77: How to Navigate Through a Crisis: Leadership for a turbulent time with special guest Rear Admiral (ret.) Timothy Sullivan

In a time of crisis, many look to our leaders for both guidance and inspiration. In the turbulence of the current COVID 19 crisis, it helps to tap into the minds of former leaders, people who managed or commanded during an event of significance. Today's guest is one of Those leaders, retired U.S. coast Guard Admiral Tim Sullivan. He is humble. He calls himself a simple sailor. But you will hear that Tim Sullivan is anything but. With over 36 years serving in the US he retired as a rear admiral who served as the Deputy Commander of the Pacific Area Coast Guard Defense Forces West. If there was an event making the news that happened before his retirement in 2011, Admiral Sullivan was likely a part of the response. From the TWA 800 explosion off the coast of Mauritius to Hurricane Katrina, Sullivan's work in response and recovery is profound. But he doesn't stay there. He in the past, Tim Sullivan has masterfully bridged leadership and military command from a time before most of us had digital technology in our hands. I spoke with him from his temporary home on a satellite hookup after he was displaced by the Woolsey wildfires that burned in California in 2018. And even through the strained lines of communications, Admiral Sullivan's value system as a leader comes through loud and clear. On my episode last week torp the commander of the USS Roosevelt between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea, I discussed the choices US Navy Captain Brett Crozier faced when he broke the chain of command to report on his virus stricken aircraft carrier. Since last week's recording of the episode, a sailor died of Coronis related complications. Yes, I asked. I wanted to know what a former commanding officer of a Coast Guard cutter responsible for a crew thought about the Navy's response. I also wanted hear what he thought about Captain Crozier's response, his thoughts. Take a listen. Admiral Tim Sullivan, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me about a topic that is pretty close to the surface and in light of recent events, and that is leadership, but also military leadership and crisis management in a time of the pandemic. So thank you for speaking with me today.

Good morning Molly. It's great to be with you and.

You are joining me from the Los Angeles area in California. And you have already dealt with a number of personal crises that is affecting your day to day as you run up into the pandemic, correct?

Yes. It's interesting being kind of on the other side of many disasters that I've had a chance to deal with in my past as a Coast Guard officer and working for the Department of Homeland Security. And we're, of course, all going through the disaster of COVID 19. And in between there, I've also been affected by the wildfires out here. So it's been interesting to be on the other side of the crisis curve, if you will.

Yeah. So you can experience, you can experience it from, from both sides, you know, as a civilian and also as an officer. So you, you reached high up the chain of command in your service with the U.S. coast Guard. Where you and I intersected is when you were in Boston. You were the commander of the first District outside of Boston. So that is Maine to New York, correct?

That's correct.

And you have dealt with a lot of experiences, a lot of crises that happen. The Coast Guard gets in a number of them, of course, because so many of them happen on the water. But since they are a part of the Department of Homeland Security, you're also involved in the big events, you know, from Hurricane Katrina to TWA 800. So, Admiral Sullivan, is there anything that you see in your experience now as a retired admiral in this Covid environment that hearkens to the past for you?

Molly? That's a great question. I've spent 36 years with the US Coast Guard, got out in 2011, have since then started my own small business where I had been on the government or if you want to think about it, nonprofit side for a bunch of years. Since then, I have been able to stay in the same business for the most part since I've got out of the Coast Guard. As you're well aware of, I teach emergency management and homeland security along with crisis communications for ucla. I have a chance to do the same thing for Department of Defense and Department of State through their anti Terrorism assistance programs. So it's been, I've had a chance if you spend that much time within the government and within the U.S. coast Guard. And then I was also had a chance to work directly for the first two secretaries of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge and Mike Chertoff, on their personal staffs at Startup. So, yeah, you get an opportunity to deal with a lot of different crises, both internally and externally. And I've had some good lessons learned that I've been able to both use myself and pass along since then.

Now, an event that happened that's adjacent to the coronavirus crisis is what happened on the USS Theodore Roosevelt when the CEO, Captain Brett Crozier, was relieved of command after he wrote a letter breaching the chain of command about the situation, the dire situation on the Roosevelt. Now, since then, at the time of this Recording. It turns out that one of the crew members has died. And we all know what happened when the acting Secretary of the Navy called out Crozier for being stupid and naive for how he led. Admiral Sullivan, give me your impressions when the news story first broke. And now, in light of a crew member passing away, what are your thoughts about that chain of command leadership? And has anything changed since you were in command with the US Coast Guard?

Well, Molly, first of all, we have to get it straightened out. I still go by Tim Sullivan. Admiral Sullivan was a great job in the past, but going back, I've had a chance, fortunately, to command a number of ships, to command a lot of different shore units. So I certainly have not commanded an aircraft carrier. But I understand how the captain was very concerned about his crew. I've kind of been on that side of the coin, if you will. And he apparently didn't. Was not getting the right response from his bosses, from his chain of command. Having said that, of course, that I'm aware of, neither you, I, or probably most of our listening audience were there. We don't understand what his thought process was directly, how. How dire straits he was. But not only has he lost a crew member, which any of us would hate to lose, an employee, if you will, but a shipmate, a crewmate is probably the. The toughest. And he's had, my understanding, is 3 to 400 of his crew of 5,000, so more or less 10% get sick. So they had a very serious problem. I think the thing that has really changed since I sat in that proverbial seat is the. Is the communication structure. When I first started going to sea, of course, pre Internet is, everything was done by messages, electronic messages that would go out. There was a gap of time in between. Now that captain has got literally and figuratively instantaneous communications with pretty high up within his organization. And it probably causes us all to maybe think or pause a little bit more before any of us hit that send button on our communications. You know, did he. Did he talk to his enlisted supervisors? How, you know, what kind of medical information did he have? There's a lot of questions that I have, but as you've already pointed out, it was highly exacerbated by the reaction all the way at the top of his chain of command.

Now, Tim, part of your work that I've admired is your communication skill, because you were someone who I felt always led within the rules of the military, but you always had an eye on public opinion. You have a background in it, and you work in it. Now as does your wife, Teresa. So you're in that world. I have to ask you, when this story first broke, I assumed that you had to bifurcate it. Half of your brain was thinking like an operator, ship's operator, a district commander. But then I'm wondering, as a communicator, did you think because that we were in the age of the Internet and social media and instantaneous reporting between a crew member and his mother back home, that the outcome was going to be a lot different had this happened 20 years ago on the carrier?

Yeah, I think, Molly, to answer your question, yeah, I think it would have been different. But again, on, on both sides here, that that ability to pause probably on both sides and think about putting yourself in that person's situation, you know, knowing exactly who you're dealing with and what you're dealing with. And of course, the other part that I've had a chance to experience working at the highest levels within our government as a principal federal official for the Department of Homeland Security, in other words, is we are working in a very politicized climate right now. And did that, did both sides realize that? Did the captain realize that when the Secretary of the Navy went on board, did he not think that individual crew members would be not only recording him, but willing to pass along that information? And in the past, Molly, you wouldn't have crew members that would either have that capability or feel like they could do that, were empowered to do that. And that's one of the other things I think that has is hurt, if you will, both sides.

I couldn't agree with you more. I was watching an interview on CBS this morning with four star general Stanley McChrystal, and they were asking him about leadership, as you mentioned, in this highly politicized environment. And one of his first answers was taking a lesson in history. So he cited examples from the Civil War and the New Deal with Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor. But are you recognizing now that it's a lot different leading in an environment like a post corona virus as a leader, especially in a leader during a time of crisis is going to be a lot different? We're going to have to have one foot in the past, but certainly one foot in the present with technology and just the different way that we disseminate communication. Would you agree, Molly?

I would completely agree with that. I've had a chance to actually go to some training and go to school with Stan McChrystal, and I appreciate the work that he's done. And I also like his bent towards the Historical part of it. Because as much as we'd like to think we're all dealing with this the first time, and that might be true in our lives. Big crises have happened in the past. What can we learn from them? When you look at a kind of a post corona sort of crisis communications right now, we have to find, I think, a happy medium between bending everything towards what is obviously a very silent, deadly killer, but at the same time keeping that in context with what's going on in the rest of the world. Is your organization, for instance, really ready for the next Covid? Because let's take, you know, not to be a Nancy negative here, but let's take. I'm living out in California right now. Could California endure, as we've seen, for instance, tornadoes over the Easter weekend? Could California endure a very large earthquake here at the same time or the next fire season? That is definitely on its way. There's some things that as both emergency management professionals and crisis communications people, I can guarantee you, I can guarantee you that there will be another crisis between now and the end of the summer, certainly, just naturally, if anything else, hurricane season is coming, tornadoes are coming. I can't predict an earthquake, obviously, none of us can. But are you ready for that as a, as an individual? Are you not only keeping one foot in the past, as we talk about in the historical side, but are you ready for the next one that's coming along?

Absolutely. So, you know, just. I know from your experience that you always knew, especially in the Coast Guard, that something was around the bend, something was on the horizon that you always needed to be prepared for. And of course, the motto of the Coast Guard, Semper Piratis, you know, always ready, which is what you are. Now. Let me ask you, in terms of your framework for a crisis, what about your relationship with the employees or the crew members, you know, someone, your internal stakeholders? What do you have to say about, you know, empowering them or working with them?

Well, that's certainly one of the things, Molly, that's changed, as we mentioned on the aircraft carrier, and of course, it's a very large crew there that unfortunately that captain does not know every member of the crew. Many of us could be working for large organizations, but when you're looking at any crisis is understanding what the communication scheme is within your organization. And then as your training and timeframe and as your organization allows, how can you empower those employees? You and I and everybody else like to think they're the best crisis communications managers, but when something happens, when something goes bump in the middle of the night, we're not likely to be the first one to pick up the phone. A secretary, a watch stander, somebody is going to pick up that phone at the proverbial deck plate level. And how well are they prepared to do their job? Can you trust them? Can you provide them your, you know, not only some technical and training background in communications, but they do, they in fact understand the policies and guidance of your organization? You know, that gate guard, that secretary is the one that's going to pick up the phone and make that first probably initial statement to, to a media source or possibly they're going to just do it on their own. They're going to, as you mentioned, they're going to mention it to a relative or a family member or somebody within another organization. And you've now lost control of your message.

You had mentioned off the cuff that I probably think this, then you would think this, that we're all great crisis managers, but I'm going to push back on you a little that I don't think that you led that way, nor do I lead that way. And I think the best crisis managers are the ones who don't know that they know everything and who are willing and understand that they need to pivot and they need to change because every crisis is different and that's certainly what you've done. Now also you mentioned. So we were talking about internal stakeholders, talk about your relationship with the press, the external stakeholders. You were very, very good about building relationships with them when you were working Coast Guard, you know, through different hurricanes or through a disaster with fema. Do you have any experience or any thoughts on working with the media?

Sure. First of all, let me just go back for a second and I completely agree with you as far as, you know, working with the media and also understanding your chain of command. What I intimated on being a good crisis leader is most of us, when whether we're voting for somebody or whether we are hiring a new individual or we see our bosses, we don't necessarily vote for them or hire for them as being emergency managers. Yeah, maybe we should, maybe we should think about, you know, he or she might be an excellent communicator, but how well are they going to do under pressure?

Oh, isn't that the truth? Have you found. Well, I already know the answer to this, but could you expound on this, like where you've noticed that there was a, a delineation or someone veers off the path from being a very good manager but to where they weren't Communicating it well where there was maybe a disparate skill set at play during a crisis.

I absolutely can Molly, and then I'll get back to your point. On the, on the working with the media. Good, good leaders that I saw two that I can think of off the top of my head during Hurricane Katrina. My part during Hurricane Katrina was in support of Secretary Mike Chertoff. So I spent time with President Bush. I spent time with. I knew the department very, very well at that point, having been there since the startup and to walk or to watch the then head of fema, Mike Brown, who might have been a pretty good leader in his business world but quite frankly was, was not prepared to be the head of fema. And I saw the same thing when we first traveled down to Louisiana with the secretary and the then Vice president. We met the repeatedly with the governor of Louisiana and she was, she was excellent. She was, she was very good. But she did not understand crisis management and what her roles were. For instance her on the first couple days, her first thought process was to take three days off for time for prayer. And I'm a Christian but this was a time that action was necessary. Time where people were literally dying in the streets. And God helps those who help themselves, if you will. Going back to the media for a second is understanding the media, knowing who you're dealing with. You know, in the business that you may be in, whether it's a non profit or for profit, you probably have a, a normal group of either social media or, or I would call it traditional media type folks that you deal with that are specialized in, in your world of work. Do you really understand them and can you help them on a day to day basis? I, I used to call it kind of putting some chips in the bank. People are human. If you can help that person out in their job on a routine things or take them to your company or I used to take people either on a flight or on a Coast Guard cutter as their time would provide you. They're going to still write the story up but they're going to better understand what you and your company and your business does. For instance, when I was dealing with of a 747 that fell out of the sky, TWA Flight 800. The first people that I had that morning of course when I was the on scene commander that as it turns out was going to be weeks on time was there was 40 different media boats that showed up. This is right off Manhattan. And I was able to very quickly discern that I could not do My operational job, commanding 40 other units besides those 40 media and still get the job done. So I picked up the phone, talked to the Pentagon correspondent for cnn, a guy by the name of Wolf, Wolf Blitzer at the time, and said, wolf, you got to help me, along with a great public affairs officer, by the way, up and up in district in D1 that you know very well that we set up a media pool very quickly and that was able to take a lot of pressure off our organization. We filed for them on a daily basis, gave them full access. But the idea of knowing what the media needs and wants and that you can actually pick up the phone and ask for help really changed things. So do you have that good rapport with the media folks? Do you know when you're on and off the record? Do you know when you can understand what their business is and vice versa?

Now, you mentioned TWA 800, which seems like a lifetime ago. It was 1996. And then we have Hurricane Katrina, which was in 2005. And incidentally, when I do workshops or if I speak and I mention Hurricane Katrina, I'm finding now there are people in the room that really don't connect with it and they don't remember what happened. But you were intimately involved in both of those cases. And now here we are in 2020. You're not actively working as an admiral or district commander, but I know that you're still involved and you understand what's happening there. Tim, give me your thoughts on media relations from being in the trenches yourself in a number of cases compared to now, what you see. If you were a leader, is there any advice that would stay the same from TW800 to now or anything that's changed in your opinion?

Well, it's a great question and certainly, certainly things in all of our lives have changed. And most of it goes back to our previous discussion on the, on the ubiquity of communications and the speed of this, of those same communications. But there's a, there's a couple tried and true things that I think that would really help. I was actually emailing back and forth with Mike Chertoff on this the other day. I was his principal federal official for the last pandemic for region 10, FEMA region 10 with H1N1. And we were discussing how, how things have changed. You know, if you had liaisons, if you will, that were from the federal government that were working on a day to day basis with those FEMA regions, with those other emergency management directors, could things have been better? Would they Be better. I think the other thing that really hasn't changed too much is being a professional yourself, really, really, really knowing your business line, be able to speak to it intimately and then quite frankly having a pretty good background in understanding emergency management, you don't have to be an ICS guru, but understanding how your company or organization fits into the local, state and federal level and what part crisis communication plays within that. I was able to link in a large emergency management medical company the other day back into some of my contacts still within female and provide that link if you will, between them having product and being able to help out emergency management people on the street. Every EMT gets their, all their things from this particular company back into fema. And I think again, if you are going back and understanding how that system works again, whether you're in the private or public sector, it really, really pays off. And the last thing I would tell your, your listeners about this and it seems so very obviously is telling the truth. It's, you know, it sounds so obvious and it might even be some initial pain, but it's much better than the alternative which is having to continue back out. And we see that in the media quite a bit is understanding what, what that truth is. And it's truth. Of course at that time and place the truth does change. Things do change. But telling the truth, understanding and you have to get buy in from your organization to be able to do that is hey, being very forthright and helping both the media and helping your listeners understand how important that is.

Now speaking of the truth and information coming to light, I can't let this go without asking that. You were on the phone with Michael Chertoff. He was a former US Secretary of Homeland Security. Can you say any part of that conversation and his thoughts on COVID 19 or the management of it or any of his leadership ideas as it relates to how leadership is handling it now?

Well, in fairness to the secretary and Mike and I have a good personal relationship, I've had a chance to work for him since I got out and we've kept up. Personally, I would just say that in fact going back to some of the same thought process that you and I were just discussing is what we were discussing, Molly, is what, what can we learn from the past, not only from different administrations, but you know, tried and true ways of both communicating and coordinating emergencies like this. Because like I said, this is a big one. This is one that we'll all remember certainly in our lifetimes, but is one that continues to, we should still all continue to go back, kind of recheck ourselves, our understanding of emergency management, who does what, and being able to honestly characterize that when we discuss that with not only our friends, but certainly with the media.

In this particular case, Tim, you had mentioned ics, which is the incident command system. So people in the military, people who work in emergency management, will understand that structure and how people operate during an incident. If you could generalize crisis management at the general level, the nonprofit level, for the people who don't have ICS training, what kind of leadership advice could you impart onto a business owner or someone in the corporate world from your work in emergency management?

So you've just kind of highlighted what a couple of different projects that I've been working with with a couple of organizations, some very large medical organizations, as it turns out, that I've had a chance to assist. And I'm working actually with a, a local town close by where they have a pretty good sized dam and we are writing an emergency management plan for that. And the, the, the junction between emergency management and leadership is, is a good one. Most of us, fortunately, even at a small business, don't have to think about it. But one of the things I would encourage your listeners and others to do is be thinking about that and actually get smarter on it. Whether it's through an extension course at your local school, whether it's taking FEMA courses online, Understanding emergency management. And we all think it's never going to happen to us until, you know, we all read, unfortunately, about school shootings that could happen to your son or daughter. Understanding who does what, what part are you, you know, are you as an organization, even a small business, are you prepared to do that? And then whether you're, whether you're working with consultants like me, or quite frankly, you can go online through FEMA and get a lot of good informations that. Do you have a plan we talked about? I was affected by the wildfire here over a year ago for my house. I actually had, and I don't want to sound too much like a geek, but we had a fire and emergency plan for our house. And in that crisis situation, when I realized I'm going to have to leave here within an hour, I actually went down my checklist and was able to accomplish some things that I know would not have happened. Can you do the same thing for your organization? Can you do it for your family? Do you have a good plan for when you're separated due to that storm or due to that earthquake or due to the next pandemic? So I think it behooves us all to do that basic preparation to understand and then understand probably yourself obviously well enough that I don't necessarily have to be the leader of it. But you know, can I do we have a plan? Can we pick that off the shelf? Can I just follow the plan and help my family, help my organization out to do the right things at the right time?

Tim, that's outstanding advice for anyone who does not have decades of experience in the military or emergency management. Even if you don't have, it doesn't mean that you can't think and live and operate with that mindset because the resources are certainly there. And we saw from the news accounts with the wildfires out in California and what had happened and so many people were left unprepared and left without a home and left fighting for their lives really, that if anyone just takes a little bit of time to murder, to plan around their own life circumstances and then by extension their business or whatever they do, it could make crisis planning and management probably go a little bit more smoothly with just a little bit of planning.

Yeah, I completely agree with you, Molly. I think what most people forget is whether it says us as individuals or for that organization is kind of the American ethic is you really need to be able to stand on your own two feet for that first 24, 48, 96 hours, whatever it might be. It kind of gets us to avoid the toilet tissue crisis that we are apparently all going through is are we prepared as individuals, are we prepared as parents, Are we prepared in small businesses or non profits? Not, not necessarily for, you know, that huge cataclysms. But can we take care of ourselves? Do we have the basics? You know, whether that's in knowledge or equipment or in ppe? Do you have that basic wherewithal to be thinking that way? And I think one of the things that's going to come out from a pandemic is people are going to start thinking about that crisis management, that leadership spot again, whether you're a parent or whether you're running a business, maybe much more than we have in the past.

Tim, I'm so happy that you spoke with me today because you quite brilliantly were able to bridge this high level thinking and operations from your experience, but you were able to distill it down to a very basic level that any for anyone who can understand now, if someone did want to tap into your experience experience, what are the services that you offer for clients?

Well, like I said is I'm actually running my own business called Cutterman llc. I work with your organization or with very large organizations, either as a consultant or as part of your group to better understand both what they're, you know, not only what their crisis management plan is or isn't. I've been just amazed in the last 10 years since I got out as to even companies that do this for a business, how they are not very well prepared themselves. So whether it's me or again someone else going back doing this on their own, there are resources out there where people can tap into both their own knowledge by getting smarter, if you will. The course that I teach at UCLA is available online. Most of my students are from around the world and around the country, relatively inexpensive and yet by the end of it you've actually your final project is you have a pretty good outline for an emergency management plan for your organization. And I know that there's plenty of other places that provide those same services.

Tim, thank you so much for sharing your experience, your sea stories, your war stories with the listeners. I will include all of your contact information in the show notes. I can say with certainty that it's leadership like yours that is heavy on communications, heavy on common sense, but also tapping in to the knowledge from the past and our history can get through any major crisis. So I want to thank you for taking your time to speak with me and share your wisdom to my listeners.

Thanks Molly. It was my honor, my pleasure to continue to work with you. We will get through this. We will, we will carry on. People just have to continue to move forward, keep thinking, stay a step ahead. And again, think not only what am I planning for today, but what's coming around the bend.

And as always, Semper Paradis always ready. I want to thank Tim Sullivan for speaking with me on the podcast today about leadership response in a time of crisis, preparing for the next big one, putting your chips in the bank with employees in the press, knowing the crisis acumen of adjacent stakeholders and finally telling the truth. It's better than the alternative. For more information on Tim Sullivan's current work in emergency management, strategic and operations consulting, communications and business development, and maritime and port safety and of course, emergency management. I have links provided in the show notes. That's all for this week. Thank you so much for listening. If you're in the business of response, if you are responsible for the response efforts of a small to local sized business or organization or cooperative, I urge you to head over to my website mollymcpherson.com and check out the response kit. Also responsekit.org will have resources that you need at your fingertips to help you in the response phase of COVID 19 and any crisis beyond. We'll speak to you again next week. Bye for now.

Sa.