What Can A Career Focused on Public Service Look Like? Meet Jordan See.

[00:00:00] Welcome back to another episode of The Political Life. Today we have another exciting guest. We have Jordan C., is on the podcast with us, someone, another guest that has been brought to us by the new co-host, Maggie Mick.

[00:00:32] And so Maggie, why don't you introduce or bring our guest on? Thank you, Jim. I am so pleased to introduce Jordan C., he's a longtime friend and colleague. And as we head into the Fourth of July holiday and celebrate our nation, what I have always

[00:00:53] appreciated about Jordan is not only his approach to the work in government affairs and we'll get into that in his rise, in his career, which has been steadfast and quick. But he also serves our country.

[00:01:09] He's in the Army Reserve and previously in the National Guard and we'll talk about his lessons of leadership and how he also juggles that with a very large job. But Jordan, welcome to The Political Life. It's great to be here.

[00:01:24] Y'all thank you, Jim and Maggie for having me. This is going to be great. And Jordan, why don't you just share with us where you got your start? Everybody has their first job or had one opportunity that maybe gave them the political bug and what

[00:01:39] was that for you? Yeah. So when I was kind of preparing for this, I was talking about looking at my, looking across my career and I was like, what was that moment? Right? What was the thing that gave me the opportunity?

[00:01:52] It really is a compilation of a number of things. But I will say that it was, it was the idea that I left the comfort of home. I grew up in Florida at the time when I was making decisions on what I was going to do

[00:02:05] with my career. I was working as a fraternity consultant. So I was traveling around the country in Canada and working for my fraternity. I made the decision that I wanted to go to law school and I stopped in and Jackson,

[00:02:17] Mississippi because I had been accepted to Mississippi, you know, Mississippi college school of law there in Jackson and I was introduced to the dean and the dean took me to lunch and all of a sudden I realized that I'm sitting in a room with then governor Haley

[00:02:30] Barber and Lieutenant, then Lieutenant Governor Phil Bryant and then treasurer Tate Reeves and you know, and this whole room of people who are just impacting folks every day. And I knew that at that point I was like, I remember I called my parents and I

[00:02:45] said, I'm going to move to Mississippi. And one thing led to another. I was able to work on a campaign for the upcoming then treasurer or foretreasurer who is now the Attorney General Lynn Fitch and she introduced me to after she won her victory party, she

[00:03:02] introduced me to Congressman Greg Harper. And at the time he was his first term and it was that decision, I mean moving to Mississippi and being encapsulated by all of these people who are really engaged around helping

[00:03:14] people in public service and wanting to make people's lives better that ultimately it led to an opportunity where I came to DC. And from that point on, I was on the hill for just shy of 70 years and I've been jumped

[00:03:29] off start lobbying and so been lobbying now for just shy of 10 years now. So it has been a whirlwind like you said. I mean, and I appreciate the opportunity of really kind of coming on and talking more about that. Yeah.

[00:03:42] And you've worked for a couple of really wonderful members of Congress. What were what's one career highlight from your time on the hill because seven years is kind of a lifetime. It's double the annual tenure or the usual tenure of a hill staffer.

[00:03:57] You know, so I was really fortunate because I came on. I didn't really have a policy focus that I was really interested in. I was super interested in right. I was I was just really excited to work on the hill.

[00:04:09] You know, graduate law school and I was like, I'm going to I'm going to make my mark somewhere right. And the first job that I was given was was the communications director. You know, our communications director in Congressman Harper's office was moving

[00:04:23] off of the hill and he was making a decision to help his career in his life. And I remember our district or sorry, our deputy chief of staff came over to my desk and he was like, she was like, hey, can you come with me?

[00:04:36] And she's like, we walked around the cannon building and we're and she's like, there's going to be an opportunity that's going to come open and you just have to say yes. And she didn't tell me what it was, but she was like, you just have to say yes.

[00:04:48] And, you know, I walked back into the office and about 10 minutes later the Congressman goes, hey, can you come into my office real quick? And so we sat down and he explains to me that, you know,

[00:04:58] I've done a great job and we'd love to advance me in the office. And he's like, how would you like to be the comms director? What is that? Yeah, how does that make you feel? And I just remember being very honest.

[00:05:07] I was like, sir, I don't actually know what it comes. I don't know how to be a comms director, but I will figure it out. Right. And he looked at me and goes, I have no doubt.

[00:05:17] And that was the the opportunity to kind of work on the hill. And and then really quickly after that, I became into a higher role where, you know, Mr. Harper sat on the Energy and Commerce Committee. And as you know, the the coveted position in the Congress

[00:05:32] has the most jurisdiction in the Congress. And so we were just at a time, you know, health care was was obviously big. This was pre-Obama care. You know, there was just so much going on at that time.

[00:05:44] And so, you know, there was just not enough people to take on the number of meetings and the and the policy issues. And so very quickly I was handed that health care portfolio and some financial services portfolio and really took on a hybrid role

[00:05:57] of a comms director and a legislative assistant. And I will say that's in you made a point about how to juggle a lot of things. I think that was the first job where I learned that, you know, being being good at time management and prioritizing the big things

[00:06:14] and getting those things done early have been very helpful. You know, it was. And then ultimately, I think when we moved into the years of Obamacare and I remember probably the biggest moment on that time was was when we,

[00:06:28] you know, the Republicans were in the majority at the time and they repealed Obamacare and it didn't go anywhere in the Senate at the time. But I can remember the the twenty nine hour sitting in the chamber watching members sleeping under the diast

[00:06:42] or going back in the anti room. And, you know, I remember that was that one time with the staff, like all the staff, we were up all night. You know, remember calling my wife, I'm not coming home tonight because we're going to work through this thing.

[00:06:53] And for twenty nine hours, we just sat there and watched members. You know, we were having to run back to their offices and go get them because they were ready to vote for the next tranche of votes

[00:07:03] for on the or it was time for them to hear the bill read. And so we would have to go and find our bosses or you'd see members sitting in the back of the room, you know, with their heads up against the wall,

[00:07:14] because they were just knocked out because they were all asleep. So it was a really fun opportunity. And, you know, and I think in prior you know, episodes of this podcast, people talk about like how much fun the hill was.

[00:07:25] And I tell folks all the time, I mean, especially young people that I work with and I try to mentor is you don't leave too early. Right? I mean, there's so much stuff. There's so much greatness that happens in that in that world

[00:07:38] when you're twenty five years old and you're, you know, obviously, you're not making a whole lot of money and you're taking pay cuts if you're coming from private practice or to go do those things. But, you know, those opportunities and those

[00:07:50] relationships that you make and those, you know, those decisions that keep you there are just so important. Right? And there's no replicating behind the curtain. No. And I and it's funny because when you when you pull it back and you see obviously the tinkering and how it works

[00:08:08] and you see the jockeying and you really do see the bipartisanship, right? Isn't that the great part about what we all do? Right? Is that, you know, obviously we have different ideas on how this country should run or how states should run or how municipalities should run.

[00:08:21] But the other day it's, hey, I want to get this done. How can we work together to get this done? And, you know, ninety five percent of the stuff happens daily, right? It's only the things that really see the news, of course,

[00:08:34] and on this on the folks that listen to this podcast will know that it's only the stuff on the news that you hear that is not bipartisan. But oftentimes it is they're just stuck on one provision or they're stuck on one thing.

[00:08:44] And so I think that's the greatest part about working on the hill is that it really does give you a understanding at a federal level, how agencies are running and how you how oversight looks like and how appropriations plays into those things and how authorizers work.

[00:09:00] And so the better you understand that. And as you guys know, once you leave Capitol Hill, oftentimes folks move back home, right? You know, DC is not the place for everybody. Now I reside there and I've lived there for over 15 years

[00:09:13] and my wife and I really enjoy it. But, you know, we have a number of friends who have gone back to the states and, you know, work in state capitals now. And now they are either they're lobbying and doing

[00:09:23] government relations at state levels or they're working in big cities and they're in the government relations departments for large corporations or trade associations, right? And it is really a great opportunity to learning ground, approving ground, right, to learn these opportunities and then take those back

[00:09:40] to where you're from and really make an effort to to be to make your states better too. Jim, I've got one more question and I'm going to hand it over to you. I always like to kind of hear where people feel like they had that lucky break

[00:09:53] and you obviously, you know, shared that on the I think the comms director or even getting the health care portfolio as part of that time with the congressman may have been that. But in terms of like mentors, so you stepped forward

[00:10:08] and left the hill and at some point had to decide to take on a state portfolio. You currently had federal and state for Qualtrics, but at some point you had to get the state chops to handle those jobs. So in terms of your decision making to

[00:10:26] go and work the states and mentors that you've had throughout, just can you share kind of your decision making and those that may have guided some of those transitions? Yeah. And Maggie, we've talked about this one at length

[00:10:41] because the person that you're alluding to is her name is Claudia Tucker. And a lot of folks who probably listen to this podcast, especially folks working in the states, probably know Claudia at some level either through her efforts at GOPAC or her efforts

[00:10:55] worth council state governments or NCSL or and some people, especially if you're living in Virginia, you may know that she's a she's a county supervisor in Amherst County, Virginia. So she's she's just this, you know, behemoth of a mentor

[00:11:12] that I was very fortunate to have when I made the transition over to Teladoc Health. You know, when I made my transition from my first lobbying gig, I was I took a role with the with the small biomedical company that was it ended up Teladoc ended up buying

[00:11:30] and purchasing. And so I was only within probably the first two months that that that job before the acquisition happened. And I remember sitting meeting Claudia and this woman is mean she's a legend in her space. And so you're walking into it.

[00:11:46] And I remember meeting her for the first time and she was sizing me up. She was she I wasn't supposed to be. I wasn't supposed to be on her team. That was, you know, she had her team and I was not supposed to be there.

[00:11:58] Right. I was kind of forced into her team. And I remember within 90 seconds, I knew that she was going to keep me on her team. One, because of our similar backgrounds coming from rural areas, you know, growing up and around agriculture,

[00:12:14] you know, opposite love of country and understanding, you know, my background with the military. She loved the members of Congress that I worked for. She knew the companies I had worked for previously. And so it was very quickly, I mean, within 90 seconds.

[00:12:28] And then I mean, within probably two minutes after that, I knew that we were going to be lifelong friends. And I remember very early on, she she said to me, she goes, you know what? She goes, I know you have this federal background and you're you're

[00:12:41] you're so good at it. She goes, but you're actually a state lobbyist and you don't even know it. She's like, you could be a great state lobbyist. And I, and to be honest with you, you know, I'd be coming from,

[00:12:51] you know, because of the way that I kind of grew up through the federal side and going to working in Congress. I kind of thought she was giving me a little bit of a slight. I just didn't know what I didn't know at the time.

[00:13:01] And I said to her, I said, you know, I just don't know if that's the opportunity I'm looking for. And I could see on her face because we were in person at the time. This was right in the middle of the pandemic, but we were actually

[00:13:12] in person meeting and I could see her kind of melt a little bit. She kind of shrunk and it was, it wasn't, I didn't notice it or feel it at the time. But I remember one day I was on the Peloton because, you know,

[00:13:23] nothing was open that right that time during the pandemic. And, you know, Teladoc is booming. I mean, we are obviously the, you know, everybody's cares about telehealth at the time. And I remember I called her four or five weeks later.

[00:13:38] I had just had a conversation with my wife and I was like, I think I made a mistake. I think I mean, I think that she is giving me professional development. And I just kind of spat in her face a little bit.

[00:13:48] And that was, it just felt bad. And I kind of prayed on it and I thought about it so much. And then I called her and I said, Hey, Claudia, like, remember five weeks ago you said this and she goes, I do.

[00:13:59] She goes, I was like, I want to first say that I want to say thank you. I didn't say thank you in that moment. And I wasn't grateful for the opportunity that you were trying to give me. I was like, can I get a redo?

[00:14:07] Can I come back and can I say yes to that? And I mean, you could see on this Zoom call her share face. Let me, she was so excited and she was relieved. Right. I mean, what I didn't know at the time was how much stuff

[00:14:21] she was working on, how much Paula. I mean, we were in every state trying to change policy. Right. I mean, most states were so far behind on how telehealth issues should have worked and the pandemic, of course, just exacerbated it. Right. And we found ourselves.

[00:14:37] I mean, I mean, she said, all right, you've got, you've got this half of the country. We're going to, you know, you're going to go. You're going to be in, you know, you're going to fly up to Frankfurt.

[00:14:47] You're going to fly over to, you know, Charleston, West Virginia. We've got issues, right? And so it was a baptism by fire immediately. And I will say that I quickly learned that it wasn't much different than, you know, obviously working with Congress.

[00:15:01] It was just, it just happened so fast. And if you're not prepared to go into those legislative sessions, you know, you will get burned and you will not be, you will not get what you need. And so it was through Claudia's mentorship.

[00:15:15] Claudia, you know, she just, man, I can't tell you how much I look at her and I go, man, she's my, she is a mentor that I will have a lifelong friend. And, you know, she made the decision here.

[00:15:25] A couple months ago, she, she's going to retire from Teledoc. And so she is now kind of stepped back and I'm looking forward to see what her next chapter looks like because Claudia Tucker doesn't stop working, you know, we'll see what that looks like because she will,

[00:15:38] she'll come out and come out, you know, ready to do something else. And I'm excited to see that. So Jordan, why do you think Claudia, why did she think you had a skill set that would be very effective at the state level?

[00:15:56] You know, I think it was it was a couple of things. One, because I like to talk. I think that ultimately she said that you just like talking and people like listening to you sometimes.

[00:16:04] And so I think it was a little bit of being a better storyteller than some. I think it was the military background. I think that she, she really thought that that was something that really set me apart from a lot of our our colleagues.

[00:16:19] And we have a lot of colleagues that have served, right? But there's not a lot of folks you probably work with that still serve in some capacity. I mean, I could think of, you know, four or five on the federal side

[00:16:30] and the state side is a little easier because of state national guards and things like that. But she just thought that, you know, if you're willing to give up your time and your effort, you know, people want to hear that story

[00:16:43] and they're going to automatically feel more slightly, you know, they're going to trust you more. And they always knew that I was coming from a space that if I was taking I had to take time off to go serve or if we had training events

[00:16:56] where I had to go away for a month or two or, you know, I was not to I thankfully didn't have to deploy in, you know, in my time with when I worked with Claudia. But she just she saw that, you know, I was willing to do

[00:17:07] and it was going to work the extra mile to make sure that things got done. And so and there was also a willingness to travel at the time, too. I think that also really helped, you know, willingness to leave my family,

[00:17:19] you know, get over, you know, meet with folks, get the job done and get back and then, you know, get ready to go for the next day. I think that was the things that she saw. So two questions, really, one, what was it like

[00:17:31] overseeing state government relations for half the country? I kind of thought she was going to say because, you know, the lobbying at state level is really, you know, more kind of hand to hand combat, so to speak.

[00:17:48] You know, you're in the state capitals of people walking in the hallways. And so I thought she was going to say something along those lines, which may have been the case and clearly you know how to communicate. But what was it like

[00:18:03] overseeing half the country on such a critically important issue during the pandemic? You know, it was it was daunting. It was it was interesting part because, you know, at the state level, you know, the state medical associations on health care issues really have,

[00:18:21] you know, they they carry the greatest amount of water in the states for those issues and I remember we were running up against just about every one of them. I mean, when the state medical association stands up there and says,

[00:18:34] hey, you know, we don't need telehealth issues for these or we don't need these leniencies or we don't need these opportunities to open up. You know, that was a fight. And I remember you had legislators who, you know,

[00:18:48] you know, in some states I could think of who were married to the, you know, either the executive director or members of the board of the state medical associations and them sitting up there and just, you know, saying that, you know, a teledoc was a

[00:19:02] outsider coming in trying to change the laws of state that are hurt people and really trying to explain what, you know, not just what teledoc was, but what telehealth how it was going to help and how it was going to allow

[00:19:13] for more greater, you know, greater opportunity for folks to to see doctors and to have care that they may not generally get otherwise, especially in, you know, you look at now, not even outside of a pandemic, but just trying to find a primary care physician. Right.

[00:19:30] So that was that was daunting. It was, yeah, it would and then we still had the whole federal side, right? And I still had, right, thankfully there was, you know, I had a counterpart on the federal side who was he led the federal team.

[00:19:42] And so I was able to come in and augment really kind of the opportunity around Republicans, Energy and Commerce Committee and, you know, it's kind of the Senate appropriations folks. And so it was really good opportunity to kind of stretch as far as I could.

[00:19:56] And to be honest, I thought I was a rubber band. I thought I couldn't stretch any further. And then and then, of course, I take a job at Qualtrics and I and now I stretch even further down.

[00:20:05] So it's it has been a again, it's it's it was taking that step into kind of the unknown and saying yes and saying, I'm willing to try something new. And and what I've learned in that opportunity is that

[00:20:22] you can always you go stretch a little bit further. You can. So just one more question. I'm going to hand it back to Maggie. So what and because in your current role, I think you're over your head of government relations. So you're overseeing both.

[00:20:36] So boy, that was great training that you had the opportunity to do that. And what have you, you know, Maggie and I have our theories on what the difference is, what have you seen or what's the difference between federal and state lobbying? You know, I think that

[00:20:55] I think I said a little bit earlier, you know, you have to be incredibly prepared on the state side to to hit it and get it done. You know, you're starting what? October, November to get bills prepared for filing deadlines on some states.

[00:21:09] And you've got some states you've got 30 days, some states 45. I mean, any of the states as you guys are aware, you know, they have year round legislatures. Those filing deadlines come real quick. And it's it comes very quickly.

[00:21:22] And you've got to be prepared, you know, the federal side, you know, it could take years for a piece of legislation to get done. But as you know, as soon as that opportunity is there and if you have not done your research, you have not done your homework,

[00:21:34] you have not done the due diligence to get something done, it will not show up in a bill. It will not be passed. It will not get up into appropriations. It will not be in an authorizing bill because you haven't done the legwork, right?

[00:21:45] And so it's it's the long game, I feel like on the federal side, that really in playing that and being prepared always to when that point comes. Whereas on the state side, it's like you have to be every year as a new opportunity

[00:21:58] and if the bill doesn't pass or if it, you know, if the legislature is dying before it gets across the finish line, you're already got it ready to go. You kind of build on that momentum and you go back at it, right? So I think it's different.

[00:22:13] It's the same race force, but a different, you know, it's like the preakness in the in the Belmont stakes, right? Like it's just different races, right? You're still trying to do the same thing. Got it. Makes sense. Maggie. Jordan, tell us about Qualtrics.

[00:22:28] I believe that you joined, I think about eight months ago, if I remember correctly and how is the first season been? I assume that you are applying your preparedness skills and also your ability to juggle a lot as you build more of a larger operation over there.

[00:22:52] But tell us about Qualtrics, what the company is and how the first swing has been. Yeah, absolutely. So to give everybody a primer around what Qualtrics is. So everybody who listens to this podcast is definitely interact with Qualtrics.

[00:23:09] And I guarantee you just don't know you have either from the from doing a research, you know, opportunity at a university. If you were an undergrad or graduate school, you probably used a Qualtrics platform to kind of conduct research. Or if you, you know, if you use a

[00:23:29] if you interact with any force about any 4500 company when they send you a survey, that's probably a Qualtrics survey that they're receiving back so that they can do better understanding of what their their experience management looks like. But, you know, ultimately, Qualtrics is the leader and creator

[00:23:44] of experience, the experience management category in technology. And what I mean by that is that we're just a cloud native software platform that empowers organizations to deliver kind of exceptional experiences and build deep relationships with their customers and their employees.

[00:23:59] You know, and that that platform that it is, it focuses on collecting, organizing and understanding the most important data that's relative to customers and its employees. And so if your business can better understand what drives their customers to take action or what they flock to

[00:24:17] or what the committee or what needs to be tweaked, you know, that better puts that company in a position to be more human centric and make better focuses on, you know, retention, loyalty and overall satisfaction, right? And so that's kind of what the company has evolved into, right?

[00:24:35] Is how do we make how do we empower our customers to be the most engaged? How do we let companies then turn around and send that feedback and then make actionable decisions that benefit their customers? Right. And if you push that to a public sector idea

[00:24:51] is now we're talking about government, you know, state, federal, local governments. Our customers are the citizens that we interact with, right? And how do we take government to think like the commercial side of the business here and how do we get government to better understand, to take data?

[00:25:08] I mean, all of this unsilow data that any customer has. You know, if you think about a call center and we've all interacted with a call center either at a federal or state or local level at some point, right?

[00:25:20] You know, the state and local probably the DMV is probably the first thing that comes to mind for most folks, right? But all that data that comes in, you know, if you're not taking that data and collecting that data

[00:25:30] and then organizing it so that you can actually get a common operating picture of what that data is telling you, oftentimes it just gets siloed and there's one system and then it doesn't interact with another system. Right? And so we're trying to help government

[00:25:45] at the macro level take all this data and make better decisions and then create feedback loops, right? You know, that survey data that you get for how you interacted with the DMV or how you interacted with the Department of Medicaid, that feedback loop goes back to the department.

[00:26:01] The department goes, wow, we didn't do a great job here. Oh, man, we're doing really good here, but we can improve this part. But then also, how do you take that the next step and take that feedback loop to the legislature

[00:26:14] and the legislature who provides funding for that Medicaid or that DMV? And then. You create a circle of continuing oversight and feedback and then it allows for government to make decisions based off of all of that data.

[00:26:30] So that is what Qualtrics does at its core, is trying to create those opportunities so that customer service and employee engagement are the most. Are the most. I would say the most culturally focused thing that people think about.

[00:26:44] And so and I think when you talk to members of Congress and you talk to state legislators and you talk to mayors and you talk to county supervisors, they don't know where to start. I mean, the agencies are trying to their best,

[00:26:57] obviously with funding resources and in shortfalls that we've got. You know, we obviously coming out of the pandemic, we had huge windfalls, which was great, but now with no federal money to prop up some of these states

[00:27:11] and we're kind of we're starting to see some of that austerity come back in. And so I think that how do states become efficient? How do they take the technology platforms that they have and either make them work together and make them interoperable?

[00:27:26] Or how do they make them, you know, get rid of them and start to fresh? And so I think that's the point where we find ourselves in Qualtrics is trying to help the government at all levels work best for its citizens. So you've always been a quick study.

[00:27:42] I think that's one of your secret strengths. And that's probably why you're able to stand up so quickly at Qualtrics. Can you share with us? And I will say your quick study, because I think the night that your

[00:27:57] your final interview at Qualtrics, I think I taught you how to play pickleball in Lexington and you're definitely a quick study on pickleball. The ladies that I play with could could attest to that. But could you share, you know, your decision to enter the military?

[00:28:13] And I think that quick study probably comes from excellent training that you received there, but just your decision to serve what motivated you to pursue that part of your life and how you are still involved

[00:28:28] and and how you juggle all that with this very large job that you have now. I think it had been a three part question, but just that piece, that piece of your your life. Yeah, so I. You know, I. Yeah, I I went to the University of Florida.

[00:28:48] You know, I lived two blocks down from the ROTC building right on campus, right? I walked by that campus, that building on campus every day. And there wasn't a single day in my life that I said, man, I want to join the army.

[00:29:01] And you know, so to back up, you know, I have. I'm one of three kids and my family. I have an older sister, but I have a twin brother. And so my brother, Jacob, you know, he, you know, he we went to separate high schools

[00:29:17] for, you know, my brother was in a choral program and I was gifted and wanted all these other classes. And so it's different schools. And so we had a very different experience growing up, you know, just because of the schools and the activities that we were in.

[00:29:30] You know, my brother just didn't love school. That wasn't his thing. And so he knew that he was joining the military. I mean, the day that he graduated, he was going to the military.

[00:29:39] And so he ended up joining the Air Force and, you know, he's 19 years into his career. He's getting to soon to wrap up. And we, you know, I never thought of it. And I took that.

[00:29:51] So I talked earlier, I talked about that, the role where I worked for my fraternity and I traveled around the country. And, you know, when you're on the road by yourself for two years, I mean, I spent 300 of the days of the year at 22 and 23 years old

[00:30:04] by myself, you know, that was probably the best job that I could have had at that point in my life because I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do. Right. Of course, law school was where I ended up going.

[00:30:16] But I can remember the day that I was I was on I 70 driving from Western Kansas back toward Kansas City. And I you drive right by Fort Riley and Marshall Airfield is on the left is your driving back.

[00:30:31] And I sat kind of just driving by and I looked at it. And I just remember the moment I just like I got that I got the you get your calling, right? I got I feel like I got the calling.

[00:30:41] I feel like I maybe I wasn't doing something right in my life. And I remember I called my parents to talk to my dad first. And my dad was, you know, my dad, you know, he's a rough redneck and farming and, you know, I love my dad.

[00:30:55] But, you know, he was like, yeah, that's great. It's a great idea. And then I called my mom because she was going to be the one that was going to give me the well, do you really want to do that? You know, your brother does it.

[00:31:04] Is that your thing? And, you know, I talked to her for 30 minutes on the drive. And and she was like, you know, she was super supportive. She's like, you know, maybe that's what you want to do instead of go into law school.

[00:31:16] Or maybe and and I remember I spent this whole time being like, but I want to do both. Like, how do I do this? And I mean, of course, you know, you talk about being a quick study. I read everything I could about obviously the active duty component.

[00:31:30] And I really found out about the National Guard. I didn't know a whole lot around the reserve components of the army and the military in general. And so I got really in depth and I realized very quickly that I could, I could do both.

[00:31:43] And now the recruiting slogans will always tell you that it's, you know, one week in a month, two weeks in the summer. Right? That's the kind of the recruitings. If you're doing the army correctly, that is not how it does it.

[00:31:56] I mean, if you're just if you're just there, if you're just there to sustain and to be there, sure. But if you are, you know, if you're actively engaging in leadership, if you're promoting and you're doing the things and the hard jobs

[00:32:10] that you need to one, be prepared when we deploy and to augment those of those active duty forces, you are not doing this one week in a month, two weeks a year. Right? And so that was kind of the great, the point.

[00:32:26] I think I was like, I'm going to do this. And I got to law school that first year and I was like, I'm going to do it. I remember I mean, I enlisted on January 28th, 2010. That was the day I remember the date.

[00:32:38] Well, I have to know it because the army makes me know it. But you know, that was the date that I enlisted and I was going to go to ROTC. And I was like, I'm going to do this. I went to basic training that summer.

[00:32:48] And unfortunately, my mom passed away right before I left to go to basic training. And so that was a really hard kind of like losing mom. And then you're just going, right? And you don't really know what you're going into.

[00:32:59] And, you know, hundreds of thousands of men and women have gone through the training like that. I mean, millions if you count all the other branches, right? So it wasn't like I knew I was, you know, but you just don't know what's on the other side.

[00:33:11] And I jumped in, did it, came back. And the hardest part was that I ended up having to miss the next semester of law school because we got, we graduated too late. You know, there was about a sickness in our platoon

[00:33:26] and we got held back about two and a half weeks. And by the time I actually graduated and got back to Jackson, it was really already two weeks into the semester. And so we couldn't really start back. And so. But that allowed me to, you know, again,

[00:33:41] I worked on the campaign with with Lynn Fitch at the time and helped her get elected. And that allowed me to go get integrated into my units, down at Camp Shelby, Mississippi. And so I was able to start really learning the army.

[00:33:55] And so I was afforded that opportunity. You know, in my current role, you know, let's see what is that 15, almost 15 years later, 14 years later. You know, I became an officer. I never ended up going to ROTC because they couldn't contract.

[00:34:12] So I ended up going through the officer candidate school in the Army National Guard deployed in 2018, was gone for about 13 months, came back and picked up where I left off with my job with working with a government contractor and lobbying for them.

[00:34:29] And you know, at that point, I was like, I want to take the next step in leadership. And I wanted to, I want to, I want to take company command and I want to lead an intelligence company. Some military intelligence officers, I want to take command.

[00:34:40] And there wasn't the opportunity in the Guard to do that. So I ended up transitioning over the Army Reserve. And if there's one thing about, and the real difference that most listeners won't know and the nuance of it is that, you know,

[00:34:52] the Army National Guard is a very localized force. You stay in your state typically and folks travel from out of state to other states, but it typically you drill close to home. Well, when you join the reserve, it's a national reserve. And it's actually an international reserve.

[00:35:06] I mean, you can be in units and, you know, I live in DC, but I could have been in Washington state or I could be in Guam or I could be in Germany if I really wanted to. Now that doesn't make a whole lot of sense,

[00:35:19] but you know, I did it. So I ended up taking command in Chicago. So every month I traveled to Chicago for, you know, to command a unit. Then I was, you know, when I finished command I went to Los Angeles

[00:35:31] and that was an unit for Los Angeles for the last two years. And so now I'm actually close to home. I'm currently at a unit for Belvoir, Virginia, which is only about 20 miles south of DC, which is very lovely. But I'm in a role as an inspector general.

[00:35:46] And so I was given the opportunity to jump into a role that really is meant to be the most impartial and objective person in the military. You know, we provided violence and oversight to our one-star and higher level commands on like the, you know,

[00:36:03] on how to be relevant and timely and efficient and to create good order and discipline across the unit. And so my role is ultimately to be the eyes, the ears and the conscience of the commander that I work for. And so, you know, that's oftentimes people coming in

[00:36:20] and giving them, you know, the biggest problems or their concerns or their fears about their command and they don't want to tell their command because they're, and so it's my job to want to investigate if there's impropriety. It's my job to do investigations around

[00:36:33] if there's policy or if there are actual training issues. You know, one of the biggest inspections that I've done in my career so far is really around, I've worked for a transportation unit and you know, this is a, there's what 7,000 soldiers in this unit.

[00:36:52] We've come out of COVID and you know, there's the Army Drivers Training Program and that has a commander's program, which means that the highest level commander in that unit, that's their program and they have to push down to their levels, just driving, right? Military driver's license of vehicles,

[00:37:07] making sure that you're training on them, right? Well, guess what? In COVID, nobody was going to drills in person. A lot of it was virtual and if they were going in person, they weren't driving their vehicles and so much of the Army fell out of the requirements.

[00:37:23] And so we did an investigation and found that 90% of the unit wasn't doing their training requirements they were supposed to. And so that immediately affects, we have to stand down the entire unit. That means we're not ready, we can't send that unit to combat if we needed to

[00:37:39] because they're not trained correctly. We don't know the level of, outside of those who are new to the unit, we know that they've never trained, right? And so it was a huge undertaking to make sure that this commander understood the ramifications to help them

[00:37:53] make the decision to stand down a unit or an entire 7,000 soldiers which makes up 128 units below, right? It really was a great opportunity in the military to say this saved lives from training but it also was a really hard decision

[00:38:09] and helped ultimately ensure the readiness of our forces that were able to go down range because of it. So I hope that answers your question by the way Maggie. No, it does and I truly do. I stand in awe of you and everything that you take on

[00:38:26] and how you juggle it so beautifully, how you find the time to serve our country while doing this work, it's just, it's very admirable. So I have one final question. You talk a lot about risk and you talk a lot about not knowing what's on the other side,

[00:38:46] how do you make that decision to just go for it? I think that would be helpful for anyone at any level of their career to just know if it's an inherent confidence or curiosity, but how you feel empowered to walk through those doors? That's such a great question

[00:39:06] because I think that there's so many different ways to go but I'll tell you the way that I have been very fortunate that in my career, I've always made sure that I find a mentor or somebody that I can trust pretty quickly. I mean, I've been very lucky

[00:39:24] just about every place that I've landed either on the hill or as a lobbyist or working with trade associations, meeting Maggie Mick, I mean, finding people that you can ask questions and generally get to know what you might be going into because ultimately it's an individual experience, right?

[00:39:49] You don't know until you know it and I've always tried to put myself in a position that I'm getting as much information before I make the leap. And then ultimately you make that, you just, I'm a firm believer that doors open for a reason

[00:40:05] and doors shut for reasons. And I think that when they do shut, it's very quickly going, all right, which way do I go? And then because once that door shuts, right? Most people don't have a second plan. They're like, I'm doing this, right?

[00:40:23] And I'm very fortunate to have a group of people that have been very, maybe successful. I have a wife who we've been together for, we've been together now for 16 years who is a huge cheerleader for me, but also she's actually much smarter than I am.

[00:40:38] And so she also has this wealth of wisdom that is very helpful too. And so between kind of the, as we would call it in the army, I've got household six, she leads the household and then I've got a group of friends.

[00:40:53] I've been very fortunate to have people that helped me to make those decisions and take risks when need to. And I try my best now to be that mentor. I mean, there's not a day and Jim can tell you this

[00:41:04] and then I know Maggie from your experience too, like none of us gotten these roles by ourselves, right? You know, we, every single person that does what we do had somebody help them make the first move or help them get that next job or,

[00:41:18] and so I am a firm believer that if you never say no to somebody asking for coffee, never say no to somebody who's like, hey, let's grab a drink after work and let's talk about this or let's make sure

[00:41:30] that you're squared away and that you know all the things that you're, what you can know about the next opportunity because I think that that's what makes our world, our government relations and policy world such a great world is that,

[00:41:46] we're all trying at the end of the day trying to look out for each other. We may not agree on most things, but we're ultimately trying to make sure that people are successful, that they're supported and they have the mentor and mentee opportunities that they can give.

[00:42:02] Yeah, Jordan, I couldn't agree more. Always saying yes and- Always say yes. Yeah, and you should do it because it's the right thing to do but also, you know, you're just, people end up in places that you just can't ever imagine

[00:42:18] and so it's always the right thing to do and it can be helpful, but yeah, no, I think you're right. Jordan, this has been great. So great to have this chat and really enjoyed hearing about your story and Maggie, thank you for suggesting having Jordan on

[00:42:40] and for our listeners out there, we will see you next Monday. And in the meantime, you can follow us on X, follow us on Instagram, follow us on Facebook. You can sign up for our weekly email at thePoliticalLife.net and we will see you next Monday. Thank you.