Shawn Ryan Show
#162 Leif Babin - What Leadership Looks Like in the World’s Deadliest Warzones
Wed, 22 Jan 2025
Leif Babin is a decorated former Navy SEAL officer who served for 13 years, including 9 in the SEAL Teams. He is a recipient of the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and a Purple Heart for his service, which included leading major combat operations in the Battle of Ramadi as a SEAL platoon commander in Task Unit Bruiser. After his military career, he co-founded Echelon Front, currently serving as President and Chief Operating Officer to bring world-class leadership consulting to the private sector. Babin is also the co-author of two #1 New York Times bestsellers: "Extreme Ownership: How U.S. Navy SEALs Lead and Win" and "The Dichotomy of Leadership," both written with his Echelon Front co-founder, Jocko Willink. He continues to share his leadership expertise through speaking engagements, executive coaching, and leadership training programs, helping organizations across various industries build high-performance teams. Shawn Ryan Show Sponsors: https://lumen.me/srs https://PrepareWithShawn.com https://amac.us/srs https://meetfabric.com/shawn https://helixsleep.com/srs https://blackbuffalo.com/ https://betterhelp.com/srs This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Give online therapy a try at betterhelp.com/srs and get on your way to being your best self. Leif Babin Links: Website - https://echelonfront.com/ LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/leif-babin-2a43b631 X - https://twitter.com/leifbabin Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/leifbabin/ Extreme Ownership - https://extremeownership.com/ Dichotomy of Leadership - https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250195777/thedichotomyofleadership/ Please leave us a review on Apple & Spotify Podcasts. Vigilance Elite/Shawn Ryan Links: Website | Patreon | TikTok | Instagram | Download Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Leif Babin and what is his background?
I mean, even going through buds together, when you were 18 years old, you're a smart, capable, talented individual that just because I'm the officer and I'm in charge, I need you to be able to step up and make calls. I need you to be able to solve problems. I need you to be able to move the team forward in a positive direction. I can't make all the calls.
I can't, you know, if you're just sitting and waiting for me to tell you what to do, that doesn't work. So, That's a concept that's hard to get across in the civilian world. People say, well, I don't trust my team or, you know, they don't have as strong relationships. So we help them work to build those relationships. It's all based on the strength of relationships. It's built on trust.
When people understand not just what to do, but why they're doing it, you know, what we call commander's intent in the military, the purpose and the goal and the end state. But oftentimes now we start to see leaders in the civilian world, they release the authority, they give people ownership and they kind of let people run with stuff. The problem is they get too detached. They get too far away.
And so it's always a balance, right? It's a dichotomy and you're getting pulled in different directions. So you want to be detached as a leader. You want to step back. You want to let your people step up and lead and run with a plan and execute the plan, give them ownership of the plan. But you can't be so detached. You can't be so detached that you, don't know what's going on.
You're too attached from the challenges and problems. And then you can't actually support your team. You can't guide your team. You can't actually step in and help them. You know, if you're not even familiar with the challenges or you can't see when they're getting off track and you maybe need to, you know, help redirect them.
When you're talking, I'm just curious, this is a personal question, when you're talking about, when you're relating stuff back to Ramadi or gunfighting scenarios, because it sounds like you guys kind of do that, how quick, I mean, how fast do civilian types wrap their head around what you're teaching them when you're using those analogies?
Pretty fast, pretty fast usually. I think initially some people will think, I guess I can put it this way. The biggest excuse is that, I think the biggest excuse that any of us give ourselves, me included, is that it's harder for me than it is for other people. And so, yeah, Sean's maybe experienced some things on the battlefield. Well, how does that really apply to me?
Or, hey, you've done some things in your life and you have some good lessons learned, but that doesn't really apply to me. I have a different situation. Instead of keeping an open mind, instead of saying, oh, what can I learn from Sean? What has he experienced? How can that apply to my world? What lesson can I take and apply to that?
And before Jocko and I wrote the book Extreme Ownership, I'd have a lot of that. Businesses would say things like, well, how are you going to translate this to the business world? They would say that over and over again. Tell me how you're going to translate these combat leadership lessons to the business world.
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Chapter 2: What is Extreme Ownership and how does it apply to leadership?
dude, like, how did you know that? And I was, like, halfway paying attention in, like, Baptist Sunday school, you know? Like, getting kicked out because I was bad and, you know, cutting up and punching people in the back of the head. But I realized, like, studying the Bible was – that had been ingrained in me. That's something my family did.
That's something that we did in church and in my youth group, like opening the word, studying the word. And I'm so thankful for that foundation that was built in me. And there's times when I strayed very, very far from that. But I thank God that that always has brought me back to like, the truth, right? Always understanding that there's forgiveness for anything.
And that all it takes, you know, is to recognize your own failures and flaws. And none of us are actually good enough, you know, to achieve righteousness on our own. And only through the blood of Jesus can we do that. And that's all it takes. So that to me is, I've shared that with many people when I talk about it.
You know, we don't need an openly secular organization at Echelon Front, but I think there's so many, foundations that are biblically rooted, right? When it talks to being humble, I mean, you know, you can't study scripture and not realize like abject humility is like continually the theme, you know, the proud will be humbled and the humble will be exalted.
And that's throughout the scripture and particularly in the New Testament. But I think, you know, the idea that like, if we got to take ownership of our problems, like we're never going to actually be good enough. And that's, that's what prevents us from, you know, from achieving salvation. So that to me, I think to me, faith is everything.
And I think having that foundation that's, you know, that that's built in and, and study of the word. I try to be like the, the, Paul talks about the noble Bereans who, after he would preach to them in the synagogue, would study the Word to see if these things were so.
So, right, you hear something in a sermon, you hear something from a pastor, you hear something from somebody in the world, we would actually search the Word, open up the Bible, study Scripture, make sure that that actually is the truth and that it's open for any of us to study and know. I just, you know, it's been really cool to hear about your spiritual journey.
And I thank you for sharing that because I think for so many people out there, they're trying to find some answer, you know, in the secular world. They're trying to find, whether it's fame or fortune or money, you know, power, followers on social media, whatever it may be. And they're never going to find that, right? We all know that that doesn't lead to happiness.
It is the, and I think being grounded in that By the way, have you ever been to the Palace of Versailles? I don't think so. So the Palace of Versailles, I got a chance to go to France this summer just before the 80th anniversary of the Normandy invasions. Oh, man. And I did a go-ruck event there. We did the 80-kilometer ruck, you know, about 50 miles.
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Chapter 3: What are the key leadership principles that translate from military to civilian life?
So they just kind of hauled off and they were sitting probably 200 yards off the, you know, off the quarter, just kind of just no one knew what to do. The guys on the ladder didn't know what to do. Um, and I'm, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm trying to reach the water. Every time I tried to get my hand, I would just get ripped right back down by the force of the wave. So, um,
And within probably, you know, it felt like an hour, right? It probably was two or three minutes. But I very quickly realized, like, I'm not going to survive this, man. This is over. Holy shit. And it just happened like that. And it was – I just remember thinking, what a – Stupid way to go, man. This is like, this is so dumb. You know, I've done this a thousand times.
And luckily some heads up guys on the ladder, my teammates above me on the ladder, they realized, you know, climb back. They climbed back up the Jacob's ladder and everyone was kind of just wondering what to do. And they started, one guy was like, hey, let's hold this thing. And they started holding it in my hand. And they lifted me. I mean, that was a massive feat of strength.
And very heads up, you know, for them to do, because it was a contingency that they hadn't really even thought about. And so they started hauling the ladder in, and as it lifted me up out of the water, the painter rope popped free off my leg, and I floated down the side of the ship.
Damn.
And I mean, I could see just blood pouring down my face. The rib, so the rib driver, the lead meter rib comes over to pick me up. I just float right down the side of the ship. I'm kind of in the stern wash, you know, as they come pick me up. And their faces were white. I mean, they were like eyes this big. I must've just looked- I thought you were dead. Blood just pouring everywhere.
And I probably looked especially crazy, Sean, because I had a gigantic smile on my face. I was laughing because I was so happy to be alive, man. And I did not think I was going to live through that. And I was stoked. And actually, Elliot Miller was the corpsman on that, man. Elliot treated me and was keeping pressure on my face, took me to Balboa. You know, they got me stitched up.
I sat out for another couple weeks till the stitches healed, you know, and got our go plats on.
Holy shit. So how did you gain the respect of the guys, of the seasoned guys coming back from combat?
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