In this Business Blast Podcast episode, host Tyler Wagner interviews retired college professor turned novelist and public speaker Herb Sennett. Sennett shares a vivid Vietnam War ambush story that illustrates the importance of trusting one’s training, then discusses the value of mastering a niche expertise through his daughter’s experience building a probate practice. He offers business advice centered on identifying strengths, setting clear goals, and measuring progress. When asked about advice to his younger self, he emphasizes observing and fitting into one’s environment before innovating. Sennett defines happiness as a conscious mindset choice, independent of external circumstances. He recounts the impact of Horatio Alger’s "Andy Grant’s Book" on his philosophy of honesty and kindness, and shares a favorite maternal quote about pursuing one’s dreams despite naysayers. The episode concludes with Sennett’s online platforms—terbsennett.com, authorherdsenate.net, and lovinglifefully.com—where listeners can follow his work.
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Welcome to the Business Blast Podcast. I'm your host, Tyler Wagner. This episode is brought to you by Authors Unite. Authors Unite provides you with all the resources you need to become a successful author. You can learn more about Authors Unite and join the free community at authorsunite.com. Now let's jump into the episode. All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Herb Sennett with us. He is a retired college professor who is now a novelist and public speaker. So welcome to the show, Herb.
Thank you.
Of course, man, thanks for joining us. Uh, we'll dive into the first one. The first question I have for you today is, what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?
French. Okay. I think I was an infantry second lieutenant in Vietnam during the Vietnam War in 1969. I was crossing a very small footbridge when the unit that I was with, and I was an advisor to the South Vietnamese, National Guard. They called them regional forces. But anyway, I was an advisor and I was crossing this bridge, going over one at a time. And as I got in the middle of the bridge, bam, we got ambushed. Bullets were coming from everywhere. And my training back at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, had been drilled into me, said, uh, 'Always stay with the commanding officer whom you are an advisor to. Always stay next to him no matter what's going on. Stay with that man. It'll be the safest spot for you.' Well, he was behind me and hadn't got on the bridge yet, so instead of running forward, I turned around and ran backwards. That is, back to where he was. Well, oddly enough, the bullets were flying in front of me. I could tell from how they were hitting the little bridge and they were firing at me. I did just the opposite of what they expected me to do, and I was told that would probably happen. So I got back, hit the ground, we did what we needed to do and unfortunately didn't catch the ambushers. They got away. But I learned a very valuable lesson from that. I had been trained well, and what I did was I trusted my training and my experience and what those who taught me told me to do. I did it exactly the way I was trained. I'm here today to tell the story, which I think says a lot for Following your training, and I would say that would be good for anybody. Get the training you needed, then follow the trust the people who came before you. Trust them that they know what— if you find that they were wrong later, good, change. But as you're going, trust the people who trained you.
Yes. Wow, man, thank you for your service as well. That is an incredible story. The next one I have for you is, what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?
I don't care where it is, know exactly what your own expertise is. Get to know it. I have a wonderful little story. My daughter became a lawyer here recently, and she started as an intern with a law firm. The head lawyer took her under his wing, and he taught her a lot about probate and family planning. Excuse me, financial planning. Lawyers don't get into family planning. Anyway, and she got really good at it, but she kept telling me all this. She said, oh, can't wait to get into the law firm, branch out and do some other things. Stuff that's so boring. Well, guess what? She got hired. The attorney she was working with retired, and instead of taking over his— most of his clients, he pretty much had gotten rid of most of them as he started retiring. But she got hired by this big firm in town here, and They asked her, said, we want you to start and build a probate division of this law firm, and you know this material. So she, first day on the job, she came home and I said, well, how do you like it? She said, I love being the only one there who knows how to do it. I walked in and I was the expert. Beginning to value the fact that even though it wasn't something she really wanted to do, she's actually enjoying doing it now because she's the person in the office out of, I don't know, 10 or 12 lawyers, she's the one who knows probate, and they all know it, that they recognize her. So I say, you know, get to work at it, get good at whatever it is that you do, and then when you offer it to others, don't compromise. Always do it the way you've been trained and always go beyond your best. That's, that to me, that's what she's working on right now. She's decided she's going to branch out and train more in probate and financial planning so that she can be an even greater asset to this company. So whatever you're good at, study it, work at it.
And what is your best piece of overall business advice? And it might tie in, but I still wanted to ask that.
Of course. And once you know what you're good at, or once you know what you can do well, do it well, but also have goals. I found it fascinating that almost immediately after the first day on the job, my daughter realized I've got to learn a lot more so I can stay the expert.
Yes.
That's what she's setting her mind to do. And I would say that whatever— set your goals and then go for them. You're the one that can set the goal. Nobody can set your goals for you. You've got to set them and then set benchmarks and hit those benchmarks and go for it.
And if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?
Oh, pay attention to the people around you. Observe, learn, rely on them to help you to learn your job. Don't go out of your way to be different. It may be in the way you dress, but if there's a dress code, don't be different. Fit into your work environment and then do your best and add your creativity to the way things are done. And maybe eventually you'll become the multimillionaire that everybody else looks up to and do whatever you want.
And in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?
Happiness? You choose to be happy. I know a lot of people don't agree with that, but I've done a lot of research here recently on happiness and understanding what does it mean to be happy. It's all in your mind. Your attitude is key no matter what. And if your attitude is positive, upbeat, and happy, so I guess to say, then, you know, don't rely on other people to make you happy. You choose to be happy because people are going to disappoint you. But it's always within your power to be happy. You know, if you have emotional or mental issues, work on them. You know, get over it, work through it. But the other side of these issues is where you realize, wait a minute, I'm in control of my emotions, I'm in control of my attitude, I can be the way I want and just choose to be positive and upbeat and happy.
And what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?
Oh my gosh. When I was 10 years old, my dad gave me a book to read. He said he read it when he was a boy and found it inspiring. So he gave me his copy and he still, he still had it. It had been published around 1925. But that book so affected me that I knew someday I could be like the boy in the story. The title of the book is called Andy Grant's Book. It was written by Horatio Alger, who wrote a lot of books just like that. But from that book, I learned that it's always best to be honest and kind to other people, no And that's been my philosophy. And I ended up, before I retired, being considered one of the most popular teachers on campus where I was teaching. And I thought that was, you know, that's the best you can do. If the students liked you, they didn't always like the grade they got, but they realized they earned the grade they got. I didn't give them the grade. They got the grade they worked for. And when you don't work very hard at something, oftentimes the grade you get is not quite what you dreamed you were getting. But when you're honest with yourself, you realize, well, that's what I deserve. That book just helped me realize, just be kind to people. Be nice to people and don't cause problems for other people.
And what is your favorite quote and why?
My mother told me one time, Herb, you can do whatever you set your mind to do. I love it.
Yeah, dude.
And you know, don't let other people talk you out of it. If it's your dream, pursue it. And whatever success I may have achieved, I give credit to the greatest woman I ever knew. And, you know, and I've missed her since she passed away back in 1988. But I'm going to tell you what, she was a huge influence on my life and continues to be to this day. And I am what I am today because I followed her advice and I went after my dreams. Even when I had lots of people tell me, As a high school senior, I had a guidance counselor said, Herb, don't think about going to college. Maybe you ought to join the Navy and earn a career. Which, by the way, I ended up joining the Army, became an officer, and retired as a lieutenant colonel. You know, they don't make officers after— that's the top 5% or something like that. Did you I mean, you have to be highly educated. I ended up with two doctoral degrees eventually. I wish that lady had not died. I would love to have gone back and told her, I said, well, your advice wasn't very good. But you just don't let people, don't let other people stop you. Go for it no matter what. They're the ones that are going to be disappointed. But Who matters? What matters? It doesn't matter to me what other people think. I know what I want in life and I go after it.
Yes, man, I love it. Dude, thank you so much for coming on. Very inspiring episode. The last question I have for you before we let you go is where is the best place for people to find you online?
Two places. www.terbsennett.com. That's A-T-E-R-B-S-E-N-N-E-T-T. .com, or you can go to authorherdsenate.com— excuse me, authorherdsenate.net. And my special website is lovinglifefully.com. So you can catch me any of those 3 places.
Amazing, man. Thank you again for joining us. We appreciate it.
Love it. Thank you, Tyler Wagner.
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