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2 Oct 2018
Unlock motivation
There is not a more important position in our Air Force than that of being a supervisor. Just being put in charge of personnel is not enough. A supervisor is responsible for influencing his or her followers to perform an action, complete a task or behave in a specific manner.
1 Oct 2018
Up and In Leadership
I joined the Air Force at 17 years old to serve my country, play college baseball and fly airplanes.
25 Sep 2018
Three Leadership Rules of Thumb
Leadership is an art that is infinitely complicated and remarkably simple. Leadership is complicated because it involves people. Everyone has different motivations, aspirations and experiences. What works to motivate one person could be different for the next. However, leadership can also be very simple. There are certain habits of mind that, if you internalize, will help you lead most people in most situations.
21 Sep 2018
What is your purpose?
As I sit in my hotel room on the eve of the Air Force’s 71st birthday, I cannot help but reflect on my career and what the Air Force means to me. Today, I had the pleasure of listening to Secretary of the Air Force, Heather Wilson, address attendees at the annual Air, Space and Cyber Conference. Her words were both thought provoking and inspiring, but the thing I gleaned most was a simple question she asked, “What is your purpose?”
14 Sep 2018
Innovation legacy grows stronger every day
In October, David Grant USAF Medical Center will turn 30 years old. What most of us don’t know is who David Grant was.
5 Sep 2018
A Thousand Thunders
My fifth-great grandfather’s nephew, Sgt. Jacob Shively, sat on Lookout Mountain, Tennessee, for a Christmas photograph for his wife just a few months after he sustained a wound to his right cheek at the Battle of Chickamauga. He looks straight forward, rifle across his lap, at the ground he and the members of the 89th Ohio Volunteer Infantry recently traversed under fire.
27 Aug 2018
Time management does not exist
Time management is a concept that many people have become preoccupied with over the years. There are dozens of books available on the topic and many bases offer professional development courses on how to effectively manage time. However, when creating the professional development curriculum here at Travis Air Force Base, California, we intentionally omitted this lesson from our schedule for a single reason: Time management simply does not exist.
27 Aug 2018
From the darkness to the light
September 9, 2017, was a day my close friends and family remember as a day of sorrow for me. My beloved wife of 12 years was taken from me by cancer.
21 Aug 2018
Tankers: The Bass-Players of the Air Force
I’ve been a tanker pilot for almost my entire 18-year military career. I am also an avid bass player. It occurred to me that there are many similarities between these two passions.
16 Aug 2018
Prowling paw-pulation purr-sents problems
Imagine the most dangerous predator you can, a species that kills as many as 16 billion birds and small mammals a year, is considered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as one of the 100 worst invasive animals and has caused the extinction of 65 different species. Well, this predator is real, and it lives in the homes of more than 1 out of 3 American households.