Coast Guard, Character Leadership, and Box Turtles with Vice Admiral (ret) Sandra Stosz

Welcome back to Environmental Professionals Radio, Connecting the Environmental Professionals Community Through Conversation, with your hosts Laura Thorne and Nic Frederick! 

On today’s episode, we talk with Retired Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz, servant and author about Coast Guard, Character Leadership and Box Turtles.   Read her full bio below.

Help us continue to create great content! If you’d like to sponsor a future episode hit the support podcast button or visit www.environmentalprofessionalsradio.com/sponsor-form 

Showtimes:
1:29 Nic & Laura Discuss Box Turtles
9:12 Interview with Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz Starts
16:40  Coast Guard
24:39  Character Leadership
28:22  Coast Guard & Environmental Stewardship
40:58  Box Turtles

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This podcast is produced by the National Association of Environmental Professions (NAEP). Check out all the NAEP has to offer at NAEP.org.

Connect with Sandra Stosz at https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandra-stosz-584a652b/

Guest Bio:

Admiral Sandy Stosz started out in the US Coast Guard as an ensign serving aboard polar icebreakers, conducting national security missions from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Her forty-year career was filled with leadership lessons gleaned while breaking ice and breaking glass as the first woman to command an icebreaker on the Great Lakes and to lead a US armed forces service academy. Along the way, Sandy served for 12 years at sea, commanding two ships, and led large Coast Guard organizations during times of crisis and complexity. She finished her career as the first woman assigned as Deputy Commandant for Mission Support, directing one of the Coast Guard’s largest enterprises. She has lectured widely on leadership, and has been featured on CSPAN and other media outlets. In 2012, Newsweek’s “The Daily Beast” named Sandy to their list of 150 Women who Shake the World. She volunteers in leadership roles for several organizations, including serving as a trustee for the Coast Guard Academy Institute for Leadership and as chair of the Coast Guard Academy Sailing Council. She is the author of Breaking Ice & Breaking Glass: Leading in Uncharted Waters.

Music Credits

Intro: Givin Me Eyes by Grace Mesa

Outro: Never Ending Soul Groove by Mattijs Muller

Transcript

Transcripts are auto-transcribed

[Intro]

Laura 
Hello and welcome to EPR with your favorite environmental nerds Nic and Laura. On today's episode, Nic and I discuss box turtles, Nic's favorite. Hey, we interviewed Sandra Stosz, Vice Admiral US Coast Guard retired about the Coast Guard, character leadership and box turtles. So no wonder where we got our segment idea from because Nic couldn't handle it. I talk to Sandy with out him

Nic
Yeah, that's true actually. That's 100% true.

Laura
And finally, in case you were wondering, emos, emos. Not emos, that's a different thing. Emus can't walk backwards. Maybe Emos can't either. Maybe that's why they're sad.

Nic 
Yeah, they only walk forward and with their head down. Yeah.

Laura 
Hit that music.

[NAEP Event News]

Nic  
Please join NAEP for their next happy hour with leadership on Wednesday, March 9 2022 at 430 Pacific. This is an "ask us anything" so topics are expected to be open discussion and provide opportunities for catching up with friends as well as checking in to see what's happening at NAEP. The information is available  at www.naep.org. We appreciate all of our awesome sponsors and they are what keep this show going. If you'd like to sponsor the show, please head on over to www.environmentalprofessionalsradio.com and check out the sponsor form for details. Let's get to our segment.

[Nic & Laura Segment]

Nic
So yeah, okay, well, we're here what was how was your interview? I? I can't believe she mentioned box turtles in her thing, and I didn't see it.

Laura 
Oh, You didn't see it in her write up?

Nic 
Not, not until I was writing the questions up and I'm like damn.  It wouldn't change anything. Like I couldn't have like mystically change times.

Laura 
No, she. She's great. I talked to her on the phone before about I don't know Tim introduced this and I had already chatted with her on the phone and that's I was talking to her about books though at that point. She was very kind and telling me about how things she how she went about writing her book and stuff. And then I just felt bad because I hadn't actually read her book yet. I had all this travel and all this intention, I bought it they haven't read it and I was gonna order some signed copies for but I haven't got like I wanted to write down at the few women that I wanted to send it to and I haven't even done that yet. So I just the podcast came around. I was like, damn it I haven't read it, she's gonna know it. All this travel I had I totally thought I would read stuff, but I didn't.

Nic 
Isn't that funny how it works. You just you know, where does the time go? You have all this time? Yeah.

Laura 
Well to like, you know, I was traveling with Jessica and we talked a lot. We were planning our business. So like, intensions just went elsewhere. I went on the helicopter tour instead of sitting around on my butt reading a book.

Nic  
Yeah, Alright, don't rub it in

Laura
Hey you were just there.

Nic
Yeah, I could go. I could go get one right now. Yeah.

Laura 
So anyway,  her interview was great. She did a good job like purpose intentionally mentioning environmental work that the Coast Guard did so that it was relevant. She's really nice personality.

Nic 
That's cool. That's good. That's good for podcast by the way.

Laura 
Yeah. And then the the turtles so like, I mean, you'll hear it but she just has this love of box turtles. I can't remember already where it started, but her and her husband actually have spent time rescuing some box turtles from development so but she doesn't really know a lot about them. So like I think she kind of mentioned she would be interested in talking to you to learn more about what you know about box turtles.

Nic 
Oh man. What don't I know. Let me tell you. Actually, I can tell you some fun things though. Box turtles are basically,

Laura
Wait,  this could be our segment. Is this our segment?

Nic
I think so. Yeah. I think this is it. Box turtles are people like it just like that's the way I like to think of it like they have about the same lifespans. They have the same like diet to a degree they just eat everything. You know, and some of them like certain things more than others. I think the strangest thing when I was working with them is that they have personalities I had just I don't know why I didn't think that would be the case because it's the case but like all animals and I just like these are all the same

Laura
That's the same thing Sandy said.

Nic
I mean it's just is stunning because you'll see like and there's different kinds. Some of them are like so so box turtles can actually are one of the few turtles that can actually close all the way up. And they can completely hide

Laura
Oh like Bugs Bunny. Okay.

Nic
Yeah. You know, like, I'm out and technically, I guess technically the tortoise is because they don't go they're not like water, water things. I think that's the nerd. That's the thing I didn't need to say Thanks, Nic. But so they can completely close up right. But despite that, when they're actually pressed with a scary situation, they react differently. Some of them will just go like, Oh crap, and go away. But some of them are like, You'll never take me alive. You know, I'm defiant. You know, and they're, like, try to bite you. And it's the craziest thing in the world. You know, and there's all those ranges in between, right? And so they all have different things, some of them because we were actually tracking box turtles like seeing where their movements were and like one of this one guy is just like I'm a boss, you know, and he's just rolling through this wetland. And he would pick whichever side I went in, he would pick the other side and so the he was on my crap list and just but like he was also like this huge male, just huge, and he was just like, you know, living his

Laura
Huge?  How big is huge for a box turtle?

Nic
Oh, so like, maybe not quite the size of my head. He was probably like, Okay, that's it. I just I just showed Laura on a podcast medium. What it is, but yeah, it kind of like a little bit smaller in size like a normal person's head. I would say, you know, just

Laura 
Okay. And so like the average size is like the size of my hand?


Nic  
Yeah, well, so size of your hand Yeah, yeah, like for the females in particular is probably, it won't be much longer than that. But like, yeah, they're a little wider than your hand. Probably. As an adult. I don't know. It's funny like they do this. They're supposed to have depth perception that some turtles don't have you know, where they can tell where ledges are so like it's hard to catch them in like drop traps because they're like, they basically look at it and they go okay, that's that's not safe. It's just a such a funny thing because they're, they're so slow, right? They're not quick, but like they'll you'll see them try to eat and just like, I'm gonna get you.

Laura  
Oh, I really wish people could see the turtle faces you're making right now.

Nic 
I know. I know. It's just like, it's so funny to watch them. It's like that Zootopia thing. You know what this is like where the sloth is at the DMV. It's that kind of thing. You're just like, This is hilarious. You guys, you know, even when

Laura 
I knew somebody who had a bunch of them growing up, like I guess once you are in love with Box turtles, you're just in love with Box turtles. Like oh, don't they live like forever. So how do you how do people take care of them?

Nic 
So okay, well, there's a lot of misinformation about box turtles. Right? So there's so again, people think that they're especially they're like people, right? If somebody was like, Alright, I've got you now for the rest of your life. Here's a bunch of salad. You're gonna get mad and then you're gonna die because you're not you're only eating salad, right? Like you don't get enough nutrients. But people don't understand that and just like here's some lettuce, it seems fine. He's not moving a lot but that's the turtles do right? And they end up dying. And so that's like a. And ironically, box turtles in North Carolina. You are not allowed to own one, which is illegal because they are wild animals. You can own a tiger, but not a box turtle, which is the weirdest, you've gotta love laws. Isn't that crazy? So usually, when people have turtles they are not box turtles, they're usually like Egyptian tortoises or some other kind of tortoise, then again, you can just own from elsewhere. You can own turtles no problem. But yeah, they're always they're always picky. They're really picky. They want variety. They want all kinds of, you know, experiences in life. It's kind of a funny thing. Yes, they have a bubble that they like to stay in generally, especially the females, but what they do on a day to day basis is different. So they just kind of like to be you know, unique.

Laura 
So what you're saying is don't have a box turtle as a pet.

Nic 
Right? Yeah. that's what I'm saying. And, yeah, I don't know what your friend was doing, but it's probably not a good idea to have. Yeah, and turtles will outlive you like so what are you going to do when you die.

Laura 
yeah,

Nic 
What are you gonna do with it? Who's gonna take it when you die? And you know, do they know how to care for it and all that. They also get like respiratory infections, they get lung infections, you know, it's you got to really take care of them. You can't just throw them in a box and be like this is cool. They'll be fine. Because right, so it's more complicated than people think. So

Laura 
Awesome. Well, let's get to our interview with Sandy.

Nic
Cool.
 
[Interview with Vice Admiral (ret) Sandra Stosz Starts]

Laura
Welcome back to EPR today we have Sandra Stosz, Vice Admiral, US Coast Guard retired on the show. Admiral Sandy Stosz is an experienced senior leader who has served and operated in the military, maritime, Homeland Security, transportation and academic sectors. She started out in the Coast Guard as an ensign serving on polar icebreakers, conducting national security missions from the Arctic to the Antarctic, so crazy awesome. Her 36 year career was filled with leadership lessons gleaned with breaking ice and breaking glass as the first woman to command and icebreaker on the Great Lakes and to lead a US Armed Forces services ex service academy. She finished her career as the first woman assigned as Deputy Commandant for our mission support, directing one of the Coast Guard's largest enterprises. She was responsible for all facets of support for the Coast Guard's diverse mission set through oversight of human capital, lifecycle engineering and logistics, acquisition information technology, training and education and security. I'm so honored to have you here today. Sandy, so thank you for joining us.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz  
Thank you very much Laura. I'm honored to be here to speak with you today.

Laura 
Great, so I'm honored to have you here. Nic is very sad crying in his Mai Tais in Hawaii right now that he can't be here but he doesn't have access to Wi Fi wherever he's at right at the moment. So he'll be listening later. I'm sure wishing he was here. So I also want to give a quick shout out to Rear Admiral Tim Gallaudet, who was on the show a few months back for introducing us and that was episode 40. For anyone listening who might want to check that out. So let's get started. When I read your bio, I was just the first thing that caught my attention was the icebreaking because it sounds really intense. And just as a woman being in charge of something like that I can't even imagine so why don't you tell us a little bit more about what ice breaking is in and why it's done?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
That's a great question, Laura, because a lot of people don't know especially Coast Guard? Icebreaking? And it has a mission that the Navy used to do up until the 1960s or so. And the icebreaking fleet was turned over to the Coast Guard and the heavy polar icebreakers that go up to the Arctic and the Antarctic go up for two different reasons. And we still do missions in between. So if there is somebody that needs to be saved, we'll stop what we're doing and then make a search and rescue or whatever needs to be done. But in the Arctic, we do scientific missions. So we usually bring national science foundation members up, different scientists and the different science communities. They've got different projects they want to study in the Arctic. We had people everything from counting birds, to doing sediment core sampling, and ice samplings. Collecting specimens. So it was really really fun to have the scientists on board that was most of what we did in the Arctic and we certainly were also in the Arctic giving national security presence so keeping a United States presence up in those unclaimed or disputed waters, whatever word or term you might want to use in the Antarctic, which is the south pole for some people. People don't know that sometimes, which is okay. It's confusing. We do scientific research but also we resupply the big science station down there which is McMurdo. There's also Palmer station and many smaller stations that are now run by the National Science Foundation used to be the Navy which is why the icebreakers used to be part of the Navy's fleet. But we go down there and break a channel into McMurdo through the ice normally about 20 miles of annual ice that comes every year. Because certainly in Antarctica there is multi year ice. There's the glaciers that ice comes down but we go and we break the channel from with the one year ice so the supply ships can get in and they supply the science station down there so that the scientists can keep on going. We go down there and their summertime which is a winter time in the northern hemisphere. So it's not that cold it's well it can be summer, the Antarctic summer, it's daylight all the time and it's often right about freezing or 35 degrees. So that's relatively warm.

Laura 
Ok, it's not in the negatives, right?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
So we've been supplying and support the National Science Foundation which engages in amazing kinds of science. Everything down there. They go all over looking at odd formations that are left by the glaciers, the dry valleys. There are micro organisms that live down there. South Pole stations studies particles like neutrinos, Deep Space type stuff. They have all kinds of facilities down on Antarctica. So I think it's really an interesting scientific area that most people don't know about all the science research that goes on, down in Antarctica, which in the South Pole station in particular.

Laura 
Yeah, that's fascinating and what an interesting part to play in that. Getting

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Absolutely.

Laura
Someone has to do that, right.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
It was such a great way to start my career. I started my whole Coast Guard career coming out of the Coast Guard Academy, which is a college my first ship was to Glacier which was a polar icebreaker that went to Antarctica. And my second ship was the Polar Star which is still in service. And I went to the Arctic and the Antarctic on the Polar Star.

Laura 
Awesome. So how long are you on these ships for any of these types of missions?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
The deep freezes were about five months. And I'm sorry, a deep freeze, it's the name for the mission. Arctic every year so I was on deep freeze at three and deep freeze at five. So those are about five months because you have to go all the way to Antarctica and you stop in South Pacific islands, South America, Australia, New Zealand along the way. So it's a wonderful opportunity for a young person to serve their country while doing a I think a very worthy mission and to see the world a little bit so that was the south trips down to Antarctica. Then the Arctic trips are in the summertime, they were probably two or three months long. Now the range from the summertime, it was been two or three months up there and if it was a winter trip, about two months up there, a little harsher environment during that time.

Laura 
Yeah. And then so you're on the ships for a couple of months at a time. How do you, you're getting off the ship often are you stuck on the ship. How do you not get cabin fever?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz  
You know, it's interesting because you would think you would get cabin fever from being on a 300 or 400 foot ship for months on end. When you're going about your daily life you're have duties you're busy the whole time you're standing up on the bridge in my case driving the ship so you have exposure to the elements and you see all the scenery, the animals you get to see you feel like you're in a different world exploring a new world even though you're inside the ship a lot of the time because it's cold. And you do get to stop so when I went to the Arctic, we stopped. I think it was Unimak island that we stopped at and we got to see how people live there. We stopped in Prince Rupert over in British Columbia. Maybe we stop someplace in Alaska like Juneau and then go on down south. We stop in the South Pacific islands, South America and Australia, New Zealand. It's really quite an adventuresome opportunity for a person, the young person especially.

Laura  
Cool well let's talk about that. How did you decide to join the Coast Guard and what's an ensign? I'm not familiar with that. Start your career there.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
In the Coast Guard and in the Navy, we have a certain rank for our officers. So the Coast Guard is one of the Armed Forces. I was gonna say five but now we have the Space Force. So we have Ensigns and Lieutenant junior grades you got the chain all the way from Ensign to Admiral. In the Marine Corps, in the Air Force, in the army, you start out as a second lieutenant and you work your way up into a general officer. So this is the nomenclature. It's a little different for the services, but I got interested in the Coast Guard. This is a good story to tell because for context, it's all about opportunity and seizing opportunity when it comes. I was born for context in 1960. And by the time I was in high school getting ready to go into high school in 1972. We had Title Nine which was equal opportunity and education for women and girls. That meant that when I got to high school, there have been a couple of years of that and girls had sports teams that were actually assigned to a coach. They were treated the same as boys sports teams, which in the past you might have had a girl sports team but it was kind of ad hoc, maybe no coach permanently assigned. So then we had the Equal Rights Amendment 1973. And then in 1975, the Defense Appropriations Act signed by put into law by Congress and the President required that the service academies which the Coast Guard academies won the Naval Academy in Annapolis, West Point from West Point New York Air Force in Colorado Springs, Merchant Marine in Kings Point, those all were only men up until 1976,1975. The law was passed and the next year women girls had to be accepted. So I was a junior in high school when that happened in 1976, the first class of women entered and I was living in Ellicott City, Maryland and the Naval Academy's right down the road in Annapolis. And so I'd always been a tomboy. I've been raised with three brothers and my neighbor walked over a copy of the Baltimore Sun and she said to my mother look, Sandy's a tomboy. She might be interested in this new opportunity. And I was I was like, it's so exciting to be able to be part of something bigger than yourself. I know people say that a lot now but it's true young people I think are searching for something to be part of that makes them feel like they've got a purpose and the Coast Guard had these, the Navy had these great missions. And I applied and my guidance counselor who was also my swim coach, he took me aside and said, Look, Sandy, you can't put all your eggs in one basket. I know you're excited about the Naval Academy, but you've got to cast a wider net. So I he said look, I've got this brochure from the Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut. And we pored over that flyer. And between the two of us we decided it was a small Navy. And of course the Coast Guard's not a small navy.

We have much different missions. So we do missions like search and rescue, law enforcement, Marine Environmental Protection. Fisheries Enforcement is one of those law enforcement missions which gets into your topic of your podcast, all kinds of missions, and we do them every day whereas the Navy does a lot of training. We have big ships and small ships. We have aircraft, but we do we protect America, but we also push our forces overseas. So we have six brand new patrol boats over in the Persian Gulf, keeping America safe by pushing keeping us threats overseas. And we have 418 foot national security cutters patrolling in the South China Sea to maintain once again that that national security presence. So I didn't know all this at the time, but I applied the Coast Guard because it was an alternative and they get back to me right away. And my mother said, well take that bird in hand and I'm like, Okay, I will put in my acceptance and accept that appointment because the Naval Academy, it's political, so I had to get a nomination from my senator, and then get in the queue to be appointed. Meanwhile, the Coast Guard Academy didn't have a political congressional nomination process. So I was accepted on my merit. And I also found out later that the Coast Guard hadn't closed any doors to women. The Coast Guard Service Chief or Commandant equivalent of a CEO said, hey, if we're going to admit women, we're going to do it right. We're going to offer them the chance to serve on the pointy end of the spear at sea in the air. So yeah, so the Naval Academy, meanwhile, put combat exclusion laws on women that lasted for decades that kept them away from serving in the most prominent front line positions, which of course, they couldn't necessarily may be promoted as quickly or as as high. And I had none of his obstacles at the Coast Guard at the Academy in in the Coast Guard. So I'm sorry that story was a little bit long, but I think it's a great story to tell for seizing opportunity and making sure you look around to not just get focused on one thing. Open your aperture, compare your options and look at what the alternatives offer which I didn't really do. I kind of lucked into the Coast Guard by chance. And was very fortunate to have that opportunity to serve 40 years with a organization that has noble missions, great core values and amazing people.

Laura 
Yeah, that's really awesome. No, I appreciate it, even though it was a long answer, but even just getting that overview of the Coast Guard and all the different things that it does, I think a lot of listeners probably don't know either. I know. I just learned a lot of stuff. So that's really great. So you join when were you still serving on ships with mostly men, you know, early on in your career, or is it is it still mostly men or how's it going now?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Well, I came in, in 1978. And I know that's really old for a lot of your listeners, but I'm part of history now. So there's some benefit to that. So when I came in, I was in the third class of women to enter the Academy. And so I couldn't escape being the first so I was the first and only woman on a number of my ships. And I chose a seagoing career. It was available and I was like excited to do something that other people couldn't do. And it was it was hard being one of the only women at times, but I've been raised with three brothers and I had gotten used to being the only girl with a bunch of boys running around with all their friends were over. You can imagine a house full of boys. So I found that there's power in being different. So I could go ahead and use that power because I wasn't uncomfortable with men. They were the ones off balance. So I found that if I went onto a ship and was a first or only woman, I could break the ice figuratively by putting them at ease and helping them understand what it was like to serve with a woman. So I think that that was a very important lesson for me to learn was that there's power and being different and it's not always just well, if you're the only woman minority things is going to be too hard. No, it can be looked forward to turn the tables you can find the opportunity in there too.

Laura  
Oh my gosh, I love that. The universe always gives us what we can handle right and so that you were equipped with what you needed. But I love the perspective that you were kind of breaking glass in a different way. Maybe the the men have the glass ceiling and not you, so so that's fantastic. So that's all really awesome. And I'm just I'm picturing it sounds so neat. I was get a little bit of jealous of some of my interviewees because I'm like, Oh, I wish I did that. That's really cool. You must have some moments though that may be challenging moments early on in your career that have kind of shaped who you are today.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Oh, most definitely. Holy cow. I mean, from the time I was a little girl, and I always start my talks regardless of the audience or the subject with core values because my book that you know about "Breaking Ice and Breaking Glass: Leading in Uncharted Waters" is about character centered leadership. And I came to find that during my time in the in the Coast Guard, leadership was all about character. There's all kinds of leadership out there. But if you're serving a greater purpose, you're part of the government and you're serving the people and there are taxpayers paying your salary. You got to do everything with integrity. You got to have respect. You've got to devote yourself to your duty. So the core values are really important. And when I was young, I had some hard times that built those core values and helped form my character. And my parents were strict with us kids and I learned humility and honesty from them because one time I I know this was an environmental podcast, so I'll anger somebody but I'm gonna throw this in here. I stole a bird's egg out of a  bird's nest. Oh, and my mother saw it in my room. I was about seven. So a little girl and I love birds. And my mom says Where did you get this egg and I like found it on the ground. Well, she didn't buy that. And so the truth came out that I taken the egg out of a nest and I got in trouble and I I was embarrassed. I was in trouble. I felt ridiculously awful because I loved animals and here I am taking a bird's egg because I needed to have it. Anyway, honesty and humility. And then I had a time when I was about 1314 and 15 that I worked on farm work up in Connecticut staying with my grandmother in the summers because it was during the 1970s when we had the oil shock and there were no jobs and no money for college. So I knew I had to work and I went up I worked on tobacco, a tobacco farm. Oh, wow. And it was really grueling. It was migrant labor. We had a lot of migrants from Puerto Rico. We had the most of our laborers were juvenile delinquent boys and girls who were staying in the UMass Amherst dorms during the summer. There were a few of us local girls and boys but they separated the girls and boys to do the the farm work. So it was really hard and you had to make your quota or you'd be fired. The quota is a certain number of leaves to pick or tobacco leaves to sow. And if you got more than your quota, you got more money that piece work for each additional piece. So I learned hard work and perseverance on the farms, laboring away in the sweat and he which I'm not sure many kids do nowadays. So my core values were formed in childhood and continued to serve me well all through my Coast Guard.  Whenever I encountered a hardship is either honesty and humility that sustained me day to day, or hard work and perseverance that got me through hard times.

Laura 
That's great. And I totally agree. Values are so important in helping you make your future decisions. Where do you want to spend your time where, what aligns with your values, what kind of company you want to be at what aligns with your values, all of that. So it's really great advice before we jump into some other things in your book, let's jump back and talk about a little bit about how the Coast Guard has been a leader in protecting the environment because I know you've done some fisheries work and you know, let's give them a little attention to the environmental work they do.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Oh sure. I'd love to so my career path on the Coast Guard was going to cutters and ships we call ships cutters in the Coast Guard. So I was assigned on for 12 years on different ships and we did fisheries law enforcement on a number of the ships I was on and I was the senior boarding officer or the person in charge of the boardings to go over in the Pacific Northwest. Let's say I was stationed on a ship out of Eureka, California and we enforced laws that derived from the Magnuson conservation and Fisheries Management Act of 19 I believe it was 76 and that was regulating fisheries stock and fishing on the west coast where you had foreign fishing vessels coming over to fish within the 200 mile Economic Zone exclusive economic zone. So there's all this interesting legalese that goes into fisheries enforcement, but it's all about trying to protect the fish some of them being an additive species and keep the stocks healthy for the future. And if you didn't have those kinds of regulations, there are technologies that would take every fish from the sea. So my job for years was to go out on ships on a particular ship that I was stationed on in Eureka, California and go out for a month. At a time and board foreign fishing vessels board. We had a joint venture operation at a time where US fishing vessels that were smaller would drag from fish usually midwater trolls for whiting and hake and they would transfer those cod ends of their nets up onto the foreign fishing vessel, which was a processing ship, say 3 or 400 feet. In my day they were from Russia and Poland. And they would process the fish right there on the ship, take them back to their countries. And we'd also enforce the salmon fisheries up and down the coast. We would do all the fisheries and it was a lot to learn. We work with NOAA, the National Marine Fisheries Service would come along sometimes on our ships because they were the real experts and helped us to learn more about the complicated and ever changing rules that govern fishing. So that was the big one that I was involved with. And I'm passionate about that to this day, because I believe that the fish stocks are very vulnerable. But oil pollution is another one. And during the Exxon Valdez back in 1989, or during Deepwater Horizon when we had those spills, the Coast Guard was front and center and the response to those spills. So we certainly respond when there's a spill but more importantly, and people don't know about this. The Coast Guard has got a very strong prevention mission where we work hard to prevent oil spills, and we are very regulatory organization. So that's something you won't find where the rest of the military, we regulate industry. We inspect offshore structures, and to make sure that we do all we can to keep vessels from discharging to make sure that pipelines are secure. So I think that's a really noble mission to in environmental protection.

Laura 
Absolutely. I do know from my days and doing ambient water monitoring in Tampa Bay that anytime there's a sunk boat or something in the harbor you call the Coast Guard so they come in and check it out I guess.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz  
Yes, Exactly. We also do that scientific research support mission on the polar icebreakers that I talked about earlier.

Laura 
Very cool. So yeah, so those of you listening if you are interested, the Coast Guard is another avenue for environmental positions, and they're doing some very important work, the Exxon Valdez so I've actually been to Valdez, which I never place I never intended to be at but I had the opportunity to go once and it's beautiful. And I can't imagine an oil spill up in that area. And so you were there part of that cleanup, right? And then there's a story in your book and there's something to do with socks. So how does Socks play a part in the Exxon Valdez?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Oh dear. So now we're getting into what could be a longer story that I'll try to keep a little bit shorter in 1989 when the Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster happened, we didn't yet have the laws in place and exercised that would dictate who cleans up an oil spill. So Stafford Act was just had just been put in place and what that does is it assigns responsibility for different parties when there's a big environmental disaster like an oil spill. So Exxon wasn't liable at the time to go clean up like they are today. Like what happened with Deepwater Horizon and BP was on the spot to do the cleanup. Now I know there was a lot there's all kinds of opinions of politics that go into there. So let's not get into that. But up in the Exxon Valdez area, somebody had to start cleaning and in taking care of the disaster. So I was a military aide to the Secretary of Transportation where the Coast Guard resided at the time now we're in Homeland Security. And Secretary Sam Skinner was wondering how the heck does the department and the Coast Guard, FEMA how people were going to respond and do some mitigation. And so he called in the COO chief operating officer of Exxon. And it was, I mean, with Lee Raymond, I always remember that name. And he came to Washington instantly from wherever he was, and they sat down in the office, just the two of them and I got to listen in on how they could work together to start to attack this problem. It was overwhelming for people in Valdez, their livelihoods were at risk for miles of oil covered coastlines. And so Mr. Skinner was saying, you know, we're looking at how we respond and government procurement, it would take forever just to get the workers on scene that are mopping beaches, the wool socks, they need to keep their feet from freezing. I forget what month of the year it was, but it was cold. Anyway, whatever month it was in the water and oil mixed together were freezing. So Lee Raymond said, I can have socks up there tomorrow, or whatever it was, because it was private sector. And so that sparked a great partnership and whatever people might think of Exxon, during that Mr. Raymond made sure that that he used the power of the private sector to get up there and start getting things done while the Coast Guard provided more of a coordination and on seeing control and interacting with the town's people and Valdez, and everything else that you would have to do to manage a big disaster like that. So yeah, that was all before you had the legal division of duties and the oil spill. Let's see oil, OPA 90 came of it. Oil Pollution Act of 1990. And the oil spill liability Trust Fund came of it and that was a trust fund that was started and was built into funded by industry so that when you had a big disaster, this trust fund could go and have a source of funds, because Exxon did put the money into clean up too and people don't know that they think they just don't know. And now you have a trust fund that supports the cleanup and of course, something as big as Deepwater Horizon had to have a lot more than just the Trust Fund. But it's a huge complicated topic. I hope I haven't taken too long trying to give a little bit of a story there.

Laura 
No, I think that's great. And I think if people would like to hear more, they can pick up your book and read, read more on the story. And so the title of your book is breaking ice and breaking glass leading in uncharted waters, which I think is a wonderful title was that easy to come up with? Or did you have to brainstorm that, or Where'd you come up with the title from?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
I tend to do no work on that at all, hardly. So what happened was I was a young lieutenant working for Secretary Skinner. So I was in my late 20s. And there were a few other young people in the office that helped him out. They did advance work for his trips. And one of them was my friend Shane. And so I was telling Shane one day, look at all that we get to do here in the front office with the secretary. We can look down on all of government, see how it works. We're getting all this opportunity. We're learning how to be leaders. I'm going to read a book Sunday, and my friend Shane knew that I had been one of the first and only women and going to see on polar ice breakers, breaking the ice. She said Sandy, you've got to call that book Breaking Ice and Breaking glass in 1990, the title of my book was predetermined by my friend Shane. Now the leading in uncharted waters part I did have held on I sent options out to friends and colleagues and ask their advice because I knew the first part, but I wanted to have a subtitle. So the leading and uncharted waters was the work of many minds coming together to come up with something that kind of followed on from Breaking Ice and Breaking Glass.

Laura 
Oh, that's a great story. Well, I love it. It came out wonderfully. So you talked a little bit about character leadership and what other things what aspects of character leadership are you describing in the book or what will people learn from picking it up?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
I think that one thing that seems to be catchy that people tell me they like is my three P's of power. So leading with character is all about doing the right thing, right being the kind of person that people want to follow. Because they they follow you because they want to not because they have to because of your position. So a boss of mine once told me Sandy, if you want to succeed in the Coast Guard, you have to know there's three kinds of power. There's personal power, professional power and position power. And if you're going to succeed you want to lean on the first two. That's the personal power and professional power and the position power only when you have to when you absolutely have to. And so personal power is your ability to motivate people and persuade people and empathize with them, maybe lots of stuff. But I'll just throw that out there. Your professional power is how you present yourself, how you treat other people, how you do your job, how hard you work, and then your position power is what rank you are. So you asked about what is an ensign and what's an admiral earlier on. So if you are a really good leader of character, you seek I believe, to build trust and earn respect every day through your personal power and professional power. And if you do that you're not going to very often if ever have to rely on your position power to order somebody to get something done. So I really tried to live that and see how often I can just use my position my personal power and professional power. keep messing that up. And try to persuade people motivate people try to build trust and earn respect, try to unite and strengthen people and not divide and weaken them and try to build everybody up so that everybody succeeds as individuals and as a team and as a Coast Guard so that all the goals are met not just let's get the service ahead or let's just get me promoted to the next job and you guys are going to do all the work and get me promoted. Everybody wins. Every person who works for you who gets training gets to go away to professional development programs, gets counseled on their performance so they know where they can improve. Every team gets a support it needs the tools it needs. What it needs to get the job done, and then you're serving your organization. So it's a virtuous cycle of everybody winning and if you're leading with character,

Laura 
Oh, I love it. That's really great and very powerful with the P's.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Yes. More P for power.

Laura
Well, thanks for explaining that. I think it's really great. I think what you're doing is great. Obviously you had a great career and just knowing you and talking to you. I believe that you walk the talk and everything that you say and do. But before I let you go we need to talk about turtles. As I mentioned before, Nic couldn't make it. He's in Hawaii, so we don't feel too bad for him. But he did do his graduate research work with box turtles. And he's very, very sad to be missing this conversation with you today. So what is your connection with turtles?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Well, my husband Bob and I just love turtles. And it started when I was a young kid. We'd be hiking. My parents took us all on hikes. I do think that's another thing that helped shape me. Being raised with three brothers were were athletes, active hiking all the time and you find turtles and snakes and my dad would help us kids learn how to pick up a black snake and then it wasn't dangerous, so we weren't afraid of them. And likewise with a turtle. Show us how you could you know look at a turtle and examine it. They're beautiful. The box turtles they all have a different pattern to them. So he would educate us on wildlife. And I love turtles because they have personality. So snakes don't really toads don't really frogs, no. Now, the Turtles have little personalities and they have little behaviors that are endearing. So I fell in love with turtles and not just box turtles, but sea turtles and water turtles of all kind and I also think it's cool that turtles are kind of a special animal and a lot of cultures. So when my husband and I were living in Falmouth, Massachusetts, and there's a new development going on right next to us where they're clear cutting five acres of forest that's pine box turtle habitat. So we worked with a developer and the town's Zoning Board of Zoning Board of Appeals to see if they could require and they did require a turtle protection plan for box turtles so that before they clear cut and bulldoze five acres of turtle habitat, we can try to save the turtles. So my husband Bob, and I would walk the property and we would find the turtles and we would place them outside of the turtle exclusion fence. If they had they put a perimeter fence around. We place them outside so they couldn't get back in because they'll go right back to where you found them. If you don't have a fence. So the developer installed the fence. They hired a turtle on environmentalist to look for turtles, but we live right there. So we hiked it every day and we placed turtles outside. So we felt like we did a good deed for the environment. And turtles are being bulldozed under everywhere. You look. Most people don't use travel protection plans. They just bulldoze away and what we noticed is on our property, we probably relocated outside the barriers about a dozen turtles, all females and the males range during mating season or all the time and they get hit by cars and the females don't so now it might not look like box turtles are that in danger. They're not considered endangered in Massachusetts. They're a species of interest or concern or whatever. But they're all females. There's not enough males to carry on the breeding, right. So thanks for giving me a chance to put in a plug about box turtles and some of the environmental challenges we face with with development.

Laura 
Yeah, absolutely. I mean do turtles burrow?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
They dig in for the winter, they'll find a soft part of earth under a log, they'll go down enough to get out of where they're going to get frost, you know, but they bromate so they don't hibernate. But yeah, they're really resilient, but they can dig in.

Laura 
Yeah. And that's challenging for developers too, when you can't find them very easily because I think sometimes they'll move them if they can see them. But if they don't, then they've you know, I didn't see it out of sight, out of mind kind of thing. But it's also just the complexity of it too. It's not as simple as just like moving all the turtles if they're all female is still a problem. So I think, you know, make a good point there, why we still need scientists and people to be working on these problems, because they're just not that simple.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
No. And once they're gone, they're gone. I mean, box turtles can live to I think, 75 to 100 years. So it takes, I believe I read this that takes 15 to 20 years before they're sexually mature. So it's not like a Robin or a squirrel, where you feel sad if you see one dead on the side of the road. But when I see a full grown box turtle, my heartbreaks, because that's 25 to 75 years.

Laura 
Yeah, that is very sad. We'll have to talk to Nic some more about turtles. So he can get his fill and I know that he knows a lot about them from his research. So thank you for sharing that. And thank you for doing that. I think we're out of time. I would love to keep talking to you for the rest of the day. But I know you have things to do too. So is there anything else that you know you wanted to talk about that we didn't touch on?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz 
Well, there's so much to talk about, but I really am thankful for the chance to talk about what the Coast Guard does to protect and preserve our natural resources and our environment. And there's more beyond what I mentioned. But we that's a big mission of ours and I think that it's important to have government agencies who are the stewards and protectors of our scarce natural resources. I don't usually get to talk about that, because I'm talking about other kinds of leadership but you gave me a chance to, to wrap in the environmental stewardship with the character centered leadership and thank you for doing that Laura.

Laura 
Awesome. We are happy to do that and provide this platform. And finally, if anybody would like to pick up your book or contact you, where should they go?

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz  
You can catch me at my website. It's easy. www.sandrastosz, all one word, .com. You got a place you can sign up for my newsletter, which is really just my weekly blog. I've got a blog called leading with character, a different character centered leadership topic every week. And you can get me on LinkedIn, get me on Facebook or Twitter, but the websites probably the best and sign up for my newsletter and you can also buy the book on the website. The book is all about giving back leadership lessons learned over my 40 years in uniform with the Coast Guard and I am giving back the proceeds. So my publisher cuts my royalty checks directly to the Coast Guard Academy Institute for leadership which supports developing cadets into leaders of character.

Laura 
That's really awesome. Thank you so much for sharing with us today. Sandy, I hope to talk to you again soon.

Vice Admiral Sandra Stosz  
Thank you, Laura.

[Outro]
Laura
That's our show. Thank you, Sandy for joining us today. I learned so much about the Coast Guard and I'm just super inspired by you. Please be sure to check us out each and every Friday. Don't forget to subscribe rate and review. Bye.

Nic
See you everybody.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai