Leadership Under Fire

Jim McNamara hosts this episode of the Leadership Under Fire Optimizing Human Performance Podcast. Jim is a senior Firefighter at the FDNY and serves as a Human Performance Advisor for LUF. He's also the principal author of the Leadership Under Fire Senior Man’s Performance Journal. Our guest in this episode, Jerry Smith Jr., is a Firefighter with the Baltimore City Fire Department (BCFD) currently assigned to Rescue Company 1. He was previously assigned to Truck Company 15 and entered the fire department in 2004. Jerry grew up in suburban Philadelphia, which is where his fire service career began as a volunteer. He is a member of the BCFD Dive Team and serves as the public safety scuba instructor. Jerry was also a member of the Central Maryland Urban Search and Rescue Task Force 2. He holds a Bachelor's Degree from Loyola University of Maryland. Currently, Jerry is involved with the UL Firefighter Safety Research Institute in their three year study of Fire Service Residential Home Size-up and Search and Rescue Operations serving as a member of the technical panel. Jerry has been actively involved with Leadership Under Fire since its inception in 2012.

When faced with a career-halting injury, our guest in this episode, used the challenge as an opportunity to hone his skills in a way that ultimately helped the Chicago Cubs break the Curse of the Billy Goat and capture the World Series in 2016. Kyle Schwarber played baseball for Indiana University where he was an All-American for the Hoosiers. During the summer, he played for the Wareham Gatemen of the Cape Cod Baseball League. Kyle was drafted by the Chicago Cubs in the first round of the 2014 Major League Baseball draft. He signed on June 11th and made his professional debut with the Boise Hawks just three days later, going 3-4 with a home run and three RBIs. In his first year of professional baseball Kyle played several levels of Class A ball as well as Double-A. The Cubs promoted Kyle to the Major Leagues in June of 2015 after having played just one year in the Cubs Minor League system. Kyle finished his rookie season having played 69 games, with a .246 batting average, 16 home runs, 52 runs scored, and 43 RBIs in just 273 plate appearances. At just 22 years old, Kyle hit several epic home runs for the Cubs in the 2015 National League playoffs. The Cubs and Kyle entered the 2016 with high hopes though Kyle’s season certainly did not go as planned. Last season, Kyle hit 38 home runs and 92 RBIs while batting .250. In addition to being a World Series Champion slugger for the Cubs, Kyle is a leader in the community where he is incredibly passionate about supporting first responders with his charity Schwarber's Neighborhood Heroes. The campaign is designed to recognize first responders by honoring their heroism, courage and devotion to duty. 

The conversation you will hear in this episode was recorded in early 2019 at a Leadership Under Fire Optimizing Human Performance Summit, which took place in Annapolis, Maryland. The event was devoted to the concept of resilience, the ability to navigate adversity and absorb failure and loss in high-risk settings. We explored the concept from the individual, team and organizational level as well as from a physical, mental, emotional and moral perspective. Guest presenters included FDNY Black Sunday survivor Firefighter Brendan Cawley, Dr. Preston Cline and Coleman Ruiz of the Mission Critical Team Institute and Lynn Vincent and Sara Vladic—the NY Times bestselling authors of Indianapolis: The True Story of the Worst Sea Disaster in US Naval History and the Fifty-Year Fight to Exonerate an Innocent Man. That’s just to name a few. You can hear audio from the entire Summit by visiting leadershipunderfire.com. To help listeners gain context for each Summit discussion, LUF Founder Jason Brezler and podcast host Patti Murphy discussed their reflections shortly after the event. So, you’re about to hear that conversation and then an introduction to Jim Roussell, followed his contribution at the Summit.

What is going on inside of the mind of one of the USMC's top marksman? Joining us in the latest episode of the Leadership Under Fire Optimizing Human Performance Podcast is Julia Carlson. Among many other accomplishments, she was the first female to graduate the Small Arms Weapons Instructor School. Her marksmanship and Marine Corps highlights include: over 15 Interservice awards, five International awards of which two were Combat Precision against all militaries in the world, over 40 National titles and awards to include four history making championships by being the first woman to ever win since the induction of the competition in 1902. She was named the Female Athlete of the Year for the Marine Corps in 1998 and has held three National Service Rifle records. She earned her Distinguished Rifleman Badge in 1997 and her Distinguished Pistol Shot 2014 and is one of four known female Marines to become double distinguished. During her time as a member of the Marine Corps Shooting Teams (both active and reserve), she has taught marksmanship skills to active and reserves around the country, youth, civilian groups, law enforcement, and other branches of the military as well. She retired from the US Marines as a Master Sergeant in 2016 with twenty-two years of service.

In this episode, Leadership Under Fire welcomes back to the Optimizing Human Performance Podcast American journalist, author and filmmaker Sebastian Junger. Sebastian was featured on the show in March of 2019, but that conversation seems even more relevant as our entire society is navigating a deadly pandemic that has brought with it great uncertainty while disrupting many of our social norms and economy. And so, it seems fitting to follow up with Sebastian and pose a few questions to him that are specific to the crisis that is the COVID-19 pandemic. The original conversation will follow after the latest interview.

In this episode of the Leadership Under Fire Optimizing Human Performance Podcast, we'll unpack Justin Legg's unprecedented story of resilience. In 2006, Justin experienced a major medical setback, but as discussed, his mental fortitude has carried him through every challenge in life. Justin is a retired Navy SEAL Officer who graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 2000 with a B.S. in Systems Engineering. He was a member of Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL Training (or BUD/S) Class 234 and became a plank owner of SEAL Team SEVEN. While with SEAL Team SEVEN he deployed to the Middle East twice and participated in combat operations in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. After returning from Iraq, he transferred to Special Boat Team TWENTY-TWO in Mississippi, where he served as a Task Unit Commander and the Team Training Officer. Justin medically retired from the Navy in 2012. He completed his master’s degree in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington D.C. He works in Energy Resilience as a consultant to the Department of Defense. 

Laurence Gonzales is the author of three novels and five books of nonfiction. His bestselling book Deep Survival: Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why has been published in six languages and was followed by Surviving Survival: The Art and Science of Resilience. His other works include Flight 232, Lucy and House of Pain. Gonzales has received numerous awards including two National Magazine Awards and the Distinguished Service Award from the Society of Professional Journalists. In 2015 he received a Journalism Fellowship from the Santa Fe Institute (SFI) and in 2016 was given an appointment as a Miller Scholar there. His appointment as an SFI Miller Scholar was renewed for 2017, 2018, and 2019. He is our guest on this episode of the Leadership Under Fire Optimizing Performance Podcast. 

This episode is hosted by Jim McNamara. For those tuning in for the first time, Jim is a senior Firefighter at the FDNY and serves as a Human Performance Advisor for Leadership Under Fire. He's also the principal author of the Leadership Under Fire Senior Man’s Performance Journal. Bob Athanas is our guest in this episode. Bob recently retired after 37 years of service with the FDNY. Bob grew up in Southbridge, MA, and served as a paid firefighter there from 1976-1983. He moved to Brooklyn, New York, in 1983 and served four years as an FDNY fire alarm dispatcher in the Brooklyn Central Office and later the CADO Unit. Bob was appointed as a FDNY firefighter in 1987. He transferred to Rescue 3 in February of 1991 where he would spend the next 29 years of his career. Bob also served as an adjunct instructor at the FDNY Fire Academy and the lead instructor for thermal imager training for many FDNY training programs. He also taught at the FDNY Special Operations Command Technical Rescue School and helped develop the FDNY SOC Advanced Firefighter Rescue Training program. Bob was also a member of the Urban Search and Rescue New York Task Force 1.

Jake Dutton is a firefighter with the FDNY currently assigned to Ladder Company 102 in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn. He was previously assigned to Engine Company 235 and has worked as a paramedic in the New York City Emergency Medical Services system since 2006. A native of Northern California, Jake grew up as a competitive skier and avid outdoorsman. He began his career in the fire service working as a seasonal firefighter for California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, now CAL FIRE, and North Tahoe Fire District in North Lake Tahoe. Jake is a member of the FDNY’s Incident Management Team and serves with a NYC-based disaster relief organization where he regularly responds to disasters and humanitarian crises around the world. He holds a Master of Art degree in Emergency and Disaster Management from American Military University and a bachelor’s degree in Fire Science from Columbia Southern University. Jake serves as a Human Performance Analyst for Leadership Under Fire.

Ben Oliva is a certified mental performance consultant and mental health counselor. He is a member of the SportStrata team, which utilizes the most recent innovations in sport and performance psychology to coach individuals and teams to reach their maximum potential. He specializes in training athletes and elite performers using evidence-based mental skills training. Ben is the mental performance coach for Fordham University and New York University Athletics. He has works with the Baylor Football program and other NCAA teams. Beyond athletics, Ben is a mental performance coach for the New York City Fire Department’s Mental Performance Initiative and delivers leadership and mental performance workshops for business organizations across the country. Ben’s experience includes working for the mental skills group of the Boston Red Sox and serving as an assistant coach at Williams College for the baseball and football programs, where he was also a two-sport varsity athlete. He received his master’s degree in sport and performance counseling from Boston University and his undergraduate degree in psychology and astrophysics from Williams College. Ben serves as a human performance advisor for Leadership Under Fire.