Life Lessons from the Special Forces with Leadership and Resilience Coach, Garry Banford | Episode 15

In today's episode we are joined by former Special Forces leader Garry Banford. Garry served over two decades in the UK MOD, 16 of those with the UK Special Forces. One of the UK’s most combat-seasoned leaders and serving all of his years with UKSF in the ever-adapting aftermath of the Twin Towers attacks, Garry rose to the senior leadership position of Sergeant Major and has led some of the most high-performing teams in the world. His experience has tested and strengthened his resilience through the busiest years of Special Forces history.

He now shares his experience via his coaching company Duratus, guiding leaders and teams across all sectors from finance to football. Garry empowers business professionals to embrace uncertainty, be more resilient, and release their true potential. 

Join us as we explore the significance of self-awareness, the impact of organisational values and the necessity of delegation in achieving personal growth and better output. If you’re interested in learning about the power of storytelling, the importance of nurturing environments, and the strategies for maintaining mental and physical well-being in the face of diversity, this episode is for you.

In this episode:

07:30 The struggle of leaving your network - seeking new challenges.

13:58 Finding your edge - how mentors push potential.

18:03 The importance of reviewing performance after action.

21:59 Special forces selection tests resilience, character and adaptability.

30:17 Mental health - The importance of seeking feedback from loved ones.

35:08 Special forces training and the lack of practical combat storytelling.

43:30 Well-being in bouncebackability - quality sleep vital for recovery and productivity.

01:04:25 Why leaders must embrace uncomfortable delegation for growth.

Connect with Garry here:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/duratus_gaz/ 

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/garry-banford-640286111/ 

Please like, subscribe or follow, so you're notified of any new episodes coming up, and if you're keen to reach Rusty or Simon with any suggestions, feedback or comments, you can contact them via the show's LinkedIn page here:

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-bouncebackability-podcast/

Transcript

 Well, welcome back to the podcast, everybody. Great to have you on. We've got Gary Banford today. He is former special forces sergeant major. 

Simon Ursell [00:00:25]:
That would be interesting. Over 20 years in the special forces. He's now a, business coach, coaching business leaders and a great guy. He's been into tighter grains, done some great stuff with us. Just fascinated to see his take on bounce back ability.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:00:40]:
Yeah. Great guy, Gary, and like most of, people I know who are in special forces, very calm, very quiet, very considered. You would have no idea. Gary. Yeah. Exactly that. You had you you would have no idea of what he's capable of. And then I guess just a a note to myself to try another at any point to compare any of my experiences like running with the Bulls in Bamblona

Simon Ursell [00:01:01]:
No. Don't do that because that'll really embarrass you.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:01:03]:
To, any of his experiences, which is probably gonna be on the extremes of, like, human performance, quite frankly.

Simon Ursell [00:01:12]:
Yeah. And just and it'd be interesting to see how relatable that is to what we do and whether it is because it's extreme, but it's similar. It's, what we deal with is a lot less extreme, but similar stuff. So I'm hoping we can learn late.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:01:24]:
Then let's hope neither of us embarrassed ourselves.

Simon Ursell [00:01:27]:
I think we might. Let's get him on.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:01:31]:
Welcome to the pod, everyone. Hope you're well. This is an interesting pod. We got Gary on, interesting because he's gonna get feedback on the quality of this pod. So we've agreed it's gonna be 45 minutes, but if it's any less, it's probably not going so well for him.

Gary Banford [00:01:45]:
Yeah. If it's more,

Simon Ursell [00:01:46]:
it's going really well. 45 minutes.

Gary Banford [00:01:48]:
I'm sweating. I'm sweating.

Simon Ursell [00:01:51]:
Bit of pressure, bit of resilience building. So do you wanna, tell the listeners, a little bit about yourself, Gary?

Gary Banford [00:01:56]:
Yeah. Absolutely. Well, firstly, thanks for inviting me down. I'm Gary of Gaz Gazz Banford. I spent 22 years in the military, started in the marines as a young man, a spotty 18 year old, and then volunteered for special forces selection. I went through that process around 2003 and did the rest of my military career in in in UKSF, specifically in the SBS special boat service. Then, left the military by a decision.

Simon Ursell [00:02:26]:
What's a special bait service?

Gary Banford [00:02:29]:
It's one of the 3 UK special forces tier 1 units. We can we can go into a little bit more detail. There's 95% commonality with the SAS, so read into that what you will. We can go into detail if

Simon Ursell [00:02:45]:
No. That's cool. It's just conscious people may not know it.

Gary Banford [00:02:47]:
Yeah. Absolutely.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:02:48]:
So no.

Gary Banford [00:02:48]:
It's they've heard of the SAS, and, we're 95% similar to them and the ones you haven't heard of probably. Okay. Yeah. And then I I left the military and set up a coaching and mentoring business, starting with anyone that would want to listen and coach and be coached or be mentored, and then now we're transitioning to predominantly dealing with business leaders, and senior executives, around how to improve themselves and improve their teams from my experiences and the the other coaches that I've got.

Simon Ursell [00:03:20]:
Nice. Nice. Rusty's got a got a killer question.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:03:25]:
Yeah. I was just interested. Obviously, you've driven all the way down from Derby today, so we appreciate that. Yeah. Thank you.

Simon Ursell [00:03:30]:
We appreciate it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:03:31]:
And and you said you listened to a couple of pods, and I'm just curious like, how would it translate to you, so bounce back ability, like, what does it mean to you, I guess, and then maybe like where does it exist in your world?

Gary Banford [00:03:43]:
Yeah. So in many ways so bounce back ability I would see is one aspect of resilience. Resilience has been something that has been vital in my life as it is everyone else's life and something I've, I guess, paid a lot of attention to as I've kind of navigated life and and as we do navigate life. And that in fact, my my business, Doratus, is is Latin for to endure. So it's something that I'm I'm I'm passionate about and it's one of the you know, I was always fascinated in my when I first, was successful and went into special forces, I was fascinated by the guys at the end of their career that were more middle aged, say, looking at myself right now, and they still have energy, still have life, still have zeal for the job. And that was fascinating to me because I joined an organization where the train was moving at a 1000 miles an hour. And I was like, how am I gonna hang on for all that time? But they clearly had worked stuff out, so I was always fascinated by that. And I think so bounce back ability for me is life is gonna punch you in the face.

Gary Banford [00:04:53]:
It's gonna keep coming and how you respond and react to that, the ability to at least come back to where you were, is is bounce back ability. I I I I see there's opportunity to grow beyond experiences as well. So you might take a dip after an experience post traumatic growth, for example, to come back and above where you were, and to be a you've to have learned and to moved on.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:05:18]:
And what do you think, 18 year old Gaz would say looking at, middle aged Gary now?

Gary Banford [00:05:26]:
You did alright. Well done for having all your limbs. Most of your sanity. Life presented thousands of challenges and you made a ton of mistakes, but that is life. So 18 year old would be like, yeah. You've done alright.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:05:42]:
You've done alright. Nice. And you reminded me, I'm sure you've got a question, Simon, of Gary Klein talks about expertise as like when when the going gets tough those people who have expertise their eyes light up and, I would imagine I just wonder whether that kind of resonate with you must have been in lots of situations where the going gut tell for it was ambiguous and actually at that point where you have to be skillful, yeah my my experience as well with coaches and it's obviously a way lower level than what you're talking about is that those people get really excited at those moments.

Gary Banford [00:06:17]:
Yeah. I think I think one of the needs that I recognize that I I had and then I was surrounded by people, my old organizations, is they were choosing to incline towards a challenge. There were people that were biting something off that was chunky, and they were motivated by that. And that is uncommon. I think that's quite uncommon. Most people would choose the easier decisions. Now when I volunteered for the military, I could have the local regiment to me was the Staffordshire regiment. No dis I don't even know if it exists now, it might be the rifles, but there's no disrespect to those at all.

Gary Banford [00:06:52]:
That would have been an easier decision to me. I I chose to join the marines because for a load of reasons, but one of the reasons was that's the hardest that I could see. I couldn't I didn't vocalize it this way. I wasn't doing it because that, but the challenge was the most exciting to me so I was inclined towards that challenge. And it also took me away from my family. If you stick a pin in the UK, I couldn't live any further from the coast and I choose I chose to join the marines which put me on the coast away from my family, away from my support network, away from everybody that I knew. And I can look back now and think that's a bit of a bold decision. You know, knowing what we do, like bounce back ability, a lot of this is a social phenomena.

Gary Banford [00:07:30]:
Right? We're we're, we're supported by our networks, and I was choosing to leave my networks that I knew at the time to hopefully develop stronger networks. That was my that was one of the decisions I made. And then also whilst I was in the marines, it would have been very easy to coast and to have a great successful career in the marines, but events happened in the world and I chose to bite off another chunky challenge and go, oh, I'm gonna try and see what I'm made of and volunteer for what I could see is the hardest selection process there was out there and see how I fare. I'd only ever heard horror stories as to people that have been unsuccessful. You don't you never you rarely get to speak to the people that have been successful in that world. So I was always listening to the messages from the guys that had failed, but I still had a go. And again I can communicate this now. At the time, I wasn't aware of any of this.

Gary Banford [00:08:28]:
This is 45 year old Gary kind of working some of this out. So, yeah, like, inclining towards a challenge, eyes lighting up when you see, oh, this is a bit scary. The unknown, but it's also variety. It's also adventure, and there's something in that. Probably something psychopathic about it as well. Right? There's something Well,

Simon Ursell [00:08:47]:
I don't know about a psychopathic, but I'm sure there's something psychological going on there. It's it's interesting. I remember you you came down and I remember you speaking and you you drew, 2 circles up on a whiteboard. The mid the one right in the center was the comfort zone, and the one on the outside was the red zone. I think these were this was your vocabulary, I think. Yep. And then in between the comfort zone and the red zone, there was your uncomfortable zone.

Gary Banford [00:09:16]:
Stretch.

Simon Ursell [00:09:16]:
Yep. That stretch saying. So, I mean, in here, there's a lot of this sort of trope about get comfortable being uncomfortable, all these kinds of things. It sounds to me like when you started your career, you were already seeking out discomfort, right from the get go, And that sounds quite bouncy to me. Like, you're gonna be pretty good at because you're seeking it out. I guess there's some sort of resilience building there anyway. Yeah. How how would you suggest people get into that frame of mind? Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:09:48]:
Because that's that's where the good

Gary Banford [00:09:50]:
stuff happens. Yeah. I I wouldn't frame it as seeking the discomfort. I think and I think people that do it don't view it as the they're not seeking uncomfortableness, they understand that's a byproduct of what it is they are seeking. They're seeking adventure, they're seeking excitement, they're seeking challenge And I think part of that is inevitably going to be just uncomfortable, and it's understanding that's just a byproduct. So the fear, like, I've got a I I I host a podcast and I I, you know, being where you are is not easy but it's definitely more uncomfortable being on the receiving end of the questions. I'm sure you've had those experiences as well.

Simon Ursell [00:10:28]:
Right? Definitely with me and Rusty because we're really harsh. Aren't we Rusty? Yeah.

Gary Banford [00:10:32]:
Yeah. Yeah. And so coming down today, it's it's it's more uncomfortable being on this side of the microphone. And I love asking the questions. I'm I'm in I'm in I'm intrigued. I'm curious about a lot of things, and so I I I enjoy that process. But, you know, so I but I volunteered to do this because I know I'm gonna be challenged, and I quite like that. I quite like to kind of be able to put the words together in a way that hopefully connects with people that they can hear and to to to

Simon Ursell [00:11:03]:
learn, grow from. Do you think that that is something that gets more, I was gonna say easier, but I think that's the wrong word. But do you do you think you get better at doing that the more you do it?

Gary Banford [00:11:15]:
Inevitably. Inevitably, I I think

Simon Ursell [00:11:18]:
So how do you start doing it?

Gary Banford [00:11:19]:
Yeah. The first step. So the the first time. So a word or phrase that we use all the time with the, and I can apply this back to my what the what the military does incredibly well, it's not it's far from perfect. What the military does incredibly well is train people in experiences. So it gives it gives people it's like an experience accelerator, the military is. It puts you into thousands and thousands of situations, and at the back end of those experiences, you become more experienced. Not necessarily better always, but you become more experienced, and so we say all the time experiences times a1000 equals experienced.

Gary Banford [00:11:59]:
The only way to get experienced is to have thousands of experiences. So the first step is to take it and to go get that new experience, and understand that's gonna feel uncomfortable. If you've got a process also where you can reflect, you can learn, you'll over time incrementally improve. That's the only way as far as I'm aware. You know, you can read, it's a bit of a social media kind of throwaway comment. You can read about swimming as much as you like, but until you jump in the swimming pool and experience it, you you're not gonna learn and you need the experiences to really learn about resilience, whether it's in how to endure, challenge, bounce back ability. It's it's an experiential thing. So

Simon Ursell [00:12:45]:
Well, learning, isn't it? Learning learning is is really, really fast when you're doing and very, very slow when you're sat in a non social space, Rusty. We spoke about this last year. So you wanna pray social space where you're able to be around other people and learn from them, and that will also help build your resilience up because then you've had an experience, I guess.

Gary Banford [00:13:09]:
Absolutely.

Simon Ursell [00:13:09]:
At the other end of the scale then, when you hit that red zone, how do you know? Because so many people I know, and I can think of a few already right now, who are in that red zone, struggling to get them back into uncomfortable, where they where they are, where it's uncomfortable, but they're learning and and kind of enjoying it. How how when do you know how do you know and how do you move back?

Gary Banford [00:13:31]:
Yeah. I think I think you need a series of barometers. So you need self awareness. It's a great place to start with self. Right? So start with there's there's a couple of aspects. So look at yourself first, like like when have you experienced and what have you learned from it? So I got a number of tells when I know that now through many thousands of experiences of when I've gone over the edge. It's a bit like the the Moto GP riders. They've got it they they all fall off.

Gary Banford [00:13:58]:
They know where the edge is and then so you you find that edge and I think we all should find the edge because we've got so much more potential inside of us if we don't know where that edge is. So I think people fear pushing too hard and because that capacity is actually quite great and that capacity grows when when we, we we we push sometimes in in the right environment. So know thyself is is firstly, but then also have a have people around you that that know you also and can help you with that. So, my old organization, I was surrounded by this is what I mean. I've compared myself to people at the end of their career. What are they doing right? And what compared to me that isn't enabling them to be still full of energy, to still be full of life and zeal for the job. And I was curious, so I was learning from those, like mentorship, we might call that, so you can choose your mentors, you don't have to know people, but you can, you know, the way we consume information online now, you can choose someone and stalk them online can't you learn a lot about them through YouTube etcetera. Or you can get coaching so you can have someone help you to navigate this from their perspectives, from your perspectives, some other people's perspectives.

Gary Banford [00:15:14]:
So I think there's an all all, you know, our own trusted networks now one of my best barometers is my wife. Right? So she's we we set up various agreements of of how hard, let's say, in this aspect of how hard we're gonna work. And it might be 7 o'clock on a Tuesday evening, and she would come in and check-in on me, and we've agreed a standard. I thought you said you were gonna finish at 6 o'clock today. Oh, yeah. You're right actually. Because ourselves, we can get in these little funnels of, and again I I know myself that I when I'm when I'm when I'm interested in something I can just burn hours. That isn't conducive to a happy family life and so I've agreed principles with, you know, one of the most important or the most important relationship in my life with my wife, not

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:01]:
We'll edit out one of the we'll edit that out. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:16:04]:
Well, we'll try and edit it out. Rusty, you'll edit it out.

Gary Banford [00:16:07]:
Yeah. So it's about having barometers, I think and and ensuring that we communicate what that that that standard is that we're agreeing to.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:16:15]:
I've got a lot of questions if that's okay. I'm trying to yeah. I mean, again, I think a curriculum is a series of experiences surrounded by expertise. Obviously, military gives you different experiences. Lots of people having the same experience every day and they're not doing the reflection part. So I was curious like you mentioned that like at those ages would it have been I guess was it the peer group that was mentoring you and coaching you? How what did reflection look like?

Gary Banford [00:16:42]:
It evolved. So let me talk about 2 real experiences. So joining the marines, what the marines do brilliantly is impress their values into moldable people early on. So they they they've got a very clear values, and they impress them into people to suit their cultural fit. And if you don't fit culturally, then you don't stick around generally. No one no one joins the marines to try and change the marines. It's all about, like, I wanna be a part of that organization. They're clear in their values.

Gary Banford [00:17:11]:
And so that was those are my only certainly, individuals coached me with how to be better and told me how to improve. And then I started to learn from people externally and I was like I said before, I'm quite curious, so I'm I'm curious as to what people do and why people do it. I've always been fascinated by that. When I volunteered a special force and I joined special forces, one of the things that I noticed straight away is with how as part of the process, the reflections was built in. So everything we did, whether it was a training serial, whether it was a meaty operation, whether it's a highly successful operation, we always, as part of the process, had a robust reflection process. We call it an after action review, and it took a number of forms. So and let me paint a a kind of quick scenario. We could have conducted an operation.

Gary Banford [00:18:03]:
It could have taken we did up all day planning it then out all night conducting it, coming back in at first light, everyone's exhausted. The first thing we do when we get back is we conduct a quick after action review. So we're learning and just making sure that we've captured everything that we need in that moment. Now that's not the finished article, but it's the early reflection so that we've built the picture of what actually happened. It's like any stressful event you might, you know, drive home today and be involved in a or see a car accident. Ten people involved in a car accident will all see it very differently. And it's only if you stand together and compare notes and ease it, obviously, including the CCTV cameras, build a picture of what really happened. And so we after a mission we would always review what happened so that everybody is clear in what happened and there's lots of benefits to doing that.

Gary Banford [00:18:54]:
But it's hard. It takes discipline. And that was the biggest change that I noticed that the marines didn't always do that. In special forces in training if it went well or if it went terribly we did it. If after an operation if it went well, if it went terribly, we always did it. It was just part of the process and that enables these thousands of experiences to have learning effect and to hopefully make changes to improve.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:19:22]:
And I was gonna just build on one more thing there because I was interested and I'm sure this, you know it's it'd be different in your world but I was really curious as to how you interact with people so I I'm like nodding along to your view of life and, challenges, experiences, all that stuff. However, that's not everyone and so would they not be in your in your team? And then the second thing is I guess because because I'm interested in like resilience by community and this whole team thing, how would you interact as a group with someone who didn't who wasn't like who was wasn't sticking to the values or wasn't because that will exist in lots of organizations and that can often get in the way and frustrate people and it could be like chatting behind their back and it just yeah. I'm just curious how that would work in your world.

Gary Banford [00:20:05]:
Yep. So all all just aim all of this at the, special forces really or my experience as a special force. I can't speak on behalf of special forces, but this is the their will through my eyes, I guess. The culture is is what we're talking about here, isn't it? So in in in that world, if people didn't meet the required agreed standards, the standards are all agreed by the people, then they wouldn't stick around. Like, that that organization has

Simon Ursell [00:20:38]:
How would they exit?

Gary Banford [00:20:40]:
How would they

Simon Ursell [00:20:41]:
How would they leave?

Gary Banford [00:20:42]:
So they wouldn't get there in the first place.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:20:46]:
So recruitment is really important.

Gary Banford [00:20:47]:
So yeah, they wouldn't get there in the first place. So the standard, the agreed standard for special forces is incredibly high and hard which puts most people off. And so they don't wanna hold themselves accountable to that standard. Like, people join the marines to really, like, and there's gonna be a few marines I'm sure listen to this, and that was never the case for me. Some people join the military from these sexy adverts that go I wanna do that. That's what they're selling. The reality of the job often isn't that and so people stay in that job and they if they go oh I really want to do that exciting adventure combat let's say, then that's really happening in special forces. That's the work that they're doing although other organizations will sell it.

Gary Banford [00:21:27]:
The the most of that is happening in special forces. And so if guys want to hold themselves up to that high standard it's it's happening in special forces. And special forces selection is incredibly tough, and they've got a number of filters. The first, it used to be 4 weeks, it's now 3 weeks of the hills phase. That that selection process is really just a test of who will stick it out. We're talking about it's it's the physical preparedness people need to put in, the discipline to be ready when they start is quite high. It's not incredibly high. It's quite high.

Gary Banford [00:21:59]:
But it's a test of can you just keep getting up every single day and going again? The real test in special with special forces selection which is 6 months long, the first 3 weeks now isn't a big chunk of it but it's where most people fail because they fail that test to just keep getting up every day and trying to keep going. The real test where people get selected is in the jungle which is 6 weeks on the other side of the world in a completely alien environment where you're taken out of your comfort zone like we spoke about earlier and are challenged every single day and are held accountable to work in standards but also character. And so it's a place where people's character can really get assessed. Now I understand people listening to this going, well, business doesn't have the chance to assess people's character. We're we're talking already there for 9 weeks of selection already by those first two phases, and there's still another 3 or 4 months with UK special forces to do some character selecting and through new insights and new learnings for people. So if people don't fit in or don't agree to a culture and values then they stick around. They just exit by going thank you that is me. I'm gonna go home now.

Gary Banford [00:23:13]:
Thank you very much.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:23:13]:
And I imagine you like me think that business could hire on character. They could test for character.

Gary Banford [00:23:18]:
I think businesses should hire on character, not I quite do.

Simon Ursell [00:23:23]:
I think I think quite a lot do. Like, I quite think quite a lot do, but don't even know they're doing it. Yep. It would be number 1. Number 2, I think some businesses are really intentional about it. I mean, we we've got a fairly intentional recruitment process at Tyler Grange. Nothing like sending people to the jungle. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:23:38]:
That might be a problem with HR.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:23:40]:
They would enjoy the jungle, the ecologist.

Simon Ursell [00:23:41]:
Oh, they'd love it.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:23:42]:
They would love it.

Simon Ursell [00:23:43]:
But I'm not sure about getting up every day and being tested. I don't know. Yeah. I don't know.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:23:47]:
They're available for surveys. They're available for surveys.

Simon Ursell [00:23:50]:
I'm doing ecologists a disservice, maybe. But, in in our case, we have a very strong sense of purpose. So, at Target Grange,

Gary Banford [00:23:57]:
it's about

Simon Ursell [00:23:58]:
social mobility and, helping the environment. And you have to volunteer at Tarly Grange, and that actually does filter people out. Plus you've got to work really hard. We have very long hours for the 4 day week we do. You can be up at night, up early in the morning, all those kinds of things. And if that's not for you, I think we we the we didn't when we first started our business, but we certainly do now. I think we do filter people out, and I wouldn't say that's unusual.

Gary Banford [00:24:25]:
Yeah. I think one of the key things and what I'm sure Tyler Grange I know I've seen a few years ago now, but I've seen, the great culture that you've got there. With all good cultures, people police the culture. And and Yeah. So my old world, the standard which wasn't necessarily written on the walls, it was police in everything we did. So if there were certain actions or behaviors that peep the group, the community didn't agree with, it was police. It was like that that standard of behavior isn't acceptable. And people weren't kicked out because of it straight off.

Gary Banford [00:25:00]:
They were they were given advice and given opportunity to change their behaviors. And I think that's what the best cultures do. People are held accountable to the agreed standards of those cultures, you could say societies. And, you know, without those standards, peep peep you know,

Simon Ursell [00:25:17]:
people are less Mustafa. I've got him in already.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:25:20]:
Who love him?

Simon Ursell [00:25:20]:
I do love Mustafa. Mustafa would talk about challenge, wouldn't he? So, you know, you'd have a a lot of support in an environment, which is really important. But you'd also have a lot of challenging environments which is really important. I think that really speaks to this sense of purpose and values and culture. So the challenge will come via that in a lot of ways. So we're gonna you've gotta deliver these targets at work. You've gotta deliver this amount of projects or whatever it is that it might be that you're measuring. But also, you have to behave in a certain way, and that can be challenged.

Simon Ursell [00:25:52]:
So, you know, you have to go and volunteer on we do a 4 day week. Part of being in a 4 day week company for Tyler Grange is you've gotta volunteer. That, for some people, puts them off. I mean, we have people who say, I don't wanna do it, and that's fine, but Tyler Grange isn't for them. And I think our team police that, but it is challenging. So I think purpose, culture, values do provide challenge just as much as, some of the more sort of financial metric measuring stuff that goes on in business. Sounds fairly similar, although way more extreme in in your world of special forces.

Gary Banford [00:26:26]:
Yeah. I I I agree. I think it's I think it's exactly the same. I think people would easily look at the military and and assume that standards were upheld by dress and bearings and how smart people are. That in in special forces, that's less important. You know, people are treated in a much more adult dare I say it way and the the standard those standards are a given. People can be disciplined when they need to be disciplined, they prove that. The things that they really care about is mission success where you're being thrown into arguably the the hardest of missions, that's why special forces are being chosen.

Gary Banford [00:27:03]:
So the standards that you have to keep yourself at personally, that's just that you need to be on that. And so that, you know, I think people would yeah. I see lots of crossover, The culture the culture and the people.

Simon Ursell [00:27:18]:
For sure. And, Rusty, in sport, I mean, you know way more about this than me or Gary, I suspect in the sport. It's massive, isn't it? In terms of in the best teams, strong culture that is policed by the team rather than a sort of, you know Yeah. And police

Rusty Earnshaw [00:27:34]:
also means, like, catching people in, doesn't it? So catching people doing it well. I was thinking again because I'm in sport like showing up is like such an important skill isn't it? Like you're injured or you're a little bit injured or you've been out injured for 6 months and you're coming back into your 1st training session and just that ability to show up is like, just I'm just interested by that to be honest. Then the other thing that I just wanted to pick up on, you spoke about the military like does lots of things very well but like if you give the military 2 gifts from your time post military that you could actually, with hindsight, these 1 or 2 things might have made a difference, what would they be? It's

Gary Banford [00:28:13]:
a great question. So the first one that jumps to my mind the second one might have to go dig in a bit more, but the first one that jumps to my mind So

Simon Ursell [00:28:20]:
I asked

Rusty Earnshaw [00:28:20]:
for 2. I need to have 1.

Simon Ursell [00:28:21]:
You're so mean.

Gary Banford [00:28:22]:
Yeah. The first one that jumps to mind is is certainly my old organization is to be more empathetic towards its people. Right? So that the standards are very high and hard and that can sometimes come at a very, unforgiving way. Like, this is just meet these standards and and how this manifests, you know, the the job by its very nature compromises people's families, that compromises relationships. And I think that the organization is very unsympathetic of that. Now it's a bit in line with what you were talking about earlier, Simon. Well, if you don't like that, well, this isn't the job for you. Right? And so the the divorce rates within that that organization and the failed relationships and the is incredibly high, and it's unsympathetic to that.

Gary Banford [00:29:15]:
And I think there's a bit more balance there for because that that when it's interesting when guys are deployed on operations, it's not the stress of what they're about to do that causes the problems more often than not. It's the contact back home and knowing that the washing machine's broke, the children at school are having problems, and the guys aren't there to really deal with it. That's hard. And I think the job and certainly some of the leadership within the job that have navigated all of that through their experiences, sometimes can be quite unsympathetic of that.

Simon Ursell [00:29:54]:
And that's Mustafa's support matrix, isn't it? So, you know, it's it's not just the the setting of challenge. You've got to then provide amazing support. And I mean, Rusty, you've talked before. We certainly try to sit at Target Grange, but, sometimes get it right, not always. You're measured by people who leave sometimes, aren't you? I mean, I think it's the the people who have been in your organization and how they speak of you once they've left it is a really big Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:30:17]:
And and ask your loved ones. Like, again, if you want feedback on, you know, your mental health maybe ask your wife rather than ask you, they're probably more likely to give you the the right answer and he just reminded me yesterday was, it was just with a and again same in sport around the divorce stuff I think like you know sports especially like cricket where you're away a lot like people probably felt to understand like how much you're putting in for that. Had a real interesting moment yesterday we're talking about I was with a team and they were talking we talked a bit about Gen z and like, I mean they're talking about a person that, turns their phone on at 9 and off at 5 so they will take no work stuff outside of that and, and someone just had a moment like someone who's almost my age, a little bit older, an older person, said maybe they've got it right and we've got it wrong.

Simon Ursell [00:31:10]:
That does sound quite nice.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:31:12]:
Yeah. Yeah. It does. But Kevin, this kind of showing up relentlessness like and I'm I'm nodding along with you but also and I guess I was curious about I think one of the big things that sits alongside bounce back ability, resilience, your ability to do this stuff is like world class recovery. Absolutely. Like looking after yourself, knowing how to switch your brain off, knowing how to I mean especially in your context like physically be healthy, but also be mentally healthy. I'm just curious as to, like, where that takes you.

Gary Banford [00:31:43]:
Yeah. So you said By

Rusty Earnshaw [00:31:45]:
the way, I'm still waiting for a second

Gary Banford [00:31:49]:
so I can

Rusty Earnshaw [00:31:49]:
give for the The second one's come to you. The sec the sec the second You need to remember the second one for me is

Gary Banford [00:31:54]:
about, leaning into learning through story. So no like, so no one is Claire Murphy. Claire Murphy.

Simon Ursell [00:32:00]:
Claire Murphy. Yep.

Gary Banford [00:32:02]:
So she's coming to work with us in in a few weeks time.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:04]:
Is she?

Gary Banford [00:32:05]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:32:05]:
Yeah. She's class.

Gary Banford [00:32:06]:
She's brilliant. But the no one in the military wants to be the storyteller because that's seen as you'll you'll get policed for that actually. So the culture will police you for being a storyteller because it's never about you. Right? It's always about the team. And so but what what because of that, because that's so indoctrinated into people, there's so much learning that goes missed or is lost when people leave.

Simon Ursell [00:32:35]:
What's the perceived benefit of that?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:37]:
Of the

Simon Ursell [00:32:37]:
Of of the policing of that that you mustn't be a storyteller? Because there there must be a reason why people are so strongly saying they

Rusty Earnshaw [00:32:44]:
don't have that.

Gary Banford [00:32:44]:
It's the value of being humble. So you're by telling a story of what you did, you aren't being humble because it was never you as the team. And so they police it to ensure that it's never about you.

Simon Ursell [00:33:00]:
And sometimes it is actually about you. You did do something.

Gary Banford [00:33:03]:
Inevitably, but like and that's the whole issue with the the the decorations and the medals. Right? No one wants the medals. Well, I guess some people do want the medals, but the, yeah, people don't wanna make it about them. So it's it's it's the the value of humility which is so important in those organizations mean that to be the one upfront telling the story about what they did one time, that's like I'm sweating thinking about it. Do you know what I mean? It's like no one wants to

Simon Ursell [00:33:28]:
be that person. But wouldn't but wouldn't that same group of guys wanna listen to a guy from World War 2 talk about it and he'd be covered in medals. Oh.

Gary Banford [00:33:36]:
100 percent 100% which is why I've taken the podcast that I had into private, an exclusive group so that it's where some of the guys that I used to work with, it's not released publicly, but people can come and listen, and it's more in a webinar format and ask questions because and actually the guys

Simon Ursell [00:33:54]:
Rusty and I really wanna listen to your podcast.

Gary Banford [00:33:57]:
And the and the guys that get to do the talking about their experiences, and it's not not making it about them but they're just sharing what they learned. Afterwards they go, gosh that was so cathartic. That was ace. And I'm like I know. But it like outside of that in in the organization, and I know this firsthand, they'll say, we don't talk about what we did. That's out of order. That's not humble. And so there's that and and Oh,

Simon Ursell [00:34:27]:
Clare is gonna blow your mind.

Gary Banford [00:34:28]:
I've I've done work with Clare. I've I've I've Okay. Cool. She's she's she's brilliant and but it's but this is this is I think what we're talking about with cultures and organizations and standards, UK special forces is built on. We don't talk about it. And so to be the storyteller it's just it's so uncommon. And again, I guess, because the benefits of storytelling and sense making and reflection and actually the stuff that you're probably doing more of now since you

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:00]:
left than you ever did when you were in it. You're missing opportunities that are super important.

Gary Banford [00:35:04]:
And can I give a really

Rusty Earnshaw [00:35:04]:
good example? Had some probably some pretty challenging experiences.

Gary Banford [00:35:08]:
Yes. And this so can I give a really good example? So they they the the special forces are training people to go into the hairiest types of combat, the crunchiest kinds of combat. I was never sat down and told what it was gonna be like to get into a gunfight by someone that had been there before I did it for the first time. That sounds mental to me now, you know, to say the the the amount of experience that is in those organizations and no one ever sat me down as a as a new guy and went, this is my experience from being in a gunfight. And why I think it comes down to, well, we're a big timer telling us stories about being in a gunfight. It's like, well, that's actually quite useful to know because my first experience of doing something like that was, well, you know, in in Baghdad where the first time this helicopter fired some rockets into a building, I had this expectation which was born from Hollywood and watching commando and Rambo growing up, and I was like and I was like that's pretty underwhelming. That wasn't what I expected, and I don't need those thoughts in the moment on the ground. I I want to have learned that in a more sterile environment.

Gary Banford [00:36:22]:
Right? And I think there's benefits to and and then the the consequences of what you then see and what you do, and and no one shared any of that. And I think it's such a wasted opportunity. And yeah. I I I'm quite passionate about this because there's there's a lot to learn from this because you're right. There's guys are fascinated by the stories of the men that did the courageous acts let's say on d day. They're fascinated by them not because there's a there's a real sense of understanding the grittiness of war or anything like that, but just the courage. How do people show courage? That's that's a vital quality in life. Bounce back ability it's a nice segue isn't it? The bounce back ability you know, it's it's realizing that you're in the the bottom of this pit like in this this this valley and then going right, I've now gotta get myself out of it first and foremost.

Gary Banford [00:37:16]:
Like you've gotta make that decision and that takes courage. It is easy. This world will press you down to take courage to go, I'm going to now use my energy to change my circumstances that takes courage. So to listen to people that have demonstrated courage and how they've done it and to unpick that and relate it to yourself is a vital thing that people need to have in life which is why people love to read about these things. But then organizations that are sometimes and this is the example that I had are living in those kind of environments aren't using story to share that. And I think of the lost experiences of the guys that have left over the last 10 years from between the Twin Towers attack to where we are now, the busiest time in special forces history. No one's captured those stories for the organization. There's things they sit inside the men and some women that fought that fought there, but they've not been they've not been expressed.

Gary Banford [00:38:16]:
They've not been captured.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:17]:
It's such

Simon Ursell [00:38:17]:
a shame.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:18]:
Fascinating even just to think of that organizational bounce back ability that they've let so much, you know, thoughtful, good mistakes, like leave the building and then, you know, I'm imagining you going, one more question, has anyone been in a gunfight before? It'd be really helpful for me to know. Yeah. Yeah. And and I'm sorry, but apologies for this terrible comparison, and we are gonna come back to recovery in a second. But, like, when I did the running balls at Pamplona, which is about 0.0001% as coverage you needed, I definitely was going, has anyone done this before?

Gary Banford [00:38:52]:
Yeah. Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:38:52]:
Yeah. Because when you put into a situation you're not used to, like, sometimes it might be helpful. You might have some they might have some insight that might in some way help.

Gary Banford [00:39:00]:
And you need to be really wary because some people will go, I've got some experience. Come listen to me, and they're the last person that you wanna listen to. Right? Because they're like, I've done this 10 times before. And that's the problem. These cult these environments realize that you don't wanna attach yourself to the storytellers always, but you do need to find the people that can humbly say they've got a few scars on their bodies typically as well. Yeah, I've done this a few times, and and if you want some help, I can maybe give you some help in it. And that's really useful to find those people, to know where to look for those people firstly.

Simon Ursell [00:39:32]:
Aren't we speaking here of, and this is a theme that goes right the way through all of our parts, the environment, And because the stories are in a part of the environment, right? So you're in a you're in a group, you're in a society, a special forces group or a sports team or a business or whatever it might be. The stories of that are what helps set the environment. So if you're stood waiting to go running with the bulls,

Rusty Earnshaw [00:39:55]:
Terrible comparison.

Simon Ursell [00:39:56]:
Terrible comparison, but I'm gonna keep going on about it.

Gary Banford [00:39:58]:
Courageous and brave thing to try. Very courageous.

Simon Ursell [00:40:01]:
Very courageous and brave.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:40:02]:
You had 2 days of drinking beforehand. I gave her courage.

Simon Ursell [00:40:05]:
Perfect. So but, for you to be able to draw on the group of people you're with to help you with courage is incredibly important. So because quite often when you talk about bounce back ability, resilience, whatever it might be, people look at a person and say, they are courageous, and I need to be courageous. And actually, it's more a question of the environment being very supportive of what you're trying to do, so that you can be courageous. Everybody has courage within them. I mean, this is what the psychologists tell me anyway. Some have experiences that make it much harder for them to be courageous. Others have experiences that have helped that, but the environment in which they which they are operating is going to give them courage or not.

Gary Banford [00:40:53]:
Like, couldn't agree with that more. 2 things jumped to mind. I I can't remember who

Rusty Earnshaw [00:40:59]:
who said I'm

Simon Ursell [00:40:59]:
glad you said I couldn't agree with that more because I went on a bit of a

Gary Banford [00:41:02]:
No. No. It's it's

Rusty Earnshaw [00:41:03]:
it's almost Elmo at one point. I was

Simon Ursell [00:41:06]:
thinking about Elmo at one point.

Gary Banford [00:41:07]:
It's, it's it did speak to me, Simon, to be honest. There there's a quote that I can't remember who said it, but we are not the survival of the fittest, we are the survival of the nurtured. Right? Like, we're humans. We are, you know, and we're we're all born into this world. We are nurtured through life. And our groups, organizations, our families, they're the they're the things that help us make sense of this world and the experiences that collectively we can share help. So we're we're not the survival of the fittest, and that's an individual endeavor. We are we are a social, we're social people, and we we are the sum of the people that we're we're nurtured by in many ways.

Gary Banford [00:41:52]:
And I can't remember the second thing that came into my mind when you said that.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:41:54]:
Well, that's fine because we can speak about recovery. So again, like, in order to, you know, to be in the bottom of the pit and have courage and clearly like some of the stuff you chat around and around environment like but also you've got to both physically and mentally be in a good space to do that. I imagine your world was pretty challenging in that respect to what, you know, how would what do you think about when you start talking about like just being really great at recovery?

Gary Banford [00:42:19]:
I think the best people my observation when I was at the start of my career and and and looking at the guys at the end of their career and seeing what the successful guys had is the people that were able to do this well. They probably didn't even understand that's what they did well. We say now, work hard but recover harder. So we should all know how to sprint, we should all know how to work hard and because there's gonna be times again in our life whatever your job organization you're working that you're gonna need to knuckle down and work hard. We might call that a sprint, but equally you are then gonna need to understand that you can't keep sprinting, you need to be able to dial that back, you need to be able to turn that down. And I think the thing that I work with and and Dorators that we work with the most with the guys that we work with is they all know how to work hard. The thing that they do least effectively is recover or know how to recover or know how to even start to that process. And there's there's loads of things to say on this.

Gary Banford [00:43:30]:
So foundation the the fundamental principle to recovery is is sleep. So, like, knowing how to rest and get good sleep is vital. My old world, this is something I talk about quite a lot. We would work plan typically plan through the day then go out at night so that there's a full 24 hour cycle there that doesn't take in a lot of rest. For those that could we would encourage something called forced rest, and this forced rest was for those that weren't deeply involved in the planning process go get some sleep before you go out. And as a team, as a collective, as an organization we would be able to support one another. So the people that have been deep involved in the planning process would be switched on the whole time, deliver the orders process, the mission delivery, and then we go out and they're they're by their nature, they're switched on constantly, and sometimes that would take more than a day, sometimes that'd be 36 hours, maybe even 2 days we'd be going into things that we don't know how long it's going to be until we turn off. We'd come back, we'd do the after action review, then we would prioritize recovery, then it would be like go get our heads down, and then come reset and sweep up and do and do the the the other bits of organizational, meet the other organizational needs that we had.

Gary Banford [00:44:54]:
So it's the guys that can be switched on, but then also switch off, that can get some rest, that know how to rest, and there's various things that we can help people with that. Again, when things were incredibly chaotic for me, I didn't no no one ever used story to tell me this or to coach me this. When when life was busiest for me let's say on operations before I went to sleep I'd just make some notes in my head and just get them out on paper, like think and ink I call it now. So we think and ink and just get it out, like what happened, why did you do those things, and just process some of it. And that allowed me to close off loops inside my head, allowed me to rest. And I think one of the things I most commonly hear with business executives now is they if they can fall asleep, which some can't, they wake in the night and their brains are spinning, they're whirring because there's a 1,000 things and it's like, yeah. I get it. I understand that.

Gary Banford [00:45:46]:
Think and ink. Have a notepad at the side of the side of your bed or in your note app. Just just get your notes. Well, one of the things you've got to do tomorrow, get it out, get it down on paper, then that's tomorrow's problem. It allows you to switch off, and well it certainly can help. So the people when we talk about recovery, the people that can perform at the highest level they can recover, they know how to recover, they put the things in place to allow their bodies to rest even if that's in a short 5 minute window throughout the day. If you know you're involved in a sprint being able to just a micro break to then go in a circuit breaker we might say is is key.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:46:26]:
My experience is people just don't pencil that stuff into their week.

Simon Ursell [00:46:29]:
They don't know. They don't have time, do they? They always say that.

Gary Banford [00:46:32]:
They feel they don't have time.

Simon Ursell [00:46:33]:
No. No. I I'm aware of that.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:46:34]:
Some stuff. Can I can I just ask one more question just to just to build on that, you, I was thinking a bit about like you now and I was listening to Andrew Huberman podcast the other day on the Knowledge Project he was talking about like exercising some of the muscles in your body like the delayed gratification muscle and resilience muscle and so what are you doing now 45? I know we chatted earlier we obviously have adult problems at this age and they definitely challenge our resilience muscle but you still got this same level of, like, energy, drive, showing up, setting yourself challenges. You are you keeping it alive?

Gary Banford [00:47:09]:
Yeah. I I am and it's some so it's interesting. So when I left that organization I didn't appreciate the framework and scaffolding you might say that that organization give me gave me for those things. So like let's say personal well-being. I was unaware of just the habits and the organizational needs that that that that job had that kept me active. When I sell my own business it's I can easily sit down on my ass all day and just write or just talk to people via zoom and I needed to re engage and be more deliberate in caring for myself and if that if that makes sense. So, yeah, I need to put challenges into the diary to give me something scary to aim at so that I do the make the actions so that when I can't be asked or don't think I've got the time that I do the work that needs to be done. So interestingly, you asked me this question.

Gary Banford [00:48:10]:
Tomorrow, I've been hoodwinked into a stand up paddle board in ultra marathon. Now, I've got a stand up paddle board.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:48:18]:
Terrible. So that's what

Simon Ursell [00:48:20]:
the heck

Rusty Earnshaw [00:48:20]:
is that?

Gary Banford [00:48:21]:
So it's it's about 8 hours on a on a paddle board, And I I've got a paddle board, but I'm gonna it's it's gonna be hideous. But there's a there's 5 of us doing it and that that group is we're gonna we're gonna have laughs. We're gonna have banter. It's gonna be a good crack. We're not it is a race. For the first hour?

Rusty Earnshaw [00:48:39]:
Then there'll be 7 more hours We call it type we call it of wobbling around.

Gary Banford [00:48:42]:
We we call it type too fun, don't we? Type too fun. So we don't appreciate it at the time, but afterwards, we look back, oh, that was a good laugh, wasn't it? And then in the fun. In the in in May, I've got a peak district, marathon. Again, I I don't love running, but if I've got a scary challenge in the diary with a group of people that I will hold myself accountable to to the agreed standards, if I don't wanna let them down maybe people say, oh, it's people pleasing. Maybe, but it holds me accountable so that

Rusty Earnshaw [00:49:15]:
It works. 3 or

Gary Banford [00:49:16]:
4 times a week I get out of the door and I do my training runs. I've not been able to regularly practice stand up paddle boarding training, but, so this is just gonna be a suffer fest. But, again, you you learn

Rusty Earnshaw [00:49:27]:
I can imagine your wife coming out and go, Gary, why are you standing on the ironing board in the living room? I'm practicing. I'm practicing. Put the broom down. Yeah.

Gary Banford [00:49:36]:
Yeah. Yeah. No. Quite true. So it doesn't have to make sense to everybody. That's for sure. No. And and again, you you realize this is maybe this is the kind of person that well, I I know it is.

Gary Banford [00:49:44]:
It's the kind know thyself. It's the kind of person I am. I I like challenges. I like to stretch myself, and I like to learn what, you know, what happens out the back end of that and, you know, please, some of that is useful to me and There

Simon Ursell [00:49:57]:
is so much stuff in here. We've gone over our time, by the way, but we can carry on.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:50:01]:
He's done it. He's achieved it.

Simon Ursell [00:50:02]:
Yeah. Yeah. Gary dropped. Did he? Yeah. He didn't even notice. Yeah. There's there's a heck of a lot here. I've I mean, mean, I think we can count for a little bit longer because I've got so many questions.

Simon Ursell [00:50:14]:
One of the things I wanted to loop back to, and something. We've we've had Justin Reuter in to do some training with us on delegation. Yep. And some of the stuff we've been talking about, I think delegation is shocking in business. It's one of the key things I see in business. I'm getting helping other companies. It's one of the things I see dealt with very poorly. It's almost seen as something you shouldn't be.

Simon Ursell [00:50:39]:
I must do the work. I must I must be present. I must do everything. And it's incredibly incredibly restrictive on growth. So Justin's come in and done and the guys loved it. I mean, they absolutely loved having him in. It really opened their eyes and then using, stories from the military to help, understand that. Is is delegation something, that you spend a lot of time coaching, thinking about? Because I'm I'm fairly obsessed with it at the moment.

Gary Banford [00:51:08]:
Yeah. So old world. So like delegation wasn't a term we used, it was a a principle that we applied to everything we did. So Like

Simon Ursell [00:51:19]:
turning commands or

Gary Banford [00:51:20]:
So mission command is, look, this is the problem we've got. There's a hostage on the other side of the world. Right? Guys, you're the team that's gonna solve that. Happy with that? Absolutely. Let's go. So that that delegation of responsibility and and in every level when you get into in in a in a team like that, you're you're given responsibility. And that responsibility has been delegated by someone that could do it and probably do it to a higher standard themselves if if they had the time and and the the inclination. However, they also understand that there's no learning in place if you don't get responsibility that is going to stretch you.

Gary Banford [00:52:04]:
This ties into everything we're saying. Yep. So it comes in many, many forms. So we there's I I hear it all the time and this is a conversation just this last week I've had with a couple of the the guys that I I kind of coach. Their diaries are back to back, they're full, and there's really only 3 things that they can do in that situation. There's say no to more stuff. That's 1. 2, they can delegate, or 3, they can improve their output.

Gary Banford [00:52:36]:
Right? There's only 3 options. So you can say no to more stuff, you can delegate, or you can improve your output. What are you going to do? And they go, well, I can't I can't, improve my output. Great. Brilliant. Let's get that one off the table. So what can what are you gonna say no to, or and what are you gonna delegate? Because they're your only 2 options. Okay.

Gary Banford [00:52:57]:
Interesting. And I don't have the answers. They they they work this through, but delegation is a massive part of that. And as a leader, like my best experiences in my career, no not best, my my my biggest learning experiences in my career were ones where experienced leaders gave me responsibility that scared me to death, that probably scared them to death giving me that responsibility, and I went and did it with a team, not by myself ever, but with a team and I learned so much. Yeah. And You

Simon Ursell [00:53:29]:
hear it across business as well, don't you? I mean, you hear it in all walks of life, sport, business, it doesn't matter where you are. People who talk about an environment they were in where they were given stuff to do that was stretching them and they loved it. And it's and, that's

Gary Banford [00:53:42]:
Type 2 fun. Type 2 fun.

Simon Ursell [00:53:44]:
Type 2 fun. I'm I'm definitely using that phrase. The, the the delegation of difficult tasks to people so that they grow is that that's the expectation setting Mustafa talks about. Then you've got the support, say, you know, people like Luke Doherty, who are helping people with mindfulness, so that they're able to be better able to cope with those kinds of experiences. It's just massive. There's so much of this stuff comes down to leaders letting go, because they are blocking growth. They're blocking the growth of the individual by not giving them experiences to learn, and they're blocking growth for the organization by not allowing new people to come in and do stuff.

Gary Banford [00:54:20]:
Couldn't agree more and I think as leaders and leaders shouldn't feel bad for going when they heard they've just heard you say that go, yeah that's that's I've probably been doing that because it's common. It's it's

Rusty Earnshaw [00:54:32]:
the easy

Gary Banford [00:54:32]:
thing to it. It's the easy thing to hold on to responsibility and go, it's just easy if I do this myself. But that isn't

Simon Ursell [00:54:39]:
You feel guilt. So so, one of the things that I come across all of the time with people when they are delegating is they feel guilty because they feel they should do it themselves and they've given it to someone else and they feel bad about that.

Gary Banford [00:54:50]:
So 22 scenarios jumped to mind. So I I explained it like the one of my learning experiences where I was asked to do something early on in my career by a very experienced leader. I know he was afraid of asking me to he he had a bit of fear around me taking on that responsibility. It went well. Fast forward 8 to 10 years, I'm in the same situation asking someone to do something that I've gone, man, that's really risky for him. I should be doing that myself. But then I remembered this example that I'd had, and I passed on responsibility to this guy. And he and he went well.

Gary Banford [00:55:23]:
He he did the job brilliantly. Better than I could have done it, maybe. And he also and also and also and also he got the learning experiences from it. And I got the opportunity to do other things with my time as well, which, you know, is is is an improvement. Right?

Simon Ursell [00:55:39]:
Can you share a little bit more detail about those or you're not allowed to?

Gary Banford [00:55:43]:
I can. It was in it was in it was on an operation where, on in my experience, my first experience, a number of individuals had ran away from, a building that we were trying to detain the people inside, and they'd gone and hidden somewhere. And we were still focused on the building, and so the people that ran off, we needed to ensure that they weren't the people we're looking for, so we needed to send some people. Now we couldn't afford to send much manpower, so I I got asked if my team and then me and 2 others, if we would go and check who those guys were, let's say. Those guys were armed, it was in a really bad part of the world, dangerous part of the world for us, certainly. And he he checked over the radio in front of everybody, hey, Gaz, you okay with that? And I was like, yeah, I'm fine with it, boss. Off we went, that was it, and then reported back all good. Lots went on, of that but we'll leave it there.

Gary Banford [00:56:44]:
Afterwards he said to me, and he we shared this and he was like, you know, sorry. He said for for asking you to do that because I would have loved to have sent 10 guys with you. There's there's there's principles in in in military planning. If we we try and I think it's 3 to 1. I think we try and work 3 to 1. So if there's 1 person, make sure you go with 3. If there's 3 people, go with 9. Does that make sense? So you've you've got the you've got the upper hand, let's say, in in in combat, let's say.

Gary Banford [00:57:11]:
Now there was at least 2, maybe 3 people, and there was only 3 of us. That's not a great kind of purport. That's not a great share, but that's all we could share. So that's what that was the decision, and that's why we have to afterwards, we had this chat. Fast forward 8 years or so, exactly the same scenario. I was the kind of the the commander on the ground if you like and one of my more junior team leaders as a couple of people had run off exactly the same situation and I was like nearly said his name then. I was like, are you okay with doing that? Yep. No problem.

Gary Banford [00:57:43]:
And I was like, I don't wanna put him in this situation. But then I remembered and actually it went well. He learned a load and it was fine and actually it was all fine. And so it's it's delegated responsibility. The easy thing is to to do it yourself in those scenarios. And it's actually that's not good for the organization if you're doing everything yourself. So,

Simon Ursell [00:58:03]:
amazing story. And then and I think people listening to that, if you're sitting there worrying about delegation, just think about gas in that situation and maybe say, it's probably not that bad. Let's just give it a crack. Because I think it's so important to take the courage to delegate, isn't it?

Gary Banford [00:58:19]:
Absolutely. You mentioned you mentioned guilt, and I'm a I'm a I'm a father, husband to 4 children, and I I like to delegate responsibilities in the house. Right? And so the children, I like to get them to mock in.

Simon Ursell [00:58:34]:
Do your family

Rusty Earnshaw [00:58:35]:
like your family getting responsibility? Could someone please go get the ironing board in the room for me? I'm about to do a bit of deliberate practice in the living room.

Gary Banford [00:58:42]:
You know? But I I am I am less guilty about asking the kids to to do some jobs and responsibilities. My wife, for example, who hasn't lived in my world kind of occupationally feels much more guilt around asking the kids to load the dishwasher for example, you know, and I'm like no. They need to. This is our house. This is there's lots of things that we need to get on top of. We've got lots of things that we need to be doing. Let's just give them that responsibility and they'll do it terribly the first time they do it and we need to just correct things, etcetera. But it's how do you delegate? You you you start at the smallest level and build people up.

Simon Ursell [00:59:18]:
About having

Rusty Earnshaw [00:59:19]:
You're obsessed with delegation. I will have to show you my delegation framework at some point. It is a skill, obviously. It's not as Yeah.

Simon Ursell [00:59:25]:
It is. It's huge.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:59:26]:
Simple as your situation, they'll have made some decisions around your your competency and your clarity and your motivation to do it and it it didn't just happen like that did it?

Gary Banford [00:59:36]:
No, the children often don't do it, right, and so I've gotta check myself and how I can manage that situation to ensure next time that they they do do it and see the benefit for them, not for me.

Simon Ursell [00:59:47]:
Do you debrief them after the dishwasher loading?

Gary Banford [00:59:49]:
We we debrief not to the same level. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Pressel the pressel position normally helps though, Jake.

Rusty Earnshaw [00:59:55]:
I would say shout out to my 13 year old daughter, Elsa, who is pretty good at delegating to me. Yeah. Quite frankly.

Simon Ursell [01:00:00]:
That's a great skill.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:01]:
Good for her.

Gary Banford [01:00:01]:
They they try that skill. That's for sure. That needs police, and that's what a good a good culture will do. It will police behaviors that are acceptable and not acceptable.

Simon Ursell [01:00:10]:
Okay. Well, we've hit the hour, so I think we should wind up that. Gary, really really appreciate you coming in this, superb. Learned a lot.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:17]:
Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful. I've loved every minute of that and well done. I'll make it to

Gary Banford [01:00:23]:
the hour. Yeah.

Simon Ursell [01:00:25]:
Over and out. Great conversation.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:26]:
Thanks, guys. Bye. Many apologies for the reference to the running of the bulls in Camplona.

Simon Ursell [01:00:31]:
You couldn't help yourself.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:33]:
Yeah. I got a bit giddy. Well,

Simon Ursell [01:00:36]:
running the balls is scary for normal humans. I think Gary just looked at you with a slight sort of rolled his eyes a little.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:42]:
Yeah. I enjoyed the the eye rolling partner. He did.

Simon Ursell [01:00:45]:
And by the way, he didn't roll his eyes. He was very nice.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:00:47]:
So much in that. Again, like, I know we do this every time, and I'm like, there's gonna be loads of and, of course, there's some repeat themes, but I just thought, like, oh, like, I'm all in on Gary, and he's a great storyteller, isn't he? Which is pretty cool considering he was, banned from doing it back in the day.

Simon Ursell [01:01:04]:
Yeah. I mean, I didn't I mean, I I can't I guess I kinda knew that they have you know, it's all about being humble, and I can see the point of that. But so yeah. For for storytelling to be banned seems, yeah, a bit remiss.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:01:17]:
A bit remiss, for the attention of, British forces. A couple of, people

Simon Ursell [01:01:23]:
Please don't come and get me.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:01:25]:
Couple of big rocks for me. Again, I I like, you know, just that experiences, but also, like, the reflection on experiences. They've had loads of, huge variety of experiences and getting together, reflecting on them, it's the most important thing we do, the after action review stuff, you know, Vyto, maybe consider that in your environment and think about how well you're doing that. And the second thing which was linked which comes just after the after action review is obviously the recovery stuff. Again, if you wanna you know, they're talking about staying awake for 36 hours, which is quite frankly scary to me, but how can you have microsleeps? How can you look after yourself?

Simon Ursell [01:02:03]:
And I resisted the temptations to talk about a 4 day week in that part as well.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:02:06]:
Yeah. You did well. And then also like the team aspect to that. So I remember, working with England with Fletch and he would be like, Rusty, you need a holiday and, like, 2 days isn't enough. You actually need to take a bit longer off. I would probably benefit from Fletch at the moment in my life. Yeah I'm gonna guess what yours are because again they have that beautiful quote around we're not it's not about the survival of the fittest it's about the survival of the nurtured and, that leads you straight into environment that's and we, if you had a little thing on your pad that would allow you to press a button that would put up a sign that was Oh, I

Simon Ursell [01:02:41]:
don't know what we'd say. I mean, maybe maybe I could use this one. Maybe I should use that one every time.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:02:48]:
Environment, that'd be pretty cool.

Simon Ursell [01:02:49]:
On because

Rusty Earnshaw [01:02:50]:
Well, have you have you got any

Simon Ursell [01:02:52]:
other options on the buttons? I've got applause, which we're definitely not using. Yeah.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:02:56]:
It's pretty cool you've discovered this.

Simon Ursell [01:02:57]:
And we've also got comedy moment.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:03:01]:
Yeah. So, I mean, what were your 2? Environment was obviously one of them.

Simon Ursell [01:03:04]:
Yeah. Absolutely. So, yeah, the environment. I mean, it's the theme in every I mean, right from the first pod we did with Phoebe, right the way through all of all of the pods we've done, environment in terms of how it's overlooked. It's it's astonishingly overlooked. And at best environments, when you're talking about special forces where they're dealing with the most extreme things, that anybody can possibly imagine, I suspect. The environment that they are within their within their group, within their unit, within the society that they're operating in, that environment is everything. That's what they're relying on to be able to perform in this really stressful place.

Simon Ursell [01:03:44]:
So environment's key, and and I think it was it came across in pretty much everything Gary was talking about was how they work really hard on making sure the environment's very supportive.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:03:54]:
And what's your second one? And by the way, just a pod update. I was looking at my socials today on, latest on Phoebe Watchers that, she's at the NFL draft and M and M is there.

Simon Ursell [01:04:04]:
She is. I mean, I'm still, yeah, living my life through Phoebe's socials. She's in

Rusty Earnshaw [01:04:09]:
a process. Else has Phoebe watch out there, Just keep us updated on what she's up to.

Simon Ursell [01:04:13]:
Yeah. Because, yeah, we are interested. Yeah. My other one was would clearly be delegation, because I've got a bit of an obsession about it at the moment.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:04:22]:
Now you've got a thing going on with delegation at the moment.

Simon Ursell [01:04:25]:
Yeah. Because it's it it again, it's so it's so overlooked. And I think that so many leaders feel bad about delegation, but if they don't delegate, the organization cannot grow, and the people within the organization are gonna grow way slower. And I think this speaks to a need for training around delegation and a need for intentional, uncomfortable, delegation. Justin Reuter, who we had on the pod, he he talks about extreme delegation being where you wanna be trying to go, so doing it in a way that makes you feel uncomfortable. And I think Gary's story about he he gave us a couple of examples about delegation, one to him, and one where he had to do it. And I got the sense that where he had to delegate, that was really hard. Where he was delegated to, that felt pretty easy.

Simon Ursell [01:05:12]:
So I think I think leaders get in the way so much, of people's resilience by not by protecting them from experience, if that makes sense.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:05:23]:
Yeah. Makes perfect sense. And maybe on the next part, I'll just ask you for 1 because you just do environment every time. But I appreciate the environment one and I definitely appreciate the delegation and, okay. And and now is the, the, the ritual we now perform after the pub. We're off to sandwich sandwich.

Simon Ursell [01:05:42]:
They're gonna go for sandwich sandwich. Best sandwiches in the world. Yeah. Shout out to sandwich sandwich.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:05:46]:
Over and out.

Simon Ursell [01:05:47]:
See you.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:05:48]:
Thanks so much for joining us on the Ban's Back Movie podcast with Sam in Russell. We've really enjoyed your company. If you wanna reach out to us, Simon, where can they reach you?

Simon Ursell [01:05:58]:
LinkedIn's best place. Simon Ursell, u r, s for sugar, e, double l. Send me a message. Rusty, where can we find you?

Rusty Earnshaw [01:06:04]:
TikTok? No. Not really. LinkedIn, Ross Blanchard. And then the same on Twitter, but please, ignore all my political thoughts.

Simon Ursell [01:06:12]:
Yeah. Second that.

Rusty Earnshaw [01:06:13]:
Over and out.