On this episode of The First Responder Playbook, we flipped the script as Sergeant V interviewed me about my journey into law enforcement, why I started this podcast, and the ups and downs of my career. From humble beginnings as a dispatcher, through leadership roles, detours, and hard lessons learned, we dove into the importance of owning your mistakes, embracing growth, and mentoring the next generation. Whether you’re a first responder or just looking for leadership wisdom, this episode is packed with practical takeaways and real talk about what it takes to serve and lead.
Want to be a guest on The First Responder Playbook: Insights on Leadership and Training? Send Brent Colbert a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/1748037097521814b71b1b454
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Episode Transcript
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(00:02):
Guys, welcome to the first responder playbook. We're gonna flip the script today.
I've got Sergeant V back with me, and I'm gonna let him interview
me today, and we're going to talk about, you know, the reasons
I started the podcast I got in law enforcement and how my career
has progressed. So, Sergeant V, you're the interviewer. Let's get it
started. Yeah. I've really enjoyed your
(00:24):
podcast, and I just thought it was appropriate that
your audience finally get to know who is
Brent, right? What. What makes Brent
tick. And so there's an old quote. It started, it was very famous
among the military, but it's kind of spiral from there, and I've heard a lot
of other famous people say it, and it's, if not me,
(00:47):
then who? If not now, then when?
So that's my question for you. When you first started law enforcement,
when you first had that little glimpse of an idea that, you know what? Maybe
I want to pursue law enforcement, what made you say,
if not me, then who? You know,
I really never wanted to be in law enforcement. I grew up around
(01:10):
it. And I always say there's two kinds of cop kids. The ones that go
out and do stupid stuff, and the ones that do, you know, kind of lay
low. And I was the one that laid low, but I still never had any
interest in it. It's just not what I wanted to do. I always respected the
profession, but I want to be a meteorologist.
And so I love the weather still to this day.
(01:31):
But my dad was a sheriff my last semester of college,
and he's like, hey, just come do a ride along with one of my deputies.
And, you know, I finally did. And it was one of those days that, like,
we ran call to call to call and, like, took three people to jail.
And I was like, man, this is fun. And then he's like, all right, now
it's time to do the paperwork. And that wasn't very fun. But
(01:53):
I realized then that, like, that's a necessary
part of the job. And so it didn't scare me away,
and I was hooked. And
so I. I dispatched for quite a few years, four or five years,
until my first police job, you know, and
(02:14):
my why was I wanted to serve my hometown.
I finally decided to get myself certified
through what they call a COPS program in Oklahoma, and that was basically
through a college. And I had already had my
bachelor's degree, so, like, I really didn't gain
(02:36):
anything out of it other than getting certified. I got an
associate's degree after my Bachelor's degree.
Yeah. So, I mean, like I did for, you know, somebody that's never been to
college, though, you would go through the process of getting your associates and then your
bachelor's along with getting certified. But I already have my bachelor's,
so I actually got an associates in criminal justice after already
(02:59):
having my bachelor's degree, which I kind of chuckle at now. You know, I'm
working on my doctorate and I. I wanted to serve my
hometown. The pay stuff, the equipment sucked.
But I got a lot of good hands on police experience,
and I learned how to talk to people very
(03:19):
quickly. I'll never forget, and I use this as a
training example of I let somebody get one over on me.
And you think, why would you
admit that you let somebody get one over on you?
Because it happened. And I'm not going to shy away from it.
(03:39):
I'll never forget, I was running stationary radar. The guy was
doing like 15 over in a residential neighborhood. And I stopped him
and he just started, you know, tearing into me. And I was
maybe, God, four or five months into being a
cop. And he's like, you guys are worthless. You're out here. That's all you're doing,
stopping cars in the neighborhood. And I said, yeah, because you're doing 15 over,
(04:03):
you know, like it's a residential neighborhood. Anyways, he refused to sign
the ticket. And my. Finally a partner of mine showed up and,
you know, I could. He was kind of a veteran cop, and I still talk
to this day, but he's kind of cracking his knuckles behind, you know, my
peripheral vision, and guys like, I'm not signing the effing ticket.
And I'm like, man, you're gonna go to jail and you're gonna get drug out
(04:23):
that window and you're not gonna like it. And he finally signed the ticket.
But looking back on it, I let it drag out way too long.
And he should have went to jail. I mean, I let him get way
above what his peace was in, but it was
because I wasn't confident in my abilities yet. You know,
that's frustrating when that happens. But at least you learn from it and you could
(04:45):
admit that you learned from it. That's the important thing, right?
Absolutely. And that's why I. I try to self reflect often
because it happened. I'm not going to shy away from it. And
since then, no one's got one over on me like that, you know.
But if I don't learn from that mistake, do I stay in law
(05:06):
enforcement this long? Do I. Do I let it Affect me so much that
I get out of the career. And now that I'm in more of a training
role, I can tell these other people, like, hey,
this happened. Don't let it happen to you. Learn from what I did
wrong and apply it to your career. And
don't repeat my mistake I made. It wasn't a
(05:28):
career defining mistake because God helped me. Every officer out there has
probably done something stupid or just as worse in
their career, but I'm willing to admit it and say, hey,
I messed up and I learned from it. That's one thing that
I've seen get a lot of officers not just in trouble, but even fired.
And they've lost their certification because they can't admit when they make mistakes.
(05:50):
So that's a, an honorable trait. So I want to take you
back to before when you mentioned that you went on that ride
along and it was about four years that you spent in dispatch before actually
making the decision to, all right, now I'm going to get out on the street.
What was it about that timing that made you finally make that move?
I don't think it was voluntary. Like, I was trying actively to get hired
(06:13):
on. Okay. But when your dad's an elected official, sometimes
people may not like him or, you know, may have a preconceived notion about
him or. And for whatever reason, like, I wasn't trying
to at the time. I was trying to apply just for bigger agencies. And
this was before, like, you know, I was testing
with like 80 something people. So, like, it was still competitive.
(06:35):
And, you know, for whatever reason, that never worked out. But I will
say this, it worked out in a good way because I learned
so much from being a dispatcher. I learned how to talk
to people in their worst moments. I learned how to, you know, do time
management stuff. I learned how to prioritize. And
so while it didn't move as quickly as I wanted it to,
(06:58):
I did benefit from being a dispatcher. And so for that I'm always
grateful. Yeah, there's something to be said about learning how to
communicate over a phone when you can't actually see their body language and
all you have is tone and inflection and the words that they're saying and
to be able to effectively communicate just over the phone. Dispatchers have a heck of
a time and I, I respect them very much for that.
(07:20):
So that's awesome. So what was your, your first promotion
after getting out on the street and making patrol, what was the
first promotion that you went to? Did you get on swad or get promoted like
a corporal or anything like that. So
my first actual. I. I'm not gonna say promotion. I
switched agencies before I had my first promotion. I went
(07:43):
to about the same size town, but it was more
suburban, it was more closer to a metro.
So I did that actually for probably four years as
just a patrolman again. And that was a step up because we had nicer
equipment, we had different style of calls. It
was different people I was interacting with compared to
(08:06):
my hometown. And so we got a lot of
bleed over from Tulsa. And so we would deal with gang bangers, we would deal
with drugs, weapons, vehicle chases, a lot more.
And that made me grow as an officer.
And so then I would say my first true promotion was I was
the public information officer.
(08:29):
I volunteered for that because we were out there
doing cool stuff every night and no one knew. And
you'd get on the local social media sites and, well, they're just hanging out Taco
Bueno all night, or they're hanging out, you know, ihop. And
no one cared to get that information out there enough. And so I
volunteered. And I'll never forget,
(08:52):
I went, I love, I love the guys that sent me,
but they saved 50 bucks. Instead of sending me to the FBI
FBI Leader Tio class, they sent me to a private one.
And literally all I did during that class that week was
watch YouTube videos. He didn't actually get up, make us do practicals.
(09:13):
He did have some good information, but, like actually doing it,
there wasn't any. So I got back and we.
They probably didn't use me for four months. And then they finally called me
one day and said, hey, this illegal marijuana
grow. And it was right after they just legalized medical marijuana in
(09:34):
Oklahoma. They called me and said, hey, this illegal marijuana grow
got robbed and the homeowners got tied up and beaten up.
So I get out there, it's like 95 degrees. It's like
right at like five o' clock news. Every news agency in Tulsa is there.
And they put me looking into the sun. And so, like, I'm
(09:55):
sweating profusely. As you know, I don't have much of a skin
tan. And so I'm just baking in the sun. And
like, yeah, I'll never forget this because I. I still laugh with
her to this day. There's like, you know, mix of female reporters and male
reporters. And this guy asked me, or this female reporter asked me a
question and she says, you know, whatever she asked me, I
(10:18):
said, yes, sir. And so all my trooper
buddies, you know, instantly took Screenshots of that made
memes of the face you. Because I. I made a
smirk, and they're like, this is the face you make when
you call female reporter, sir. And
I learned from that, though. Again, you know, I. I
(10:40):
learned like, hey, sometimes you got to pick where you're going to do your interview
at. And. And so I learned things
not to say, and I
enjoyed that role so much because I was still on
patrol, but I got to dictate what we put out.
And literally, we went from a agency that was,
(11:03):
you know, Maybe posting Happy 4th of July, Merry Christmas on Facebook
to, like, posting almost daily. And, you know, if
somebody did something cool, hey, give me the information on that. Like, hey, if you
need to help find the suspect, give me the information on that. And like, we
were getting the news was calling literally every day, like, hey, can you
talk about this? And, like, we were on the news like, three or four times
(11:25):
a week. And I
feel proud of that because before they weren't doing that,
and, you know, I helped get that off the ground.
And so to this day, like, I'm an advocate for using the media
and working with them and not shying away from them, because
(11:46):
when you try to hide something in the dark, the people are going to instantly
think that you're purposely doing it for bad reasons. But if you're out
there doing good things, people actually want to hear those things
and use the media as a relationship and don't shy
away from it. Yeah, that transparency is really important,
and that PIO fills that spot very well. To be able
(12:09):
to. To actually get the information out there and share it in a. In a
good format where it makes sense and the everyday citizen can see it and say,
okay, yeah, they're actually doing something, as opposed to just seeing an
arrest log with a list of names, date, times, locations, which
doesn't really say much. Yeah, absolutely. I also like
how you got that little trial by fire that very first interview four months
(12:31):
after your training that I don't know if you were
ever an fto, but letting a rookie make a mistake is the best way for
them to learn. You go out there, you get the. The little bit
challenging case, and you let them make a mistake or two so that
you can teach them what's really important and to slow down, pay
attention, and take a little bit more time or control whatever they need
(12:53):
to. To work through it. So that was awesome that you got to experience that.
Absolutely. And like I said, it was literally trial by fire. It was like 95
degrees that day. It Was miserable. Worst interview I've ever done. But I can laugh
at it now. So what was, what was your next
promotion that you got? I got promoted to corporal after that,
which I enjoyed. But again, when I became corporal
(13:14):
later on at another agency, I realized that I
wasn't necessarily. I'm not gonna say I wasn't ready, but I
wasn't put in a position to succeed because they
put me on a shift with another corporal. And so there was always
kind of. That's just how it shook out. There
wasn't enough sergeants to be spread out, and
(13:36):
they didn't want to add another one to our FOP contract. And so we
had two corporals on one shift, and there was a lot of headbutting.
Me and her got along personally, but
at the time, we butted heads a lot because she was a senior
corporal and I was just, you know, know the new corporal at the end of
(13:58):
the day. We had the same rank. There wasn't any such thing as a senior
corporal. But after
I left the agency, we actually ended up getting on very well
because we both admitted, like, hey, we were probably a little bit stupid during that
time, and we didn't. It wasn't a bad relationship by any means while I
was there. But it's hard to grow as a leader when
(14:19):
you're sharing power with somebody at the same rank, you know? Yeah, that's
a challenging spot to get put into unless you sit down and
come up with a good game plan and understand your roles and
how you're going to work them out. And so does everybody else underneath of you
and above that. Yeah, I could see that being a challenge. Anytime that
I had to come over and help another shift, and I was of equal
(14:40):
rank of a supervisor, whether it be sergeant, corporal, or whatnot,
I always made sure to sit down with them and say, hey, this is your
shift. I'm just an extra body. This is what I can offer. If you need
me to step up, take charge for certain things, I will. But, you know,
we need to understand our roles here. And then likewise,
if a supervisor of equal rank came to my shift, we'd sit
(15:03):
down and say, okay, great, this is my shift, I'm going to run it. But
I will ask you to fill certain spots here and there, but you got to
have that open communication. Absolutely.
And I, I, I. What's funny is she actually ended up
promoting up to the ranks. She passed away of cancer about a year ago,
and she actually ended up becoming a captain. And I was never
(15:25):
so happy because we would still keep in touch. And
I, I'll just say it when, when I first started there, she wasn't happy there,
but she had a kid and she wanted to.
We finally had a change of leadership and
once she moved up a little bit to sergeant, she
(15:47):
excelled. And then she became captain and
she was like doing great. And I was so
happy to hear that. Like, she like took that next step,
like once it was presented to her instead of being, you know, the person that's
unhappy, like she was being the leader and
she did such a good job and you know, unfortunately, cancer is such a dirty
(16:09):
word. I hate that. You know, I don't get to talk
to her anymore. But we had a lot of good memories and
I still think about those quite a bit. It's always nice when
the chessboard finally starts to play out in your favor, whether
that's the administrator or the department as a whole. Right. When.
When things just start to line up and flow smoothly.
(16:32):
That's always a good feeling at a department. Yep. So after that
promotion to corporal, what was your, your next step?
Well, I, I got out of law enforcement during COVID
with everything going on. And like I said, there was just, there was
that us butting head some. Like I was burnt out. I
(16:53):
was about the seven year mark. And I think every
officer gets there to that point and there's like, want to do something different,
you know, I tried going to other agencies and for whatever reason, it didn't work
out at that time. And I took an insurance job during
a pandemic. Terrible idea, guys
again. But I've learned from it because while I failed
(17:15):
at that, on
my rebound, I've started working on my master's degree and I finished that. So now
I'm working on my doctor and I've got a year left in that. I probably
would have never done that if I wouldn't have got out of law enforcement and
failed because it made me push myself in other ways
to show that I'm not a failure, you know. And so
(17:37):
while I, I feel like I am qualified to speak on
advising people like, hey, the grass is always greener over there.
Sometimes even if you fail, you can come back in other ways and excel.
Yeah, the pandemic was hard on a lot of officers. We saw a lot of
turnover as well. That was definitely a difficult time.
(17:59):
When you hit that rock bottom, what was it that
made you decide, you know what, I gotta get back into law
enforcement. That's really where my heart's at.
Not being able to pay my bills, being dead
Serious. It was a terrible time to take a full
(18:20):
commission job during a pandemic. And then, you know, they, they sold
me on the idea of, hey, you're going to be in Tulsa. You know, it's
a good sized metro. They put me in, like, the worst part of
Tulsa to sell insurance. There's more people that didn't have insurance and did,
and it just didn't work out. And so I, I, at the
time, the only thing I really knew that I did well was be a
(18:42):
cop. I didn't hate the job. When I left it, I
wasn't, you know, like, oh, my God, I don't ever want to talk about
police work again. It was just, I was tired of the same thing
over and over again. And so I got back into
it. I, I got on an agency that was growing
Due to the McGirt decision in Oklahoma, you know, that
(19:05):
gave tribal law enforcement a lot of expanded authority.
And I worked my way up there again, and within a year, I was a
corporal again there. So things work out for a
reason. Again,
everybody's gonna have things in their life that don't necessarily work out
exactly how they want to or even if you might fail a little bit, but
(19:27):
you can come back from that. Absolutely.
So what was your, your next one? Was it the
moving into the training division? Yeah, so my next one
was a corporal, and I actually felt like that one a
lot better because I got to supervise my own shift.
I mean, I still had a sergeant above me, but there were, you know,
(19:50):
three or four days a week where he wasn't there. And so, like, I actually
got to run the shift when he wasn't there. And I felt like
that one went a lot better because I got to interact with, you know,
five to seven officers, usually at night. And they were
responsible, you know, they were responsible to me.
And, you know, I got to make decisions and, you know, I got to
(20:12):
learn from the mistakes I did make. And I felt like it went a lot
smoother the second time around. And I actually grew as an officer
because I've had bad supervisor
experiences before, like, of dealing with supervisors.
And I always told myself, I'm not going to be that person. And so
I always just try to treat people how I would want to be treated.
(20:34):
And so, you know, I just, I interacted with
them. I kind of coached him a little bit, like, hey, how's, you know, your
life going? You know, where do you want to be six months from now? On
the job? What, about a year from now? How are you going to get there,
you know, and just actually gave a.
And I felt like it went so much better the second time around.
(20:58):
And then that's when I end up in the training division.
So what made you make the shift from a leadership role to
the training division and coaching and mentoring?
Well, I ran a police academy for six months.
I left again, and I loved it. It
was a blast. The problem is they had me doing a bunch of stuff that
(21:21):
wasn't police academy related. And I'm
not kidding, they had me doing, like, beautician stuff and barbering stuff,
EMT refresher stuff I had no clue about, plus running the
police academy. And my boss,
currently in the training division, called me one day and says, hey, we got a
spot in training division. Would you want to come back? I was like, yeah,
(21:43):
and I love it. You know,
I've got a good boss, I've got a good agency I work for, but we've
got 150 officers that we get to help them get to where they want to
be training wise and growth wise.
And it's always nice to have
the ability to be. Be like, hey, this is like the direction we're going to
(22:05):
go training wise. And my boss is
receptive to new ideas. And, you know, now I'm in
a position where I can kind of mentor these newer officers and say, where
do you want to be, you know, six months from now? Where do you want
to be a year from now? And be open to realizing that,
hey, you know, it might change. You know, you may say, I want to be
(22:25):
a, you know, Dre, because I love getting DUIs right now. Well, a
year from now, as you get more experience, you might realize I really hate DUIs.
Like, I want to go work narcotics or stolen cars or.
And so I get to mentor them and say, hey, like, you're.
You're gonna change over your career. And, you know, like this, if it does
(22:46):
change, this is how we can help you get to where you want to be
now. And so I love the position I'm in now.
I like that. You know, I remember back on my career, early on,
I had a bunch of senior officers telling me I should put in for
detective. And I was trying to head down that
path, and I was interested in it. Wasn't 100 bought in on it,
(23:07):
though. I never did make detective. I found out
that patrol was more suiting for my personality. I like getting out
there, being involved in the chase, being out there on the front lines.
If I had been put in an office and then just called to Come out
to the. To the scene later after all the fun was done. I don't think
that would have suited me. So it was a. It worked out well. And so
(23:28):
I like how you're helping coach and mentor the next generation to see
those benefits. You know, sometimes they think they're heading the right direction, but if
can truly have the right mentoring, we can keep them on track. That's going to
keep them the happiest, hopefully keep them in the field or
in the right path so that they stay in law enforcement. Absolutely.
Absolutely. So now that you're in the training division,
(23:50):
is there any thoughts about what's the next goal?
What's the next mission? What's the next adventure? Yeah, eventually
I would like to be a chief of police somewhere.
You know, we'll. We'll leave that discussion for another time. But, you know, maybe.
Maybe one day soon. But
I really want to, at minimum, leave
(24:13):
where I'm at in a better spot than when I got there. Not
to say my boss did bad before I got there and not saying the person
that would come after me would do terrible. But, you know, when I decide, hey,
I'm done with training, I want somebody to say, hey, they're in a pretty good
spot there. And so that's my goal. I'm focused on right now.
But I did recently take this podcast venture over,
(24:37):
and that's probably my main focus right now is just
growing this brand, this podcast, because
it's another avenue of me being able to mentor and bring training
to other officers because they don't have to be there in person.
They can watch it in a video form. And yourself,
Jeff Johnsgaard, Dan Frazier, so many other great
(25:00):
guests, even ones that are not in law enforcement, that just do
leadership things. And
podcasting is frustrating because it doesn't grow as fast as you want it to.
And I have to stop and remind myself, you know, I'll get like,
20 views or 20 downloads. And,
you know, I have this sneaking suspicion in a couple years when it does start
(25:23):
really taking off, people are gonna come back and be like, man, you had some
really good guests early on. And because I'm
blessed to be able to have all these great views that people
that I probably consider smarter than me that actually have, like
yourself and Jeff Johnsgaard and Dan Frazier, like, you guys have doctorates in,
like, actuality, like, real life doctorates and
(25:45):
knowledge. Like, I got a piece of paper when I finish mine up,
and. And that's cool. But you
guys have such a way of delivering your message, which is just as important
of having that knowledge. And, like, people can listen to you
guys. No one cares to listen to Brent Colbert talk. When I talk on here,
(26:06):
I want to bring you guys on to share your message
because you guys have such a good way of delivering it.
A little bit of time, a little bit of experience, you'll get there.
Yeah, I shoot last couple podcasts we did, I was
all up in my own head using filler words, stuttering
over my conversations, but I had a lot going on in my mind
(26:28):
with an upcoming surgery.
There's things in life you got to learn from it. Every time I look back
and watch those podcasts, it's like, okay, what can I do better? And that's what
you're doing. You're looking back on your life and you're saying, what can Brent do
better? And that's absolutely a great way to learn.
Now, this podcast is a great platform for the next generation as well.
(26:49):
We know that they're out there, they're watching, things will get
better, and eventually you're going to start getting those guests or you're going to figure
out your method to the madness that just really gets the engagement
you're looking for. So, AB conversation.
Yeah, absolutely.
If I could say one last thing to the next generation
(27:13):
of just first responders in general.
The grass is not always greener on the other side.
And before you make a rash decision of leaving the career,
take five minutes and just picture. Could you actually picture yourself doing
something different? If you can, take the
chance, if that's what you want, take the chance. But
(27:35):
just remember that it's okay, that if you fail, you can
bounce back from that and that you can always get back in this
career. It may not be the same agency, maybe in a different one, but you
can always get back into it if it doesn't work out, when you take that
next step. And so if that's where you
think your. Your career is headed, take that risk. And
(27:58):
it's okay if you don't. It doesn't work out because you can bounce back. That's
my. My one nugget of advice. I like
that. It takes us full circle, right back to the original question.
Ask yourself, if not me, then who?
If not now, then when? Go out there and
inspire the change you want to see.
(28:20):
Absolutely. Sergeant V. You can start
running the podcast if you'd like, because you did very well.
Nope, not my. Guys.
Sergeant V is always welcome on the show. He'll be back
soon. I'm always here every week. Have a great day,
guys.
Guys, welcome to the first responder playbook. We're gonna flip the script today.
I've got Sergeant V back with me, and I'm gonna let him interview
me today, and we're going to talk about, you know, the reasons
I started the podcast I got in law enforcement and how my career
has progressed. So, Sergeant V, you're the interviewer. Let's get it
started. Yeah. I've really enjoyed your
(00:24):
podcast, and I just thought it was appropriate that
your audience finally get to know who is
Brent, right? What. What makes Brent
tick. And so there's an old quote. It started, it was very famous
among the military, but it's kind of spiral from there, and I've heard a lot
of other famous people say it, and it's, if not me,
(00:47):
then who? If not now, then when?
So that's my question for you. When you first started law enforcement,
when you first had that little glimpse of an idea that, you know what? Maybe
I want to pursue law enforcement, what made you say,
if not me, then who? You know,
I really never wanted to be in law enforcement. I grew up around
(01:10):
it. And I always say there's two kinds of cop kids. The ones that go
out and do stupid stuff, and the ones that do, you know, kind of lay
low. And I was the one that laid low, but I still never had any
interest in it. It's just not what I wanted to do. I always respected the
profession, but I want to be a meteorologist.
And so I love the weather still to this day.
(01:31):
But my dad was a sheriff my last semester of college,
and he's like, hey, just come do a ride along with one of my deputies.
And, you know, I finally did. And it was one of those days that, like,
we ran call to call to call and, like, took three people to jail.
And I was like, man, this is fun. And then he's like, all right, now
it's time to do the paperwork. And that wasn't very fun. But
(01:53):
I realized then that, like, that's a necessary
part of the job. And so it didn't scare me away,
and I was hooked. And
so I. I dispatched for quite a few years, four or five years,
until my first police job, you know, and
(02:14):
my why was I wanted to serve my hometown.
I finally decided to get myself certified
through what they call a COPS program in Oklahoma, and that was basically
through a college. And I had already had my
bachelor's degree, so, like, I really didn't gain
(02:36):
anything out of it other than getting certified. I got an
associate's degree after my Bachelor's degree.
Yeah. So, I mean, like I did for, you know, somebody that's never been to
college, though, you would go through the process of getting your associates and then your
bachelor's along with getting certified. But I already have my bachelor's,
so I actually got an associates in criminal justice after already
(02:59):
having my bachelor's degree, which I kind of chuckle at now. You know, I'm
working on my doctorate and I. I wanted to serve my
hometown. The pay stuff, the equipment sucked.
But I got a lot of good hands on police experience,
and I learned how to talk to people very
(03:19):
quickly. I'll never forget, and I use this as a
training example of I let somebody get one over on me.
And you think, why would you
admit that you let somebody get one over on you?
Because it happened. And I'm not going to shy away from it.
(03:39):
I'll never forget, I was running stationary radar. The guy was
doing like 15 over in a residential neighborhood. And I stopped him
and he just started, you know, tearing into me. And I was
maybe, God, four or five months into being a
cop. And he's like, you guys are worthless. You're out here. That's all you're doing,
stopping cars in the neighborhood. And I said, yeah, because you're doing 15 over,
(04:03):
you know, like it's a residential neighborhood. Anyways, he refused to sign
the ticket. And my. Finally a partner of mine showed up and,
you know, I could. He was kind of a veteran cop, and I still talk
to this day, but he's kind of cracking his knuckles behind, you know, my
peripheral vision, and guys like, I'm not signing the effing ticket.
And I'm like, man, you're gonna go to jail and you're gonna get drug out
(04:23):
that window and you're not gonna like it. And he finally signed the ticket.
But looking back on it, I let it drag out way too long.
And he should have went to jail. I mean, I let him get way
above what his peace was in, but it was
because I wasn't confident in my abilities yet. You know,
that's frustrating when that happens. But at least you learn from it and you could
(04:45):
admit that you learned from it. That's the important thing, right?
Absolutely. And that's why I. I try to self reflect often
because it happened. I'm not going to shy away from it. And
since then, no one's got one over on me like that, you know.
But if I don't learn from that mistake, do I stay in law
(05:06):
enforcement this long? Do I. Do I let it Affect me so much that
I get out of the career. And now that I'm in more of a training
role, I can tell these other people, like, hey,
this happened. Don't let it happen to you. Learn from what I did
wrong and apply it to your career. And
don't repeat my mistake I made. It wasn't a
(05:28):
career defining mistake because God helped me. Every officer out there has
probably done something stupid or just as worse in
their career, but I'm willing to admit it and say, hey,
I messed up and I learned from it. That's one thing that
I've seen get a lot of officers not just in trouble, but even fired.
And they've lost their certification because they can't admit when they make mistakes.
(05:50):
So that's a, an honorable trait. So I want to take you
back to before when you mentioned that you went on that ride
along and it was about four years that you spent in dispatch before actually
making the decision to, all right, now I'm going to get out on the street.
What was it about that timing that made you finally make that move?
I don't think it was voluntary. Like, I was trying actively to get hired
(06:13):
on. Okay. But when your dad's an elected official, sometimes
people may not like him or, you know, may have a preconceived notion about
him or. And for whatever reason, like, I wasn't trying
to at the time. I was trying to apply just for bigger agencies. And
this was before, like, you know, I was testing
with like 80 something people. So, like, it was still competitive.
(06:35):
And, you know, for whatever reason, that never worked out. But I will
say this, it worked out in a good way because I learned
so much from being a dispatcher. I learned how to talk
to people in their worst moments. I learned how to, you know, do time
management stuff. I learned how to prioritize. And
so while it didn't move as quickly as I wanted it to,
(06:58):
I did benefit from being a dispatcher. And so for that I'm always
grateful. Yeah, there's something to be said about learning how to
communicate over a phone when you can't actually see their body language and
all you have is tone and inflection and the words that they're saying and
to be able to effectively communicate just over the phone. Dispatchers have a heck of
a time and I, I respect them very much for that.
(07:20):
So that's awesome. So what was your, your first promotion
after getting out on the street and making patrol, what was the
first promotion that you went to? Did you get on swad or get promoted like
a corporal or anything like that. So
my first actual. I. I'm not gonna say promotion. I
switched agencies before I had my first promotion. I went
(07:43):
to about the same size town, but it was more
suburban, it was more closer to a metro.
So I did that actually for probably four years as
just a patrolman again. And that was a step up because we had nicer
equipment, we had different style of calls. It
was different people I was interacting with compared to
(08:06):
my hometown. And so we got a lot of
bleed over from Tulsa. And so we would deal with gang bangers, we would deal
with drugs, weapons, vehicle chases, a lot more.
And that made me grow as an officer.
And so then I would say my first true promotion was I was
the public information officer.
(08:29):
I volunteered for that because we were out there
doing cool stuff every night and no one knew. And
you'd get on the local social media sites and, well, they're just hanging out Taco
Bueno all night, or they're hanging out, you know, ihop. And
no one cared to get that information out there enough. And so I
volunteered. And I'll never forget,
(08:52):
I went, I love, I love the guys that sent me,
but they saved 50 bucks. Instead of sending me to the FBI
FBI Leader Tio class, they sent me to a private one.
And literally all I did during that class that week was
watch YouTube videos. He didn't actually get up, make us do practicals.
(09:13):
He did have some good information, but, like actually doing it,
there wasn't any. So I got back and we.
They probably didn't use me for four months. And then they finally called me
one day and said, hey, this illegal marijuana
grow. And it was right after they just legalized medical marijuana in
(09:34):
Oklahoma. They called me and said, hey, this illegal marijuana grow
got robbed and the homeowners got tied up and beaten up.
So I get out there, it's like 95 degrees. It's like
right at like five o' clock news. Every news agency in Tulsa is there.
And they put me looking into the sun. And so, like, I'm
(09:55):
sweating profusely. As you know, I don't have much of a skin
tan. And so I'm just baking in the sun. And
like, yeah, I'll never forget this because I. I still laugh with
her to this day. There's like, you know, mix of female reporters and male
reporters. And this guy asked me, or this female reporter asked me a
question and she says, you know, whatever she asked me, I
(10:18):
said, yes, sir. And so all my trooper
buddies, you know, instantly took Screenshots of that made
memes of the face you. Because I. I made a
smirk, and they're like, this is the face you make when
you call female reporter, sir. And
I learned from that, though. Again, you know, I. I
(10:40):
learned like, hey, sometimes you got to pick where you're going to do your interview
at. And. And so I learned things
not to say, and I
enjoyed that role so much because I was still on
patrol, but I got to dictate what we put out.
And literally, we went from a agency that was,
(11:03):
you know, Maybe posting Happy 4th of July, Merry Christmas on Facebook
to, like, posting almost daily. And, you know, if
somebody did something cool, hey, give me the information on that. Like, hey, if you
need to help find the suspect, give me the information on that. And like, we
were getting the news was calling literally every day, like, hey, can you
talk about this? And, like, we were on the news like, three or four times
(11:25):
a week. And I
feel proud of that because before they weren't doing that,
and, you know, I helped get that off the ground.
And so to this day, like, I'm an advocate for using the media
and working with them and not shying away from them, because
(11:46):
when you try to hide something in the dark, the people are going to instantly
think that you're purposely doing it for bad reasons. But if you're out
there doing good things, people actually want to hear those things
and use the media as a relationship and don't shy
away from it. Yeah, that transparency is really important,
and that PIO fills that spot very well. To be able
(12:09):
to. To actually get the information out there and share it in a. In a
good format where it makes sense and the everyday citizen can see it and say,
okay, yeah, they're actually doing something, as opposed to just seeing an
arrest log with a list of names, date, times, locations, which
doesn't really say much. Yeah, absolutely. I also like
how you got that little trial by fire that very first interview four months
(12:31):
after your training that I don't know if you were
ever an fto, but letting a rookie make a mistake is the best way for
them to learn. You go out there, you get the. The little bit
challenging case, and you let them make a mistake or two so that
you can teach them what's really important and to slow down, pay
attention, and take a little bit more time or control whatever they need
(12:53):
to. To work through it. So that was awesome that you got to experience that.
Absolutely. And like I said, it was literally trial by fire. It was like 95
degrees that day. It Was miserable. Worst interview I've ever done. But I can laugh
at it now. So what was, what was your next
promotion that you got? I got promoted to corporal after that,
which I enjoyed. But again, when I became corporal
(13:14):
later on at another agency, I realized that I
wasn't necessarily. I'm not gonna say I wasn't ready, but I
wasn't put in a position to succeed because they
put me on a shift with another corporal. And so there was always
kind of. That's just how it shook out. There
wasn't enough sergeants to be spread out, and
(13:36):
they didn't want to add another one to our FOP contract. And so we
had two corporals on one shift, and there was a lot of headbutting.
Me and her got along personally, but
at the time, we butted heads a lot because she was a senior
corporal and I was just, you know, know the new corporal at the end of
(13:58):
the day. We had the same rank. There wasn't any such thing as a senior
corporal. But after
I left the agency, we actually ended up getting on very well
because we both admitted, like, hey, we were probably a little bit stupid during that
time, and we didn't. It wasn't a bad relationship by any means while I
was there. But it's hard to grow as a leader when
(14:19):
you're sharing power with somebody at the same rank, you know? Yeah, that's
a challenging spot to get put into unless you sit down and
come up with a good game plan and understand your roles and
how you're going to work them out. And so does everybody else underneath of you
and above that. Yeah, I could see that being a challenge. Anytime that
I had to come over and help another shift, and I was of equal
(14:40):
rank of a supervisor, whether it be sergeant, corporal, or whatnot,
I always made sure to sit down with them and say, hey, this is your
shift. I'm just an extra body. This is what I can offer. If you need
me to step up, take charge for certain things, I will. But, you know,
we need to understand our roles here. And then likewise,
if a supervisor of equal rank came to my shift, we'd sit
(15:03):
down and say, okay, great, this is my shift, I'm going to run it. But
I will ask you to fill certain spots here and there, but you got to
have that open communication. Absolutely.
And I, I, I. What's funny is she actually ended up
promoting up to the ranks. She passed away of cancer about a year ago,
and she actually ended up becoming a captain. And I was never
(15:25):
so happy because we would still keep in touch. And
I, I'll just say it when, when I first started there, she wasn't happy there,
but she had a kid and she wanted to.
We finally had a change of leadership and
once she moved up a little bit to sergeant, she
(15:47):
excelled. And then she became captain and
she was like doing great. And I was so
happy to hear that. Like, she like took that next step,
like once it was presented to her instead of being, you know, the person that's
unhappy, like she was being the leader and
she did such a good job and you know, unfortunately, cancer is such a dirty
(16:09):
word. I hate that. You know, I don't get to talk
to her anymore. But we had a lot of good memories and
I still think about those quite a bit. It's always nice when
the chessboard finally starts to play out in your favor, whether
that's the administrator or the department as a whole. Right. When.
When things just start to line up and flow smoothly.
(16:32):
That's always a good feeling at a department. Yep. So after that
promotion to corporal, what was your, your next step?
Well, I, I got out of law enforcement during COVID
with everything going on. And like I said, there was just, there was
that us butting head some. Like I was burnt out. I
(16:53):
was about the seven year mark. And I think every
officer gets there to that point and there's like, want to do something different,
you know, I tried going to other agencies and for whatever reason, it didn't work
out at that time. And I took an insurance job during
a pandemic. Terrible idea, guys
again. But I've learned from it because while I failed
(17:15):
at that, on
my rebound, I've started working on my master's degree and I finished that. So now
I'm working on my doctor and I've got a year left in that. I probably
would have never done that if I wouldn't have got out of law enforcement and
failed because it made me push myself in other ways
to show that I'm not a failure, you know. And so
(17:37):
while I, I feel like I am qualified to speak on
advising people like, hey, the grass is always greener over there.
Sometimes even if you fail, you can come back in other ways and excel.
Yeah, the pandemic was hard on a lot of officers. We saw a lot of
turnover as well. That was definitely a difficult time.
(17:59):
When you hit that rock bottom, what was it that
made you decide, you know what, I gotta get back into law
enforcement. That's really where my heart's at.
Not being able to pay my bills, being dead
Serious. It was a terrible time to take a full
(18:20):
commission job during a pandemic. And then, you know, they, they sold
me on the idea of, hey, you're going to be in Tulsa. You know, it's
a good sized metro. They put me in, like, the worst part of
Tulsa to sell insurance. There's more people that didn't have insurance and did,
and it just didn't work out. And so I, I, at the
time, the only thing I really knew that I did well was be a
(18:42):
cop. I didn't hate the job. When I left it, I
wasn't, you know, like, oh, my God, I don't ever want to talk about
police work again. It was just, I was tired of the same thing
over and over again. And so I got back into
it. I, I got on an agency that was growing
Due to the McGirt decision in Oklahoma, you know, that
(19:05):
gave tribal law enforcement a lot of expanded authority.
And I worked my way up there again, and within a year, I was a
corporal again there. So things work out for a
reason. Again,
everybody's gonna have things in their life that don't necessarily work out
exactly how they want to or even if you might fail a little bit, but
(19:27):
you can come back from that. Absolutely.
So what was your, your next one? Was it the
moving into the training division? Yeah, so my next one
was a corporal, and I actually felt like that one a
lot better because I got to supervise my own shift.
I mean, I still had a sergeant above me, but there were, you know,
(19:50):
three or four days a week where he wasn't there. And so, like, I actually
got to run the shift when he wasn't there. And I felt like
that one went a lot better because I got to interact with, you know,
five to seven officers, usually at night. And they were
responsible, you know, they were responsible to me.
And, you know, I got to make decisions and, you know, I got to
(20:12):
learn from the mistakes I did make. And I felt like it went a lot
smoother the second time around. And I actually grew as an officer
because I've had bad supervisor
experiences before, like, of dealing with supervisors.
And I always told myself, I'm not going to be that person. And so
I always just try to treat people how I would want to be treated.
(20:34):
And so, you know, I just, I interacted with
them. I kind of coached him a little bit, like, hey, how's, you know, your
life going? You know, where do you want to be six months from now? On
the job? What, about a year from now? How are you going to get there,
you know, and just actually gave a.
And I felt like it went so much better the second time around.
(20:58):
And then that's when I end up in the training division.
So what made you make the shift from a leadership role to
the training division and coaching and mentoring?
Well, I ran a police academy for six months.
I left again, and I loved it. It
was a blast. The problem is they had me doing a bunch of stuff that
(21:21):
wasn't police academy related. And I'm
not kidding, they had me doing, like, beautician stuff and barbering stuff,
EMT refresher stuff I had no clue about, plus running the
police academy. And my boss,
currently in the training division, called me one day and says, hey, we got a
spot in training division. Would you want to come back? I was like, yeah,
(21:43):
and I love it. You know,
I've got a good boss, I've got a good agency I work for, but we've
got 150 officers that we get to help them get to where they want to
be training wise and growth wise.
And it's always nice to have
the ability to be. Be like, hey, this is like the direction we're going to
(22:05):
go training wise. And my boss is
receptive to new ideas. And, you know, now I'm in
a position where I can kind of mentor these newer officers and say, where
do you want to be, you know, six months from now? Where do you want
to be a year from now? And be open to realizing that,
hey, you know, it might change. You know, you may say, I want to be
(22:25):
a, you know, Dre, because I love getting DUIs right now. Well, a
year from now, as you get more experience, you might realize I really hate DUIs.
Like, I want to go work narcotics or stolen cars or.
And so I get to mentor them and say, hey, like, you're.
You're gonna change over your career. And, you know, like this, if it does
(22:46):
change, this is how we can help you get to where you want to be
now. And so I love the position I'm in now.
I like that. You know, I remember back on my career, early on,
I had a bunch of senior officers telling me I should put in for
detective. And I was trying to head down that
path, and I was interested in it. Wasn't 100 bought in on it,
(23:07):
though. I never did make detective. I found out
that patrol was more suiting for my personality. I like getting out
there, being involved in the chase, being out there on the front lines.
If I had been put in an office and then just called to Come out
to the. To the scene later after all the fun was done. I don't think
that would have suited me. So it was a. It worked out well. And so
(23:28):
I like how you're helping coach and mentor the next generation to see
those benefits. You know, sometimes they think they're heading the right direction, but if
can truly have the right mentoring, we can keep them on track. That's going to
keep them the happiest, hopefully keep them in the field or
in the right path so that they stay in law enforcement. Absolutely.
Absolutely. So now that you're in the training division,
(23:50):
is there any thoughts about what's the next goal?
What's the next mission? What's the next adventure? Yeah, eventually
I would like to be a chief of police somewhere.
You know, we'll. We'll leave that discussion for another time. But, you know, maybe.
Maybe one day soon. But
I really want to, at minimum, leave
(24:13):
where I'm at in a better spot than when I got there. Not
to say my boss did bad before I got there and not saying the person
that would come after me would do terrible. But, you know, when I decide, hey,
I'm done with training, I want somebody to say, hey, they're in a pretty good
spot there. And so that's my goal. I'm focused on right now.
But I did recently take this podcast venture over,
(24:37):
and that's probably my main focus right now is just
growing this brand, this podcast, because
it's another avenue of me being able to mentor and bring training
to other officers because they don't have to be there in person.
They can watch it in a video form. And yourself,
Jeff Johnsgaard, Dan Frazier, so many other great
(25:00):
guests, even ones that are not in law enforcement, that just do
leadership things. And
podcasting is frustrating because it doesn't grow as fast as you want it to.
And I have to stop and remind myself, you know, I'll get like,
20 views or 20 downloads. And,
you know, I have this sneaking suspicion in a couple years when it does start
(25:23):
really taking off, people are gonna come back and be like, man, you had some
really good guests early on. And because I'm
blessed to be able to have all these great views that people
that I probably consider smarter than me that actually have, like
yourself and Jeff Johnsgaard and Dan Frazier, like, you guys have doctorates in,
like, actuality, like, real life doctorates and
(25:45):
knowledge. Like, I got a piece of paper when I finish mine up,
and. And that's cool. But you
guys have such a way of delivering your message, which is just as important
of having that knowledge. And, like, people can listen to you
guys. No one cares to listen to Brent Colbert talk. When I talk on here,
(26:06):
I want to bring you guys on to share your message
because you guys have such a good way of delivering it.
A little bit of time, a little bit of experience, you'll get there.
Yeah, I shoot last couple podcasts we did, I was
all up in my own head using filler words, stuttering
over my conversations, but I had a lot going on in my mind
(26:28):
with an upcoming surgery.
There's things in life you got to learn from it. Every time I look back
and watch those podcasts, it's like, okay, what can I do better? And that's what
you're doing. You're looking back on your life and you're saying, what can Brent do
better? And that's absolutely a great way to learn.
Now, this podcast is a great platform for the next generation as well.
(26:49):
We know that they're out there, they're watching, things will get
better, and eventually you're going to start getting those guests or you're going to figure
out your method to the madness that just really gets the engagement
you're looking for. So, AB conversation.
Yeah, absolutely.
If I could say one last thing to the next generation
(27:13):
of just first responders in general.
The grass is not always greener on the other side.
And before you make a rash decision of leaving the career,
take five minutes and just picture. Could you actually picture yourself doing
something different? If you can, take the
chance, if that's what you want, take the chance. But
(27:35):
just remember that it's okay, that if you fail, you can
bounce back from that and that you can always get back in this
career. It may not be the same agency, maybe in a different one, but you
can always get back into it if it doesn't work out, when you take that
next step. And so if that's where you
think your. Your career is headed, take that risk. And
(27:58):
it's okay if you don't. It doesn't work out because you can bounce back. That's
my. My one nugget of advice. I like
that. It takes us full circle, right back to the original question.
Ask yourself, if not me, then who?
If not now, then when? Go out there and
inspire the change you want to see.
(28:20):
Absolutely. Sergeant V. You can start
running the podcast if you'd like, because you did very well.
Nope, not my. Guys.
Sergeant V is always welcome on the show. He'll be back
soon. I'm always here every week. Have a great day,
guys.
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