CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Hi.
Interviewer: Hello, how are you?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Very good.
Interviewer: We got the internet working, I appreciate your time tonight. I’m going to. I have a few interview questions. I appreciate your time. And I just have about 10 questions and whenever you’re ready, we can, I’m just, I just like to go down through the questions and then after I’m done asking you these questions, I’ll be posting them, and editing them online. So, do you have any questions?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: No, I am ready though and you can use it to post it online. I mean you can use it for public use. And, you know, and I’ll get, I have the consent forms I’ll send to you.
Interviewer: Oh, great. Good. Thank you. Thank you again for doing that. My first question I’d like to start with is: What does leadership mean to you?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Well, you know, and I do have a list of the questions here as well, and I thought about this a little bit over the years Erika.
The way it’s worked for me with leadership, I always am under the philosophy that I do not like to have individuals do things that I would not do.
So, my main goal and leadership is to lead by example. But also, and so I tried to put that out there, and everything that I do. And everything that I do around leadership I’m talking about. So, leadership by example is it, is what defines me.
And, but it’s also and I, you may have heard this before, but it’s getting individuals to do things. But in such a way that they are very willing to do those. And so, you’ve got to be able to identify individuals’ strengths and weaknesses and know the way, a way to get to those strengths so that it can really help as a team.
So, it’s a leadership by example and knowing your team, and their strengths and weaknesses. So, you do have to be quite involved with the group that you’re involved with, or you get to really know the group that your involved with and develop the sense of trust between that group and yourself. So, that’s what it is to me.
Interviewer: Okay, great. Oh, good answer. Thank you for sharing that. Um. The second question I know you had that it says like:
What are your leadership positions and community roles you’ve held in the state of Maine?
I didn’t know if I could maybe get a list of the different positions and roles, but if you do have some, I know that I’ve had a few of those.
But yes. What are the different, what are the leadership positions and or community roles you’ve held in the state of Maine?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: There’s a number of different roles I will get a list to you, but I’ll state four or five different ones that I’ve had over the years.
Um, as far as on a civilian side. I’ve worked as a Career Center, Employment Counselor. Even though I didn’t lead individuals I handled a program.
When I initially started working with the state. So that was more of a manager of a program.
And people were coming to me, particularly around testing with the state because that role also included being that one of the state program testers for the state, it was more of an assessment thing where I actually myself.
For this state, it was more of an assessment thing where I actually myself. And one of my coworkers handled the state testing program, and individuals have coming to us to, to be trained for testing, employers were coming to us to use our program which is a general aptitude test battery. Very similar to the ASVAB for the military.
And we were the, my coworker and I we were the leads for the state for that. And like I said employers from all over the state individuals, other career counselors, from all over the state were coming to us to be trained, and we were the knowledge people on that.
Another thing with a state was towards the end of my career. I was the Veterans Program Manager for the state, which included taking care of a $900,000 state contract for the state of Maine, It was all around the veteran programs, and there were anywhere from 10 to 12 veterans program individuals that worked with that to these programs and I was the lead for that.
The manager and the lead for that for that program, it was a federal program.
I was also an Employment Training Specialist III which meant that when the employer, when the Career Center manager was gone, I was the Career Center manager for one of the top three Career Centers in the state which was in Bangor.
So, and which included supervising and managing up to, I would say probably, well, 10 to 12 individuals at the Career Center. So that, that was around the Career Center my civilian.
I also, as far as my military experience. I was in the end, I was the State Human Resource Advisor for the Maine Air National Guard, which was the, which included up to roughly 1200 Maine Air National guardsmen. So, anyways, I was a State Human Resource advisor advising the top military officers in the state, which was the Tag, the Adjutant General.
And on my way, as I progressed through my career. I held a number of different leadership positions around. Electrical Superintendent on deployments to First Sergeant’s for both Squadron level, and Wing level, etc. So, there was a number of different leadership opportunities for me in those positions.
And, third in this is minor but it actually is something that’s noteworthy at least to me. I was the first selectman for a small town in in Maine. Which was LaGrange and had about roughly 500 residents and the first selectmen in that town in that particular town, they didn’t have a town manager or anything, but in essence the first selectman was the town manager for that town, and I went from third selectmen to first selectman and did that for about four years.
So, so I’ve had experience as a civilian in my civilian jobs below 25 years had experienced in my leadership experience in my military role for 33 years total.
And then, also, as a community leader, with the first selectman role for four years. So those are just a few of the things. And I did deploy to quite often and was in different leadership roles for other things as well but those are just a few of them.
Interviewer: Okay. So, third question I have is through these leadership roles:
What valuable knowledge and skills have you learned as a leader that would help educate others and leadership positions?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Yes. There’s each one of those three, you know, major categories, between the civilian job military job, and the community leader position. There are different things that I got from each one of those.
One of the things, as far as a civilian job versus the military job, is that you really got to be open minded around any leader has to be open minded, particularly around civilians, because they bring to the table, individuals that you’re leading bring to the table, a sense of an ability to be able to. Well, it’s not as much of an ability but it’s just a different mindset from the military, but obviously in the military. You can tell people what to do.
And they have to listen to you, even if they don’t agree with you, they have to listen to you. And as a military leader. I always tried to do the best by the military, and like I said earlier that I always lead by example. So, I would really want anybody to do something unless I would do it myself.
But in the military, sometimes you have to. And so, you can get to that point where you just tell people what to do and they don’t like it but if you, they have to do it.
In a civilian environment you can’t do that so much because they have avenues, different avenues to be able to either work around you, or to are just sit back and not do it.
So, you have to really be open minded on how you want to approach military individuals, I mean, the civilian individuals versus the military.
So those are some of the things that are different in those roles. And then when you go to the community.
Community leadership position as a first selectman or even as a town manager, you really have to be listening to what those individuals are telling you, because it may not be something they might be telling you something that’s really passionate to them or something that’s really bothering them or, for some reason, it doesn’t have any effect on you, but you want to do best by your community. In those situations, so you have to really have an active listening ear to what they’re doing.
So, I guess, the bottom line to answer the question is, is that you have to really look at things differently depending on the leadership position you’re in, and the and the role that you have taken.
So that’s one of the big things is skill, and that’s just knowledge stuff. So, some of the skills that I’ve learned, which I felt that I have don’t have had some of these skills over the years is just be an active listener, an active listener is somebody that actually hears the individual, what they’re trying to tell you, and you respond back to them in a way that they know that you understand what they’re saying.
So that’s an active listener. And be open minded, you know, and don’t be afraid to, to say, you know, I’m I don’t understand what you’re getting at, but please help me understand. So that’s the that’s I guess those are some of the skills that I would have I learned to the end.
I think those are some of the key things. And one other thing, and which is I think major is that you’ve got to develop that sense of trust you, the individuals have to be able to have a sense of trust in you, and you have a sense of trust in them and be able to know what their strengths and weaknesses are, because as long as you know what their strengths and weaknesses are, you can use that trust to make sure that they feel like they’re part of the team and use that to make them feel like they’re part of the team go after their strengths. No matter how minor it might seem it, it is really important in helping develop that trust. So.
Interviewer: Thank you. That’s a good one with what people should be seeing in you and then what you, what others should be seeing in you and what you should be seeing them in order to create that relationship, which leads to the next question is: When did you realize you wanted to be a leader in your organization? When did you realize it?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: It’s strange because it’s not strange but I think it’s typical of any on the military side we’ll talk about first.
Whenever you see a supervisor that you’re leading, and you don’t agree with the way that they’re doing things.
And so, I realized I want to be somebody. I want to lead that person because that guy doesn’t know what he’s doing.
As one of the times in the military when I know that I could do a better job than they can.
As far as in the civilian side of it. It’s a little bit of the same truth there but also, it’s about being able to accept the fact that at some point, you don’t want to be at the bottom. At the bottom of the rung, you don’t want to be the one doing all the grunt work so to speak. You do want to be the one setting in, or I felt that I wanted to be the one sitting in the front office and being able to be an effective, be effective and understanding of how people that I’m leading.
Um, understanding of how people that are leading can get through some of the problems that they’re getting through. And, probably overall in the long run because of my childhood upbringing and being one of the oldest or the oldest male in the family within a family of a dysfunctional family with my mother and father split when I was young,
I always felt like I was helping out my, my whole family, my seven and eight brothers or sisters. So, I felt like I was developed, developing some leadership skills even at a young age.
So, um when did I realize that I want to be a leader in the organization? I guess it’s. As soon as I got in and did not like the way things are going.
Interviewer: Right.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Yeah.
Interviewer: Yeah. Had this. You kind of answered the fifth question with some of it is: How has your knowledge and experience helped you lead others in the state of Maine?
Is there an experience or something that you’d like to share that relates directly to that?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: I think it will go right to the military piece of this Erika because I always selected as the First Sergeant for Squadron level because of my leadership abilities.
And so, as a squadron First Sergeant individuals come to you for guidance and assistance, not so much about technical skills that they’ve learned in the military, but more about issues that they might be having between individuals within shops or even at home or family. So, I think, I think that some of my civilian job experience crossed over into the military, because I was, my civilian job, I was always helping people look for work or work around barriers around work and, and some of the barriers related right to family issues. So, um.
Interviewer: So, the next question was question number 6: What are the most effective leadership skills that you apply while leading others in an organization?
Or are some skills that you should be aware of while leading others in an organization. So, basically, effective ones but also not effective ones that you’d want to be aware of.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Well, I will tell you I think you have to develop a sense of trust with the team that you’re leading. If you don’t have that sense of trust then it, it’s not going to be a real productive team.
And so, the teams of the individuals that you’re leading have to be able to trust you, you have to be able to trust them. So that’s one of the things and to develop that trust is that.
To me, it’s around that lead by example you know, I can show somebody that I can climb to the top of 150-foot telephone, our communication pole and even though, you know it’s been 20 years since I’ve done that.
I would do that just to develop some trust with the shop and did that when I was deployed because I was asking them to go out.
Interviewer: Yeah.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Or I would stay out there in the middle of the night until 12 o’clock, make sure that the electrical that we were working on got done, I wouldn’t be in bed. While the team was out there when it was a major issue that we will work on. I would be there with them.
So, developing a sense of trust, is the key to developing a good team. And make sure that you include everybody on that team, everybody has to be included in the work that you’re doing.
No matter how small it may seem. One of the things that I’m leading right now, I am the state chair for the Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve Program, and we have 25 volunteers. And I lead those 25 volunteers and each one of those volunteers brings something different to the table.
But I’ve made sure that no matter if it’s three hours, a quarter, that they get involved in it.
I asked for their advice. This is a team of experienced, community leaders, military leaders, etc. but I’d make sure that they are included.
And if it’s a, if it’s a matter of getting an opinion on something, or if it’s a matter of actually relying on them to get something done.
Because I know what their strengths are. So, that’s it, I guess.
Interviewer: That’s a good example. Thank you.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: You got to listen to them. Yeah.
Interviewer: Absolutely.
Do you believe that leadership styles, the next question is: Do you believe that leadership styles and skill sets are beneficial? If so, how would you go about applying them within an organization while leading a group of people?
It’s almost like you just answered that question when the last thing that you just said were the ones, but do you have a. Do you have something you want to share, or I could just go right into the next question?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Obviously, yeah, I do believe that leadership styles are beneficial, and skills are beneficial. The only thing I want to add here is to kind of emphasize here is that you have to shift your styles a little bit depending on your situation, which I explained earlier around working with civilian individuals working, as a community leader, or working in the military environment, there is a shift there okay.
Interviewer: Its recognizing those shifts at those time.
What leadership traits would you apply, while leading others in your organization?
Are there any good traits that you would have?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Yeah, I think I’ve answered that in a number of different ones. Which is developing a sense of trust and actively listening to individuals making sure, making sure.
And this hear comes from a, a, an old philosophy by Stephen Covey, which is “the only way you’re going to be understood, is if you understand” this is under an old total management or total um, can’t remember the TMO, what it stands for.
But basically, is that you’ve got to understand where somebody’s coming from, in order for them, for them to understand you. So, you got to understand them so they can understand you.
Interviewer: So, no, that makes sense.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: So, and if they don’t if you don’t understand where they’re coming from then you’re going to.
It’s not going to be a good situation, and it’s going to it’s that trust that you’re trying to develop, it’s not going to be there. So, make sure you understand to be understood. Okay.
Interviewer: Okay, that’s good. Good point, good answer I mean. Question number nine. Yeah, thank you for sharing that. Thanks, Dad.
Has there been a leader that’s inspired you to where you are today?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: There’s actually been a number of them.
One of my initial ones was actually my high school is physical education teacher Carroll Connolly.
He was really successful in, in, particularly as a basketball coach at the high school level, but he also was a, a strong individual within the physical ed department he was the one that I just why I decided to go into teaching.
At first, even though I never really got into teaching at the high school or elementary grades, that’s the reason that I did it was because of his leadership.
As I got going in my career after that, there was a couple of different individuals. And in particular, I guess, in the military, Colonel Young or General Young now.
He was always somebody that was really quiet and kind of lead in a hands-off way and in a lot of ways. And, and let the individuals do their thing to a certain point, of course he had, he was a commander, you know, at one point, squadron commander. And he had to make sure that the military mission got done.
But he would, it seems to me, he was allowing his supervisors, his senior noncommissioned officers to do their job.
And I learnt a lot from that, I learnt a lot from him at the way he was doing things and so, he was one that I always looked up to and continue to look up to, as well as General Farnham himself, you know. As because he was my supervisor for a while.
So, in the military side I had some real great military leaders that are still great leaders today.
So those are a couple of them and then there was other ones as well that on the civilian side that I thought did a great job.
But one of the things though, I guess, probably one of the primary things was is that they relied on every single one of the ones that I had relied on a lot and trusted their leadership, their leaders to do the job.
So that’s one of the biggest things that I got from them. Was that you to have trust in the people that are below you and allow them to do their job in their way.
Because everybody’s going to be a little bit different and but yet they’re all going to be successful. So.
Interviewer: What developed your relationship with this leader and how has it impacted in developing your leadership skills and abilities? You kind of answered that was leading right into the next question you kind of answered that.
With that, is there anything else you want to say? Anything else that or I can just go right into the next question?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Yeah but developed by always just helped you and develop you. Well, you know I did model some of the things that I, the way that I do things after them.
You know, because of the fact that they had such a, such a way about him that was effective.
You know, and it worked.
And so, if it’s working and then I can develop that same type of same style and be, and not be so and not be intrusive to individuals and getting the job done. Then that’s why, yes.
Interviewer: I kind of added in an impromptu question, kind of just try to get a little question in to it says:
Have you inspired others while leading them in your organization? And how did you recognize this? And what did you do in the situation to continue to inspire them further?
More like I if you have an example or an experience of how you inspired others while leading them in the organization and how you continue to do it or after you recognized that you did.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: And I’m not going to throw out specific examples because I don’t I I’d like to think that I’m humble enough not to, to feel like I’ve made a difference.
I feel I’ve made a difference in some people’s lives Erika. And, and I’m going to because you’re doing a questioning, I’m going to leave you aside and I’ll leave my family aside, Cameron aside. And I’ll put, I’ll put it out to some other individuals.
Because I let me just leave it at this that if people got inspired from what I did or the way that I handled things and do things. That’s great.
And, but that’s not my primary goal in leadership is to inspire individuals, but it is something that. That is the result, you know any, any leader.
Um, any leader that any good leader has individuals that they’ve, they’ve probably have left a mark with. And those individuals are the ones that you should probably ask that question of so, I’ll just leave it. So, I am just going to leave it at that.
Interviewer: Okay. No, that’s fine. Yeah, no, that’s good.
Maybe I should try to reword that a little bit differently.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Oh no, you might have it might have.
Interviewer: Yep, ok.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: You might have worded right for some individuals but for me, I’m just happy to, to feel that some of the teams that I have led, and I feel have been successful.
I’ll give you this one example as a team and not as an individual.
When we were in Iraq. I was the Electrical Superintendent in Iraq, and we came away with the, with the team of the month, award.
So, in order for us to get that team of the month, in a deployed environment, the individuals that have had to been working together. And I was a leader of that team so as a team we got that on team of the month award.
And, and I didn’t hear anything negative coming from the team.
We did have some run ins but we, in the end, we were all working together as a strong team, and we won it. So that’s.
Interviewer: That’s great. No, that’s, that’s a great example.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Okay.
Interviewer: Question number 12: Do you have any advice on how to best lead others moving forward into the 21st century? Moving forward into the 21st century?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Yeah, you see this gets into a political statement for me now, partly because as we move forward as a country, as we move forward as a, as a as a global community.
We as the leading, the main superpower hear in the world. We need to be leading us down the road us as a world into a more globalized situation, and global globalization, we need to be working together as this one, 210 countries around the world.
And we need to be thinking as individuals and as leaders on how we can save this planet. There’s a real issue around climate change. The real issue around global warming.
And I guess the leaders of this country.
And the young leaders of this country the ones that are becoming leaders need to recognize the fact that they were in, there are some major issues around climate change. And, the quicker that we can get that we as a leadership, a major leader in this country can get to, to recognize that that we need to work together as a as countries around the world, particularly the major countries like China, Russia, Japan, all of the major world superpowers is England, you know, a lot of the European countries and the quicker we can get to that point, the better chances we are saving some of what’s going to happen here in the 21st century by the end of it.
If we don’t, then there’s going to be a lot of adaptations going on and a lot of technological changes that going to have to be rushed through.
Anyway, I guess. We need to be thinking about it as a globe, and not so much about it as a nation, we need to be expanding our thoughts, and we’re not.
I’ve got a lot more on the political side but I’m not going to go there. I’m just going to leave it at that.
Interviewer: Okay. Um, thanks, thanks for sharing that. No, that a leads, this is the last question: Do you have any recommendations for future leaders of Maine?
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Now, I’m not going to talk about military piece here, so much is I’m going to talk about how Maine, although this year certainly is, is something that the military leaders need to understand.
But as overall leaders in Maine several of the Maine some of the leaders that are going into the future, from this state, we need to know how, particularly, economically, how Maine fits into a global market.
Oh, and it’s happening. I can tell you that it’s happened.
Because I mean we often think about how the US can lead.
You know, can lead in this globalization or in this whole idea around how we can direct how we as a country can direct other countries to do their business.
But I think as Maine leaders we need to really think about how we can fit into this changing economy.
The economy is changing because of the climate change. I mean we’re, we’re right now as a state. If you look at 1970s and 80s. The major industries in this state were some of the major industries where the shoe industry and the paper industry, and it’s gone.
And it’s gone, in part because of this globalization. So, we need to be thinking as Maine leaders we need to be thinking about how continue thinking and thinking forward about how we fit into this global economy as a state, because we have a lot of resources here.
You know, anywhere from the seafood industry to, to have the ability to grow trees, and help with climate change and help with this new green economy.
So, I think we need to be thinking in that sense, as far as those state leaders, the economic leaders and community leaders we, we don’t want to necessarily think about how the US can fit into the economy let’s think about how Maine can fit in the economy.
That is the question for future Leaders of Maine. So, how Maine can fit into the future economy, and help save, save the planet because of climate change.
Interviewer: No, that’s good.
CMSgt (ret) Dennis Wellman: Hope that helped you,
Interviewer: Know it did that’s great. Thank you.