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• Your Hosts: Derek Pinkham, Conference Project Manager and Emily Coleman, Assistant Conference Planner
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VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics' Conference Project Manager Derek Pinkham and Conference Assistant Emily Coleman sat down last spring with Sean Matson '05 co-founder & CEO of MATBOCK, and the co-founder and president of Strike Force Beverage. Matson spent 13 years (2005 - 2018) as a Navy SEAL Officer, with multiple deployments in strategic locations. Matson is currently an entrepreneur.  We heard from him the spring of 2019 during VMI's Business Leadership and Innovation Conference.  He has been instrumental in the success with MATBOCK and Strike Force by leveraging the leadership skills from his time on active duty.

Our Center's mission is to enhance the VMI citizen-soldier journey with programming that educates, engages and inspires critical thinking, ethical decision-making, and leader development. For more information about our Center and its programming, please visit Center for Leadership and Ethics. Visit our YouTube page to see Matson's BLIS conference remarks.

In this episode, we touch on the following leadership competencies within the VMI Leader Journey: communication, supervision, inclusion, self-development, initiative, decision making.

TRANSCRIPT for Challenging Yourself with Sean Matson '05

EMILY COLEMAN: Welcome to the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics Leadership Journey Podcast!

DEREK PINKHAM: This podcast aims to share leadership stories from our VMI Corps of Cadets and high-profile leaders who visit The Center for Leadership & Ethics and VMI Post. We are on this Journey with you.

COLEMAN: Hi, I’m Emily Coleman 

PINKHAM: and I’m Derek Pinkham 

COLEMAN: We are your hosts of the podcast.

DEREK: Our guest is Sean Matson, VMI Class of 2005, co-founder and CEO of MATBOCK and the co-founder and President of Strike Force Beverage. Sean spent 13 years (2005 – 2018) as a Navy SEAL Officer, with multiple deployments in strategic locations. We spoke to Sean during the 2019 Business Leadership and Innovation Summit here at the Center last April. And without further delay, we give you Sean Mattson.

PINKHAM: The first question I want to ask is do you have any advice for cadets about their leadership development? What do you wish you knew as a college student or a cadet that you now want to know that would have helped you?

SEAN MATSON '05: So, I think… well, one you know VMI from day one is building leaders, right, citizen-soldiers. I mean that yeah that's the mission. It's a mission it's all over VMI and you know obviously I'm biased because I am a VMI alum and you know I'd say that you know the best college in the world that does this, right, you know from day one you're immersed in this culture where you have someone who might be older than you and might be younger than you in your face you know telling you what to do and you know that's obviously a type of leadership for no authoritative type you know and then as you go through your years at VMI you get different leadership experiences now they might not be big some are bigger than others or whatever but you have these opportunities to lead peers and arguably probably the hardest leadership challenge you'll ever get to do is your peers and you're leading these in situations where you might not know what to do but they're telling you you're the leader go do it and so those are some of the most challenging times so from day one VMI is building that right away on you so in terms of what I wish I would have had leaving VMI you know going into I really I don't know I don't really like because it did a really great job of setting that foundation for me

PINKHAM: mm-hmm

SEAN: now where I will tell you maybe I differed from others is I knew I wanted to go in the military

PINKHAM: right

MATSON: so I took those opportunities I went to go do cadre [cadet instructor staff], I swam - you know I did I tried to put myself into situations and force myself to learn to fail okay I've got a build I've got to learn better you know ways to maybe communicate something to somebody or you know articulate my position so that that person now wants to do what I need them to do

PINKHAM: but you're so if I if I'm reading you right so VMI put you in that right position to safely be able to do that

MATSON: it gave it gives everybody that walks through you know the arch that that ability now it's on the individual to take that and want to pursue through it so you know again the first day you could be said in this some people don't want leadership right or they don't want that position fine you know that's that we need those people just as much as we need leaders because you know if you have too many leaders too many cooks in the kitchen are just as bad as not having a leader

PINKHAM: so there is a followership model you learn how to follow first yeah sure and that journey will take you through VMI to some command position 

MATSON: exactly yeah yep

PINKHAM: so I another one that that's personally my favorite question to ask is what are some practices as an effective leader that helped you on your journey any specific things that you do that get you in the right mindset the right mode

MATSON: simple I treat people the way that I want to be treated

PINKHAM: mm-hmm

MATSON: you know I I look at things I try I try really hard not to come into typically when you're faced with leadership I'll say problems or trying to whenever you're faced with trying to lead someone usually you're trying to solve a problem with it usually kind of goes in synonymous with each other so you're problem-solving and you know a part that could be a failure in leadership is immediately looking at the problem and saying all right you're to blame or you know like no forget that right now it's not the time to the blame game it's how do we solve this problem let's look at it let's dissect everything let's figure out how to solve this problem moving forward now then take that and you know the next step after you solve that problem is come back and say how do we mitigate this from happening again right so so that's when you look at not again you're not trying to blame somebody it's but how can we put steps in place or how can we put a resource to something that eliminates or mitigates this from happening again from us so that we can continue to grow and build

PINKHAM: right so so professor Morris earlier today said the most important thing about entrepreneurship is process it sounded like a little bit

MATSON: that's what you were talking about sure yeah exactly as I said I mean typically as leaders you're trying to solve a problem someone gives you something says you're in charge X and today that could be you know getting everybody over a wall or that could be how do we grow this company to X million dollars or whatever that is but typically it's you know that those are synonymous with each other 

PINKHAM: So you've led in the military and you're leading now in business in the civilian life so how is that how is that different

MATSON: it's different because maybe language is probably the best way to put it you know the other piece of it was you know I was you know as a seal officer I led a hundred percent males right so I only had that to deal with now as I got a little bit you know more seniority and got more rank there were opportunities and I had positions where I had to do a mix of male and female but for the most part like my platoon it's all males now we have enablers to help and other things to that piece of it but and and I had to obviously lead them as well but you know for the most part you know I have a completely different language with my platoon then I did with enablers and it wasn't that I ever thought less of my enablers in fact I I see them as equals because we would never get out on a mission if the Intel guy or the admin person or you know a logistician or whoever it is doesn't have help with their part to this it doesn't it doesn't work we don't go anywhere without a huge support staff it's the end team to help us so there are different languages that I had to do that I have in the military in in a civilian world now I will say the principles that I use like you know and communicate to my guys I was very much a hands-off leader I'm a very very much hands-off leader I am not the one to tell you okay hey you know from 8 to 5 I want to see and break down your hour by hour I I trust enough that the person is going to use their time wisely

PINKHAM: where was there was a professor early on was there somebody in the seals that taught you something that you know you always go to

MATSON: this might I don't know the best word for this but I've always been in competition with myself I always have been I was a swimmer growing up you know I I don't do anything to try to impress anybody I don't try to do anything to you know show off I'm trying to better myself and so I'm always in competition with myself and I am my hardest critic obviously I'm my worst enemy because like this will never never stop this feeling I've from 12 years old I wanted to be a seal right VM I was never in the picture until ninth grade ish timeframe when I met on alumni and he was like hey you should go to VM I was like I don't even know what that school is I want to be a seal like where does that fit into this and he was like well it's military school okay well you know how and that that helped you know that that set up and then you know soon as as soon as someone was you know hey you can't do that or hey hey well hey there you go that's that's you know that's for me is that's all it takes right because I'm gonna show you I can do it because again that's that's my that's my driving force is me and how do I beat and how do I better myself and keep driving I'm not at it for to show someone else hey guess look what I've done or look at this it's always to beat myself a sort of personal improvement model

PINKHAM: yeah yeah that's cool appreciate that I usually I usually ask this first but I wanted to go to it last but what does leadership mean to you and how is your definition of leadership changed throughout your career

MATSON: so you know starting here VMI going into the military and then being out in the private sector well I think you mentioned it earlier you know being you know you have to you have to know how to follow someone first before you can ever try to lead somebody and that is a constant balance of how do you how do you know when you need to follow someone right and how do you know then when they need to step in and need to need to lead that person right and and as a quote unquote leader right you have to do that without any hiccups and be able to switch that hat on and off and again VMI starts that and instills that into you day one because again you're you're getting you know you know yelled at by cadre right RDC [Rat Disciplinary Committee] and all these other people and then two seconds later someone's telling you you're in charge go do this and then you're stuck going how do i how do I do this right and you're trying to lead your peers so you're you are just you were just having to follow someone now you have to lead and it's back and forth back and forth and it's just you know I don't say a ping-pong game but you have to be able to do that with like a light switch and not hiccup because if you do those are when you stumble and ultimately might fail on something and have to get boned

PINKHAM: Yeah I think maybe do I have one more question here oh yeah hopefully this will be a good one and perhaps we'll end on that what has been your most difficult decision you've had to make as a leader

MATSON: so something that you could actually share difficult decision that I had to do is the leader you know i-i've had to I've had to fire a chief a platoon chief of mine you know and basically I ended his career you know a guy that had had a very reputable reputation and plenty of awards for different combat missions and things like that and I had to fire him he just wasn't living up to what I was expecting what my platoon was expecting from a chief and you know that was difficult and you know I I sent like I said I essentially ended his career because of that because I mean for SEAL community your platoon chief or a platoon commander if you don't do those jobs and you don't do them well and and and go past them I mean it's a head shot you're basically your career is done you're not gonna advance past those those you might not even make rank now the stakes are super high right in those situations absolutely yeah absolutely and that's why I mean they're there they're the milestone there's that's your first milestone as an officer a real first milestone mark because if you don't pass platoon commander you're never gonna make command right and you're only a lieutenant at the time so your four years or so into the military and you know you could potentially are leading you know 16 to 20 21 ish guys and your platoon chief is towards maybe the end of his career you know 15 you know 12 to 15 years somewhere in so he's obviously older and more wiser than you are but that position for him again is is his his milestone to if he ever wants to be command master chief or anything you know I mean that could hinge on him even get in a retirement right

PINKHAM: yeah right so a lot of thought went into that I take it

MATSON: yeah a lot of consulting with other leadership and nerves

PINKHAM: Right so I mean that's also another good practice right in terms of being the leader is talking to you yeah other leaders you know very much so yeah well great I really appreciate it that kind of exhausts what I have now if you want to if you have anything to say the cadets maybe a little advice that how to get through the next few months

MATSON: yeah buy Strikeforce no no honestly the I said I I wouldn't have gotten into VMI if it wasn't for the help of alum you know and we were just talking about this in one of the workshops we were in is you know how to get and how cadets start tapping into the VMI alumni own network early and often and it is relationships it is getting into them it's not you know you know there's not any crazy like secret handshakes you have to do or anything like that it's simply just having a conversation with a few people extending that you know that invite to something or maybe you know accepting an invite to something and starting that conversation because that network is extremely powerful and when leverage properly it allows you to have exponential growth and anything you ever want to do it's just you have to you have to put some time into that and that time is is really minuscule compared to the return that you give 

PINKHAM: well powerful great yep appreciate it

MATSON: yeah thank you

PINKHAM: all right

PINKHAM: [music playing in the background] The Center for Leadership and Ethics would like to thank the following: Cadet Caleb Minus '20 for the intro and backing music. Find more of his musical stylings on his Instagram page @mynus_official. M-Y-N-U-S official. Colonel David Gray, US Army (Ret.), director of the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics, and of course, as always, our podcast guests. Find this podcast and other Center for Leadership and Ethics programming information on the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics' website or try our YouTube Channel. Follow the VMI Center for Leadership and Ethics on Facebook, Twitter,  LinkedIn, and  Instagram accounts. See you next episode of 'The Journey.' Thanks for tuning in! [music fades]