How To Level Up Your Leadership with Chief of Navy Reserve - Vice Admiral John Mustin | Part 1

John Mustin (0:00)

I've got a staff and I've got a team, and they're looking at me. And if I come in and I am moping and grouchy and pissed, they're going to be too. Instead, I want to greet them every day with a sense of optimism, like, hey, I don't care how hard this challenge is that we're dealing with, we're going to figure it out and it's going to be awesome.

And if you want to be a member of this elite high-performing team, then that's the way you carry yourself, and you work that down echelon with your folks too. So in order to participate, I'm pretty candid saying, I only want high performers on my team.

Michael Gervais (0:42)

Okay, welcome back or welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Michael Gervais, by trade and training a high-performance psychologist. And I am thrilled to welcome Vice Admiral John Mustin to the podcast for this week's conversation. What is it like to lead 59,000 people?

What if those people are spread out all over the world? Chief of Navy Reserve or CNR, Vice Admiral John Mustin knows exactly what it's like. And he does it with a singular laser guided priority in mind, war fighting readiness.

So what exactly does readiness look like? When it comes to performing at the highest level, Vice Admiral Mustin is steadfast in his belief that individual performance is informed by both competence and character. We'll find out how he helps instill these traits in his force and the challenges that come with it. Vice Admiral Mustin has an extraordinary grasp on leadership philosophy, communicating effectively across large organizations and using his civilian experiences to inform strategy within his military career. And he is generous enough to share his insights with us around both organizational and personal high performance. We covered a lot of ground. In fact, we covered so much ground that we felt this conversation was best shared in two parts. So enjoy part one now and then make sure you come back for part two. With that, let's dive into this week's conversation with the very impressive Vice Admiral John Mustin.

Admiral, this is an honor and I do not say that word lightly. And so thank you for being here. Thank you in advance for bringing a generational type of insight and wisdom to this conversation. So I appreciate you.

John Mustin (2:39)

Well, I can't tell you how thrilled I am to be here. And as I mentioned, I've been a long-term listener or a longtime listener. So this is kind of a big moment for me too.

Michael Gervais (2:47)

Yeah, there we go. Okay, good. So we're both in it. All right, good. So let's start at the top. In your most succinct way, like, what is the US. Navy Reserve?

And why is it important for us to understand the operations that you're running?

John Mustin (3:02)

Ah, great question. So the Navy Reserve's about 60,000 citizen sailors as we describe them. And we're an augmentation force that makes our Navy more capable and have greater capacity in the event of peace or war.

So at its most basic level, we were born prior to the nation's entry into World War I, so 1915 So we just celebrated our 108th anniversary.

And in every significant conflict since then, the Navy Reserve has augmented the active-duty force for our nation. In World War II, we had 2 million sailors that were reserved, that served in the Pacific and in the Atlantic. So the nation has come to expect that the Navy Reserve is not only ready to perform, but is qualified, certified, and able to mobilize when ready. So the missions that we're doing around the world, I've got people in every time zone, in every area of responsibility, every combat and command area that are serving right now. I mean, they're around the world representing the interests of our nation. So it's important.

Michael Gervais (4:05)

In your organization, the reservist organization is civilian, are they civilians? Or like how does the bifurcation work between being a sailor versus being a civilian?

John Mustin (4:19)

Sure. So of my 60,000, 10,000 are active duty sailors whose job is to train and administer the reserve force.

The other 50,000 are called selected reserves. And those are the folks that you may know by the old bumper sticker of a weekend, a month and two weeks a year.

So we say, okay, that sums to 38 days. And it really today does not need to be a weekend, a month and two weeks a year. You know, that's the minimum requirement. You may want to do two weeks at one time and then do another two weeks and then not come in for a couple of months. As long as it sums to that 38 days, then you get what's called a good year.