S3 E37: Chief J. Taylor Part 2 Innovative Leadership in Unexpected Places

And he comes there with all kinds of experience , because he retired from the Irving Fire Department in Texas and before that he might have been a professional actor , author , presenter . He was an NCAA Division I football referee for over 20 years . I'm telling you this guy has done it all .

He's empathetic , he understands the firefighter , he understands the needs of the firefighter , the fire service . Please listen and enjoy with that , chief Taylor . As always , today's podcast is sponsored by Fire Facilities . Makers of reliable all-American steel fire training structures built the way you train Fire facilities .

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We have empirical data that backs up every one of those points and I'm happy to discuss them with you at any point . And I said I also appreciate the fact that you took the time to speak your mind because you have that right , but I'm happy to share that data with you at any point .

And so actually , she and I have hit it off very well since then and we've had a lot of great conversations because of that . So you can't be a you can't be afraid of . Somebody has a differing perspective . Just be calm and relaxed and share your data and answer their questions and now , you don't mean today , in today's world , right ?

So if I'm doing my job right , I'm just like a good professor at a university . If I'm doing my job right at the end of the semester , you should not know where I fall or my beliefs are . I should share both sides . It should make you think about both sides . It should never , you should not be able to look at me and say this is where he stands .

If I'm doing that , I mean I'm not operating the right way . So I think that as a , as a chief , I can't . I can't impart that . I've got to be , I've got to be open . I have to be diverse and thought , I have to be receptive of anybody that comes my way .

And you know , that's one thing I think that helped me so much as a football official for over 25 years is that we had to be the calm in the storm , and it's no different than being a firefighter out there , whether it be an EMS run or a fire call , anything .

That's difficult that we come across when people are agitated and you see them as their worst day in their life . You have to be the calm in the storm .

And so when I dealt with multimillion dollar football coaches and I talk about this in one of my articles , but you know eight , you know the multimillion dollar coaches their lives are predicated on the decisions of 18 year old men , boys . So any of us that have raised boys know their frontal lobe doesn't fully develop to their 25 .

So anything you put in front of them until that point , you don't know what's going to happen . So you can prepare them as much as you want to prepare them , and then you get under the lights with 90,000 people .

You don't know what they're going to do , and so you have to approach it that way , and I think that you just have to mentor , foster continually positively reinforce , but hold them accountable , let them know what the expectations are , be clear on those expectations .

That hold everyone accountable , including yourself , and I think that that's , that's what you have to start with at the end of the day .

Were you working on this when I was down there or did it already come out when I was down there ? I can't remember , but it already come out .

I was in office and I had been thinking about right , when I write , I think about it in my head for a while and then I just basically spit it out and refine it and send it on so that I think I sent it to to Firehouse right at the end of December and then about the time you were here was about the time they were about to publish it oh , right after

you were here actually .

Leadership is only as good as the person charged with responsibility for the entire organization . The unfortunate part is that the person in charge isn't always a leader .

Gut punch , reddit , gut punch To me and I'm not asking you to give me a whole lot of background on this , but I can't imagine that everybody you've come across in your career has been a fantastic leader . So that line had to come from something other than yourself . Maybe a little bit from yourself . Which lenses is my minute ?

My next thing sorry , stumble there . My next thing is that you know everybody can teach you something . It's either how to do something right or how to do something wrong . So when I read that , it seems like to me there's a lot of history behind that one sentence . What can you tell me a little bit about that one ?

And so , and the point really with that , whether you're you're a CEO or a fire chief , it doesn't matter . Are you a , are you a supervisor or a manager or are you a leader ? And there's a difference . And I think that there's always that , that Prevailing discussion of whether leadership is inherent .

The people are they born with leadership or can they be taught leadership ? And I , you know , I've gone around on that thought my entire life and I think it's kind of like having a lot of speed when you run .

And you know I have very few talents in my life and one is I could throw something really hard and accurate , and the other ones I could run really fast , and Coaches can help you refine that speed or that , refine that accuracy , but I think a lot of it is inherent .

So I think for some people the leadership perspective is Easier to gravitate towards , but I still think you can refine people that maybe don't have that or weren't Subjected to that as I grew up . I think I was blessed to have a dad that this is how I was taught . What I do now . What I emulate , is how I was raised and how I was taught .

It was the cowboy way . You treat others the way you want to be treated and you know it's just the cowboy code . You treat people the right way and you get bucked off . You get right back on . You don't grab about it .

You look , you look how you know , look at yourself and say you know I got thrown , I'm not gonna get thrown next time and how can I be better about it ? And that's how I was raised . Through that I had great coaches that not only in track and football , basketball , all the way up through college , but so I was blessed with a lot of leadership

Skills . And then in officiating I came across some great leaders and in officiating the thing about that was One thing that I that I was drawn to football officiating was . There's so many similarities between the fire service and football officiating . The way we operate Well , operate as a team . Nobody leaves anybody hanging .

If you watch football officials that the goal on the football field as an official is to get the call right at all costs , and so I was kind of known as being a fixer as a field judge , and so I always looked at the wide angle at all 22 in my vision , all 22 players .

And if there was another call on the field or you know , a punt return and I see that it's a side block and I see a flag come in and I know that that's probably for that block . I'm immediately going to that official after the place . And what did you have ? Well , I had a block in the back on 22 . Pick it up .

It was a side block and we have enough trust with each other that we don't even discuss it any further than that . It should be pick it up , it was a side block and they should have enough trust to me to know All right , and they do that , and so we do .

We're the same way in a fire service we pick each other up and we make sure we get it right at the end of day , and that's what gravitated me towards that . But through that I met people in different walks of life that I may have never come across .

So I've met CEOs from , from you know , fortune 500 companies and attorneys and fire , firefighters and police officers and school teachers and from every walk of life that are football officials , and to meet these people from different parts of the country and From the different parts of the world in some instances and travel places .

I never thought I would travel to you . I never thought I would be flying across to Hawaii to referee a football game and being paid to do that . So that that was a blessing , but it was . I always look at learning experiences Is how does it make me better in everything that I do ?

And my dad always told me if you walk off the football field and you Didn't learn something , you wasted a day . If you same thing at school or anything else you do . So I take that approach with everything that I do that if I haven't learned something today , even at my age I'm 56 so even at my age , if I don't learn something today , I've wasted a day .

There should have been something I could have learned . It may be something very small , but I Think that's important to always have that mindset of continual growth and continual professional development , continually pushing your education and training and everything you do . Just just how do I get better ?

And that's always say to folks is kind of one of my things is just get better , and I learned that from a fellow football official . When people crap about stuff or he didn't , they didn't like the fact that they got an incorrect on a call they made when the film was graded he just look at them , say get better .

And really that's what it comes down to you .

Now Let me ask you this , though , and real quick yet you got to be honest , can cannot trust you to be honest . Okay , you played sports in high school . I Was in band in high school . Would you have beaten me up with my own trombone ? And you got to be honest .

I said I'm not marching in my football uniform . I said I just want to play in the spring . He goes you can't play spring concerts If you don't march that half time I said I'm out . I couldn't do it , so I was . I was probably too vain to go out there in my football uniform in March while everybody else was in a In a band costume .

I still like golf . I was not really a sports sport , but it involves a ball and you can drink early in the morning when you do that . So I think it's , it's a game .

okay . So the next thing I want to talk about is so I was so impressed with you and your staff and I met you , so impressed with your fire department . Then you tell me that you used to be , or still are , maybe an actor . So I'd like you to tell me some of the things that you were in .

So make a list of , but my favorite I think you were told that . I don't know if I told you that , but Well , maybe maybe you're right , Maybe it's chief Johnson , but save my favorite thing that you were in till last . Tell that story last , because that blew me away when you told me that one little thing .

So Tell us a little bit how you got into acting and some of the things you did .

I was very passionate about theater as well and always did that , even to the point when I was playing college football and it it taught our junior college or university at Tulsa . I was in the off season in the spring . I was also in theater and I loved doing that . So it was a passion of mine .

And so when we got to living in Denton , texas , where we lived and raised our children and for 25 years I was an Irving firefighter , so I was in that area , in that neck of the woods , and so Our next door neighbor we built houses next to , and her name is Julie Johnston , and Julie is an actress , a wonderful actress and a Beautiful singer and she does

the the , the one person Patsy Klein show , and just an amazing voice . But she's been on and off Broadway in different movies and she's the voice of baby bop on Barney .

So those , those out there that are at an age where they remember that and they remember her voice that's not her real voice , but that that is her voice so moved in next to Julie and she found out I was a firefighter and we got to know each other really well and she knew I had an acting background and she said we always need firefighters for Barney , would

you like to do that ? And I said oh sure , I'll do that . Um , ironically I didn't film anything Barney related for about 10 or 12 years after I got into doing commercials but through her Long Story Short , got in with her agent . I just happened to hit it right , got lucky . It was around 99 , 2000 .

Screen Actors Guild went on strike so all the production companies from the West Coast were coming to Texas because it's a right to work state to film their commercials Long Story Short . And I got lucky and hit four or five national commercials right off the bit there .

It got me a jumpstart into that business and was very lucky and that led to 30 , 35 regional national commercials that I did . Then it kind of developed into a little bit of TV and some things I did there and then did some film there at the end when I made assistant chief Victor Conley and Irving appointed me as assistant chief back in 2014 .

I finished filming a movie at that time and I was at an audition for a movie called my All American . It was called my All American . The same director that directed Rudy great movie about the University of Texas back in the late 60s , won a national championship . Freddie Steinmark was a walk-on defensive back that played on that team .

That was just a fighter , one of those Rudy type people , but then was a starter . I ended up starting for the University of Texas but then ended up ultimately having cancer that affected him and his leg , having it amputated and a few years after what they show in the movie , he passed away .

It's a great story and I was actually cast as the defense coordinator in that movie .

But I had to turn that part down because I was in the process of applying for the appointed position of assistant chief and Irving where civil service one tested and two appointed and was going through that process and I knew that I couldn't commit to that because if I got that opportunity couldn't film it and if I didn't I would just miss out If I'd have

stayed in the field as a captain at the time . I could have got the time off to do the two and a half three weeks for that part . So long story short . I didn't take the part , but then they wrote one in for me . So I am in the movie as a Pee Wee coach and open the movie up . So that was the last thing that I filmed and went on hiatus .

So that was the last one I did . But I was in prison break . Friday Night Lights , the TV series that you may or may not have seen , and then a lot of people know that I was in Breaking Bad . So I played Officer Cavanaugh in Breaking Bad and had hair . That was before I shaved my hair off . So , yeah , walter White and I , brian Cranston , interacted .

In the scene that we're in is Nola Contender he's the name of the episode and those that are breaking bad fans . It's right after Wayfair , 9-1-1 , the plane crash that occurred . It's the episode after that .

And he's driving that putrid looking Pontiac Aztec , that green vehicle that he drove , and he's driving through the desert and he's singing , driving through the desert on a horse with no name and he has a cracked windshield and police officer turns around , spins around and pulls him over . And that's me and we .

What's fun about that is if Brian Cranston you know I've come across , been blessed to come across a lot of different actors and some are legit , real , sincere people and some are not and he is the real deal , just a wonderful , gracious person and had a great story and thought he was going into law enforcement at one point and so when he found out I was

actually a firefighter , we really kind of created a bond there in a short period of time . But that scene , if you go back and watch it , I pull him over , I'll walk up license registration . You know how I get to play a police officer , so I get to be a jerk , but I'm kidding , I'm kidding , it's fun . So I couldn't grow a mustache .

I never could get cast as a firefighter . I'm always cast as a police officer . I don't know . But so everything you pretty much see in that scene with he and I while he's in the vehicle is on script almost verbatim .

The second he steps out of that vehicle , everything we say is completely improv and so which was really cool , how that progressed from what was on script to what we end up doing , and I would give anything to have the outtakes to that scene , because we did everything , from he flopping on the ground like a dead fish to be on top of him threatening a punch

we were doing , you name it . It was 105 , 108 degrees right outside of Albuquerque on a two-lane highway and there's a crew of 40 people filming that . And it was just before . I want to say it was about 2008, . Give or take right when we filmed that . But you know , videos on cell phones wasn't prevalent then .

But he and I are sitting there and he said he said , jay , I don't know the words to that song . I said , well , I know the chorus . And so we're going through horse with no name , you know , we're trying to figure it out good , to come in from the right , you know , trying to figure out the words to that .

And so we're going back and forth and then Vince Gilligan comes over . Who's the creator ? Who's not always there but was there for this day , and he got involved in that too .

So we're starting to sing it and talk our way through it and the next thing , you know , the entire cast or the crew , excuse me is over there under this huge tent and we're all singing it and to have to have had a video of that , of everybody singing that , and then to go see him do that scene and and progress through that was just it was priceless to

do that . And then the follow-up scene later in that episode he has to apologize to me . So we get in that altercation and I end up macing him and taking him to jail , pepper sprain him and it was a lot of fun and but , yeah , I've been very blessed to be able to do that .

Come across the folks that I have in in that end and I'll get back into that at some point . It's just that's not my , that's not my priority or focus right now , but Some point I'll get back into the acting phase .

So I use this as an excuse to where I can pretend like I know somebody that's a star right , like , yeah , I mean I know you , but I don't . I might have laid it up a little bit more , but I'm like , oh , you , like he's . Oh , yeah , I just start watching this . You know I'm pretty far into it's pretty good .

I said , uh , I See , I got a friend that's in that . You know that's . I said , uh , really who ? I said , uh , yeah , you do you get to the part where you know he gets pulled over by cop and he finished the sentence for me he goes . Oh , you mean , after the plane crash he had the crack and they , I said , yeah , yeah , I said he goes .

Well , who do you know ? I said , well , the cops , really , he's , you know he's , he played the cop there . He goes really . He was like so pressed , I just walked out , just took it as it was walking out with that one . So I had a brush with greatness , but in the transitive because of you .

So I may , I may continue to lie and embellish that story a little bit , oh yeah , I'm gonna be that guy you're grasping if I'm all you got .

Now to this day , every month I'll get a text or a call from somebody that says Jay , are you in ? Are you in Breaking Bad ? Yeah , I am . I was as a long time ago , but it's amazing .

People still watch that show and it it was very well written , great , and I had opportunities to come back on that show again but I couldn't because of football officiating , because it was in the fall and then they they spun off with better calls All and they asked me to come reprise offer officer cabin on that as well and I couldn't do it because

of football . So I hated that . I missed out on those opportunities . That have been a lot of fun , but just to have that opportunity and to work with Brian Cranston and the crew there it was , he was . I'm a big fan of him just because of the type of person he is , because he's a really great , sincere person .

I was like is he ? Is he ? And he said is genuine , as you could be like oh , no , no , no , he's the nicest , just the friendly , everything that you think . He's that guy that made my day , that story . I love that story and you know I've rewatched .

Here's the funny thing I've watched Breaking Bad so many times not since you and I've met , though , but I remember that seemed so well because you lose as a shit on a cop and I'm thinking the whole time . I'm like you're a meth dealer . You know you're the kingpin and you're losing . Never once can . Now I watch it and I'm like , oh , I see it .

Yeah , you had hair and everything like that .

I don't know where he goes . You got me so pissed off . Do you have the remotest inkling ? And I said that's not even a , that's not even a word . So that was one of the funny . But I was was great about the improv part of it , because both of us were just feeding off each other and that was completely all script outside the vehicle .

And that's one thing I enjoyed about directors . Some of them want you to stay completely on script , but the good ones usually Want you to stay along the confines of that script . But works what flows well and comes natural to the actor . So the ones that do that , it just flows and it works well . So that that's a great experience .

And you know that that transcends into things I do now . So a lot of what we do is improv . You get questions You're not expecting and you have to be able to feed off that and have an articulate answer , go in a proper direction with it . So it's it's . I look at his all learning experience .

You said you're 56 . Yeah , I'm two years younger . I look at least 37 years older than you . No , you don't look at , look at this . It looks oh , I look like fine Corinthian leather . People should put their makeup and stuff inside my head . I'm a human purse . And then you say you're 56 , I'm doing push-ups .

Flip that trombone around so that you're you build up both sides equally .

I would be the one that threw it and and hung a slider on a tree or something . Oh yeah , like a cartoon so here's .

So that says so much about what type of leader you are , what type of human being you are , that your admin made sure to text me while we're doing this just to brag on you , and I gotta tell you he ain't wrong and I hope people I'm gonna post your articles on when this goes up on my social media .

I'm obviously gonna be putting the Breaking Bad YouTube up for sure , but we have to get- Don't put the Barney one up . Oh yeah . I finally did do that , by the way . I'm totally looking for that . I'm sorry I've got to . All right , I'd like to end the podcast with what's the best firehouse prank you've ever played or have played on you .

I said go into the kitchen , there's two Styrofoam cups and there's a stack of them . Go get them . I don't know if we have lids , if we do use a lid , if not , just get two cups . I said just collect me an air sample if you would . So just go out there and collect me an air sample and bring that to me .

And that was always a fun one to watch them out there trying to get an air sample with a Styrofoam cup and a lid . But I have to say that one came from my wife , because my wife , stacy , was a 20 year Southwest Airlines flight attendant and they used to do that to brand new flight attendants , the pilots .

She never fell for it , she's a lot smarter than I am but they would get young flight attendants and they'd be out in front of the airplane out there getting air sample for the pilots , so I brought that one from Southwest Airlines .

And it was always fun to see the ones that would actually flip the hose over and wash the backside of the hose . Or if they get the creeper and go underneath the underneath part of the hose and try to clean the hose and you get them on both sides of that . So that was always something fun to do . So there's several coming to mind right now .

I could talk about those things for a long time . But the pranksters that's part of being family . That's what builds that camaraderie and that teamwork and that familiar , that family atmosphere around the station .

Actually I probably won't . I'll just change all the Taylors into Johnson's just to mess with you .

Thank you for everything you do . I'm gonna go buy a football bat tonight Just to get back into the sport . What do you think about ?

I'm always available anytime you need me and I'm also happy to share with anybody out there . Any of your listeners that wanna share information or reach out to me and ask me questions , feel free to share my information . I'm happy to interact at any time and anything I could do to make someone else their situation better .

It's all about experiences that you have and how you can keep somebody from stepping in one of the holes you've stepped in in the past and hop over them instead . So I'm always happy to help and I'm there anytime , but I really do appreciate it and can't wait to get you back down here .