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July 16, 2021

The Natural Leader: Interview with Retired Army Special Forces & Content Creator Chris McPhee

The Natural Leader: Interview with Retired Army Special Forces & Content Creator Chris McPhee

Today, we are joined with an Army career warrior. He spent a total of 21 years in the United States Army.

 Fifteen of those military years were spent as an Army Airborne Green Beret. This retired Special Forces, military professional now serves as a project management consultant, Project Management Professional Exam Trainer, a business owner, Mentor, Coach, Podcaster, and Content Marketing Producer.

"Chris McPhee is a retired U.S. Army Veteran, and Green Beret turned professional photographer and project manager. After 21 years of military service, his new mission is teaming up with organizations to help them share their message/story via the media channels of photography, video, and podcasting. He over two decades of experience leading teams in challenging work environments; 10+ years of photography and videography experience."

Chris McPhee's Email:
cmcphee@greenberetmedia.com

Chris McPhee's LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/iamyourprojectmanager/

Chris McPhee's Website:
https://www.iamyourcameraguy.com

Chris Podcast "Team Room Talks":
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-team-room-talk-podcast/id1476329813

SPECIAL “THANKS” to TMF apprentice, Mr. Avi Dhanraj for the episode edit.

Transcript
KP:

This episode is brought to you by act now education, go to www dot act now education.com for a free comprehensive educational resources and opportunities for active duty veterans, military spouses and children.

Chris McPhee:

In the military, you're indoctrinated of teamwork leadership from day one. When you go through basic training, they put you through the tune sizes. They're trying to see who the leaders are, because little Do we know there's going to be an F TX at the end, and they're going to put the people that's able to influence and motivate people to get stuff done. What I learned from john Maxwell is the law of influence. If you don't have influence, then you can't lead nobody. You don't have to be in a leadership position. To lead people you just need to be able to influence them, have the buy in and they will follow you.

KP:

Thank you for joining us today, folks. Today we're joined with an army career warrior. He spent a total of 21 years in the United States Army. 15 of those years were spent as an army greenbrae. This retired military professional now serves as a project management consultant, project management professional exam trainer, a business owner, a mentor, a coach, a podcaster, and a content marketing producer. Today I'd like to welcome Mr. Chris McPhee to the show. Thank you for joining me today, sir.

Chris McPhee:

What's up? What's up? appreciate it. KP finally I'm in the formation right now.

KP:

The more information right more information.

Chris McPhee:

Yeah, I remember those days. Now. This is gonna be a lot of fun. Thank you for having me. No,

KP:

the honor is all mine. Sir. I just want to start things out. Man. Would you mind telling us a little bit about yourself where you're from? And and what was your upbringing like?

Chris McPhee:

Well, you know, I like to take people on a journey. And I know all of you listening, have seen have heard of the movie Back to the Future. So we're gonna jump into DeLorean and I go back in time. Go back in time, where it all started. For me. I'm from Miami, Florida. I grew up there in the city of Dade County in Liberty City, a rough neighborhood in, in Miami. So everybody sees South Beach. But across the bridge is the real Miami where where all the natives live and where things are really happening. But over the years, I managed to make it through with a lot of mentors and a lot of guidance and a lot of bug weapons. And in 94, I graduated high school and joined the military and I enlisted in the Army in 1994 as a personal admin clerk, not what, what I really expected or thought about down the road, what I came out after 21 years, but initially I didn't I wasn't really looking at jumping out of no airplanes. I wasn't looking at going into any type of field type situation. But after about two years in the military, you know, all that changed my perspective change. And I decided, Hey, you know what, I'm, I'm gonna go and do this. This looks cool. It looks, it looks challenging. And I made it. And here the rest is history, multiple deployments to Afghanistan and Africa, in Europe, doing things all over the world. And I retired in 2015. And that, you know, that was a point of transition for me, which a lot of veterans struggle with, or have a hard time with oars, even after the initial date. We're still trying to do it some years after. So I'm, I would say that I'm still transitioning, because I'm still trying to figure out what I really want to do what really, really makes me tick, what do I really love. And I think I've found that in media, I found that in project management, and mentoring other folks that are transitioning out of military or any help with business, or they need help, you know, working on a video or audio, they want to start a podcast, or they want to talk about project manager, they want to pass the test, they want to scale up. And that's what I like to do is just help people. I love training, I love learning. And so I figured out why don't you help people and train and teach and learn. You know, so that's, that's my cycle, and I'm enjoying it. And, you know, that's why I'm here, you know, so that's, that's a little snapshot, reel, Digest version.

KP:

Now, maybe you've had a very, very impressive and successful career overall through the military and even what you're doing right now as far as being a content creator and, and leveling yourself up. you've, you've accomplished a lot. I mean, just looking at your LinkedIn and knowing and knowing you. I'm very honored to actually have you on the show. And to be interviewing you right now. And you also helped me out when I first started, you spent a good two hours on the phone with me talking to me about things that I should take into consideration. And, you know, I took heed of everything that you said, and it's only helped me out tremendously. So I want to thank you right off the bat for that. But really quickly, I just want to take it back, you know, coming from where you came from, why exactly did you decide to enlist, because I'm sure that's probably not the number one most popular thing to have done? You know, most people, most young adults don't want to join the military. So why did you decide to enlist in the military?

Chris McPhee:

Well, for me, I was in a household with a single mom and I was the oldest of three boys. So I was wrestling in high school. And you know, in South Florida, everybody wants to be the football star. So South Florida is a big football community. Yeah, so we started playing football, you know, grade school, middle school. And if you transition into high school, you know, you might get a gig to go to college, and then maybe make it an approach. So everybody's doing that. I was a little guy. And after a shoulder injury, I realized, you know, I need to wrestle so wrestling was it, and I had aspiration and going to college to wrestle. But that didn't happen. And I would say, you know, I was thinking about college. And that's what's so cool about what we have now, if that's not in your household, and nobody's putting that in your head. Nowadays, with the internet and access to education, it's everywhere. So everybody knows, hey, I'm going to college or there's ways, opportunities for you to get to college, and just not knowing and I think having more mentorship on that or asking more questions, I might have ended up in college wrestling. But I realized, if I wanted to go to college, my mom might not be able to afford it. And I knew friends that were working during college and going to school and wrestling. And I did not want to do that. Because I did in high school, I wrestle, I did my homework. And I worked in the evening, because then you know, I had to make a little money to bring it into the household, and to take care of myself, or lessen the load on on my mom and do for myself. So she could provide those resources that I've been absorbing and give it to my younger brothers. So that was that was my mindset at that time. So I said, I'll work. And I thought a GI Bill, my uncle was in the army. And back then it was like, be all you can be in an army. And my GI Bill will give some college fun. I was like, You know what? That might be something I want to do. So I connected with a recruiter. And luckily, he was the admin guy who had been in the 82nd Airborne Division. And he was like, You should go admin, or, you know, I was like, do they have wrestling in the army? He's like, yes, they have wrestling army. So that was my hook. Right? So I'm like, I could go wrestling army and be a soldier and, and I could continue my wrestling career, which I joined to be admin. specialty, but initially, I was thinking like, I want to be an engineer because I was into art and architecture. I was a technical guy, because I had computer background. So I was like, Hey, you know, is anything in a technical field? And it was like, yeah, you could be a missile rocket launcher repairman. And I was like, that sounds like I'm being a field. So I'm not going to do that. And then it was like, well, we have this combat engineer. And I was like, that, that field work against that. Yeah, I was like, Nah, I don't think I want to do that. And in the back of my head, my, my, I could hear my recruiters, man go. And then I said, What do you have in the admin field? He's like, well, we got the 75 Bravo here, personal admin specialist, and I was like, you don't have been a long day. I have been in maps, you know, and I was like, You know what, let's do this. So I I actually enlisted on a delayed entry program. So in my 11th grade year, I enlisted and I was waiting to go. So when I graduated from high school, I already knew I was going to the army. So 30 days later, after high school, I was at Fort Leonard Wood and basic training at Fort Benjamin Harrison, first duty station for Riley, Kansas. And surely after maybe a year or so, because I had continue wrestling within in community. So everywhere I went, I found a wrestling school or high school, a club, because I knew they were were, you know, nationwide just from wrestling in high school. And after meeting with another soldier who was into wrestling, he actually became my mentor. And one of my coaching, we volunteered coach wrestling in a Junction City can They're outside of Fort Riley, Kansas, I realized they had this thing called the world class athlete program. So I filled out my application. And lo and behold, PFC McPhee got accepted to the world class athlete program. At that time in 96, it was for Benjamin Harrison. So I got accepted to come to training camp. And I spent about two months in training camp, training three times a day nutrition is weight management, physical training and technique with some of the best wrestlers in the army. And then also that world class athlete wrestlers that were already there, cross training with Navy and Marines, they would come in, and we'll have tournaments with each other and practice sessions. So yeah, for good two, three months, I was I was an athlete for the army. That was my job. But at the time, our girlfriend at the time who later became a wife, she was pregnant, my daughter, so I had to make a decision. You know, do I want to chase this Olympic dream, And oh, by the way, was the Olympic year in Atlanta that year. So if I would have stayed my track, which a couple of guys in our camp actually made the Olympic team. And I was one of those guys who had the potential to do it. I chose to be a dad. So. So I put that on ice. You know, that's why mindset is key, you know, mindset. It starts upstairs, and then you know, it goes where it needs to go. But if your mind's not in into it, it's not going to happen. So automatically, my head wasn't there no more. And I was like, I want to go home. And I went home, even after they say, we'll fly you there, right? When we know, you know, so we were having some issues. So I said, let me go do this, because I don't want to have any regrets that I miss my daughter's birth, because I was chasing something else. And I had a choice to make a decision. So I put that on pause, and came back home. And then saw the advertisement or the recruitment when I went to back then, which is like, the professional development leadership course, which is, I think, is like warrior WMC now, or a leadership course, so yeah, that's why I saw the the recruitment brief to Hey, you want to be a greenbrae get to get this cool hat. And you can travel all over the world, you know, different languages, you know, Europe, in Asia and South America and Africa, you know, in the Middle East. And I was like, You know what, this sounds exciting. This is the travel part. So I signed up, can they also like offering Ranger School, I was like, oh, man, I could do all this cool stuff. And by that time, I had already been to aerosol school was already airborne qualified. So yeah, we're there when the jumping out of airplanes thing. I did that about a year and a half in the army. And started our ropes. You know, so that, that that transition, especially for us is easy, because I realized, you know, because I was an athlete. I didn't know all the tactical stuff initially. But I knew I was an athlete. And physically I wasn't worried about not making it. I mean, I knew how to train I knew how to, I mean, I train at University at the University of Minnesota for a summer camp for 30 days when I was a freshman in high school, you know, so it goes to show you what level of training I was at, at that age. I was already I mean, a top guy in my state, competing to Nationals as a sophomore and freshman in high school. So you know, the potential was there you know, circumstances live certain life gets in the way and you have to make choices and that's that's what I ended up doing but redirected recalibrate it Special Forces was my new Olympic Chase, and I chase a lot of things there and helped a lot of people we did a lot of cool stuff. But no, that's how I got to the army. two classes at night still got my education. And I finally got my degree about three four years before my retirement because I was a hey I'm gonna need to get this degree knocked out, had a lot of education, army education in life education, but needed to have something to quantify with with the civilian workspace far as being competitive when I trans transitioned out of the military so that that when they're in in and that's why definitely you know, the long version why join the army?

KP:

No, it sounds like man from the beginning. Like even as a kid, you already had that hard working grit. And, and it's funny you say that because I wrestled in high school. And I thought that when I played football, two days was it like I thought, Man, this is the toughest. And then I wrestled. And man, nothing is worse than doing bear crawls like up on

Chris McPhee:

mezzanine with the running stairs, right and stairs,

KP:

it just I mean that. And I was explaining to a buddy of mine who's a fellow Marine who has a high schooler I told him, I said, you need to get your son his freshman year, I say you need to get your son involved in wrestling. Because it's all about who you surround yourself with, you surround him with, you know, hardworking scholar athletes in high school, he's going to be that way too. And his son, like one day came home and said, Hey, Dad, I'm signed up for wrestling his first year, and the kid has gotten A's and B's since then. So I would imagine that your transition and your foundation, from the beginning, that's where it kind of all started for you. And and man, it seems like from the beginning, you've just been a very thoughtful, professional, I mean, thinking about your mom, and, you know, understanding that she's not going to be able to afford to go to college. So you got to make this hard, right? And then you got to join the military and, and just work your way up. And you've been a leader since the beginning, Chris. And with that being said, I just wanted to follow up and ask you during those 15 years as a greenbrae. How many deployments did you actually go on? And what was that like on your family life?

Chris McPhee:

far as the deployments, you know, I did four, combat rotations to Afghanistan. So right at the beginning of 2002, I was single at the time, I'm glad I was single at a time. Because what I saw happen to relationships. during those first two, three deployments, I share something with you, unfortunately, my teammates, my senior camo guy, in our company, third Special Forces Group tronic company, second Battalion, he committed murder suicide, he was the first soldier at Fort Bragg, when they had the series of suicides and murders going on. With guys coming back from deployment, he was the first guy. So that was a hard deployment. The first one, the second one, a little bit more shaky. Because we had some other guys get shot. And then, you know, I didn't have a family to go home to but my kids, they were, they were with my ex wife at the time. So luckily, with those with those operation had gotten remarried in 2018 2007, while I was still in swig, and my wife was a soldier, too, so she, you know, it was still hard, we had one kid and together, and then we have a blended family. So we have four kids together. You know, it was hard, it was hard, in some instance. But most of the time, those deployments were short, and it was a little bit easier because I wasn't in like direct combat zone, right. So I didn't really, I would say, I didn't really feel the stress, like some of my buddies out, I watch, go through, you know, the wives have an issue with their wives or, you know, on both sides, and, you know, I'm gonna be real both sides of others. Other tables, you know, so infidelity, you know, people get lonely, you know, it's human nature. We're not this, we're not designed to be Yeah, apart. Especially when we, when you want to be together and you want to be with somebody, it's hard, you know, so for whatever other reasons, people fall into the trap. And that's what happens, you know, people like, Hey, I'm out, or, you know, people don't believe in it. No more. I mean, I've seen buddies where, you know, their, their wives and girlfriends are just like, I'm out of here. I'm not, I'm not dealing with this. You know, and just, yeah, jump ship, you know, but then there's some dudes just had to commit to it. So that's the reality of it. But I didn't, I would say honestly, I didn't really feel that I just observed it and learn from it and try to make the best of my relationship when I can't.

KP:

Yeah, it's definitely a hard life. And that's why I asked because I know that special forces, they tend to deploy quite a bit. And sometimes it's long, sometimes it's short. So it's something that you definitely have to prepare yourself for. And so, just to pivot a little bit, I wanted to find out, you know, how did you use and apply the skills that you developed, you know, while in the military to the civilian world well,

Chris McPhee:

I've always been an IT, I would say closet nerd in the mid 90s, before I even joined spider forces, so that so let's go, let's jump into delivering and so, men, men 1997. We have computers coming online. And we're like at 286 386. Right? So this guy is learning how to build and put computers together. So we don't have smartphones. Nobody's zooming. We barely have internet. We have dial up internet. We barely have internet. So it's hard to imagine. But yeah, yeah, yeah. So so about 99. I got what we call the A plus computer technician certification, and then installing and doing some software. So we at that time we had doesn't look nothing like it looks now. But you know, that that went on it, but that, but that skill helped me in our deployments. Because, you know, in our options, we need to communicate and I was a communications. So I, that was my specialty. I was a communicator, I was at echo. So since I knew networking and computers, I would network to computers, and you know, our SATCOM comms, you know, that was my thing, you know, so I wanted to be an at echo. And so I went through the Morse code, I learned Morse code at the time, we were doing Morse code, and, and a 99, when I was going through the Special Forces Qualification Course. And, and as I got closer to retirement and looking at retirement, I was like, Well, what can I do when I transition? You know, okay, I got computer skills, you know, security skills that would transition to be like a super cool cop, or some type of security consultant or something in the security world. And by that time, you know, a lot of contractors, security companies were available, so I could have ventured off to do that. But the other part I learned was becoming an Intel analyst, and diving into, into intelligence around of the combat zone in the battlefield. And so once I got that craft under my belt, and when you become a senior, so I retired as a master sergeant. So and this is the delta between leadership, what I've learned in the military and what's in the civilian workspace, when you take another rank, you get a class or you go to a course to teach you how to be the best at that. That's not in the civilian space. A lot of people out there that I've worked with, they're just in those positions based off of time, and because of what school they have, but they're, they're not good leaders. In what I've learned through being in the john Maxwell network, is that what leadership I learned in the military is not going to transition over to the civilian space that now what I've learned and the principles and techniques of welfare for people, motivating, inspiring mentoring, counseling, you know, those things I learned, but like, there's less time for conferencing and huddles, when you get in bullets shot at you go that way. Come with me. There's no, there's no time for conferencing, or you know, but that's what happens in the workspace, somebody says something, it's like, well, we should do this, but I don't think we should do this and you spend like an hour bickering over what you should do, versus, hey, let's just get it done. And that's what I saw when I initially transitioned that, I would say, the leadership and a lot of organizations is weak. I was just saying on the record, because I can I can I just I'm just real. That's, that's why I'm an entrepreneur. That's why I work in my own organization. That's why I only team with other elite executives and operators in their business, to give them the high level of performance because when you're used to operate an optimal level, coming out of the military, it's hard to go into some cubicle. You can't just undo being, you know, a go getter. In the military. You're indoctrinated of teamwork leadership from day one. When you go through basic training, they put you through the tune sizes. They're trying to see who their leaders are, because little Do we know there's gonna be an F TX at the end, and they're gonna pick the people that's able to influence and motivate people to get stuff done, that they like. So, what I learned from john Maxwell is The law of influence, if you don't have influence, didn't, you can't lead nobody, you don't have to be in a leadership position to lead people, you just need to be able to influence them, have the buy in, and they will follow you, especially in the workplace, a lot of people just want to come in and punch their clock, get their money and go back to do whatever, because maybe they hate their job, they don't like it. And that's when I really started pursuing my company greenbrae Media and get into media and photography, because I loved it. I liked it. I also had another business where I was doing government contracting on the side, so I just got tired of doing that. And I started diving more into the project management side of industry. And it allowed me to teach and once I figured out because in the military, I learned planning, the five paragraph op order, meaning you learn how to plan a mission, like if you go and do a training event, there's a plan for that, if you got to go get water, there has to be a plan for that. For every airborne operation is to plan for that. It's where we sit in, in on on an aircraft, there's a plan for that, you know, there's a plan for everything. So that was easy for me to transfer in a project management. The hard part was the lexicon and learning the lingo. But once I learned the lingo, and made the correlation between the two, I was like, oh, I've got this and I ran with it. I became the expert in my organizations, I helped everybody. Once again, I was leading from the front influencing, hey, you need to do this, you need to do that. So I got promoted really quick to a lead analyst. So I trained people on state size, and when we got abroad, life would be easy for us, you know, because when you're when you're in the in the game, there's no time for training, you know, so, so I did that. And then after a while, I was like I'm moving on and I did some freelance contracting for a while. And then I say, let me more getting a second job was more of a strategy. And I really developed a keen sense that one of my favorite one of my friends and I'm gonna give him a holler. His name is Robert Rodriguez. And that's where I got my Pac podcast, mentorship from and we work together in Kuwait. In one day, we were walking in he said, it was another gentleman walking with us. And he was like, Man,

Unknown:

this is good money, man. We gotta, we gotta chill out, man. And

Chris McPhee:

Ryan's like, I want more man, like, there's more to life than this and just going to the defect working 12 hours, go to sleep for 612 hours, come back and you do the same cycle for six months. On his camp, you can't go home.

Unknown:

You know? And he's like, Nah, man, he said, he said, he said, I'm guaranteed money, not the nine to five. And I looked at him, he had this fake look on his face. Like, you know what, man, I would just punch you in your mouth right

Chris McPhee:

now. You just don't know how I feel. But I heard that. And I looked at him. And later on, I was like, Rob man. carotene would like, explain it. He's like, Look, Chris, like, the non of fire needs us. In anybody listening to this right now. Unless you own that company. That company doesn't operate without you. All right. Let's change the dynamics a little bit. The company needs you to function to operate to go to grow. If you're not bought in, on the mission, the vision, then you're just spinning your wheels waiting for another opportunity. And you probably hate that job. So if you hate that job, that's where you're at. You're not bought into the mission. You're not influenced by it, you're just collecting a paycheck. Or you're just doing it because you got a side hustling, you're ready to transition. Like I said, you're looking for the next thing. Yeah. Because people who are bought into the vision, the mission and they're drinking the Kool Aid. They try they're trying to climb the ladder. Right? Yeah. So so they love their job. II know, well, maybe they really genuinely love their job, and they just like doing the right task at that job. But for me, and a lot of people out there, we want more. You know, we want to have our own business. We want to do this. We want to travel we want to do this, but there's constraints. But you got to understand that the nine to five needs you. So don't feel there's scarcity. If you got skills, planning skills, communication skills, It skills, management skills, the more skills you have, the less there is a mindset of scarcity. Right? I could go work, I could leave right here right now go on LinkedIn, and probably apply to 10 jobs and get three. Sometimes I just apply to a job just to go through the interview, just to see where I'm at. And I don't even take it. So I really don't have no, there's no scarcity of work for me. Like I could get a job. But But no, that's how I that's how I see things, man. Yeah, just holistically my mindset is, the more skills you have, that's how you defeat scarcity. Yeah, right.

KP:

Yeah, you've, you've been, you've been practicing adapting and overcoming ever since you were a kid, and nothing from where you came from, to, you know, wrestling at a highly competitive level, you know, as a teenager, adapting, overcoming and then you practice it in the military as well, switching from human resources to, to special operations, and it's something that you're still practicing today. So I completely understand why you have no problems betting on yourself. Because you've, you've challenged yourself, and you've bet on yourself before and you come out on top every single time, Chris, and that's what's amazing about you, once I realize that

Chris McPhee:

would build their relationships, and interacting and engaging people, especially now in social and you know, you have to be a leader and you have to drive engagement and you you have to know how to like Dale Carnegie, how to win friends and influence people, you know, I had to learn that in when I became a real estate agent, because I didn't know how to sell as a salesman as an adult. And I didn't know how to sell real estate, they taught me how to do it, but it didn't tell me how to sell it. So that's where I learned a lot of books I at that time. This was 2006 I wasn't a big reader, like for pleasure. It was just more for technical reading, like how to do my job, right. So I never read only if I had to, but now I had to but I had to learn about storytelling, and you know, setting up teams and this is how you set up teams out here. And this is how you do this. This is how you market this is how you meet people. This is how you market yourself before the internet or before social one thing they told us how to connect with people. And build community was your your name tag everywhere you went. So if you went to Home Depot if you went to any event, do your school, all these what they call sphere of influences now, that's Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, you know, LinkedIn, those are new digital spheres of influence, but pre social media as we have it now. That was the school at the PTA. That was you know, volunteering that boy scouts. That was you being the guy in your neighborhood waving at everybody. You know, or that was you picking up the phone cold calling. We used to do that dialing for dollars. I used to do that I used to cold call people Hey, you. You ever thought about selling your house? Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, no Click Next one. Yeah. Click, click, go into doors. Nope. You know, like, that's why I say you know, people, and I'm gonna just put it out there. These are tools. And you still have to interact with people on these tools. Right? I had no clue. This internet thing was like this, right? I was living under a rucksack running operations. And I knew about Facebook and YouTube, but I didn't know how to use it. And LinkedIn was the first social media platform I learned how to use because I was a professional and I wanted to get into professional space. So I focused on that. And then I learned about Facebook, Instagram, and then I got into photo and video and realize social media and for branding. For me. It's it's, it's the same thing. It's about building a relationship. That's why I started a podcast. I didn't start it to monetize it. And I'm gonna just say it, all this hoopla. Everybody's listening to out there. You know, unless you're a big name like Joe Rogan. Like I watched Joe Rogan. As a kid on Double Dare. I've seen Joe Rogan as a stand up comic. And if you haven't been following Joe Rogan, since like the 80s. It didn't happen overnight. It's not a coincidence that his podcast is the bomb. No Joe Rogan's the bomb. And Joe Rogan started a podcast so Joe Rogan says a lot of stuff. Hey, Joe Rogan already had a following. It was like well shoot. If you want to Joe Rogan, you got to get on his podcast because he's off the chain. That's how Joe Rogan podcast is the heat now because he just started it, and he does all these cool things. Like, so when you're, I hate to say when nobody knows you, that's hard for you. It's hard to get listeners is hard to try to monetize. And you know, I tried to do that and realize, like, I didn't want to be a slave to sponsorship because you got to produce. They're expecting you to sell their brand and sell their product. I'm like, no. That's like working a nine to five. Yeah, you know,

KP:

I think, yeah, I think for people like Joe Rogan, it's, it's it's definitely been a journey. Yeah, it is. A journey. A journey is, is long, and a lot of folks today want the really quick, hey, I want something to happen tomorrow. And so I understand what you're saying with

Chris McPhee:

that. You know, you don't you really don't, you know, like, really, you literally don't have to go overboard, but the market has created this facade with all this tech. Yeah. You know, and that's what I've come to, you know, just like, yeah, like I said, at work, I realize, none of our needs me. And I realized that I really don't need all that to do a podcast like,

KP:

right, exactly, right. I mean, everything that you just mentioned, every single show that I do, I learned something new, and I try to do it better each and every time and, and you really had a huge effect on, you know, my podcasting in my show, and I just want to thank you for that. And welcome. You're, you're you're an absolutely amazing, professional, I've loved your content that's out there. If If anyone listening is interested in connecting with you or following you on any of your platforms, would you mind mentioning how they can? How they can do that?

Chris McPhee:

Yes, yes, the easiest way to find me is go to Google, or any platform and hashtag, I'm your camera guy, right? So so that's the easiest way, but anything, if you find me on Facebook, it's Chris MC fi PNP. on LinkedIn, you can find me Chris Smurf. MC fi, I'm there or if you throw in, I'm your project manager, you see where we're going with that. That's my URL. So anything linkedin.com forward slash, I'm your project manager, is a quick way to find me. But yeah, any anywhere, if you just Google me, you'll see all my hits, you'll see the PI cache, you'll see the YouTube channel, you see anything I put on Facebook, anything that that I've been connected with, you'll be able to see that

KP:

most definitely anyone listening out there, make sure you follow this man he has his journey is continuing. Even though he's retired out of the military, he's pivoted so many times adapted and overcame. You know, he's got a lot of big things in the works. And so, Chris, I really appreciate your mentorship. Man, you You helped me out early on, you definitely talked a lot of sense into me. And you and you got me to where I am today. So thank you for that. No, man. That's,

Chris McPhee:

I mean, that's the key. I think, you know, I learned, like you say, Well, what did I learn in the military transition? You know, that crawl, walk run method, right? So you got to crawl a little bit, you know, figure stuff out what works, you know, boom, boom, boom, you pick it up a little bit, you start walking. And then once you feel you get it, then you start running. But if you jump out the gate, it's always gonna be like, your hair's on fire, you know? Right. You always feel that way.

KP:

Right? Yeah. Well, Chris, is there anything you'd like to tell everyone before we sign off with the show?

Chris McPhee:

Well, I would, I would like to leave your guests with. I've been reading Robert Greene's mastery. And I would challenge you to take advantage of the protege mentor relationship, find somebody if they're a real mentor. And you want to be a real protege. It shouldn't cost you anything but time. So if you're paying for it, that's not a mentor. That's a coach. Right? Yeah. Yeah, it's a different. So real mentors, and I have many of them for different things in my life. It doesn't cost you because they know you and they genuinely want to help you. Right? coaches want to help you. But that's their business. Right? That's their business is to coach people because people need coaching. But some mentorship is different. You know, sometimes you got to get your hand held a little bit, or somebody needs to talk to you a certain way and only your mentor who knows you could talk to you like that. Right.

KP:

Thank you so much, Chris. I appreciate your time today. And for the folks listening out there. If you want to link up with Chris, I'm gonna make sure that all his links are in the show notes. Chris, thank you for your time today.

Chris McPhee:

Appreciate it. GAPI man, thank you for that. The more information I'm in it, I get the fall out now.

KP:

Yeah. Actually, early on that was part of my outro was Fallout and people were like, What's that mean? And because the Navy says something different. The Air Force says something different. I don't know. So. But thank you everyone for listening today for the morning formation. I'm KP with Chris. And we're out. Oh,