Navigating Leadership and Cultural Transformation in High-Stakes Professions with Michael Lopez

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Transform your understanding of leadership and culture in high-stakes professions with insights from Michael Lopez, a distinguished coach and consultant. Our latest episode offers compelling discourse on fostering a service-oriented approach within the first responder and law enforcement communities. You'll gain a fresh perspective on leadership that resonates with a new generation of professionals who yearn to comprehend the 'why' of their actions, rather than simply executing orders. Michael draws on his vast experience to discuss the parallels between public perceptions and the pressing need for transformative change in organizations under intense scrutiny.

Embark on a journey that transcends the world of first responders, touching on universal themes of transition and personal growth. We discuss how embracing the lessons from failure can enhance learning and performance, and investigate the psychological effects of fear of failure in critical professions. The conversation navigates through the 'teach, demonstrate, practice, and apply' framework, showcasing its potency in shaping effective leaders. Our dialogue traverses both professional and personal spheres, highlighting the common threads that bind the experiences of change and development, regardless of context.

In the final segments, we consider the intricate balance between influencing an organization's culture and the pursuit of self-betterment. I share my own stories and meditate on the tough choices one faces when aligning personal values with professional environments. Whether you're considering a change from within or contemplating a fresh start elsewhere, this episode is a treasure trove of wisdom for anyone looking to lead by example and remain true to their core principles. Join us for an episode that not only salutes the dedication of first responders but also serves as a catalyst for reflection and personal evolution.

As a First Responder, you are critical in keeping our communities safe. However, the stress and trauma of the job can take a toll on your mental health and family life.

If you're interested in personal coaching, contact Jerry Lund at 801-376-7124. Let's work together to get you where you want to be and ensure a happy and healthy career.


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Episode Transcript

Jerry (00:02):
Welcome to today's episode of Enduring the Badge
podcast.
I'm your host, jerry Dean Lund,and if you haven't already done
so, please take out your phoneand hit that subscribe button.
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And, hey, while your phone'sout, please give us a rating and
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On whichever platform youlisten to this podcast on, such
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(00:22):
grow and the reason why, whenthis gets positive ratings and
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and that allows our podcast togrow and make more of an impact
in other people's lives.
So if you would do that, Iwould appreciate that from the
bottom of my heart.
All right, welcome to Enduringthe Badge podcast.

(00:44):
My very special guest today isMichael Lopez.
How you doing, michael?

Michael (00:47):
Doing great.
Jerry, Thanks for having me.

Jerry (00:49):
Yeah, thanks for coming on.
I appreciate you taking thetime.
Michael, can you introduce theaudience and yourself to the
audience?
Yeah, yeah, sorry.

Michael (00:56):
Yeah, absolutely Well.
First let me say again thankyou and just to say to all the
men and women that do the workthat you represent, I just want
to say thank you.
I've got friends, family andI've been the beneficiary of
these really, really brave folks.
And one of my good friends isthe assistant chief of police in

(01:18):
a little town called Salinas,california, and I always talk to
him and say you've got thehardest job in the world and I
just appreciate everyone.
I'm Michael Lopez.
I really kind of define myselfas a coach and that really means
a couple things, certainly toorganizations and leaders and

(01:38):
teams.
I spent most of my career inconsulting in different forms,
helping organizations transform.
But I'm a coach to executives,to teams.
I coach sports.
I played college football.
I coach high school football.
Every good thing I've learnedabout being a leader has come

(01:59):
from either working with or inthe military or coming from
athletics.
And so, you know, in that roleI always say I believe I have
three obligations.
The first one is to help peoplemove into uncomfortable but
necessary conversations andexperiences.
The second is to help themthrough that process.

(02:20):
And the third one is to lead byexample.

Jerry (02:23):
You know I try to live my life by the strategies and
tactics that I talk about andand happy to share some of those
with you and your audiencetoday yeah, I'm excited because
I you know, in the firstresponder world it's really
getting hard to train and retainand you know people and to get

(02:43):
into like law enforcement'sreally tough right now.
Yeah, fire and EMS is stilltough, but not as bad as law
enforcement.
And with your experience inlike coaching and you know what
kind of culture should that likewhen these departments create
to have people want to be withthem?

Michael (03:03):
Yeah, yeah create to have people want to be with them
.
Yeah, yeah, I had a speaking tomy, my good friend who's the
assistant chief of police, uh,at a dinner with him and the
chief of police not too long agoand we we talked about this
very conversation of of.
You know, certainly, lawenforcement has become a very uh
, loaded conversation these daysand and you know, I know you're

(03:24):
, you and your audience arereally well aware of that Um,
and and people have strongopinions and, and I think
anytime you have strong opinions, of course people have views
about where things should,should migrate and and, and I'll
I'll take a page out of myfriend's book who's who's in
this world every day.
You know they're the shift awayfrom sort of paramilitary style
stereotypes, you know, and intoa sort of a service led or

(03:50):
orientation of of of which iswhat you all do and what, what
law enforcement is is certainlya challenging transition and
understanding that thatmigration from to.
I help a lot of companies withwhat we call from two shifts.
I need to go from one state toanother state and I think you

(04:11):
know certainly that migration ofunderstanding that it is an act
of service and as an act ofservice.
You provide a really importantstructure in society and keeping
people safe, serving thecommunity, um, the important
ways that that happens.
And you know, of course, what'schallenging, and this is true in
companies, right, um, I, I do alot of work in energy and and

(04:36):
people have really strongfeelings about energy.
Right, it's also a very loadedenvironment these days, and I
remember years ago, if youremember, the BP oil spill in
the Gulf of Mexico, right, therewere whole segments of people
who just said I'll never work inthe energy industry because
they're destroying the planet.
And, of course, there's so manygood things happening in the

(04:57):
world of energy and green energyand sustainability and
renewability that it's more thanjust that one moment.
But we have a hard time the wayour brains work, remembering
really bad experiences, right,and, and you know so, so that
shifts is important.
I'd be interested in hearingfrom you, as you hear other
guests like I see some pocketsof progressive thinking in that

(05:18):
regard about the need to changesome folks that that sort of
cling to you know, maybe pastperceptions, um, about that.
How's that shift going, uh,from your perspective?
What do you hear from otherpeople?

Jerry (05:32):
I think it's going slow.
I think there is a shift rightas the younger generation start,
you know, coming up through theranks in the different
departments.
So I think there is a shift,because that's how they want to
be led, Right.
They don't, they don't like tobe led.
You know paramilitary military,you know they don't like that.
Right.
There's just a differentculture.

(05:53):
They want to know a lot morethings.
In paramilitary, Like, you gettold what to do, you go do it.

Michael (06:08):
Like asking the why behind things is not really
something that goes well.
One of the things that,speaking of energy, one of my
clients happens to be a nuclearfleet of stations, so you talk
about an organization wheresafety is a really, really
important dimension ofperformance, right, we don't
want anything to go wrong inthose places as a result.
It also has heritage from themilitary.
Many people who work in thenuclear industry now came from

(06:29):
the Navy, which was sort of theorigins of nuclear power in the
United States in terms oftransitioning people from the
nuclear fleet there, and sothere's a lot of Navy heritage
that comes into that.
As a result, you get a lot oftop-down directive culture,
right?
Which is tell people what to do,and you've got a procedure for
everything and you've got astructure for everything, and

(06:50):
those things serve a purpose.
But look, every strength is aweakness in the right
circumstance.
And what's happened is thatpeople in the bottom of the
organization and I say thebottom, I mean in the hierarchy
of layers of ranks, the peoplethat do most of the organization
, and I say the bottom, I meanin the hierarchy of layers of
ranks, the people that do mostof the work there's a real lack

(07:12):
of freedom in their minds aboutwhat they have the ability to do
right, and that has all sortsof residual effects on
innovation, creativity,engagement, happiness.
Right.
We like to feel we've got somedomain over our lives right.
Agency is a big piece of whatmakes people people.
I want to feel like I can chartmy own course, and when you

(07:34):
remove that from people, it's areally disempowering experience.
Um, and and so we, I I rememberone of the first times we were
together with this client.
We had a little workshop andthey had this procedure and and
in the top of the proceduretimes.
We were together with thisclient, we had a little workshop
and they had this procedure andand in the top of the procedure
it says when faced withuncertainty, we stop, and and.
And I was like, can you explainwhat that means?

(07:54):
And they said, well, it it.
You know, this is a stationwhere safety is important and if
you don't know something you'vegot to stop and go ask.
And I said, where do we applythat?
And they said everywhere.
And I said I mean, yeah, I getit when it's the reactor, but
there's a lot of times wherethat behavior does not help you
actually move forward.
Right, and so so it's thingslike that.

(08:15):
Right, changing culture isabout understanding when does a
behavior no longer serve me andwhen has it become an anchor or
a drain on the organization, andwhat the what then do we
replace it with, which is thereally harder part of the
conversation.
Yeah, yeah yeah, sort of likewhat does the new thing look
like?
And honestly that's why I havea job is is helping people make

(08:37):
that transitions very, verydifficult yeah, you know we're.

Jerry (08:43):
You're talking about the transitions and I think you know
the leadership transitions inthe first responder community.
There's just a lot of peopleright.
They've been in the firstresponder community, they just
moved up through the ranks world.
What are these big companiesdoing and creating such great

(09:05):
cultures that we're not doing?
You know, in the firstresponder world Like cause that
would attract some people, Ithink.

Michael (09:21):
Yeah, well, I think um.
Every culture has its ownchallenges, right, and?

Jerry (09:23):
and I think certainly in the last several years.

Michael (09:24):
I mean it's important to recognize that some
industries and some jobs arejust unlike anything else, right
, and I think the firstresponder community is one of
those jobs.
Right, like the military, likelaw enforcement, like
firefighting.
All of these things are sounique in the experience of not
just what we do physically butthe situations that people put

(09:47):
themselves in Right.
Right, I'm going to, I'm goingto poke my own industry a bit in
in the eye.
We talk about uncomfortableconversations and experiences in
the white collar world.
I mean, come on, let's be let's, let's be real right they're,
they're not.
You know, having a having anargument with someone is not
like all this other stuff thatyou all do, right.

(10:08):
So I think it's relative andit's important to acknowledge
that right, context matters, butI do think there are some
things that you can take awayand figure out.
How do we extrapolate theseinto strategies that might work
in this community?
The military certainly has hadthe same challenge for years.
Right, of actually recruitingand retaining people.

(10:32):
I think, certainly the idea thatyou are providing a service and
that the mission matters.
That is something that bigcompanies struggle with, right.
If you would go work at, youknow, pick a big company I don't
want to use a name because,like, I'm poking at them, but
you know, pick any sort ofprofessional industry.
You know they talk aboutpurpose.

(10:54):
Right, and our purpose may be.
Maybe you work in a you knowplace that does you know
toothpaste or you know whatever,and you're like, hey, I'm
keeping people healthy becausethis is what we build, and,
right, there's, there's anattachment to that idea.
Um, I think the mission of, ofwhat the first responder
community does, needs to play ahuge role in amplifying the

(11:17):
experience.
But what needs to happen and Isay needs, I'm going to be, I
want to choose my wordscarefully is if, on the one hand
, what you're saying is we havea great mission and we serve the
community, but my experience asan everyday, on patrol or in
dispatch or whatever it may be,is I've got a supervisor above
me who's a jerk or who's pushingme too hard or doesn't

(11:41):
appreciate my contributions.
It's hard for me to be serviceoriented when I'm kind of
getting hammered from the otherside of the wall, Right, so that
that's one of those things thatI think other companies are
starting to understand that thesupervisory layer of the
business has tworesponsibilities, and one of
them is to run the business, butit's the other.

(12:02):
But the other, and mostimportant, is to help the people
that run the business.
Right, your job is not tomanage a spreadsheet.
Your job is to help the peoplebelow you be successful.
And I think you know now that,now that the financial
incentives of job switching areso fluid, right, it's the it's
sort of the old phrase of likepeople don't leave bad jobs,

(12:23):
they leave bad managers.
Right, it's the it's sort of theold phrase of like people don't
leave bad jobs, they leave badmanagers, Right and and so
because it's so easy totransition out of that, it's
like why do I need to go putmyself in these dangerous
situations or stressfulsituations when I can go over
here and and not have to dealwith that, Right?
So I think companies theystruggle with that a little
differently, but it's certainlypart of it, right this?
Idea that what is this middlelayer of the business?

Jerry (12:46):
Yeah, I think, oh sorry, go ahead.

Michael (12:48):
No, no, no please.

Jerry (12:49):
I was thinking that you know, leaders don't often get
trained right, they just come upthrough the ranks and they feel
like that is training, but likethat is a different type.
That's kind of like training ofjob skills but maybe not people
skills and leadership, othertypes of leadership skills.

Michael (13:09):
One of the most difficult transitions I did a
post on this LinkedIn maybeseveral months ago, but is one
of the most difficulttransitions is from doer to
leader, and because, right,every transition and again this
is why I have a job is is movingfrom the old thing, which is my
success, was governed by myability to execute an action.

(13:32):
Now my success is governed bymy ability to teach others to
execute that action with thesame level of quality, and what
stops people from doing that isgiving up control in a way that
then they just go.
I'll do it myself.
There's sort of a great exampleback to one of my clients is at

(13:54):
a power station there's aboutone supervisor for every 12 to
15 maintenance people, and theproblem they had was all of the
supervisors had grown up asmaintenance people and then they
got the job of supervisor.
Well, they were just glorifiedmaintenance people doing all the
work.
They weren't teaching the techs, and so you'd show up in the

(14:16):
morning, you'd see all thesetechs sitting in the you know
kind of in the waiting roomwhile the supervisor's running
around, and you'd ask him whyare you sitting there?
Well, we don't.
We didn't get our job orderstoday, or I don't know how to do
this thing.
Well, where's the supervisorout doing the work right?
And?
And so you have to thinkdifferently about your
responsibility, and that's avery difficult transition for

(14:38):
people to make.

Jerry (14:40):
Yeah, any recommendations on how to make that transition?

Michael (14:44):
Well, first of all, I think it's important to
understand what's required inthe transition.
So the first thing is time, andI think we expect too
frequently people to changefaster than they really should,

(15:04):
right, yeah?
The second thing, I think, issupporting and understanding
what the new job is, right?
So a lot of times, peoplearen't really getting an
understanding of what's the nextlayer of responsibility and and
what's required.
So, so, time knowledge, whichis the second thing, like what's

(15:25):
the job?
Has anyone really describedthis to me in a way that I
understand, and what does thatlook like?
Um, I think the third thing issupport, right, and so a lot of
times we'll, you know, you go toa training and maybe it's a
two-month thing, you have acouple of classes.
That's the beginning of thejourney, right?

(15:45):
Those aren't the.
That's not the end.
At the end of that process,you're still in a transitionary
period, and so the supportstructures and I mean, I know a
great example, I think, in inthe law enforcement community,
you know ride alongs and beingin those experiences and
watching others, right, there'sa reason that the apprenticeship
model works.

(16:05):
Right.
When you wanted to 200 yearsago, you want to be a blacksmith
, you know what you did.
You worked with a blacksmithevery day and you learned how to
do that and you got feedback,you got coaching in the moment,
right, and you got thatexperience.
And so to me, I think that's,those three big pieces, are
really important.
Now, depending on the job, youknow, each of those three things

(16:26):
might show up a littledifferently, but but I think we
have undervalued the importanceof repetition and time and
failure, right, and that's, Ithink, the other other part that
is a real obstacle intransitions is you're going to
mess it up, right, and the truthis our brain learns more when
we mess up than when we succeed.

(16:47):
And so, you know, there was agreat study done, sort of
throwing darts at a dartboardand that actually had people
hooked up to electrodes.
Sort of throwing darts at adartboard, and, and that
actually had people hooked up toelectrodes, and, and the closer
you got to the bullseye, theless reactive your brain was.
Interesting, the farther away,the more reactive you were,

(17:08):
which meant, oh, my body goes, Ineed to correct, I need to
learn, I need to adjust, right.
But we, we have fear of failure,right.
Oh, they're not doing it.
Maybe we promoted the wrongperson.
They're not cut out for thisjob.
You know, pick your phrase.
You know failure is requiredand and I don't know that we
give ourselves enough freedom inthose experiences, which is why

(17:30):
coaching matters.

Jerry (17:31):
Yeah, I think you're right and failure is part of the
job.
It's just risk in these type ofjobs is so high, so failure is
not looked at very, very well.
I mean there's different typesof you know levels of failure,
but I mean if you feel likeevery time you're going to make
a mistake or fail at somethingand you get hammered, like that

(17:54):
creates an enormous amount ofpressure on you and it's hard to
perform under those conditions.

Michael (18:00):
Yeah, yeah.
And it's back to that exampleof you know, when faced with
uncertainty, we stop right.
I mean, your whole job isuncertainty, right, Like that
can't be the answer, Right?
And so, yes, certainly there's.
There are literally lives onthe line and that is the
ultimate risk that you know youall face.
But there's degrees to it,right?

(18:20):
And so the question is how doyou learn how to operate at
layers below that, so that youdon't just take?
You know, I have one tool in mytoolkit.
It's a hammer and everything isa nail and I just hit it with
the hammer.
And you know, life is a lotmore nuanced than that, and you
know it applies into our dailylives in all sorts of ways,
right, the transitions we makein parenting, the transitions we

(18:43):
make into adulthood, thetransitions we make at different
phases of our career, differentage groups all of those things
come with with a transitionaljourney that these concepts can
be applied to, right?

Jerry (18:56):
yeah, I mean, a friend told me today when I was talking
to him um, we're speaking atmental health conference and
he's talking about transitions.
Transitions is the weak spot,like when you're transitioning
from things.
That's that you're.

Michael (19:09):
You're weak, you're and I get it like, I get what
you're saying, like you'resaying like, yeah, you're kind
of open, like you're, you'revulnerable yeah, yeah, and one
of my favorite I don't evenremember where I heard this, it
was years ago which is, um, ifyou look at a symphony of really
, really accomplished musicians,right, pick the best symphony

(19:31):
you can imagine.
The job of the conductor is notto manage the individual
sections but to manage thetransitions in the music, right,
the shift from one part of thesong to the next, and the
integration of the groups,because any one group by itself

(19:52):
can only do its part.
Right, and so the role ofsomeone in that, and it's just a
.
It's such a beautiful analogyto me.
You know, particularly as acoach, right, we don't, we don't
get to run the play.
Right, my job is to teach youthe play, and that you're like
my time's over.
Right, I'm 50 years old, Idon't get to play anymore, so I
have to stand and watch.
Uh, but there's a formula forthat, and, and the way I

(20:13):
describe it, particularly inthis apprenticeship model, but
to help is sort of what I callteach, demonstrate, practice and
apply.
So, as a leader, if you'restruggling to help your teams be
successful, this is a reallygood model to think about.
So teach is I'm teaching youthe action, the play, the tactic

(20:35):
, whatever it may be.
Right, and that seems prettynormal.
Right, we go to class and wepay attention.
Maybe you're on a whiteboard,maybe you're in a simulation,
whatever it may be.
These are the steps of theprocess and, most importantly
you said this earlier I'mteaching you why we're doing it
right.
What's the goal?
Right, I don't want you to be amindless person walking through
these steps.

(20:56):
I want you to think about itand understand what the outcome
is.
Then we're going to demonstrateit.
Right, and again, this, I thinkparticularly in the military,
the first responder community.
You know it's such a physicallydemanding job.
You all do this really well.
Right, we're going todemonstrate it.
We're going to show you.
Right, we're going to walkthrough it together.
I do this with athletes on thefield.
Right, we're going to walkthrough the play.

(21:16):
Nobody's running, we're just.
You go here, you go here.
Here's the timing right, you'regetting feedback.
Then you're going to practicethat.
Right, you're going to providerepetition to that experience.
Right, and then you get to godo it.
And the reason I think that issuch an important framework is
we only think about that inphysical terms, but you can

(21:38):
apply that same four-stepprocess to an emotional
interaction, a conversation, anargument, you know, a spousal
interaction, whatever it isright.
You can do that same thing,right, you can teach someone.
Here's how to have a difficultconversation right.
I'm going to demonstrate thatto you.

(21:59):
We're going to practice itright.
We're going to argue aboutsomething Oops, excuse me.
We're going to argue aboutsomething and then you're going
to go off and do it right, butwe don't extend.
I think a mistake that we make,or a miss, is we don't think
about the brain and our behaviorand teaching that in the same
way that we think about,oftentimes, teaching our bodies

(22:20):
and the physical coordination ofactivities among groups.

Jerry (22:24):
Yeah, I mean, we work so hard training our bodies, but I
feel like our brains are oftenleft out of that.

Michael (22:30):
Yes, yes, yes, and it's a very tough thing, because
it's much easier also to seeyour physical progression happen
much more rapidly.

Jerry (22:42):
Right, something changes right yeah, it's, yeah, more,
more obvious, more like you.
You see that you and you feellike, when you look at yourself,
like your body changes.
You feel that but, right, whenyou're working on your whatever
or working on things that abovethe neck, you know, it's
difficult to see and sometimesit takes a different perspective

(23:03):
, right, maybe a coach'sperspective, to like I'm seeing
these changes in you, like inyour, in your behavior, like, oh
well, I wasn't really noticingthem because there might be so
slight to you and over time,yeah, and over time.

Michael (23:13):
Yeah, one of the things I do a lot with with teams I
work with is actually um,because those very perceptive on
your part of like, it's veryslight, it's very subtle um is
we give a language to thoseshifts and we actually help
people understand how to label.
I'm being different right now,right so.

(23:34):
So if I were going to take aphysical action and apply a
different tactic, it would beobvious by my physical movements
that I'm doing something new.
But in this case, if it's notobvious, we give it a language.
So I've worked with a lot ofcompanies and we will identify
priority behaviors.
I want to be more open tohealthy conflict let's just use

(23:56):
that phrase or embracing healthyconflict, and we would have
people in meetings raise theirhand and go I'm embracing
healthy conflict right now and Ihave a question, and then
they'd ask the question.
And the importance of thatsignal is that I am actively
committing to demonstrating thebehavior that we all agreed to

(24:17):
and I'm doing it in this moment.
It also, by the way, allows meto ask a question much more
assertively.
I don't have to mince my wordsas much, right, because now I'm
less.
Oh well, jerry asked thisquestion.
He was kind of being a jerk,right, and someone may think
that it's like no, jerry isactually executing an action we
all agreed to do.

(24:37):
So let's not worry if youpicked a word that's maybe good
or bad or not quite right, andlet's think about the bigger
picture, right?
That's how you have to kind ofdo that.

Jerry (24:48):
That would be amazing to see happen on a more often basis
in the first responder world.
That has not been like myexperience.
For the most part, yeah, it'svery can be very judgmental,
right, or very, like if you saythe wrong thing or something
like that, you know they thinkyour perspective is this and so

(25:11):
it's.
Those conversations would go alot better.
I know some organization I'vebelonged to for a little while.
They thought, yeah, let's dothis, but then people still get
butthurt about it things andit's like, okay, then we're not
really doing this, and then theproductivity of those meetings
just kind of stall out.

Michael (25:31):
Yeah, and it's just more you know that that phrase
it's a good phrase, this sort ofbutthurt idea, right?
Which is one of the things westruggle with in behavior is I
do this little exercise withteams in a workshop and it's all
around conflict.

(25:51):
Okay, and it's a simpleexercise and you rate yourself
on a one to five scale on howcomfortable you are with
conflict.
Right, and it's a qualitativescale, but one is like I don't
like it.
Five is, you know, happy to doit?
Let's go, I seek it out, right?
Yeah, and one of the biggestthings I always it happens every
time and it's one of myfavorite parts of the workshop

(26:13):
is I ask different groups withdifferent numbers to work
together to build a strategy forhow to interact, and invariably
the fives tell the ones don'ttake this so personally, and I
laugh just like you're laughing.
You don't get to decide thatfor somebody else.

Jerry (26:35):
Yeah.

Michael (26:36):
Your responsibility as a five is to understand how do I
tailor my approach so thatsomebody who's not like me can
have a productive interaction,because what happens if I don't?
Oh well, michael's a one.
He doesn't like engaging inconflict.
Let's just shut it all down andgo back to the way things were.

(26:58):
Well, we're in this conversationbecause the way things were
weren't working, so we have toadjust right, and so one of the
greatest ways to learn aboutyour own behavior is to interact
with people who are not likeyou in very extreme ways, and
the challenge we have look, wesee this in politics, we see it
in all sorts of places, right Iswe get so stuck in our, the

(27:24):
accuracy of our beliefs, that weactually stop observing it.
It sort of becomes aboutwinning, instead about observing
the interaction.
And, and if we can get pastthat and I spend a lot of time
with teams doing that, uh,helping them, no, just be less
attached to your point of viewand observe what's happening,

(27:47):
and if you can do that, realgrowth starts to happen.
Oh, wow, this is not aneffective conversation, why?
Right?

Jerry (27:53):
Yeah.

Michael (27:53):
Struggling in this interaction.
What, what may be happeningwith me.
Why isn't this person notlistening?
Why am I not listening?
Right, that's where real growthstarts to take hold.

Jerry (28:03):
Yeah, I think I mean perspective like you, like I
think I'm big on perspective,like listen to someone else's
perspective.
I mean you may not be seeingthe whole picture or they may,
you know.
They'll probably say somethinglike oh crap, I didn't even
think about that.
You know, it's just good to getother people's perspective and
listen, listen to them.

Michael (28:22):
Yeah, one of the things that happens, and we talked
about this in our lead up tothis conversation, not to get
too brain science about it, butthere's a great book that I
would recommend your listenersread or listen to, called how
Emotions Are Made.
It's a book by a woman named DrLisa Feldman Barrett.
It is quite simply one of themost transformative books I've

(28:46):
ever read.
It's very dense, it's veryscience oriented, but it has
really turned on its head ourunderstanding of how we
experience emotions and how ourbrain works and I'll spoil some
of it, but I won't spoil all ofit which is our brains are
prediction machines.

(29:06):
Right?
Our brains are constantlyguessing what's about to happen
next, and, if you think about it, our brains are just in this
little black box called ourskull and the only thing it can
experience is what happens to us.
Right, like I can never knowwhat your experience is like,

(29:30):
and vice versa.
And so it stands to reason thattwo people can have the same.
We can both go on the samerollercoaster, but maybe 10
years ago I had a terribleexperience and just yesterday
you had a great one, and weexperienced, because what
happened is our brain predicted.
I'm about to get on thisrollercoaster and it's either

(29:51):
going to be terrifying or it'sgoing to be the best time of my
life.
And where we get stuck is thatour emotions are actually the
result of how accurate thosepredictions are.
So if I'm in a argument with myspouse and this argument has
gone the same way every time forthe last 10 times, well, my

(30:14):
prediction, going into thatargument is going to be the 11th
time is going to be exactly thesame.
So I have to understand thatthat's what my brain's doing and
I actually have to try to.
So I have to understand thatthat's what my brain's doing and
I actually have to try tointercept that process in the
middle, right?
And so that is a huge source ofwhere we get stuck in sort of

(30:36):
arguing with people and notbeing able to resolve issues you
talked about at the beginningof this call the shift that law
enforcement and the firstresponder community needs to
make.
Well, imagine everyone engagingin that discussion, right,
we're all having a differentexperience based on what we've
learned and what we'repredicting, right?
If you've ever heard someonesay, well, that's never going to

(30:58):
work, it's because, yeah, maybein their past it didn't, but in
mine it it.
It did.
So how do we get past that?
Right, it's just it's.
It's such a great book.
I would just encourage peopleto to read it.
It's a it's a fascinatingrethink of what's happening
inside our bodies when weexperience the world.

Jerry (31:18):
Is that a big key to having those difficult
conversations not likepredicting, you know what will
happen.

Michael (31:25):
Well, yes.
However, I would say that yourbody does a lot of that on its
own Right.
So and again I think in in thefirst responder community, your
collective relationship withstress is so much higher than
the average person because whatyou've been trained to do is
walk into situations and look atcues and go what's about to
happen for very important safety.

(31:48):
You know, saving lives yourself, included.
Situations, of course, like wetalked about that, that can
extend too far, because notevery interaction is going to
end up that way, but you have tostrike this balance.
But what happens is your bodyactually starts responding
before you even realize it.
Right, increased dopamine,increased cortisol, uh, you know

(32:10):
our relationship with serotoninand oxytocin and all these
things that actually prime thebody for movement, and so the
trick is to understand thatthat's what, what's happening,
and not overreact to it.
Right, if we were going to godo public speaking, we're kind
of doing public speaking now-Right but back in the old days,

(32:30):
right?
People used to say publicspeaking is like scarier than
death, right?

Jerry (32:35):
Right yeah.

Michael (32:36):
Have this feeling Right .
I do it all the time.
You do it a lot for us.
Our brains have learned publicspeaking Isn't the worst thing
that could happen to us.
So when we walk onto a stage,yeah, we're a little, we're a
little primed, you're focused,but that focus is harnessing
positive stress towards being inthe moment, right or somebody
else.

(32:56):
It could be debilitating, rightand and just I can't do it.
I can't walk out there, becausetheir brains have learned this
is a really bad moment, right,and they start to shut down.
And so, yes, those are extremeexamples, but that is something
that I think.
If we all understood, a how itworks and B that I can have some

(33:17):
domain over that experience,well, now I can start to respond
differently.
I might not react differentlybecause my body's deciding for
me, but I can responddifferently.
I might not react differentlybecause my body's deciding for
me, but I can responddifferently.
And then, if I do that enoughright doing hard things, then
I'll learn over time that I'vegot a little bit more control
over that, if that makes sense.

Jerry (33:38):
Yeah, no, I was speaking today.
And they're like are you ready?
Are you prepared?
Or you're like, yeah, I'm ready, I'm good to go.
Like did you look at thequestions?
You know that the audience isgoing to ask.
I'm like, yeah, I did, but I'mnot like I didn't, like I've
learned right to for me, like Ijust like I know what aware of

(33:59):
them, but I'm not going to superfocus in on and be like, oh
crap, they're.

Michael (34:03):
Right.
One of the things I spend onthis.
You use this word focus, whichis really important.
One of the things I one of thethings I do is you can look on
my website.
Your readers or your, yourlisteners can can take a look at
it.
I talk about these sixprinciples of human
transformation, and if you wantto change anything about
yourself, you've got to takethese six principles and kind of

(34:24):
shake them up into your kind ofperfect recipe.
There's a formula for change,but it's not formulaic, right?
So your blend of six might be alittle different than mine and
one might be more than another,but one of this idea is our
relationship to stress and howwe create focus, right.
So we all know your communityknows the fight or flight

(34:45):
response, right.
So we all know again, yourcommunity knows the fight or
flight response, right.
When we become prepared for anaction, our bodies trigger a lot
of dopamine and a lot ofcortisol.
Those things create focus,right, and most people in your

(35:05):
community again.
I played sports very different,but we talk about it.
Right, it's the tunneling ofyour vision, it's the
hyper-focus on something veryspecific, right, I think about
when I played sports.
The world goes quiet around you.
You stop hearing anything,right?
And I'm sure it happens in thesame world.
I didn't hear anything right?
It's just the only thing I sawwas me and the person or the
crime or the opponent orwhatever it is that experience.

(35:29):
We don't actually leverage thatenough in what I would say
worlds that aren't this world.
How to create?
We're very distracted, right?
How do I actually create focus?
How do I rebuild myrelationship to stress?
Because stress, right.
The human body was designedunder stress.
We perform under stress.
Muscles grow, bones grow.

(35:49):
You have to be stressed inorder to learn, right?
So when we're talking aboutthis behavior modification, I
actually can only do that if I'mjust a little bit stressed and
hyper-focused, but we we don'tactually know how to train
ourselves to do that outside ofphysical exercise, right?
it's just a big part of you knowit's, it's, it's just a big

(36:11):
part of what I do is sort ofhelping recreate that experience
for people.
Um, one of my favorite phraseswhen I run workshops for teams
is uh, at some point in the day,you all are going to be really
upset with me and I love it andI'm here for it, and that's when
you're going to be really upsetwith me and I love it and I'm
here for it, and that's whenyou're going to learn the most
right.
So it's just, it's just sort ofpart of the process.

Jerry (36:33):
Yeah, I think you're right.
Focus has gotten reallychallenging, I think, for people
, just all the distractions, theconstant distractions, so
people's focuses are so limitedyeah, yeah, and.

Michael (36:48):
And when we focus and learn, right, so you have what's
called an ultradian rhythm,about a 90 minute cycle.
That is your optimal learningwindow and, uh, it's about the
maximum length of time that youcan hyper focus on something.
At that point you need a break,and particularly in what I'd
call the white-collar world butyour world's probably similar in

(37:09):
different ways right, we gofrom thing to thing to thing to
thing all day.
Right, I had two minutesbetween my last meeting I'm five
minutes late to my next meeting.
I've got 12 hours of sessionstoday, or whatever it may be,
and if you want to learnsomething new, I need to block
off 90 minutes and then I needabout 10 to 20 minutes of of of

(37:31):
silence.
After that, take a walk, don'tlook at your phone, close your
eyes, meditate, whatever it maybe, and then I need to sleep
seven to eight hours in orderfor that learning to actually
embed itself in the neuralpathways.
That then I can actuallyrecreate it.
Right, and recovery is a bigpiece of this, and I know in

(37:54):
your community with highlystressful, you know that's a big
issue, right, do people havetime to?
Are they getting the support?
Are they getting the physicalrecovery?
Are they getting the emotionalsupport Right?
What does that look like?
Or is it just I'm going to pushthrough, right?
I'm going to bite down onleather and I can suck it up and
go, and the truth is your bodydoesn't work that way.
Right, your brain just does notwork that way.

(38:17):
You can decide to try, but itdoesn't really work that way.

Jerry (38:21):
Well, I think that's commonly what people do, because
, like they're just they are,they're just like they, like
they're not sleeping, they'renot exercising, like you know,
this is a combination of thingsyou know and and their training.
So you know they can be, youknow, short or they can go, like
you know, half days, type ofthing.

(38:41):
So it's like hard to absorb theinformation and then retain it
to use it again, right, and then, like when I feel like when
people are in training, it'shard for them to be present,
yeah, yeah and want to learn,right, do you?

Michael (38:57):
you have to be kind of in that inquisitive state, right
, to learn yeah, one of thethings I've, one of the things
I've said again I did anotherpost on this which is
particularly as adults.
It's not a hard and fast line,but over the age of about 25,
right.
So from zero to 25, we learnpretty organically.
Right, it's through a processcalled neurogenesis, which is my

(39:19):
brain just makes new neuralpathways.
Right, you want someone tolearn a new language?
Teach them between the ages ofzero and six.
Right, it's.
You know you want to, uh,someone to learn a new language?
Teach them between the ages ofzero and six.
Right, you ever try to learnGerman at 50 years old?

Jerry (39:31):
It's really tough.

Michael (39:33):
It's really tough.
Um, so as we get older, we haveto be able to to decide that we
actually have something tolearn.
It's not about whether or notwe can.
You'll learn.
It'll happen a little bit moreslowly, but again, maybe go back
to the world of politics orother strongly held beliefs.
What stops our learning journeyis that I don't actually think I

(39:56):
have anything to learn fromthis interaction.
And once I've done that, I'mnot moving anything into kind of
long-term storage right.
And so you have to decide.
I don't just get to show up toclass and magically have it soak
in.
I have to be intentional, Ihave to be focused, and then I
have to follow a protocol oflearning that then allows me to

(40:18):
take that and sort of move itinto long-term storage right.
And again, the brain is thesame as the body.
If you trained for 12 hours aday, physically after about
three days your body would shutdown and you just physically
could not perform the action.
And yet we treat our brains asif it's this endless supply of
energy that will never stop, andit's just not like that yeah, I

(40:42):
think you're right.

Jerry (40:43):
Well, and then there's you know that like, well, I'm
tired or whatever, so I'm goingto take caffeine or use these
artificial things to, like,stimulate my brain.
It's not really stimulate yourbrain, is it?

Michael (41:06):
Sleep.
One of the things I do loveabout where we've gotten to as a
, I think the science in oursociety is we appreciate the
value of sleep much more than weever did.
If you want to perform, sleepis the foundation of just about
everything that you do.
And it's funny.
I was thinking about this theother day.
I was thinking about my back inmy MBA program 20 years ago.

(41:27):
For some reason I thought ofthis randomly.
I was working on it was in myfinance class.
I was working on some problemin a spreadsheet.
I was trying to build a formula.
I don't even remember what itwas, but it was very difficult
and I was getting reallyfrustrated and I had been at it
for quite a while and I finallyjust shut my laptop and I went
to sleep and it took me a whileto get sleep because I was angry

(41:50):
and frustrated and everything.
I fell asleep at like threeo'clock in the morning.
I woke up and I had the answer.
I walked downstairs and in 30seconds I fixed my spreadsheet
and I went back to bed.
It was.
It was and I didn't even knowat the time.
I thought it was just like kindof random, like serendipitous,
but but that's actually whathappens is that when you sleep,

(42:13):
the things you learn when you'reawake move into long-term
storage, and in doing so, theybecome embedded behaviors, they
become physical actions, theybecome reactions and respond.
You know all that sort of stuff, and so it is.
There is nothing more importantto your performance as a human
being than sleep.

Jerry (42:34):
I think it's like often still the first thing that gets
sacrificed is sleep, and thenthey feel like there's other
ways that it can be.
It can be made up, but youcan't you can't.

Michael (42:47):
No, you can't, it's just.
It's so important that it'sjust.
It's just.
I've gotten better at it.
I mean over time.
I was the same in my thirtiesand forties.
You know, I'm going to, I'mgoing to just push through.
Right, I'll sleep when I'm dead.
Right, that phrase right.
Stop sleeping and watch howmuch more quickly death comes,
because it is just so important.

(43:07):
So, yeah, I would encourageeveryone.
If you're not getting sleep,you want to change your life,
you want to make a change.
Don't do anything else and justwork on that right.
And there's real strategiesaround how to sleep better, and
we don't always have theopportunity to do that right,
and so that and I there's realconstraints and people in

(43:28):
particularly in your world thatwork at nights.
It's really hard, you knowthere's there's a lot of stuff
around that, but it's always.
I tell people you want toperform better, start there, and
then we'll work on the restafter you've gotten that locked
down.

Jerry (43:39):
Yeah, I really like that.
I have one last question foryou, sure and this.
So, like I'm in, we're going toshift gears a little bit here.
Okay, I'm in a culture that Idon't like, I'm just going to
leave it.
What do I do?
Wow, okay, I just threw that.

(43:59):
It's really open.
I know it's a good one.
Yeah.

Michael (44:06):
Well, so I'm having two .
There's, there's two, I thinkthere's two paths, and each path
has a couple of branches on it.
I think one of the best lessonsI've learned in my life is that
, uh and I learned this the hardway, by the way, as most good
lessons are learned you cannotchange a system without being a

(44:36):
part of it.
So your first choice is do Istay or do I leave?
Right now, for most of us, ifyou're talking about employment,
we all have a choice, right,some people may have more
different choices than others,but you know most people in
today's society that these areall at will arrangements, uh,
and so you, you have somefreedom of movement.

(44:57):
But I'll use my, my friend, mylifelong.
We have friends since we werelike eight years old.
Um, he, he was going throughthis conversation about shifting
culture, kind of holding on tothe old ways, putting his name
in the hat for the assistantchief of police job, sort of
wanting to, to turn his back andbe like, well, you know, stick

(45:21):
it to them and be like, well,I'm just gonna leave, sort of
thing.
And I told him um, if you wantit to them and be like, well,
I'm just going to leave, sort ofthing, and I told him if you
want it to change, then you'rethe kind of person that needs to
stay and lead by example and beyou know it's very Gandhi kind
of statement and be the changethat you want to see in the
world.

Jerry (45:38):
I like it, I will tell you.

Michael (45:39):
Yeah, I look, I you know you should never take
lightly that decision.
It's very, very difficult rightNow.
You may still decide to stayand try to change it, and it
doesn't, and that's okay, butbut, but I think if you're, if
you're in a culture that youdon't like, you have to decide

(46:01):
if you want to be part of thesolution or not.
And if you're going to be partof the solution, you have to be
all in and understand what thatmeans to try to change culture.
Changing culture is it's, youknow, it's sort of like like the
spread of religion.
Right, there's a reason thatwhen religion spreads, it
spreads slowly but it sticks.

(46:22):
Right, it's town by town,street by street, block by block
, house by house, person byperson.
Right, you got to get intothose discussions of beliefs and
values and discomfort andarguments and you got to get
everything we've talked aboutright.
On the other side of that isthis is this new world, but but
people, people don't.

(46:42):
They will imitate what they see, right, and so you know,
oftentimes I love this phraseabout kids, particularly with
kids are the ultimate reflectivesurface, right, they'll give
you back exactly what you givethem, which is children
particularly.
They're wonderful observers.
They're terrible interpreters,yeah, they know when there's

(47:05):
something wrong at home, uh, andthey know when things are
pretty good, right, and they'llmimic the behavior of their
parents.
Right, you want your kids togrow up to be good people, be
good people, right?
This is not like this.
It's not rocket science, right?
I mean, it's prettystraightforward stuff.
And so if you don't like theculture you're in, then be an
example of the kind of cultureyou want to create and help

(47:28):
other.
Help bring others into thatexperience, and it'll change.
It won't change as quickly asyou want, and it sometimes it
can be a lonely road, right, butI?
But I think that's the decisionthat you have to make, and, and
the thing I was going to sayabout leaving every culture, you
find there'll be somethingabout it you don't like, yeah,

(47:49):
right.
And so you have to decide whatare your non-negotiables, right?
I've been a part of a couplecultures where there were some
ethical breaches that I justdecided that that's not
something I can be a part of,right, and when you move on, you
move on and you make thatdecision and you learn a lesson,
and you have to be okay withthat too, um, but, but

(48:11):
everywhere you go.
There'll be something about itthat you don't like, which I
think, and I know we're gettingto time, but I think part of
that then tracks all the wayback to this idea of your own
individual purpose, right, why?
are you there and that's adecision that only you can make.
Right, and if it means enoughto you, you'll withstand the
struggle to change it, to get onthe other side.

(48:32):
If it doesn't, then you won'tright, and that's an
oversimplification, of course,but I think that's the big piece
.
Right, You've got to commit tochanging something and leading
people through that experience,which kind of goes back to my
opening.
Right, my job is to help leadpeople into those conversations,
to support them on the journeyand then lead by example.

(48:55):
Right, you know it's a lonelyroad trying to change things for
the better, but it's a journeythat's worthwhile and, you know,
one that I think everyone intheir own lives should find a
way to take.

Jerry (49:07):
Yeah, I think the real hard part comes is it doesn't
come as fast as we want it to.
We're in such an era of justlike everything is so fast.
Everything's on our phone, weget deliveries the same day.
It's just like everything'sboom, it's there, deliveries,
you know it's same day.
You know it's just likeeverything's boom, it's there.

(49:28):
And then in our lives, though,things just don't change like
that.

Michael (49:31):
it takes a lot longer our, our, our technology has
outstripped our physiology,right, and so it's just uh that
that can be.
Uh, there's a joke I make aboutyou know, if you've ever fixed
anything in your house, right,there's kind of the three-two
rule, right, it's going to takethree times longer twice, as
much money as you thought.

(49:53):
It's just a good way to set yourexpectations right, which
really means you sort of have tolove the process, right, you
have to love the process ofgoing through change, of going
through change.
If you enjoy the process,you're less worried about the
speed of the outcome and you'reless focused on the magnitude of

(50:14):
the outcome.
Right, Like you know, we allmake kind of resolutions at the
beginning of the year.
Right, and you know, maybeyou've got a health one, I'm
gonna lose 30 pounds or whatever.
You have to love the process ofpursuing that goal, because you
don't lose 30 pounds in onehour long workout.
Right, it takes time and ittakes repetition, and so you
have to I always tell my clients, companies and otherwise is is

(50:38):
fall in love with the verbs andnot the nouns.
Fall in love with the actions.
Right, 30 minute run, thestruggle, the stress, the sweat,
the challenging conversation.
The outcomes will happen, right, If you do it long enough and
you just have to fall in lovewith that process and then
you're not worried about if it'shappening quickly enough.

Jerry (50:59):
Yeah, I like that, yeah, yeah and it and that can be
challenging too, right?
All these things like to fallin love with the process.
You know, that's like it's moredifficult when it's not your
process.
So when it is your process it'sa little more to fall in love
with and do.

Michael (51:16):
But I mean, there's just a all of this is available
to everyone.
And certainly, you know, what Ido is help individuals and
teams and companies go what'syour perfect recipe, right?
What works with your culture?
How do we want to design this?

(51:36):
How do you want to put it intopractice and what does that look
like?
And you know, I think it's easyto watch a couple reels and go,
hey, I'm going to cold plungeevery day and all of a sudden
all my problems will be gone.
No, no, that'll help a littlebit, but you know there's more
to it, right.
So we've got to do that work tokind of figure out what's my
perfect formula.
But it's all available to allof us, no matter what world

(51:57):
you're in.
You know, whether it's highstress stakes of the first
responder community or I'm youknow, I'm a middle manager at at
you know a tech company, right,we're still people, right, and
those processes, thosemechanisms are still available.
Uh, it's just context driven.

Jerry (52:14):
Yeah, yeah, definitely Michael.
Where can people follow you andfind this information out of
all the good things that you'redoing?

Michael (52:21):
Yeah, uh, so best place to start is my website.
Uh, michaeljlopezcoachcoach,which is a fun, suffix to put at
the end of my website, but itis a real thing, so all my
socials and everything you canfind me on there.
A little bit more about some ofthe principles we've talked
about, and that'd be a greatplace to start and, you know,
happy to connect with anyonethat's interested to learn more

(52:43):
or talk about anything else toconnect with anyone that's
interested to learn more or talkabout anything else.

Jerry (52:51):
Yeah, I love your, your take on.
You know the culture and thechange and what you need to do
and take on as a as a person.
Right, sometimes we just likemaybe leave those things up to
other people to do, butsometimes we have to take some
accountability to do some ofthat yourselves.

Michael (53:02):
Well, that's.
It's a great phrase and maybeleave you with this comment is
um, the only person you canchange is yourself.
You have no dominion over anyother person on planet earth
except for you.
You can influence, but the onlyperson you can change is you,

(53:23):
and so we get stuck, I think, alot on what other people are
doing or what other peopleshould be doing.
The best thing you can do is tochange in the ways that you
want to live and, again, leadingby example.
Other people will follow it.
But we often get stuck in theshoulds and the days, and it's

(53:44):
important to be what about I andme?
And what can I do?
And and start, there is a greatplace to start yeah, that's
perfect.

Jerry (53:53):
I'm gonna leave it right there at the for the ending.
Appreciate it thanks, jerry.
Yeah, thank you, michael thanksagain for listening.
don't forget to rate and reviewthe show wherever you access
your podcast.
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a hold of our host, jerry DeanLund, through the Instagram
handles at JerryFireAndFuel orat EnduringTheBadgePodcast, also

(54:21):
by visiting the show's website,enduringthebadgepodcastcom, for
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