February 18, 2025 • 43 mins
Louie Sharp, international speaker, best-selling author, and accelerated business growth consultant, has released the latest episode of “Leadership & Love,” a fast-growing podcast channel followed by industry leaders!
In this episode, Louie interviews John Dave (JD), a former Marine Corps pilot and American Airlines captain. Their conversation focuses on two significant leadership stories involving crisis and positive resolve. The first focuses on JD’s leadership during the Mount Pinatubo volcanic eruption in the Philippines and how he creatively boosted troop morale. The second story details a critical incident as an American Airlines captain when his co-pilot suffered a medical emergency during final approach.
🌟 Both stories emphasize the importance of perspective-taking during crisis, attention to detail, and respecting positions of authority while leading with care and compassion.
Louie’s Leadership & Love Nugs (podcast time stamps)
- Put yourself in others' shoes to understand their needs and expectations. (9:51)
- Consistently maintain professionalism through attention to detail in appearance and behavior. (40:38)
- Respect positions of authority while leading with care and compassion. (42:41)
#LeadershipandLove #Leadership #Clients #Crisis #Love #Needs #Profesionalism #Leading with care #Leadingwithcompassion #Thegiftedleader #Podcast
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Welcome to the Leadership and Love Podcast.
We will cover leadership, mindset, personal development,
and sales and marketing.
You'll experience thought-provoking conversations with both
nationally and internationally recognized leaders.
Our goal is to inspire you and deliver actionable items
that you can implement that will help you accelerate your
(00:22):
growth.
Get ready to discover the magic and the power when you lead
with love.
I'm very excited, humbled,
and honored this morning to not only have a former Marine
and someone I served with, but also a lifelong friend,
John Dave, better known as JD.
(00:44):
So JD,
thanks for showing up today to help us out and be interviewed.
Well, thank you for asking.
I'm honored very, very much so.
Appreciate it, man.
I'm gonna give you a little background on JD, John Dave.
He was a Marine Corps pilot,
and he started out flying 53 Sea Stallions,
which for those of you that don't know,
(01:04):
it's the biggest helicopter the Marine Corps has.
And then he went into a reserve unit,
also the reserve unit that I was in.
And he served there and he started flying Huey helicopters,
which is a little smaller version, twin engine.
And then he also went into American Airlines and flew as a
pilot and rose up to the rank of captain and flew as a
(01:25):
captain for American Airlines for a number of years.
And I invited JD on for a number of reasons.
I don't think there's anybody that really exemplifies
leadership and love better than him.
And so I'd like you to start JD with,
tell us about the story of when we were stationed in the
Philippines, Mount Panatubo erupted.
You can kind of give him an idea of what the conditions
(01:47):
were after the volcano erupted.
And when we were left and everybody else was evacuated.
Oh yeah, that was quite an experience.
We had, we woke up, and I don't know if people knew this,
my wife didn't know,
she knew about the explosion from the volcano,
but she didn't realize that a typhoon came across at the
(02:08):
same time.
So that wet rain mixed with the dry ash,
it was coming down like wet cement, if you remember.
You put your hand out,
and it felt like somebody was pouring wet cement in your
hand when you stuck it out underneath the awning.
And rocks were coming down out of the sky,
it was absolutely crazy, it was apocalyptic,
it was amazing.
So we woke up the next day, everything was gray,
(02:30):
it was like moonscape, everything was gray,
everything was covered, no power, no water,
all the utilities were shut down and we saw how many
electrical boxes blowing up on the electrical poles during
the night, boom, boom.
I guess the ash being acidic or something was messing with
the wires, so nothing.
So we went to an all officers meeting that day.
(02:52):
And if you remember, all the hangers were collapsed,
I mean, the buildings,
the roofs weren't made to handle that,
they were all collapsed,
all the trees were stripped because the wet ash just
stripped the bark and leaves off the trees,
and it was just, all gray, it was amazing,
it looked like we were on the moon.
And we had an all officers meeting and our CO says,
(03:13):
talking about what we do next, and when this is settled,
we gotta get the equipment,
we gotta clean the ash off our hangers so we can open them
up and get the birds out,
we're gonna need to help people out, blah, blah, blah.
When it's all said and done, he says to me, he goes,
I don't know why he looked at me, but he says, JD,
what can you do to raise morale and stuff here, you know?
And I says, well boss, I'll work on that,
(03:35):
I'll look and see what our options are.
And then as you know, we got busy every day, on the roofs,
scraping like snow,
scraping the ash off the roof of the hangers,
because the roof,
the weight had collapsed and couldn't open the doors.
And the locals were trying to get us out to help fly and
help deliver rice to the towns up in the mountains and
(03:56):
stuff.
Well, after about five or six days,
there's everybody sweating their butt off,
we got no showers, we got no running water,
we're drinking iodide water out of the water buffalo,
the water tanks, we're eating MREs and everything.
So we had another meeting about four days later and the
boss says, JD, what'd you come up with?
I said, I think I got an idea boss,
(04:19):
because I knew all the officers clubs, the enlisted club,
the staff club, they're all closed,
they had no electricity.
So I went to the officers club,
got my little helper truck there and I got Louie and I got,
there was another guy that was with us,
can't remember his name right now.
And I went to the officers club first and I said, hey,
I wanna buy a couple cases of beer.
(04:41):
And the guy says, they're warm, I go,
I'll take care of that.
So anyway, I'll speed through this pretty quick.
So we went to the enlisted club, we went to the staff club,
we bought, I don't know,
maybe 10 cases of beer and all warm, all 98 degree beer.
So then it just so happens, the day before,
I'll go backtrack a little bit, the oxygen farm,
(05:02):
everybody calls the locks, liquid oxygen,
they fill the jets so the guys can breathe when they're
flying, he called me up and he said, hey,
I heard you're in charge of clearing your, you know,
your deck area out in front of the hanger and stuff,
your ramp, I said, yes.
He goes, you got bulldozers?
And I said, yes, we do.
He says, do you have any rubber tipped bulldozers?
I'm going, I don't know what that was.
(05:24):
So I went out and Guy Beveridge was working one of them and
he knows this stuff and I said, hey, he goes, yeah.
He goes, yeah, Captain, we got one right here.
And I said, okay.
So I called the guy, I said, yeah, we got one.
And he says, can you come over and clear my locks farm?
And the reason I needed rubber tip,
because you can't have sparks.
When I, see, I learned something new that day too.
And he says, I said, yeah, he goes, well,
(05:45):
can you come over and clear our thing?
And that's when the light bulb went off from my chemistry
classes.
And I said, can I get a tank of liquid oxygen?
He goes, oh, Captain, I just can't hand that out.
And I go, well, how bad do you want your lot cleared?
He goes, okay, but you bring a truck over, I'll hook it up.
But I know nothing about it.
I go, okay.
(06:06):
So as you know,
we went and got liquid oxygen in a tank while they were
clearing their field.
And we brought it back to our hangar area.
And we had one refrigerator on a generator in our
operations area.
And I asked the CO, I said,
can I use that refrigerator today?
And he said, well, yeah, what's it for?
I said, you'll wait and see.
(06:28):
So we cleared out the refrigerator and we got it running on
a generator.
So it's working.
So I got yourself and another guy,
and I got one of those welders gloves from the metal shop.
And we were taking six packs of beer and dipping them in
liquid oxygen and almost immediately,
they're almost frozen.
And we stacked that refrigerator.
(06:48):
You open that door, it was solid beer.
And I guarantee you,
we had the only cold beer in the Luzon in the Philippines
that day.
So all hands meeting later on at the end of the day.
The CO does this little, you know, umptest squat, blah,
blah, blah.
And he says, okay, Captain Dave, he has something for you.
I don't know what it is.
(07:08):
I hope he doesn't embarrass me.
And he turned it over to me.
And if you remember, I said, hey,
you guys been working hard,
you've been sweating your butt off,
been drinking iodide water and eating MREs.
You need a break.
I opened up that fridge.
I swear to God, there's some people that cried.
I said, everybody gets cold beers.
And that was, I mean, we were running around like kids.
(07:30):
We had our flight suits off and drinking beer.
And that was really, that was a pretty good highlight.
Everybody appreciated that.
Got the motivation and the little esprit de corps going
there and everybody felt pretty good about it.
They really raised morale.
So that was a pretty good deal.
Yeah, and I can tell you that for those of you,
(07:52):
one of the things that JD left out is it was one of those
miracles.
I truly consider it a miracle because like he said,
we had been working in 90,
95 degree heat with almost 100% humidity,
shoveling this volcanic ash was literally like he said,
concrete or wet sand for days and days on end.
And so, and we hadn't had showers,
(08:14):
we didn't have running water.
And the day that JD cracked open that refrigerator,
it started to rain for the first time in weeks.
Oh, that's right, yeah.
Yeah, and so we were all out there to his point,
we stripped down to like our boxers and we were having our
first shower and two cold beers and it was like flipping
(08:35):
heaven.
It was awesome.
somebody somebody got a soap bar was passing around a bar
of soap.
Yep, I remember.
I've got pictures of it.
But the point I wanted to make is, JD,
I think that was a great example of your leadership on
really thinking outside of the box to take care of the
(08:56):
troops.
And that's one of the things that you did through the
career that when you and I served together,
you always looked out for the troops.
And you always had that kind of mindset that you would
take, you know, we had to accomplish the mission,
but take care of the troops.
I'd like to ask you,
what advice would you give to young leaders or even
(09:16):
experienced leaders on how to keep that mindset of taking
care of other people?
And you truly, you loved people, right?
You were a happy go lucky guy.
You were the you were the upbeat guy.
We were in some pretty bad situations on a number of
occasions.
And this,
this is a great example of you just being the light in the
darkness.
(09:36):
But what advice would you give to leaders that are out
there wanting to be,
be as successful as you were in every area of your life by
taking care of the people that they're working with,
working for and working for them.
Well, thank you for that.
Thank you for that vote of confidence.
Louie, the biggest thing,
and I carried this on into American Airlines and I used to
(09:57):
talk to people about it there too,
is I always looked at it as, if it was me right now, okay,
I'm referring myself to one of the troops, right?
If it was me right now, what would I be expecting?
What would I want?
What would I want to get?
Where would I want to be at this situation if I was one of
the troops?
And I always kind of geared myself towards that.
(10:17):
Like you said, we land somewhere.
We're on a weekend trip, boondoggle somewhere.
First thing is like,
let's get the troops somewhere to live.
Let's get them something to eat.
Because at that moment, I know if it was me flying all day,
I'm tired.
I want to get this uniform off.
I want to take a shower.
I want to get something to eat and a cold beer.
So that was always my thought was, if I was in their shoes,
(10:38):
what would I expect?
What would I want right now?
And that's how I always geared myself.
As in American Airlines,
same thing with people in the back of the aircraft.
And we got delay.
We got a maintenance delay.
We got a weather delay.
I'd always sit there and think,
if I was in the back right now, what do I want to hear?
What do I want to know about the situation?
So I always geared myself towards that lowest common
(10:59):
denominator of information.
I'm not going to change anything.
We're delayed for two hours on the ramp,
but the people in the back want to know what's going on.
That's all they want to know.
And I'd always geared myself towards that.
And the Marine Corps was always the same thing.
What would I want to know?
What would I want?
What would I expect out of this situation?
And I think that's one thing I think,
as you've seen before in your business, your world,
(11:22):
leaders at a time, they forget.
They forget who they're working for.
And I think that's the problem.
You gotta put yourself on the other end of it and go,
who works for me?
Who am I working with?
What do we all want out of this?
And that's how I geared it, basically.
It's pretty simple.
Well,
but that's really profound wisdom and a couple of golden
(11:43):
nuggets that you dropped there.
And I want to reiterate that for our listeners and
viewers.
That is you think from the other person's perspective,
that, that,
that was really profoundly wise from somebody so as young
as you were early on in your career.
And the other thing is, is that what that information,
sharing information is very powerful because well,
(12:05):
there's a lot of people that will hoard information
thinking that it's going to, they're going to hold power.
But when you share that information,
everybody's on the same team with the same information,
but it's faster to get to that.
Even like you said, when you're on the ramp delayed this,
you share that information.
You want to get to your destination as bad as they do.
And now everybody's in the same boat.
(12:25):
I'd like you to share another story when you were on final
approach,
you were a captain for American Airlines and so that which
means you're in charge of the aircraft.
And if you could tell us the story of what happened when
you're a co-pilot and you had an incident on your final
approach.
One thing I want to say about that, well,
that mindset here ahead of time is I've always used this
(12:48):
term and my family will laugh at me,
but I've incorporated it probably since college days,
maybe even high school.
I always say,
I just said it to a friend of mine here recently, I said,
having fun is my best revenge.
Shave my head and send me to Okinawa, guess what?
I'm going to have some fun.
That's just the way it's, you know,
otherwise I'm just going to mope around and feel like
crap.
Anyway, yeah, I was flying with this co-pilot.
(13:10):
We flew five days in a row.
And I say that because he was away from his family for five
days at that time.
We flew a three-day trip, he stayed at a hotel,
and then we flew a two-day trip.
And of course I went home because he doesn't live in Dallas
and I did.
So he was away from home for five days.
So we're doing one leg from Dallas to Albuquerque,
(13:31):
and then we're going to turn around and fly back home.
And that was going to be the end of our five-day sequence.
So we take off out of Dallas, he's flying,
and the people I don't know,
and I'm surprised how many people really don't,
they think a captain flies every leg and the co-pilot's
just there to assist.
I tell my friends, I go, no, usually you trade off.
I'll fly one leg, you fly back.
(13:51):
Or I'll fly two legs today, we got two legs tomorrow,
you fly tomorrow.
It's pretty much a 50-50 swap of flying.
So Mike's flying over to Albuquerque,
and my plan is to fly back.
So we have lunch on the way over,
flight attendants serve lunch.
I didn't have anything to eat, he did.
And so he's flying, and most guys like I do,
and I can't speak for every pilot, below about 2,000 feet,
(14:15):
I kick off the autopilot.
You hand fly it, you get a feel of the airplane,
what the winds are doing to you,
and everything for the final approach.
At American Airlines,
you got to have everything done by 1,000 feet,
generally speaking. Flaps down, gear down, you're on speed,
you're basically ready to land,
you're just flying the approach in.
That's by 1,000 feet.
So Mike's doing his checklist, and I'm the radio operator,
(14:38):
and I'm the checklist guy.
So he's flying.
And he says, you know, gear down, flaps three, and so by,
it was around 1,300 feet, maybe.
He says, looks at it, and my call is,
landing check's complete.
So we're ready to land.
And then as a 737 captain,
I've got a heads-up display in front of me.
(14:59):
So I look into the heads-up display,
it tells me everything.
It tells me our azimuths, our speed, our altitude.
You don't have to look at all the instruments.
It's one focus,
and you look through the hood to the runway.
So it's one visual perception of everything you need to
know.
So I'm just focused on that.
And all of a sudden, I want to say maybe 1,200, 1,100 feet,
because it wasn't long after I said landing check was
(15:19):
complete.
The airplane goes, does a hard right bank.
And I grab the yoke and straighten it out,
and I'm looking over at Mike, and he's leaning over,
and it looks like he's reaching for something.
So I'm hitting him on the shoulder.
I feel bad about that now, but I'm hitting on the shoulder.
I'm going, Mike, Mike, what are you doing?
And he's not responding.
I'm going, Mike, and you got to understand, we're 1,000
(15:43):
feet headed towards the dirt at 180 miles an hour.
And I grab him, and I kind of turn him, and he turns to me,
and he's out.
I think he's just passed out.
I didn't know what happened.
I thought maybe it was something he ate for lunch.
I didn't know.
So I was like, oh, it kind of shocked me.
I was like, oh, crap.
And I kind of lost focus.
(16:03):
I got him on the yoke.
And of course, I let him go kind of out of shock,
and he fell back over on the controls, and we banked again.
I was like, crap.
So I grabbed the yoke, pulled it back over,
and I got to get him.
He was a 6'4", about 240, big boy.
So I reached over, pushed him back,
and then we got shoulder harness lock that locks your seat
belt and your shoulder harness so you can't move forward.
(16:25):
So I lock that.
So now Mike is, he's in position.
He's not going to fall on the controls anymore.
And if anybody ever saw the movie with Sully on The Miracle
on the Hudson, he says in that movie,
when everybody was making that turn to land after the bird
strike and they all made it to the runway,
they wanted to nail him for not making it to the runway.
He made a bad choice.
(16:46):
And Sully says, wait 30 seconds and then do that,
because that's how long it takes you in your head to go,
what happened?
What do I have here?
OK, what do I have to do next?
It takes you that long to realize what happened.
And so it did.
It took me a few seconds and I went, whoa, OK, wow.
All right, I got to get Mike to medical.
(17:08):
I thought about going around, but around Albuquerque,
there's 12,000 foot mountains.
So I would have had to clear those first to get focused on
getting him medical attention.
We have defibrillators.
We got oxygen in the aircraft.
We could have done the flight attendants are trained on
both of those,
but that's going to take too long to get him medical help.
So I just continued on.
Declared an emergency, landed on the runway and told him,
(17:31):
you know, the medical emergency was one of the pilots.
I didn't want to give out too much information over the air
at the moment.
So the controller was very good.
He goes, everybody's out of your way.
Clear Bravo One is your gate.
That's okay.
So we come in and pulled off at the end of the runway.
And I got to tell you this,
and I've talked to Check Airmen and American Airlines about
this extensively afterwards.
(17:54):
And one thing is you don't realize all these years you fly
and you've got two people in the cockpit doing stuff.
When you land, everybody has duties to do,
get the flaps up, do this, do that, change radios,
turn this on, turn that off.
All of a sudden, I'm doing it all.
And it was a handful.
I got to tell you that.
It doesn't sound like it.
Some pilots go, ah, that's not big.
(18:15):
Well, you never flew an airplane by yourself.
So it is quite a change.
So I'm getting all that done, trying to talk to ground,
trying to get to my clearance,
trying to tell the flight attendants what's going on so
that they know,
because at this point they don't know what's going on.
So I briefed them and I said, hey, as soon as we land,
I mean, as soon as we get to the gate,
get the oxygen and defibrillator up here,
Mike has passed out.
(18:36):
That's all I told him.
And I went to the ground, told the people, hey,
when we get to the gate,
we've got emergency in the cockpit, stay seated.
We'll take care of you later.
So we go wheeling up there and there was no medical.
Sometimes you always see ambulance down by the gate or
something.
There was nothing there.
I'm just a ground guy ready to wave me in them.
So I get on the ground and I said, hey,
where the heck's the medical?
(18:57):
I got mercy here.
They're waiting on the jet bridge for you.
Okay.
So we wheel in and they opened the door and the flight
attendant comes in right away.
She's got the defibrillator, she's got the oxygen.
And she said, should I put this on Mike?
And I look over and he's leaning towards me and he's just
blue.
I mean, he's got drool and everything.
(19:17):
And I didn't know this before,
but I guess when you pass your body, everything left loose.
So he's a mess.
And the thing I didn't know either is when I was coming
down for the final descent, he,
I heard them like a big exhale.
So I thought he was still alive.
I thought he was just breathing.
I didn't know that was his last breath.
So I learned something that day too.
(19:39):
So we can wheel on in.
They get a couple of medical guys in there, big guys.
They lift the shoulders.
I get in front of them,
squeeze in there and I lift his legs.
I'd say he's about 240.
He's a big boy.
And we take him up the jet bridge and they put them up
there and they start working on them.
And that's what I told.
We talked to the Check Airmen about this in American
Airlines.
That's when my job really got exciting.
Like you talked about as far as leadership.
(20:01):
I have flight attendants to control.
They're getting a little bit edgy.
I've got passengers.
I wanna know what's going on.
I gotta get off.
I wanna get, go.
And I've got the station operations chief on the airplane
asking me questions.
I've got our American Airlines chief asking me questions.
I got a call back to dispatch and let them know this
(20:22):
flight's not going back.
I gotta let American Airlines chief pilot know that we got
a problem here with one of the pilots.
All this stuff going on.
And then to top it off after it was all over,
I got the New Mexico state police and coroner wanna ask me
questions cause somebody died on a New Mexico soil.
(20:42):
So it was just a lot going on.
And that's what we talked about with the leadership role
was that was all on me.
I had to take care of all those things and get them done.
And the biggest, I told you this before, Louie,
the biggest compliment when this was all done was the
flight attendant came up and I've answered all these
(21:04):
questions.
I've made the calls.
I'm trying to get the aircraft moved or something where I
can get the people off.
Cause they got things to do.
I'm trying to take care of them cause until they are off
the airplane, they're my responsibility.
So I'm ask can we move the airplane to another gate?
No,
because your gates are fixed and they're on the jet bridge.
You can't move the jet bridge.
(21:25):
Okay.
Can we take people off the back door with air stairs?
No, we don't want them walking on the ramp.
And so I'm always trying to get them off on their way.
We have another crew that was deadheading, 737 crew.
I even called dispatch and I said, hey,
can that captain and co-pilot come up here?
Can they move the airplane?
No,
it's your airplane until the emergency is over and you hand
(21:46):
over the log book to maintenance.
It's nobody else can get up in the cockpit.
So, and with that said, one thing they had on the news,
one of the ladies was interviewed from ABC news.
She said the captain kept his composure.
He kept things under control.
He seemed to be caring about the situation overall,
(22:06):
but he seemed to care about us.
One of his base concerns was taking care of us.
That's what a leader does, right?
I told you before, if I was in the back,
what would I want to do?
I want to get off.
You know, regardless of what's going on,
I got places I want to go.
So I was trying to do that.
And then when it was all said and done,
it was pretty hectic, but it all worked out.
And that's one thing I told the...
(22:27):
Uh, check airmen, I said,
one thing you don't realize is when the situation was out
of my hands, IE Mike was up the jet bridge,
the EMS were working on.
They're doing the CPR and all that.
He was out of my hands,
but I still had all this to take care of, you know,
calling all the people and calling.
And I said, we don't ever teach that.
(22:47):
And I briefed you on this before when American Airlines,
when you'd make captain, you go to,
we call it charm school.
It's four days of how to be a captain.
You go to the schoolhouse.
They teach you all your assets.
They teach you what's available to you,
how to get a hold of dispatch, how to get a hold of loads,
what they teach you basically what a captain needs to know
to be a captain.
And then, um, I told him, I said,
(23:07):
one thing he didn't brief me was of an emergency like this,
all the stuff you have to do and all the things you have to
know,
I didn't know that like FAA will try to send somebody if
they have them available,
they'll send them to the airplane and say, Hey,
I'm here to take the log book, you know, no.
American Airlines is the only American online personnel.
The only ones can take that log book after an emergency and
(23:29):
some of those things they have incorporated into, uh, new,
uh, new captain training.
So.
So, so I want for our listeners, first off,
thanks for sharing that story, JD,
I want our listeners to pick up on a couple things that
JD's been saying throughout our conversation so far.
One is he said, I learned, I learned, I learned,
he's constantly learning, even as a captain,
(23:52):
he was learning new things.
The other thing that I really appreciate for those of you
that are leaders, excuse me, I'm a big,
big advocate of processes.
And so what JD did was he went back to the,
to the leadership and the trainers of captains and said,
Hey, look, there's things that we're missing.
Now,
their process is better because JD went through this experience.
(24:15):
And now,
other pilots are now being a captain specifically are being
trained on what could happen.
And when it does,
what are the protocols and what are the proper procedures.
I have a couple of questions for you, JD.
One of them is on final approach when you know you're at
about 1300 feet and Mike literally dies next to you.
(24:36):
He died.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Unfortunately,
what did you do or what were your thoughts that,
or maybe what was your awareness around keeping your
composure as being the only guy now to land the plane to
your point, you're going to have to turn up,
turn everything off and on and control the flaps and the
(24:57):
slats and all that kind of stuff.
The landing gear.
What would you share with leaders when, again, when,
when it's all going sideways,
what did you do or what had you done in the past,
maybe to prepare you to be calm in that situation.
Um,
but I told you one time before back 30 years prior in the
(25:19):
Marine Corps,
I was doing a check ride become aircraft commander in the
CH 53 and my check airmen of Marine major,
we came on a turn and we were getting vectored somewhere
and he just faked it, but he slumped over on the controls.
He basically pretended he had just passed out and or died
or and or in a combat situation.
(25:40):
He had just gotten shot.
That was his his sign to me of, Hey, you got it.
What are you gonna do now?
Your co-pilot's dead.
What are you gonna do?
And so we handled it then.
But here we are 30 years 30 years later,
that same exact thing only for real actually happened to
me.
So you know, you talk about as a leader,
(26:03):
dwell or don't dwell on the situation at hand.
I think I mean, it happened.
Okay, what's got to come next?
I can't dwell on Mike.
You know,
I've got 150 people in the back counting on me to do it
right.
I don't do it perfect, but I gotta do it right.
And so okay.
All right.
That's why I say when it takes about 30 seconds, you go.
Okay, okay.
What?
(26:23):
And my next thought was after I got over,
this is my situation.
Okay, this is what I have.
What do I have to do next?
Think of what I have to do next.
What's the next step to get this situation handled properly
to a good conclusion?
And that's what that was my thought the whole time is that
moment right there.
And then the next thing I did, you make the call to tower,
(26:44):
declare an emergency, tell them what you got.
And then you just focus on what do I have to do?
What's the next step to make this happen?
And I have seen people in the past,
something like that happens.
Maybe not that degree,
but just a bad situation at your work or whatever you can't
focus.
I want to say what do you have to do next to correct the
problem?
That's I think that's the best thing.
(27:05):
A leadership is you can't somebody throws a pie in your
face.
You can't go.
What the heck is that?
You got to clear your eyes out and go for the next move.
You know, that's just what you got to do.
That's that's really great wisdom and you're absolutely
right I think we all tend to focus on what the the negative
of what just went sideways or south sometimes Yeah,
(27:28):
you said something in there that that coach of mine has
shared with me She phrases it a little differently But done
is better than perfect and you said I got to get it right
but I don't have to get it perfect and so that's very
powerful for leaders to know because often we're fear will
keep us from taking action right because we're afraid We're
(27:50):
gonna make a wrong move or do something but getting
something done and it's crazy.
It's funny to me I said something something to somebody
recently and they And they and it shut them up and they
were they were complaining about how hard or how difficult
was something was and I said Look, nobody's shooting at us.
This isn't hard.
(28:11):
Yeah It's it's all a perspective thing,
but nobody's shooting at us And I and I think that you and
I think that you're again I want something that JD shared.
That's just great wisdom is that it's we can accomplish
anything one step at a time So your team can accomplish
what something once and I want you also to hear again what
he said in the middle of this major crisis and he he was I
(28:35):
think if if I remember correctly you got an award didn't
you some sort of award from American Airlines?
Yes.
Yeah,
and so he was he was awarded for his bravery and courage
and composure in the middle of all this.
But,
he said it again in the middle of all this he was thinking
about everybody else.
He was still looking out for the team He was still looking
out for the passengers the flight attendants.
(28:57):
He was still looking out for the rest of the team So you
can maintain your composure take one step at a time and
still be taking care of the team and that's one of the
reasons why I wanted to have you out of your JD because
those are powerful lessons and to my point about that I
made to somebody you were landing an airliner with 150
(29:19):
passengers plus the crew and it all hung on you, r
ight? If you'd have lost your composure,
like I said at the beginning of this it would have been
catastrophic you to come out It would yeah,
it could everybody could have been lost instead of just
Mike your co-pilot though everybody on board could have
been lost
Yeah.
You know,
the thing that I said to the station manager there at
(29:42):
Albuquerque, after everything was said and done,
I told you, I was talking to the station manager.
I had the state police chief there, and I had the corner,
the state corner there.
And the, the administrator there, he says, wow, this,
this was awful.
This is, this is just terrible.
And I said, could have been a lot worse.
And like you said, you know, don't focus on this.
(30:04):
It could have been a lot worse.
We, we got it done.
And everything I told him, I said, yeah, Mike, Mike,
it was Mike's time.
If you want to say that,
but my biggest accomplishment that I took warmth with on
that day was everybody went home.
Everybody went home.
That was supposed to,
and I had a friend of mine after that.
He said, you know,
(30:25):
people say that all the time when your general sense and
your, a friend dies or a family member dies or, you know,
something happens.
You see it on the news and he goes, well, it was his time.
And people have always said, well,
if I'm in the back of an airplane and it's the pilot's
time, what do we do then?
And my good friend of mine, he says, well,
(30:45):
JD just shows you what happens.
So that made me feel pretty good, but.
Yeah, you just don't have hope.
It's not both pilots time.
Exactly.
Exactly.
I'd like to, I'd like to, uh,
stress something else that JD just said that's very
powerful as well is, um,
(31:05):
I as well survived the helicopter crash.
And so one of the things that we have is these procedures
and processes in our businesses and, and,
and even in our personal lives,
and one of the things that J did JD did was when,
when it's all this started to happen,
he just snapped into what he had done over and over again,
(31:26):
because he didn't have somebody else reading the checklist.
He knew it mentally so that he could take those actions
without the assistance of his co-pilot.
And so this is why it's so important to have processes and
make those become habits,
because it was the same thing when, when Bill Nurbin and,
and, uh,
more heart and myself went and we had troops on board and
(31:47):
it was the same thing, it was none of our time, right?
We all walked away from it, but it was a horrific crash.
But one of the things that helped save us was Bill Nurbin
and I going through the crash procedures and knowing those
processes, much like you on final approach,
you had done it so many times.
It really, that was, that was probably the easy,
(32:07):
and I'd like you to answer that.
Was that the easiest thing in the middle of all this?
Um, I'll tell you what,
I don't know about easy and you know, there's probably,
you can explain after your own, uh,
incident when it's all said and done, you go, wow,
you know, I don't,
I don't remember thinking about it as much as just doing
it, just doing it.
(32:28):
Like you said, just doing it, getting it done.
And then when you're all done and you're at the hotel that
night and you're going, whoa.
And then you think about it, you go, wow.
I, wow, I got that done.
I got that done.
I got,
cause I was going through the process because I knew the
FAA I was going to go through a board.
They're going to have questions and answers to find out
just like Sully, if I did it right, you know,
(32:49):
so I was going through everything in my head and I was
like, okay, I did that right.
I did that right.
I did that right.
You know, and I, and then when you go through all those,
you go, wow, it just seems like it just went,
I don't remember doing it necessarily, all of them,
but they all got done and it's like you said, it's, it's,
uh, it's just,
and that's the thing as the captain of American Airlines
and all my captain friends will tell you the responsibility
(33:09):
is you. You're in charge.
You've got a co-pilot very well versed, very well trained,
but you're there to make the decisions you're there to make
sure everything.
And when I went from co-pilot to captain,
I couldn't believe the responsibility it was put on my
shoulders.
It was amazing.
And so you behoove yourself to learn it, to know it,
(33:30):
and be the one that has the answers and for that incident,
the, it all came,
it all came to me and it worked out as planned as far as
our training.
American Airlines is one of the best training programs
around.
And I always,
I went there to their training department and thanked them
very much for the way they run our show.
So yeah, it worked out pretty well.
(33:51):
Yeah.
And again, and I'd like to stress one more time that again,
JD mentioned, he learned, he learned the process,
he learned what he had to learn to be,
to take on that responsibility of being a captain.
And so I would challenge listeners,
what do you need to learn?
What do you need to learn to be a better leader?
What do you need to be learned to be a better salesperson
or a better marketer, a better time management person,
(34:15):
a better person personally?
What do you need to learn?
I think learning is a very, very powerful tool.
And one of the things I recommend to people,
I read every day,
and I'm going to read every day to the day I die,
because there's so much out there and so much information.
But when you learned everything you needed to learn to be
the captain,
because you realize the responsibility that I put on your
(34:37):
shoulders.
And before we go, JD,
is there anything else you'd like to tell our listeners
about leadership and love?
Because I think again, and I just want to say this,
so everybody gets it.
This is really what I want corporate America to be doing is
leading like JD did and does continually.
He leads like this in his personal life.
(34:58):
I was honored and humbled again to be at his retirement
party for American Airlines.
And I can tell you that your leadership style and your
friendship and your connection to people came from all over
the country to congregate in Kentucky for JD's retirement
party from American Airlines.
(35:19):
It was a lot of fun.
But again,
that's the power of the kind of leader you are that people
would follow you, right?
And that's who we want to be as leaders,
the people around us follow us and you continue to do it
even though you're retired.
So do you have any final comments or advice,
wisdom for leaders?
Well, thank you very much for that, Louie.
(35:40):
And, you know, I told you before,
I was pretty humbled with some of the people that showed up
for the retirement party.
That really touched my heart.
But here's a simple thing.
And I even had other fellow pilots that are good friends of
mine kind of go, ah, J.D.
Well, American Airlines, when I first started,
you had to wear your coat, you had to wear your hat,
you had to wear polished shoes, you know, all that.
(36:03):
And as the years went on with the way our society has kind
of lost some of the flair of, let's say,
of dressing properly, they got where they told,
you don't have to, the hat was optional.
You don't have to wear a hat, as a captain.
And then they said, if it's too warm,
you don't have to wear a jacket.
You know, so we got guys running around, you can see them,
(36:24):
anybody that goes to the airport,
you can see them every day.
You got a captain walking around,
and he's got his tie loose, no jacket, no hat, you know.
And one thing I did all the time,
and I got compliments from this,
and I had quite a few people say,
that's what we want to see.
I always wear my jacket, always had my tie up,
(36:45):
always wear a hat, always had polished shoes,
always had a clean uniform.
Everywhere I went, I wore the jacket and the hat.
And people with some of my buddies would go, you know,
you don't have to do that.
Well, to me, that's part of leadership.
I'm setting the example.
This is what, and I've had customers come off the airplane,
tell me, you are the captain I want to see up there.
(37:07):
Because they saw me, come on.
And when I say goodbye to them, I put my hat on,
and I'm professional, and I say, thanks for flying with us.
I can't tell you how many people got off the airplane
saying, that's the captain I want to see up front.
So I'm setting the example, and hopefully at that moment,
my co-pilot hears that, he's going, ah, okay,
that's one step I need to take, you know,
when he makes captain.
(37:28):
So that was always,
I've had people in the hallway at the terminal come up and
go, you look like a real captain.
Just out of the blue, I'm just walking to the airplane.
But that's what they,
because they see the other captains or whatever,
and they go, okay,
then they see somebody that is actually dressed the part,
and I'm respecting the position.
I always tell my buddies, all the work I did to get here,
(37:50):
all the tests, all the hoops I had to jump through,
to get here, I'm showing respect for this position.
And that's why I did it.
So hopefully my co-pilot sees that, and when he's captain,
he'll do the same thing, or she'll do the same thing.
That's one reason why I did it.
And I've got very good, excuse me, response from that.
And that was one reason I did it, to set the example.
(38:11):
I think leaders need to set the example.
And you know, when you throw in the Marine Corps,
if I don't, oh, it's another thing as a leader.
If I wasn't gonna do it, I wasn't gonna ask you to do it.
You need to make sure your people know that if you're
asking to do it, I'd be more than happy to do it myself.
So that was a big thing.
So J.D., I just for our listeners,
(38:34):
he just dropped two more golden nuggets.
And I'm serious, man, you have such wisdom.
And so one of them is it's attention to detail, right?
Those little things matter.
The fact that your shoes are shined matters.
It makes a difference.
The fact that your tie is up and tightened around your
collar the way it's supposed to be makes a difference.
But when you pay attention to the little things,
(38:55):
the big things take care of themselves.
I tell that to people all the time,
you've got to take care of the little things.
And those little things create the discipline, right?
It's easy to not shine your shoes.
It's easy to not wear your hat.
It's easy to throw your sport coat or your coat over.
And the second golden nugget he just shared here was the
respect the position.
I'm a professional speaker.
(39:16):
Every time I step on stage, I'm in a suit and tie.
I respect that I've got that privilege.
I've been trusted with your attention, your time.
And I see a lot of speakers that they'll,
they'll step on stage.
And I'm thinking, are you kidding me?
They're in blue jeans and a t-shirt, right?
They need a haircut.
They're overweight.
They're what all these things.
(39:38):
I'm thinking you're not respecting not only yourself in the
position,
but those that you showed up to lead these people.
And that that's the best you got is a jeans and a t-shirt?
So that I, and I've never heard anybody say it that way.
And that, and it's a funny thing, right?
JD, when, when you respected the position,
you were busy respecting yourself.
And what did it get you?
(39:59):
It got you respect.
There's a lot of people without a doubt,
because in a lot of that,
I was around you long enough to know,
I know your demeanor and your behavior and your mannerisms
and you carried yourself like a professional, all the time,
even when you were busy being fun, you were that guy.
(40:19):
And so that makes a difference.
And people all the time are craving respect,
but they're not doing the things that to get that respect
and they're not giving that respect.
And so I'm going to ask one more time, cause that was just,
that was powerful.
Is there anything else you'd like to add before we go?
Well, we talked about the people that work for you, right?
(40:40):
And I thought, I just thought about this.
I grew up, and as a co-pilot,
I watched the captain all the time.
And I learned things, okay, I'm never gonna do that.
Or, ooh, I gotta make sure I put that in my box of tricks.
Make sure I'm gonna do that, okay?
And I brought my kids up the same way.
They go, dad, you got that Marine Corps discipline.
Yeah, you're so hard ass.
(41:00):
I go, okay, well, this is my first time being a dad.
So if you don't like what I do, don't do that to your kids.
If you like what I do, put in your memory banks,
make sure you do that with your kids.
So I learned things with the flight attendants that some
captains in my predecessors did, and I went, ooh,
I would never do that.
And I learned that and kept that in my mind.
So I always had respect for the flight attendants and their
(41:21):
position and their job and what's required of them.
And I reflected that.
And again,
I got compliments from many flight attendants that said,
geez, I just love the way you run the show.
I love the way you, because I'm respecting them.
And I walk on board in uniform, dressed,
start to press shirt.
I mean, that's the way I always came to work.
(41:43):
So like you said, the first thing they see is, oh,
here's a captain that has got his shit together.
So immediately, their reflection,
or their impression to me is, okay,
this is a captain that he's got it going on.
And that's what I want to bring forth when I first walk on
the airplane.
So it worked out pretty good that way.
And so I did it for those reasons.
And like you said, the ultimate was respect the position.
(42:04):
And everybody else will respect the position too.
So.
And one of the things and I want I wanted this to be really
clear for everybody because JD was this great leader,
but he was also this great personality You don't have to be
a jerk or a hard guy or mean to be a great leader He was he
was respected and admired,
(42:25):
but he also showed up as this guy that cared and he's
talked about that through this whole whole conversation so
you can have and that's one of the reasons why I started
this podcast.
I want people to understand you can lead with love and JD, y
ou're just a living breathing example of that
Thank you, Lou.
I'm just glad to be here.
I really appreciate your confidence in me.
Thanks again for joining us and listening to this episode
(42:48):
of Leadership and Love.
I would like to challenge you to ask yourself,
what's one thing that you heard today that you can
implement immediately to improve your leadership and
accelerate your growth?
If you've gotten value out of this episode or learned
something that you can implement today,
we'd ask that you please share it with those that you care
(43:09):
about.
Our goal is to create more leaders who are leading with
love.
Welcome to the Leadership and Love Podcast.
We will cover leadership, mindset, personal development,
and sales and marketing.
You'll experience thought-provoking conversations with both
nationally and internationally recognized leaders.
Our goal is to inspire you and deliver actionable items
that you can implement that will help you accelerate your
(00:22):
growth.
Get ready to discover the magic and the power when you lead
with love.
I'm very excited, humbled,
and honored this morning to not only have a former Marine
and someone I served with, but also a lifelong friend,
John Dave, better known as JD.
(00:44):
So JD,
thanks for showing up today to help us out and be interviewed.
Well, thank you for asking.
I'm honored very, very much so.
Appreciate it, man.
I'm gonna give you a little background on JD, John Dave.
He was a Marine Corps pilot,
and he started out flying 53 Sea Stallions,
which for those of you that don't know,
(01:04):
it's the biggest helicopter the Marine Corps has.
And then he went into a reserve unit,
also the reserve unit that I was in.
And he served there and he started flying Huey helicopters,
which is a little smaller version, twin engine.
And then he also went into American Airlines and flew as a
pilot and rose up to the rank of captain and flew as a
(01:25):
captain for American Airlines for a number of years.
And I invited JD on for a number of reasons.
I don't think there's anybody that really exemplifies
leadership and love better than him.
And so I'd like you to start JD with,
tell us about the story of when we were stationed in the
Philippines, Mount Panatubo erupted.
You can kind of give him an idea of what the conditions
(01:47):
were after the volcano erupted.
And when we were left and everybody else was evacuated.
Oh yeah, that was quite an experience.
We had, we woke up, and I don't know if people knew this,
my wife didn't know,
she knew about the explosion from the volcano,
but she didn't realize that a typhoon came across at the
(02:08):
same time.
So that wet rain mixed with the dry ash,
it was coming down like wet cement, if you remember.
You put your hand out,
and it felt like somebody was pouring wet cement in your
hand when you stuck it out underneath the awning.
And rocks were coming down out of the sky,
it was absolutely crazy, it was apocalyptic,
it was amazing.
So we woke up the next day, everything was gray,
(02:30):
it was like moonscape, everything was gray,
everything was covered, no power, no water,
all the utilities were shut down and we saw how many
electrical boxes blowing up on the electrical poles during
the night, boom, boom.
I guess the ash being acidic or something was messing with
the wires, so nothing.
So we went to an all officers meeting that day.
(02:52):
And if you remember, all the hangers were collapsed,
I mean, the buildings,
the roofs weren't made to handle that,
they were all collapsed,
all the trees were stripped because the wet ash just
stripped the bark and leaves off the trees,
and it was just, all gray, it was amazing,
it looked like we were on the moon.
And we had an all officers meeting and our CO says,
(03:13):
talking about what we do next, and when this is settled,
we gotta get the equipment,
we gotta clean the ash off our hangers so we can open them
up and get the birds out,
we're gonna need to help people out, blah, blah, blah.
When it's all said and done, he says to me, he goes,
I don't know why he looked at me, but he says, JD,
what can you do to raise morale and stuff here, you know?
And I says, well boss, I'll work on that,
(03:35):
I'll look and see what our options are.
And then as you know, we got busy every day, on the roofs,
scraping like snow,
scraping the ash off the roof of the hangers,
because the roof,
the weight had collapsed and couldn't open the doors.
And the locals were trying to get us out to help fly and
help deliver rice to the towns up in the mountains and
(03:56):
stuff.
Well, after about five or six days,
there's everybody sweating their butt off,
we got no showers, we got no running water,
we're drinking iodide water out of the water buffalo,
the water tanks, we're eating MREs and everything.
So we had another meeting about four days later and the
boss says, JD, what'd you come up with?
I said, I think I got an idea boss,
(04:19):
because I knew all the officers clubs, the enlisted club,
the staff club, they're all closed,
they had no electricity.
So I went to the officers club,
got my little helper truck there and I got Louie and I got,
there was another guy that was with us,
can't remember his name right now.
And I went to the officers club first and I said, hey,
I wanna buy a couple cases of beer.
(04:41):
And the guy says, they're warm, I go,
I'll take care of that.
So anyway, I'll speed through this pretty quick.
So we went to the enlisted club, we went to the staff club,
we bought, I don't know,
maybe 10 cases of beer and all warm, all 98 degree beer.
So then it just so happens, the day before,
I'll go backtrack a little bit, the oxygen farm,
(05:02):
everybody calls the locks, liquid oxygen,
they fill the jets so the guys can breathe when they're
flying, he called me up and he said, hey,
I heard you're in charge of clearing your, you know,
your deck area out in front of the hanger and stuff,
your ramp, I said, yes.
He goes, you got bulldozers?
And I said, yes, we do.
He says, do you have any rubber tipped bulldozers?
I'm going, I don't know what that was.
(05:24):
So I went out and Guy Beveridge was working one of them and
he knows this stuff and I said, hey, he goes, yeah.
He goes, yeah, Captain, we got one right here.
And I said, okay.
So I called the guy, I said, yeah, we got one.
And he says, can you come over and clear my locks farm?
And the reason I needed rubber tip,
because you can't have sparks.
When I, see, I learned something new that day too.
And he says, I said, yeah, he goes, well,
(05:45):
can you come over and clear our thing?
And that's when the light bulb went off from my chemistry
classes.
And I said, can I get a tank of liquid oxygen?
He goes, oh, Captain, I just can't hand that out.
And I go, well, how bad do you want your lot cleared?
He goes, okay, but you bring a truck over, I'll hook it up.
But I know nothing about it.
I go, okay.
(06:06):
So as you know,
we went and got liquid oxygen in a tank while they were
clearing their field.
And we brought it back to our hangar area.
And we had one refrigerator on a generator in our
operations area.
And I asked the CO, I said,
can I use that refrigerator today?
And he said, well, yeah, what's it for?
I said, you'll wait and see.
(06:28):
So we cleared out the refrigerator and we got it running on
a generator.
So it's working.
So I got yourself and another guy,
and I got one of those welders gloves from the metal shop.
And we were taking six packs of beer and dipping them in
liquid oxygen and almost immediately,
they're almost frozen.
And we stacked that refrigerator.
(06:48):
You open that door, it was solid beer.
And I guarantee you,
we had the only cold beer in the Luzon in the Philippines
that day.
So all hands meeting later on at the end of the day.
The CO does this little, you know, umptest squat, blah,
blah, blah.
And he says, okay, Captain Dave, he has something for you.
I don't know what it is.
(07:08):
I hope he doesn't embarrass me.
And he turned it over to me.
And if you remember, I said, hey,
you guys been working hard,
you've been sweating your butt off,
been drinking iodide water and eating MREs.
You need a break.
I opened up that fridge.
I swear to God, there's some people that cried.
I said, everybody gets cold beers.
And that was, I mean, we were running around like kids.
(07:30):
We had our flight suits off and drinking beer.
And that was really, that was a pretty good highlight.
Everybody appreciated that.
Got the motivation and the little esprit de corps going
there and everybody felt pretty good about it.
They really raised morale.
So that was a pretty good deal.
Yeah, and I can tell you that for those of you,
(07:52):
one of the things that JD left out is it was one of those
miracles.
I truly consider it a miracle because like he said,
we had been working in 90,
95 degree heat with almost 100% humidity,
shoveling this volcanic ash was literally like he said,
concrete or wet sand for days and days on end.
And so, and we hadn't had showers,
(08:14):
we didn't have running water.
And the day that JD cracked open that refrigerator,
it started to rain for the first time in weeks.
Oh, that's right, yeah.
Yeah, and so we were all out there to his point,
we stripped down to like our boxers and we were having our
first shower and two cold beers and it was like flipping
(08:35):
heaven.
It was awesome.
somebody somebody got a soap bar was passing around a bar
of soap.
Yep, I remember.
I've got pictures of it.
But the point I wanted to make is, JD,
I think that was a great example of your leadership on
really thinking outside of the box to take care of the
(08:56):
troops.
And that's one of the things that you did through the
career that when you and I served together,
you always looked out for the troops.
And you always had that kind of mindset that you would
take, you know, we had to accomplish the mission,
but take care of the troops.
I'd like to ask you,
what advice would you give to young leaders or even
(09:16):
experienced leaders on how to keep that mindset of taking
care of other people?
And you truly, you loved people, right?
You were a happy go lucky guy.
You were the you were the upbeat guy.
We were in some pretty bad situations on a number of
occasions.
And this,
this is a great example of you just being the light in the
darkness.
(09:36):
But what advice would you give to leaders that are out
there wanting to be,
be as successful as you were in every area of your life by
taking care of the people that they're working with,
working for and working for them.
Well, thank you for that.
Thank you for that vote of confidence.
Louie, the biggest thing,
and I carried this on into American Airlines and I used to
(09:57):
talk to people about it there too,
is I always looked at it as, if it was me right now, okay,
I'm referring myself to one of the troops, right?
If it was me right now, what would I be expecting?
What would I want?
What would I want to get?
Where would I want to be at this situation if I was one of
the troops?
And I always kind of geared myself towards that.
(10:17):
Like you said, we land somewhere.
We're on a weekend trip, boondoggle somewhere.
First thing is like,
let's get the troops somewhere to live.
Let's get them something to eat.
Because at that moment, I know if it was me flying all day,
I'm tired.
I want to get this uniform off.
I want to take a shower.
I want to get something to eat and a cold beer.
So that was always my thought was, if I was in their shoes,
(10:38):
what would I expect?
What would I want right now?
And that's how I always geared myself.
As in American Airlines,
same thing with people in the back of the aircraft.
And we got delay.
We got a maintenance delay.
We got a weather delay.
I'd always sit there and think,
if I was in the back right now, what do I want to hear?
What do I want to know about the situation?
So I always geared myself towards that lowest common
(10:59):
denominator of information.
I'm not going to change anything.
We're delayed for two hours on the ramp,
but the people in the back want to know what's going on.
That's all they want to know.
And I'd always geared myself towards that.
And the Marine Corps was always the same thing.
What would I want to know?
What would I want?
What would I expect out of this situation?
And I think that's one thing I think,
as you've seen before in your business, your world,
(11:22):
leaders at a time, they forget.
They forget who they're working for.
And I think that's the problem.
You gotta put yourself on the other end of it and go,
who works for me?
Who am I working with?
What do we all want out of this?
And that's how I geared it, basically.
It's pretty simple.
Well,
but that's really profound wisdom and a couple of golden
(11:43):
nuggets that you dropped there.
And I want to reiterate that for our listeners and
viewers.
That is you think from the other person's perspective,
that, that,
that was really profoundly wise from somebody so as young
as you were early on in your career.
And the other thing is, is that what that information,
sharing information is very powerful because well,
(12:05):
there's a lot of people that will hoard information
thinking that it's going to, they're going to hold power.
But when you share that information,
everybody's on the same team with the same information,
but it's faster to get to that.
Even like you said, when you're on the ramp delayed this,
you share that information.
You want to get to your destination as bad as they do.
And now everybody's in the same boat.
(12:25):
I'd like you to share another story when you were on final
approach,
you were a captain for American Airlines and so that which
means you're in charge of the aircraft.
And if you could tell us the story of what happened when
you're a co-pilot and you had an incident on your final
approach.
One thing I want to say about that, well,
that mindset here ahead of time is I've always used this
(12:48):
term and my family will laugh at me,
but I've incorporated it probably since college days,
maybe even high school.
I always say,
I just said it to a friend of mine here recently, I said,
having fun is my best revenge.
Shave my head and send me to Okinawa, guess what?
I'm going to have some fun.
That's just the way it's, you know,
otherwise I'm just going to mope around and feel like
crap.
Anyway, yeah, I was flying with this co-pilot.
(13:10):
We flew five days in a row.
And I say that because he was away from his family for five
days at that time.
We flew a three-day trip, he stayed at a hotel,
and then we flew a two-day trip.
And of course I went home because he doesn't live in Dallas
and I did.
So he was away from home for five days.
So we're doing one leg from Dallas to Albuquerque,
(13:31):
and then we're going to turn around and fly back home.
And that was going to be the end of our five-day sequence.
So we take off out of Dallas, he's flying,
and the people I don't know,
and I'm surprised how many people really don't,
they think a captain flies every leg and the co-pilot's
just there to assist.
I tell my friends, I go, no, usually you trade off.
I'll fly one leg, you fly back.
(13:51):
Or I'll fly two legs today, we got two legs tomorrow,
you fly tomorrow.
It's pretty much a 50-50 swap of flying.
So Mike's flying over to Albuquerque,
and my plan is to fly back.
So we have lunch on the way over,
flight attendants serve lunch.
I didn't have anything to eat, he did.
And so he's flying, and most guys like I do,
and I can't speak for every pilot, below about 2,000 feet,
(14:15):
I kick off the autopilot.
You hand fly it, you get a feel of the airplane,
what the winds are doing to you,
and everything for the final approach.
At American Airlines,
you got to have everything done by 1,000 feet,
generally speaking. Flaps down, gear down, you're on speed,
you're basically ready to land,
you're just flying the approach in.
That's by 1,000 feet.
So Mike's doing his checklist, and I'm the radio operator,
(14:38):
and I'm the checklist guy.
So he's flying.
And he says, you know, gear down, flaps three, and so by,
it was around 1,300 feet, maybe.
He says, looks at it, and my call is,
landing check's complete.
So we're ready to land.
And then as a 737 captain,
I've got a heads-up display in front of me.
(14:59):
So I look into the heads-up display,
it tells me everything.
It tells me our azimuths, our speed, our altitude.
You don't have to look at all the instruments.
It's one focus,
and you look through the hood to the runway.
So it's one visual perception of everything you need to
know.
So I'm just focused on that.
And all of a sudden, I want to say maybe 1,200, 1,100 feet,
because it wasn't long after I said landing check was
(15:19):
complete.
The airplane goes, does a hard right bank.
And I grab the yoke and straighten it out,
and I'm looking over at Mike, and he's leaning over,
and it looks like he's reaching for something.
So I'm hitting him on the shoulder.
I feel bad about that now, but I'm hitting on the shoulder.
I'm going, Mike, Mike, what are you doing?
And he's not responding.
I'm going, Mike, and you got to understand, we're 1,000
(15:43):
feet headed towards the dirt at 180 miles an hour.
And I grab him, and I kind of turn him, and he turns to me,
and he's out.
I think he's just passed out.
I didn't know what happened.
I thought maybe it was something he ate for lunch.
I didn't know.
So I was like, oh, it kind of shocked me.
I was like, oh, crap.
And I kind of lost focus.
(16:03):
I got him on the yoke.
And of course, I let him go kind of out of shock,
and he fell back over on the controls, and we banked again.
I was like, crap.
So I grabbed the yoke, pulled it back over,
and I got to get him.
He was a 6'4", about 240, big boy.
So I reached over, pushed him back,
and then we got shoulder harness lock that locks your seat
belt and your shoulder harness so you can't move forward.
(16:25):
So I lock that.
So now Mike is, he's in position.
He's not going to fall on the controls anymore.
And if anybody ever saw the movie with Sully on The Miracle
on the Hudson, he says in that movie,
when everybody was making that turn to land after the bird
strike and they all made it to the runway,
they wanted to nail him for not making it to the runway.
He made a bad choice.
(16:46):
And Sully says, wait 30 seconds and then do that,
because that's how long it takes you in your head to go,
what happened?
What do I have here?
OK, what do I have to do next?
It takes you that long to realize what happened.
And so it did.
It took me a few seconds and I went, whoa, OK, wow.
All right, I got to get Mike to medical.
(17:08):
I thought about going around, but around Albuquerque,
there's 12,000 foot mountains.
So I would have had to clear those first to get focused on
getting him medical attention.
We have defibrillators.
We got oxygen in the aircraft.
We could have done the flight attendants are trained on
both of those,
but that's going to take too long to get him medical help.
So I just continued on.
Declared an emergency, landed on the runway and told him,
(17:31):
you know, the medical emergency was one of the pilots.
I didn't want to give out too much information over the air
at the moment.
So the controller was very good.
He goes, everybody's out of your way.
Clear Bravo One is your gate.
That's okay.
So we come in and pulled off at the end of the runway.
And I got to tell you this,
and I've talked to Check Airmen and American Airlines about
this extensively afterwards.
(17:54):
And one thing is you don't realize all these years you fly
and you've got two people in the cockpit doing stuff.
When you land, everybody has duties to do,
get the flaps up, do this, do that, change radios,
turn this on, turn that off.
All of a sudden, I'm doing it all.
And it was a handful.
I got to tell you that.
It doesn't sound like it.
Some pilots go, ah, that's not big.
(18:15):
Well, you never flew an airplane by yourself.
So it is quite a change.
So I'm getting all that done, trying to talk to ground,
trying to get to my clearance,
trying to tell the flight attendants what's going on so
that they know,
because at this point they don't know what's going on.
So I briefed them and I said, hey, as soon as we land,
I mean, as soon as we get to the gate,
get the oxygen and defibrillator up here,
Mike has passed out.
(18:36):
That's all I told him.
And I went to the ground, told the people, hey,
when we get to the gate,
we've got emergency in the cockpit, stay seated.
We'll take care of you later.
So we go wheeling up there and there was no medical.
Sometimes you always see ambulance down by the gate or
something.
There was nothing there.
I'm just a ground guy ready to wave me in them.
So I get on the ground and I said, hey,
where the heck's the medical?
(18:57):
I got mercy here.
They're waiting on the jet bridge for you.
Okay.
So we wheel in and they opened the door and the flight
attendant comes in right away.
She's got the defibrillator, she's got the oxygen.
And she said, should I put this on Mike?
And I look over and he's leaning towards me and he's just
blue.
I mean, he's got drool and everything.
(19:17):
And I didn't know this before,
but I guess when you pass your body, everything left loose.
So he's a mess.
And the thing I didn't know either is when I was coming
down for the final descent, he,
I heard them like a big exhale.
So I thought he was still alive.
I thought he was just breathing.
I didn't know that was his last breath.
So I learned something that day too.
(19:39):
So we can wheel on in.
They get a couple of medical guys in there, big guys.
They lift the shoulders.
I get in front of them,
squeeze in there and I lift his legs.
I'd say he's about 240.
He's a big boy.
And we take him up the jet bridge and they put them up
there and they start working on them.
And that's what I told.
We talked to the Check Airmen about this in American
Airlines.
That's when my job really got exciting.
Like you talked about as far as leadership.
(20:01):
I have flight attendants to control.
They're getting a little bit edgy.
I've got passengers.
I wanna know what's going on.
I gotta get off.
I wanna get, go.
And I've got the station operations chief on the airplane
asking me questions.
I've got our American Airlines chief asking me questions.
I got a call back to dispatch and let them know this
(20:22):
flight's not going back.
I gotta let American Airlines chief pilot know that we got
a problem here with one of the pilots.
All this stuff going on.
And then to top it off after it was all over,
I got the New Mexico state police and coroner wanna ask me
questions cause somebody died on a New Mexico soil.
(20:42):
So it was just a lot going on.
And that's what we talked about with the leadership role
was that was all on me.
I had to take care of all those things and get them done.
And the biggest, I told you this before, Louie,
the biggest compliment when this was all done was the
flight attendant came up and I've answered all these
(21:04):
questions.
I've made the calls.
I'm trying to get the aircraft moved or something where I
can get the people off.
Cause they got things to do.
I'm trying to take care of them cause until they are off
the airplane, they're my responsibility.
So I'm ask can we move the airplane to another gate?
No,
because your gates are fixed and they're on the jet bridge.
You can't move the jet bridge.
(21:25):
Okay.
Can we take people off the back door with air stairs?
No, we don't want them walking on the ramp.
And so I'm always trying to get them off on their way.
We have another crew that was deadheading, 737 crew.
I even called dispatch and I said, hey,
can that captain and co-pilot come up here?
Can they move the airplane?
No,
it's your airplane until the emergency is over and you hand
(21:46):
over the log book to maintenance.
It's nobody else can get up in the cockpit.
So, and with that said, one thing they had on the news,
one of the ladies was interviewed from ABC news.
She said the captain kept his composure.
He kept things under control.
He seemed to be caring about the situation overall,
(22:06):
but he seemed to care about us.
One of his base concerns was taking care of us.
That's what a leader does, right?
I told you before, if I was in the back,
what would I want to do?
I want to get off.
You know, regardless of what's going on,
I got places I want to go.
So I was trying to do that.
And then when it was all said and done,
it was pretty hectic, but it all worked out.
And that's one thing I told the...
(22:27):
Uh, check airmen, I said,
one thing you don't realize is when the situation was out
of my hands, IE Mike was up the jet bridge,
the EMS were working on.
They're doing the CPR and all that.
He was out of my hands,
but I still had all this to take care of, you know,
calling all the people and calling.
And I said, we don't ever teach that.
(22:47):
And I briefed you on this before when American Airlines,
when you'd make captain, you go to,
we call it charm school.
It's four days of how to be a captain.
You go to the schoolhouse.
They teach you all your assets.
They teach you what's available to you,
how to get a hold of dispatch, how to get a hold of loads,
what they teach you basically what a captain needs to know
to be a captain.
And then, um, I told him, I said,
(23:07):
one thing he didn't brief me was of an emergency like this,
all the stuff you have to do and all the things you have to
know,
I didn't know that like FAA will try to send somebody if
they have them available,
they'll send them to the airplane and say, Hey,
I'm here to take the log book, you know, no.
American Airlines is the only American online personnel.
The only ones can take that log book after an emergency and
(23:29):
some of those things they have incorporated into, uh, new,
uh, new captain training.
So.
So, so I want for our listeners, first off,
thanks for sharing that story, JD,
I want our listeners to pick up on a couple things that
JD's been saying throughout our conversation so far.
One is he said, I learned, I learned, I learned,
he's constantly learning, even as a captain,
(23:52):
he was learning new things.
The other thing that I really appreciate for those of you
that are leaders, excuse me, I'm a big,
big advocate of processes.
And so what JD did was he went back to the,
to the leadership and the trainers of captains and said,
Hey, look, there's things that we're missing.
Now,
their process is better because JD went through this experience.
(24:15):
And now,
other pilots are now being a captain specifically are being
trained on what could happen.
And when it does,
what are the protocols and what are the proper procedures.
I have a couple of questions for you, JD.
One of them is on final approach when you know you're at
about 1300 feet and Mike literally dies next to you.
(24:36):
He died.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Unfortunately,
what did you do or what were your thoughts that,
or maybe what was your awareness around keeping your
composure as being the only guy now to land the plane to
your point, you're going to have to turn up,
turn everything off and on and control the flaps and the
(24:57):
slats and all that kind of stuff.
The landing gear.
What would you share with leaders when, again, when,
when it's all going sideways,
what did you do or what had you done in the past,
maybe to prepare you to be calm in that situation.
Um,
but I told you one time before back 30 years prior in the
(25:19):
Marine Corps,
I was doing a check ride become aircraft commander in the
CH 53 and my check airmen of Marine major,
we came on a turn and we were getting vectored somewhere
and he just faked it, but he slumped over on the controls.
He basically pretended he had just passed out and or died
or and or in a combat situation.
(25:40):
He had just gotten shot.
That was his his sign to me of, Hey, you got it.
What are you gonna do now?
Your co-pilot's dead.
What are you gonna do?
And so we handled it then.
But here we are 30 years 30 years later,
that same exact thing only for real actually happened to
me.
So you know, you talk about as a leader,
(26:03):
dwell or don't dwell on the situation at hand.
I think I mean, it happened.
Okay, what's got to come next?
I can't dwell on Mike.
You know,
I've got 150 people in the back counting on me to do it
right.
I don't do it perfect, but I gotta do it right.
And so okay.
All right.
That's why I say when it takes about 30 seconds, you go.
Okay, okay.
What?
(26:23):
And my next thought was after I got over,
this is my situation.
Okay, this is what I have.
What do I have to do next?
Think of what I have to do next.
What's the next step to get this situation handled properly
to a good conclusion?
And that's what that was my thought the whole time is that
moment right there.
And then the next thing I did, you make the call to tower,
(26:44):
declare an emergency, tell them what you got.
And then you just focus on what do I have to do?
What's the next step to make this happen?
And I have seen people in the past,
something like that happens.
Maybe not that degree,
but just a bad situation at your work or whatever you can't
focus.
I want to say what do you have to do next to correct the
problem?
That's I think that's the best thing.
(27:05):
A leadership is you can't somebody throws a pie in your
face.
You can't go.
What the heck is that?
You got to clear your eyes out and go for the next move.
You know, that's just what you got to do.
That's that's really great wisdom and you're absolutely
right I think we all tend to focus on what the the negative
of what just went sideways or south sometimes Yeah,
(27:28):
you said something in there that that coach of mine has
shared with me She phrases it a little differently But done
is better than perfect and you said I got to get it right
but I don't have to get it perfect and so that's very
powerful for leaders to know because often we're fear will
keep us from taking action right because we're afraid We're
(27:50):
gonna make a wrong move or do something but getting
something done and it's crazy.
It's funny to me I said something something to somebody
recently and they And they and it shut them up and they
were they were complaining about how hard or how difficult
was something was and I said Look, nobody's shooting at us.
This isn't hard.
(28:11):
Yeah It's it's all a perspective thing,
but nobody's shooting at us And I and I think that you and
I think that you're again I want something that JD shared.
That's just great wisdom is that it's we can accomplish
anything one step at a time So your team can accomplish
what something once and I want you also to hear again what
he said in the middle of this major crisis and he he was I
(28:35):
think if if I remember correctly you got an award didn't
you some sort of award from American Airlines?
Yes.
Yeah,
and so he was he was awarded for his bravery and courage
and composure in the middle of all this.
But,
he said it again in the middle of all this he was thinking
about everybody else.
He was still looking out for the team He was still looking
out for the passengers the flight attendants.
(28:57):
He was still looking out for the rest of the team So you
can maintain your composure take one step at a time and
still be taking care of the team and that's one of the
reasons why I wanted to have you out of your JD because
those are powerful lessons and to my point about that I
made to somebody you were landing an airliner with 150
(29:19):
passengers plus the crew and it all hung on you, r
ight? If you'd have lost your composure,
like I said at the beginning of this it would have been
catastrophic you to come out It would yeah,
it could everybody could have been lost instead of just
Mike your co-pilot though everybody on board could have
been lost
Yeah.
You know,
the thing that I said to the station manager there at
(29:42):
Albuquerque, after everything was said and done,
I told you, I was talking to the station manager.
I had the state police chief there, and I had the corner,
the state corner there.
And the, the administrator there, he says, wow, this,
this was awful.
This is, this is just terrible.
And I said, could have been a lot worse.
And like you said, you know, don't focus on this.
(30:04):
It could have been a lot worse.
We, we got it done.
And everything I told him, I said, yeah, Mike, Mike,
it was Mike's time.
If you want to say that,
but my biggest accomplishment that I took warmth with on
that day was everybody went home.
Everybody went home.
That was supposed to,
and I had a friend of mine after that.
He said, you know,
(30:25):
people say that all the time when your general sense and
your, a friend dies or a family member dies or, you know,
something happens.
You see it on the news and he goes, well, it was his time.
And people have always said, well,
if I'm in the back of an airplane and it's the pilot's
time, what do we do then?
And my good friend of mine, he says, well,
(30:45):
JD just shows you what happens.
So that made me feel pretty good, but.
Yeah, you just don't have hope.
It's not both pilots time.
Exactly.
Exactly.
I'd like to, I'd like to, uh,
stress something else that JD just said that's very
powerful as well is, um,
(31:05):
I as well survived the helicopter crash.
And so one of the things that we have is these procedures
and processes in our businesses and, and,
and even in our personal lives,
and one of the things that J did JD did was when,
when it's all this started to happen,
he just snapped into what he had done over and over again,
(31:26):
because he didn't have somebody else reading the checklist.
He knew it mentally so that he could take those actions
without the assistance of his co-pilot.
And so this is why it's so important to have processes and
make those become habits,
because it was the same thing when, when Bill Nurbin and,
and, uh,
more heart and myself went and we had troops on board and
(31:47):
it was the same thing, it was none of our time, right?
We all walked away from it, but it was a horrific crash.
But one of the things that helped save us was Bill Nurbin
and I going through the crash procedures and knowing those
processes, much like you on final approach,
you had done it so many times.
It really, that was, that was probably the easy,
(32:07):
and I'd like you to answer that.
Was that the easiest thing in the middle of all this?
Um, I'll tell you what,
I don't know about easy and you know, there's probably,
you can explain after your own, uh,
incident when it's all said and done, you go, wow,
you know, I don't,
I don't remember thinking about it as much as just doing
it, just doing it.
(32:28):
Like you said, just doing it, getting it done.
And then when you're all done and you're at the hotel that
night and you're going, whoa.
And then you think about it, you go, wow.
I, wow, I got that done.
I got that done.
I got,
cause I was going through the process because I knew the
FAA I was going to go through a board.
They're going to have questions and answers to find out
just like Sully, if I did it right, you know,
(32:49):
so I was going through everything in my head and I was
like, okay, I did that right.
I did that right.
I did that right.
You know, and I, and then when you go through all those,
you go, wow, it just seems like it just went,
I don't remember doing it necessarily, all of them,
but they all got done and it's like you said, it's, it's,
uh, it's just,
and that's the thing as the captain of American Airlines
and all my captain friends will tell you the responsibility
(33:09):
is you. You're in charge.
You've got a co-pilot very well versed, very well trained,
but you're there to make the decisions you're there to make
sure everything.
And when I went from co-pilot to captain,
I couldn't believe the responsibility it was put on my
shoulders.
It was amazing.
And so you behoove yourself to learn it, to know it,
(33:30):
and be the one that has the answers and for that incident,
the, it all came,
it all came to me and it worked out as planned as far as
our training.
American Airlines is one of the best training programs
around.
And I always,
I went there to their training department and thanked them
very much for the way they run our show.
So yeah, it worked out pretty well.
(33:51):
Yeah.
And again, and I'd like to stress one more time that again,
JD mentioned, he learned, he learned the process,
he learned what he had to learn to be,
to take on that responsibility of being a captain.
And so I would challenge listeners,
what do you need to learn?
What do you need to learn to be a better leader?
What do you need to be learned to be a better salesperson
or a better marketer, a better time management person,
(34:15):
a better person personally?
What do you need to learn?
I think learning is a very, very powerful tool.
And one of the things I recommend to people,
I read every day,
and I'm going to read every day to the day I die,
because there's so much out there and so much information.
But when you learned everything you needed to learn to be
the captain,
because you realize the responsibility that I put on your
(34:37):
shoulders.
And before we go, JD,
is there anything else you'd like to tell our listeners
about leadership and love?
Because I think again, and I just want to say this,
so everybody gets it.
This is really what I want corporate America to be doing is
leading like JD did and does continually.
He leads like this in his personal life.
(34:58):
I was honored and humbled again to be at his retirement
party for American Airlines.
And I can tell you that your leadership style and your
friendship and your connection to people came from all over
the country to congregate in Kentucky for JD's retirement
party from American Airlines.
(35:19):
It was a lot of fun.
But again,
that's the power of the kind of leader you are that people
would follow you, right?
And that's who we want to be as leaders,
the people around us follow us and you continue to do it
even though you're retired.
So do you have any final comments or advice,
wisdom for leaders?
Well, thank you very much for that, Louie.
(35:40):
And, you know, I told you before,
I was pretty humbled with some of the people that showed up
for the retirement party.
That really touched my heart.
But here's a simple thing.
And I even had other fellow pilots that are good friends of
mine kind of go, ah, J.D.
Well, American Airlines, when I first started,
you had to wear your coat, you had to wear your hat,
you had to wear polished shoes, you know, all that.
(36:03):
And as the years went on with the way our society has kind
of lost some of the flair of, let's say,
of dressing properly, they got where they told,
you don't have to, the hat was optional.
You don't have to wear a hat, as a captain.
And then they said, if it's too warm,
you don't have to wear a jacket.
You know, so we got guys running around, you can see them,
(36:24):
anybody that goes to the airport,
you can see them every day.
You got a captain walking around,
and he's got his tie loose, no jacket, no hat, you know.
And one thing I did all the time,
and I got compliments from this,
and I had quite a few people say,
that's what we want to see.
I always wear my jacket, always had my tie up,
(36:45):
always wear a hat, always had polished shoes,
always had a clean uniform.
Everywhere I went, I wore the jacket and the hat.
And people with some of my buddies would go, you know,
you don't have to do that.
Well, to me, that's part of leadership.
I'm setting the example.
This is what, and I've had customers come off the airplane,
tell me, you are the captain I want to see up there.
(37:07):
Because they saw me, come on.
And when I say goodbye to them, I put my hat on,
and I'm professional, and I say, thanks for flying with us.
I can't tell you how many people got off the airplane
saying, that's the captain I want to see up front.
So I'm setting the example, and hopefully at that moment,
my co-pilot hears that, he's going, ah, okay,
that's one step I need to take, you know,
when he makes captain.
(37:28):
So that was always,
I've had people in the hallway at the terminal come up and
go, you look like a real captain.
Just out of the blue, I'm just walking to the airplane.
But that's what they,
because they see the other captains or whatever,
and they go, okay,
then they see somebody that is actually dressed the part,
and I'm respecting the position.
I always tell my buddies, all the work I did to get here,
(37:50):
all the tests, all the hoops I had to jump through,
to get here, I'm showing respect for this position.
And that's why I did it.
So hopefully my co-pilot sees that, and when he's captain,
he'll do the same thing, or she'll do the same thing.
That's one reason why I did it.
And I've got very good, excuse me, response from that.
And that was one reason I did it, to set the example.
(38:11):
I think leaders need to set the example.
And you know, when you throw in the Marine Corps,
if I don't, oh, it's another thing as a leader.
If I wasn't gonna do it, I wasn't gonna ask you to do it.
You need to make sure your people know that if you're
asking to do it, I'd be more than happy to do it myself.
So that was a big thing.
So J.D., I just for our listeners,
(38:34):
he just dropped two more golden nuggets.
And I'm serious, man, you have such wisdom.
And so one of them is it's attention to detail, right?
Those little things matter.
The fact that your shoes are shined matters.
It makes a difference.
The fact that your tie is up and tightened around your
collar the way it's supposed to be makes a difference.
But when you pay attention to the little things,
(38:55):
the big things take care of themselves.
I tell that to people all the time,
you've got to take care of the little things.
And those little things create the discipline, right?
It's easy to not shine your shoes.
It's easy to not wear your hat.
It's easy to throw your sport coat or your coat over.
And the second golden nugget he just shared here was the
respect the position.
I'm a professional speaker.
(39:16):
Every time I step on stage, I'm in a suit and tie.
I respect that I've got that privilege.
I've been trusted with your attention, your time.
And I see a lot of speakers that they'll,
they'll step on stage.
And I'm thinking, are you kidding me?
They're in blue jeans and a t-shirt, right?
They need a haircut.
They're overweight.
They're what all these things.
(39:38):
I'm thinking you're not respecting not only yourself in the
position,
but those that you showed up to lead these people.
And that that's the best you got is a jeans and a t-shirt?
So that I, and I've never heard anybody say it that way.
And that, and it's a funny thing, right?
JD, when, when you respected the position,
you were busy respecting yourself.
And what did it get you?
(39:59):
It got you respect.
There's a lot of people without a doubt,
because in a lot of that,
I was around you long enough to know,
I know your demeanor and your behavior and your mannerisms
and you carried yourself like a professional, all the time,
even when you were busy being fun, you were that guy.
(40:19):
And so that makes a difference.
And people all the time are craving respect,
but they're not doing the things that to get that respect
and they're not giving that respect.
And so I'm going to ask one more time, cause that was just,
that was powerful.
Is there anything else you'd like to add before we go?
Well, we talked about the people that work for you, right?
(40:40):
And I thought, I just thought about this.
I grew up, and as a co-pilot,
I watched the captain all the time.
And I learned things, okay, I'm never gonna do that.
Or, ooh, I gotta make sure I put that in my box of tricks.
Make sure I'm gonna do that, okay?
And I brought my kids up the same way.
They go, dad, you got that Marine Corps discipline.
Yeah, you're so hard ass.
(41:00):
I go, okay, well, this is my first time being a dad.
So if you don't like what I do, don't do that to your kids.
If you like what I do, put in your memory banks,
make sure you do that with your kids.
So I learned things with the flight attendants that some
captains in my predecessors did, and I went, ooh,
I would never do that.
And I learned that and kept that in my mind.
So I always had respect for the flight attendants and their
(41:21):
position and their job and what's required of them.
And I reflected that.
And again,
I got compliments from many flight attendants that said,
geez, I just love the way you run the show.
I love the way you, because I'm respecting them.
And I walk on board in uniform, dressed,
start to press shirt.
I mean, that's the way I always came to work.
(41:43):
So like you said, the first thing they see is, oh,
here's a captain that has got his shit together.
So immediately, their reflection,
or their impression to me is, okay,
this is a captain that he's got it going on.
And that's what I want to bring forth when I first walk on
the airplane.
So it worked out pretty good that way.
And so I did it for those reasons.
And like you said, the ultimate was respect the position.
(42:04):
And everybody else will respect the position too.
So.
And one of the things and I want I wanted this to be really
clear for everybody because JD was this great leader,
but he was also this great personality You don't have to be
a jerk or a hard guy or mean to be a great leader He was he
was respected and admired,
(42:25):
but he also showed up as this guy that cared and he's
talked about that through this whole whole conversation so
you can have and that's one of the reasons why I started
this podcast.
I want people to understand you can lead with love and JD, y
ou're just a living breathing example of that
Thank you, Lou.
I'm just glad to be here.
I really appreciate your confidence in me.
Thanks again for joining us and listening to this episode
(42:48):
of Leadership and Love.
I would like to challenge you to ask yourself,
what's one thing that you heard today that you can
implement immediately to improve your leadership and
accelerate your growth?
If you've gotten value out of this episode or learned
something that you can implement today,
we'd ask that you please share it with those that you care
(43:09):
about.
Our goal is to create more leaders who are leading with
love.
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