Thirty Minute Mentors Podcast Transcript: General Larry Spencer

I recently interviewed General Larry Spencer on my podcast, Thirty Minute Mentors. Here is a transcript of our interview:

Adam: Our guest today was the second-highest-ranking military officer in the United States Air Force. General Larry Spencer was the Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force and was one of only nine African American, four-star generals in Air Force history. General Spencer is also the author of the book, Dark Horse: General Larry O. Spencer and His Journey from the Horseshoe to the Pentagon. General Spencer, thank you for joining us.

General Larry Spencer: Well, thank you so much for having me. I'm really looking forward to the conversation.

Adam: I'm looking forward to it too. You're a native of Washington, D.C., huge Washington Commanders fan. Sadly, for you, sorry. But you're born and raised on the horseshoe, a tough inner city street, right in the heart of Washington, D.C. in a neighborhood where violence was high and academic expectations were low. Your home life was tough as well. Your dad lost his left hand in the Korean War, he suffered from PTSD, and he was working two jobs while your mom was home all week, raising six kids, not the easiest life growing up. Can you take listeners back to your early days? What experiences and lessons were most instrumental to shaping your worldview and shaping the trajectory of your success? 

General Larry Spencer: Sure, well, it's interesting to think back on it in hindsight, because when you're there, you don't know any difference. And so that was my world unfolding in sixth place, which was in southeast D.C., a street shaped like a horseshoe, which is the reason we call it the horseshoe. And it was in the midst of projects, so just a very poor area, a lot of activity. I was a very poor student in school, the school system was not very good. My dad, as you mentioned, was in the army, and he worked in the enlisted club. So my dad typically will leave home around 4:35 in the morning, and he would get home at one o'clock at night. So there were days where I didn't see him, he was just working that much. My mother had not graduated high school and didn't have a driver's license. So she was stuck there with six kids all day. And I don't blame her for this. It wasn't her fault. But I didn't have help with my homework. I didn't really have many mentors other than my parents. Today, I tried to go back to a lot of the schools in D.C. to try to talk to the students. We had none of that back then. So it was an interesting environment. And there was no legal segregation back then. But I was practically segregated because I was in an all-Black neighborhood, went to an all-Black school, an Black church, and there's nothing wrong with that, other than my view of the world was very limited. And so my self-esteem and self-worth were very much affected by that. Because I rarely saw people that look like me that were successful. Success in my neighborhood, then, and, frankly, to some extent, now, we're athletes. So those who play professional sports, which was my goal at the time to be an NFL football player or entertainers. So those were the folks that I got to see that made a lot of money. And what was even more confusing is when I went outside my neighborhood, those folks who represented success didn't look like me either. When I went to a doctor, there were no Black doctors. My father went to buy a car. They weren’t even Black sales folks there. So that was a very confusing time for me. And keep in mind, I was born in the mid ’50s, so I came up in my neighborhood through the Civil Rights Movement. And all of that was swirling around the Vietnam War. There was just a lot of stuff going on, in addition to being in a tough neighborhood. So it was an interesting time. I don't regret it. I wouldn't do it any different because I learned a lot from that experience. I grew up pretty fast on that experience. But while I was there, I really had no goals. I didn't want to be there. So I want to be a dad, folks would ask me, what do you want to be when you grow up? I had the same answer: I'm gonna be an NFL football player. And I was good at sports, but that was my answer, because that's who I saw who looked like me that was successful. And it's important, though, to point out that to some extent, that has not changed. As I mentioned, I've spoken with, or at many of the schools in D.C., and especially a lot of the young Black males. When I asked them what they want to do post-high school, the large majority of them say they want to go to the NBA. They want to be the next Lebron James. Oh, they want to be the next Jay Z. They want to be a rap singer because they are identifying with folks who represent success. And one of my pet peeves is to get more mentors out into those school systems, everyday people who go to work every day and who are taking care of themselves and their families. One of the things that a lot of people ask me, well, how did you become a four star? And, of course, I think that's the wrong question to ask. But the other part of that question is how did you become a four star in the Air Force? And you want to pilot and hindsight, I would have loved to have been a pilot. But a lot of people don't quite comprehend growing up in southeast D.C., mid ‘50s to late ‘60s, I had never met a pilot. I never talked to a pilot. I've never flown them to airplay. I had never been to an airport. The first time I went to an airport and the first time I flew on an airplane was when I joined the United States Air Force. And I had to fly down to basic training in San Antonio, Texas. So it's not that I didn't have the intellectual capability to be a pilot. Although my grades were awful. I didn't see that, that wasn't in my scope. And it was always fascinating to me. When I talked to my counterparts in the Air Force, many of whom were pilots, I would always ask them, why did you become a pilot? And they generally have the same answer: when I was a kid, I went to an air show. When I was a kid, I had an uncle who was a pilot. They were fascinated by flight early on in their life. Not the case, if you'd grown up in an inner city, it just doesn't happen. And so, your view of your future, your hope, if I can use that term, is very narrow. And that's a shame. Because when I'm talking to students in the junior high schools and high schools now I walk out of there fairly depressed because I know or at least I think I know, there could be a cure for cancer in one of those kids sitting in those classrooms. Someone could solve world peace. But they will never achieve their potential simply because they are generally in a poor school system. They don't have the support system at home for mentoring and studying and tutoring. But the bigger issue to me is they don't have that lens to be able to see outside of the neighborhood and see what the possibilities are. And so that's sort of the environment I grew up in, which again, is one of the reasons I wrote the book. Folks used to see me as a four-star and say, well, you went to the academy, you were a fighter pilot, your parents had a lot of money, you had all these advantages. And I say no, not so fast. And I don't say that to say look at me, look at what I did. The reason I wrote the book was because a lot of the folks that asked me that question, they've already decided they can't be a senior general officer in the Air Force because of the way they were raised, because of the education they had. And what I tried to do in the book was to show them that yes, you can if you're willing to put in the work and you're willing to sacrifice and you have the potential regardless of how you started out. You can achieve your goals, but you're gonna have to work for it.

Adam: You hit on so many themes that are not only essential, period, but are essential to this podcast. I'm a very big believer that each and every one of us no matter who you are, is special. Society might train us to believe that there are a select group of special people out there. Tom Brady might be special. Michael Jordan might be special. And they are. But each and every one of us is special. Every person who you're speaking to in every single inner city classroom is special. Every person listening to this podcast is special. It sounds hokey, but the reality is, we each have something about us that makes us different, that makes us unique. It's our superpower. And the more quickly you could figure out what it is about you that makes you special, what it is about you that makes you different, what it is about you that makes you unique, the more successful you'll be in life, the more successful you'll be in business, the more successful you'll be as a leader. And it's a journey that requires a lot of introspection, but it's also a journey that requires the help of others. And that's another theme that you nailed so perfectly. The power of mentorship and representation matters. In your own personal case, growing up in the inner city, you didn't have that. You didn't have mentors around you who you could look to and say, I want to do anything else beyond become a professional athlete. But representation matters. Mentorship matters. We need more mentors out there. We need more people to go out and make a difference. And I want to ask you about a mentor who made a huge impact for you, who made a huge impact in your life and made a huge impact on the trajectory of your career in the military. Once you enlisted in the Air Force, you came across a senior noncommissioned officer who recognized that potential in you and gave you the guidance that you hadn't had before. How did you and that mentor ultimately connect? And what advice do you have for anyone listening on how to optimize a mentor-mentee relationship?

General Larry Spencer: Yeah, great question. So I'm going to have to ask you to use your imagination for a second because when I joined the Air Force, this was in the early ‘70s. Of course, long hair was the norm back then. And I had an afro like you wouldn't believe. Now I know, that's hard to believe. And I wish I could grow one now. But one of my first assignments was to Taiwan, where I spent a year working in the post office. And my friends and I made a bet that we could go the entire year, it was a year-long remote tour, we could go the entire year without getting a haircut. And keep in mind, my hair was already too long. And I went a year without a haircut. But there was a system of wearing a stocking cap at night to pack it all down. And you can fail to get away with it during the day. So fast forward, I finished that tour. I went back to the States at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri which was a very strict command, by the book command. And I was going through the process of disguising my hair. And it just got to a point where I couldn't disguise it anymore. And I came in one Monday morning, and I didn't have time the night before to do the ritual of packing my hair down. I'm a top striper Airman First Class. So I’m scared to death because I know I'm gonna get in trouble with my boss. And so I was sitting at my desk facing the door to the hallway. I was the first one there, but literally running through my mind about what is going to happen to me when my boss gets in. And a Chief Master Sergeant, the top and listed grade in the Air Force, went by the door, looked in at me but continued to walk by and I wiped my brow and said, wow, I got away with that one. And before Michael Jackson made this popular, that Chief Master Sergeant literally moonwalk back to that door and looked in at me, and said, “I can't believe what I'm seeing”. And so he said, “Airman get up from your desk, grab your hat and come with me”. I said, “Chief, I'm sorry. I'm sorry”. I'm waiting for my boss to come in. He said, “Airman, get up from the desk, grab your hat”, which I could barely get on, “and come with me”. And so we walked out in the parking lot. And I've discovered now every Chief Master Sergeant I've ever known had a pickup truck. I'm not sure what that's about. We got in his pickup truck. He took me over to the base barbershop and he paid the barber and he said, “Give him a military haircut”. And he sat there with a smile on his face watching as I watched my hair fall off on the floor of the barbershop. And so we got done and we got back in his truck. And he started talking to me, he said, “You seem like a pretty sharp guy. I've noticed you do a really good job. You keep the uniform looking good”. But he said, “I don't understand why when you know the Air Force regulations on hair length. Why aren't you following the regulations?”. And he said, “Look, I was young once. I get all the fans and I know what your friends are doing. And if you want to grow your hair long, if that's your priority in life, then get out of the Air Force and grow your hair long. But as long as you're in the Air Force, you're going to follow the regulations”. He said, “Is that clear?”. And I said, “Yes, chief”. But I want to make a point here, that he wasn't talking to me in a way that I felt offended or I felt like he was chewing me out. He was talking to me in a way no one else had, in a way that he cared. I felt like he cared what happened to me. And he wanted to help me. And so he asked me what I was doing with my life. And, of course, I didn't have a good answer. And he said, “I'm assuming your plan is to get out of the Air Force in four years?”. And I said, “Yes”. He said, “But you're going to get out of the Air Force with the same thing you came in with”, which is nothing. So he said, “Why don't you take college courses?”. And I said, “Well, chief, I've been meaning to do that”. He said, “No, you're not meaning to do anything”. So we got back in his truck. We went to the base Education Office and I signed up for two college courses on the spot. And then he took me back to work. And that followed me from that day forward until I graduated from college. And that connected with me when I got my college degree and helped me get into officer training school. That one individual literally changed the trajectory of my life, it is no telling what would have happened to me if I hadn’t run into him that day. But what I try to get people to understand is, for perhaps the first time, this guy cared about me. He didn't look like me, we didn't have similar backgrounds at all, we were completely different people. But he saw me as an Airman with potential, but just needed some guidance, and needed some mentorship. And he provided that for me, and I will forever be grateful to him. And in fact, he is one of the reasons why I try to mentor as many people as I can. Because I get it, everybody's different. I have three kids, and they're all three completely different. And they all three need different things. And they all are motivated by different things. And this guy was able to get through to me like no one else had ever done before. And I can't tell you how that impacted me not only not the rest of my Air Force career, but the rest of my life. This one individual who happened to walk by my door and see me with hair that was too long, in that instant, changed my life.

Adam: There's great irony there because you connected because he cared about how you looked. But at the end of the day, he didn't care what you look like, he just cared about you. And fundamentally, a great mentor cares. The relationship was so successful because he wasn't chewing you out. He cared. He was caring about you. He found a way to connect with you. He connected with you through kindness, through love, by respecting you as a human being. And the way that he was able to connect with you, the way that he was able to serve as this life-changing mentor. That's a great model for leadership. Those characteristics are some of those same key characteristics of great leaders. And I want to ask you, in your experience, what do you believe are the key characteristics of a great leader? And what can anyone do to become a better leader?

General Larry Spencer: I think what's really important is first you have to be yourself. There are people who are introverts, extroverts. They're people that are born leaders, others developing the leaders. Anyone can be a successful leader. But I think you have to do that within the personality that you have. And within the skill set that you have. The number one trait I believe, particularly in the military, but I found it to be the same in industry, is what that chief told me. And that is to care about the people that work for you. I don't mean, going around asking them every day, what did you have for dinner last night? I mean, genuinely care for them. And by the way, you can't fake that. They know if you care about them or not. Because by the way, caring does not always mean a pat on the back. Caring sometimes means a little bit of a kick in the butt. But they can tell the difference. Just like I could tell the difference with the chief, they can tell the difference. The number one trait of a good leader is you genuinely care about the people that you're leading. I also think it's really important to be able to communicate well with people. And one of the things that bothers me today, and it's been exacerbated by the pandemic, because so many things we do now virtual is, a lot of folks think they can lead from their computer screen and send out emails and send out directives. But I don't think there's any substitute for something I did almost every day. And that's called leadership by walking around getting up from my desk walking around talking to the troops, interacting with them, figuring out what they're working on, what issues they were having, how could I help them, keeping them motivated, keeping them fired up about the mission, making sure they understood what the vision of the organization was, and more importantly, how they fit into the organization. I heard Jack Welch say the other day, that there are two parts of leadership that people get but a third part they don't. And one is he said, “Everybody understands you have to have a vision. Everybody understands you have to communicate that vision. But most leaders don't understand you have to get those folks who are doing the work to buy into it and understand why they should want to complete that vision. And how they fit into the bigger scheme of things”. So to give you an example, a lot of my career was spent in financial management. And when I was a Wing Comptroller, at a base Comptroller, and when I arrived, and they asked me at my first commander's call, what is our mission as the financial managers for this base? What do you think is our top mission? And I said to them, “Our top mission is to launch airplanes”. And they didn't quite understand what I meant by that because we didn't work on the flight line. But the point I was making to them was, we have a warfighting mission here on this base that involves getting airplanes off the ground. And if we, as financial managers, are not contributing to that, then we're not doing our job. So whatever you do every day needs to be focused on those folks who are working on airplanes, fixing airplanes, flying on airplanes, do they have the resources they need? One of the sayings I had was folks who are working on the flight line, we need to make sure they are focused on their mission and not worried about their pay. So we need to take care of all those things to make sure that we were doing our part in the warfighting mission of the base. So I think a leader first has to care. You have to get out amongst your people. And make sure they understand who you are, you understand who they are. And you have to make sure that they understand the mission, the vision, and you make sure that they understand what part they play in a mission.

Adam: So many great lessons there. You can't fake caring. Being present. 90% of success is just showing up. Correct. Love and accountability are two of the most important things that every leader should bring to the table. And that every leader can bring to the table. They're not conflicting, lead with love, but also lead with accountability. Correct. motivate the people around you, not through fear and intimidation. But by providing them with the resources that they need to become their best selves. Give them the tools that will allow them to focus on how they can perform at their very best.

General Larry Spencer: Absolutely. We could talk a lot about leadership and read a lot of books about it. But until you experience it, it's not real. And for me, when that first impacted me most was during Desert Shield Desert Storm. I was at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base again, I was the Comptroller. And when the war started, we're going back in time here, but this is hard to believe. But this is when people used to write checks. And before there was an electronic transfer of funds and all that we will deal with cash and checks. And on the second airplane to take off out of that base heading toward the Middle East, I have three finance folks on there. A Master Sergeant, a Staff Sergeant, and an Airman First Class. The Master Sergeant had in his hand a briefcase, just like the old gangster movies full of cash with rubber bands around it, and checks. It was just an unbelievable experience. And by the way, a lot of folks don't understand this. You don't go to war without money because there's not much you can do without money. I can't quite paint the picture of that atmosphere. Keep in mind we hadn't been to war as a country since Vietnam. People had gone through a 20-year career and never had to deploy any of that stuff. And here we found ourselves in a war. And of course, the tensions were high. It was a huge deal. And I walked up on that airplane, it was a C 141, which would only fly cargo planes. And picture this, the whole fuselage of the plane was filled with cargo equipment so equipment stepped up to the top of the airplane. And the troops that were on that airplane were against the back of the wall of the airplane, the fuselage, no windows, they were in web seats. So bad and as uncomfortable as you can get, and they had their feet propped up on the equipment, that's how little space there was for the passengers. So it was a very uncomfortable experience. But I got up on the airplane, it's because those were the first three folks we deployed. And I got up on the airplane to say goodbye to them. I was talking to the Master Sergeant with that briefcase, explaining to him hey, you please be careful because we're all accountable for that money and those checks. And I looked at the Airman First Class, he was probably 19 years old, scared to death. And I looked at him, I said, “Hey, Airman, you're going to be fine. This is what we trained for. This is going to be great. I'm proud of you. Your parents are proud of you”. And in fact, I ended up going back, calling his parents telling them how proud I was of him. And he looked at me and he said, I was a major at the time. He said, “Sir, are you going with us?”. And I said, “Airman, I've already volunteered to come as soon as my number comes down, I'll be right behind you”. And he looked at me and said, “Sir, I feel a lot better if you're going with us”. I could hardly hold it together, walking down off the airplane, because for perhaps the first time it hit me, this leadership thing is not academic, it is real. And we were a family. And they were okay, as long as we all were together. And they felt okay if we were all there together. And I was the leader and they wanted to lead with them. And again, as soon as I stepped off the airplane, I just lost it. Because I'm looking at this young kid’s eyes. And I knew I was his commander. I've known that all along. But I didn't realize how serious it was to them. That I was the guy they were depending on to lead them. And that's huge. It was something I'll never forget for the rest of my life, the confidence that they had in me. And I'm not taking any credit for that. But I didn't realize they had looked at me that way. I was looking at them, like, yeah, I'm your commander, and I will do anything for you. But I didn't realize how they internalize that. And that it didn't matter what was thrown at them. As long as we were all together and they had their leader with them, they would be okay. And that's something that I’ll never forget.

Adam: The power of great leadership. We kicked off the conversation by going deeply into how important representation is, period. And the importance of representation in corporate America is becoming more and more understood. The importance of representation in the military is becoming more and more understood. What advice do you have for all leaders on how to become part of the solution? And how to build truly diverse and truly inclusive organizations?

General Larry Spencer: Yeah, that's a great question, because we're living in a very divided country right now. And it's really unfortunate. And not much keeps me up at night but the fact that our country is so divided does keep me up at night. Because I don't see an end to it, at least in the short term. But the way I talk about diversity, it really doesn't matter how you feel about diversity. We are in a diverse country. The military is very diverse. So whether you like it or not, you're gonna have to lead diverse teams. And I could quote you all the studies that talk about diverse teams performing better than homogeneous teams. But if you don't believe any of that, or you don't like any of that, or a lot of folks view diversity as a zero-sum game, and that is, if a woman gets this, then I can't or Hispanic gets this, then I can't. That's not diversity. You want to hire the best talent for the job that you have to complete. And everything being equal, that slate of workers will be reversed. The debate comes in, is that slate, or is the process equal? That drives a whole different discussion. But my advice to people is if you're going to be a leader, the folks who you are leading are all not going to look like you. And so you have to understand different people with different backgrounds. And by the way, it's not just gender and race. It's about background. I mentioned that I'm from southeast D.C., which means my life lens is probably different from yours. Not better or worse, but different because we're been raised differently. And we see the world differently. It's a lot worse here, Redskins fan, commander. So once I became a leader, both in the military and in industry, I love the idea of throwing a problem in the middle of the table and hearing diverse views from all over the world, all over the country, all different backgrounds, women and men, you name it. It's important to get those points of view. But I also think it's important to understand other cultures. Because let me give an example I will mention to them. But there are some cultures, by the way, by culture in particular, that are raised to say, I think the term is, the raised nail gets hit by a hammer. And so the point of that culture is, we don't want to be out in front, we want to lay back, knowing that, as a leader, you want to try to draw folks like that, who may not have the confidence to speak up. There are cultures who will have their hand up and they're in your face every five minutes. As a leader, you want to be able to say, okay, thank you, let's give somebody else a chance. So whether folks believe diversity is a good or bad thing, I tend to look past that and say, if you're going to be a leader in this country today, whether you're in the military or not, you're going to have a diverse team, whether you like it or not. And so you need to understand how to get the best out of that team. And by the way, you know the demographic as well as I do, the demographics of our country are changing over time. And so it's not like you can go find one group or another and say, I'm just going to hire those people. That's just not practical. I'm a very strong believer in diversity, again, not to build a Noah's Ark. That's not the point. The point is to get folks from various backgrounds, again, not just race and gender, but academic background, professional background, and to be able to take advantage of all of those different points of view as you are solving problems.

Adam: Yeah, I'm with you 110%. Leaders can't ignore the fact that the workforce is diverse. You have to live in reality. And that reality should be a competitive advantage. So lean into it.

General Larry Spencer: One quick example, when I was a Second Lieutenant, my first assignment was down in Robins Air Force Base in Georgia. I went to my first staff meeting. Coincidentally, I'm the only Second Lieutenant in the room and only African American in the room. So I'm sitting in the back, which is fine. At the table is a two-star Commander and one-star and Colonels around the table. And then you got a roomful of people. They're wrestling over an issue that I have some knowledge of just based on my enlisted background. They didn't know any of that. But I had background on this issue that they did, but I didn't say anything. I'm a scared Lieutenant sitting in the back. So they wrestle with this problem. And the Commander finally said, “Well, you know what? We're not gonna solve this today”. And as the tradition of the staff meeting was, at the end, the Commander would go around the room to see if anybody's got anything. And then he would go around the table and say, okay, the staff meeting is over. So the Commander swung his chair around and he went around the room, and he saw me and he said, “Hey, Lieutenant, welcome. I haven't seen you before”. And I said, “Yes, sir. I'm Lieutenant Spencer”. And I've just got here brand new. And tongue in cheek, he said to me, “Well, I suppose as a brand new Second Lieutenant, you got an answer to this problem”. And everybody kind of laughed in the room. And I said, “Sir, I'm not sure I have an answer. But if you don't mind, I've got an idea for you”. And he was kind of taken aback. So he said, “Okay, Lieutenant, let's hear your bright idea”. So I laid it out for him. I said, “Based on my experience, I certainly wasn't any smarter than anybody in the room, but I've dealt with this before. And here's what I would do if I were you, sir”. And he said, “Thank you, Lieutenant”. And he continued around the room, and he swung his chair around to the table. And he was about to go around the table. And he stopped and he swung his chair back around looking square at me. And he says, “Lieutenant, would you repeat what you just said?”. And I repeated what I said, and again, it wasn't rocket science. It was just a different experience I had. And he said, “Oh, my God. Why didn't we think of that?”. And that was the point. I wasn't any smarter than anybody else in the room, but I had a different perspective. I had a different life lens, I had a different experience. And that allowed them to look at the problem a little bit differently, and perhaps look at a solution a little bit differently. That to me is the strength of diversity. 

Adam: I could not agree with you more and credit should also be given to him for taking you seriously, for valuing your opinion, for asking the question, and for listening.

General Larry Spencer: Absolutely. For those out there who are just starting off in their careers. Just like that one Chief Master Sergeant, I changed my life trajectory. That one event propelled me in that command because two days later, I walked into the office and my boss said, “The general wants to see you”. And of course, I'm scared to death. They're going to see a two-star, I thought I was in trouble. And I walked in and he said, “Lieutenant, I was impressed with your comments. I've got a couple of projects that I want you to work on”. For me, that was a cost analyst at the time. I ended up in the Air Force cost analysis, based on that one event. So again, it's amazing to me as I look back over my life, how these singular things led to something else

Adam: The importance of stepping up, the importance of having confidence in yourself. You didn't think that you were sharing anything that was rocket science, but the reality is, you knew your stuff, and you weren't afraid to share it. You weren't afraid to voice your view. And that was a game changer for you. 

General Larry Spencer: Absolutely. I wasn't this way initially when I was growing up. Once the light bulb came on, I became a no-risk, no-reward kind of guy. If the commander had a project, I would volunteer for it recognizing that I could fail, but I was okay with it

Adam: Yeah, don't speak so you can hear your own voice. But if you have something to say that you think is valuable, don't be afraid to say it. 

General Larry Spencer: Absolutely.

Adam: The Air Force has two awards named in your honor, which is pretty incredible. One is the General Larry O. Spencer Innovation Award. How can leaders foster innovation?

General Larry Spencer: Great question. And I can't tell you how humbled and honored I am to have the Air Force actually name an award after me. And occasionally as recently as about a month ago, I will get an email from someone who says, hey, I just won the award named after you. So it is very rewarding and very humbling. I don't believe in changing things just to change it but I also don't believe if it ain't broke, don't fix it. To me, if it ain't broke, make it better. I had the opportunity when I was the president of the Air Force Association, to interview on stage in front of 12,000 people, to interview Jeff Bezos, who's considered quite an innovator. But what was most interesting was a conversation I had with him backstage before we went out front. And one of the things I asked him about was, you are known as an innovator, but how do you cultivate that innovation environment in your companies? And what he said to me was a couple of interesting things. He says, yes, he encourages folks to be innovative, and he rewards those that are innovative. He said, “The thing is, you can't just have folks walking around throwing out ideas, and then they go back to the office”. I mean, he doesn't let folks walk in, drop something on the table and walk out. He says, okay, well tell me a little bit about how we're going to implement that. How do you think that's going to work? And by the way, he said, something I thought was really interesting. He says, “I purposely let people fail”. In other words, he said, folks will give me an idea, and they're convinced that it's going to work. I'm pretty sure it's not. But I'll let them run with it anyway. Because I want them to see that I don't want them to stop. I don't want them to get discouraged. The other thing he told me, which has stuck with me since that conversation, was he said that a lot of times people don't know what they want until you show it to him. And the example he used was Alexa. And he said, when they were talking about Alexa, everyone said this will never work. There's no way the American people will put a box in their house that talks to him. They just won't do it. And by the way, I've got four or five of them in my house now. But he said, once that was developed, they knew that was going to work, even though polls told me they wouldn’t. And so a lot of times, it's hard to get folks to see the vision until you show it to them. And then I'm gonna use it, which I thought was pretty interesting as well. But yeah, innovation. Think back to Desert Storm, when we hadn't been in a war since Vietnam. And we had all these innovative weapon systems that had been developed over time. And think back to when we were all watching the Desert Storm war on TV, and just blown away by these smart weapons that we could put through somebody's bathroom window. Everyone was blown away with the technology. And I worry sometimes that we don't take that as seriously as we should. Because God forbid we get into some conflict with a major power. I always hoped that we would wake up on day one of the war and the adversary would say, oh, my God, where'd they get that from? We didn't know they had that. I worry sometimes that we lose that innovative spirit and that creativity and that pushing the envelope on technology, because we don't have to. The lesson there is, and this is particularly important in the industry, if you wait around for your competition to come up with an innovation that works, then you're out of business already. And so keeping the motivation and the key to keeping your staff energized about, yeah, we're leading the pack today. But if we want to lead the pack tomorrow, we can't rest on what we have right now. We always have to think about the future. And so yeah, I'm a big believer in innovation and a big believer in rewarding those that are innovative.

Adam: General Spencer, what can anyone do to become more successful, personally and professionally?

General Larry Spencer: I think it's first thought with a strong work ethic that you're going to get up every day and go out there and swing at the ball when it comes down. It's easy to strike out if you just stay in and watch the pitch. The only way you're going to hit is swing the bat. And the only way you're gonna score a touchdown is getting in the game, you can't sit on the bench. And so I try to encourage people to get in the game. There's always gonna be haters sitting in the stands and sitting on the bench, telling you what you can and cannot do. Get in the game. Get out there and get with it. It's also important to try. And this is really hard, trying to figure out what's important to you, what are you passionate about. You know, the old saying about if you'd have a job that you love, you'll never work a day in your life. If you find something you are really passionate about, you're gonna really be good at it. But we only have one life, we only get to do this once. When I'm 90 years old, sitting in my rocking chair, thinking back over my life, I want to be able to say to myself, what a life. I left it all on the field. Success is defined by us as individuals. No one else can define what success is for us. Success is not necessarily making a lot of money. Success is not necessarily being CEO of a company. So success comes in a lot of ways. Success can be giving back to your community or giving back to your neighborhood or helping people. Martin Luther King talked about if your job is to be a garbage man, and you'd be the best garbage man that's out there. Because that's a valuable service that all of us need. And so it's really important to recognize we only have one shot at this, leave it on the field. And back to my mentor story, bring others along with you along the way.

Adam: Get in the game. Leave it all out on the field, no matter what team you root for. 

General Larry Spencer: Absolutely. 

Adam: General Spencer, thank you for all the great advice and thank you for being a part of Thirty Minute Mentors.

General Larry Spencer: Well, thank you so much for having me. I really enjoy it and thank you for the great job that you're doing.

Adam: Thank you. I really appreciate it.


Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally-recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one on one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.

Follow Adam on Instagram and Twitter at @adammendler and on LinkedIn and listen and subscribe to Thirty Minute Mentors on your favorite podcasting app.