Chapter Blue
Tyra Valeriano, host of Chapter Blue, comes with 11 years of law enforcement experience and talks about mental health, self-care, work-life balance and more. Through honest conversations and personal experience, Chapter Blue allows for officers worldwide to share their stories, struggles, and successes both on and off duty and to give the public an insight to what the media has made into such a controversial profession. The podcast will establish the connection to the important topics and struggles in law enforcement and open up to all first responder roles in the new year to address how interchangeable the roles relate to the struggle. Join the conversation, because it’s long overdue!
Chapter Blue
Building ADB: Training and Leadership with Daniel Mee
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What if better leadership, smarter training, and honest wellness support could flip agency culture from burnout to buy‑in? We sat with Daniel, a Philadelphia sergeant with 23 years on the job, to explore a clear path from surviving shifts to building sustainable careers and stronger families. His journey from street cop to patrol supervisor reframed what service looks like: protect the public, invest in your team, and keep your values—faith, family, and country—at the front of every decision.
We get practical about the daily grind. Daniel breaks down how to guard family time, use time off without guilt, and design fair schedules that honor birthdays, anniversaries, and real life. He’s candid on wellness, too: EAP, peer‑to‑peer teams, and trusted clinical partners only work if we drop the stigma. His take on strength is sharp and humane—if your mind is scrambled, you can’t back your partner or your kids. Early help keeps small problems from turning into headlines, discipline, or divorce.
Then we dig into ADB, a vetted, law‑enforcement‑only network mixing top‑tier instructors, live courses, and an online community for ongoing engagement. Imagine finishing a human trafficking class and still having direct access to instructors, or pulling over a vehicle and tapping the community for real‑time insights on hidden traps. ADB pairs that agility with national conferences—wellness, women in policing, and a year‑end summit—and leans on grants to widen access. The core idea: mistakes of the head shrink when training is current, practical, and relentless; leadership starts at day one, not at a badge of rank.
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www.adbtraining.com
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Fit For Shift is a first responder focused wellness app for health, fitness, stress reduction, and community. Make this app a part of your agencies wellness program today, or visit our website for a 30-day free trial. First responder credentials are required to join.
Good morning, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Chapter Blue. Today I'm happy to introduce my guest all the way from Philadelphia. Thank you for joining me today, Daniel.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you. It's all my pleasure.
SPEAKER_01:Daniel has more than 23 years of experience in law enforcement, and he's working on a really cool project for police officers. I had the pleasure of talking to him and some of his business partners not too long ago, and I felt that what they were doing was freaking awesome. And I wanted them to have the opportunity to talk about it amongst other things in law enforcement. So, Daniel, if you'll take it away, give us some information on your background and what you're doing today.
SPEAKER_00:Sure. Thank you for having me. My background is that I have over two decades of experience in the Philadelphia Police Department, a part of the rank as a sergeant. And I'm transitioning over to a new company. It's called ADB, stands for A Different Breed, and is an online community, a platform for law enforcement officers across the country where we can pour into them training, education, webinars. We send all uh people out to different cities across the country to conduct in-person training as well. And we're here basically to upgrade the professionalism in law enforcement in America.
SPEAKER_01:Very nice. So, how long have you been a sergeant?
SPEAKER_00:I've been a sergeant since December of 2018. It's been an absolute pleasure. Um, one of the highlights of my career is being a sergeant, being able to give back to the officers that are there to pass the torch on a few wood, to make sure that they're out there conducting themselves obviously in a professional manner, but also in a safe manner. Um, I was always dedicated to advancing their careers, making sure that they were studying, pushing them to take those promotional examinations, and being the sergeant that I always wanted. I mean, I had a few good sergeants out there, some were good, some weren't, you know how it goes. But um just trying to pick off the best portions of those great sergeants that I did have, um, cast aside the negative ones that did some of the you know subpar ones had, and try to formulate my own pathway in in being a supervisor out there.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome. So you served a long time already in law enforcement. What was the turning point for you when you were ready to promote?
SPEAKER_00:That's a that's a really good question. I really never had any desire to get promoted throughout the vast majority of my career. I love being a cop on the street running around answering nine-month month calls, directly impacting people's lives on a daily basis. I worked in a very high prime environment for the 19 out of the 23 years that I was on in the job. Um, and I loved every minute of it. Very stressful, very busy, but very rewarding. You know, high risk, high reward, that's that's where it's at. So I never really had any any pathway for that. I came across a few supervisors who encouraged me to do so. I started really stepping back and thinking about my career. I wound up getting married, had a couple of kids, and thought to myself, I can't do this forever. My body was not what it was when I was 25 years old. You know, you start breaking down a little bit. What can I possibly do to advance my career? And that was that was the avenue that I selected. I mean, it's nice for pension purposes, and you get a couple more dollars in your in your pocket. But I chose this job to serve, and that's to serve the American people, and it's also to serve my peers and and the agency that I'm working for. You know, I want to help other people um do a great job out there. And I thought that I was somebody that could could do that. So that's pretty much the genesis of me getting promoted. And it was it was wonderful. I loved it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I think being a sergeant is probably the best job that there is. I don't think there's anything better. I mean, I was never anything more than a patrol sergeant. I didn't go higher than that, but I still think it's the best position in all of the departments. So that's awesome. Um, from what you said, I do have a couple questions. I know you said that you got married and started a family. How was that for you? And how is that uh with having kids? I mean, what was your journey like?
SPEAKER_00:It was it's it's the greatest, it's the greatest thing that's ever happened to me is getting married and having children. Um I'm a I'm a core believer in the faith family, country cops, and and it was um God's will that I got married. My wife is a wonderful human being. Um marriage is challenging, of course. Um, but we have a great time. We have two wonderful children, two daughters, and and they are fantastic. Uh just sent them off to school a little while ago. One was sad, one was happy. That's the day that we're gonna have today. Okay, you know, let's go have some ice cream and have a good time. But it's it's absolutely been a thrill and an absolute honor. Um, and I cherish every moment with them. I know that being in law enforcement and being on the street that long and seeing the things that we see, you better cherish every moment because you don't know what's gonna happen. So it it's it's a very wonderful mentality to have because I cherish every moment with every person that I have. I'm cherishing this moment with you and the audience that's out there. You know, we who knows what can happen next.
SPEAKER_01:Right. Um, do you have any tips for officers that might be struggling with the family life being in law enforcement? Because we know that's a struggle. Um, a lot of agencies across the nation are shorthanded. So, of course, you have your officers working overtime, they're staying late, they're burnt out, and of course, they have a really hard time giving any of that energy to their family. So, is there any tips that you have?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, absolutely. I was I was 100% there. I know exactly what you're talking about. You get stretched very thin, especially if you're gonna be working shift work and your responsibilities are all over the place. Whether you're a police officer, you're a detective, no matter where you are in the food chain and in law enforcement, you are stretched thin. You have to prioritize your life. Where are your priorities and write them out? I got a whiteboard over here, it cost me 70 bucks. I screwed it to my wall and I put on there faith, family, country, tasks. I put on that, put that on there so that it reminds me every single day when I'm getting up and getting ready for work exactly where my my values are. Don't shy away from them and don't bend. If your priority is whatever your priority is, it doesn't matter. If if you are mattering kids, you know, make sure that you're you're writing those things down and you're adhering to them. My advice would be to say to yourself, slow down, right? Think about what you're doing, and say to yourself, do I need do I need to work that over time? Why do you need to? Are your finances not in order? Then that that's something you need to check. You don't need to eat out every day. I mean, figure it out. We get paid, you know, a pretty decent salary here in Philadelphia, so I can't complain about the money that's coming in. Our union does a very good job, and and the Philadelphia Police Department has taken care of us in that sense. We have good health care. So I you know, I'd like to gripe just like any other cop out there, but that's not one that I can really complain too much about. Um, so make sure that your finances are there. That's a big that's another big stress stressor that people have. So it's it's really lining up your values and your priorities and and taking the time to say, I'm gonna take that day off today. I'm gonna I'm gonna take that sick day today, I'm gonna take that vacation day today. You can't take that that time with you. So use it and spend that quality time with your family. Take that vacation. This is a one one-ticket trip, and we all know that. You're never going to be here again.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. You know, being that you are a supervisor, um, you know, I don't know what your guys' agency is like. I want to say that it might be pretty similar to what everybody else is facing, but I don't want to assume that. Um, but I know when I was a patrol sergeant, approving a time off was something that I was adamant about. I wanted to make sure that everybody who put in for time off got their time off. And sometimes there were instances where I wasn't able to do that because manpower is so low, and then you're, you know, stretching your guys thin on the other side. And just sometimes it's not possible. So, what do you do to help keep your guys balanced out and keep those morals and values going for your shift?
SPEAKER_00:That's the responsibility of the supervisors, and you're absolutely correct. It is a very delicate walk that we're doing right now when it comes to scheduling people out for vacation time. The way that I did it was very simple. We in Philadelphia, we um we do our annual vacations, and we usually have to put that in around December of the prior year, and then it gets sent to the chain of command, it gets approved as approved or what have you for summer vacation periods, which lasts from May to September. As soon as they're submitted and they're returned around January, I tell all of my officers, I say, listen, this is the time where you say to yourself, I want the list of birthdays, anniversaries, all of these things that you need to do. The the things that pop up, the baseball games and the and the plays that pop up with the kids and things, we can deal with that as they come down the pike. But give me all of the dates that you know that you better be there for. You better not miss that on our anniversary, because I don't want to hear you coming in here telling me that you know you're having an issue at home. This is the time. January is the time, or whatever time in your agency. Give the agency the benefit of the doubt and say, if you say I want to take off in November and you're giving me this vacation request in January, February, March, we can figure things out. We can get somebody else to come in there and work and cover the shift, or we have buddy days here in Philadelphia where I can work your shift, you work my shift. We can figure things out, but don't come to me the day before and say I have an anniversary tomorrow and you gave me no notice. And now that that's where that friction starts happening, and then the decay of morale continues. So it's just a way to get everybody to get on the same pathway to success.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. Um, before we jump into the business that you started and start talking about all that, um, I'm curious, how do you guys have resources for, first of all, for your first responders? What kind of resources do you use in your agency? And do officers have immediate assistance or availability to those resources, or do they need to go through a supervisor to access those?
SPEAKER_00:The resources that we have would be we have an EAP program, the employee assistance program, where officers are able to contact them on their own. They can go through a supervisor. Um they can they can show up down there. There's uh there's plenty of ways to get access to that. That counts as your tour of duty for the day. So if you need to talk to somebody, absolutely. I mean, we just had a plane crash here in Philadelphia where both of our our union and the agency put out numerous, you know, text messages, emails, et cetera, to get officers that were involved in that, and even officers that weren't, because I mean it was a pretty um pretty wild situation to get them the help that they need before things start festering, right? These these wellness things, we need to nip them in the bud and and eliminate them, or at least address them, recognize them before they start boiling over into your personal professional life. And now we have a small problem that has now mushroomed into a huge issue. So we have the EAP program, and and that works pretty well. They just introduced um a wellness peer-to-peer program. So there have been officers that have gone through training that have now they're now conducting peer-to-peer programs where they can call each other on the phone and text each other, email each other, go through social media to you know be that shoulder to lean on in situations like that. And those officers have been trended to sit send them out to other uh outside agencies to help out. Um we have we have numerous doctors uh throughout our our network that will see patients on the fly. We also have partnered up with uh the University of Penn for Penn Behavioral Health. They are um they're a great resource to for officers to utilize to go out there and and hook up with them and and receive that mental health uh services that they need. So there's several.
SPEAKER_01:That's great. Is there any a time in your career where you felt like you needed to reach out to any of those resources?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, there's been plenty of times in my life that I've done that. As a matter of fact, I've had supervisors send me there. When you come, when you come into catastrophic situations that are affecting you, sometimes, you know, I could tell you personally that it I didn't recognize anything. I thought I was completely fine. And then I, you know, supervisors say, You're not, you're gonna go over there. You know, sit down and talk with somebody, it's not that big of a deal. I never I never shied away from having conversations with people. You know what's the worst that can happen? I have a day off and I'm sitting here talking to a counselor for an hour and then I go out and go have a uh go out to lunch. I mean it's it's part of your tour duty when they when when you go there. So it's you have to be open up as being a law enforcement officer. We we expect to go into somebody's house and solve the problems in in a half an hour, like it's some kind of you know, sitcom. The reality is that all of those situations build up in our own heads, and then we don't have the the wherewithal to go out and seek help for ourselves, so it seems detrimental and backwards thinking.
SPEAKER_01:Right. I actually had this conversation with someone yesterday, and I mean, I don't know that it's really applicable to what we're talking about, but we were talking about masculinity and how it's something that officers, male officers are pretty proud of. You know, we they don't talk about anything. This is a stigma, we don't care, this is dumb. And granted, there is a fine line between what it is when it comes to wellness and masculinity. It's not to take away the masculinity, right? It's not to say that you are a weak individual or you know, you don't have thick skin. It actually has nothing to do with that. Um, everything that officers go through is not normal. Most people don't even experience one incident in their life that an officer has experienced over 800 in their entire career or more. And so we were talking about it, bring it made me think of it because you said that it was, it's not a big deal, right? It's not a big deal for you, but it seems like such a freaking wall to break right now. It is so hard to get through this wall with law enforcement and first responders in general to also make them realize that it is not that big deal to go and talk to somebody. The big deal is not doing that and not addressing your issues and realizing that it doesn't have to be a traumatic event at work that is causing issues in your life. It can be finances, it can be home life, it can be your kids, it can be literally anything. And of course, the stress that you endure at work is not helping that situation. So we just got into this conversation about, you know, trying to break that wall down to help officers understand, specifically the men in the field, that it's not about your masculinity, it's not about taking away being more of a man, it's not that. It's just the way we're wired. We got to deal with our issues and we got to rewire our brain so that we're able to function in and out of work at home and make sure that it's effective and not working against us.
SPEAKER_00:I wholeheartedly agree. And and and to the to the point about men, I could speak speak specifically about that being a man myself. Being an alpha is something that we need on this job, and that's for men and for women. You know, we don't need betas here, and that's that's another discussion. But but back to your point, alphas often will shy away from helping themselves, and that is not a sign of being strong. I'm here to tell you that. It's not a sign of being strong, it's a sign of being weak. Your job is to come to work every day and live and life in general. Bring your A game. Okay, great. You went to the gym today, you got your swell on, you're 225 pounds rock solid steel, you do, you know, you're eating protein bars every single day. Fantastic. You look great, but inside in your brain, if it's scrambled eggs, you can't help me. Because when I'm getting my face kicked in over here, what are you gonna do? You're gonna go driving one thousand a thousand miles an hour with your hair on fire, you're gonna get in an accident, and you're not gonna be able to help me. You have to slow down, think about what you're doing, and say, how can I best bring my A game once again to the landscape and where we're at? That means that you need to go check your brain out. You know, when you're when your husband or your wife or your family is is saying to you, you know, you're being mean, you're being this, you're being that at home, that that that's called a clue, right? And we use clues in law enforcement. They bring us to evidence and it brings us to the truth. If you have a clue in your life where people are telling you that you're being a pain in the neck or you're being not yourself, these are clues. And a real, uh, uh, a tough guy, if you would, you know, recognizes that, looks in the mirror and says, I'm gonna upgrade. A tough person, an alpha doll will do that. And that's how you upgrade your professionalism, your personal life, and you live better.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I agree with that. Um, okay, I want to jump into ADB training. So tell us what got you into this idea. Um, what sparked the ADB training? What is it? And where are you guys at as far as distributing this for officers and first responders?
SPEAKER_00:Well, the core principles of ADB is what is again, it's upgrading the professionalism of our law enforcement officers in the country. There's training that's out there, you know, we all go through an academy and then we have these ongoing trainings. There's other companies out there, and that's that's wonderful. What we have done is we have gone through in a very ruling selection process to get top-tier, high-caliber talent from across the law enforcement sphere, bring them together into a cadre, get them all aligned with what we're trying to do, and pushing them out across the country. And what we're doing is we're having an online community where by years end we'll have a hundred thousand people in that community. And in there, it's a social media platform for law enforcement officers only. Right? You have to be vetted to get in there. So once you're identified as a law enforcement officer, you come in. It's a subscription-based uh platform because we have to keep out the trolls. I don't need anybody coming in there, you know, screwing around. It's a couple bucks a month. And in that platform, you're able to see different webinars from our instructors. Instructor engagement will be there. So when you go to one of our classes for human trafficking, for example, or narcotics interdiction, or our undercover narc uh our undercover uh coursework, it's gonna be we're up to seven days on that course. That's gonna be really wild. But um, once you once you go through our coursework, you come back and you get to have that secondary engagement with those instructors who taught that class. So if you're one of the folks like myself, where you're sitting in the class, you're trying to absorb everything, you leave, and then you have a bunch of questions, those questions will still be answered because you have that ongoing engagement. So we have we're gonna have channels in there for every possible topic under the sun for folks out there, so that they have the tools and the the education necessary to not only survive out there, because we're always taught in the academy, everyone's gonna kill you, you know, everybody's out to get you, which isn't really true. You know, that's five percent of our job we're gonna have out there, right? The 95% of the time it is the human engagement that we have. And those are the issues that we need to address as well. So it'll give them the opportunity to go out there and say, let's say that I come across a human trafficking scenario. I didn't really receive any of that type of training when I as a police officer to identify a child or a female or even males that are being trafficked. I mean, I just like everybody else out there with a time on it. Conducted thousands of vehicle investigations and it never really popped into my head that this part I'm looking for guns and drugs and bad guys per se. How many stops did I do that where somebody in there was being trafficked? And the more I engaged, and as we were going through the onboarding process with a lot of those folks, I was sitting there saying to myself, geez Louise, how many of these people did I you know, I just I missed it. You know, and and and that's on it, that's on me. So I'm trying to we're we're doing we're we're filling in those gaps, if you would, of the train that people aren't receiving. And we're we've we've gotten a wildly positive reception, not only from the instructors that are that are coming into the contract, but people across the country, including top-level executives, chiefs from all over the place. And they're really encouraging us to to push this throw to be the platform for officers to come in and be again solution-based. Come in there and you not hear complaints, but bring your solutions with us and have that upscale professional conversations where we're getting things done.
SPEAKER_01:That's uh it's awesome. I mean, we talked about this already, but I think hearing it um in in this way, it just clarifies it even more exactly how important this can be for officers if they are able to utilize it. Um, I do have some more questions about the training. So let's say officers want to take a training that you guys offer. Is that going to be offered through the app or is it something that they have to sign up for and attend in person? And let's say they're paying for the subscription. Are all trainings included in that subscription?
SPEAKER_00:Well, the the in-person training, we're gonna be sending those trainers out, and we're gonna be conducting the training in different areas throughout the country, and officers are are obviously welcome to attend. Online training will be happening, that's gonna be happening in in the next year or so, probably later on this year, early next year, we'll start really fleshing out the online training portion. So officers will be able to go into the online platform at the ADB Nation and say, hey, I want to go look up something about you know narcotics and addiction, and and it's really good. The online online portion of everything is really good because you're doing it on the fly. So let's say, for example, I pull over a 2010, you know, Nissan Murano, and and I'm looking for traps in that vehicle. I'll be able to go in the community while I'm sitting there in my patrol car. You know, obviously we have people watching the folks that are in the car, you have your backup watching them, but I'm going onto the phone saying, I have this car. Does anybody know about any traps in that car? Because I got that feeling that there's something going on here, and then that's when we can start to, in real time, you start saying to yourself, okay, well, here's the instructor that I took the class, they're jumping in, saying, Yeah, go check here underneath the front, you know, passenger wheel. Well, there's a trap there, what have you. So in real time, you you're able to do that. The subscription will give you a discount on training, and that gives you more access to the people that are in the community. Um, but the the in-person training is really where we will be that's gonna be our core because the online training is great, but nothing beats face to face when you're sitting there and actually sitting in the room with someone and having those conversations face to face. Coupled with that, we'll be having different conferences throughout the year. We'll have a we're going to be having a wellness conference next year. Um, we have our women's conference coming up in June with some top-notch uh female leaders in the industry. They're gonna be out there speaking. It's gonna be crazy. Uh, I'm not invited, sad to say. Uh the men the men aren't invited at this point. We're not invited, but maybe we'll sneak in. Uh, and then our annual conference will be we're deciding between Phoenix and Las Vegas at the end of the year, where we're gonna be giving away uh some some big prizes there. And you know, we're gonna be giving away some some some different trinkets and things like that, the folks that are in the community, because um we we firmly believe in giving back, we believe in win-win, all of our partners. We all we we always have a positive relationship with these folks because we we believe in lifting each other up. We're all on the same page, we're all running in the same direction. That doesn't mean that we all have to have the same opinion. You and I can differ on something, but we both have the same goal of of leveling up the professions. And that's what I think our goal here is you with your podcast and also nation. You know, we're trying to make things better for all the folks that are out there.
SPEAKER_01:So I have a question that maybe I'm sure you guys have already talked about this. Um, there's a lot of issues with funding and officers not getting training that they want. And I know that this is something that we've talked about before. Can you tell the listeners how ADB is going to help with officers getting training that they're interested in and hopefully bypassing the struggles that they're having right now?
SPEAKER_00:Why don't we give it something that has always popped up? Topics like funding, you know, manpower, things like this. And there are there's some obstacles that are there that we can work with. There's certainly, this is the United States of America. We are the greatest country that has ever been on this planet. And we can figure things out. We've split the atom, put a man on the moon. We can certainly figure it out. We have people that are, we have grant folks that are now working behind the scenes to locate that governmental funding where we can help out agencies throughout the country. We can certainly mitigate any type of financial situations because the bottom line is this we have to get this training out to these folks. We have to get them upgraded. It's one thing if somebody goes out there and does something, you know, the the old adage of mistakes of the head versus mistakes of the heart. If you have somebody that's out there making a mistake of the heart, that's gonna be that's on the agency that hired them. I don't know why they would have hired that individual with when when there's indicators there. Mistakes of the head are the officer made a mistake, and if they had proper training, would that same mistake occur? My intention is no. You know, give them the tools that they need to go out there again, not only survive, but fly out here.
SPEAKER_01:So let's circle back to leadership. Um, do you guys have anything that is specific to leadership? And I mean, you might have your own opinion on this, but I've had numerous guests. I talked to numerous officers, I have my own experiences with leadership in general. It's not really a very good reputation. So, do you guys have anything that really is geared towards leadership?
SPEAKER_00:Yes. The short answer is absolutely. And there's two phases of this. Number one is there's a difference between leadership and management, right? As a sergeant, I can go out there and I'm gonna schedule people to work here or work there or overtime or what have you. And I'm scheduling people. Okay. I'm also scheduling people if I worked at the widget factory. When are they gonna work? When are they gonna come into the cube farm? You're coming nine to five, you're going, you know, four to twelve, what whatever. I mean, that those are those are management skills. Leadership is quite different. Leadership is having those skills and also having the care, compassion, and passion for the people that are not only around you, but throughout the people that you're serving. Do you have passion for your officers? Do you have passion for your agency? Do you have passion for the citizenry that you're supposed to be serving out there? And that is that is the difference. Our leadership courses start at the very beginning, day one. We don't believe that you have to have stripes on your shoulder, stars, bars, scrambled eggs, or any of that stuff to be a leader. You are a leader as being a police officer. You are leading the charge. You are the first one there during all of these critical events that happen. You know, and and anyone in the industry will tell you that. Nine month line call comes in and you're going to it. It's a person shot on the highway, it's an active shooter, it's a whatever the case may be, an overturned truck. The officers there first. They have to be leaders. We know that they're leaders, and inherently, you took this job to be a leader, you took this job to make a difference. This is the opportunity. What we do at ADB is we hone that and we give you skills to make sure that that is sharpened. Iron sharpens iron, and that's what we are here to do. So while you come in with those those skills into the academy, you come into this industry saying to yourself, I am a leader, I am different. When danger happens, I go there. I'm in a restaurant, it's getting robbed, I go there. Right? I mean, I I could tell you about a time being in a restaurant and some bad things happened, and I was just happening to have a conversation with with the um the server there about who's better for officers or firefighters.
SPEAKER_01:I guess you got your answer.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, yes, that that's a story for another day, but that was that was definitely um that was definitely, you know, it but the whole idea was that I was there with a couple of other officers and they looked at me and they were going, and I said, All right, let's go. And went out there and helped, you know, because that's what we do. While everyone else is sitting in the restaurant, we're out there handling business. And that is just that is leadership. It burns from the inside, and that's something that we need to make sure that these officers are recognized for, and we assist them in sharpening that throughout their career so that when they are the top-level executives, they're looking back onto their folks and saying, Well, here's what you need to do to be the proper leader. I can get a manager to do anything, I can hire somebody from any industry and get them to run a police agency. Will they do it right? Will the morale be there? Will the retention be there? No.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that brings in another couple of questions. Is you know, the big debate right now is where does the issue really lie in law enforcement right now? Is it recruitment and retention? Is it wellness? Is it not getting enough pay? What is the problem? I personally do not think that recruitment is the issue. I think that retention is the issue. And obviously, like we've spoken about before, when you have retention and you're able to keep your officers and your morale high, it overflows into recruitment and you don't really have issues with recruiting. But when you have your officers who are working within your agency going out and saying things like, I don't like my agency, my leaders are doing X, Y, and Z, this isn't what I like. I'm miserable, I don't want to go to work and they're telling other people these negative experiences that they're having. Well, the people who probably wanted to apply once upon a time are gonna be like, I don't want to apply there, you know, I don't want that. So it negatively affects recruitment. So when you're just trying to recruit more officers with this negativity and toxic uh toxicity inside of the agency, it's it's not gonna fix a problem. So you're offering obviously really good trainings that are gonna help leaders lead and not manage. And of course, officers who want to go to trainings that maybe they haven't had the opportunity to go to are gonna have that chance with your guys' business coming to them. Is that right?
SPEAKER_00:That's absolutely correct. It's it's all about, excuse me, it's it's exactly what you said. You have to foster a positive morale within every single agency out there. There's people out here that are in kids out here, grade school, high school, college, they're in the military, they're looking around, they're they are the alphas that we want in this industry. And they're looking over at law enforcement and saying, hmm, that's that's kind of a sketchy agency because I'm hearing things online. I mean, everything is online, and and I, you know, I sound like a dinosaur, but you know, that that's where it is. That's where the kids get the information. It's all online. And reputation in this, in in our world in law enforcement, is everything. Perception is reality, which that's just a part of life. So you need to make sure that your agency is at top notch when it comes to morality, that you're taking care of your people. And the people that you need to take care of are the are the boots on the ground, to be quite honest with you. If you're not taking care of your folks that are in the line, that are out there for answering 911 that are in control, then you're never ever gonna have a successful agency. And the reason is because you have you have folks that say, Well, patrol is the backbone of police. True. So let's give them what they need to do to succeed, right? Are we doing that? Are we making sure that we're taking care of them? That doesn't mean have a pizza party for them. I mean, everybody always cracks up with pizza party. Oh, we're gonna have a pizza party. Well, does that build morale or does that just fill your stomach full of of deliciousness? Great, awesome. But are are you are you upgrading the morale there? What are you doing to make sure that these officers are okay? What are you doing as a supervisor, as an agency to level up? Doing things the way that we've always done it doesn't work. As a third-generation cop, I can tell you about my father, my grandfather, my father, and me, and having similar and different experiences throughout our existence in law enforcement. The way that my grandfather did things in 1945 after he walked off a naval vessel and into the police department is completely different than the way that I do it today. You know, you've got to upgrade. The thing right now is we're kind of as a whole, as a collective, we're kind of banging up against this wall, not necessarily resistance. We all recognize things need to get done, whether it's the wellness sphere or what have you. But we're just kind of figuring out the roadmap to success, I guess. But that's what we're doing in the nation. We're having these conversations with individuals like yourself that are able to broadcast all over the world, you know, and initiate these conversations. Like let's we know that we need wellness, for example. What's the roadmap? What's the best thing? And it might be different for Philadelphia, from New York, from Tulsa to San Francisco and everywhere in between. It it's agency specific and it's and it's you know, community specific. You know, there's people are are different across this country in different communities. So let's make sure that these roadmaps are tailor-made, but the overall objective is that we all get to the same place of you know of success.
SPEAKER_01:What makes your guys' training platform different than other training platforms that are available to law enforcement right now?
SPEAKER_00:We're gonna going to be the largest voices out there, and that that that's that's where where we have the secret sauce because there's no one out there that's gonna have as many people as we have. We have the the online platform, we have conferences, and the training that we have is far superior than any other company. I'm confident in that because I've done my research, I've seen it. We have literally gone through with a fine-toothed comb people from across this country, and they are top to chief and everybody in between, and they are experts in their field, and they are absolute wonderful presenters. And when they can go out there, and when I was having conversations from the initial conversation of the onboarding process up until the hiring process, and now we're gonna be sitting in these classrooms. I am amazed at the talent that has been assembled here. And it's not because you know, we we're we're great at picking people out or you know, patting myself on the back here. I truly believe that this is a a movement that is uh is uh brought here through, you know, we're a faith-based organization. This is not by mistake that these people are all coming together to do this. This is this is from the Almighty. I'll flat out and say it. This is this is a a movement that is is here because the people in this country and across the world for that matter not only deserve but demand excellence in their law enforcement officers. So it's the passion that we have here at ADB to do that. This is not some Mickey Mouse weekend warrior thing that we're doing here. This is a cultural movement. And if you want, and if you're a law enforcement officer out there and you want that passion, the knowledge, the skills to upgrade your profession, the ADB Nation is the place for you. Come on home.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome. Um you know, even with you saying all that, I think what really probably should hit home with those that are listening that are in law enforcement is that you are also in law enforcement. And you're not just speaking because of this creation and this focus and vision that you have. It's actually coming from a place of being in law enforcement and you're doing it. So that speaks volumes compared to, you know, there might be other agencies out there or programs that used to be in law enforcement. They're going based off of old tactics or old stuff, and they're teaching this redundant stuff that isn't applicable anymore. And here you are, you're still in the field, and you you know what's going on, you know what needs to be done and what needs to be changed.
SPEAKER_00:Very much appreciated. And that's that's that's part of what what our instructor onboarding process is. The vast majority of our instructors are still in the game, they're still out there working, they're still doing hot jobs out there, and they're coming in here and pouring in that that current knowledge into our into our folks out there, into our students. And that's where we are staying ahead of the game. We are not getting into this the way we've always done it mentally. I I I could never stand that. That always drove me crazy. This is where you unleash the creative side of your brain as a law enforcement officer. I promise you, if I put you into a room and there was somebody in there with a gun, you figure a way to get out of there. You know, we don't walk into a into a structure without knowing how to get out the back way. You know, that's what we do. We get creative. I got to go out the window, jump out the window. Let's get creative here and unleash that. And that's what our instructors do, each one of them. And they are from a wide swath of people. It's amazing the talent that is out there uh for law enforcement officers. It really is mind-blowing. Like once we start bringing these people together, and if it's like, oh, there's not just one or two, we you know, we are well on our way to 70-ish or are in our cadre right now in our pipeline, and it's it's it's mind-blowing, but very positive, you know, and I keep saying to each one of them, I wish I would have met you 20 years ago when I was a young cop running around out there. I really couldn't use that knowledge, but I mean, it is what it is. So I'm just trying to pass the torch back, and that's what we're doing here. You know, I was passed a very burning torch from my father to me that he received from his father when I got on the job in 2001. I mean, I got on in October of 2001, right after the 9-11. And at that time, the the whole country, they loved the cops. We could have done anything. I mean, it was it was really weird because growing up, I would hear the stories, you know, some people like the police, some people don't. I mean, at that time, on 9-12, everybody loved the police, and that's when I came into the job and then come full circle. And now here we are where you know you have 2020 with a lot of bad things happening there, but the pendulum's swinging back. But at the end of the day, it's all it's it's all about our dedication and our passion to helping these officers out here be the best that they can and reach that that mountaintop that they're striving for.
SPEAKER_01:You did mention that you will be flying people out for training. So, does that mean that you guys will be able to do trainings in all states, or how will that work out for uh DBA training ADB training?
SPEAKER_00:100%. We are going everywhere. Alaskan Hawaii, you are not getting out of this. We are going there too. We are going all over the place. We're going to be flooding the market with instructors everywhere, every single agency. They it is absolutely imperative that we get this information out there. It is imperative. And and look, like you said, I mean, there are other companies out there. I'm not here to bash anybody. I just I I firmly believe in my in my heart of hearts that we can do it better. And we're going to dominate the industry out there. There's there's no one that can compete with us. We are the number one, we are the the uh the top dogs out there. And if you if you're an officer out there that feels a little bit on a on a ship that's listless or rudderless, if you would, join the ADB nation and we'll jump on our ship and and we'll help you out without a doubt.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. So if there are listeners out there or law enforcement officers that want to make contact with you in regard to joining, uh, how would they be able to do that?
SPEAKER_00:Sure, they can hit us up at www.abtraining.com. That's our website. Well, it's just a a landing page right now. We're gonna be pushing out the uh the full-blown donation in the in the coming week. So stay tuned for that. You can always reach me at on LinkedIn. I'm always hanging out on there. Some people sample there too much, but uh I'm always on there. So you just check me out over there and uh I'll answer any further questions that anybody has. Or uh if you if you're interested in being an instructor or host agency, hit me up and we'll uh we'll have conversations.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome. Well, we are running out of time, but there is a question I haven't asked it in a while because our conversations are usually going over on my time, but I think I can squeeze it in here. Um, I normally ask my law enforcement officers what they would what advice would they give their rookie self based on everything they know now? And being that you have a business that is focused on training, I'm actually really interested to hear what your answer would be.
SPEAKER_00:My answer to myself. So going back, if I was to, if I was to get into the proverbial DeLorean and go back to the future, I would absolutely tell myself that patience is a virtue, that higher education is imperative, and that a long-term plan starts today. Right? You're not gonna do this job forever. 10 years, 20 years, 25, 30 years, it's not gonna be there forever. And if you started when you were young in your 20s, that means now you're 15, 55. Well you still have a on a chunk of life left, right? So let's make sure that we're planning for the future. What does that mean? We're planning for our our next phase of our career. Maybe you want to be an entrepreneur, don't shy away from it. Um, if you want to get another job somewhere else in another career, don't shy away from it, but prepare for that, right? Because you never know when the end of your law enforcement for your. So just be ready and give yourself the background, that resume that's necessary to navigate to the next life because it's it will be here. And trust and believe. I I can sit here and honestly tell you I can close my eyes and think of my sergeant in the police academy saying it's gonna go by in a blink of an eye. And here I am. So that's how quick it happens, folks. So get it together now.
SPEAKER_01:That's good advice. Is there anything that you would like to add to let the listeners in on? Uh, any tips, anything that you have that you want them to know before our session ends.
SPEAKER_00:Spend time with your family. Spend time with your family and get right with your faith.
SPEAKER_01:Those are good tips. I I definitely vouch for spend time with your family. That's an important one for sure. Um, well, I appreciate your time, Daniel. Thank you so much for joining me today. I know that you are a busy man, so the fact that you were able to squeeze me in and have this conversation and share everything about the business that you guys are starting. I'm excited to see how this is going to go in the law enforcement world. I am rooting for you guys. I see your guys' posts on LinkedIn all the time. And I think that it's definitely going to be a game changer for sure. For the listeners, if you didn't catch the website, it is www.adbtraining.com. And if you guys want to contact him, I will have that in the description. Um, thank you again, Daniel. Uh, for the listeners, thank you for tuning in. I appreciate you guys. Thank you for your support. And as always, be safe and I will see you on the next one. Thank you for joining me on Chapter Blue. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to follow and tag me on social media and share with your friends and fellow officers. If you're interested in joining an episode, I'd love for you to be a part of the conversation. Until next time, stay safe, take care of yourself, and remember, you're never alone in this journey.