactics in the in the whole Special Warfare community the AFSPECWAR community realize that, you know, as we will continue to be involved in the counter violent extremist organization fight like that's going to continue to happen, that'll be a SOF focus area for the nation, counterterrorism forces will be will be employed. But we also need to make sure that we are pivoting to an addressing near peer competitors. And we've seen this through, you know, the closest threat what would be Russia. And that that pacing threat, as we start to look out in the distance is definitely China. And this is a war of values. It's a war of ideals. It's a war of partnerships, right. And so how do we build partnerships with those that we hold closest to us and continue the presence that the United States and the democratic alliances across the world have had for decades to maintain the knowledge base that we have right now to maintain the standard of living and kind of the world order that we currently know. And so, what I would what I would offer to us the changes that we've seen in the ST Vision and as we continuously talk about this at the AFSOC levels, and even higher is happy to pivot the formation. So, number one, you're not losing sight of that counter violent extremist organization fight. We've got people deployed tonight right now, getting their kit on and ready to engage these combats and how do you also seek to establish yourself and gain competitive advantage in those partner nation building I'm sure partner force exchange kind of kind of locations. I think one of the key focus areas that we're going to start really getting involved with is a preparation of the environment focus. And as you as you look at the SOF core tasks, Across the board, really, three of them jumped out to me for being, you know, central to what Special Tactics and aspect were writ large, but really within the two, four staff what we do, that's the direct action missions that that's our Special Reconnaissance mission set. That's our fifth mission set itself. You know, we also have a pretty good contingent of personnel recovery, but that's a subset of direct action. And we start getting into it. So as we as we look forward to the future I can imagine we're going to start rebalancing our force, rebalancing our focus areas towards this preparation of the environment activities, and then being able to set the environment for you know us within soft but also the larger geographic combatant commands to have advantage when we're facing near peer competitors.
Aaron 25:01
We get so many questions, you know, where is asked that we're going, how does how does Special Reconnaissance fit into that? Where does a PJ fit into these teams and for us that get to hear people like you message this, and then we get to hear people downstream message directly to us and translate it into, you know, kind of that tactical speak that we need. It's good to hear that, you know, the Wing Commander has the way forward on this. that's a that's a pretty solid one. So, we're going to completely switch gears on you, sir. So, you just talked about how much AFSPECWAR is changing. We're talking about where it is that we're going as a future we're talking about new career fields that don't even have CFETPs yet. But what do you look for when we're talking about and you're on with three sled dogs right now like in your young enlisted? You know, we speak to people that haven't even made that bridge to Airman yet like, No kidding. Not even been to basic. And we always talk about, you know, how to establish yourself and kind of how to how to have those have those traits and work on those things. What do you look for from your junior enlisted? So that you know that you can grow that next generation of AFSPECWAR that next generation of St. What are those baseline personality traits that you look for?
Col Allen 26:18
Yeah, so I think, you know, as we as we go through our assessment selection process a little bit different, right, because, well, we'll look, we'll probably talk about that a little bit. But within the, within the force right now, what I really, really value is people's character, men and women of character, right? So, it's building upon that foundation of character. And that's something that you get to you get to find early on in life that you get to reinforce early on in life and then you build upon that because that's, that's the central portion of who we are and what you are offering. I really care about people who embrace growth, the mentality associated with learning and constantly asking, how can I do it better? Wow, are other people doing these things? I really care. About that, because of that turns into both trainability. But then also there's a, there's a professional curiosity to get yourself better. You know, we always do the things we've always done, we're always going to get right the same thing again and again and again. But what I care about is people who are who are not afraid to question the status quo and to pull in information now, especially in the in the junior enlisted force in the junior officer force, man, you got to listen, right, you got to be able to soak in what people are telling you. But that's part of the growth process itself. And then finally, I really care about being the absolute best at your job that you can be like there's a competitive environment within both training for and then going through the training pipeline, on the operational side. And then once you get into your unit, and compete to try to be the absolute best at your job that you can be, which means that you're talking to more experienced NCOs/SNCO as you're pulling officers aside that, that have expertise in different areas, and you're trying to Learn as much as you can through the process. And in so doing, not only you making yourself better, but you're upping the game of your entire team that's around you, because people are seeing that hunger and that drive and to be able to get after, you know, the competence aspect of our job. And that's, that's really, really valuable in any team environment. But I, you know, it's all based upon the character of the person. That's the thing that I really value the most. Is there anything that you focus on more for your junior officers that might be different from the enlisted folks? Right off the bat, I think it's understanding principles of command, right, and then realizing that, that you will get some understanding and awareness of the tactical mission set and that's really important for young officers to do, because we don't get to spend as much time in a tactical environment, but to gain as much as you can and to learn it as quickly as possible going through that. So that is that's really listening to the folks around you. And then being developed by the NCO and SNCO Corps that's around you. The specific tasks that we give our NGOs, of course, is to develop and train the enlisted force, but the implied task is also to develop the officers who are around them. And I've benefited greatly from the NCOs and SNCOs that I've worked with all the way through, not just the pipeline, but all the way through the operational organizations that I've been a part of. And so for that, that officer forced to learn it to know and understand the, the weight of command responsibilities and the weight of, you know, understanding the role that you're going to play both in a small team environment, but then as that fleets up to a Flight Commander role, potentially DO, potentially Squadron Commander beyond to realize that you are surrounded by subject matter experts and you have to be able to learn as much as possible for from them and then to realize that you're not going to get a whole lot of hacks at the tactical iterations there as you're going through.
Peaches 30:09
Who was your favorite exec?
Col Allen 30:12
Oh, that's a good one. I was going to I was going to go hard pass on that one. In fact, I saw the I saw I saw potentially there could have been a question on this one. But I was like, Yeah, man, I don't think I and, and really, I'm waiting for Brian Silva to finish his PA school. So, at some point, yes, we could probably bring him back into the 24 SOW which I think is a great idea Peach.
Trent 31:01
Sir, I'm not really sure where you're at with your career if you're planning on getting out, but where are you going from here? Like moving forward? Are you staying in ST? Are you know, further down the road? Are you going to you're just going to leave us and pop smoke and be like good luck, y’all? I'm going to go sail away on a boat and have a good time.
Col Allen 31:22
I think what happens next is I probably stepped into a staff role and for officers, that's normal, right? As you progress through the operational units, you'll step into an operational unit and go to a staff and ops unit and staff and kind of bounce back and forth there. So, so I was at the 720 for two years prior, I've been here for one year, so the next year, at the end of next year, I'll probably step into a staff, but I want to be able to participate and give, you know, give support and provide support any way that I can to this community that you know, I think it clearly has meant a lot to me personally as we've gone through, you know, as I've gone through the last couple of decades here, but What I think is a real value for the Air Force, for SOCOM, and for the nation. And so, I'm just excited to be a part of it right now and I hope I get to contribute you know moving forward in the future though not as not as closely as I'm able to do right now. But to be able to be an advocate is a big deal.
Trent 32:18
I think you're going to missing all the young guys out there you know, you step away from Ops you're going to miss it I think
Peaches 32:24
But the thing is that hunger never goes away like you're you know I’m living a staff life right now. Trent is you know; Aaron is still out there getting after it. You do become a caged animal. So, and apparently talking to some Chiefs that I know That have retired they said it, it never goes away. It's always going to be there for the rest of your life. So, I have that to look forward to as well as you guys.
Col Allen 33:08
So, I mean it's a good point though, right so what drives you like what gets you excited to come into work and what gets you excited to invest in other people and I think that the people you work with respond to that really well. If you if you're content with just kind of sitting back and relaxing and you know, resting on your laurels like No, nobody responds to that. That's not the kind of people that we want to have in the organization anyways, but yeah, you're right. For the for the for the retirement life as I as I look ahead, whenever that's going to be, I can imagine you're trying to find some aggressive hobbies, so be good.
Peaches 33:43
Unnecessarily putting yourself in danger. So, our demographic is generally 15 to 35. We've got some younger people and we've got some older people. But what we also have is we actually surprisingly, I guess from for me because I don't know who the hell wants to listen to me, but we have some people within our ranks, you know, this the Special Tactics ranks the Air Force, and even some of our sister services. What would be a message that you would want to give to them as they either you know, enjoy following AFSPECWAR or come You know, trying to enter or they're already on team?
Col Allen 34:29
Yeah, so I guess to the folks that are outside the community number one, it's worth it. This is a this is an awesome organization. It's comprised of, you know, the just incredible people, and they bring your game up significantly, right. So, this this is all the way back to the first person that I ever met in training with Jared Pietras, 20 years ago was right in Lackland, which is good, and the very first person. This community is awesome like it's an incredible community and in while you'll see the light hearted back and forth and giving each other a hard time like we have some incredibly disciplined people to organization not that we have some but that's who we are. That's the ethos of the organization is that we're able to pivot to and turn towards problem sets in an instant and then be able to array our full capability set towards it, but I tell you, it's worth it. So, coming in the community. For the people who are already in the community. I just want to say thanks. I'm really grateful to work with the disorganization and be a part of who we are. I am I am really excited and energetic. As I start to look towards the future to the things that we are going to be participating in, it's going to be different, right? it'll not be the same as the last 20 years. But of the last 20 years of what AFSPECWAR has done and grown to are any indicate the next 20 years; you're going to be just as effective as we start looking forward. So, thanks, thanks to the people who are out there listening to this, and thanks to your families, because it's a hard life, but it's a really rewarding life to.
Peaches 36:25
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I don't think anybody else would have a differing opinion, or else we wouldn't have been doing it for as long as we have.
Trent 36:36
It's an addiction, that having people around you that that push you forward, and always, you know, challenge, your best your version of your best is it's addictive, you know, and once you lose it, you might not realize how good you have it. And so that's not around you all the time.
Col Allen 36:53
So that's exactly right. I mean, the people that we have that we attract and that we retain are exactly that and I think that's what we do. As I talk to my friends who have gotten out, I respect everybody that's you know, served in any capacity for even the shortest amount of time but the things that they miss the most are the people who are around, I think, Jim Rohn that talks about, you're the average of the five people that you spend the most time with, right? The things that they like and what they push you to do what you expect out of yourself. So, what look at your friends’ expectations, right? If we're talking to the 15 to 18 year old demographic, what are your friends expecting you to do and what is within reasonable and then what's way outside of their of their comfort zones, and that's, you know, this organization and the people that comprise this place, have been really good at kind of pushing each other to get better at whatever it is we decide to do. So that's an it's a really healthy part of the organization.
Peaches 37:46
Exactly. And if you're not surrounding yourself with people that will force you to get better or you are hanging out with somebody that happens to be toxic, it will either build you up or tear you down really, really fast. So, a little bit of story time really quick before we wrap this up. I remember it being 1999 and I was at INDOC and you had not arrived yet. I didn't know of LTA or Lt. Allen that was showing up until I think it was Bubby. It was either Bubby or costal told me Hey, this guy's coming in you're going to love these fantastic and then may I had already been there for a while and it was just kind of amazingly I already had the salt on me I was already grizzled you know. Yeah. And then here comes this young ambitious Lieutenant and then that started our pipeline all I mean, pipeline to now and I mean you and I, we shared you know, we went to INDOC together we went to Air Traffic Control together, Combat Control School then we were on the same team at the 21 STS was a blue team. I mean that we were the best team but I mean we did have some pipettors in terms of you know, we had Bullet Bob, we had each Nielsen, Kendall like so we had some pipe hitters you know. And then you know, you go and you do take the route that you did and then you DO for us at the 321st and then 720th commander for us and the 24 SOW Commander, so it's pretty awesome and, and one of the things that and I'm going to throw it out there because I'm not sure if it's embarrassing. It definitely won't be embarrassing to you, but it'll be embarrassing more so to make it, so I'll just take that. I'm sure you remember this. But we were at a concert in North Carolina back in 2003. And whatever concert was I don't remember but no, we're in Raleigh, and these two guys, some of our buddies were drinking and we kind of gotten separated because this concert and they got jumped. And Funny enough, they're the ones that got arrested, not the guys that that initiated fight and I'm sure our guys weren't completely innocent, but whatever. These guys ended up finding us in the parking lot and we handled business appropriately. Yeah. But nevertheless, two of our buddies are still in jail. So, if you're not familiar with the geography of it, Raleigh, to Fayetteville areas, you know, an hour, hour and a half, right? So, we call one each, Matt Allen or Captain Matt Allen at the time and say, Hey, we got a spot of trouble. Need you to come bail us out? And not me, not me. Yeah, that's great guys. So, as you come in the middle of night and you talk to the cops, you end up getting them out free of charge, no issues, right. I turned to you and I say, hey, so can we have late reporting tomorrow because you know what's really lighten Yeah, that's right. All senior smile here.
Col Allen 42:16
okay, I don't think he's just smiling when he when he asked me that.
Peaches 42:19
No, no you weren't you weren't just like kind of one of those seriously like is this where you want to be when Jesus comes back?
Aaron 42:38
It's like being late if you're late just stop on the way Get down to get coffee, he late for everybody. And that's it. There's no point.
Col Allen 42:45
That's exactly right. Yeah, I remember that. I remember that pretty well. I remember just going You got to be kidding me. It was like it took like an hour and a half drive up there something like that. And I remember having to report into the commander later on and kind of go I'm just going this is nuts but that was actually I think it was just prior to our deployment or push over to Jordan right as we stepped into the Iraq/OIF kickoff, and I was thinking man how do we how do we make sure that we're that we're full up and a capability piece here and still address you know what's going on?
Peaches 43:24
We actually have a lot of sores, but there's just not enough time and I don't want to incriminate anybody else either.
Col Allen 43:35
I remember. Ah, I remember going to an Incubus concert with you up in Raleigh. Are you tracking any of this? You remember? That was like 2003/2004 and I remember specifically just get in my ears blast it out and just go This is awesome. And I looked over at Peach who had massive amounts of cotton balls like just jammed in his ears like just rocketed like this is so great. I'm like, I'm an idiot for not bringing that. He looked like you like such an old dude in the middle of a concert. But I was like, but that's also genius. And you know, I've got hearing problems now down and doesn't so clearly, I should have learned about that one.
Peaches 44:21
Yeah, something about following NCOs or something
Col Allen 44:24
Something about trusting your people? I'm not really sure that's right.
Aaron 44:31
And we bring it all the way back to the beginning. Perfect, perfect time for wrap up.
Peaches 44:37
Well, before we wrap it up, I want to say thank you. I mean, it. You're an awesome human, awesome human, and I love being around you. And I mean, even though I'm not in your command. Right now, I'm coming back to your command. So, I look forward to doing that. So, thanks for joining us. And for everybody else. Check out Colonel Allen's reading list? Well, we will publish it in the comments section of this really kind of reflect on what he said, I think that one of the key things that he talked about was trust. And we have talked about that numerous times on this podcast. And we've also brought up, you know, transparency and open communication. All of those things are tied in together because without the trust, you can't have open communication. You can't have transparency, because you're too worried about what is going to be, you know, what is going to be said, what kind of judgment Are you getting or anything like that. So, I think trust really is that foundational part of being a good leader and a good follower because you know, that we you have to be able to do both and go back and forth. It is not just you're always a leader or you're always the follower, because like we mentioned, there's going to be times when you're an E-2 or E-1 in training and guess what the no one's taking charge or somebody needs to take charge and that could be you. So, sir, again, thanks for joining us. We really appreciate having you. And unless you got any final shots we're out of here. All right, everybody, train hard.
TLDR: Straight from the mouth of one of the best SW leaders we’ve ever met. Trust your people. Work hard. Be part of the best team.
LEAVE A REVIEW
It’s our collective goal at Ones Ready to help Special Warfare candidates get through Selection and become better Operators than we ever were. By leaving us a review, it helps our podcast get in front of more candidates just like you.
So thanks in advance for leaving a review, we truly appreciate it.