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You speak to high school students, or you speak to people in the industry and they’ll say, “Hey, that was really interesting. You know, you’re a fighter pilot. But that seems so divorced — so different — from what I do on a daily basis, you know, like where do those overlap?” And so I say, “Oh man, there’s a million ways in which they overlap. Because there’s just these fundamental truths that seem to come out for success in life.” I’ve told a lot of people I’ve spoken with that I strongly believe that success can be generated. It’s something that you can kind of study your environment. You can determine what it will take to succeed. You can chart that course and you can get yourself to success. It’s not a passive endeavor. It’s a very active endeavor. And so whether it’s being a fighter pilot or anything else, figure out what those specific steps are for you and then pursue them relentlessly. Take every opportunity you can build your network, get that support you need and, and find that pathway to success. One of the things we looked at deliberately when selecting future TOPGUN instructors were, really, three things. We said, talent, passion, and personality. That’s what we were looking for. It will point you towards success regardless of your endeavor, regardless of your industry or what you’re doing at this moment in time. You had to be at least — of course — be average, if not, preferably above average because you needed to be credible.
People had to see you as someone that they could look up to that they would want to learn from as they move forward in their own career. You want to strive to be, as you’d say, the master of your craft. You want to create that talent — doing anything from an entertainer on TikTok or YouTube, all the way to someone in the medical profession or teaching in school. How do you take where you are today and then be better tomorrow? And once you’ve done that, continue to do the same thing the next day. That’s how you build that talent up.
You had to have passion because at TOPGUN you would, with most squadrons, you’re going to be working at least six days a week. You’re coming in on Saturdays. You’re at the squadron for 12, 14, sometimes 16 hours in a day, just to accomplish the mission, to do the flights, to do all the training involved with being a successful instructor.
It takes that perseverance — that grit, some people might say — where you, no matter the type of adversity you face, you stick with it. And we all have good days. And more importantly, you all have bad days. Well, how do you handle that adversity? What is it you’re going to do to kind of claw back from defeat, learn those lessons, and then propel yourself forward to even higher levels? If you’re waking up each day and you’re not really excited about what you’re doing, it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but maybe it points towards the fact you should find something you’d be more passionate or more excited to do as your profession. And then lastly is going to be the personality. So you could have all the talent in the world. You could have a lot of passion for what you do, but if you have a really bad personality, no one’s going to want to listen to you. So you have to be approachable. You have to be someone that others want to approach. They want to bring their questions to someone who stays calm under pressure. You don’t overreact to situations. A big part of success in life — a big part of success in your career — is being able to build these really diverse networks of people around you, who are supportive, who can help propel you to greater heights. And so the best way to build that network, the best way to be successful in building your teams is to have a great personality.
So you find these bedrock principles like talent, passion, and personality, and you distill them down to how they can relate to you and your particular circumstance in life today. And then you find that you put those into practice and then you just make it something that’s consistent, something that’s repeatable day after day. And like I mentioned earlier, you just want to make sure that no matter what you’re doing today, make tomorrow better than today. And then do the same thing the day after.