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  • Leadership Lessons: Season of change

    With summer comes change in the Air Force.  As we all know it is a huge PCS season and change is in the air.  Personally, we may be uprooting our lives from one base and reinstalling them in another. As organizations, our commanders, supervisors and coworkers are changing. It is a time where there

  • Leadership Lessons: Preparedness

    Although I was never a boy scout, the concept of preparedness was instilled in me at an early age. This mindset has come in quite handy through my years growing up. My dad, like many fathers, thought it was important for a young man to be able to take care of himself and survive whatever is thrown

  • Leadership Lessons: Building connections that matter

    I recently listened to a Technology, Entertainment, and Design (TED) talk entitled "The Illusion of Being Connected," given by Gen. Stanley McChrystal, former Commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and U.S. Forces in Afghanistan. In his talk, McChrystal postulated that

  • Getting out in Grand Forks: the Lincoln Drive Park

    I traded bases during technical school. Most people thought I was crazy for wanting to go to Grand Forks, N.D. instead of Barksdale, Louisiana, but my wife doesn't like hot weather and I didn't care where I was stationed as long as I was able to see a new place. I grew up in a small town in southern

  • New rape prevention program may be the answer we’ve been looking for

    I have a couple of favorite phrases that I like to keep in my vernacular: "You don't bring a knife to a gun fight," and, "If you want something done right, you've got to do it yourself."I recently saw some news that combines the spirits of both of these phrases, and put a big smile on my volunteer

  • Leadership Lessons: Keeping Safe and Secure

    Basic security fundamentals are taught to all Security Forces during technical training despite seeming inherently simplistic. During the summer of 1990 at the Security Police Academy, our instructors repeatedly stressed the importance of not just observing that doors and gates were closed but to

  • Leadership Lessons: The definition

    Leadership. There appears to be no shortage of definitions. A Google search of "leadership definitions" yields roughly 127,000 results in .39 seconds; add the word "quotes" to the search and results jump to 791,000.  It seems that every notable person across every professional field has his or her

  • Leadership Lessons: My most memorable opportunity

    As I ran down the 5K trail during our Glow Run fundraiser on May 15, I was fondly reminded of when I was asked to take the lead on the Relay for Life at Spangdahlem Air Base, Germany. Having a hard time saying no to such a meaningful event I willingly accepted, not knowing this would turn out to be

  • Leadership Lessons: From Pilot to PA

    Throughout college I was a cadet in the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps (AFROTC). While in AFROTC, I had only one job in mind; I was going to be a pilot. This isn't an uncommon aspiration for a modern Air Force cadet partly because a lot of cadets join without fully understanding what their

  • Heroes at Home: Thomas R. Slaughter

    About 2009, a young lady came to see me for an Air Force Aid loan for food. Airman Benjamin was a single mother. She had heard me speak at the First Term Airmen Course.Anytime anyone comes to see me for an AFA loan, the first thing I do is a budget. I want to see where their money is going.We did a