Jocko Podcast 3: Jocko & Echo (The Last Hundred Yards [book], Jiu Jitsu, Bosses, Failure)

0:00:00 - 1:09:19 > "The Last Hundred Yards" Book concepts review and relevance. 1:09:19 - 1:48:24 > Internet Questions and concepts. Jiu Jitsu: Gi? Or No Gi? Micromanagers? Friends and Family? Inept Bosses? Failure and how to deal with it. Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/jocko-podcast/exclusive-content

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Jocko Willink?

  This is Jocko Podcast number three with Echo Charles and me Jocko Willink.

• 0:11Jocko Willink?

  So last show we dug into the book About Face by Colonel David Hackworth. And today we're going to dive into another book that was very influential to me and it's called The Last Hundred Yards. Now this book is very different from About Face in many ways. Number one, it's it was not a New York Times Bestseller. It was probably never on any kind of list of any kind. It's a legit tactical guidebook for people in the military. That's what it is.

• 0:52Jocko Willink?

  And I'm going to tell you a little bit about the author right now, guy named H.J. Poole, who retired from the Marine Corps in 1993. When he was on active duty, he studied small unit tactics for nine years. Six months at the Basic School in Quantico, seven months as a platoon commander in Vietnam, three months as a rifle company commander at Camp Pendleton in 1967, five months as a regimental headquarters company commander in Vietnam in 1968, eight months as a rifle company commander in Vietnam, 1968 to 1969, five and a half years as an instructor with advanced infantry training

• 1:37Jocko Willink?

  down at Camp Lejeune. While he was at that advanced infantry training company, he developed, taught, refined courses of instruction on maneuver warfare, land navigation, fire support coordination, call for fire, adjust fire, close air support, 203 grenade launcher, movement to contact, daylight attack, night attack, infiltration, defense, offensive military operations in urban terrain,

• 2:04Jocko Willink?

  defensive military operations in urban terrain, NBC defense and leadership.

• 2:12Jocko Willink?

  So, the guy has some good background. And this book was very influential to me when I was coming up. And again, as I, just like with About Face, as I was thinking about what I was gonna say about it. And I wanted to talk about when I got it. And I couldn't remember when I got About Face. It just kinda came into my life at some point. And it's the same thing with The Last Hundred Yards. And I don't really know 100% when I got it, or who told me to get it. It's one of those things that just became so ingrained with me that now, I don't even remember when it happened.

• 2:51Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 2:51Jocko Willink?

  So, one of the, one of the key kind of components, or the basis of the book, that I kinda have to introduce you to, is it, it talks about something called maneuver warfare. And maneuver warfare is a, is a, obviously a type of warfare. It's a type of technique. And it's, it's counter to something that's called attrition warfare. Now, you could probably guess what attrition warfare is. Attrition warfare is, we're gonna go against the enemy. We're gonna go stand toe to toe, and we're gonna punch each other in the face until one of us goes down. Now, you add bombs and bullets into that scenario. It means we're gonna stand across from each other from the enemy,

• 3:37Jocko Willink?

  and we're gonna shoot each other and bomb each other until one of us breaks. And that's a very American way of fighting, is to start this attrition warfare. Because why? We've got massive supplies, we've got awesome industry, and we can get away with that. Maneuver warfare is, is very different. And to go into the book a little bit, in talking about maneuver warfare, this is what maneuver warfare is. In maneuver warfare, the emphasis is on maneuver. Firepower is considered important only to the extent that it facilitates maneuver.

• 4:20Jocko Willink?

  The overall offensive mission is to win decisively by getting the enemy to surrender.

• 4:29Jocko Willink?

  So it's very different. You, you, in, in that definition, they're not even looking to kill the person, the enemy. They're looking to make them surrender because it's in some ways easier if the enemy surrenders. You don't have to kill them all. Now, to go on, the focus is outward on the enemy. Again, this is, this is maneuver warfare. The focus is outward on the enemy.

• 4:55Jocko Willink?

  And a few mistakes like out distancing one's logistical support or shooting at a friendly unit are acceptable and unavoidable. So that's kind of crazy, right? That you actually, you take these risks in maneuver warfare, where you might engage friendly forces, you might get so separated that you end up in a bad situation, but it's because you're pushing the pace.

• 5:21Jocko Willink?

  Control is decentralized and every subunit or individual is encouraged to display the initiative needed to react successfully to the local threat. And this is the biggest

• 5:36Jocko Willink?

  distinguisher between attrition warfare and the way it's run and maneuver warfare. Decentralized command and that is a chapter in the book Extreme Ownership that Leif and I wrote. It's, that's one of the laws of combat that we talk about is decentralized command. Is that everybody that's out on the battlefield, every individual unit leader can make decisions on their own and they can make something happen, they can react and they can execute without having to run it up the chain of command. That's maneuver warfare. Very, very different. And, and you know, these days where we see the big difference, you know, you see a big bureaucratic company. You know, now that we're working with businesses, we see a big bureaucratic company.

• 6:19Jocko Willink?

  They become very centralized in their control and they fight attrition warfare against other companies because they're bigger and they have more resources. Whereas you see the young startups, what are they doing? They're doing maneuver warfare. They're, they've got decentralized command. They've got people taking chances. They're taking risks. And they've got different leaders out there on the battlefield that are trying to make things happen.

• 6:41Jocko Willink?

  The emphasis is on training personnel, and this is back to the book. The emphasis is on training personnel well enough ahead of time that they can follow their commander's intent. In combat, after only receiving broad guidance, of course, subunit must still keep their commanders informed of any actions that might affect adjacent units. So you end up with a situation where

• 7:08Jocko Willink?

  the commander is not telling you exactly what to do. They're giving you broad guidance. Hey, this is the, this is the end state of the mission that I want to have accomplished. And they're not telling you exactly how to accomplish it. They're just telling you what they want done. So that's a, that's, that's a difference between the two. Now,

• 7:30Jocko Willink?

  there's a piece that's very different as well, or

• 7:37Jocko Willink?

  maybe not different, but another key element of maneuver warfare and decentralized command versus attrition warfare and centralized command. So if you don't, if, if you're listening and you haven't been in the military before, the military is separated into two groups of people, officers and enlisted people. The officers are sort of the senior leaders who are, you know, strategic planners and they're, they're, they're the broader, higher up, higher ranking leaders. And then the enlisted are the tacticians, the folks that are shooting the machine guns, throwing their grenades, making things happen. And they do have, you know, the enlisted

• 8:21Jocko Willink?

  servicemen also have their non-commissioned officers, which are the senior ranking enlisted guys, which are usually the expert tacticians. But it's interesting. So this is going back to the book now. In, in the average platoon, the NCOs provide most of the collective experience. So again, you see this sometimes in the movies where they get the young officer and they're green and they don't really know what's going on. And then you get the salty old, you know, badass that's played by a salty old, you know, uh, Clint Eastwood and he's the

• 8:58Jocko Willink?

  That older guy with all the experience, that's what that's saying. This, the NCOs provide most of the collective experience. For this reason, they should participate in most of the tactical decisions. That absolutely makes sense. This should in no way challenge the authority of the officers. Okay, that's, that's sensible. After all, commissioned and non-commissioned officers share the same responsibilities in combat. If the lieutenant, which is the officer, is wounded, the platoon sergeant takes over. When they both, this is key, when they both work together, better decisions result. Obviously, you've got two minds instead of one. This brain trust can be further enhanced by including squad leaders.

• 9:42Jocko Willink?

  So they're, they're saying, let's bring in more minds, more of these junior enlisted guys. Let's find out what they think.

• 9:50Jocko Willink?

  The enduring satisfaction that comes from making a situationally correct decision, and then having that decision fully supported during execution, far outweighs the temporary insecurity that may come from soliciting the advice of subordinates. I love that quote. I love that. Because, I'm gonna say it again. So it's saying that the decision and the execution, doing that well, far outweighs the temporary insecurity that may come from soliciting the advice of subordinates. So, and I used to see this with these young junior officers. If they're insecure with their leadership, they don't wanna take advice and they definitely don't wanna ask for advice because they feel like that makes them look weak.

• 10:34Speaker 01

  Right, right, or they don't know what they're talking about.

• 10:36Jocko Willink?

  They don't know what they're talking about. Oh, they're gonna lose respect.

• 10:38Speaker 01

  Right.

• 10:39Jocko Willink?

  That's all their ego talking, and it's their insecurity talking. Whereas you get a young officer that's smart and that's confident, he has no problem looking at the gunnery sergeant or looking at the platoon chief and saying, "Hey, chief, how do you think we should do this? Hey, chief, I've never even seen this type of operation before. Can you give me some help or can let, can you take lead on this?" And that is the way a real leader operates. You don't always see that, unfortunately.

• 11:08Speaker 01

  Same thing with the mistakes too, right? When you say, "Oh, man, I made that mistake."

• 11:11Jocko Willink?

  Oh, exactly.

• 11:12Speaker 01

  It's hard to do that a lot of the time because you think, "Oh, this guy doesn't know what he's doing." "He obviously made a mistake, he even admitted it," kind of thing.

• 11:18Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and what, what the reality is, people don't actually think that. They don't think, "Oh, he just admitted his mistake, he really doesn't know what he's doing." No, they go, "Okay, well, at least he's aware of his mistake." Unless everything they do is a mistake, then that's different. On the other hand, it is courting disaster to rely on one's personal impressions to provide the solution to complex scenario and then not consider whether one's subordinates have the skills to execute that solution. So don't sit there stuck in your own brain afraid to ask anybody else, or you're gonna lose.

• 11:55Jocko Willink?

  Now,

• 11:59Jocko Willink?

  as we push through this, we can get pretty deep.

• 12:06Jocko Willink?

  To you, this going back to the book again, to a US infantryman actively engaged in a losing effort, this shortage of reference material can be quite unsettling. And what this, what this is talking about previously to this sentence is saying that although there's all kinds of books and manuals in the military, this detailed reference material of exactly how to do the frontline, what does that point man do? What does that machine gunner do? How do they actually do it? That information can get lost because it's more past word of mouth than anything else.

• 12:42Jocko Willink?

  And it goes into talking about, believe it or not, Hackworth, with a combat commission from Korea, Lieutenant Colonel David Hackworth was no stranger to war when he called, when he was called to serve in Vietnam. After two tours, he pointed out that the US knowledge on small unit infantry tactics had not been significantly enhanced by the longest war in US history, meaning Vietnam. And here's what, here's what Hackworth said, "Almost 15 years since the tragic inevitable fall of Saigon," and this is, so he's saying this 15 years after the end of Vietnam War, "almost 15 years since the tragic inevitable fall of Saigon, there's been no major honest postmortem of the war. There have been critiques dealing

• 13:26Jocko Willink?

  with the big picture, but none has addressed the lessons learned the hard way at the fighting level where people died and the war was in fact lost."

• 13:38Jocko Willink?

  So all those lessons learned and all those, no one ever made an honest critique and dug down onto the battlefield to see what these guys could do. And I know I talked about this last time as well, is that when I first got in the SEAL teams, there was guys from Vietnam. And when those guys spoke, you absolutely listened because you were hearing knowledge, knowledge. And

• 14:07Jocko Willink?

  that, if I didn't experience that, if I didn't meet those guys, I would, no one, you know, I wouldn't hurt it. It wasn't written down anywhere. And so you've got to always remember, when you do learn stuff, you gotta write it down. And you know, Leif and I talk about that, the fact that when we got back from Ramadi, you know, I started teaching at Trade Ed, what's called Training Detachment. And he started teaching the SEALs that were coming out of, uh, the new guys that were coming out of the SEAL training. And that's where we were, had the opportunity to really capture a lot of this information that we learned in Ramadi, and we were able to pass it on. And ultimately, those lessons learned are what became the book.

• 14:53Jocko Willink?

  So, that being said, you start talking about doctrine. And I can tell you that doctrine is not everything. In fact, and you'll hear me talk about people, people's biggest strengths are often their biggest weaknesses. So if you have someone that's super aggressive, and they're, they're aggressive in the business world, they're making things happen, and that's a real advantage for them, but they can get over aggressive, and then they end up doing stupid things and they fail. That's one example of how your biggest strength can be your biggest weaknesses. In, in the SEAL teams, we really didn't have, we had very limited doctrine. And it was a real big weakness for us, because if you had never run a certain type of operation

• 15:34Jocko Willink?

  before, you couldn't refer back to something and say, okay, here's the method, or the, the written documentation of how you're supposed to do it. So that's, that's pretty weak. That's pretty horrible. That's a big weakness. But at the same time, it was a strength, because as the battlefield changed, as we started getting tasked with missions that we had never done before, that no one had ever done before. We were very adaptable because we were used to trying to figure things out. So it's a strength and weakness. That being said, and although we did capture much of our lessons learned. This is going back to the book here. Basic field manual, talking about all these manuals that capture the doctrine. Knowledge is fine, but it is useless without common sense.

• 16:19Jocko Willink?

  Common sense is of greater value than all the words in the book.

• 16:26Jocko Willink?

  And this is another thing they will stereotypically put in Hollywood movies about cops or about soldiers. You know, you've got some guy that's by the book, by the book, by the book. And, and you can see this is calling it out. This is, this is Colonel Armor R Sims. A guy that was in the Marine Corps on Guadalcanal. And he said that common sense was more important than anything in the, in the field manuals, which is something I completely agree with.

• 17:01Jocko Willink?

  And to, to carry that point a little bit further. Back to the book and here's a quote from Major General Fuller. The central ideas of an army is known as its doctrine, which to be sound must be based on principles of war. And which to be effective must be elastic enough to admit of mutation in accordance with change in circumstance.

• 17:29Jocko Willink?

  So again, these, all these people that really understand war, they know that this doctrine is something that needs to be written. It needs to exist, but it needs to be adapted to. And common sense is, is the superior rank over doctrine.

• 17:47Jocko Willink?

  And another thing, and this is, this is a, a.

• 17:52Jocko Willink?

  A comment on training. Because it becomes very difficult. When you think about training people for situations that are unknown. It's easy to train something, people for something that they know is gonna happen. But it's a lot more difficult to train people for something that's unknown. How do you do that? As we get into the discussion of training a little bit. The small unit into the book here, the small unit that too faithfully follows the method in the book will eventually attempt it under the wrong conditions. Furthermore, the unit may have a diff- have difficulty surprising any enemy who has read their book. That makes sense, right?

• 18:36Jocko Willink?

  The enemy is gonna know your play. And by the way, all these military manuals can all be found online. They're, they're online, they're on the internet. So the enemy definitely reads what we have. On the other hand, the unit that doesn't prepare for any particular scenario will take too long to decide what to do. Automatically sacrificing surprise and momentum and then not have the teamwork to execute what it does decide to do. So there's two ends of the spectrum. You know, we talk about the dichotomy of leadership and how you're constantly going against opposing forces. Well, here's, you know, you can train so hard and so specifically to what, to doctrine, that it eliminates your flexibility.

• 19:18Jocko Willink?

  The other end of the spectrum is to not train at all and then you can't execute anything. And Rommel. Rommel said, "The ordinary soldier has a surprisingly good nose for what is true and what is false." And, and I, that's not just soldiers. You know, I, I talked about that before. That people know, even if they don't know what the truth is, they know you're not telling them it. They may not know what the actual truth is. And, and then going back to training, in actuality, back to training and back to the book, in actuality, most, most small scale combat is won or lost months before the battle during training. And that's something that people say all the time about mixed martial arts as well.

• 20:03Jocko Willink?

  You know, it's during that training, as you prepare, that's what wins the battle. It's the fight camp. And it's the same thing with, with military maneuvers.

• 20:20Jocko Willink?

  So as we continue on here.

• 20:25Jocko Willink?

  As expected, battlefield conditions change. So too must learning. Overreliance on book solutions in itself constitute a shortfall in training because it minimizes the importance of the unique aspects of each situation. Blind faith in standard operating procedures doesn't even constitute being well-trained. This is something that when I was running training, we caused complete mayhem on the guys that were going through training. And anybody that went through training when I was running it right now has a smile on their face because they know that they were put into scenarios

• 21:03Jocko Willink?

  that were completely confusing, distracting, disturbing, mayhem, chaos. It was just crazy. And the reason we did that is because we wanted to test their minds. Not their standard operating procedures, not their shooting capabilities. We wanted to test the minds of the leaders. Could the leaders be in that chaos, step back from that chaos? Either physically or mentally or both. Get an assessment of everything that was happening and then say, okay, this is what we need to do to get out of the situation or improve the situation or win the situation.

• 21:51Jocko Willink?

  What the other thing that it requires, not only is that the leaders step back and have the ability to step back, but the NCOs, again, these non-commissioned officers, must love initiative and must hold what ground they have to the utmost. It often happens that a sergeant or even a corporal may decide a battle by boldness with which he seizes a bit of ground and holds it. So we tried to inspire the younger guys, the new guys, a guy that had no experience in the SEAL teams. But we wanted that guy to go, you know what? I'm going to get in this room. I'm going to take this building. I'm going to get to this rooftop. I'm going to get this good position. And not to do it.

• 22:31Jocko Willink?

  As a rogue element, but within the confines of what the strategy was and what the plan was. And that's where you end up with an, with a unit that works together very well.

• 22:46Jocko Willink?

  And, you know, one of the things that I remember of where people get locked into these, you can see it sometimes in MMA fights. You'll see a fighter that's got a good, you know, ground game or he's, and, and all he's trying to do is take the person down. Take the person down, using all their energy, just keeps trying to clinch, keep, keep shooting shots. And they're getting their shot stuffed, but they can't adapt. They don't have the skills or they don't have the mindset to adapt. I remember one scenario where we had what's called a bunkered machine gun position. This is in a training, uh, training event. So there's a long hallway, this is in an urban environment, there's a big giant building. This is all fake, by the way, but there's a big giant building.

• 23:31Jocko Willink?

  And in the end of the hallway, we've got a bad guy who's in a bunkered position. So he's in behind tables and drawers and concrete. And he's got a fully automatic paintball gun. And the SEALs are trying to go down the hallway to get him. And they're shooting at him, but this guy's in a bunkered position. They can't hit him, he's hidden. And so every time they come out the hallway to try and move towards him, he just mows him down. And first it's one guy, then it's another guy, then three guys, then it's six guys. Then it's eight guys are laying in the hallway, you know, cause every time they get shot with paintball, if they get shot a few times, we're putting them down. Like, okay, you're dead, just lay down, stay there, you're dead, stay there, you're dead.

• 24:15Jocko Willink?

  Okay, you're, oh, you, you're dead too. They can't move, they just gotta lay there.

• 24:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 24:20Jocko Willink?

  So I go to the guy that's running it and it was a platoon chief. And I walked over and I said, hey, chief, you know, how's this gonna work out? And he said, we just gotta, I gotta get these guys moving down this hallway. And I said, do you think there might be another way?

• 24:38Jocko Willink?

  And he kinda looked at me and he realized that, yeah, there's another way. He sent a couple guys back out of the building. They walked down the outside of the building to the window where the guy was bunkered in, threw a couple grenades in there, jumped in, killed the guy. But the mindset wasn't there to have the flexibility to do that. And that's what we were training, cause I never wanted to see guys get locked into a situation. That's why training, all training, needs to expand your brain. It needs to expand your mind, it shouldn't constrain, shouldn't constrain your ideas.

• 25:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, it almost seems like that would be a different type of training even. Almost like you could, like if someone's forcing the double leg or something, they're forcing, they're not getting it, they're not getting it. He should have been trained in other takedowns. If in fact, taking the guy down was a strategy, he should be trained in other stuff. Maybe some judo stuff.

• 25:32Jocko Willink?

  No, no doubt about it. And this is one, one thing that's interesting and I, I think it's the, the evolution is you're hearing, you know, about Conor McGregor right now. And I hate to jump on the bandwagon, but you know, you see him doing like this movement type drills, which is really good because what is that doing? That's training you for these weird situations, you know? And that's another, like with, uh, training jujitsu with Jeff Glover. He puts himself in these weird positions and does these crazy things that when it happens to him, he just has better reaction because he's used to being in these strange positions. And when we work with corporations, um, and work with companies, we'll, we'll do role playing

• 26:18Jocko Willink?

  with these CEOs or mid-level managers and we'll, we'll play, you know, Leif and I will play the unruly old, you know, uh, job site foreman. That knows more than you do and how are you going to deal with them? And we put them in these hostile situations and do things and say things. And that, that throw them for a loop, that make them uncomfortable, that, that they don't know the solution to and they have to think on their feet. And that's, that's one of the, you know, one of the pieces of training that I always like to go back to is how can we? How can we do things that surprise people in training? So that, so that we exercise their brain.

• 27:00Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:00Jocko Willink?

  Not, not what they know. We don't, we gotta get what you know.

• 27:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 27:04Jocko Willink?

  We, you gotta train what you know, you gotta practice what you know. How do we train what you don't know?

• 27:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:08Jocko Willink?

  What you don't expect?

• 27:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's like a deeper, it's like, almost like a level deeper in the training. Like it's, like it's real beneficial. I think, I think Henner guys talk about this. Training jujitsu, a good way to train for self-defense is train with a real athletic guy who's a white belt. So he won't do predictable things that you've been training every day. He'll do unpredictable things where you, you know, it won't be super easy.

• 27:35Speaker 01

  And at the same time, it won't be something that you have full knowledge of and full experience of.

• 27:40Jocko Willink?

  If you get the 280-pound powerhouse that shows up to the gym that's never trained before, the first time you train with him, it's gonna be harder to catch him than it will three months later. No, maybe, maybe three months it'll be about the same. But like a month into it, where he kinda knows what he's supposed to try and do.

• 28:01Speaker 01

  Right.

• 28:02Jocko Willink?

  But you know exactly what he's gonna do, then it's easy to catch him.

• 28:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 28:05Jocko Willink?

  It's easier. So you've, you're, you're right. It definitely is a, is a transitional time. And it is good to train with people that you have no idea what they're going to do.

• 28:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it's not even to say that, that, and it does, it gives you experience with these unorthodox things for sure. But that's not what you're talking about as far as what's being trained. What's being trained is not to be so dogmatic in your actions and your, you know, your, your plan. It's to, this, this sounds really cliche. It's to expect the unexpected.

• 28:31Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  Right? But it trains you to think that way.

• 28:34Jocko Willink?

  Well, it, it's true. And I don't know if this is cliche or not. I'm pretty sure it is. But I say this and people kinda freak out when I say it because I'm like a, a, a structured, disciplined person. But I say it all the time, free your mind. You know, you gotta free your mind. That's what, when I talk about this stuff, I, I hate when I find myself in a situation where my mind is not free to see what's going on. And I can't detach from what's known.

• 29:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:02Jocko Willink?

  And, and go and enter the unknown and, and, and deal with the unknown.

• 29:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:09Jocko Willink?

  You know, another thing that can affect this is...

• 29:17Jocko Willink?

  Our ego and how our ego can prevent us from learning or listening to other people or other schools or other martial arts or other gyms or other perspectives.

• 29:30Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:31Jocko Willink?

  So i- i- in this book,

• 29:35Jocko Willink?

  The Last Hundred Yards,

• 29:38Jocko Willink?

  he talks about that. Uh, even giving a sister organization with the same manuals credit for knowing anything can be difficult. Pride in one's unit can help to build cohesion, but it can also stand in the way of learning. Learning must always take priority over pride. How readily, how readily a military organization can assimilate new information establishes how easily its component elements can acquire new knowledge. The Germans of World War I are generally credited with developing the application parameters that define modern infantry tactics. Here's how they did it. The German army of 1914 was the most decentralized in Europe.

• 30:22Jocko Willink?

  Free from all but the most general supervision and relieved by a promotion system that based, based strictly on seniority of the need to constantly please superiors, the German battalion or company commander was free to train his troops according to his own lights. So the way they advanced people is just how it wasn't based on how well you did on this particular thing. So they weren't kiss and ass the whole time. It was just, oh, you were in rank, you now you get promoted. So they were free to kind of operate and do the best they could, and that had a big, big impact.

• 31:00Jocko Willink?

  For, for example, by 1918, the Germans had line infantry squads that could penetrate allied defense lines almost at will. As opposed to, you know, the, the Allies who would always try and coordinate these big giant massive attacks at the same time, and you have to get everyone aligned and you have to execute perfectly with thousands of people. That's obviously very challenging, rather than just saying, okay, our goal is to break through the lines, go and figure it out. Think of all the different creative ways that go to figure that out. And it's, and it's crazy. And that's why it was so successful. Now, the Germans lost. They obviously made some mistakes on the strategic level.

• 31:44Jocko Willink?

  And as a matter of national policy, they made some pretty big mistakes too. But that's kind of a, that's kind of a whole nother, a whole nother story. Most military leaders agree that doing nothing to prepare an infantry squad for combat also does little to enhance its chances for success. Most can also agree that providing guidance that is too restrictive may cause the squad to disregard unforeseen circumstances. The answer must lie somewhere in between. That's what we've been talking about. And you see this with fighters as well. And you see fighters that prepare for a specific attack from somebody. But then that other somebody decides to mix it up and comes out and does something. It's happened to me when I was cornering fighters before.

• 32:29Jocko Willink?

  Where I've gone out and said, oh, didn't expect that.

• 32:32Speaker 01

  Right.

• 32:32Jocko Willink?

  Here we go. This guy just took, you know, John Bones just took down, uh, uh, DC. You know, like, where'd that come from? Why did he do that? So we see that kind of, that, that mentality that throws things off and it puts people in a, in a predicament.

• 32:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. And you mentioned John Jones. He, um, he actually even admitted that some of the stuff that he does, he just, he's never trained for. He just did it. But it's, man, it's that different, that separate element of your mind or, or training. I don't know if he had training doing that or just a creative person or whatever. Um, just that separate element. It's, it's a whole different part of the strategy, you know?

• 33:11Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 33:11Speaker 01

  Whole nother asset.

• 33:13Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And also you can see that he's encouraged by Greg Jackson. He's encouraged and he does things. You know, he, he has an open mind.

• 33:21Speaker 01

  Right.

• 33:21Jocko Willink?

  Got a free mind and that goes a long way. Free your mind.

• 33:25Speaker 01

  That is kind of a cliche, by the way. There's a, like a song.

• 33:28Jocko Willink?

  Is there?

• 33:29Speaker 01

  Free your mind and the rest will follow, or something else will follow out in other words.

• 33:33Jocko Willink?

  I'm not familiar with that. Let's not sing it.

• 33:38Jocko Willink?

  So finally to talk about decentralized command and, and what I would see happen with decentralized command is I tell some junior leader, okay, you know, you need decentralized command, you need to let your guys go out and do what they need to do. And they go out on the battlefield and this is, you know, getting in training where there, no one's going to die. They'd go out and all the little leaders would get their own ID and they'd go and try and make all this stuff and happen and the commander would lose control and everyone would get crushed and shot up with paintball and the whole nine yards. And they come back and they say, oh, you know, I, I, I did decentralized command. It doesn't work. See? And I would say, no, you did decentralized command, but you missed the key part of decentralized

• 34:22Jocko Willink?

  command, which is guidance, parameters, understanding of the mission, commander's intent, standard operating procedures, limits of advance, all these nice little restrictions that you put on the guys. Now they're, they're wide restrictions. I shouldn't have said little. They're wide restrictions. They give them a lot of mobility, but they understand what the objective is, what the end state is, what their parameters are, how far they can maneuver. Like they can know, they can, hey, if you can't go past this building, you can't go past this road, you can't go wherever. You draw those lines so that they can operate freely within those lines. And that's how they're made. That's how you maintain control with decentralized command.

• 35:08Speaker 01

  Would you call them like guidelines? Or because when you say operate within those lines, is it pretty encouraged to stay within those lines with their creativity? Or does the creativity, is that allowed to kind of overflow? Like if you say, you know how far you can engage there, are you saying there, there are no exceptions?

• 35:26Jocko Willink?

  No, there can be exceptions. You know, if I call you up and say, Echo, I'm at building 14 right now. We see enemy moving to building 27. I want to push down this road. Are we good to do that? And you say, all right, let me check the map. Let me check where my other forces are at. Yep. We're, you're good to go. You can move. So. There are times where I have to check back with you to make sure we're good to go and make sure that you understand. But I'm, I'm going beyond what parameters were set and that's why I have to communicate to you. But I went all the way up to that point. I maneuvered on the battlefield for, you know, three, four, five, six hours. Maybe it was a day, maybe it was two days without having to say, Echo, I need some guidance here. Echo, I'm going to pitch beyond what you told me.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. So these guidelines are kind of, you go in with the knowledge that there are exceptions. As long as they're responsible.

• 36:12Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  Or as long as what you do, you be responsible about making those exceptions.

• 36:15Jocko Willink?

  And, and communicating. You know, that's, that's when bad things happen. When bad things happen is when you go outside the, the limitations that you're supposed to be in and you don't tell anybody. That's a very, very problematic. Now, um. When we, when we talk about why it's so, why you have to maintain that flexibility. The reason is because combat is infinitely complex. And it's one of those dichotomies because it's infinitely simple, but it's infinitely complex. And believe me, the complexity of it got me, got the best of me on many occasions. Where I was, where I lost it. I did not, could not follow the complexity of the situation. I had to, bad things happen. I had to regroup. I had to try and figure them out.

• 36:59Jocko Willink?

  Had to assemble these thoughts in my head as all this thing, all these things are happening. Going to the book, as it relates to combat, the term situation encompasses many variables.

• 37:12Jocko Willink?

  Mission, enemy, terrain, weather, troops and fire support. Time, space, logistics. Each category has many facets. Disregarding a seemingly inconsequential circumstance can invalidate an otherwise logical solution. One must continually study the possibilities. Continually study the possibilities.

• 37:39Jocko Willink?

  And I've seen that where one little problem can escalate into all kinds of problems. That's something that whether it's a unit that we that we did just what we just talked about, which is, you know, you get a unit that goes where they weren't supposed to be and they didn't tell anybody. That can become very problematic, as you can imagine. Cause all of a sudden, you know, you've got people shooting from a building where there's not supposed to be any friendlies. Well, guess what? You're going to shoot back at them.

• 38:08Speaker 01

  Right.

• 38:09Jocko Willink?

  So that's a horrible situation. Things with communication where, you know, some radio frequencies go down or for for whatever reason, you lose communications with people and all of a sudden you're in a black hole and you don't know what's happening. That's another situation where one little tiny piece can really throw massive complexities into this situation.

• 38:37Jocko Willink?

  Going back to Rommel and back to training.

• 38:42Jocko Willink?

  The best form of welfare for the troops is first class training. This saves unnecessary casualties. And I think I did talk about this before, but taking care of your people, you know, and how taking care of your people.

• 38:58Jocko Willink?

  It can mean, A, that means we're going to cut them loose early. Because that means you're taking care of them, but the reality is the way you take care of them is to train them hard and be disciplined. So I will never lose sight of that one. This is a skipping around a little bit, but I wanted to throw this in there because

• 39:20Jocko Willink?

  because of the fight we had in Ramadi. And it's just talking about how the fighting in the urban environment is so challenging. And it says in the book, built up areas, meaning cities, should be bypassed wherever possible. In urban terrain, the attacker may need as much as a 10 to one manpower advantage.

• 39:45Jocko Willink?

  And Sun Tzu, who wrote The Art of War, "The worst policy is to attack cities." And if troops are attacking cities, their strength will be exhausted. That's just a for time immortal. Trying to fight in cities is absolutely the most challenging of all environments.

• 40:07Speaker 01

  Why? Cause they're dug in and their little strategy kinda is established?

• 40:13Jocko Willink?

  They're dug in. They are 360 degrees around you.

• 40:20Speaker 01

  Oh yeah.

• 40:20Jocko Willink?

  They are above you, they are to the left, to the right, in front of you, they're behind you, and they're beneath you. They're in the sewage systems, they're in the basements. So you're in this 360 degree fire zone. And on top of that, just about every building is a hardened fighting position.

• 40:42Speaker 01

  Oh, right.

• 40:43Jocko Willink?

  So all you have to do is enter a building and you've got a pillbox, you've got a bunker. And so therefore, it's very, very challenging. And I just talked about having an enemy machine gun in a bunkered fighting position. That's a nightmare. It's a little less of a nightmare when you have tanks to come in and blast them.

• 41:01Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 41:01Jocko Willink?

  So, God bless the tankers. I love those guys. We worked

• 41:09Jocko Willink?

  side by side with those guys. 110 AD. Guys crushed it for us and we appreciated it.

• 41:18Jocko Willink?

  Respect for one's enemy is crucial to success on the battlefield. He is not a coward. He is not stupid. And he probably has comparable weaponry. That's from the book, How to Focus on the Enemy and Make Sure That You Are

• 41:34Jocko Willink?

  You Are Respecting The Enemy.

• 41:39Jocko Willink?

  Flexibility to a changing situation again in the book. Having the ability to detect and then react to a changing situation can have great value in war. What manuals contain is mostly technique, not doctrine. This technique is merely a framework around which to build common sense solutions. And what that translates to is discipline equals freedom. You have these standard operating procedures. You work them, you refine them, you practice them, you get good at them, but you don't get stuck with them. You free your mind by having discipline. And it means that you can adapt these strict standard operating procedures. You can adapt them instantaneously and do something else with them because you're a maestro.

• 42:24Jocko Willink?

  And you can make that happen.

• 42:28Jocko Willink?

  Now, we get into this, and this is going a little bit deep.

• 42:34Jocko Willink?

  But we start talking about something called mission type orders. And that is different from, let's say, what would be called a directive. Where I say, Echo, you're going to move down this street. You're going to take this building, number 27. You're going to set security in there and you're going to hold that position.

• 42:59Jocko Willink?

  That's different because now I've told you exactly what to do. I've said, okay, Echo, you're going to move down this street. So I'm telling you which way you're going to go. I'm going to tell you exactly which building you're going to take down. And I'm telling you to set security in there. Now, what I really want to say is that that means you have to do what I just told you. Because you have no choice. I mean, I didn't give you any other options. I told you exactly what to do. Now, what if I were to say, Echo, we think the enemy is over in this area. We want to be able to hold security on them from an elevated position.

• 43:34Jocko Willink?

  Find a building down there and make that happen. So now you've got all kinds of freedom. You might pick 27 because maybe it was the best building, but maybe 36 was or maybe 32 was. Maybe 27 was hardened, maybe it wasn't tall enough, but you have this organic flexibility in your mind because you've been given a goal of why you're doing the mission. Not just what to do. So it's very important when you're dealing with people. You know, in any walk of life, that you tell them not just what they're trying to do, what to do, but what they're trying to accomplish, what the mission is, why they are doing it. And that is incredibly important. Just like aggressiveness is important.

• 44:19Jocko Willink?

  And going back to the book from General Howlin' Mad Smith. "Since I joined the Marines, I have advocated aggressiveness in the field and constant offensive action. Hit quickly, hit hard, and keep right on hitting. Give the enemy no rest, no opportunity to consolidate his forces and hit back at you. This is the shortest road to victory."

• 44:48Jocko Willink?

  Do I need to even expand on that?

• 44:52Jocko Willink?

  I mean, I think Howlin' Mad Smith just hit the nail on the head.

• 45:01Jocko Willink?

  Next point.

• 45:05Jocko Willink?

  "Controlling subordinates only to the extent that surprise momentum or not sacrificed. Personnel should become so familiar with their leaders' intent that they can be trusted to act on their own initiative. They should never be required to ask permission to respond to crisis situation. Seconds count in close combat. Subordinates must be trusted to act appropriately and only required to inform their leaders of decisions that might affect others. That's it. That's decentralized command." Now, you're gonna think at first that this is a little bit of a stretch. But it's not. So controlling subordinates only to the extent that surprise and momentum are not sacrificed. I'm going to relate that to jujitsu, believe it or not.

• 45:50Jocko Willink?

  In jujitsu and in any sport.

• 45:54Jocko Willink?

  You have to train your standard operating procedures so that your body can execute them without directives, right? If you have an instinct to defend the arm lock, you will escape the arm lock. If you do not have that instinct because you haven't trained it enough, you will get caught in the arm lock. If you have to think about the move, it is too late. And that's exactly what decentralized command is. If Echo is out on the battlefield and he gets flanked and he has to ask me what to do, he's gonna get killed. If Echo is on the mat with me and I slap a Kimura on him and he has to think about the defense, it's too late.

• 46:38Jocko Willink?

  He's already tapping. Whereas if I go for the Kimura and his instinct moves him out of that position, then you survive. The, uh, one more thing that I, when I think about that type of training, is something we used to do was called Blender Drills. Where you take your SEAL squad or your SEAL platoon and you start making calls on them. Flank left, you know, push right, strong right, center peel, you just do the most random calls.

• 47:12Speaker 01

  You mean calls?

• 47:13Jocko Willink?

  Uh, you're making tactical calls. You got, you got 16 guys, they're called immediate action drills. And for instance, if you're patrolling through the desert and you start getting shot at from the front, then you do a, what's called a contact drill. You're gonna react to that contact. The contact is the enemy. You're gonna do a maneuver as a group. And they're all kind of choreographed maneuvers where squad one goes over here, squad two goes over here, we lay down a base of fire, you start to move, cover and move out. But what we would do is we would mix up those calls. In the middle of one maneuver, we'd call for another maneuver. And in the middle of that one, we'd call for another one. And in the middle of that one, we'd call for another one. And what it did was it trained the mind.

• 47:58Jocko Willink?

  It trained the minds of the leaders and of the guys to expect the unexpected, as you said earlier in that cliched way, but something that's completely necessary. Trained them to be reactive and open-minded to things that were gonna happen. Now, when we talk about learning...

• 48:21Jocko Willink?

  And this is a, eh, the title of this chapter in, in the book, The Last Hundred Yards. It's called, "Old Habits May Get in the Way." And I think it's pretty obvious what that means. Adults learn, here it is. Adults learn within the context of what they already know. Ideas that are too far removed from their personal frames of reference are hard for them to accept. How often do we see that? We see it in life, we see it in the business world, we see it in combat, we see it in training. Ideas that are too far removed from people's personal frame of reference are hard for them to accept. Unfortunately, when one gets dropped into a hot landing zone on his first day in combat,

• 49:06Jocko Willink?

  it's often too late for him to learn anymore. For this reason, infantry must continually reassess and expand their frames of reference. Boom. Hello, life. For this reason, infantrymen and everybody else in the world must continually reassess and expand their frames of reference. Everybody. When one's survival's at stake, the other way can hold as much appeal as the established way. So, clearly, we see people in the business world stuck in that rut all the time. We see people in their personal lives, they get stuck in a rut all the time. So, everybody has got to continually reassess and expand their frame of reference.

• 49:51Jocko Willink?

  Going back to the book. What adults know comes primarily from two sources. What they have been told and what they have experienced personally. Okay, that's pretty clear, right? I think that's pretty obvious, but this is when it gets pretty cool. They sometimes have difficulty keeping the two sets of ideas separated, becoming convinced that what they have been told is true, even though they have never personally experienced it. And that is something that you see in the military. You see in the military where guys kind of, they hear something, they make it into something that they think that they've experienced. I know it sounds crazy, but they do it. And...

• 50:38Jocko Willink?

  It's dangerous. It's dangerous. And I never, when I realized that that happened, when I realized that that was going on, I was very suspect of everything that got said. You know, I was very suspect and said, well, let's, let's make sure that we confirm these ideas before we just run out and do them.

• 51:00Speaker 01

  Is that kind of like those martial arts demonstrations, right?

• 51:04Jocko Willink?

  Exactly. Exactly. And you can imagine that before the UFC and before you actually putting two humans in a cage to brawl, it was all theoretical.

• 51:13Speaker 01

  Right.

• 51:14Jocko Willink?

  And if someone said, you know what, if you strike the person here in the neck, they will fall down.

• 51:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 51:20Jocko Willink?

  And, and this is, the people legitimately believed that, hey, if you hit the person in the neck, there's a brachial nerve and it'll go down to the skull. And they will immediately fall down. And people believe that, but they never tried it, but they believed it. And there was, a lot of the times, those stories were mixed in with someone that had been told that they'd seen it one time, or they experienced it or whatever. And so that's a good point.

• 51:46Jocko Willink?

  And this is when you get into people that are not telling the whole story. And this is something I'm very careful of. Is when I know something, like I never claim to know anything a hundred percent, and I will always caveat everything with, you know, like a ninety nine point nine percent.

• 52:04Speaker 01

  Right.

• 52:05Jocko Willink?

  But there's sometimes when I'm giving information and I'm saying, look, ah, this is not a hundred percent. I don't know this for sure. But this is what I've seen and this is what I've experienced. Sometimes I'm like, hey, listen, I know this and I have experienced it and this is what will work. And I, I definitely, when I was instructing in the SEAL teams, I was very clear when I was saying, hey, I have not done that type of mission before, or I have not done this in combat, or I have not seen how this would really work. But here's what I think, because that's a lot different than this is what you need to do, because I have seen it, I have done it, and I do know confidently

• 52:45Jocko Willink?

  that barring the common sense, this is how you should execute this. So sources, back to the book. Sources have many reasons for not disclosing every facet of an issue. One is to propound more convincingly their perspective. Infantry men can't afford to harbor points of view that aren't well founded. They need continually to reassess their viewpoint and expand their frames of reference to encompass infantry knowledge from around the world and across centuries.

• 53:17Jocko Willink?

  Awesome. Free your mind.

• 53:20Speaker 01

  Is that kind of like looking something up on Google or on the internet?

• 53:26Speaker 01

  And then the difference between just going with that first answer? And going with a, you know, a bunch of, a bunch of results, a bunch of websites.

• 53:35Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 53:35Speaker 01

  Right?

• 53:36Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 53:36Speaker 01

  Save me.

• 53:36Jocko Willink?

  And, and people that see something on the internet and then talk about it as if they know it firsthand.

• 53:43Speaker 01

  Right, when they read it on there for that first result they got, they clicked on it, boom, there's your answer.

• 53:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, those people out there, we don't like you.

• 53:51Jocko Willink?

  You're clouding the truth. Okay, getting into some leadership and really life choices. And you can apply these to life, you can apply this to business.

• 54:03Jocko Willink?

  Here are some choices that humans have to make. Protect the status quo or take risks necessary to win decisively. That, that's, that speaks on its own. Protecting the status quo can be easier than changing it. To take action, one risks making a mistake. So that's a choice. And it's not a black and white choice, there's a lot of shades of gray in there. And how can you modulate that choice? But it is a choice that you have to be aware of.

• 54:32Jocko Willink?

  Focus inwards to prevent mistakes or on the enemy to keep pace with a changing situation. This is an interesting professional, professionals of all types try to minimize errors. Unfortunately, trying to do, trying too hard to do so in the military profession has some serious trade offs. Initiative, ability to surprise one adversary, perspective on the overall picture and learning, just to name a few. And I would say that those are the exact same in any profession.

• 55:01Jocko Willink?

  That when you, when you are only focused on not making mistakes, how are you going to make any risk?

• 55:08Jocko Willink?

  Jiu Jitsu.

• 55:09Speaker 01

  Right.

• 55:10Jocko Willink?

  The, the minute that you're just like, hey, I'm gonna go with what I know. And I am so guilty of this. I am the guiltiest of all in, in that I'm very,

• 55:21Jocko Willink?

  set in my ways in, in the moves that I do. You know, I do four submissions, maybe even two, you know? But, you know, they're, they're like what I'm good at, so I do them a lot. And I go through phases. And I shouldn't even say it's phases. I go through days where I take a lot of risks and I learn more. And then I go through days where I'm just there because I have to train. And I'm gonna do what I do and I'm gonna do what I do well. But that's not when I learn. That's not when I get better. I get better when I'm trying something new. And that applies to everything in life.

• 55:59Jocko Willink?

  Key to an infantry man's ability to react to whatever confronts him is his authority to exercise some initiative.

• 56:10Jocko Willink?

  You gotta give your people the freedom to maneuver. You have to. In combat, the leader must personally supervise only those actions that jeopardize the overall mission, and then allow subordinates to exercise initiative and make a few mistakes on everything else. Those subordinates must be able to identify mistakes as they happen without fear of punishment. Or the same mistakes will happen again. This is making mistakes without fear of punishment. You know, Dean, our, you know, buddy Dean Lister, he does these drills that he calls consequence free drills. Where he just says, okay, you're gonna start, you know, that someone's gonna be on your back and you're gonna try to escape, but

• 56:53Jocko Willink?

  doesn't matter. Doesn't matter what happens. If they submit you, doesn't matter. It just doesn't matter. Consequence free drills. It's just to take chances because all of us, you know, we all hate getting tapped out. We all hate giving up position. So you do these consequence free drills. You go, okay. I look at the guy and I'm like, okay, you're gonna tap me out. It's no big deal. You know? So do I'm gonna try crazy stuff. And that's what they're saying here. You gotta give people the chances to make mistakes.

• 57:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. And that's actually an important one because how that applies to life. That applies to life. Right when you're born, when you're, when you're like, if you're, let's say your parenting style, if you have that parenting style where a kid makes a mistake, he spills his milk, or he's trying something new, he makes a mistake and he gets punished for it, and that's how he's raised. When he grows up, he's gonna be very reluctant to try new things in life and or or explore certain, you know, aspects of of creativity, namely like starting his own business. That's why most people don't start their own business, because they've lived that kind of, I think most of us have lived that kind of life, where if you make a mistake when

• 58:04Speaker 01

  you're a kid, you get punished for it, even in school. When you make a mistake on your test, you get that red X on the thing, you got five wrong out of ten, you got a fifty, you got an F. There's your punishment, your F. Oh, wait, I don't know these five things, can I learn, I'll take the test again and show you that I, no, no, you got an F. There's your punishment. Repeat the grade.

• 58:26Jocko Willink?

  That sucks.

• 58:27Speaker 01

  There's your, so you don't even wanna make any mistakes. You don't wanna try anything new, you don't wanna, and you just have that mindset, and that's why most people are like that.

• 58:35Jocko Willink?

  There is, however, a point where people, you know, you could be raised in a way where you're not responsible for your own actions, because there's no consequences to what you do. So if you don't study and you get the red X's all over your test and you don't receive any punishment for it.

• 58:49Speaker 01

  Right.

• 58:50Jocko Willink?

  Then you will never learn, cuz only, only he who suffers remembers.

• 58:55Speaker 01

  Right, but there's a difference in me, this, I know, it always comes back to that dichotomy that you talk about, where it's, it's really in the middle area. So I think that it has to be leaning towards that, what you were saying, let them, give them freedom to operate. If you make a mistake, but they're putting effort into it, that should be commended. Don't, if you get one wrong, two wrong, don't give them this trophy that says, hey, congratulations, you failed. A failure should, should be, I mean, the goal, right, is to to make successful people.

• 59:32Jocko Willink?

  I will, I will, despite what I said, or in, in conjunction with what I said about there needing to be consequences. I agree that the correct answer or the correct reaction would not be, you failed, you're horrible. But you failed, what did you learn? How can we improve?

• 59:51Speaker 01

  Yes, exactly, exactly right. So.

• 59:54Jocko Willink?

  You notice that was exactly, exactly. Double.

• 59:57Speaker 01

  Double exactly right. Yes, for sure. So yeah, they kind of get the best of both worlds. Where they get, get that, that, the fact that they failed, they understand that. And of course, no one's just like, no one's goal is to fail. So they know that they failed, they understand that they failed. But encouraged to improve and encouraged to understand. But I think in a lot of ways, people don't get that.

• 1:00:21Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. And you definitely, you definitely don't see it when in businesses. You definitely don't see it in the military.

• 1:00:29Jocko Willink?

  And so, yeah, you're right. You've got to encourage that.

• 1:00:31Speaker 01

  Well, yeah, and it, and I think it, it could get, and this is just me speaking from zero experience. But I would imagine that it would get really rigid in the military because the stakes are, are a lot higher.

• 1:00:41Jocko Willink?

  Well, that's why this is talking about training. You don't want to let people make those kinds of mistakes in combat. You won't give them that much rope where they can get somebody killed in combat.

• 1:00:50Speaker 01

  Yeah. But yeah, in a training in, in, in life, in a learning situation or a developing phase.

• 1:00:57Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 1:00:58Speaker 01

  Which in life really is your whole life. But so.

• 1:01:01Jocko Willink?

  Always learning.

• 1:01:01Speaker 01

  Always learning. So I think to stick to that, I don't know, format, whatever you want to call it. To stick to that, where understanding your mistakes, don't like a mistake, a legitimate mistake. The punishment should not be the significant part of that experience.

• 1:01:19Jocko Willink?

  The learning.

• 1:01:19Speaker 01

  The learning should be. And hey, look, I understand there's different philosophies.

• 1:01:23Jocko Willink?

  No, there's just got to be, there's got to be some consequence. Some people don't learn without consequence. You see that these days with these, some of the new generation, which you're, you might even be a part of. Uh, but the new, you know, the new generation that grows up consequence free is, and they don't take any responsibility for their actions. They don't take ownership of anything that goes wrong. Cause they've been raised in a way where failure doesn't matter and there's no consequences to their actions.

• 1:01:47Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:01:48Jocko Willink?

  So.

• 1:01:48Speaker 01

  Absolutely true.

• 1:01:50Jocko Willink?

  Not to beat a dead horse on this subject. I had some notes in here, uh, around this from the book. Trying too hard to follow the book while solving battlefield situations makes one fairly predictable, even to enemies who haven't read the book.

• 1:02:07Jocko Willink?

  These don't, so you have to make some changes and back to the book. These don't have to be drastically different from what's in the book. Often it's enough just a very amount of speed, stealth, or deception with which the standard method is executed. Standardizing what subordinates practice in peacetime may make those subordinates easier to control, but does not help them learn the alternative techniques needed to develop momentum in battle. So that actually supports your last statement. Standardizing what subordinates practice in peacetime may make those subordinates easier to control. So if you're trying to control someone by beating them down and saying you failed, you need to do it this way, and it's the only way, you're going to get more control of them,

• 1:02:51Jocko Willink?

  but you're going to not allow them to operate in the real world, where they have to think of new ideas and think, they have to free their mind.

• 1:02:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, and in a way you might, I would hypothesize you might not even get the best out of them, really.

• 1:03:06Jocko Willink?

  I believe you are correct.

• 1:03:07Speaker 01

  They would get that rigid standard of output, and that's kind of it.

• 1:03:12Jocko Willink?

  And going to a quote from the book supporting your hypothesis, from Colonel Merritt A. Edson. He goes on about how you need to fight the Japanese, and he closes with, "Encourage your individuals and bring them out." Which is just a beautiful statement.

• 1:03:36Jocko Willink?

  Now, this is kind of to close out this section here.

• 1:03:41Jocko Willink?

  We are talking about,

• 1:03:45Jocko Willink?

  and this definitely applies to life. Human beings are always trying to structure the chaos of battle, and that may be the root of the problem.

• 1:04:00Jocko Willink?

  Human beings, human beings wanna have structure. They want things to be orderly. And combat is not orderly, nor is life, nor our relationships, nor our business deals. Nor is the chain of command, nor our personalities and egos and everything that we try and do to control this chaos. The idea that we can control it is false.

• 1:04:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:33Jocko Willink?

  What you have to do is you have to deal with it.

• 1:04:36Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:04:36Jocko Willink?

  You have to let that thing squirm underneath you. You have to let it move and see where its weaknesses are and grab hold of what you can and let go of what you can't.

• 1:04:45Speaker 01

  It's kinda like, um, you know, those physio balls?

• 1:04:47Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:48Speaker 01

  They're kinda, they're not rigid or nothing.

• 1:04:50Jocko Willink?

  Well, I always talk about when I'm training with someone that's bigger than me.

• 1:04:53Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:04:53Jocko Willink?

  You know, you get on top, you can't hold them down.

• 1:04:55Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:04:56Jocko Willink?

  You have to let them move underneath you.

• 1:04:57Speaker 01

  Yes, yes.

• 1:04:58Jocko Willink?

  And that's what this reminds me of.

• 1:05:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'll add this to your list of things that aren't.

• 1:05:03Jocko Willink?

  Controllable.

• 1:05:04Speaker 01

  Controllable, um, all of existence. That's why, like, you think of a leaf or, you know, okay, con- uh, consider something that's control, like, uh, that's why we invent rulers, that's why we invent thermometers, you know? Temperature is so dynamic, I can walk right five feet away. The temperature, when you really come down to it, the temperature's gonna be different. There's no set controlled anything. Everything's so ambiguous and slippery and wiggly.

• 1:05:30Jocko Willink?

  So you're saying everything?

• 1:05:32Speaker 01

  Everything, all of existence. Does, but, but like how you said, where people try to control, that's kinda, I think that's in our nature, though. That's why we come up with rulers and mile markers and.

• 1:05:42Jocko Willink?

  It is, and it, and it can drive you crazy.

• 1:05:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:44Jocko Willink?

  And if you try and control the chaos of combat, you're gonna get destroyed. And if you try and control everything in your life, things that are not controllable, then you're gonna destroy it. If you try and control a relationship.

• 1:05:55Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:05:55Jocko Willink?

  And aspects of relationship that are not controllable.

• 1:05:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:05:58Jocko Willink?

  You know what you control in a relationship? You control you.

• 1:06:01Speaker 01

  Yourself, in a real ambiguous way, by the way. Because you're always adapting, ideally, from an ideal standpoint, you're always adapting as well. So yeah, it's like this kind of loose idea of control.

• 1:06:11Jocko Willink?

  You try and control the relationship by controlling the other person when in reality, you need to control yourself.

• 1:06:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:06:17Jocko Willink?

  Cause most people don't do that.

• 1:06:19Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:06:20Jocko Willink?

  Most people don't exercise the beauty of mind control, that they can control your mind. You can think what you want to think. You can put those thoughts into your head. You can eliminate the bad ones.

• 1:06:31Speaker 01

  Right, right.

• 1:06:32Jocko Willink?

  You can bring forth the good ones.

• 1:06:33Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:06:34Jocko Willink?

  With mind control.

• 1:06:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:41Jocko Willink?

  And I almost want to close on that, because that's such a good thing to remember. But I will follow it up with this. It says, "Complex instructions are, at best, premature during what is usually an inaccurate assessment of the situation." So when you're looking at something, and you're going, "Okay, here's the plan. Here's what we're gonna do." At best, that's premature and inaccurate, what your plan is. So when you're trying to figure out what you're gonna do with that business deal, and you're trying to create this very detailed plan around it, at best, it's premature and inaccurate.

• 1:07:13Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:07:17Jocko Willink?

  At best, it's premature and accurate. So don't get locked around, you're gonna make these plans, they're gonna be rigid, and here's the way we're gonna do it. At best, it's premature and accurate. So think about what you can control and what you can't, and move forward from there.

• 1:07:32Speaker 01

  A good example of recognizing, or a good way to recognize if you're not practicing these types of thoughts, or, you know, ways of looking at things, is when you make a plan, and the plan, and it doesn't go according to plan, and you get mad about it, you're, that should be a red flag, right? A red flag right there.

• 1:07:55Jocko Willink?

  That is a red flag.

• 1:07:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:57Jocko Willink?

  And, and when your relationship isn't going the way you want it to be, it's because you, it should be a news flash that you can't control this other human being.

• 1:08:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:06Jocko Willink?

  You can only control you. So don't, and this goes back to what we talked about on the last show, when we talked about, you know, your family and your close friends, and, you know, we kind of got to the point where...

• 1:08:21Jocko Willink?

  I I I think I was saying, hey, you can't worry about them. And you said the same thing, and I think this is a little bit more clarity on that point is you cannot control them.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:08:32Jocko Willink?

  So you need to grab what you can, you know, keep it, keep it as under control as you can, but you're not going to get the solid control that you think you that you desire.

• 1:08:43Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's kind of like if you have this big like trash can lid and then you have this blob of like mercury. You're trying to keep it in the center, but don't try to like squeeze it with your hand or something because it's gonna

• 1:08:56Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:56Speaker 01

  Come out of your fingers, you know?

• 1:08:58Jocko Willink?

  Yeah, and and that, what if your co-host of a show comes up with examples like a trash can lid and mercury? You can't control that. All you can do is listen, nod your head and say, good point?

• 1:09:14Speaker 01

  It's more of an analogy, you know? It's like this comparison of, you know, using metaphors.

• 1:09:21Jocko Willink?

  Check. So moving on, moving on to some questions that we've got from Twitter, from Facebook.

• 1:09:30Jocko Willink?

  Got some really good questions and as a matter of fact, these are a continuation of questions. I didn't even ask this time because we didn't get through many of them from the last time I asked for input. So these are a continuation, which means I apologize once again, I I don't have the names collected of who gave these questions, so my fault. I apologize if you if we answer your question. We appreciate you giving us the question so that we could answer it.

• 1:09:57Jocko Willink?

  First one, let's get down to it.

• 1:10:00Speaker 01

  So in regards to jujitsu, this is kind of a common question, but your input, gi or no gi? Do you train both? Et cetera.

• 1:10:14Jocko Willink?

  The answer is gi and no gi. I definitely train both. I like to train both. I don't care which one. They're both fun to me. And just as we've been talking about a lot tonight through the book, the last hundred yards, I want my training to be different and surprising and be uncontrollable. And when you change, it definitely affects you. When you change from gi and then all of a sudden you take off your gi and you're sliding all over the place, you have to be a better grappler to be able to deal with that. So I want to be a better grappler. So I do that. And you know, there's, there's something else that's in between gi and no gi. And that's when you put MMA gloves on.

• 1:10:56Jocko Willink?

  You put MMA gloves on and it is somewhere in between gi and no gi because you can get legitimate wrist control. It's hard to sneak in a choke on somebody when they're wearing gloves. So there's, there's benefits to them all and I try and do them all.

• 1:11:11Speaker 01

  Yeah. What um, do you find any benefit to doing one and or the other? You know, like if you train in the gi, there's certain benefits in training with a gi.

• 1:11:22Jocko Willink?

  I think if, if you train with the gi, you, your defense has to be better because there's more friction. And so if you're going to escape an arm lock with the gi on, you have to do it very well. If you're going to escape a knee lock with the gi on, there's a lot of friction. It's a lot harder to get out. So your defense has to be better. With no gi, your offense has to be better because there are no handles to grab. It's slippery. The people can slide out of the exact opposite reasons. So you, you, I think you improve your offense more. And I will say this, my game is

• 1:12:00Jocko Willink?

  compatible with both where I don't do a lot of crazy lapel weaving in between your legs and up over your back and then back over your right armpit and around your neck. I don't do a lot of that. I don't disagree with it. I think it's fine. But I like to, most of the moves that I do are compatible with both, or there's very small differences between the way I have the games set up.

• 1:12:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, and Dean originally told me that same thing where when you train in the gi, your defense starts to develop a little bit more because you gotta like arm lock, you're in an arm lock, you can't just spaz out of an arm lock is easy.

• 1:12:43Jocko Willink?

  And even more important actually is not just the submission, but a cross side or a mount. When someone's a cross side on you with a gi on, they've got those candles and it's very difficult.

• 1:12:52Speaker 01

  Or posture control, wrist control, all that stuff.

• 1:12:54Jocko Willink?

  And it's easier to hold them down.

• 1:12:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:56Jocko Willink?

  So if you train no gi and you're trying to hold someone down with no gi, it actually takes more technique to hold somebody down with no gi than it does with gi. Even though sometimes I hear people say the gi is more technical.

• 1:13:08Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:13:08Jocko Willink?

  I don't actually agree with that. I think they're both technical in their own aspect.

• 1:13:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, so and even and holding someone down, that's more of an offensive move.

• 1:13:15Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 1:13:16Speaker 01

  Right? So if you're being held down with the gi, you gotta understand the concept in those techniques to get out. Or whether it be being held down or submission or whatever, you have to understand those concepts. And when you understand the concepts, then you can be successful.

• 1:13:31Speaker 01

  As opposed to like a no gi situation, you don't necessarily, I mean, you should understand the concept for sure, but you don't necessarily have to because you could just spaz out of it or like an arm lock. You could, if you're sweaty, you could spaz out of an arm lock with little technique, you know, if you're strong. Um, with the gi, it's gonna be way harder to do that. So you'll, you'll kind of in a way learn more and flip flop when you go offense to defense, the same kind of thing. With, with the no gi, offensive stuff, you gotta understand where you gotta control his shoulder. Otherwise, he's gonna, you know, have enough room to slide it out. So you have to have that perfect control to execute a good submission if the guy's good, so.

• 1:14:07Jocko Willink?

  And I think, you know, with life,

• 1:14:12Jocko Willink?

  what I do in life is I try and put myself in tough situations. So I'm practicing them, so I'm used to them. And you know, that's what, that's what the physical aspect of life is. In order to improve, you gotta challenge yourself and put yourself in the worst scenarios and go and try and get through them. You know, whether that's a weight room with a squat rack, or whether that's a run, or whether that's a swim, or whatever that physical challenge is, you wanna, you wanna make it as difficult as possible.

• 1:14:41Speaker 01

  Or putting yourself out there.

• 1:14:43Jocko Willink?

  Or putting yourself out there as I have challenged myself to be outside my comfort zone into the world of humans.

• 1:14:51Speaker 01

  Multimedia.

• 1:14:52Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 1:14:54Speaker 01

  They say, or I've heard, that public speaking is the number one fear of people.

• 1:15:02Jocko Willink?

  I have heard that as well.

• 1:15:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:15:04Jocko Willink?

  And, and I, it's hard for me to relate to, I have no, I do, I'm not afraid of getting up and talking in front of people.

• 1:15:12Jocko Willink?

  Like, like it doesn't, I don't understand that. I don't understand what that must feel like.

• 1:15:16Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:15:17Jocko Willink?

  You know, so.

• 1:15:17Speaker 01

  You understand why, though.

• 1:15:19Jocko Willink?

  I, I, it's really hard for me to understand.

• 1:15:21Speaker 01

  Right. It's hard for you to relate, right? Well, cause man, it's.

• 1:15:25Jocko Willink?

  Do you get nervous talking in front of people?

• 1:15:27Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, to a degree. I mean, obviously it depends on the mood, depends on the people.

• 1:15:32Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 1:15:32Speaker 01

  But, yeah, uh, yeah, I think I'm really no different than, than most people in that regard, for sure. But yeah, there's a reason for that. I think it's because it's, it's almost like this subconscious feeling that everyone's judging every little thing that comes out of your mouth, every little thing that you do movement wise, you know, so your whole being is being judged by all kinds of different people with all kinds of different standards, yeah. And when you care about that, or when you've paid the price for that, maybe, I think, cause we, you know, when you get raised, I think you pay the price for that, if you say the wrong thing, if you do the wrong thing.

• 1:16:09Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:10Speaker 01

  And I think in a way ridiculed or, you know, whatever, whatever, however that looks for you, you've paid the price for, um, growing up or.

• 1:16:18Jocko Willink?

  And now you don't want it on a large scale.

• 1:16:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, and that's exactly what you got. You're in a, in a situation where that's all kind of coming, you're coming into your brain where you, you fear that price that you're gonna pay, and it's times a thousand, because there's a thousand people there. And I think it's kind of subconscious. All you're left with consciously is this just anxiety.

• 1:16:42Speaker 01

  That's how we feel.

• 1:16:43Jocko Willink?

  Free your mind, Echo.

• 1:16:46Speaker 01

  No, you gotta put yourself in those bad situations.

• 1:16:48Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 1:16:49Speaker 01

  You have to, you know, put your, if you're gonna public speak, or if you're afraid of public speaking, book a small thing, or, I don't know, do something to put yourself in that situation. And if you don't wanna go from zero to 10, do a small one, you know, do something like with low consequences, you know, or less impactful consequences, and just start small and go up.

• 1:17:15Speaker 01

  That's probably what you did.

• 1:17:19Speaker 01

  So, next question.

• 1:17:22Jocko Willink?

  Next question.

• 1:17:26Speaker 01

  So, okay, micromanagers, how do you deal with micromanagers?

• 1:17:29Jocko Willink?

  Okay. So, if you worked for me, and you were super squared away, then I was a great boss and totally left you alone. If you worked for me, and you were not squared away, I was a complete micromanager. So that's a little indicator. Now, I have worked for micromanagers before. Everyone does, you run into them in the world. And the way, the best way I've figured to get out from under the draconian thumb of the micromanager is to try and gain their trust. And what you wanna do is you want to be ahead of them.

• 1:18:12Jocko Willink?

  You want to, and actually, this is something that I, when I was on the Tim Ferriss program, I talked about how when I told my dad I was joining the military, and I was this rebellious kinda crazy kid, and he said, "Oh, you're gonna hate it, cuz you hate authority."

• 1:18:24Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:18:24Jocko Willink?

  And I did it anyways. And when I got in, I was like, "Damn, my dad was right, I do hate authority, I don't like listening to people, and now I have to listen to them all the time." And then, I realized very quickly when I was in my first SEAL platoon, I didn't want anyone to tell me what to do, and I was in charge of the radios, I was a radioman. And... What I did, what I did was, you know, if the radios had to be ready, I knew they had to be ready. I just got them ready. I got them ready ahead of the time. I did everything before anyone could tell me to do it. I would come into work to be ready before anyone could tell me what to do. So I basically was completely psychotically proactive. And just was ahead of the power curve on every little thing that I could be ahead of the power curve on.

• 1:19:09Jocko Willink?

  And eventually, it didn't take long, the people that micromanaged me, all of a sudden were like, hey, I'm not gonna bother with this guy anymore. He's already done it. Cause every time they say, hey, do you have this, it's already done. Hey, did you start preparing? They already did them this morning. And eventually they say, oh, okay, this guy knows what he's doing. And what you're trying to do is build up the trust, cause that's what it is. It's a little, it's a little, uh, lack of trust that people have, that things are gonna go the way. And they've probably learned that somewhere, so don't hold it against them. But it's your job to create a relationship with them of trust where they stop micromanaging you and move on to somebody else that needs to be micromanaged.

• 1:19:52Jocko Willink?

  Next.

• 1:19:55Speaker 01

  Okay, so what about family and, uh, and people who are close to you? Are they all the same? And if not, how do you deal with it?

• 1:20:04Jocko Willink?

  So this is the, the trials and tribulations of the alpha personality. And you're always trying to go hard, go fast and make things happen. And how do you deal with, this is someone that asking this and whoever you are, thank you for asking this question.

• 1:20:26Jocko Willink?

  People are people like me, are they same? And if not, how do I deal with it? Well, first of all, no, there's not too many people like me. And, and as a matter of fact, there's not too many people like you, Echo. And people that are listening to this, there's not too many people like you either. People are unique. And I, I'm not trying to make people like me or make them do the things that I do. I'm, I'm over that phase, you know? I've talked about this before, like there was a time where I would try and convince people about things. And I don't try and do anymore. I'll discuss them, but I'm not here to win an argument. I'm, I'm not that concerned about you. Not that concerned about what you think. I'll, again, if, if you're someone that I'm friends with and I'm trying to help, yeah, I'm concerned.

• 1:21:11Jocko Willink?

  But I'm not trying to change people's minds.

• 1:21:16Jocko Willink?

  But it's interesting because what I'm really trying to do is I'm trying to appreciate people's perspectives. I'm trying to learn from other people. And I thought this was actually speaking of Twitter. On Twitter the other day, I posted a, a little paragraph. And it's by a gay, a guy named Mark Ripeto, who's a coach. He's written, you know, probably one of the best, one of the best books about weightlifting that you can get. It's called Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training.

• 1:21:51Jocko Willink?

  Mark Ripeto. But the opening of it is freaking awesome. And I brought it with me so I could read it to you. So here's, here's this, this opening to this book about weightlifting.

• 1:22:09Jocko Willink?

  "Physical strength is the most important thing in life. This is true whether we want it to be or not. As humanity has developed throughout history, physical strength has become less critical to our daily existence, but no less important to our lives. Our strength, more than any other thing we possess, still determines the quality and the quantity of our time here in these bodies. Whereas previously, our physical strength determined how much food we ate and how warm and dry we stayed. It now merely determines how well we function in these new surroundings we have crafted for ourselves as our culture has accumulated. But we are still animals.

• 1:22:53Jocko Willink?

  Our physical existence is, in the final analysis, the only one that actually matters. A weak man is not as happy as the same man would be if he were strong. This reality is offensive to some people who would like the intellectual or spiritual to take precedence. It is instructive to see what happens to these very people as their squat strength goes up."

• 1:23:22Jocko Willink?

  Now, that's freaking epic, right? That is an epic call out to the passion that Coach Ripertill has, right? That's just awesome. So I put that on Twitter, I was fired up, you know? And because somebody mentioned starting strength and I said, yeah, of course, you know, this is a classic. And uh, some, somebody on Twitter, wrote back and it said, I disagree. I will avoid reading things like this. And I wrote back, and again, I'm not trying to argue with anybody.

• 1:24:05Jocko Willink?

  Um, I just wrote back, hey, when I don't agree with people on a subject, I don't avoid it. I just try and learn from it. And, and the fact of the matter is, even though I think what Coach wrote is awesome, I actually don't agree with it. I don't think that strength is the most important thing in life. I think knowledge is more powerful. I think respect and loyalty and honor and treating people well. I think all those things are more important than strength. And there's been people that were incredibly weak in the world that have done amazing things and were powerful leaders and were incredible human beings. So I don't actually, you know, believe that strength is literally the most important thing.

• 1:24:50Jocko Willink?

  Now, that being said, um, if you are smart, if you are an intellectual, then you realize that you should use that knowledge to be strong. So you can not be physically bullied, so you can be healthy, so you can protect yourself, so you can be self-reliant. I mean, there's no doubt that strength is a, is a powerful force. But like I said, there's many other things that I think are more important. Now, But, but what I like about it is that hearing this opinion broadens my mind. It makes me smarter. It makes me understand how important strength is to some people. And maybe that it should be more important in my head. Because honestly, when I read that for the first time years ago, I was like, oh, you know what? That's awesome.

• 1:25:30Jocko Willink?

  And I should always keep somewhere in my mind that being strong is important and being strong is good. And you know, in this day and age, people actually, I think, believe that being strong is bad.

• 1:25:43Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:25:43Jocko Willink?

  As crazy as that might sound, there's nothing wrong with being strong. You know, being strong is good. Never mind, nothing wrong. It's a good thing to be strong. I wish I was stronger. I try and get stronger and I'm not a naturally strong person. I'm just kind of an average person that works out a lot. So. My point there is number, number one, when you get people that are different than you, don't try. I don't try and change them. I try and keep an open mind. I try and learn from them. I'm trying, and I talked about this earlier tonight. People have strengths and people have weaknesses. And if people have strengths, I'm going to try and learn from their strengths. And some people are, have more weaknesses. And I try and learn from them as well.

• 1:26:27Jocko Willink?

  You get someone that's an addict. You get someone that's a, a, a sociopath. Or you get someone that's a, you know, a, a real giver or someone that helps. There's people that, one thing that, that I, I don't feel like I help people enough. Um. And so I always look at people that are very helpful. And I say, okay, what can I do? What can I take away from their perspective? But you know, if I meet someone that's an addict, I learn from them. They teach me very important lessons. People that are winners, people that are losers, I'm going to learn from both of them. Now, back to the original question of how do you deal with it?

• 1:27:10Jocko Willink?

  Because I'm, I'm, I'm inferring from the question that this person that asked it gets frustrated that others are not living up to their expectations. Now, this is going to sound bad when I say this initially.

• 1:27:28Jocko Willink?

  Is that I actually have relatively, or I shouldn't say I have, I keep relatively low expectations of humans. Meaning, when I meet someone, I don't expect to get a lot out of them. I expect to be let down. I expect people, as I talked about the other day, people are crazy. And, and I expect that. I expect people to do irrational things. So that's kind of my baseline. And then, what's beautiful about it is, I'm surprised and happy and, and pleasantly surprised

• 1:28:12Jocko Willink?

  when people are supportive, when people are reliable, when people are good people, when they make sense, when they're not crazy. And so, I think setting the right level of expectations is important to keep yourself from going crazy trying to change people. And the other thing I like about this attitude is, I'm not sitting there blaming on other people around me. I'm not blaming, whether it's my family, whether it's my team, whether it's my people I work with, I'm not blaming them for being unmotivated, or blaming them for not trying hard, or blaming them for whatever. I'm just taking responsibility for what's happening in my, for me. I'm taking responsibility.

• 1:28:55Jocko Willink?

  If they're not motivated, I need to try and motivate them if I care about them. If they're dragging me down, whose fault is that? That's not their fault. I'm letting them drag me down. So I'm taking responsibility of my interactions with people to make sure I move it in the right direction. And as a leader, it's my job to get the most out of people. I mean, I always talked about that. You're gonna have, your whole team is not gonna be studs. You're gonna have people on your team that are weak. And it's your job to get what you can out of that person. Take advantage of whatever strengths they might have. Cover for their weaknesses where you can.

• 1:29:34Jocko Willink?

  That's what you're doing as a leader and you're leading whether that's leading in business or your team or your group of friends or whatever. You're taking a leadership position and you're getting what you can out of people.

• 1:29:48Jocko Willink?

  And that's how I deal with people that are close to me that are not the same as me. Don't want to hang around with a bunch of people. Well, I don't mind hanging around with people that are like me. Seal Teams is pretty, the Seal Teams has a lot of people with the similar, you know, they're like, got some similar personalities in there, which is always fun.

• 1:30:10Speaker 01

  Attitudes, yeah, for sure.

• 1:30:14Speaker 01

  Are there, so you say you have low expectations, is there?

• 1:30:19Jocko Willink?

  Doesn't that sound bad? I apologize to people of the world right now.

• 1:30:22Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:23Jocko Willink?

  That when I look at you, I have low expectations. Don't think of it that way.

• 1:30:26Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:30:26Jocko Willink?

  I'm saying in my own mind, I'm just setting low expectations on people.

• 1:30:31Speaker 01

  Right, or you just don't expect a lot, you know?

• 1:30:33Jocko Willink?

  Yes, that's low expectations.

• 1:30:34Speaker 01

  Like you don't expect shittiness, you expect, you just don't expect a lot.

• 1:30:40Jocko Willink?

  Yes.

• 1:30:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, so if someone's making this, you know, tall claim, you don't expect that claim to be fulfilled a hundred percent or, you know, or whatever.

• 1:30:49Jocko Willink?

  I set, I set low expectations and I look to be pleasantly surprised by those people in the world, the people that are listening to this podcast. You all out there, you're gonna, you're gonna fire me up, you know? But, but, but really, that's, you know, most people that you meet, you can't rely on.

• 1:31:07Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:31:07Jocko Willink?

  And that's why it's important to find people that are like-minded

• 1:31:10Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:31:10Jocko Willink?

  and link arms with them and go forward into the fray.

• 1:31:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, and it's not like people are unreliable specifically. It's just that if you set your own specific expectations on people, because everyone's different. You're different, like how you're saying, so if you set your specific expectations, which I, I think most of us do that in one way or another.

• 1:31:32Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:31:32Speaker 01

  We expect certain things, all the way down to the language we use. Some people, you know,

• 1:31:38Speaker 01

  some people don't like if they're called boss, you know, you're like, hey, boss, what's up, boss? Some, I'm gonna be honest, I don't really like that when someone calls me boss. You know, if you don't know your name, you know, hey, brother, same thing, boss. But they meant it in a good way.

• 1:31:50Jocko Willink?

  Right.

• 1:31:50Speaker 01

  You know, but I expect, yeah, I expect you never to use that word when you address me, kind of thing. I mean, it's not that serious.

• 1:31:59Speaker 01

  But anyway, that's just a small example. So if you start setting your own expecta- your specific own expectations consciously and subconsciously, yeah, you you you'll probably get let down. And guess what? Whose fault is that?

• 1:32:11Jocko Willink?

  It's your fault. And you know what's a good it's good tie into this is, and I run into this with business leaders, where they know they're super overachievers and they expect that level of performance out of everyone and they're not gonna get it. And the way I explain it to them, I say, listen, I understand what you want to have happen. But just because as a leader, the lead, the platoon commander is able to carry a hundred pound rucksack, 10 kilometers into the target, hit the target and walk back out another 10 kilometers, doesn't mean that everybody else in the platoon can do it. And therefore, he cannot plan that mission.

• 1:32:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:32:47Jocko Willink?

  And I would usually get through to them on that because they do realize that they're high performers and that they're overachievers and that they're not gonna get. So how are you gonna set the expectations so that you're you've got people that can actually achieve the expectations you've set for them? So that's right on point, boss.

• 1:33:08Jocko Willink?

  Sorry.

• 1:33:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, so I dig it, man. Set those low kind of low expectations.

• 1:33:12Jocko Willink?

  I know, that sounds horrible.

• 1:33:13Speaker 01

  And let them be them. But let them be them.

• 1:33:15Jocko Willink?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:15Speaker 01

  You know? And that way, when you get let, if you get let down,

• 1:33:21Speaker 01

  actually, you probably have a less chance of getting let down. So it's essentially you're minimizing the downside, maximizing the upside.

• 1:33:29Jocko Willink?

  That's a positive way. That's a very positive way of putting it. Yes, you are correct. Thank you for making me, giving a positive spin to my negative attitude.

• 1:33:37Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think I think I understand what you mean. I think so.

• 1:33:43Speaker 01

  Part of it is denial, by the way, because I don't want to ever admit or think that you had some low expectations of me and my functionality.

• 1:33:56Speaker 01

  Um, okay, we'll go next question. Uh, okay. What are the top three? The top three to 10 business problems you're asked to solve?

• 1:34:07Jocko Willink?

  Good question. Interesting question, because why would you say top three to 10? Who, who wrote that? That's crazy. You know, you'd say three or four, or three to five, maybe, but three to 10?

• 1:34:18Speaker 01

  No, no, this actually should be top three.

• 1:34:20Jocko Willink?

  Well, we'll go for it. That being said, here's the problem. Here's the problem that we come up against in Leif and I deal with on a regular basis. Is we get called in due to either a lack of execution? Or desire to improve execution. And this is the same thing we dealt with with working with leadership in the SEAL teams. You get teams that are not executing correctly. That's, that's the problem that we come in to solve. Now, that execution could be production, that execution could be sales, that execution could be manufacturing. It could be anything. That execution. So, that's what we always get asked to solve. That being said, why is there a problem in execution?

• 1:35:05Jocko Willink?

  And the problems, these are where you get like the, okay, five to seven kind of common problems that we deal with. We address, we address most of, most of them. Uh, in fact, we address all the major ones in, in the book. There's a few nuanced ones, but. Uh, you know, the generally the issues are like, oh, you can't get people to buy in. We always hear that. Our, our folks aren't buying in.

• 1:35:27Speaker 01

  Buying into what?

• 1:35:28Jocko Willink?

  Buying into the plan, the philosophy, the strategy, whatever. Uh, people don't understand what's happening. They don't, they don't understand the vision. And we go back and we say, okay, do they understand the why? Are, are they, is, how is the vision being communicated? How is the vision being translated up and down the chain of command? Because you go down from the CEO who has a vision and the way he would speak to that vision is a lot different. Than the way a frontline, you know, equipment operator is gonna wanna understand that vision. So, is the strategy simple and understandable through the chain of command? That can cause a lack of execution? Are there silos?

• 1:36:09Jocko Willink?

  Are there different elements within the company that are not helping each other and supporting each other with a good cover and move? Is there micromanagement going on? We had talked about micromanagement, but micromanagement can cause legitimate problems of execution. Is there unclear guidance? That can cause problems. Is there ego interfering? That can cause problem. Is there ego driving process instead of

• 1:36:34Jocko Willink?

  the best methodology driving process? Sometimes it's ego driving process. So it's all these and there's just these problems and there we've seen them all. I don't think I've seen a new problem yet in quite some time where I've said, oh, I've never seen this before. And we and they're always these problems of execution are leadership problems and we've seen the same thing in some way in the SEAL teams. So I think that's why we've been successful as a company going in and getting people to execute better because we've seen it. We know how to fix it and that's what we do.

• 1:37:11Speaker 01

  All right. Um, next question is,

• 1:37:16Speaker 01

  how do you handle a boss that doesn't know as much as you? And they don't understand what you do. But they're bossy.

• 1:37:26Speaker 01

  But they bossy.

• 1:37:27Jocko Willink?

  Okay, so this is actually a normal situation. This is not abnormal. Bosses often don't know as much as the frontline troops. I can tell you right now. I was the boss of thirty five or forty SEALs when I was a task unit commander and I didn't know as much as they knew about their jobs. I didn't know what the snipers knew about sniping. I didn't know everything that the radio men about knew about the radios. I didn't know like Leif, Leif was working with the Iraqis every day. I didn't know about his Iraqi soldiers and what they were like. I couldn't pretend to know that stuff.

• 1:38:08Jocko Willink?

  But I was actually secure in that fact. I was okay with that. And that's what I recognized that that wasn't my job. And I was okay with it. So, the question is, how do you deal with someone like that? Well, let's first recognize the fact that they are insecure in their job. So the reason I was able to like, let my guys run stuff is because I was secure with myself as a leader and my position. When you're dealing with someone that's still bossy, they're trying to impose upon you how to do things. And that is because the root of that

• 1:38:51Jocko Willink?

  is likely, I don't want to call it out as a hundred percent, but the root of that is likely insecurity. He is insecure about his authority, insecure about his leadership, insecure about his position. So, when you want to deal with it, how do you deal with it? Your job becomes in this situation to make your boss feel secure in their position. That's what your goal becomes. That means, and, and yes, you know what that means? It means nodding your head and, and giving them credit where they might not deserve it. And inflating their ego, or not inflating, but massaging their ego a little bit. And you know

• 1:39:36Jocko Willink?

  what that means? The hardest part of that isn't massaging their ego. The hardest part of it is checking your own ego. The hardest part of that is saying, is, is you want to prove to them that you know more than they do. And that just bubbles up and over and it will ruin your relationship. And it will ruin the, the job that you're trying to do of make them feel secure. Because you're like, hey, boss, actually, you're wrong. It's this. Well, your ego feels good, but guess what? You just hurt his ego. Now is what they're gonna do? They're gonna try and pose more will upon you. So you've actually gone backwards. You win the battle, you lose the war. So, what you need to do is make that boss feel secure, massage their ego. Don't try and prove that you know

• 1:40:20Jocko Willink?

  more. Try and prove that you're there to support and help. And in the long run, that will be the beneficial way to improve that relationship. Let them recognize or let them feel secure with what they at, where they're at. And then they won't impose, try and impose their will on you as the boss man.

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, that, I'm gonna add, uh, what you, kinda what you were saying, I think, last time.

• 1:40:48Speaker 01

  This is a small, tiny side note, but I think it's really important. When you try, when you're doing that, when you're convincing or, or making them feel more secure as a boss.

• 1:40:57Speaker 01

  Be sure to come off genuine and consistent. Remember how we were talking about that? Because a lot of people, they'll be like, okay, that's what I'm gonna do. And then they overtly wanna show that that's what they're doing. Whether it be to other people, because you know, maybe they got scolded or, or whatever in front of other people. And then so they overtly do it and it doesn't come off as genuine, then it's counterproductive, you know?

• 1:41:16Jocko Willink?

  Yes, this is called, well, this is what I used to call in the SEAL teams, classic overcorrection. And classic overcorrection, you know, we'd see guys go too far in one direction. Cause we're always talking about the dichotomy of leadership. And I'd say to a guy, oh, you're doing, uh, you're doing too much. You're not doing enough decentralized command. And they do classic overcorrection and they would lose control of everything. Or they, if we told them everyone was too wild and they didn't have control of anything, they'd go into level nine micro management, you know, and just lock everyone down. So yeah, you don't wanna do a classic overcorrection. You wanna, you wanna moderate and modulate your efforts to make the person feel secure. No doubt about it.

• 1:41:56Speaker 01

  Can you apply extreme ownership at mid-level management versus the C-suite level?

• 1:42:04Jocko Willink?

  Well, this is, this is absolutely true. Can you apply extreme ownership or the, the, the leadership principles that we talk about in extreme ownership? Can you apply them at mid-level management versus the executive level of the, the C-suite folks? And the answer is absolutely yes. And not only that, but extreme ownership applies through the entire chain of command. The principles are meant for everyone inside the chain of command. Cause as we talk about all the time, the leadership just doesn't mean the actual designated leaders. Every person on a team needs to be a leader. And while that may sound cliche, it is actually true. So.

• 1:42:51Jocko Willink?

  Not only that, but the senior executives at a company, the CEO, they work for somebody. Whether they work for a board, whether it's, you know, Steve Jobs in charge of Apple, guess what? He's reporting to shareholders. So everyone has some kind of boss. Everyone's working for somebody and everybody needs to use these principles all the way up and down the chain of command. The principles of leadership don't change no matter where you are in the chain of command or what situation you're in. And that's why, you know, we're getting, we get called in to help every level of the chain of command, from the frontline troops, from literally from the frontline troops, the, the equipment operators, the operators in the field, the salespeople on

• 1:43:33Jocko Willink?

  the front lines, we work with them all the way up to the C-suite and above.

• 1:43:39Speaker 01

  Yeah, just like how you were saying, it applies to everybody and in every situation. It's, it's absolutely true. Like in life, in a relationship with your husband or wife, and in the relationship with your kids, same exact thing.

• 1:43:54Jocko Willink?

  Yep.

• 1:43:54Speaker 01

  Like if you're taking responsibility for everything you did wrong and right, right? I would imagine you take responsibility for the right things you did, but if you're taking responsibility, I think that's when you can eventually function the way that, that you hope that you'll be able to function.

• 1:44:09Jocko Willink?

  You are correct. Just to be clear though, when you do do something right and you are in a leadership position, you actually don't take responsibility for it. You push that, you push that praise of accomplishment to the team.

• 1:44:22Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 1:44:24Jocko Willink?

  Yeah. You never want to absorb that.

• 1:44:26Speaker 01

  Dang, that's advanced, bro.

• 1:44:28Jocko Willink?

  That's actually white belt material.

• 1:44:33Speaker 01

  Last question, I think. How do you deal with setbacks, failures, delays, defeat, or other disasters?

• 1:44:44Jocko Willink?

  How do I deal with setbacks, failures, delays, defeat, or other disasters? I actually have a...

• 1:44:56Jocko Willink?

  Fairly simple way of dealing with these situations. It is actually one word to deal with all those situations. And that is good.

• 1:45:12Jocko Willink?

  This is actually something that one of my direct subordinates, one of my guys that worked for me, pointed out to me and he would, he would call me up or pull me aside with some major problem, some issue that was going on and he'd say, boss, we got this and that and the other thing. And I look at him and I'd say, good. And finally, one day he was telling me about some issue that he was having some problem and he said, I already know what you're gonna say.

• 1:45:40Jocko Willink?

  And I said, well, what am I gonna say? He said, you're gonna say, good.

• 1:45:45Jocko Willink?

  He said, that's what you always say. When something is wrong and going bad, you always just look at me and say, good.

• 1:45:53Jocko Willink?

  And I said, well, yeah. And, and I mean it. And that is how I feel. When things are going bad,

• 1:46:03Jocko Willink?

  there's gonna be some good that's gonna come from it. And, oh, mission got canceled? Good, we can focus on another one. Didn't get the new high-speed gear we wanted? Good, we can keep it simple. Didn't get promoted?

• 1:46:21Jocko Willink?

  Good. More time to get better.

• 1:46:26Jocko Willink?

  Didn't get funded? Good. We own more of the company. Didn't get the job you wanted? Good.

• 1:46:34Jocko Willink?

  You can get more experience and build a better resume. Got injured? Got injured, sprained my ankle? Good. Needed a break from training.

• 1:46:46Jocko Willink?

  Got tapped out? Good. It's better to tap in training than to tap out on the street.

• 1:46:53Jocko Willink?

  Got beat? Good. You learned.

• 1:46:58Jocko Willink?

  Unexpected problems? Good. We have the opportunity to figure out a solution. And that's it.

• 1:47:09Jocko Willink?

  That's it. When things are going bad, don't get all bummed out, don't get startled, don't get frustrated. No. You just look at the issue and you say, good.

• 1:47:24Jocko Willink?

  And I don't mean to say something that's all cliche and I don't mean to sound like Mr. Positive, find the positive, but do that. Focus on the good.

• 1:47:35Jocko Willink?

  Take that issue, take that problem. And make it something good. It'll bring that attitude to your team, too.

• 1:47:44Jocko Willink?

  You go forward.

• 1:47:48Jocko Willink?

  And lastly, like to close this out.

• 1:47:54Jocko Willink?

  If you can say the word "good", guess what? It means you're still alive. It means you're still breathing. And if you're still breathing,

• 1:48:08Jocko Willink?

  well then, hell. You've still got some fight left in you. So get up, dust off, reload, recalibrate, reengage,

• 1:48:23Jocko Willink?

  and go out on the attack.

• 1:48:27Jocko Willink?

  And that right there is about as good as it gets.

• 1:48:36Jocko Willink?

  And that's all I got for today. So, everyone that's been listening, thank you for your patience. Thanks for listening. Thanks for spreading the word. And most of all, to everyone listening to the Jocko Podcast. Thank you for getting after it.