ChoinqueCast

In this episode, host Jim Emerick sits down with Brooke Brittain, Athletic Coordinator & Head Basketball Coach at Mansfield High School. Brooke shares her remarkable journey from serving as a military police officer during the Iraq War at just 20 years old to becoming a successful head basketball coach and athletic coordinator in Texas. The conversation explores leadership, resilience, optimism, grief, personal growth, and the lessons Brooke learned from both military service and coaching. Join us as we discuss the hidden costs of leadership, the power of relentless optimism, and why great leaders must learn what weight to carry and what weight to set down.Brooke Brittain is a retired Army Reserve leader, combat veteran, and author of Between Grief and Grit. Alongside a 20-year military career that included multiple deployments to the Middle East, she built a successful career in education and coaching. Today, she serves as the Head Girls Basketball Coach and Athletic Coordinator at Mansfield High School in Texas. Brooke is also pursuing her doctorate and is passionate about leadership development, resilience, and helping others navigate adversity with purpose and optimism.Expect to Learn:Why Brooke believes relentless optimism is a leadership and combat skill, not a soft skill.How military service shaped her approach to leadership, resilience, and personal growth.The hidden emotional costs leaders carry and how to recognize when it's time to let go.The Four Ss framework for maintaining physical, mental, and emotional well-being.Why coaching should be viewed as a gift for growth rather than a form of criticism.Episode Breakdown with Timestamps:[00:00] – Teaser[01:21] – Welcome & Introduction of Brooke Brittain[05:45] – The power of optimism and “relentless optimism”[11:27] – Dr. Martin Seligman and Army’s Master Resilience Training – optimism as combat skill[15:59] – Combat example: losing a soldier in 2009 and picking up false responsibility[20:52] – Transition to coaching while serving in the military; deployments as a coach[26:47] – Coaching vs. evaluation – coaching as a gift, not criticism[31:52] – Balancing multiple pursuits: General John Heffley. “teeter‑totter” not balance[34:00] – Closing and book promotion🔗 Connect with the Guest, Brooke Brittain :👉 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brooke-brittain-943a131a7/👉 Between Grief and Grit Book: https://betweengriefandgrit.com/🔗 Connect with the Host, Jim Emerick:👉 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimemerick/🔗 More from Choinque:👉 Website: https://www.choinque.com/blog👉 Facebook: https://facebook.com/918903204639744👉 Instagram: https://instagram.com/choinquecast👉 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@choinque👉 X: https://x.com/choinque👉 Email: iamgood@choinque.com🔗 More about Leadership Courses: 👉 Schedule: https://www.academyleadership.com/Emerick/🔗 Follow the Podcasts:👉 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/choinquecast/id1290927745👉 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/56oY3glVaoTXmmcWWGQGry?si=69f1cd525a5d4be5👉 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAA4czS4aI7V5g3i2Sd4bUQ

One of the attendees at our most recent Academy Leadership Excellence Courses hosted at the USAF Academy shared a realization both on the first day to our group of eleven, and afterward during our one-on-one follow-on executive coaching sessions. Here’s what happened. Much of the first day of a Leadership Excellence Course is focused on learning about ourselves, in particular, what energizes us so that we may energize and perhaps inspire others. This attendee shared his reflection that over the past six months his working environment had changed — from one energizing to someone who prefers an independent course of action — to a more compliance, rules-based day to day routine. In addition, he was increasingly left out of decision-making processes, which he has both an instinctive need for and was brought up believing people ought to include others when making choices. Keep in mind this attendee had been successfully working 2.5 years on a really cool project. Attending the course providing time to think, share his story, and after the course share his findings as documented on his Action Plan, which was shared with his supervisor. That’s the best part of the story - finding the courage to share who one really is and what genuinely motivates us. Guess what happened? Hint: His new supervisor is a good leader. After reassignment to a new project, and to a new sponsor, which his company generously accommodated, he was introduced as a new member of the leadership team on the first day. A direct quote from the attendee’s email: “This is unique in that project managers are usually not included that way with senior leaders' direct reporting groups. In our first leadership team meeting, he must have asked me 10 times what my opinion was and what strategies I thought the team should consider. OK... I am SO happy. You already know how E2L [this type of sharing works], but I thought you would appreciate the recent, specific example.” What’s may we take away from this story? When we take the time to honestly assess ourselves, and create an environment where others may do the same, we can create a very motivational environment. Not surprisingly, here’s the closing part of his email: “Next steps for me... I go to corporate headquarters next week. I will be doing planning sessions and team building exercises with my new leadership team. And, I will get to meet my future project team members. My plan is to share my leadership philosophy with the leadership team. In addition, I will meet with each of my new management peers and fill out the Motivation Assessment form. The idea is that I want to improve my relationships with peers better than in the past. I do well with my reports and further up the org chart - but my detractors are typically peer managers at my level. We will be doing a major organization change effort over the next year, so I want to develop really strong and positive relationships with the other managers this time around.” Think about that. This isn’t about pay raises or foosball tables in the break room. It’s about learning what makes other’s tick. How well do you really know yourself? Can you recall the last time you finished a work day more energized than when you started? What happened that particular day? More importantly, do you know your team members that well? Can’t wait for the next coaching session to learn what happens next. Great leaders create an energizing environment.

At a recent Leadership Excellence Course hosted at the United States Air Force Academy, one of the attendees both had and shared a significant realization and growth experience. With Roger’s permission, it’s worth sharing with you: Team, I was going to share the following with you tomorrow at our all hands. Unfortunately, that schedule did not hold up. Given that all of us have so many things going on right now, I could not find a time when I thought we could get together as a team before most of you deploy out to Montana, or South Dakota. While communicating with you in this regard is not ideal, and definitely is not what I had hoped to do, I felt it was necessary to at least get this too you with some brief explanation. Recently, I had the privilege of participating in a truly extraordinary learning experience. During this time, I was provided an opportunity, and the tools to evaluate what my personal leadership philosophy was. It was a very tough, introspective journey that directed me in a very transformative way. This experience forced me to deal with quite a number of things, some of what I am not particularly proud of, and others for which I am. This experience forced me to consider, and reconsider what my relationship is with each of you. It also gave me an opportunity to realize how much I appreciate each of you. I have attached this leadership philosophy for your review. Please know that I mean every word of it, and will purpose to live up to it as best that I am able. This is in essence my contract with you. If you have If you have any comments, questions, or concerns, please do not hesitate to stop by. Always your advocate Roger Let’s listen to the first paragraph of Roger’s Personal Leadership Philosophy: Being a leader is a privilege. Being a leader is an act of service. Leadership carries with it a responsibility to share a vision, to direct a course of action, and to inspire a desire to succeed. Leadership is passionate. Leadership is about creating a future that is inviting, that seeks to tease out the best in all members of the team and provides security in the knowledge of a job well done. Leadership is a partnership between the leader, and the led. If the partnership does not exist, then all you really have is second rate management. What do you think about the last two sentences? Roger is essentially sharing that if a partnership doesn’t exist, all we have is management. It’s one of the best descriptions distinguishing between management and leadership, and Roger composed and shared this despite the fact he plans to retire within six months. After the course, I requested a meeting between myself, Roger and his supervisor. Something tells me inside that although Roger may formally retire from a full-time job, his desire to positively influence and serve others seems intact. Let’ think about that. Great leaders continuously grow.

At an in-house Leadership Excellence Course last week multiple attendees realized, that from their position in the corporate hierarchy, the mission of the company was not as clear as it should be. This affects the teams they are responsible for, and may be addressed in multiple ways, which were discussed in several of our nine leadership workshops. Here are three examples. First, the corporate mission may be included or referenced in their Personal Leadership Philosophy, for both possible introduction and reinforcement. Second, during the Aligning and Accomplishing Goals workshop, multiple attendees observed that a lack of knowledge of broader corporate goals could lead to misalignment when establishing SMART (specific, measurable, agreed-upon, realistic, trackable) goals with subordinates. We discussed this common situation within organizations is how silos form, or independent groups working either unaware and/or disconnected from the direction of the overall enterprise. The third example was during our last workshop, Coaching to Develop People. After distinguishing coaching from appreciation and evaluation, the other two forms of feedback, we narrowed our workshop focus specifically on performance coaching, and noticed how this type of coaching is similar to what competitive athletes do. Coaching without a prior, agreed upon set of goals is rarely effective. It stands to reason that if our prior developed goals, as well as our subordinate’s goals are not aligned with the overall organization, than our coaching may lead our team in the wrong direction. Jim Collins emphasizes the same, and it’s worth visiting his web site and the emphasis on alignment. In our Core Values Alignment workshop, one of our more advanced workshops, we bring to attention that most businesses treat development of central tenets such as core values administratively, or focused on grammar and creating visually appealing posters, rather than the more demanding leadership challenge of aligning derivative activities, such as the mission and goals throughout the organization. Without peeking at any documents, or going on-line, how well can you describe the mission and goals of your organization, or declared corporate values? More importantly, how well can your subordinates, and can they share with anyone the connection between what they do every day, and how that helps the organization move toward unified goals? Great Leaders Create Alignment.

Our Academy Leadership group, a terrific team of former military officers who are also senior civilian executives, often share our stories. With his permission, I would like to read to you an email from Kevin Derbin, 1979 Naval Academy Graduate. It’s a powerful coaching story from Kevin and his wife Pam. Their words. Their story: I wanted to share a very personal story about the power of our Personal Leadership Philosophy. I hope you get a quick chance to read this and appreciate your busy schedules. In January, Pam’s division of Humana was eliminated unexpectedly. As always, things happen for reasons whether we plan for it or not. As she began her search, it created a time of reflection and redefining purpose (as it has for many of us who are veterans of corporate America) while navigating the unknown. She worked with Humana for over 10 years as a Case and Team Manager in their Home Health business. We recently started her quilting business (which she is very gifted at and award winning) but just being christened, it’s not quite ready for sea yet so she began to fish the leadership opportunities in Nursing in the Louisville area. Her sights set on a similar position, she started casting. She received several calls of interest (and not) but recently spoke with a national home care company with 2 opportunities as a Case Manager and a Director of Operations. The recruiter told her that she was overqualified for the Manager role but referred her to the Executive recruiter as she felt Pam had the experience for that role. Pam was shocked, a bit nervous and doubted whether she was able to fill the expectations of that leadership role. Her first interview went well and made her realize that she did have the experience and ability to “move up”. We spent the next week working on her Personal Leadership Philosophy which she felt would be important for her not just during the interview process but to solidify her own confidence and be prepared to be effective in the role should she get it. During the next set of executive interviews, she proactively asked if she could share her Leadership Philosophy in response to a leading interview question which took the team by surprise as they had never heard of it. They loved it and were impressed that she even had one. The proportion of the discussion quickly shifted to leadership, values and examples of living those values. Pam received an invite to a final round of interviews, in person, with the team that she would be leading and her prospective supervisor (whom she had already met). During this session, Pam again shared her philosophy informally with the team. Not only were they appreciative but were taken back by its candor and heartfelt message. She was offered the position with Amedisys (not surprising to me), a promotion from her previous role, and has reenergized her sense of self, her capability and how important her Nursing profession is to her. She is excited for the position to start in May and looking forward to leading a team again. Two points. Had it not been for life throwing a curveball, she would not have proactively searched for a position of greater responsibility outside Humana. Pam attributes sharing her Leadership Philosophy as key lever in not only putting her own thoughts and values into perspective but the power of having one and sharing it during the interview process was invaluable not only for its authenticity but that she had placed so much emphasis on leadership and its importance in the role already. In retrospect, having a Personal Leadership Philosophy doesn’t necessarily guarantee admission but it’s clear that few have heard of one, have one or even think about articulating one. In the case of interviewing (that we get asked frequently about), it creates a conversation that turns focus toward an open discussion that most likely would not have occurred. More importantly, a conversation that the one being interviewed controls and becomes the driver. Better yet the leader. Side note – the quilting continues…and perhaps an opportunity at Amedisys for an E2L/PLP workshop and...! Respectfully, Kevin Kevin didn’t need to share this with our Academy Leadership team. It could demonstrate vulnerability, or perceived weakness. On the other hand, what types of people do we wish to follow? What is your leadership philosophy? Leaders Share Their Stories