022 - Inspiring Leadership - Lt. Col Dave Grossman on Modeling Behavior and Taking Charge

I want to express my sincere gratitude to Colonel Grossman for sharing his expertise and insights with us. To connect with and learn more from Colonel Grossman, be sure to visit his website at www.GrossmanOnTruth.com - trust me, it's worth it! 

Thank you all for your continued support and for tuning in to De-Escalation Conversations.  Stay tuned for more exciting episodes and interviews coming your way soon!  #DeEscalationConversations #Leadership #Training 

Lt. Col. Grossmon's BIO:
In their description of Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, Slate Magazine said, “Grossman cuts such a heroic, omnicompetent figure, he could have stepped out of a video game.”  He has five patents to his name, has published four novels, two children’s’ books, and six non-fiction books to include his “perennial bestseller” On Killing (with over half a million copies sold), and a New York Times best-selling book co-authored with Glenn Beck.

He is a US Army Ranger, a paratrooper, and a former West Point Psychology Professor.  He has a Black Belt in Hojutsu, the martial art of the firearm, and has been inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame.

Col. Grossman’s research was cited by the President of the United States in a national address, and he has testified before the U.S. Senate, the U.S. Congress, and numerous state legislatures.  He has served as an expert witness and consultant in state and Federal courts.  He helped train mental health professionals after the Jonesboro school massacre, and he was also involved in counseling or court cases in the aftermath of the Paducah, Springfield, Littleton and Nickel Mines Amish school massacres.

Col. Grossman has been called upon to write the entry on “Aggression and Violence” in the Oxford Companion to American Military History, three entries in the Academic Press Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace and Conflict and has presented papers before the national conventions of the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Since his retirement from the U.S. Army in 1998, he has been traveling full time as one of our nation’s leading trainers for military, law enforcement, mental health providers, and school safety organizations.

Today Col. Grossman is the director of Grossman On Truth, LLC (www.GrossmanOnTruth.com).  In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, he has written and spoken extensively on the terrorist threat, with articles published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Civil Policy and many leading law enforcement journals, and he has been inducted as a “Life Diplomate” by the American Board for Certification in Homeland Security, and a “Life Member” of the American College of Forensic Examiners Institute.

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Transcript

0:08

That's not a bad attitude to have. I control my destiny. I control my faith. I refuse to be a victim. What we've got is these informal leaders out there who are leading by example. Keep your back to the wall, carry your gun off duty, wear your body armor. From a spiritual standpoint, you've got to be a living witness. From a spiritual standpoint, you can't be doing bad things and then try to call people towards your faith, because nobody will listen to you. You've got to be modeling that process yourself. You've got to be carrying that backup gun, seeking that training, developing those skills, and they will watch you. They learn vastly more from what you do than what you say. San Diego nine one emergency. You need to come right away. There's a man with a gun, and it's loaded. Receiving emergency signal from people's yards 1141. We got a white female down. We need paramedics code for you. All available units, roll code that way. This morning, we are honored to have Lieutenant Colonel Dave Grossman, the director of the group and, you know, a US. Army Ranger. A paratrooper, former West Point psychology professor. He has a black belt in Hojutsu the martial art of the firearm, and has been inducted into the USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame. But beyond that, you know what, Colonel Grossman? You really change lives. And you do it in the areas of training, you do it in the areas of leadership, and you do it in the areas of communication. Welcome to the show, sir. It's good to be on board, Carrie, and thanks for putting together this podcast. You know what? I retired from the army 21 years ago. I've been doing this truly 2300 days a year for 21 years. I have a great sense of urgency, but I love the podcast. I can't tell you how many five minute blurbs I've done in radio or television over the years that are just spitting in the wind. The podcast is an opportunity to get a lot deeper. And my hats off to you for putting together this podcast and making this resource available. And I know right up front you want to talk about training, and so I want to give you two case studies that I use in my class. The first case study is the Pulse nightclub. 49 dead. There was an off duty cop hired by the nightclub to provide security in the parking lot. The official Orlando report said, quote, he said, I heard rifle fire. I had a pistol. I chose not to go in. He's being sued. He sat outside while 49 people were murdered behind him, shot him in the back of the head. Would have been over. And then two people escaped out an exit, and the killer came out the exit behind him, propped open the door with his foot, and murdered those two people in front of the cop and brought the cop under fire. Everything up to this point is straight out. The official Orlando report, one of the people is there an added piece of information is the cop was behind a vehicle, his behind cover. The vehicle was riddled with rifle bullets. The cop fired most of the magazine for about 30ft away. Didn't hit once. No wonder it didn't go in. No skills, no competence. No ability. The other case study is the draw. The Prophet Muhammad Art Festival in May of 2015 outside of Dallas, Texas, in Garland, Texas. Draw the Prophet Muhammad Art Festival. That said, could it be more provocative? That said, that's a horrendous offense to Islam to draw the image of the Prophet Muhammad. And they were afraid to draw bad guys in a dead two. Our critics from Arizona showed up. They K 47. The body armor could have been the Pulse nightclub times, too. Now, remember, the bad guy could choose where he goes, when he goes, and what he takes with him. They had body armor. They had rifles. They had the element of surprise. They rolled out of the vehicle, and a 59 year old traffic cop with a pistol filled a boat. An incredible act of marksmanship and bravery and courage and competence. It's a photograph of the officer receiving a Presidential Medal of Valor from President Obama. It's Officer Greg Stevens. I tell people, which one are you going to be? You're going to be standing there with the President, put a medal around your neck and be sued because it didn't go in. Are you going to burn a magazine? From 30ft away? Not hit once. Officer Greg Stevens began to fire at 40ft. The bad guys roll out of the vehicle. He's on the passenger side. The bad guy on the passenger side rolls out and opens fire. Greg Stevens says, I cannot tell you who fired first. I will tell you who fired best. From 40ft away. With a Glock, he puts a volley of four into the bad guy and puts him down. The bad guy on the other side. Over 30 rounds of rifle fire will be fired at Greg Stevens. They won't hit once because he's putting effective fire on them. The bad guy on the other side again. Another volley of four puts him down. An incredible act of marksmanship in valor. That officer Greg Stevens. I worked with him quite a bit. Very humble man. 60 years old when the president put that medal around his neck. Has retired after 40 years on the street. Street cop for 40 years. And he tells cops nationwide, training is a gift. Seek every bit of training. Don't be that cop that says, oh, I got to go to training again today. This is a gift. Your department has given you this gift, this life saving, life changing set of skills, and seek those skills. And Officer Greg Stevens. He wasn't a SWAT dog. He was on the negotiator. He was a negotiator on a SWAT team for a little while. He wasn't a competitive shooter, but his department had an open range about once a month, and for 37 years he was there. I tell people, be ashamed to have the range open, ammo available, not be there, be ashamed. You go to the range on your own time. Why? Because it's open and ammo is available, and they're there for me for 37 years, he said. I trained for 37 years for that date. For 37 years. Once a month, he made a small deposit in a major account, and then a May of 2015, he made a major withdrawal for that account. So the question is, are you going to be huddled outside? Are you going to burn a magazine 30ft away and not hit anything? Or are you seeking training? Are you seeking that opportunity? Are you going to cower outside? Are you going to burn a magazine, accomplish nothing, and be sued? Or is the president going to be putting a medal around your neck? It comes down to one thing, and that's skills marksmanship skill above all else. I've got a Sci-Fi fantasy series of mine that I use to kind of exemplify some of the things I teach. A little sci-fi fantasies there. It's kind of fun. It's got a phrase in it that says piss on golf. Real Americans go to the range. There's no survival skill found on the golf course. There's no cardio mans found on the golf course. For us, the golf course is a willful and deliberate misuse of a perfectly good rifle wrench. And we're not impressed. If you hit a little golf ball, trinity Arch hit a golf ball from Tunity Yards, we're impressed. It's always fun to dig at our golfers, and they're always good sports. But all of us say, how do we spend our money? How do we spend our time? Be better prepared for a moment of truth. Can we find the money and time to go golfing, or can we find the time to go fishing? Somehow we never find the time to hit the range or hit the gym or hit the dojo to develop our skills. I remember the 1970s. I enlisted in the army. My dad was a cop, and every department had a pistol team right up to the 1970s. A World War II veterans were running the show, and those World War II vets were our sheriffs and our chiefs, our captains and our sergeants. And that generation honored one thing above all else marksmanship. Physical fitness is great, but we're all going to grow old and stay physically fit as long as you can. The older you get, it harder it gets. But we can't help growing old, and a lot of us can't help putting on some weight. We'll grow old and we may grow fat, but we can still be one hell of a good shot. And the rolly poly little guy on the pistol team, when the World War II vets were running the show. The roly poly little guy on the pistol team won the honor to bubble ups. You know, take another look at Officer Greg's team. It's a few inches shorter than me, maybe a few pounds heavier than me. But this is the man our fathers and grandfathers honored above all else marksmanship skills. And you can be 59 years old, a little overweight and a little Understring but you can still be kicking tail and make an incredible feats of valor and competence if you sought the training. And he sought training on his own time. And there were times when he bought his own ammo and he went to the range making a deposit in an account for a major withdrawal once in a lifetime. And I tell everybody it's all about training and seat training. It's not enough to carry the gun. It's not enough to be brave. You have got to hit the range. You have got to practice. You've got to nurture and develop those skills. Whatever your department is, it isn't going to just happen. Shooting is a perishable skill. It is the most important skill you will have. Now you're 1000 times more likely to lay hands on them than you are to shoot them. And you're 1000 times more likely to talk to them than you are to lay hands on them. Being able to communicate is terribly important. And that brings us back to a leadership dynamic that we'll bring it later on. But when we get to the leadership side of this package let's talk about modeling leadership to remain calm at the moment of truth and what leadership should look like to nurture a profession of quiet professionals. But our side of the equation right now is training and your department will never give you all the training you need. You've got to seek training on your home. You got to have a hobby outside your slot. It's a very pure and beautiful thing though when your hobby reinforces your survival skills. There are so many things we could be doing with our loved ones to reinforce survival skills. Hunting I'm convinced from a lifetime of study. For many reasons hunting is one of the best ways to prepare for combat. Don't hunt what your friends are doing. See what it's about. Competitive shooting, cowboy action, shooting airsoft and paintball. Can't buy ammo, can't afford ammo. Don't whine to me. Airsoft and paintball. My grandkids and I sitting on the dock throwing pine cones in the water and shooting it with a pellet pistol. It costs virtually nothing to plink away with that little pellet pistol for hours on end. Martial arts, enormously valuable set of skills you can seek with your loved ones. Just seek that training that will reinforce those skills. And first and foremost is Marksmanship. If your hobby doesn't have survival skills at least for Lord's sake let your hobby have cardio demands. Running, basketball, softball, tennis, swimming bicycling. They all have cardio demands. And so I tell all my cops, you see a cop carrying golf clubs, look her in the eye and tell them one thing for me. Let the sheep go graze on the golf course. 17 years ago, this war first began. My son has got nine combat tours under his belt now. And the bad guys are not going away anytime soon. The minute the bad guys get a nuke, they're going to use it, and they're probably going to pop it off in a boat a half mile offshore. Can we stop every 20 foot boat a half mile offshore? We have our magnificent law enforcement internally defending ourselves. But externally hunting these guys down around the planet is our military. And I bring you a message from a young Special Forces sergeant from a young green Beret. A month after 911, we all kind of remember what it was like. A month after 911, the World Trade Center is still smoldering rubble. We're still spending 4000 dead. I'm turning the first batch of spec ops headed out to Afghanistan. A young Special Forces sergeant, a young green Bray, comes up to me and said, colonel, go to Afghanistan. We're going to kick their ass. He said, While we're there, you tell those cops you teach, don't let them come kill my kids. Don't you let those bastards come hurt my kids. Those kids over there are fighting and dying for us every day. And they ask one thing watch my six, cover my back. And if we're not doing our job in this war, if we're not training, if we're not dedicating ourselves, we're not doing our job in this war. And I fear that on some dark morning across America, they'll hit school buses and elementary schools and daycares. And if they succeed, God forbid, not a parent in the nation will send the kid to school the next day. Not a parent in the nation send the kid to daycare. No cripple or economy. Millions are dropping out the workforce. But if you're dropping your kid off at daycare, if you're dropping your kid off at school and there's somebody there starting to kill those kids, you will kick their ass. You will not just save your kids life, you will save our way of life. If you got the gun, if you've done the training, the kids overseas are fighting and dying. That laying the life down for us every day. And they only ask one thing watch my six, cover my back. I've been passing a message on for years. And early on, a crusty old Chicago PD sergeant came up to me. He said, colonel, you tell those kids we got their sakes, we got their back. We can't be everywhere. You tell them you do the best you can over there. We'll do the best we can over here. And every day they don't attack us is a victory. Every day they don't attack us is a victory. The draw of the Prophet Muhammad Art festival. The attack. The Feds tell us that this is the first ISIS directed attack on American soil. These two idiots came up online and said, we want to die for the cause. What should we do? They said, go to Garland, Texas and murder the people of the draft of Muhammad Art Festival. But it was brought to his preaching halt because one officer hit the range every single time on his own time, often with his own resources, putting a small deposit on a steady basis into a major account so that he could make that withdrawal, that one huge withdrawal and incredible marksmanship and skills. In May of 2015 in Garland, Texas, at the draw of the Prophet Mohammed Art Festival. Are you pissing your time away? Are you pissing your money away? Are you preparing for your moment of truth? Can you find money to go golfing? Can you find time to go fishing? But somehow we never find time to hit the range. As we love our nation, as we love our way of life, we have got to train. We've got to seek that training. We've got to develop those skills. At our moment of truth, we'll not be found wanting, will not cower outside and be sued. At our moment of truth, we'll be standing there getting a medal from the President. And the choice is yours. Are you going to train? Are you going to prepare? Are you going to piss your time away? And at the moment of truth, be unprepared, unfit and live your life in shame? It's all about training. Voice. In your words, colonel Grossmack, I listen to you 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so it really means a lot that you're here on the Tactical TLC podcast. And the takeaway, I think, for this section is truly what you said to paraphrase you. We all have the same 24 hours. How we use that time, what we choose to do with that time, what we get to do versus our half to dos. And we really need to make sure that training is one of our priorities, one of our focuses, because, as you say, making those small deposits into that account later, that's available for us, if we don't make those small deposits as we go along, we're not going to have that to be able to withdraw from. So very true words. And thanks for focusing so much on the trainings, on the training part of it. Let's shift into leadership and where do you see we can talk about titles and rank and everything else, but the true leaders are the ones that operate on a daily basis, that are informal leaders, I think. So what words of wisdom do you have in the leadership area for those who haven't made rank yet? Or maybe we're at the first line of supervision, a field training officer, an engineer or a fire officer that's training the brand new firefighter or the new medic that's got an intern. What words of wisdom do you have for the lying people? One of the things I tell people is this constant battle against cynicism and denial. I tell everybody that there's only one person in the universe you can control. There's only one thing you control, it's yourself. We all agree with that. There's nothing, nothing in the universe you can control except yourself. And we give way to bitterness if we give way to cynicism or complacency or denial. That's the one thing we can't control. Somehow we got this model in our head to be the old timer, you got to be that cynical old geezer, and that's not true. There's people out there that are as excited and enthusiastic about the job. Officer Greg Stevens, the draw of the Prophet Muhammad Art Festival hit 40 years on the streets as a frontline officer and loved every minute of it. Loved every time. He said every traffic drop was an opportunity to talk to somebody and to see what's going on in their world and to make friends with somebody and to warn them and to guide them and to nurture them in these paths of safety. So it's this battle against cynicism. Quit pissing and moaning about things you can't control. It'll drive you mad. Turn them over to higher power. Identify the one thing in the universe you can't control it's yourself. And never give way to cynicism or complacency or denial. Dedicate yourself to hitting this job with enthusiasm every day. And there's only one thing you can control. The only one thing, it's yourself. It's called an internal locus of control. There's only one thing you never control yourself. A cop told me one time, he said, I don't get PTSD, I give it. I'm a carrier. As long as you understand that we're all human. As long as you understand that my coming time, we all might need a hand. That's not a bad attitude to have. I control my destiny, I control my faith. I refuse to be a victim. What we've got is these informal leaders out there who are leading by example. Keep your back to the wall, carry your gun off duty, wear your body armor. From a spiritual standpoint, you've got to be a living witness. From a spiritual standpoint, you can't be doing bad things and then try to call people towards your faith because nobody will listen to you. You've got to be modeling that process yourself. You've got to be carrying that backup gun, seeking that training, developing those skills, and they will watch you. They learn vastly more from what you do than what you say. And you've got to model that behavior for this young generation. I'm out on the road two, three in a days, a year. People come up, I sign a book for them. I ask them, who are you with? What do you do. And very often, how do you like it? And you won't believe the number of cops that said, I love what I do. If the American public knew the world's full of people, go to work every day, do a job they hate to pay the bills,

and their world starts their 05: 20:11

00 world. When you get home at

05: 20:15

00, when the world begins, everything else is just some terrible thing they had to do to pay the bills. How many people can truly say they love what they do and that's our goal, is to nurture that love and to communicate that love to others? This can be one of the most exciting, rewarding, and challenging tasks in all the world. And I make the point to my cops like this imagine if there was one day without justice. Empty all the prisons. Empty all the jails. 2.5 million convicted offenders. Let them all go for a day. They promise they'll come back. No prison, no jail, no cop, no court, no justice, no law for one day. Murder. How many could 2.5 million just released defenders take out in a day of freebies, let alone everybody else? Got a grudge out there. Rape, theft, child abuse. It's the law of the jungle. For one day. If you can take it, it's yours. Be like chaos and despair. And I believe we'd never put the pieces back together again. We can go a day without food. Happens all the time. We can go a day without doctors or teachers, but we can go a day without water. The only thing we need more than justice is the air that we breathe. And anytime you feel like you're spinning your wheels out there, anytime you feel like you're not accomplishing anything, imagine what it would be like if we had one day without justice. The one irreplaceable ingredient in our civilization is justice. And if that falls, our civilization falls. But believe in who you are. Believe in what you do. But as we climb up the ranks a little bit, one of the things I tell everybody is part of the bulletproof mind, part of resiliency, is to nurture an environment of quiet professionals. What I tell people is, nobody respects your temper tantrum. They respect your calm. We're all human. As we get older, we get a little better at that. That's why most of the make better grandparents than we did parents. We're older and wiser. We've got maturity. And nobody's impressed by your temper tantrum. They're impressed by your calm. And we've got to strive for this environment of quiet professionals. The laconic spartan, the stoic roman, the inscrutable samurai, the stiff upper lip brits. And today we talk about the quiet professional. And I watch a video of a traffic stop gone bad, and somewhere down the line, that cop loses his temper and everything comes downhill. Now, if that cop has leadership, this screaming in his face, how can he expect him to be any different. We got to model this concept of quiet professionals, of calm. And it really is a major discovery when you say, wait a minute. Nobody respects my temper tantrum. We're all human, but we got to strive for a higher level. We think that the role of a leader is to scream and shouting dead in people's face, and that's not true. The role of a leader is to warn and to nurture with sorrow. Respond when something went wrong. And anytime as a leader, we respond out of anger. We've made a mistake. We need to respond out of love and sorrow. As the company commander, we gave Article 15. We're given punishment. And early on, I thought we're supposed to do this is to shout at this guy and tell him what Duddy is. And I realized that that was terribly counterproductive. And we talked to him in sorrow and talked to him about they let down their comrades and they'd let down their unit. And if we had to deploy to combat tomorrow this behavior, if everybody manifested this behavior, we'd been shattered. We'd be destroyed. So nurture that environment of quiet professionals, nurture that in yourself. To me, it was an amazing discovery when I realized that the role of an adult is quiet and calm and not to lose your cool and not to lose your calm. Nobody said it was easy. It's a constant battle against complacency and denial cynicism. But as that low level leader modeled the behavior, as you come up the ranks, continue to model the behavior. Wear your body armor, wear the uniform, carry the gun, carry a backup gun, hit the range. You know what the most shameful thing of all? The range is open and the leadership is not there setting the standard. They have training going. Have the leaders not participate in the training. Especially, there's a universal language of marksmanship skills. And so if your marksmanship skills are not sufficient, then make them sufficient. Seek that training. Find individuals who will bring you further up that scale. Spend time with the range, with your range master, nurture your skills. The single greatest, most impressive thing you can do with your troops is go to the range with them and shoot well at a model that standard. If you can't shoot well, then seek that training. Seek that opportunity to be a proficient shot and to stand up in front of your friends and nurture that universal warrior ethos of mark friendship and skill. And so it comes back around to training and modeling. Training and leadership is all about pulling people up to the next level, pulling people up to the highest level. And one of the more important facts of leadership is what I call living your life in Condition Yellow. Condition White is her sheep. If you're in Condition White, it's a state of denial. You don't have the gun, you don't have the Drenning, you don't have the preparation, you got your back to the room and something comes out of nowhere and you're completely unprepared. And he goes straight from condition white to condition black. Panic. You live your life in condition yellow. Keep your back to the wall. Carry the life saving tools of your profession on you. And these are the leadership models that we can manifest. And when something happens, you're not stunned, you're not surprised. You are ready. My dad was a copy starting the beat in Cheyenne, Wyoming, 1962. No academy. Wyatt Earp didn't have an academy. I want everybody to think about this. It wasn't until the 1970s that we started sending most young cops to the academy. With the exception of LAPD or a couple of other major cities, there weren't more academies. There was no FDO program. For 200 years. We gave a cop a gun and a badge and cut him loose. Imagine we still did that today. It's something I need us to understand. With ever better training, ever better tactics, ever better equipment, ever better technology, just to stay where we are. The situation is bad, and we're just barely staying alive. But my dad was a cop and no academy, but he always had a gun. He always kept his back to the wall. And mom and dad had this love affair echoed down across the generations, through the hard times and the good times they hung together. Mom died about 20 years ago in bed, snuggling Dad's arms and never woke up. I know she wanted to go that way. About a year later, dad died, sitting in his chair, holding a beer in his hand. Never spilled his beer. I think he would want to go that way. I miss him both awful bad. I give an awful lot for another 20 minutes with them. But my dad bought 20 extra years one day in a supermarket. It was 40 odd years ago. They're holding hands. They always held hands. And they're in a supermarket. They come around the corner and there's an unhappy customer. Every cop's got an unhappy customer out there somewhere. You and your loved ones could meet them anytime. And this guy draws a gun and declares his intention to harm two of the most precious people on the planet. They're holding hands. Mom locks down, but his gun hand is empty. His gun hand is free. Hold your loved one's hand, but keep your gun hand free. In academies nationwide, they put a band on your non firing hand. And if you bend down and pick up something with your gun hand, just start doing push ups. Keep your gun hand free. And dad always had a lightning draw. The gun comes out. Mom's training kitchen. Does your spouse does your kid know to dial 911? So my dad's a cop. He's got a blue shirt and he's a cop, but he needs help. It was way before cell phone, but the situation is satisfactory. Resolved. Almost lost them both. That day. The grandchildren never known their grandpa grandpa except their grandpa prepared for a lifetime for them one day that would buy him 20 extra years with his grandchildren. Can you do that? Can you walk the walk for a lifetime? Live your life in condition yellow. Carry the life saving tools? Your profession keep your back to the wall. It takes no more time. It takes no more energy. It's a conscious decision to walk that warrior path and to have the tools to be ready for your moment of truth. When that moment of truth comes, you're not stunned. You're not overwhelmed. You spend a lifetime prepared for this moment. Those of us who practice marksmanship, those of us who seek training I have a black belt in the martial art of the firearm. It's a growing, thriving concept out there. My hobby is shooting. And those of us who like to shoot, we yearn for the opportunity to use our skills in an hour of great need. So the leader has to model that behavior. And for that one day, it'll buy you 20 extra years with your grandkids. And you know, the COVID of National Geographic magazine a little while back was a photograph of a baby, and it said, this baby will live to be 120 years old. No baloney. They believe a baby born today will have an average life expectancy of 120 years. If somebody murders one of my grandchildren, they have stolen 100 years from that child. Can you walk the walk for a lifetime for that one day that'll buy your baby back those hundred years it takes? The more time it takes, the more energy. But as we love our nation, as we love our way of life, as we love our children, our grandchildren, as we love our family, we have got to walk out that door and give 100%. In the final component of this, we'll talk about communications. And I want to take a minute to communicate the magnitude of the threat and the urgency of these times and just how desperately we need our sheepdog. But remember, one day, without justice, it'd be chaos and despair. We'd never put the pieces back together again. So I tell all my cops, and we'll wrap up this segment with this. I tell them, you know, next time you put the cuffs on that violent defender, you the people you train, the people you supervise. You put the cuffs on that violent man. He's kicking and screaming and spitting and curling. Got a rap sheet long as you are on. You look at him and say, this is not a nice man. The world is a better place. He's got my cuffs on. Yeah, maybe some slicky lord will get him off tomorrow. But there's 2.5 million behind bars that slicky lord didn't get off. The world would come include if they weren't there. You do this on your way home. Park your vehicle on the way home. For just a minute on the overpass. Step out of your vehicle for just a minute. Look out on your city. Look at all your citizens going about their lives and know deep in your gut that today, at the risk of your life, you made their world a better place, whether they know it or not. That's leadership. Let's lead by example, then. Walk up to that bridge rail, put your hands on that rail, look out in your city, and let your cape blow in the wind. You feel dang good about who you are and what you do, and then get out of there before they think you're a jumper. In very true words about modeling behavior and overcoming that cynicism, that denial. And a lot of law enforcement and fire and EMS, especially farther along in their career, tend to suffer from some disillusionment where they feel that they don't have the public support and just understanding that those are the small number of vocal people and that the vast majority of people do support you. And sometimes you lose sight of that and really bringing back as a leader, whether you have the title in the rank or not, you're still a leader, and you can be and should be. Modeling that behavior is really critical. Colonel grossman, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom on leadership. Rahul my pleasure, bro. We're going to start spending about the next 15 minutes or so on communication. Colonel, when you think about communication and you talk about just such a wide breadth of topics, how do you see communication weaving in with training and with leadership and the various things that you talk about? Well, first off, last component, we talked about cynicism. We all know people who've been there for 40 years and still love every day. They're not cynical. They're not eaten up by the job, and that's our model. So you begin by communicating. You are a living statement. You communicate by wearing the body armor, by carrying the gun, by going to the training, by carrying the backup gun, by carrying the gun off duty. You communicate your daily life. You are a living communication message. But then as we go further down that road, there's a couple of things they need to understand. There is this sense that everybody hates me and nobody loves me. The truth is just the opposite. The last gallup poll, 76% of the public strongly support law enforcement. The only time in history was higher was 1968, when it was 77%. But we've been polarized. Every year, cops have better body armor, better tactics, better training. Major UMass harvard study tells us if we had 1970s medical technology, the murder rate would be four times what it is. The number of dead people underrepresent the problem, because the docs are saving ever more lives every year. And we all kind of understand that if we had world war II level medical technology, evacuation technology, notification technology, if we had World War II technology in medical technology in Afghanistan today, the number of dead Americans would be ten times what it is. If we had Vietnam level medical technology in Iraq today, the number of dead Americans would be four times what it is. And the same thing is true in the streets. This is terribly important. The foundation. I'm the guest instructor at a couple hundred universities over the years, the visiting criminal justice professor. And the very field of criminal justice is completely flawed. How do we measure criminal? Oh, the murder rate. No, the murder rate is being held down by medical technology. The number of dead cops, the number of dead citizens completely underrepresents the situation. It's actually much, much worse than it looks. And so we've got to communicate this sense of urgency as we love our nation, as we love our children, as we love our family, we got to walk out that door and give 100%. Waiting at home for me is my bride at 43 years, my high school sweetheart. I love her more than life itself, but I've been on the road for the last 21 years. I'm 62 years old, on the road over 200 days a year. As my prayer, I can do it for another 20 years. Very crazy. Bad times are upon us. I'm going to show you some of the data to understand that, we got to communicate that sense of urgency. And it's the worst of times. It's the best of times. We have the single worst year over year increase in cops murdered in the history of our nation. Every year, cops have better tactics, better body armor, better training, better technology. If it weren't for body armor, the number of dead cops could double what it is. Body armor cuts the number of dead cops in half right off the top. If we had 1970s level medical technology, that number would be four times what it is. So take away just two of many factors body armor take it out of the way, you double the number of dead cops. And then 1970s medical technology multiple that number by four times. Eight times as many dead cops. Take away two of many, many factors, and we'd have eight times as many murdered cops every year. We have better tactics, better training, better equipment, better technology. Every year, we're holding down the number of dead cops. 2011 was a record number of US. Marshals murdered in the line of duty. They completely revamped their training, revamped their tactics. The following year, no marshals were murdered. And it's a matter of tactics and training, technology. We get better and better, or we die. But what I want you to understand is we understand that we get better and better at what we do. And yet, 2016, five dead cops in Dallas, four dead cops in Baton Rouge. 2016 was the single worst year over year increase in cops murdered in the history of our nation. Ignore traffic accidents, focus on cops murdered and focus on the year over year increase. Here we have the American public rally behind our cops. We support our cops. We stand behind our cops. But the cop haters have been empowered, and both are two at the same time. They love us and they hate us at the same time. We've been polarized and the decent, good American citizens routed behind our cops. We support you. And the cop killers have been fed a steady diet of hate. Name me one cop movie in 30 years. Then the bad cop in there somewhere. We all cheer when the bad cop dies. Grand theft auto. The all time record best selling video game in history is a cop killing murder simulator. Sopranos and Breaking Bad, the Sons of Anarchy and twisted media misrepresentation of law enforcement that just feeds this hatred. And so the American public says, we stand behind you, support you, but we don't want to be you. Recruiting is down. Retention is down. These are hard times. But what I need to communicate is a sense of urgency. But also, we've been there before, you and I. Remember pre 911, post Rodney King era, pre 911 nationwide, we could not find one single cop. We couldn't find one person to pass a background check for every open slot. Pre 911 nationwide. They were waiving felonies to get people to be cops. Some of us remember LAPD rampart scandal. Horrible criminal behavior. Ramparts Divisional, los Angeles Police Department. Executive summary, page one, number one rampart scandal. We probably shouldn't have hired a cop with a felony record. Well, what do you do? No cops are bad cops. I'm telling you, far better than no cop than a bad cop. You want more cops, then pay them more. But do not ever lower the standard. Here's the major thing. I've got to communicate to my leaders. We're now in a zero defects environment. We could have some cop do something stupid and nobody would know. But now everything we do is being videotaped. Every single thing every cop does will be on CNN and YouTube tomorrow morning. You have to like it. You got to accept it. Now, what that means is we can't have one person walk out that door and do something stupid. And I tell my chiefs, I tell my sheriff, do you want to be the next Ferguson? You want riding in the streets and videos of your cops doing stupid stuff that you lower the standard? Tell them, Look, I will not lower the standard. You want more cops, you pay them more. Better no cop than a bad cop. And the airlines are like that. The airlines, it's a model of zero defects. They cannot have a single accident. Oh, come on. 10,000 traffic accidents every day. One airline crash a day is reasonable. No. One airline crash a year is reasonable. No. One airline crash every ten years? No, you cannot crash a single plane. If you crash a single plane, we will investigate. We will find you. We will fire you. We will put you in jail. That's what zero defects looks like. You cannot have a single cop walk out that door and do something stupid. Now, one of the major areas that I teach on, that we don't have a whole lot of time to track on is sleep. Sleep deprivation. Better no cop than a tired cop. If the airlines don't have arrested crew, they cancel the flight. Better no flight than a tired pilot. Better no cop than a tired cop. Oh, we're undermanned, and we got to have maximum overtime and work them into the dirt just to fill the gaps. No. You tell them you want more cops and you pay them more. Unless it's a declared emergency, I will not put tired cops out there in this road. Tired people will make mistakes. After 18 hours without sleep, your impaired judgment equal to zero. Eight legally drunk. After 24 hours without sleep, your impaired judgment equal to equal a .1 above legally drunk. We will not put tired people out on the street. Better no cop than a bad cop. Better no cop than a tired cop. We got to dig our heels in. You want more cops? Didn't pay them more. But until you do, you got to make do with what we got. Unless you make it a declared emergency, we'll not pug tired people on the streets. And we all agree we'd rather have no flight than a tired pilot. If you haven't got arrested, crew cancel the flight. I'm good with that. I'm on that plane every night. If we don't have arrested cop, then dog on it. We better have no cop than a tired cop. That's the zero defects. I tell my chiefs, you want to be in the next Ferguson? I tell my sheriff, do you want riding in the streets a video of your people doing stupid stuff? Then you put tired people out there, you work them into the dirt. You have maximum overtime. And it is an absolute, scientific guaranteed fact they will do stupid stuff. They have impaired judgment like airlines and air traffic controls, nuclear power plant operators, tugboat operators, ferry boat operators, and track engineers. What do they all have in common? They're required by law to get enough sleep. The cops aren't. And that should enrage us. If I were king could pass one law. I'd make a mandate sleep for all first responders. And we had a mandate sleep. The fact that some sleep deprived person is making life and death decisions out there should enrage us and our whole profession. They just set up and said, no, make it a law. Who could argue with that? The people attacking our cops and the tort put handcuffs on our cops. I tell them, look, here's something we can all agree on. Pass a law, mandating sleep for cops. They want to punish cops. They want to hurt cops somehow they want to strike back the cops. Let's find ground we can all agree on that will make a difference and tired people will. It's unacceptable that a sleep deprived person will make the decision whether or not to shoot your kid. We should hold them to their very highest standard. So all of that revolves around this leadership dynamics of nurturing this environment of quiet professionals and nurturing this environment of understanding the magnitude of the threat and this dynamic to which it's the worst of times, it's the best at times. The single worst year over year increase in cops murdered and yet one of the highest dynamics of public support for law enforcement and they can both be true at the same time. It's the worst of times. It's the best at times. But your courage and your confidence and your compassion shine bright for the darkness of the age. And here's the kind of communication what we got to communicate is urgency. How very bad the situation is. Now go back to that idea that medical technology is holding down the murder rate and here is the number of people murdered in America. Now we go back to 2006. We got 15,000 Americans murdered and then by 16,015 thousand 15,000, 14,000, 14,000 that's medical technology doing its job. But then in the last two years in the last two years the homicide rate has exploded like nothing we have ever seen in the history of our nation. And I asked people how many saw this in the news? Isn't this worth reporting? Two years straight the number of people murdered in America has exploded like nothing we've ever seen before. Why isn't the media reporting this? There is this dynamic. There is no boogeyman out there. You don't have to worry about crime. Our problem is out of control cops. You don't have to worry about crime. You don't need cops. You don't need a gun. You just hurt yourself. Our problem is not crime. Our problem is out of control cops. We don't need to get tough on crime. And the truth is just the opposite that things are very, very bad. The single worst year over year increase in cops murdered in the history of our nation. Two years straight the number of people murdered has exploded like nothing we've ever seen before. Gang crime and gang membership has exploded. Latin America is a howling war zone. Ain't nobody popping over the border to Mexico to do a little shopping and eat a meal anymore. And it's coming our way like a freight train. And the people who hit us on 911 are still out there with all their heart and soul. They still want to hurt us and we got to be prepared for that threat. And so it comes back to leadership communicating the sense of urgency. How very desperately we need our law enforcement officers. How very desperately we need you. How infinitely precious you are as a first responder at these dark and violent times and communicate this constant sense of appreciation that they're there for us in these dark and violent times, that they are true heroes. Off the top of my head, I'll introduce you to a dozen cops with more gunfights than wide earth ever dreamed of. The violence of the Old West is pretty much a Hollywood myth. I'll give you equivalence to the OK growl happening around America over and over again. You are the thin line of heroes that hold together the tettered fabric of our civilization, a dark and desperate time. And what we've got to do as leadership is model that behavior and nurture that behavior and set that standard. And remember, nobody respects our temper tantrum. They respect our calm and how we've got to communicate that to everybody as leaders, to model that quiet professional, that iconic Spartan, the stoic Roman, the inscrutable samurai, the stiff upper lip Brits in a day. Talk about the quiet, professional, nurturing warriors, sheepdogs that will carry us through these dark and violent times. Leadership, the most important aspect of leadership is lead by example. You are walking testimony. Are you hitting the range? Are you involved in training? Are you active? Are you able to get out there with the troops? Or do you hide? Do you wear your body armor? Do you carry the gun? Or are you caught without a gun? At the moment of truth you're huddled behind two cops were murdered outside of West Memphis, Arkansas by a father and son white supremacist sovereign nation murdered two cops. And the next time we find those two killers, they'd gone to Walmart and a sheriff and a deputy had pinned down behind the Crown Vic and the sheriff didn't even have a gun. Sheriff trapped behind a vehicle, didn't even have a gun under fire. The sheriff never even ran for reelection. He was a shattered human being. He was destroyed. These two cop killers have bringing the sheriff, another deputy under fire and he's huddled behind the vehicle and he doesn't even have a gun. He lived the rest of his life in shame. He didn't even try to get reelected. He just left in shame because he caught at the moment of truth, without a gun, without the armor, without the skills. And so folks, the most important component of leadership is to lead by example. Be a living testimony of what you desire from your troops, to nurture that environment, to lead that warrior spirit, that sheepdog spirit, that guardian spirit, to draw from all these directions, to guide our troops, to sustain the fabric of our civilization in these dark and violent times. And remember, one day without justice, empty all the prisons, turn off all the laws for one day of chaos and despair, we never put the beach back together again. And we must communicate that sense of urgency and we must communicate that sense of appreciation for the troops that are out there and the fact that the majority of the population does support us and are rallying behind us. But there's another part of the population that does not support us. That means you be careful out there. You be careful out there. True words of wisdom, Colonel Grossman, and thank you so much for honoring us with your time to be here on the show and sharing the information that you do. It's so powerful and like I said, I could listen to you for hours and in fact, I have before. And folks that are listening to this podcast, watching these videos, if you ever have a chance to see Lieutenant Colonel Dave Grossman, by all means make that time to do it. So, Colonel Grossman, for the people that want to be able to follow you, I know that they can go to Kilology.com killology.com. How else can they get a hold of you? How else can they learn more things from you? We've got an online store, Sdkmg.com. We've got sheepdogknife and gun. We're doing custom gunsmithing. We do our sheepdogseminars.com, sheepdogseminars.com. I guess the best tool is to go to that Kalalti.com, look at the calendar, look at times that will work out for you and have an opportunity. My training is always evolving and my full day training class is a great resource, just stripping away everything but what I believe is the most essential set of skills and tools that I can give to people in a day. In the meanwhile, you keep doing what you're doing there, my brother. I'm a huge fan of these podcasts and their ability to put depth of information out there to people. Good luck and God bless in all of your endeavors. Thank you so much again. Thanks for being here. Thanks for bringing the truth today, bringing the wisdom from the people that have it, which is you, to the people that need it, which is our listeners. Thank you, Colonel Grossman, for being here today. I hope you found a lot of great value in this episode of the Deescalation Conversations podcast. Please be sure to go to our website, the Idea World, theidea dot world. On that website, just click on the link that resonates with you most. If you're a K through twelve educator, if you're a firefighter, medical services, law enforcement, flight attendants, whatever industry you're in, we have specialized training for you. So check that training out. Because literally, it can save your life, it can save your relationship, it can save your career. So check out theidea world. I'll look forward to seeing you soon. Take care. You.