0:15 hello and welcome to a late starting business lessons from the military I'm your host Kevin bamel and we're here every Tuesday at our new time 10:00 a.m. except uh Pacific time except for today I got caught in a meeting at my daughter's school and and uh did not did not make it back uh to the studio here on time so I apologize uh for that um and our our purpose uh on Tuesday is to uh look at military Doctrine military history the leadership of of um great
0:52 military figures and and take those philosophies and ideas and translate them them into our professional lives running our businesses better if we have a professional practice whatever it is making all of those work better um as a result of what we learn in the military so if you saw um my social media posts this morning um I mentioned we were going to be talking I think it was about um um oops get this call gone um
1:30 uh we were going to be continuing our discussion about intelligence and um I I I don't do this normally um but but something happened um at the meeting I was at um in my daughter's school this morning um that that really caused me to to to think um quite hard about something that I learned being in the military that that is very much a applicable to our our our lives civilian business personal all of
2:07 that and and so I want to spend some time talking about that today while it's fresh on my mind and we'll we'll pick up with our discussion on intelligence next week and hopefully you'll you'll bear with me on that so just to kind of set this up um I I've been asked to sit on an advisory committee um for my daughter's school Beverly Hills High School um to help the counselors there um better
2:42 understand how they can help the students um be more successful both academically um social emotionally as well as preparing for their postsecondary school lives so that's the three functions that uh school counselors engage in and um just just as a side note I I learned something interesting School counseling as a profession is not very old in fact I'm older than it is um the first actual school counselor I guess certified or whatever was like in
3:18 1971 now I I mean I'm pretty sure that um that that I that I had counselors um when I was you know in in grade school but um I think the the sort of recognition of of it as a profession separate from teachers dates back less than or only a little more than 50 years so um in um talking about this subject so there's an organization of school counselors which you know that's no
3:54 surprise um and they offer a a reward a program I should say that recognizes um outstanding School counseling teams and so for the first time um Beverly Hills High School is is looking to participate in this program with you know the hope that they will be one of the winners um and so it it takes among other things having an advisory Council hence why um I and and about uh there must been about 30 people there um
4:30 joined in this meeting this morning and there were there were students there were counselors there were teachers there were parents there were administrators so you know cross-section of people interested in in school and the topic came up that um or the topic that came up that that engendered quite a bit of discussion interestingly was the level of participation in AP classes so um if you're not familiar with what that is these are um advanced placement classes and they allow a student who's going to
5:06 college to start at a higher level when they get to College I.E advanced placement so as a freshman they might be a freshman in college they might be able to take a sophomore level class I suppose um we didn't have AP when I was uh in high school that I recall so um and they have um uh So currently I think it's 35% of students at at Beverly Hills High School are taking AP courses at least one AP course and their goal for the coming year is is for it to
5:41 grow to 42% so a 20% increase and laudable goal that's all fine um and one of the ways they're planning on meeting the goal is through um uh discussing AP classes as part of the um annual meeting they have with each student about their classes for the upcoming semester and and and Beyond and and so um the the counselor who was presenting this particular
6:16 goal you know gave an overall picture of of of what the goal was about and and then you know kind of open up the floor for questions and and comments and one of the parents um rather assertively um said that um she thinks that parents should be involved in these meetings when students select their classes um because students um and and she was referring
6:51 primarily to ninth and 10th grade students they don't have an appreciation for the the kind of life lifelong decisions that that they're making um and and um she I don't know 14-year-old boys took a beating I will tell you but but and there were because there were there were a couple of other parents who had uh I I think freshman boys must be 14 if I recall um and and and I guess no freshman boy is able to figure out what classes he really ought to take that was
7:26 that was sort of the um the the feeling which um I don't know when I was a freshman in high school could I choose my classes I think so I don't know I mean I don't remember having that many choices frankly and and I I I do remember last year my daughter had virtually no choice about what classes she took as a freshman it was you know there were required classes and that's what she took but nonetheless um a a a rather vigorous discussion um you know came about as a
8:02 result of this parents comment and um at one point this parent said uh and and and this is getting to the the key point to the military connection that um students entering High School need to have you know a three and a half to fouryear plan that they adhere to that will make that will lead them to success in high
8:37 school because then that's going to lead them to success for the next 30 years of their lives the classes that they take in other words in those four years are what are going to determine the success that they enjoy over the next 30 years of their lives and i i i i primarily listened to the discussion that ensued and and it seemed that in general parents agreed with that
9:14 assessment um and and the counselors um did their best to explain that um since each counselor has to meet with between 280 and two and 300 students trying to coordinate um meetings with you know that many meetings with parents and such was candidly they didn't say it this way but I mean it's a non-starter it's just it's just not going to work number one a lot of the parents are are are not going to engage in it that's just good or bad
9:51 that's just the way it is and number two there just aren't enough hours in the day in the week in the month to to do that not in these days when you know most families have two working parents have more than you know they have more than one child and and and a lot of other it's it's it's just not going to happen um and and and there was a my sense was there was frustration um on both sides the parents and the counselors with each not um understanding or feeling that the
10:29 side understood what was important to them and so um I finally kind of raised my [Laughter] hand um I think this is my my job at these meetings is it's it's to grab the grenade pull the pin and drop it kind of in the middle and and hope that it doesn't blow up by what I say and I I used exactly that metaphor and I said that I I I think we need to be
11:05 careful about thinking that the stakes are so high in high school so I I I know I'm of a generation we were raised because this was largely true of our parents that we're going to go to high school we're going to go to college we're going to get a job we're going to work at that job for 34 years we're going to retire with a defined benefit pension and live out our golden years and that's how life worked um but that isn't how life Works
11:42 um it it it worked for a large percentage of the so-called greatest Generation um you know the people who you know sort of fought and lived through World War II my parents generation but it hasn't been true largely I think for the Baby Boomers and succeeding generations and the reality is and I I don't recall exactly the the the statistics but the typical young person today getting out of high school or college is probably going to have something like three to six different
12:18 careers over their lifetime um and I and and as I was saying that I could see the college counselor kind of shaking her head so so I think my statistics are are are accurate and the i i the other thing I said was the most important thing that we can do for our high school age children is to help them learn how to run their own lives and and most importantly how to recover from the mistakes they make
12:53 because it actually isn't true we can fail a class in in high school we can get a D in a class in high school it's not going to ruin the rest of our life it it just it just isn't nobody going forward is going to ask us our grades from high school and and that's not to say that we shouldn't strive to do our best in in high school we certainly should we should strive to do our best in college We should strive to do our best in life but there are very very few decisions that we can make
13:31 that are existential and that if we make the wrong decision permanently put us out of the game I mean even cre even committing a criminal act that doesn't necessarily mean that we've ruined the rest of our lives so I think I knew a lot of this before I joined the military but it really was ingrained in me how true these are by being in the
14:08 military and I'll give you a few examples of of what I mean so um when I was stationed in okanawa one of the collateral duties as a Chaplain that I volunteered for was to be the brig chaplain so the brig Brig is a Navy and Marine Corps term for jail and at any given time there was between you know I don't know 10 15 to 30 almost all men in the brig once in a while we would have a female um but but
14:43 rarely and many of them had a sense um that their life was over okay now now for the most part the things they did that landed them in the brig were they weren't heinous um I know there was one Marine who put his fist through the window of a taxi okay not the brightest thing okay he had had too much to drink and and that's what he did um in other cases they stole something or they they got into a fight and they hurt somebody okay the person didn't die
15:19 or anything like that there was no premeditation it was they did what I call they committed the big stupid right but as a result they were being um kicked out of the Marine Corps okay so they might have joined the Marine Corps to help straighten out their life and now they you because they had made decision they had made some bad decisions you know before they joined the Corp um and and now they had made another bad decision and they were getting kicked out of the Marine Corps
15:54 and many of these and they were young men almost all of them them were young men when I say young um un certainly under 30 probably under 25 um many of them thought that kind of like you know two or even three strikes and and and I'm out I'm done but that that is not that was not true okay and I felt my job was to show them that they could recover from the mistakes that they made I know one
16:29 one young man in particular um when I first met him was was probably clinically depressed but he certainly was in a very very sad upset State over what he had done to himself basically and we talked a lot and I I did a series of classes about how to you know get your life back once once you got back to civilian life and um I I uh this this one young man
17:04 was a regular attendee we talked on a regular basis and and you know after a few months he was released and sent back to the United States and um I got a letter from him um I think it was about a month or so later maybe it was an email but I think it was a letter and he just wanted to let thank me which was very kind of him as rarely as Chaplin do we figure out whether what we did worked um he wanted to thank me um and let me know that he had gotten a job as a supervisor at um I believe was
17:40 a Lowe's or maybe it was a Home Depot um and he was very excited for the future he um you know he had gotten into the the sort of management training program I think it was and um and you know because of his experience in the Marine Corps they looked at him as having um leadership skills and and and he really you know landed on his feet and and he and he he on on a certain level he couldn't believe it and he's like wow you know everything you said turned out to pretty much be correct it's like well so you know us old guys
18:16 you know we've been around the block a few times we know some things um and he he um you know he he he was able to recover from the mistakes he made um and and and that was admirable certainly um but I think part of the reason he did it he was able to do it was because of what he learned in the Marine Corps and what in general people learn in the military so this idea that we create a battle plan and we
18:55 execute that plan you know flawlessly and Achieve our objective no I mean it it doesn't work out that way the military is about making plans that inevitably are not going to go the way we think they will um and uh and we have to have you know contingencies available to us um so that we can and recover regroup
19:30 if necessary and move forward again looking to achieve our objective the the the war is not won because no battles are lost the war is one because when we lose battles we learn from those losses and we turn around and are able to be more successful ful in the next battle that certainly was the case in World War
20:05 II where especially in the early days of the war the Allies made numerous State numerous mistakes in some cases very large costly mistakes I mean if Pearl Harbor wasn't a large costly mistake I I don't know what is close to 3,000 people killed um a large portion of the fleet Dam damaged Beyond repair or disabled um airfields torn up I mean and
20:42 it was only and and and I I shouldn't say that it was not only but we were able to recover because number one our aircraft carriers weren't in Pearl Harbor when it was bombed and two for some strange reasons the fuel tanks were not bombed and so we had Fuel and we had um aircraft carriers and so we were still able to um fight the war but but it was still an enormous setback and we overcame that setback and things like the time it took to raise ships that had
21:20 been sunk and put them back into operation the time it was thought it would take and the time that it actually took was much shorter because we figured out ways we mean the the the people who were doing the Salvage and repair operations found out ways to do things much more quickly than we had thought we could do them and and and the more lessons they learned the more quickly they were able to do things so the recovery happened much faster and we didn't win every battle in World War II not by any stretch of the imagination
21:57 and even in the battles we won we paid terrible prices in some cases um and and we learned lessons that allowed us to eventually go on to Victory you know and and so then we were able to win World War II now I've been speaking about the Pacific Theater but L the same thing was largely true in the European theater as well um and that's how it is in life that's how it is in business the de there's there's no I shouldn't say no there's rarely is a is
22:33 a decision we make in business existential I.E if it doesn't pan out the business is going to die now sometimes it is if we really kind of bet everything and it goes Ary it could you know close the business but most decisions don't rise to that level you know business is a series of engagements I won't use the term battle because I it's not it's not that combative I I I don't think I've said this in a while but business is not an existential activity for the most part the way combat and War are um but we can we can
23:11 make mistakes and and businesses can recover and there have been notable ones at one time IBM was the most the largest computer company in the world and then it almost fell apart into nothing and now IBM is back and while it's not the biggest computer company but it's it's back and it's growing again okay businesses have life cycles in in many ways like the same way that people do so the so the the aim in in business
23:49 always is to make the best decisions that we can based on the information that we've got the resources that are available Etc just like it is in the military to fight a battle with the resources we have the people we have available the the intelligence that we have and be as successful as we can in obtaining the objectives of that particular operation and if we don't achieve our goals or all of our our goals evaluate why did we miss them and then
24:27 use that information to be more effective in the next business operation in the next combat operation and keep doing that and if we keep doing it eventually we will be successful okay um I I think I've mentioned this before and um he was probably in the military at some time though I I I don't know that for a fact but um I believe this was said by Felix Roy Hatton who was a investment banker as I recall um back in
25:02 the 70s I believe and he said that the key to being successful is to stay in the game and that's true just stay in the game so as long as we don't make a mistake that's so cataclysmic we can't recover from it we can be successful and there's really nothing that we can do in high school or college or you know in our military careers or
25:39 our business careers that permanently takes us out of the game unless God forbid it kills us or it you know I don't know puts us in prison for the rest of our lives something horrible like that aside from those very very um horrific situations um we we can recover and military victories show us that that's the case that the United States could recover from Pearl Harbor um which was December 7th
26:15 1941 okay and although it may have seemed like a long time later it was only about three and a half years later we had defeated both Germany and Japan we had defeated the AIS the axis um Germany in I believe it was April of 1945 and Japan in August of 1945 okay so 42 43 44 part of 45 about four and a half years okay after a devastating defeat and and and other
26:52 devastating defeats in in all the various theaters of combat okay I mean obviously the the hundreds of thousands of sailors and Marines and and and soldiers and Airmen who were killed for them they they were unable to go on to to success and and and that's sad that's that is the very unfortunate side of war is that war is an existential um and it's an existential
27:27 uh uh Endeavor for human beings okay but business is not so um there's a famous uh story about Walt Disney having gone broke I forget how many times um until he finally was successful um he didn't literally go broke I've read extensively about Walt Disney but but he and his brother Roy had ups and downs and ups and downs and ups and downs and there were many times when they weren't exactly sure where
28:03 they were going to find the money to do their next project and and and Roy uh was able to pull a rabbit out of a hat so to speak and and keep the studio going and Walt Disney was able to um take advantage of his brother's um business prowess in a way cre that creatively he was eventually um he eventually made the company not just successful but successful and
28:38 sustainable right it took both of them to do it each one of them alone would would never have accomplished what um what Walt Disney Productions now the Walt Disney Company has become the largest entertainment company in in in the world okay and so I I think that you know this may be the most important business lesson that we can get from the military and that is that battles will be won and battles will be
29:13 lost um and as long as we're willing to learn from our losses and apply those lessons we can we will eventually prevail okay in in most cases and so that's the message I bring to you today from my my school meeting um you know it's it's December it's it's a time I think for reflecting on larger issues um and so I felt like you know this was a a good moment to to bring
29:50 this to you here the the first show for December um so that's that's that's what I have for you today and I I I thank you for tuning in and especially if you tuned in and were wondering where is he okay um so uh thank thank thank you for your grace and in in my being late today I appreciate it and and I hope that that this particular show um really heartens you if if you've been feeling um if you've been struggling professionally um you will prevail you
30:28 will we can lose a lot of battles but we can still win the war that's that is the fundamental lesson of the military so that's our show for today tomorrow at 12:30 pm Pacific time is my show people making money with my guest Aaron Holtzman Aaron is an entrepreneurial accountant and uh he has a quite an interesting background professional Journey so I invite you to join me uh join Aaron and me um you can join us
31:04 live just go to our event bright page you get a free ticket or you know watch us on your favorite uh social media stream and um uh check us out there uh you can also um watch all of our episodes of course on our YouTube channel and and I invite you um if if you care to to be a subscriber so you'll never miss an episode so again tomorrow 12:30 p.m. people making money with my guest Aaron Holtzman and then next week 10:00 a.m. Monday the next edition of trusts and Estates weekly and seven days
31:39 from today we'll be back with we'll be back on track with Marine Corps War fighting Doctrine on Intelligence on business lessons from the military at 10:00 a.m. those are all pacific times so just you know three hours later for the east coast and an hour in for mountain and central time so thanks again for joining me signing off as I always do Marie you are my bell all the best folks have a great day look forward to seeing you tomorrow