0:03 hello and welcome to business lessons from the military I'm your host Kevin bemel and we are here every Tuesday at 10: a.m. Pacific time to talk about military history Doctrine and the practices of great milit military leaders and distill from them lessons we can use in our businesses so today I I I you know I was kind of struggling for what I wanted to talk about on today's show and I was when I was planning shows last week and all of a sudden it dawned on me
0:38 you know one of my favorite subjects is dogs now I know some of you out there do not like dogs um one of my longest standing and closest friends does not like dogs but I I think most of us like dogs and even if you don't hopefully you can appreciate um what what dog U um essentially bring to the table so I did some research and I I found three notable dog well I'm sure there's
1:14 more but I identified three notable dogs in military history that I want to tell you about and there's some I think outstanding lessons we can learn from these animals about potentially having dogs on our team in the workplace so um you know it for those of you who who have ever been on a walk with me if I walk by someone and and a dog you know looks at me I will I will usually ask the owner may I pet your dog
1:49 and so you know I I don't have a dog of my own right now um my dog uh my jiggers um died in in 2012 I haven't had a have a dog haven't had a dog of my own since then um and I I used for a short time I brought um jiggers into the workplace when I was a Navy chaplain and I will tell you that he um it did work the way I'm going to talk about today so I'll save those lessons for you unfortunately at that time the colonel in charge of
2:24 headquarters uh and service Battalion in okanawa um detested dogs and so uh through somebody else he told me I couldn't bring my dog to uh to see the Young Marines when I did the indoc brief but you know shortsightedness on his part I I would argue but but it is what it is so like I said I'm going to tell you about the history of of three dogs stubby chips and Cairo so if you saw my social media posts you saw those names and you know inexplicably tied to team with dog team up with dog
3:00 so let's start with tubby stubby I mean stubby was actually given the rank of Sergeant he's the only dog ever given a rank through combat in military history so he was promoted to the rank of Sergeant he was a I think he was originally a private so um he was probably a Boston terrier mix now if you know anything about dogs Terriers are tend to be very very smart um oftentimes mixed breed dogs are smarter than pure
3:37 breeds although not always uh and he served in the US Army during World War I so if you've watched any of the previous episodes I've done a number of shows highlighting different aspects of World War I uh General persing um different battles Muse arone Etc so HBY was actually he was a stray found by a fellow named private J Robert Conroy at Yale University now this may sound a little bit strange but in World War I a
4:12 large number of young men from the elite American universities enlisted as soldiers in World War I not necessarily as officers by the way in fact there's a a wonderful book um the oh shoot the millionaire flying boys or something like that and it's about one of these young wealthy young men from an elite University who started a group to who learned how to fly here in the United States and then went over to uh Europe in World War I and they flew
4:47 combat missions in World War I but they were they paid for their own training in order to be able to do that it was a very very patriotic thing uh to do so uh private Conroy actually smuggled stubby onto the ship that was that was taking him in his unit to France and he became the mascot of the 102nd Infantry Regiment stubby participated in 17 battles on the Western Front and
5:22 primarily as you might imagine you know dogs have a keen sense of smell excuse me hearing and um and it made him an excellent Scout so among the things that stubby was able to do was because of his sense of smell he could tell when a gas attack was coming toward his uh you know human colleagues and give them a warning before they would even sense that it was there allowing them to put their gasm masks on ahead of time and not be uh nearly as
5:58 impeded or heav impacted by a gas attack another thing he did was he located wounded soldiers um and and provided them with comfort you know while they were in the battlefield until they could be brought back to Friendly lines and given medical treatment um he also captured a German spy if you can imagine um and he evidently um attacked this this German that was somehow spying on the American line he grabbed onto his pans and held him until um the American
6:33 soldiers arrived um and after the war uh stubby survived the war and he came back to America he was a a national hero he he Pro he participated in uh parades he met presidents and he received medals for his service so um and and his remains are displayed at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History so um you can go to the Smithsonian in Washington DC and see Stubby's remains so so you know what a what a you know an
7:08 amazing animal right um the next dog I'm GNA tell you about is chips now chips was a German Shepherd colie Siberian Husky mix right and again we're seeing you know mixed breed oftentimes you know more and more intelligent than a pure bread he served in the United States Army during World War II and he was one of the most decorated War Dogs of World War II he served with the third infantry division he was trained as a centry dog and he participated in the invasions of Sicily Italy I'm sorry
7:46 yeah Sicily Italy France and Germany right so all of those amphibious um uh invasions th those with the exception of North Africa those were essentially all of the invasions um that occurred during World War II so um during the invasion of Sicily in 1943 chips and his Handler were pinned down by a machine gun uh nest and chips Broke Free of his Handler he attacked the enemy soldiers and forced them to surrender can you imagine uh this you
8:23 know this this you know you know German Shepherds they're they're big dogs German Shepherd colie Siberian h must have been a very formidable looking dog right it attacks these Soldiers with a machine gun um he even grabbed one of the soldiers by the throat right and this allowed the uh the so US soldiers to capture this Machine Gun Nest so for his bravery get this chips was awarded the distinguished service cross the Silver Star th those are you know um
8:58 medals for her or personal decorations for heroism and the Purple Heart which is a decoration you get for being wounded in in combat now unfortunately later the the metals were revoked there was a regulation about giving um about giving military metals to animals but but nonetheless it it it gives you an idea of the esteem with which the uh third infantry division held chips and and how what he did um in terms of saving lives of his uh fellow soldiers
9:36 right um he also by the way he saved his unit during a nighttime Ambush by detecting enemy forces before they could attack probably heard them right sneaking up or whatever and was able to alert the soldiers he was with so you know again an amazing animal um but by no means the only um a dog who who was with the troops in World War II but but you know chips is is a an outstanding example of of how dogs um helped soldiers in combat during
10:13 the second world war the third dog I'm gonna talk to you about is Cairo uh Cairo kind of near and dear to my heart um because Cairo was a Navy SEAL dog and uh for those of you who who know a little about my career I was U my last uh reserve duty Billet was as chaplain command chaplain of a Seal Team so um to know these um these people who work in the Navy special Warfare Community spe
10:48 Special Operations Community is is is is really something um and it's uh as as you might imagine it's a it's a very difficult environment um and um especially at this time um the the the seals were being called upon to do a huge number of missions far more than they had before um and and and doing missions that normally would have been assigned to just regular troops um but um the president at that time um wanted to keep a low profile on
11:25 combat actions um something that frankly did not engrace appreciate him to the seal Community um because they were so overworked um and and and their families as well did not particularly appreciated either um but um so um uh Cairo was a Belgian malinoi um I not exactly sure what that is except for I'm pretty sure it's a it's a it's a pretty big dog and he served with SEAL Team Six so I'm I'm gonna I want to show you
12:00 a um a video of one of the things that uh Cairo could do so um Cairo could um parachute and he could do what's called Fast roping out of a helicopter so I'm going to show this is just a really short video but this is one of this is not Cairo um but this is a video of of a soldier and and his dog um this is a US
12:35 Seal um Team um uh fast out there's the dog he's got his goggles on and you can see he's got his taller and um I don't know why he's checking his teeth but he is so he you know the uh the seal loads him into the helicopter and their hardness their harness together there you see there's a rig on the there's boat okay and watch watch this there's the and at the seal that's fast right it's very Rapid Way of
13:13 exiting from the helicopter anding Z now hold it there the helicop pretty amazing okay so um I mean it's it's really kind of mindblowing I mean it's you know for a human being to do that is is pretty mind-blowing but to do for a dog to do
13:48 it so um Cairo is most famous for participating in Operation Neptune Spear which uh was the Navy raid in 2011 that led to the killing of Osama bin Laden um and if if you were around in 2011 you probably remember um what a Monumental event that was because Osama Bin Laden had planned the um 91101 attacks here in the United State
14:23 so um many Americans really felt a sense of Victory after the um seals uh took out Bin Laden and with and with the help of Cairo so um Cairo was he was equipped with a a special Kine tactical vest it was fitted out with cameras and this would enable realtime surveillance without um the seals you know being in danger doing the surveillance themselves so they could check out the layout and see what was
14:58 the safest way way to approach uh a situation not not just you know the bin Laden compound but just in general that was the work that Cairo did and he he was on many many dangerous missions um during his time with with SEAL Team Six um and I I believe he uh you know lived through it and retired um and I think he was adopted by um a seal veteran um a a you know after his time in in in the military was done
15:34 so you know just again just an amazing um you know things that that these dogs did so I want to talk I want to now take some time and translate into you know civilian Business and Professional reasons why um we might want to have dogs on our teams now before I do that I'm going to talk about just some considerations about bringing dogs into the workplace um obviously nothing we do is is comp is completely
16:10 at least potentially Problem free um so having said that I'm GNA talk just about three things to consider before you know you would make a decision to bring um animals into the workplace I I I will say that um in one of the um projects that I work on um we we do have well we not so much anymore because we found homes for them because we're going to be moving the office but um we had cats in our office um the former owner of the business who passed away just loved cats
16:45 and so we we kept a number of cats there for a while um while we found them other homes um and and it was It was kind of fun you know these little I me they were small and you know very sort of agile they'd run around and you know they were they were quite delightful to watch uh I'm I'm not a particular cat lover although um I I did have a cat for for many many years Lily that I I dearly loved I I honestly prefer dogs but but these cats were were were quite Charming um I'm not aware of there being military cats though which is why this show is on on military dogs so three things to
17:20 think about um the first one is allergies and fears I.E you know that that that some of the people in your workplace could have NE ative reactions one that they not really able to control allergies right if they're allergic to dogs that can be problematic now there are dogs that are essentially hypoallergenic or I should say dog breeds and so it may be that if you if you do have someone in your office who's allergic but you get a hypoallergenic breed so then maybe that would um eliminate that that hurdle to having a
17:56 dog in your workplace obviously you're going to want to talk with someone who knows um you know dogs and and dog breeds and and dogs in the workplace you know someone who knows those those well you're probably not going to just want to go to you know the pound and just pick out any dog but but get some advice by the way I'm not saying you shouldn't get a dog from the pound I think you that would be great if you did but you're going to want to get advice as to which dog to pick that would be appropriate for the situation at at your organization now some people are afraid of dogs uh sometimes those fears
18:32 have a rational basis I.E they were attacked by a dog uh other times they're somewhat irrational but that is something I think you're going to want to take into account I know when I was a boy scout we were doing a newspaper drive and I walked up to a house and all of a sudden this dog jumped out at me and it it grabbed me in the groin um scared the heck out of me um and one of the adult leaders saw what happened and he you know pulled the dog off and I I was shaken up but you know the leader explained to me that the dog was
19:08 probably trained to uh protect the house and protect the inhabitants of the house and they had left the newspapers out because they knew we were doing this paper drive and I I should have been more careful in approaching the house and so that made sense to me I was whatever I was 11 12 years old something like that okay so um for me it didn't it didn't cause any lasting fear of dogs um but I could see where it it it might I know my daughter um got nipped by a dog and and that has um I don't want to say it's made her permanently afraid of dogs
19:43 but it's made her skittish about dogs ever since she she was a very very young child when that happened unfortunately so that's one thing to consider another is just pet Behavior so you know to have a dog in the workplace can be a great thing but it can be disruptive especially if the dog is ill behaved and so if it's barking running around a lot chasing things and and and and and all of that it it could make it very very difficult for the office to be productive so
20:19 you're gonna want to get a dog that's calm well Tred and not disruptive and and by the way it may mean trying out uh you know a few dogs to find one that is compatible with your workplace okay um even the size of a dog can be problematic I know when I was married um my daughter's mother loves dogs more more than I do and she loved to adopt um you know dogs that that needed a home in order to prevent them from being put
20:55 down and I came home one day uh I think this is when I was stationed up at Point Meo and I walk into our dining room and there's a dog resting his head on the dining room table this huge dog and um I mean you know we we we had a we had a nice house at the time but I mean it was not a big house the dog was just too big anytime he would move he was knocking into stuff and so you know I I asked her to you know find another home for the dog as quickly as possible my dog my daughter was petrified of this big huge dog so so you
21:32 know that and and by the way the dog was not uh he was not a barker he was not um he did not jump or anything he was just big and and he you know uh he was just he was just too big for this the size home we had really um I think he was a Great Dane mix or something like that I he was he was a beautiful dog by the way um so so you know you want to make sure the dogs Behavior will be compatible with your workplace now if you have a very active workplace then maybe the dog running around is a good thing right so
22:07 it just it just depends on what goes on in your organization the third one is safety and cleanliness so you know the environment needs to be safe for dogs I badly wanted to bring my dog jiggers when I went on deployment on on the USS Ronald Reagan uh the problem is twofold one is an aircraft carrier is really not a safe environment for a dog um aside from all the dangers from aircraft and all of that there's just plain falling off the ship I mean you
22:44 know if he had fallen off the ship he almost surely would have drowned now I would have Doven after him and then we would have drowned together and uh you know that would have been horrible um having said that I think that if there were a way for jiggers to have been on the ship safely he he could have done a tremendous amount of good on that ship but you know if if you have the kind of work environment where for example there's a lot of toxic chemicals so that may be problematic having a dog around because they could you know get poisoned
23:20 by the chemicals um but so that's a thing to consider and then cleanliness on the part of the dog right where is the dog going to do its business I mean you don't want the dog urinating or pooping you know in the workplace that's pretty disgusting right so is there a dog run where he can go do his business or whatever are you know is there going to be a schedule for people to take him for walks outside or whatever so all all of that needs to be worked out so you know and obviously the dog needs to be you know house trained office trained I guess we would call it in this case or or workplace trained right um so I think
23:58 those are the things we want to think about before we would put a dog bring a dog onto our team but so let's let's I want to wrap up by talking about translating like I said the the this the stories of of stubby Sergeant Stubby uh chips and Cairo um into reasons why it might be a good idea to bring a dog into the workplace and make him a part of our team so first of all um there's loyalty and teams spirit so uh stubby was was very loyal and dedicated to his unit uh
24:35 you know he protected them from gas attacks he he caught a German spy and and and and there was a sense of bonding around this mascot um that the 102nd Infantry Regiment had and we can dogs can serve the same function in the workplace so they can promote team spirit in the workplace they can create uh an environment where people come together you know play with the dog the dog can Inspire some collaboration so all of those can be one
25:10 of the advantages of or all all of those are an advantage of of having a dog in the workplace similar to having you know Sergeant uh stubby the mascot of of of an army regimen the next is stress relief and emotional support so pyro the the Navy SEAL dog well um Sergeant Stubby also provided Comfort um and emotional support um for wounded soldiers so he would go out and and and I find a wounded soldier and he would stay with
25:46 with them until that Soldier was brought back but more broadly Cairo did that for his his seal colleagues who are in an incredibly stressful environment almost always Behind Enemy Lines of some sort being inserted into a a very dangerous situation having to be extracted and so having the dog there uh supported the Seal Team Six emotionally and help them regulate the stress that they were they were facing likewise a dog in the
26:22 workplace this is one of the most this is one of the areas where a dog in the workplace can be most effective and and by the way this is where jiggers was so effective when I used to bring him to the uh indoc uh talk that I had to do um each week when I was in okanawa so um for those of you who don't know what that is so when the Marines almost all of them young would first get to okan we had a series of indoctrination lectures and they were just introducing them to how things worked in in okanawa so I I
26:59 was there to explain to them the chaplain services that were available to them so they were they had flown in from the United States the night before it's a long flight from uh um Pendleton all the way to okwa they're they're groggy they're they're jet lagged I mean they're they're you know really uh disoriented right and um and they're feeling pretty stressed to be in this new environment and so I I I would I brought I would bring jiggers along he was a little Jack
27:34 Russell Terrier he was he he had an energy about him but he wasn't real jumpy like a lot of Jack Russell Terriers and he would just kind of walk among the the Young Marines and and and kind of he would it was uncanny he would I think find a particularly stressed young marine and just kind of stop there and after usually just a few seconds to a minute the Marine would start petting him and you could see not only that Marine relax but all the Marines around him and and
28:09 they just loved um this this you know little dog being there it was kind of like I think for many of them this is kind of like a little bit of Home in their you know kind of Confusion And disorientation so um so this idea of stress relief and and emotional support I can tell you from my own experience it absolutely works and it's something that can happen in the workplace as well if you have a very high stress workplace one of the best things to consider is having a a dog there because dogs absolutely can help reduce you know emot
28:47 stress and provide emotional support so um another uh thing that um dogs promote is resilience and adap adaptability and really all of the dogs that's one of the things that they um they were able to do for their units is help them figure out what do we need to do in order to make this successful so you know again with with with Cairo right with his cameras on and even though I'm sure they had a plan for um Operation Neptune Spear um I
29:26 I suspect that once they were on the ground you know closing in on Bin Laden's compound and they had Cairo out there with his tactical vest on with the cameras able to observe firsthand what was going on they were able to adapt their plan to better ensure that it would be successful um likewise with with a um uh chips so in you the World War II dog right a lot of what he did um was scouting and and helping his unit
30:03 um know you know what to do going forward so so that was um that's integral into his his purpose as a Sentry Dog as a scout dog um and and and and same with uh St Sergeant Stubby as well he was a uh a scout dog as well so they they provide an ability for their unit to be more adaptable and therefore be more resilient and the same thing can be true um in in your workplace now this is
30:38 somewhat related to what I was talking about before in terms of dealing with stress and and emotional resilience um but but to have a dog there um that that can help calm people down once people calm down they they will have better access to their resources which will help them be more resilient help them more adaptable so again if especially if you're in a very high pressure work environment having a dog there can help your people you know retain their focus or regain their focus which will help them uh more readily adapt to whatever a
31:16 crisis is and and respond to that crisis um in a more um um um shoot I can't think of the word but in in a better way in a more resourceful way okay another thing um uh these military dogs did is they boosted morale and built trust now in Stubby's case he was the mascot for the 102nd infantry regimen and so he really was part of of boosting their morale you know his duties went beyond
31:51 the battlefield he he went to all of their social events and all that kind of stuff and and and I mean look if you've ever been if you've ever been like on a picnic with a dog and you're playing with the dog with the Frisbee or you're just playing catch with the dog um it it it really you know makes the event more fun which in the end boosts morale and so um having a dog in the workplace can do the same thing generally speaking um dogs are even if they're not crazy you
32:26 know running around kind of dogs they have kind of an inherent enthusiasm to them and they can transfer that enthusiasm to your team right and that is one of the the great things about dogs and so they can boost morale they can also help build trust among your team members so if uh if someone from the team is feeling perhaps alienated for some reason the dog can help bring them back into the team by by bringing the people together to maybe pet the dog walk the dog talk about the dog take
33:01 care of him and and and and and that can sort of bring that person back in and see that you know everybody has a common goal okay so so boosting morale and and and building trust is another aspect of that that dogs can how dogs can enhance your workplace um find finally um dogs can encourage uh physical activity now that's I mean all of the dogs Sergeant Stubby chips Cairo um you know for the most part they were
33:37 you know with their handlers keeping them moving um but you know so so you know by Nature combat is a is a Physically Active uh thing but in the workplace dogs will I think are even more effective at that especially if you have an office workplace where people are fairly sedentary so having a dog that for example needs to go out for walks so you know people who you know want to get out for 15 20 minutes walking you know the workplace dog that
34:14 gives them a reason to you know get up from their desk get up from their chair get outside for a few minutes get some sunshine which helps um uh um um what is it develop vitamin D um all of all of that is is very useful for our well-being but just getting out and moving is great now those of you I think you can tell I I stand up when I when I do my my broadcasts so I have a standup desk I have a sitdown desk right behind me I don't use it a whole lot I I tend to actually stand too much I really
34:50 should stand for about 50 minutes and then sit down for 10 um because sometimes I start getting a back ache from standing all day but I like to be up and moving you can see when I do my shows I'm I'm moving around um and uh you know if I had a dog so when when when I had my dog jiggers when I was in in business before I joined the Navy um I I I didn't have a backyard so um my wife at that time and I lived in a a two-story townhouse and we didn't have a dedicated backyard and so I used to have
35:25 to take jiggers for walks a few times a day and and so he would hang out in the office with me while I worked and then you know usually every couple of hours we'd go out for a walk sometimes it was to go to the mailbox place where um I I had my mail sent uh other times it was just to take him out for a walk to get some exercise for for the two of us or or because you know he had to uh you know do his business as we say so all of that again I've had experience with that having a dog now I work from my home so you say well okay your dog was at home he wasn't in your workplace but my home
36:01 was my workplace and and jiggers kept me moving throughout the day um and and and that's the same thing that a dog can can do in in your workplace so um there there are other lessons I think those are the key ones uh the key takeaways to how having a dog can enhance your workplace and and and you know a workplace dog okay maybe they're not going to do something as amazing as what Sergeant Stubby did in capturing capturing a German's SP or um or uh you
36:39 know searching out the enemy like chips did or surveilling you know Bin Laden's compound the way Cairo did okay those those are amazing things of course military dogs very highly trained they are tremendous assets to the military but we can still bring you know keeping in mind um the the issues I mention allergies and fears um uh what were the other two I went up on them um allergies and fears
37:15 uh oh okay yeah um pet behavior and then um a safe and and clean environment right so K taking those three things into account in terms of making sure we're doing our homework before we bring a dog onto our team I I I I you know dogs can really enhance um our our productivity the morale the physical activity and well-being of our of our team members and so I I encourage you to you know if if you are a dog lover and especially if a lot of the members of your team are
37:51 also dog lovers um maybe give it some consideration or maybe just have a day um once a month or once a week when people can bring their pets um to to work within you know certain constraints about how the dog has to behave and and safety and that sort of thing obviously you're going to want to talk to your insurance agent before you do that make sure that God forbid if something bad happens um you know you're covered so those are the that that's the lessons we can learn from Sergeant Stubby chips and chiro I hope you enjoyed hearing about these uh heroic dogs and and and
38:27 thinking about uh what they can teach us for how we can enhance the work environment for our team so team up with dogs right that's the message for today so uh thank thank you very much for joining me today uh tomorrow at 10: am Pacific time is my show people making money my guest is David Daly he's a Marine Corps veteran and drone pilot and as I call the episode he's flying with his feet on the ground he's built a business as a drone pilot I think you
39:02 will really enjoy hearing how David built his business um as well as some of his military background so please do consider uh joining me uh joining us tomorrow Wednesday at 10: a and then on Thursday is my every other week show dedicated to jiggers jiggers is place this is an opportunity as the week is coming to a close for us to relax and talk about things not related to Business and Professional matters so we'll have a cocktail uh I'll be making something called The Divine logic
39:39 cocktail okay I think you'll find it interesting if you want the recipe by the way just subscribe to my email list go to my website baml.com scroll all the way to the bottom you'll see you just fill in your email address and click uh subscribe I think it is and then you'll get an email a couple of hours before show just letting you know the show is starting and the recipe for the cocktail will be there and you can make one along with me uh and we're going to be talking about the existential question reason versus Lo logic okay and and and you
40:16 know people have argued about this question for Millennia and we're going to delve into it and see what what can we make of this thing about uh I'm sorry Faith versus reason did I see reason versus logic that's that's no faith versus reason right is it logical to have faith um if you're faithful does it mean you can't use reason and logic um you know is you know what is the conflict there why have people debated this for so so long so that's what we're going to talk about and then next week
40:52 um on Monday at 10:00 a.m. is my show uh well normally it's my show trust and Estates weekly uh next Monday though will be Columbus Day and so uh I will be doing a a special show uh honoring uh Columbus Day so hopefully you'll turn in for tune in for that that's at 10: am Pacific Time Monday so once again thank you so much for joining me always a pleasure to have you any questions comments uh thoughts feel free
41:28 to drop them into social media all the links will be in the show notes after this uh episode posts on YouTube you can also email me my email address is in the uh show notes as well always love to hear your comments and by the way if if you're not a subscriber to my YouTube Channel please do consider subscribing that way you'll never miss an episode of the way to wow shows I am thinking about adding a fifth show I'm just started giving it some thoughts so stay tuned maybe maybe there'll be a a fifth one on the way so wishing you a wonderful rest
42:06 of the day and signing off as I always do Marie darling you are my bell especially since you were such a dog