S4:E116🎙️ LIVE with John Keefe (Multi Tracks Audio)

¡Hola!

Hi, I'm John Maxwell. When the top companies in the world are looking for trainers, speakers, and coaches, there's one name that stands above the rest, and that's Maxwell Leadership. Our certified team members have gotten proven results for companies all over the globe, and our reputation, I'm proud to say, is second to none. Some of our members have risen to the top of their profession, including the one you're going to meet today. I proudly introduce you to my friend Bob Fabien Zinga.

Welcome to the Leadership and Success Podcast with your host, Coach BZ, where we help you lead with purpose and succeed with impact. If you're ready to grow into the kind of leader others want to follow, this podcast is for you. If you're determined to elevate your success and leave a lasting legacy, this podcast is for you. As my mentor, Dr. John C. Maxwell, reminds us, everything rises and falls on leadership. Our goal is simple: to inspire you, challenge you, and equip you with insights that can transform the trajectory of your leadership journey. Welcome aboard.

Welcome back, leaders, warriors, and difference makers. I'm Commander Bob Fabien Zinga, US Navy, and this is the Leadership and Success Podcast, where we help you become the leader your mission deserves. Today, I am honored to introduce a guest whose career has shaped American national power across intelligence, cybersecurity, space exploration, and the highest levels of government. My guest today is the one and only John Keefe. John is a strategic force multiplier who has spent nearly 4 decades serving our nation in roles that most people only read about in history books. At the National Security Agency, where he served as senior advisor to the director and helped modernize some of the most critical intelligence and cyber missions in the world. At the White House National Security Council, where he served as Special Assistant to President Joe Biden and Senior Director for Cyber Policy, coordinating national cyber strategy across the entire U.S. government. At NASA, where he served as the Director of Cross-Agency Strategy Integration, uniting 6 mission directorates and 10 centers to craft NASA's long-term plan for human spaceflight, commercial LEO, and the post-ISS future. And across ODNI, Capitol Hill, U.S. embassies, and the Center for Naval Analyses, where his early work supported Navy commanders throughout the Pacific, Mediterranean, and Persian Gulf. John Keefe's career is the blueprint of a multi-domain strategist: cyber, intelligence, space, policy, national defense, and emerging technology. He's also the founder of Ex Astris Scientia LLC, where he advises deep tech founders, space innovators, and national security startups on strategy, mission alignment, and navigating Washington. But beyond the resume, what sets John apart is his leadership philosophy—his belief in clarity, humility, consensus-building, and what he calls the "sailboat theory" of career navigation. John Keefe is the kind of leader who doesn't just analyze the future; he helps build it. So, whether you are a naval junior officer preparing for command, a cybersecurity engineer transitioning into leadership, or a technologist passionate about the future of space, you are about to gain insights that will shape your thinking, sharpen your leadership, and elevate your mission. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming to the Leadership and Success Podcast, Mr. John Keefe.

All right, everyone, this is Coach Bizzy. Thank you so much for watching us live for another episode of the Leadership and Success Podcast, where our aim is to help you be a better leader and have greater level of success. I have a very, very wonderful guest today. I think he's really a legend in our field, all of the work he has done. But before we get to it, let's do what we do here daily, which is to be grateful. So for our moment of gratitude. If you would please, you should know the drill by now, maybe close your eyes, take a deep breath if you must, put yourself in your happy place and think about one thing you are grateful for today. And I think today I am really grateful because I stand on the shoulders of giants, even people I don't know, people who have gone before me, people like John Keefe in our industry that has done so much to really help improve the national security of the most powerful country in the world, right? We didn't make it on our own. We are not here by ourselves. Uh, the reason why I am here is because of people like John who have gone ahead of me, and, uh, I am very, very grateful for that. And what I am hoping, you know, as I'm going to be retiring from the Navy any day now, is to really help the next generation of information warfare commanders and give them what I have learned, and that they may really reach their full potential and do even better for our country. So, uh, please, if you, uh, can let us know where you are watching us from, uh, what city, what, uh, state, and if you are outside of the US, since our podcasts are global, please, what country. And also, I want to know what you are grateful for today. And most importantly, if you have a question for my guest, please go ahead and type it in the comment. So let me see if I can do this justice and try to introduce John. So John Keith is quite an exceptional man, and I'm really, really grateful that he took the time to come here and speak with us. He has spent nearly 4 decades shaping America's strategic posture across the National Security Agency, NSA, the White House National Security Council, NSC, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, or DNI, the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and most recently NASA, right? He was the Director for Cross-Agency Strategy Integration. So he's now the founder of X*SENSTIA LLC, advising the next generation of space, cyber, and defense innovator. So without any ado, please help me welcome to the Leadership and Success Podcast, John Peep. Good morning, John.

How are you doing today? I'm well, Bizzy. How are you? I appreciated that early photo montage. There were a lot of photos of Hawaii, photos and video from Hawaii, which I lived in for about 3 years much earlier in my career. So I appreciate that.

Absolutely. And actually, that's because you do post somewhat on LinkedIn, which is fantastic. I love it. There are a few people, especially in our field, who I completely know. You cannot find them anywhere online or social media. And I completely understand. One of my mentors, the only way for me to get in touch with him is to pick up the phone and actually call. He doesn't even do text. He absolutely doesn't text. You have to call, just old school. But anyway, thank you so much for being here. We are so grateful you are here. Is there something you are grateful for, John, this morning?

Yes, two things. One, with the holiday coming up, I'm grateful that I have a lovely wife and she and I are about to go to Greenwood, South Carolina, to spend Thanksgiving with my mother-in-law, who I have a great relationship with. And then in the bigger scheme of things, I retired out of the federal government here several months ago, and I am grateful that I've had the time to reflect on some of the things I learned from my decades of service with the government, and as well as my earlier career where I was government adjacent. Wow, that is really something.

I mean, being a public servant, I think there is definitely Nothing like it. Thank you so much for sharing. Is there maybe something about you, John, that most people may not know?

Yeah, for folks that know me on LinkedIn, which is where I just post things professionally, they would probably not know that I am an avid scuba diver and underwater photographer. And I've done that. It's been a little while. COVID put the kibosh on doing that as much as I used to. But yeah, I came to appreciate evolution on a coral reef because when you get down close to a coral reef, you see all manner of species that are fighting over every patch of territory, and they just evolved perfectly to survive there. That's pretty, pretty amazing.

Do you have a favorite spot for scuba diving?

Yeah, two. One, Truck Lagoon, which was the site of a famous World War II battle where the Japanese supply fleet was caught at anchor by the US Navy. Yeah, so that's a, a lagoon where there's about 100 ships that were sunk in the space of 3 days. And so most of them are accessible, uh, to scuba divers. And then my other favorite place has been Palau, which is both a combination of really extensive coral reefs and also the site of a World War II battle.

Man, that's, that is really wonderful. Can you maybe take us through briefly your leadership story, how you ended up being at NASA and working for the White House, the DNI, I mean, NSA. You've been pretty much all over the place. How did that come to be?

Yeah, so the summary version is that I started out as a Cold Warrior. I started at the Center for Naval Analysis right out of grad school in the late '80s. That was the end of the Reagan defense buildup. Back then, it was— my specialty, my initial specialty was anti-submarine warfare. So that was tracking Soviet submarines. Uh, I, um, stayed with that for up to about, uh, 1999 and then went to work for, uh, a Navy Admiral that I had worked for who you might know, Joe Pryor. He had been the Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Pacific Command. I'm using the old terminology. Yes. And then he went on to be the U.S. Ambassador to China. So I did, uh, a year and a half, uh, at the embassy there. And then I came back, 9/11 happened, and that was what Pushed me into the intelligence community, ultimately wound up at the National Security Agency, which is, and I, I went there as a strategist. And so that, wow. Spent about a total of 15 years employed by them. 2 of those years were at the White House as a senior director for cyber policy at the National Security Council. And I was about to retire out of, out of that because the White House will, will do the one thing it will do to you is it'll take a complex, uh, 3-dimensional human being and flatten you out into a 1-dimensional workaholic. And so I was going to retire and a colleague of mine, a friend and colleague who knew NASA's needs and my background said, you all should talk. And NASA saw an opportunity to bring somebody in from the outside who knew how to do strategy, which Pam Melroy was then the deputy administrator. She was a champion of having an agency strategy and wanted somebody to help her with that. So that's how I landed.

That is really quite an adventure because you've lived quite a remarkable multi-domain career. NASA, NSA, the White House, the DNI, Capitol Hill, CNA, on and on and on and on. When you look back, now that you are retired, what unifies your journey?

Yeah, so I think this is a great question because it makes me turn introspective, but I think that the unifying theme is vigilance. The exception is, of course, going to NASA, which was all about idealism and space exploration. But all of that prior work, I think, was all about— I have a term that I use for people that like this, that like me. And there are many of us, many others like me out there. I call them rampart watchers. These are the folks that naturally walk the castle walls at night and are looking over the horizon for what's the next danger that we need to be worried about. And so that is the thing that I think You know, I started analyzing the world way back at the Center for Naval Analysis, understanding where the threats were, and then start slowly started to figure out what can you do about them. And that was the segue into strategy.

Wow. If, if you can share, where does that sense of vigilance kind of started for you?

Yeah, they, uh, so we were talking about this a little earlier that, yeah, this, there's a little bit of family tragedy in my background, uh, which was, uh, the loss of a baby brother. Uh, I was about 3 and a half or 4 at the time. And, uh, it was a, uh, then known as sudden infant death syndrome, but, uh, crib death. Uh, and my, my earliest memory is of the ambulance in the driveway, and that turned me into a rampart watcher. I was the son that, that then became the person that always looked on the horizon for what's the next danger.

Wow, very sorry to—

by the way, I didn't really understand that about myself until much, much later. It wasn't until I I worked on the congressional investigation into 9/11. What were the underlying causes of the intelligence failures behind 9/11? And I interviewed a bunch of folks who, as it turned out, are Rampart Watchers. And they were doing the same thing that I naturally did, which is they're always focused on the horizon and what's the next threat coming at us. Yes. And they were, they, a lot of them were doing it well before 9/11. Like they recognized the threat and they could not get people to wake up to the threat that they were seeing. Pay attention. Wow.

Yeah, 9/11 definitely was a huge milestone for my generation, right? Gen X is— I guess it's 9/11 and then the global pandemic, everything. But, um, but I think something else happened too when, when you were a child, right? Because what kind of inspired you to get into engineering? It may have to do with your father. Yeah, uh, yes.

So my, my dad taught me how to build models, and it's been— and, you know, this is at age 5 and 6. You know, it was back then snap-together models, and, uh, eventually got to be more sophisticated. But, uh, but he had a propensity to bring home airplane models, and so that was how I came to appreciate airplanes. And that, that was inspired me to eventually— I mean, from as far back as I can remember, I, I knew I wanted to be an aerospace engineer, which is ultimately what I did in college and grad school. Ah, um, but yes, building the SR-71 was, uh was where that was. Even today, it looks like a very futuristic aircraft. It was built in the '60s and is now at the Dulles— well, you can see various models in various museums. I always see the one at the Udvar-Hazy Center out at Dulles Airport.

Wow, that is quite fascinating. So how did your engineering background influence the way you later thought about intelligence, cyber operation, and strategic development?

This is one of my secrets, that I approach every problem the way an engineer would. Uh, so I, you know, I'm always about the pro— what's the problem statement? Uh, what's the question that we're supposed to answer? What are the assumptions? What are the underlying equations? Yes. What are the results? And then what's the interpretation and the implications? And so, uh, that is the way I approached engineering problems. It's the way I approached strategy. I also largely approached, uh, space policy in the same way. Wow, that is quite amazing.

Of course, not everything on this podcast, as you know, is all Unclassified, so whatever you can share, because you served as the senior advisor to the Director of National Security Agency. You held multiple senior strategic roles there. What does effective strategy look like inside an agency as complex as the NSA?

Yeah, so it ultimately comes down to the outcomes that you're trying to achieve. General Nakasone was a big champion of this. He was the one I was senior advisor to. You know, what outcomes are we trying to achieve? And you can ask that at multiple levels of the organization. It can be, you know, a small, you know, mission unit inside the agency. It can be a directorate-level organization, or it can be the agency itself. But it always started with what outcomes were you trying to achieve? And then we would ultimately break that down into a short list of actions, like what has to happen to get to those outcomes? And the outcomes might be only 2 or 3 things. The list of actions, my ideal world was no more than 6 because a large organization struggles with anything more than 6. And then you have to have people who have the resources to go make those actions happen. And the complex actions, of course, involve multiple organizations. But at the end of the day, you got to have the right set of leaders who are pushing that forward. And then there's an implementation plan, which is— that's always the hardest thing to do. It's one thing to do to formulate the strategy, implementing is actually much more time-consuming. Wow.

Now, for most of the people that I mentor, many of our listeners right now, they are rising military officers and cyber leaders. What leadership traits do you think make someone successful in high-pressure, highly classified environment?

Yeah, um, the— so that I, I'd like to repeat this thing that I learned from Joe Prier, who one of my mentors. And again, he would, you know, I met him when he was a 3-star admiral and he was, uh, he rose to be Vice Chief of Naval Operations and eventually, uh, US Commander of US Pacific Command. Um, and he always had this, this really simple formula that he used to, uh, repeat in front of big audiences and small audiences, which is you had to know your stuff, you have to take care of your people, and you always have to do the right thing. Uh, and those, those 3 traits I've sort of found that are really useful just because it's easy to remember and they're sort of really good guiding principles. But the other thing I've learned is calm under fire. The most effective leaders are not, they're not yelling at people. And both Joe Preyer and Paul Nakasone were very similar. Like I never saw them raise their voices.

Wow, that is quite insightful. Can you say those 3 things one more time, please?

Yeah, which is know your stuff. The more profane version of that, you have to know yourself, you have to take care of your people, and you always do the right thing.

That is powerful. And the thing is, especially in the military, the more you rise through the rank and the more responsibility you have, I think the more critical it is to kind of go back to basics, knowing your things, taking care of your people, and always doing the right thing, even when nobody is watching, especially when nobody is watching, because that's when you get in trouble if you're not paying attention. So for my, the aspiring leaders listening to me now, some of those people I mentor, that's really, I think, a key to success in any field. Thank you so much for Shanks, sir. Let's talk about 9/11 just a little bit. Again, that's really the one thing that I think changed everything for my generation, part of the reason why I eventually joined the US Navy. But what did the intelligence community learn from 9/11 that still shapes our posture today?

Yeah, so I think that, I mean, the one that's out there in public that really shapes public thinking is the imperative of information sharing. Yes, I think, and I saw this really firsthand, I saw it at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, but really at the National Security Agency, which really does quite a bit of sensitive work, uh, but that imperative of information sharing, making sure that the right set of, uh, interagency players had the information that NSA had so that they could go take action. NSA, of course, is an intelligence agency. It was not necessarily the action arm., that would be involved in, uh, what comes after finding out a piece of critical intelligence. So that was one thing. But, but I also think the thing that people don't talk about, but I, I see shaping the agency to this day, is that the bias for action, it was no longer acceptable. And, and, uh, the mission ethos— I worked on the counterterrorism mission, that was the first mission I worked in at NSA— and then, and there was a bias for action, which the ethos was don't, you know, don't be passive in the face of an emerging terrorist threat. You had to figure out what, what can we do about it and who are the right action players to go do it, whether it's the FBI or CIA or the military. You, you had to have some sense of the significance of the information that you're dealing with and how you're gonna get it to the right folks and then to explain the implications to them. It was no longer, I'm gonna churn out my report and it's gonna go out in an automated cable.

Mm-hmm. Why? Because you also alluded to it earlier when you talked about implementation and execution. Having said that, you've said in the past 90% of strategy is implementation. Can you unpack what leaders misunderstand about strategy?

Yeah, so first, I think of strategy as positioning the organization for the future. That was what NSA strategy was all about. I have to do current operations. I'm doing mission. I'm collecting intelligence today, and I have to churn out reports and make sure winds up in the right places. But the environment is evolving, the adversary's evolving. And so I had to stay out in front of the adversary. And so I was— the strategy was very much about how do I stay in front of the adversary and cope with things like changing technology at the same time. And so that was the way that we defined strategy. What it wasn't was a glossy document. And so that, so part of my statement of 90% of strategy is the implementation, uh, is a reaction to what I just, my early Navy experience, like every, every organization I ever ran into had a glossy document, but then you'd ask them like, okay, what are you doing with that strategy? And let me blow the dust off the COVID Yes. And so, so to me, strategy had to be about implementation. And that, that was, um, what, uh, that was what I appreciated about NSA. They were very much into, it's not, In fact, we didn't have glossy documents. General Accasoni's strategy for the agency was 2 pages and he sent it out as an email, but it had enormous implications for the workforce. And so, you know, being really attentive to how the strategy would drive budget and activities, that was to me is what I'm getting at. And you'll wind up, if you have a, you know, if you have a strategy that you've developed, you'll spend the next year or 2 implementing. And that's what I meant by 90% of strategy is actually in the implementation.

That is so powerful. It reminds me of what one of my dear mentors taught me when I first became an officer. He said something like 90% of success in the Navy is just showing up. Just show up and do what you're supposed to do and everything is gonna work out somehow. And I think he was so right about that. So you've served in the White House as a special assistant to President Joe Biden and senior director for cyber policy. It's really one of the most demanding leadership positions in government.

So what prepared you for such a role? Yeah. My glib answer is to say that nothing really prepares you for the role, but no, everybody comes with a background. In my case, having done strategy at multiple levels of NSA. So I was a senior director for cyber policy. That was the Cyber Directorate. There were about 12 or 15 people in that directorate, depending on what moment in time we were talking about. And, uh, and so you had to have a cyber background. Um, yes. But the, what really sort of qualified me for that job was, was two things. One, having done strategy in cyber at multiple levels, uh, of the agency and as well as working with US Cyber Command. Uh, and then secondly, I had a working relationship with, uh, Anne Neuberger, who was the Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber and Emerging Tech. And she was also an NSA senior executive and she and I had worked, uh, closely together for, uh, multiple years prior to her going to the White House. She went there right after the— right at the start of the new administration. It took me about 18 months to catch up to her.

Wow, that is really fascinating. Now, the next question I'm going to ask, one of the quotes one of my dear mentors told me was, it's kind of like herding cat— actually, he corrected himself, it's like herding wet cat, which is pretty much impossible. But In your role in the White House, you were able to build consensus among agencies with different culture. And I know the DOD, but even within the DOD, the Army and the Navy, two completely different cultures. Sometimes we want to kill each other instead of working together, but you were dealing with all of the DOD, DHS, State, Justice, Intelligence Community, on and on and on while under national pressure. What was your secret? How did you do it?

Yeah, so I think especially at the National Security Council, The key is really letting everyone have their say. So that the role of senior director at the NSC is to convene interagency meetings to discuss a particular set of policy issues. In my case, they would've all been cyber-related. In some cases, we were involved in regional issues, but cyber was one dimension of the— Yes. Of the broader set of issues that the US government, the executive branch was dealing with. So the, um, so you let it— and the senior directors, that was where, where the— where you really started to get serious about like, okay, what are we going to do about this particular issue? Ransomware, for example, was one of the issues we had to deal with. And so letting all the different departments and agencies have, uh, have their say about what they thought should be done. And then, you know, as the senior director, you had to be the one that was making sure you were listening to like what generally each department and agency is going to bring some value add. And so your, your role as the senior director was to pull out what is the value add here. More importantly, can you spot, especially in real time, can you spot like where is there already consensus? Like let's pocket all the consensus and agreement that we have and then figure out where, where there, where there are disagreements and are the disagreements big enough that it needs to go up to a higher level for further discussion.

Wow, that is, uh, just Incredible. So what does the future of cyber operation and national cyber strategy look like today in an era of artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and geopolitical competition?

Yeah, well, especially artificial intelligence, I think, is a really fundamental shift in the technology. The, you know, what does it look like? What does cybersecurity look like in this new era? Well, it looks a lot more complicated. I think some of what you're seeing, especially out of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, is a battlefield training ground for how does cyber really work and how can it be effective. And I think there's hits and misses. The Russians did an attack on Viasat early on that tried to cripple Ukrainian command and control. And then what they didn't— what the Russians didn't count on was this thing called Starlink, which hardly anybody had heard of, but it turned out to be an incredibly resilient satellite communication system. And the Ukrainians were able to roll to that and were able to maintain command and control of their own forces on the battlefield. In an era of AI, you know, we've had this debate when I was at the National Security Council, does AI favor offense or defense? And the answer was always yes. So, you know, AI may be able to help you find vulnerabilities in your own code and help you secure critical infrastructure. Or if you're on offense, well, I can go scan somebody else's code and figure out where the vulnerabilities are and come up with new tools for conducting cyber intrusions. So I'm not— it's not clear to me which way that breaks. And like most technologies, they can be used on offense or defense. And it's up to our own ingenuity to figure out how do we make it work for us in both ways.

Wow. But it looks like when I look at your career, sir, you really have a tact for trying to solve the impossible. For example, when you went to NASA, you were brought in as the director of cross-agency strategy integration. And I wonder what it really took for you to integrate 6 mission directorates and 10 centers into one strategic vision. It looks like Mission Impossible to me.

Wow. As it turns out, it was. So this is actually something that NASA struggles with. And just the way you said it, it's 6 directorates at the headquarters, which The headquarters is here in Washington, D.C. 10 centers are scattered across the United States, across, I think, 7 states. And the money is in the headquarters and the workforce is actually in the centers. And so you can imagine that there's always friction between these entities over what's a priority. And so what does it take to integrate all those? What it takes is a singular vision. NASA had this in the Apollo program. We're going to land a man on the moon and bring him back. Safely to Earth. And, uh, and NASA, I think, has struggled with that. What is that unitary vision? And, you know, Jared Isaacman's, uh, confirmation hearing is going to be next week, and you can see him trying to pare down the set of priorities that NASA is working on, which I think is a move in the right direction. Um, and, but I think, you know, NASA has many constituencies that it answers to. It's got Congress— those 10 centers are in 10 different congressional districts. You've got the Office of Management and Budget. They're setting the president's budget among all the president's other priorities. You've got industry, who's got its own views about where the emphasis should be. So then you've got the scientific community. NASA is fundamental to advancing science in ways that I think make history. The idea of finding life elsewhere in the solar system would be like this extraordinary scientific discovery if they can ever find a place. Where life exists that is not Earth. And, but, you know, these are all exciting things, but it's really, you know, they're all, they tend to be quite expensive. And so it's really hard to prioritize among that, you know, buffet of really interesting things that NASA can do for the nation.

And also, I think, you know, in our industry, when we talk about space, I guess I've been doing space since about 2007 at first at Nav Network Com— actually, it was Spacewar!, but they call themselves Navwar now. But anyway, Network Com, Compact Fleet, and Third Fleet. Let's talk about low Earth orbit because you're kind of a legend in our industry because you helped shape the microgravity strategy for the low Earth orbit, kind of, no, to help define the post-ISS era. So that's something a lot of people are quite concerned about. What do you think are the biggest opportunities ahead in LEO?

Yeah, so I think this is a great question because my answer actually might surprise you, but the biggest opportunities right now are actually in space defense. And by that I mean Golden Dome. The amount of money that is proposed to be spent on Golden Dome is enormous.

And $175 billion with a B?

Over 3 years. That's the equivalent of buying 7 NASAs in 3 years. And so that money will clearly have an effect on technology development as well as, you know, there's a whole body of startups that are energized by the prospects of contributing to that mission. So I actually think that is probably the single biggest mission. The other one that intrigues me, the 2 places where people make money in low Earth orbit right now is Earth observation and communications.. And so you can see, you know, Blue Origin has its Kuiper constellation, SpaceX has its Starlink. And so this idea of mega constellations is transforming the way we move internet traffic around the Earth. It's no longer just undersea cables going across the seafloor. And so I think that is likely to continue growing. And then the thing that actually interests me the most is in-space assembly and manufacturing. In space assembly, now, you know, there are companies that are figuring out how do I build bigger structures in low Earth orbit. I've heard of it as the tyranny of the payload fairing. Yeah. Which is right now I'm constrained by the size of the rocket and the payload fairing that I can put on the top of the rocket on what— how big is a structure can I build bring up to orbit, but if I can assemble that stuff in orbit, I can build much bigger structures. The International Space Station, of course, was done this way, but now companies are figuring out there are ways of building even bigger structures based on the idea that I will take panels and assemble them. In some cases, they're self-assembling, and then you can build quite large structures in orbit. And then the question is, is there some activity in orbit that you can do that Well, actually, where you can manufacture something that you can't make, manufacture here on Earth, or not as well as you can make it on Earth. And can I do it up there in orbit and bring it back?

Wow, man, it's truly amazing how science fiction is becoming reality every day these days.

It does make me think, are we talking about Death Star level stuff, John? Yeah.

Man, but I am assuming you've worked with General Glen VanHerck, right? He was recently commander for NORAD and US NORTHCOM.

Yeah, I know him more from my days at NSA than I do from NASA, for what it's worth.

Yes. Yeah, because I had him on the podcast a couple of weeks ago and he talked about the Golden Dome too. In his view, it's kind of like an imminent project-level initiative to defend US airspace infrastructure. Through layered AI-enabled missile and drone defense. But one thing is he said, and I wonder if you agree with him, because I've always talked about all-of-government approach, and I remember when President Obama was our commander-in-chief, he talked a lot about that. But what the general is saying is not just all of government, it actually should be all of nation effort, including the industry and everything, like policy, technology, industrial revitalization working together to defend our homeland. Is that the same sense you have about the Golden Dawn?

Yeah, uh, yes, um, although I actually— my mind just shifted over to cyber for a second, which is, um, uh, and Neuberger and I have talked about this, that, you know, 90% of US critical infrastructure is actually in private sector hands. True. So the idea that the government is going to be somehow positioned to defend all of that, I think it's just never going to occur. And so the question is, how can you— how can we have internet service providers and telecommunications providers that actually sit on all the traffic coming in, into and out of the United States? And, and so a more efficient way of building cyber, cyber defenses for the nation is actually to involve the private sector. And it raises this really interesting question, like, how should we have private sector participants in an interagency process? I, I know when I was at the NSC, that question was— nobody knew how to answer that question yet. Like, it just, you know, it caused the lawyers' heads to explode. I can imagine. Yes. But it, it's— to me, it's a really— it's the next evolution, especially when you have this pragmatic problem of trying to protect private sector entities. And, you know, the American public, I think, is going to react negatively to anything where the government at this potentially watching or monitoring internet traffic. I know I'd have concerns about it too. And so, uh, the question is, how do we solve this problem? To me, in my mind, AI actually is one of the solutions here, which is if I can analyze lots of network traffic, I should be— in theory, I should be able to find the, the malicious traffic and do be able to do something about it. The Australians are actually further down the road than we are in this. They, they're already, uh, experimenting with some of Man, it's so interesting.

I'm so glad that I was born in this time of history because so many challenges and, you know, innovation. I mean, it's very exciting to be alive today for sure. But I think we need to talk a little bit about your sailboat theory of career progression. I'm not going to let you off the show if we don't talk about it just a little bit. Can you tell us kind of its origin, where it came from? Because, you know, It has resonated with thousands of people. And can you also share how leaders can or should recognize when to tack the boat?

Yes. So it comes from my— I graduated from Stanford University. I spent a couple of years on the sailing team there. I was a terrible sailor. As it turns out, most of the folks that were really good on the team had grown up on the West Coast, and they had been sailing all their lives. I was self-taught in a lake near, in New Hampshire. But one of the things that to be a good sailor on the sailing team, you had to be able to, you had to be able to know where the wind is and then spot the wind shifts. And then the wind shifts would tell you, was it time to tack the boat or do you stay on the same course? And so, and there could be an event if you spotted the wind shift early, there was an advantage to your boat to make an attack early. And so that always— so that was— that's where the theory comes from. It also comes from this idea that, you know, when— as I was moving up through my career, I always had this idea, like, climb the ladder. That's like the model of career progression. And I was like, wait a minute, there's an alternate theory out there, which is what I call the sailboat theory of career navigation. And, and it's knowing when to tack the boat to go, you know, if one course is taking you to interesting work, then you stay on that course. And that's not the interesting work anymore, or there's a change in the environment, then it's time to tack the boat and go sail towards where the new interesting work is. Wow.

Yeah, because I was going to ask, uh, what internal signal tells you it's time for the next career move, especially when your current role is quite comfortable and prestigious, but you're not really learning much anymore? Yeah, I think this is a great question.

And there's two ways of answering this. One is, is there a big macro change in the environment? Yeah. And for me, there were, there've been a couple changes in, in my, uh, professional environment. One was the end of the Cold War and that, you know, the Department of Defense and all the subordinate entities include the Navy sort of drifted along like the, we're not like we've been, we built our entire organization and ethos around the idea that the Soviet Union was the thing that had to be contained. And that when that went away, the question was, what do we do? Uh, we didn't have to wait that long cuz 9/11 came and that was another big wind shift and terrorist groups. Okay. That was not what we were thinking about at the time. Now that became a dominant feature in national security for at least 15 years. And then in the midst of that, the rise of cyber operations, the internet didn't even exist at the end of the Cold War. Well, it did if you were at DARPA, but for most of us, it didn't exist. And then, I mean, I remember learning browsers in the mid-'90s, internet browsers, and You know, and then all of a sudden, as you know, governments put stuff online, all of a sudden this whole, you know, intelligence realm that can be grown up around this. And, uh, and so cyber operations became a thing. Uh, software got more sophisticated, it came laden with vulnerabilities, and you can see how that one went. Uh, and then, and lastly, the, you know, for me personally, I think that I did not— I was not paying attention to it, but the growth of the space industry Through some really clever thinking at NASA and some really clever companies, to include SpaceX, who started thinking about, hey, there's ways of reducing costs in rocket launch. And if we do that, then it opens up a whole new economy and a different set of space exploration options that we hadn't previously visualized.

Wow. So talking about the future, this is going to be my last question for this segment. I guess it's a two-part question. Where will artificial intelligence disrupt cyber operation, space operation, and intelligence integration? And then the second part is, what innovation do you believe will define the next 10 years?

Say the first question again.

Where will AI disrupt cyber, space, and intelligence?

So I think I actually think AI has the greatest chance of being a positive force in intelligence disruption. By that I mean that, you know, just to see the power of large language models, the ability to do foreign language translation, whether it's intelligence or open source material, just, you know, wow, they don't need an army of linguists in the same way I used to if I can have large language models that'll actually do accurate translations. And so that, in that sense, like, that's potentially revolutionary. And one can imagine that there's, you know, ways of optimizing how you use your collection resources, whether you're the National Reconnaissance Office or National Security Agency. There are ways of optimizing that AI models can solve in a way that humans might not be able to. Just the idea of change detection, the private sector space industry is already doing this through its own collection which they sell on the commercial market, but they can figure out like who's digging holes where. If you want to look along the US border and figure out where tunnels are, you know, there's a private sector company that's actually— can collect that data and spot it for you, and they do it all automatically if you ask, if you need it to. In terms of cybersecurity, I think, again, I think the AI to identify software vulnerabilities or AI to manage operations of both of those things, I think, are are possible. The question is, what does it run faster in, offense or defense? Yes. Wow. And then for space exploration, this has been a debate inside. NASA will tell you that they're already doing AI because they've, they've used AI for computer vision, for example, on the Martian rovers. But if you want to take a spacecraft to Mars, for example, that, you know, that's the— I describe that as the complexity of a Navy nuclear submarine. Wow. Navy nuclear submarine, as you know, has a crew of 80 to 90 or 100 personnel. Well, this spacecraft to Mars is going to have 4, maybe 10 people at the most. And so that— you're— the complexity of a nuclear submarine run by 10 people, okay, the answer is going to be, it's going to be automated in many ways. And artificial intelligence is potentially the solution to that. The question is, how do I train my spacecraft before I send it on its way to Mars? Because I don't have any data. To train it on. So there's a bunch of engineering problems to be solved there.

Wow, just fascinating. Again, I'm so glad I am living in the 21st century. Wow. Okay, we're gonna go over to the, uh, second segment where I really focus on leadership. One of the first questions I want to ask, sir, is what do you think is the greatest lesson you have ever learned, whether in life, in leadership, in general?

Uh, as usual, I'll give you two answers to this one. Um, One, uh, one lesson was to always see the big picture. Rarely just do events just pop up out of nowhere. Usually they have antecedents, and so you have to be able to see that big picture. Again, this is sort of tied to wind shifts, but those, you know, those wind shifts always have antecedents, and that usually the problem is that people hadn't been paying attention to the antecedents. And then the other thing I've learned is that personnel is policy. That's one way of saying it, but who you put in your key leadership positions makes all the difference in the world. The right people will deliver the outcomes that you're interested in, and the wrong people will struggle.

Wow. So having looked at your incredible career, all of the things you've done at the White House, NSA, and NASA, and everywhere else, What do you think is the secret of your success?

Yeah, yeah, this ability to see the big picture, which, you know, and I, I've had, uh, you know, a lot of that. Some, for whatever reason, I gravitated to big picture early on. Again, Joe Preer was my, was one of my early mentors, and he really taught me to see, see that big picture. And then the other thing is that I, I think I was able to engage with folks that were much more senior to me in a way that was— Jim Prager used to call me the irreverent one because I would, I would speak bluntly. But, you know, and this is what— these are his words— but he would say that you, you speak bluntly, John, but, but you say it in a way that gets people to listen without it— like, it's like it wasn't offensive, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't perceived as a personal attack, but it's like, you know, you're able to say here's what's going on in the big picture, here's what we can do about it. Yes. And I think that, that skill has served me well in a bunch of different assignments.

Wow, that, that is really, uh, fascinating because I remember one of my mentors, I think he was the very first information warfare admiral, Vice Admiral Robert Sharp, you probably know him, but he said something like, I'd rather pull back on the rein of a thoroughbred Van to spare a jackass. That was, uh, but, uh, I think it helps. Yeah. Anyway, so, uh, what do you think is the greatest leadership advice you have received so far?

Yeah, uh, I think I'd go back to Joe Prior's advice, which is you got to know your stuff, you got to take care of your people. That, that's the one that, like, you know, especially in Washington, that I think the US military is quite good at this. Like, that just comes naturally to military leaders. Like, you have to take care of your people. The best leaders I've ever dealt with, they knew their stuff, but they also were really experts at taking care of their people and then always do the right thing, which is both— that's sort of a governing equations thing, but it's also a little bit of a moral thing. Like, you know, I always used to say, like, okay, we are You know, we're going to live within the law of the United States, but the law should never compel us to do the wrong thing. So if there's an issue, we need to go talk to our lawyers like, hey, don't— like, I do not want to be doing the wrong thing here. And that would come up in the terrorism mission, uh, the counterterrorism mission. What do we do when we— this came up in the Times Square bombing in 2010. There's a potentially a terrorist loose in the United States. We don't know where he is. What— wow. We cannot sit on our hands and not do anything. Yes, that is leadership.

Know your stuff, take care of your people, and always, always do the right thing. I would add, especially when nobody's watching. That's when you definitely need to do the right thing because somebody's always watching. So as a, as a leader, so what are you learning now?

Uh, so the thing that excites me the most is I am working with a few startup companies, and I'm learning how they see the world, which is, you know, there's a problem out there that they think they can solve, and they've got to put together the right combination of the idea, the people, and the funding to go make that idea happen. And then they got to work the customer side of it to figure out how do we get people to pay for what we think is a great idea. And so I appreciate— I've come to appreciate how challenging that is, but also applaud some of the courage that I see among folks who are much younger than I them. But they, you know, they're scrappy, they're a mix of scrappy engineers, really brilliant people, but they think of the world in broad terms. When you look at the team, they always function well as teams. That's the one thing that I think they have in common.

Wow, that's wonderful. I've lived in Silicon Valley for the last 11 years, that we see that every day, because if you don't, you're going to be out of business. So nobody wants that. So we talked a lot about your Success is— one of my favorite, uh, mentor gave me this coin. One side says success, which everybody sees and applauds, but on the other side it says failure. So success and failure, I'm reminded, two sides of the same coin. How has failure shaped your life?

The, uh, so they— yeah, I think the fear of failure, uh, is a— can be a potent motivator, um, and there And I would, so I would, you know, I'd point back to my time on Capitol Hill. So Capitol Hill, Congress is a tough, that's a tough working environment. And that I like to tell folks that you will not get as close to American democracy as you can when you're working in, especially in the House of Representatives. And because the one thing that all members have in common is that they all really know their districts inside and out. They know who their constituents are. Constituents are, they know who their voters are, they know what the issues are inside the district, they know what all the sort of big pieces of infrastructure. But it's a tough environment to work in, and that— and you have to know what I— there's— I learned this from another coach of mine: policy, politics, and procedures. Like, to get legislation passed, um, you know, you had to know the policy, like, what, what is— what's theoretically— what's the right answer? What are the politics that they're driving this, and then what are the procedures for actually drafting and getting it passed. I was not a master of those things simultaneously. It was like, it just made my little brain explode too often. And, uh, and so that, um, you know, I don't, I don't know that I would not win the gold medal of, uh, you know, Hill staffer awards. Um, but, uh, but I did learn these really useful lessons about how to think about a problem in multiple dimensions.

But if I remember correctly, you also work at an embassy, right, sir? So did those lessons at Capitol Hill kind of help you be a better statesman?

Yeah, I actually worked at the embassy before Hill staffer. Yes. And so, um, yeah, the, uh, working in an embassy, everybody thinks that it's like the State Department, which it is because that's the host agency, but actually the, the each embassy is actually a little interagency unto itself because you have Department of Defense, you have Department of Commerce, uh, you might, you might have an intelligence presence, um, you'll have, uh, might have an FBI liaison. So there's a whole, whole plethora of players that makes the, the embassy team like really interesting to work with.

Wow, that's really something. It looks like in, in your career, sir, you really have done so well building consensus, right? Like I was saying earlier, herding cats or wet, wet cats, it's almost impossible. But working with all of these factions, because everybody has their own culture and they know they have their own priorities, but coming together as one and trying to do the right thing for the nation. That's just very admirable. Okay. Who are some of the— man, we are already running out of time. I have about 5 minutes. Can I get 5 more minutes or do we have a hard stop? I'm going to take this pen down, but I really enjoy talking to you. Who are some of your mentors and people that you follow, thought leaders that we should know, that we should follow as well?

Yeah. So there are actually 11 of them. I only know this because I had to write them down. Recently, but, uh, so, uh, Dave Perron and Rich Bronowitz were at the Center for Naval Analysis. Dave Perron taught me how to think big picture about the Navy. Like that, if I were to, uh, trace it back, like he was the one. And then Rich Bronowitz was the head of, uh, the Center for Naval Analysis Field Program. He was the one that gave me an outsized opportunity early in my career. Uh, Joe Prier I've mentioned, uh, Paul Marcasoni I've mentioned, uh, Theresa Shea. Was the signals intelligence director at NSA, and she was the one that really shaped me into an effective National Security Agency senior executive. When I look back at my own behavior, like, she's very much a consensus builder. She listens to all voices. I trace it back to that. People on LinkedIn, Rob Joyce is out there on LinkedIn. He was my my first boss at NSA, uh, John Darby, John Milligan. They were all the heads of, uh, counterterrorism. They were successive heads. So I described myself as the luckiest person at NSA because I had— those are my, my three mentors, um, first three mentors there. Uh, Tom McDermott was an NSA retiree but came back as a consultant. He was the one that told me how to do strategy at NSA, taught me how to do it. And then I worked for Jane Harmon. That's a high-temperature, high-pressure blast furnace, and you learn a lot from Jane. Jane's always the smartest person in the room, and I say that like, that's just the way it is. Like, she was brilliant, but she knew policy, politics, and procedures better than anybody else I ever ran into.

She's a legend for sure. Wow. So if you could choose 3 people to have dinner with, they could be alive, dead, or even mythical figure, who would you choose and Why?

So I would have chosen Neil Armstrong just for the—

before the doping, right? Yes.

Just for the— what was it like to step out on those first few moments on the moon when you're the only human that has ever done it? Buzz Aldrin is still around, so I'd take dinner with Buzz Aldrin too. Just because I think, you know, what they did was just so profound. I think I might choose Robert Goddard for his— because the early, earliest American pioneer of rocketry, or at least the, the one that we trace our roots back to in terms of rocketry and space exploration. Like, everything that he did, you can see there were other folks around the world doing similar things, but at least for the American space program, you can all trace it back to Goddard. Werner von Braun, of course, is another hugely influential person. And then, yeah, I think those two for sure. One more? And the third one, gosh. I, you know, I'm—

my mind is going between, uh, you know, um, well, you've been given two, two answers there, uh, anyway, you can give four.

Well, you know, I'd be interested in, in a, uh, conversation with, uh, Bill Gates, but not necessarily where, what he's doing now, but just in the understanding, um, you know, what the world looked like when he was just building Microsoft, was just him and Paul Allen. And, you know, did they, did they see how big it might— it was going to become, or was it just like they were scrappy engineers and they were just churning away trying to do the best they could, and it turned out they were on the, on the path of a really big idea?

Wow, that's powerful. Okay, uh, any books that you've read that we should read?

Yeah, I think this— yeah, this one, uh, my go-to book on strategy is Good Strategy, Bad Strategy, recommended to me by, uh, by a close friend. This one resonated with me because when I read it, it was a— Richard Rommel is a professor, I think, at the UCLA Business School, and what he described resonated with what we had been doing intuitively in— at NSA, but his was derived from business, and he had all these anecdotes of, you know, this This is how, what effective strategy looks like. And, and I, you know, as I read it, I was like, yes. But it was, it gave me the intellectual framework that I didn't quite have. Wow. You know, I, you're probably familiar with, uh, ends, ways, and means. And, and I used to do, I'm so, I'm a, no offense to Air Force folks or RAND Corporation, but ends, ways, and means. I always felt like that led us into a discussion of what's the difference between a ways and a means. And I never wanted to have that conversation. Yeah. But yes, my other— I just, I read Stephen King. If you want to learn the craft of writing, Stephen King— this is an old book, but, uh, On Writing by Stephen King is great. It's funny, uh, the first half is kind of a memoir, the second half is on the craft of writing. And, uh, you just, you know, you learn, uh, what resonates with people and how he went about his craft of being a, you know, best-selling author. Yes. And then, uh I just, for everybody out there in podcast land, I grew up with the New England Patriots of the 1970s, which meant that they were the bottom dwellers all the way up. They had the debacle in the Super Bowl against the Chicago Bears in 1986. And so then Tom Brady and Bill Belichick show up, and those were a couple of good decades for New England fans. But yes, this book captures well what it was like on the team, both, and it's a hard-nosed look at what worked and what didn't. You can also see the seeds of the disintegration of the team towards the end. But yes, that's a— it's a good book for understanding how team dynamics really come into play and what you can do to foster positive team dynamics and what toxic influence can— the impact that it can have.

Yeah, like they say, the rest is history. And which reminds me, sir, so when are you planning to publish your first New York Times bestselling book?

Yeah, I'm working on a book. It will be a little while. By a little while, probably, you know, if I'm diligent about it, maybe 2026. But yes, I try to capture some of the things that I learned, both about strategy and about career progression in a book that is still gelling in my mind. But yes, I was working on it just before this.

We definitely want you back on the podcast once that's published. Last question in here I'm going to ask: is there maybe a song, a book, or a movie that would be your life's theme or anthem?

Oh my, that's a different question than what I thought you were going to ask. The, um, uh, my life's theme, see, that, that, uh, I don't— that presupposes that I'm okay with you know, my lights being up on the marquee, and that's not really the way I've navigated. As, as you found out, I'm a little bit of a ghost on the internet because— and that was because of the work I was doing at NSA. I did not want, uh, my background really well known. Once I went over to NASA, things changed and it was all fine. Um, the, uh, my— the I would have said my, like, my two favorite movies are Children of Men, which is a little bit obscure, but for folk, it's a, uh, it's a dystopian science fiction story, but it's wrapped in a biblical story. And so I like the sort of clever way that these two stories are interwoven. And then the original Blade Runner movie. Because that was all about meeting your maker and, you know, and what does it mean to be human. Wonderful.

Thank you. Thank you. I also love that you always have two answers for every question. That's wonderful. Okay. We are coming toward the end. But let me ask you this, sir. If you are the magic wand and you could solve any problem when you wake up tomorrow morning, which one problem would you like to solve?

I would love to solve the nuclear fusion problem. And the reason is it changes how the world divides up resources related to energy. And so you don't fight over oil anymore. It would change the geopolitics of the world and, and, uh, wow, make the world a more ecumenical place. But, but that sort of technology will always cut both ways. Like, you know, I don't know that we're going to get rid of the haves and the have-nots, but, it would, uh, that's powerful. And I appreciate— I mean, there are startup companies that out there that are work— trying to work on nuclear fusion. They're one of the other sets of companies that I keep my eye on are those working on, uh, nuclear fission microreactors, which I think has the possibility. NASA's paying attention to this because, uh, acting administrator Sean Duffy has, uh, said that NASA needs to put a fission reactor on the moon to power, uh, you know, a permanent presence and I mean, I think there— this is the discussion as I was there too, and that is the course of action. If they're successful for space exploration, that will change the game in a big way. That and in-space refueling is the other thing that will change the game.

That's something I think I've interviewed over 200 people now for my podcast. I've never had that answer. Wonderful. Okay. Another question I have for you, sir, is if you had one and only one day to live, what would you have liked your final contribution to be?

Oh, my final— I think I would simply choose to spend the day with my wife and, you know, have a— make her happy about my final day on Earth.

Yes, that one is very, very, very common, and I think it really puts things in perspective. I know after the pandemic No, the culture in the Bay Area has always been working 60, 70, 80 hours a week. That's startup mentality. But after the pandemic, things change quite significantly.

One of the things I learned, actually learned this at NSA, but Bill McAlpin from the— God, I can't remember the institute. It was a human performance institute that he worked for. But one of the things he taught the NSA leaders senior executives was, you have to take care of yourself. Because if you don't, the rest of the team feels, feels that. And so this, yeah, I used to do the 60 or 70 hours a week sort of mentality. And I eventually figured out that if you're not optimizing your own peak performance, and if you're not doing that, then the rest of the team is not doing it because they're dealing with your fatigue and lack of clear thinking and things like that. And so looking after oneself is actually, I actually think, is an underrated skill for leaders to have. Folks like Freer and Paul Nakasone, they intuitively knew it.

Wow. So simple, but so powerful and can have profound effects. So we are coming toward the end. How can we add value back to you?

The, uh, all I can say is like for, for anybody that's running a startup company out there that's interested, uh, I, now that I'm retired from government, I, uh, have time available and so I go out and advise and consult. And if anything in my background resonates with the folks that might be listening and they are interested in, uh, a little bit of advising and consulting time for me, I am happy to entertain those.

Fantastic. And of course, you're going to find him on LinkedIn, John-Keeffe-Fab7ace. You're going to have to change your LinkedIn URL. Fab7ace. Did you do this on purpose here so nobody would find you? I tried to figure it out. Yeah, but yeah, you do see it on the screen and it's going to be on the description of the podcast as well. Definitely follow him on LinkedIn. And my Silicon Valley friends, yes, if you need a great advisor, John Keefe is the person to go to. He's definitely a legend in our industry. So, uh, we are coming toward the end. Is there a question I should have asked you that I haven't asked yet?

Is— oh, is there a question that you haven't asked me yet?

Yeah, that I should have before we close the show.

Yeah, the, um, the, like, the interesting question is like What's the most formative experience among my career experiences?

And I would have said, please give us two answers.

So I, so I, one, I think 9/11 was the big formative experience. So I, my backstory on this is on September 10, 2001, I was in the Pentagon in the section of the building that was hit. The next day, on September 11, I actually happened to be at home because I was selling my townhouse. Like that. That is how life goes sometimes. Um, and so I found myself very fortunate. Uh, a few— about a week after, uh, 9/11, I called my parents and said, I'm disappearing. Uh, I can't tell you where I'm going or what I'm doing, but I will be inside the United States in the safest place imaginable. I was actually on my way to Central Command headquarters to join the team that was building the war plan for Afghanistan. Um, and I was there for about 10 weeks. Um, and so that that experience of where did this threat come from, because I'd heard about Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda, but I, you know, I just used to be dismissive of it. Even after the terror, the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa, you know, I thought, okay, that, all right, they have some, some amount of gain, but okay, this is not world-changing. And then 9/11 was that big wake-up call, like, yeah, these folks have much bigger ambitions. And so that was a big change. And then being in that team where the whole point was like, all right, this threat at the end of the day is going to go away. We're going to make it go away in one form or another.

Man, that is really incredible. And you may not wear the uniform of the country, but thank you so much, sir, for everything you've done to keep our nation safe. It's really something. So thank you. All right, so we are coming toward the end. I think the most important question for me to close us out is, uh, if you could go back and give a piece of advice to your 17-year-old self standing at the edge of this incredible career you've had, what would you say to 17-year-old John Kiff?

Uh, I would have, I would have said a little something on the lines of, uh, tamp down the anxiety and pay more attention to being a good teammate rather than a climber. And I mean that not— and I think I was pretty good at avoiding being a climber, but there was always that sort of like, this is, I'm sure this is common among folks that age from 17, you know, up through the 30s, you know, you got that like, am I good enough? Am I, you know, am I on a path to success? That those are always really hard things, uh, to make a judgment about when you're at that age. I would have told my 17-year-old self, like, it's all going to work out. Like, you've got all the right ingredients. You're smart, you're industrious, you know, you've got good parents backing you up, and, and those, those ingredients will carry you, uh, pretty far. And, you know, I was fortunate my parents encouraged me to choose whatever path I wanted. Um, but that— but I think that, uh, the question of, like, am I succeeding or not succeeding, like, That's a little bit of a hard habit to shake. It actually comes with age and experience.

Yes. Well, that is so powerful. And one of the reasons why I said the most important question I ask is because when I came to this country, I was 17 years old. I had big, big, big dream and I didn't know how to go from A to B. Actually, I tried to join the Navy 4 times. They rejected me, but then eventually they said yes. And eventually I became an officer, like they say, the rest is history. But, uh, wow, thank you. Thanks so much for sharing that. So to end, it's gonna take a couple of minutes, uh, it's gonna be, uh, lightning round, right? Rapid fire. So don't take too long to think. Uh, one word that defines great leadership. That defines great leadership. Uh, one word, not two. Caring. Caring. Yes. Okay. Uh, morning routine or practice that keeps you grounded.

Scrambled eggs every morning. Very good.

A book or a quote that changed your life?

A book or a quote? Let's come back to that one. Oh, actually, the quote, I'll give you the quote because it's the famous one. It's Teddy Roosevelt's quote, "The credit goes to the man in the arena." Yeah. Which, yes. And I say that because I, in my college years, wrote to NASA to be for the astronaut application, which they sent me. This is the age before the internet, by the way. And I never sent that application in. And I— and in the years after that, I started regretting it until I heard at age 50, driving back, driving home from NSA one evening, heard on NPR NASA's taking, uh, astronaut applications again. Wow. So I applied at age 50, got rejected. I still have my rejection letter, which I— which is a prized possession. But that was a where I got a chance at redemption by erasing a mistake of not submitting the application.

Thank you so much for sharing that. Man of the Arena is really— actually, it was a full speech, but people remember the Man of the Arena portion of it. Actually, I'm going to link it to the podcast at the end, but thank you. Okay, the last one is who inspired you the most today?

Oh, I think my parents did. Very good.

Okay, what do you want to do or be when you were a kid?

Uh, when I was a kid, I wanted to be an aerospace engineer.

Well, you're still in the space industry, so that's good. 3 adjectives describing you as a child. What? Oh, 3 adjectives describing you as a child.

Oh, uh, smart, uh, semi-athletic.

Okay.

One more. And good hand-eye coordination. That's a bunch of words. Very good.

What about as an adult?

Smart, patient, and strategic thinker.

Definitely strategic thinker. All right, this is it. The very, very last question is, what is one word that represents our shared experience on this podcast today?

In one word, introspective, which I appreciate.

Yeah, you finally use one answer only. Fantastic. For me, I am just grateful, sir. Thank you so much for making the time. I think I pinged you maybe 2 or 3 weeks ago, and here you are, and really being one of our master teachers today. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I really do appreciate your time, your expertise, and wisdom. And I'm definitely looking forward to your book next year because we read a lot on this podcast.

Thank you, sir. And Bizzy, thanks for reaching out, and I appreciate what you do with the podcast. I actually think this is an important series.

Thank you so much. Right. All right, folks, you've got it. That was John Keefe. So again, I want everybody to please follow him on LinkedIn. Again, the link is going to be in the notes for the show, but here it is on the screen, right? John-Keefe-570A63285. And I'm pretty sure John is going to change that. All right. And then I want to remind you guys tomorrow— actually today, I'm going to be back this afternoon. 5:30 PM California time to talk with Coach Bobby Umar. He's a global voice of art-based leadership. We're gonna be talking about leading with art. And Bobby does something pretty special. He helps people get on TEDx, right? He's been a 5-time TEDx speaker. So if you have plans to get on TEDx, Bobby might be the person you need to help you do that. So we're gonna be talking to him today, 5:30 PM California time. And then tomorrow morning, I'm gonna be talking with Coach Astrid Meyer. Like me, she's a Maxwell Leadership Certified Coach. She's a founder, executive coach. I'm gonna be talking about leading with values. She's coming to us from Switzerland. So she speaks French, English, and German, I believe. So that's gonna be tomorrow. And then on Wednesday, it took me forever, but I finally got my mentor to say yes. He's going to be here, the one and only, the legendary General David H. Peeters. He's gonna be right here. On Wednesday morning. You don't want to miss this legendary strategist, 4-star soldier, scholar, New York Times bestselling author, right? The book is Conflict, and we're going to be talking about leading at the highest level. You absolutely want to be here for Wednesday. So that's going to be my Thanksgiving gift to all of you guys. So until tomorrow, this is Bob Fabien Zinga, and thank you so much for being on the show. See you tomorrow.

Thank you for tuning in to the Leadership and Success Podcast with your host, Coach BZ. If today's episode added value to your leadership journey, be sure to subscribe, share, and join us again for more wisdom nuggets on how to lead better and achieve greater success. Remember, leadership is the most critical skill of our time. The world will always need leaders to inspire others, drive innovation, and execute meaningful strategy. So why not count yourself among the bold leaders shaping 21st century. Until next time, stay inspired, stay committed, and keep leading with excellence.