Forging Resilience

30 Andy Brown: The Art of Life-Saving Negotiation

• Aaron Hill • Season 1 • Episode 30

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Experience the evolution of Andy Brown, as he transitions from a lone officer patrolling Scotland's vast Highlands and Islands to an international hostage negotiator, adept at defusing the tension beyond our understanding.

Andy unveils how his foundational principles of adaptability, respect, and community policing in resource-scarce environments have shaped his negotiation skills, proving crucial in life-threatening scenarios across the globe. The stark differences he encountered in American policing methods, particularly in relation to gun culture, further refined his approach to maintaining calm in the eye of the storm.

In the heart of the episode, we navigate the intricate world of law enforcement negotiations, dissecting the crucial abilities that define a successful negotiator. With Andy's wisdom, we reveal the art of ego management, the might of active listening, and the power of empathy in de-escalating crises.

Discover strategies for keeping a cool head when the heat is on, and hear firsthand how a surprising advocate of meditation, Andy, employs this practice to maintain peak professional performance during operations.

Wrapping up, Andy shares soul-stirring stories that attest to the transformative power of human connections. From evacuating Afghan staff amidst the chaos of the Taliban takeover in Kabul, to the tale of averting a potential tragedy through a bond formed in a two-and-a-half-hour conversation, these narratives underscore the impact of lending an ear and extending a hand in someone's darkest hour.

Join us for this gripping conversation with Andy Brown and be inspired by the profound impact we can have on the lives of those around us.

https://www.the-right-path.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-b-brown-00148024/

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Forging Resilience. Exploring for a different perspective on strength and leadership, join me as we discuss experiences and stories with guests to help gain fresh insights around challenge, success and leadership. Welcome to Forging Resilience and my today's guest is Andy Brown, a former police officer, a chief inspector of a 30-year career, if I'm not mistaken, and now is an international hostage negotiator with lots and lots of specialisations and experience which we're going to dive into. But, andy, thank you very much, mate. Welcome to Forging Resilience. Thanks, alan Mate. Where do we start?

Speaker 2:

Give us a bit of a snapshot of your background, of your policing career and what took you into hostage negotiation. So I spent 25 years of my career operationally in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. A lot of the places I worked were really remote. I worked by myself a lot. So you work with the community and when you don't have the resources you would associate with a big police force. You learn to adapt and you learn to work with the community to keep it safe and to guide it so that it stays within the law. And then the last five years of my career I went to the Scottish Police College to teach leadership to all the different ranks throughout policing.

Speaker 2:

But for half of my career I was a hostage crisis negotiator. I kind of fell into that. The opportunity came up and I thought, yeah, I think I'd be quite good at that. Went to the police college and did the training, which is very, very intense, came out of that and got deployed a lot to suicide intervention, where you engage with people that are trying to take their own life. And within the first year I got deployed to a high-level government exercise with special forces in the UK at Fort George in a freezing cold squash court with, you know, sort of MI5 and a psychologist sitting watching me and I did really well in in terms of that.

Speaker 2:

And then opportunity came along and I've done different international negotiations and for me it's just, I think, as a as a negotiator, it's, it's a skill set we all have.

Speaker 2:

I think people tend to fall into probably three categories that you would see in the traditional bell curve.

Speaker 2:

You get people who are maybe naturally introverted, very good at listening and are very calm by nature and are naturally good negotiators, and that tends to be quite a small number of people.

Speaker 2:

The vast majority can learn the skills and then deploy them. And then you get a small minority who you would put in an empty room and they would have a fight with themselves, who would never be a negotiator in a thousand years. So for me I I had got lots of experience in Scotland and I sort of lectured a lot on negotiation and some of the challenges around a bit kidnap, because governments respond differently to things like kidnap, and I've been very fortunate to get lots of different experiences that allowed me to go to the States and do a Fulbright scholarship and to work with NYPD, the FBI, us Marshal Service, the Fugitive Task Force and to see a very different approach to policing, where it's probably more police force than police service, and I found that going over to the States is because there's so much of a gun culture is a very different approach to dealing with angry people.

Speaker 1:

I was just going to ask. So how did it differ then, in terms of the experience you had in Scotland and, in the beginning, generally rural or isolated communities compared to American, like you say, where the gun culture is so big in terms of negotiation and dealing with people?

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So I think probably my best experience of policing was when I was in Isle of Barra. So Isle of Barra is at the bottom of the Outer Hebrides. Population's about 98% Catholic and a small percent Church of Scotland. I was Church of Scotland, I went there and it's a community where everybody knows your business as the local cop. They know what you have for your breakfast, your lunch and your dinner. They know what you have for your breakfast, your lunch and your dinner. They know everything about you and it's that relationship you develop with the community.

Speaker 2:

And yes, there was the occasional on the Friday, saturday night. You get the local lads wanting to have too much to drink and then to fight outside the pub and I thought, right, I'm on my own Back up. If I shouted for backup, it was at least an hour and a half away by helicopter and I thought, how do I deal with this? So I used to go to football on a Wednesday night. I can't play football to save myself, but I'm a big guy so I can hack. So I dealt with a lot of that sort of energy that young guys would have and develop that sort of relationship with them On a Friday, saturday night. I would say hi, right, you've had too much to drink, come on, I'll take you home, and just take them home in the back of the police car.

Speaker 2:

I then met the local priest, who was quite a character, father McLennan.

Speaker 2:

My first encounter with him was he gave me a large mug of coffee and he says oh, he says you'll have a wee livener in that and poured quite a bottle of grouse into it.

Speaker 2:

So, developing that relationship, both him and I were able to deal with a lot of the tensions in the community where if I had issues with a family or individuals, him and I would have a weekly get catch up and he would speak to them and when they came out from church after mass, I and then we would do the same thing. So over that period of time I policed get the place safe, but didn't actually produce a lot in terms of paperwork and targets and all. So over that period of time I policed Get the Place Safe, but didn't actually produce a lot in terms of paperwork and targets and all these various things that you see nowadays. And I think that was my fondest memory of policing, and I think you learn to adapt these relationships. People want to help you keep the community safe, and it's about having that mutual respect. I think that's really, really important.

Speaker 1:

Because I understand that I think I do, but because what I'm hearing is that you were involved in their daily lives, not just appearing when there's a problem. You were there to support them at football. You saw them at church and at the pub.

Speaker 2:

So and yes, it was being able to deal with them, probably when they're at their worst point and the benefit of being in a relatively small community, there's always tomorrow, so you don't always have to deal with an incident there and then you can let things go because there might be a crisis point. But it's, how do you support them and how do you then put them back onto the right path in terms of their behavior?

Speaker 1:

so if we transport you then from from those times times into America, where the culture is different and the generations and the times are different and I probably would make a wrong assumption that community is not as strong in certain senses, how do you start to deal and step into trying to build those relationships in such a short, sharp amount of time? Trying to build those?

Speaker 2:

relationships in such a short, sharp amount of time. So I know there was a bit of. I know when I taught in New York there was a bit of almost gasp and awe that I had policed for 25 years with only carrying a wooden baton and a pair of handcuffs. You know you don't have a gun. No, I've never carried a gun. You know you don't have a gun no, I've never carried a gun. Uh, so there was that misconception that there was a perception that everybody carried guns. Uh.

Speaker 2:

And I got the opportunity to train uh students on one of the fbi's courses in new jersey and we did practical exercises where we had an angry guy shouting at somebody, shouting and swearing at somebody, and in Scotland we're okay, we deal with that, we're used to it, and you absorb that and you just let it wash over you because that's them venting at you. And for me it was never personal. But what I saw in the States and this was just an observation is when we put cops under that pressure of a big guy shouting and swearing at them and they could see his hands, the immediate body reaction was to reach down as if to go for their handgun and I sort of stepped in and said what are you doing? I said you're reaching as if to get for your handgun. But as soon as you pull that up, all you're going to do is escalate the thing further. So why not engage and talk?

Speaker 2:

And I got the chance to speak to the US Marshal Service, the Fugitive Task Force in Manhattan. They had lost a lot of guys as I've just lost some just now who were basically ambushed, but they're trying to apprehend fugitives. And I spoke to the commander, lenny, and I said so what's been your response to that? How have you responded to these increased attacks where you've lost guys? Well, we've put them on a week's course. They fire 500 rounds a day and we've taught them combat medics. I said that's great.

Speaker 2:

I said have you taught them how to speak to people? We don't need to do that, andy. And I said well, let me convince you. So I then convinced them. I taught 35 marshals in Manhattan, probably the hardest training I've ever done. Well, why was that? Because, basically, they gave me an hour of no response. Okay, and I was probably fairly blunt with them just said look, I ain't going anywhere, guys, I'm here all day. If you want to sit and say nothing, that's fine, but I will demonstrate to you that you are poor at communicating. I did a small exercise and they really struggled and I said right, let me show you some tricks, you already have these skills. How do you then negotiate with people?

Speaker 1:

What were some of those tricks that you you were teaching them? To be able to negotiate or communicate, and, if you can say so, so so one of the one of the the things that I use is uh, how to?

Speaker 2:

how to burst in people's ego, because ego is the biggest barrier to to communication. And I took one of the one of the ladies who worked in the office and I said I want you to come into the corner, I want you to sit in the corner and face the wall. And I'd given her a small script and I said I don't want you to speak to the first three people and you ask for volunteers and what you tend to get is you get extroverts will go first. And I said right. I said that's great, I want you to speak to her to find out what's wrong. And you've only got to do it for a minute. 60 seconds is all you've got. And then the extroverts jump in and what they always do is hundreds of questions, question, question, question, question, question, and then suddenly about 30 seconds because they're getting no response. They dry up so they don't have the mental agility to say right, where to take this conversation next, because they're getting no feedback and they can't see any body language.

Speaker 1:

Because I've deprived them of that and is that where the ego kicks in, then in terms of so when you do it in a peer group.

Speaker 2:

Suddenly the guys who are extroverted, the loudest of the group, suddenly think oh, this is actually quite difficult. And then you demonstrate to them, say you know, you look sad, I can't see your face, but you seem to be crying. Is everything okay? Using your voice, your tone, your pitch, your pace? And I said use active listening skills. And when you gradually teach them to do that, the person then starts to speak. And I said can you relate to what they're going through? Absolutely. I said well, if you share a bit of yourself, then you can empathise with them. And if you use active listening and empathy, you naturally build rapport. And once you're in that rapport stage, with the conversations flowing back and forward, you can then suggest things to them or you can influence their behaviour. So I took them through that and Lenny said that was fantastic, the guys loved it, but we want you to come out to the Bronx at three o'clock in the morning to help execute a warrant.

Speaker 1:

Was that to kind of test you, or was that for you to support?

Speaker 2:

So it was a bit of both. It was to test, but it was also to allow them to see the practical application of it. Went to the Bronx three o'clock in the morning, knocked on a door and you've got an inner cordon protecting the team at the door and you've got an outer cordon protecting the team inside because you're likely to be shot. And it was actually really beneficial because it was a closed door. We talked to the mother of the fugitive, explained why we were there and the options. And the options were you know well, he's going to be arrested at some point. It would be easier on him and you if he just came out peacefully and then nobody gets hurt.

Speaker 2:

And the conversation went on. We eventually persuaded his mother to get him to the door and we talked to him and he basically just surrendered himself. And that way the guys really appreciated the power of being able to negotiate within the whole tactical arrangement and they've now since adopted that within their teams. So for me it was and it's still there, because I go every year to teach law enforcement negotiators that the move from negotiation to going tactical is very quick, whereas in the UK and other countries it would be slightly different.

Speaker 1:

You said something earlier in terms about when people are shouting and swearing at you. So if we take that slightly out of context but put it into a work scenario where there is tensions, um, between different parties or departments and there is a change in language, um, and and tone you mentioned, you never take it personally and I, I agree, and that's great, but what's a couple of things that people might be able to do then to put that separation between themselves, that they can feel this response coming and and somebody else that is maybe slightly more blunt and and aggressive in terms of their communication?

Speaker 2:

one of the things that I didn't learn until probably late in life was to learn how to meditate, and somebody told me oh, you need to go and learn how to meditate, andy, and I'm thinking no chance, I'm Scottish, I'm a man. That's never going to happen, and I did. And allowing to meditate taught me not to think in the past and think in the future, but to be present. And when you're present and you're attuned to your own emotions, you can feel your emotions coming, and if you can do that, you can keep them in check, because when somebody is shouting at you or being aggressive towards you, it's not about you, it's about them, and for me, it's that switch in mindset.

Speaker 2:

And the biggest challenge a lot of people have is being able to control their own emotions. Because, if you, I always used to get wind up when I was younger, as a young cop, because I wore glasses and they would say I call you four eyes and I'm thinking, nah, I don't really like that, and that used to be the thing that would wind me up, and I learned just to allow that to wash over me. That's difficult, it's difficult. So some of the techniques that are really beneficial in doing that is being able to control your breathing. So if you're going to go into a meeting that you probably anticipate is going to be quite, you know, fractious, is to breathe beforehand just to allow yourself to calm. Make sure that you've got all the facts prepared, because people can't argue against facts.

Speaker 2:

And I think the biggest thing is is be honest. If you're honest and tell the truth, you know you never have to remember the truth because it's something that happened. If you, if you tell sort of little white lies or porcupines, then you get caught out and that just raises that tension. So so for me, it it's about, particularly in these scenarios, it's about being able to control your own emotions, being present in that moment and recognising that it's not about you, it's about them, in terms of their behaviour, and having the facts prepared. If you've done something wrong, then for me it about you. Know you hold your hands up so, yes, I've made a mistake here, this is, and the reasons for that mistake, but that shouldn't be a reason to you know, basically have a go at somebody and to belittle them. So for me, that that was the biggest learning point. For me is is how do you control your own emotions?

Speaker 1:

in these types of scenarios and I guess it's like anything, it's practice. You can't expect them to control your emotions on the day if you've never done that in your life.

Speaker 2:

And I think in all the scenarios that I have dealt with even the horses taking scenarios with a team that I will have we will role-play. We'll role-play different people. So I dealt with a kidnapping in Afghanistan. We trained a team in Herat. The local member of staff was a young carpet salesman an Afghan carpet salesman and a natural ability for banter and be able to negotiate with people. But you really struggle to deal with the shouting and pressure. So we role played the meetings that we would have with the taliban so sorry for my own understanding, andy were you.

Speaker 1:

Did you? Did you retrain them remotely or did you fly out there to train them to go on further, to go and negotiate with the time? So I trained them remotely. Okay, did you fly out there to train them to go on further, to go and negotiate with the talent?

Speaker 2:

so I trained them remotely okay, I was the whole thing remotely and, uh, we role played a lot of the interactions. The negotiations were all in dari, so understanding the language and the dialect, uh, in terms of how the dialect is is used, and and Dari is a very fast language, so they would talk from point A to point Z in a conversation and it's very full on and they always start talking about family. So it's a very respectful, almost indirect style of communication. But the Taliban was quite aggressive and put a lot of pressure on our guy.

Speaker 2:

So our guy played the Taliban and I played him and he shouted, he swore he did everything, tried to put me under pressure and I listened and I came back and said you sound really angry, right, and I would stop. You know, f, right, I'm angry and all these sort of things. And I said just keep calm. And if you're calm and you slow the pace of your voice and lower the tone and soften it, what eventually happens is that a person will come down to meet you. It's quite difficult to sustain shouting and swearing at somebody for a long period of time because physically it's quite difficult to sustain shouting and swearing at somebody for a long period of time because physically it's quite exhausting, unless you're high on drugs or alcohol. So I think being able to absorb that and recognise that it's not about you but that's somebody trying to put pressure on you and it's how do you handle that pressure?

Speaker 1:

to put pressure on you, and it's how do you handle that pressure? Yeah, so how come you ended up in being involved in in? In that case, there andy, in trying to negotiate with the or indirectly negotiate with the taliban?

Speaker 2:

and yes. So this? This almost sounds like a joke and I lectured in London on kidnap. I was part of the response to the Anamenas gas plant attack in Algeria. And then a week, a month later, we dealt with a Scottish captain who had been kidnapped in the Niger Delta by pirates and again a very different response from the government did a lecture in London at one of the security events and met an Irishman there Actually, you've got a Scotsman and an Irishman it does sound like a joke actually and met him there and he was with an NGO, one of the big NGOs, a Catholic Relief Service, and he said can you train negotiators? And I said yeah. I said I've been doing it a long time, so happy to help, I did the usual exchange business cards, thought nothing more more of it, came back home, back to work.

Speaker 2:

Two years later I'm back in london. I was at lord's cricket ground watching the army and navy with a few submariners who are friends, which is always a bad thing A few pints and the Irishman phoned me and he says oh, you remember me. I said oh, I remember you. He said I wonder if you can help. We've got a priest kidnapped in Afghanistan. Can you help. And I said yeah, sure, and he says okay. He said in 15 minutes' time you're going to get a phone call from Father Peter from Rome. And I'm thinking you're winding me up, you know, and he's not annoying yet man, he says it's genuine. So eventually I got a bit of paper and had a pen and got the phone call from Father Peter.

Speaker 2:

I was in Rome the week after, sat down with the Jesuits in Rome at the Curia, sat next to Father General, who's nicknamed the Black Pope, and didn't really have much understanding of what they were about. I then got marched over to the Gendarmerie within the Vatican, spoke to the head of the Gendarmerie who said, yes, we've opened a file, and gave me an empty manila folder. And I'm thinking, okay, you're expecting me to do the whole thing. And that's exactly what I did Trained the team in Herat, engaged in negotiations.

Speaker 2:

It took us five months to get proof of life, but it was about never giving up hope and just continuing that. And there's a way that you can do that tactically, where you can continue to demonstrate progress, because people go through that rollercoaster of emotions, particularly if it's somebody that they know that's been taken and it was to guide them through that, and always in a religious setting is to be, it was to guide them through that, and always in a religious setting it's to be their shepherd to take them through that really dark point in their history, you know.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, fascinating. So what were the Taliban demanding? So Taliban.

Speaker 2:

You know it was at a time when there was lots of international hostages. It's a business taking people as a business. So they were demanding $10 million because they tried to associate the priest with the Vatican. And if you Google the Vatican, it's wealthy, they do all right. Yeah, so again, it was just ridiculous. Yeah, so again, it was just ridiculous.

Speaker 2:

And you know, part of that response and you'll understand this from your background is you gather intelligence, you get all that information, you process it down to get really good quality information. We ran informants to get us more good quality information. So we're actually in a really good position and eventually we we got that proof of life. And when they take somebody, for me it's about if you take out the human element of it. It's like you want to buy a second-hand car. You want to make sure that car's been well looked after and has been regularly serviced. And that's exactly what we did with the Taliban to say you know, now you've got to look after our guy. He was on medication, so we got them to go get medication for him. He was given a wind up radio so he was able to listen to BBC World News and the Vatican Radio every single day which allowed him to pray, which was massively beneficial for his psychological well-being.

Speaker 1:

He was moved nine different times and we continued to negotiate, never giving up hope that we'd get him out Well it seems really interesting to me that they start at 10 million and in the end end up giving him back for nothing, and I guess there's steps along that process between the relationships, as that is. My question is is there a lowering of expectation on their side, or do they just get bored, or how so?

Speaker 2:

so looking after people is a hard, hard work at the best of times.

Speaker 2:

We all know that. As dads, we know that looking after people is hard work. When they initially demanded $10 million, I was quite confident in terms of we were aware, with our intelligence that I said to Hamid, our main negotiator I want you to go back and I want you to very politely tell him to fuck off. And he looked at me and goes you're joking, aren't you? No, no, no, no, no. And he says okay, so we did that. And the price dropped by 50% and I think right, bingo. And he says why are you saying bingo? I said because it's about money. I said if it's about money, their motivation is instrumental. They want something and they want money. And then to be able to continue to lower that expectation. It's about well, how do they want the American dollars? Well, as an NGO operating in Afghanistan, that's really difficult to do. We need to have all the documentation, we need to have the project papers, we need approval of the government and all these various things. So you continue to lower their expectations. And we were able to do that.

Speaker 2:

At the same time, the international military were really hitting quite hard in the Taliban. Women were given the first opportunity to vote in the country in its history. So they were on a bit of the back ropes. You had ISIS coming into the country, again a very different beast in terms of how they deal with hostages. So there was lots of different pressures and my concern was that our guy would have been sold up to ISIS.

Speaker 2:

Had that been the case, then it probably would have been a different ending. He probably would have got beheaded, but as a hostage, he did what probably anyone would do in terms of survival, because he was a religious man. He learned about their faith and converted to their faith and prayed with them. So he did a lot in terms of his own survival. And for me, the challenge was not only managing these negotiations, but managing a crisis management team back in Rome to guide them through the ups and lows of these challenges, Knowing at the same time you've still got because the priest was Indian, you've got an Indian government response and because I've worked within that government framework, I understand how that works. So you're able to navigate it quite easily and you're not constrained with the same rules and regulations in terms of negotiations.

Speaker 1:

How do you manage yourself then maybe not in this instance, but when you're negotiating something that has drawn out over a certain amount of time, and despite the fact that you're letting things wash over you, or you're practicing being present or checking your emotions, how do you make sure that you manage yourself so that you can turn back up to work and turn back up at home for your family as well?

Speaker 2:

without being so that that's difficult when you work from home, as most of us do nowadays after after the pandemic. So I work from home. I've got a really small office and one of the things that I am fairly regular at is, as I've learned over the years, as most of us do, how to manage our stress. I go to the mountains. I go to the mountains every single day with the dog. If I've got lots of stress, I probably take a little bit longer in the mountains, and probably the best example was again.

Speaker 2:

It was Afghanistan, which has been my bugbear for a long time. When it fell to the Taliban back in 2021, we basically mounted an operation with the Holy See and with support from the American ambassador and the Italian military. We were able to get our staff, our national staff, inside Kabul airport and get them on military flights and out of the country. We didn't get everybody out the first time I did it. It was my team that had been involved in the negotiations of Farah Prem to get him released from the Taliban, so I knew all of them. I knew the kids, developed a good relationship with them, so you'd probably go that extra mile in terms of helping them. I had a country director who basically wanted to martyr himself and that's something that can be quite common with religious people but recognised that he had succumbed to all the pressure and all the stress. Suddenly all the intelligence is telling us that they're coming in and suddenly they're at the door. So navigated through that and again, I always do that with respect I got my first lot onto the military flight out of Kabul, went back through and my wife said to me OK, and I went no, and burst out crying and I never cried in 30 years of policing never and dealt with quite a lot of horrific stuff and I thought, okay, that's the first time that's happened. I went off to the mountains, had a good, probably most of the day in the mountains, came back felt okay, like good, that's fine. Then got told no, you're not getting any more people out. Well, I'm thinking no, I'm not taking that.

Speaker 2:

I pushed back to Rome and you know, to the American ambassador and a good friend who's a Jesuit had said to the ambassador when the ambassador had said no, he had gone back and tried to persuade him but he hadn't persuaded him directly, he had used indirect persuasion and he had related a story when he was the priest in Johannesburg when there was a lot of riots in Johannesburg and he was faced with a situation which he thought was impossible and one of the tribal elders had reached out and touched him on the forearm and said Father, sometimes you need to be like Jesus and learn to walk on water. And he put the phone down on the ambassador after telling him that Three o'clock in the morning, morning my phone's ringing and it's Father David saying the ambassador's given us an answer in terms of getting the rest of the team out. And I'm thinking, okay, it's going to be no. And he said I'll tell you what he said. He said, fuck it, let's go for it. I went okay and then got another 65 out through Abbeygate, literally before the suicide bombing.

Speaker 2:

In between that time my daughter had her first day at primary one at school and I had to show up. My wife works for the National Trust for Scotland, so it's the usual parent thing in the queue when you're trying to take your child in. Everybody wants to know everybody else. And what do you do? And all that sort of stuff. And one of the parents said to my wife well, what do you do? She said I work for the National Trust for Scotland. I look after castles and I look after mountains because we look after Glencoe. And the lady says, oh, what does your husband do? Oh, he moves them. And I thought, wow, very good, nice, so so, yeah, so so I I got asked a question after we got these, the Afghan families out, when we did the debrief in Rome, and one of the young members of staff had said to me Andy, how do you manage that pressure, how do you look after yourself? Because I can't manage the pressure. And they were remote from it and I said, well, probably a few things.

Speaker 2:

I go to the mountains every day with my dog, I talk to the dog, the dog listens really well and I have a six-year-old daughter and in the midst of evacuating people out of Afghanistan, she wanted to watch the Minions. So what did I do? I sat on the couch and watched the Minions with my daughter and I found that very grounding, very loving, and I said I've got a Greek Cypriot wife who I am convinced has Spartan genes. She's a strong woman. I need a strong woman, very good in terms of saying no, you need to look after yourself, and sometimes, as men, we need that. I think that's really important. So for me, these were the three things that helped me, give me that sort of resilience to keep doing what I do. I don't do it for the money, I do it because I feel that my purpose is to help others. That's been my purpose throughout my life and if we help others, what we can do is we can neglect ourselves.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, inevitably we end up not helping either ourselves or others so, for me, taking that time out to look after yourself, even if it's a couple of hours during the day, is really important, and I think it's how you find that space. That might be going to the gym, it might be running or whatever, but for me it's the mountains, and I find that peace in nature and I've learned, having worked in the Highlands and Islands, which is magnificent in terms of the scenery. It's also brutal in terms of the weather during the winter. I've worked with a lot of people who I would call characters, uh, who don't have a huge educational background, but they've got that, that education in life and, uh, I think for me, I've learned a lot from that interaction, as well as from a lot of the the studies that I've done over the years as well.

Speaker 1:

Yeah definitely. In terms of that emotion that came up when you were initially told that you can't take any more families out. What do you perceive that was?

Speaker 2:

Well, having talked to the US Marine Corps at Kabul Airport and the height of it, and talking to a young Marine who was basically working through a list and he wanted a list of all my Afghan team and all the photographs and says well, I don't know who you are. You've just told me you're Brian from from us marine corps. You could be anybody so. And we've been given a, a code word by the, by the military natasha, and he was about to put the phone down me and move on to the next person list and I says no, no, no, no, you're not going to do that. So I went to speak to your sergeant. The sergeant came on the phone, had done his homework, knew exactly who I was, and I said you were given a code word, you give me that code word, I'll give you all the list. And he says yeah, yeah, boss. He said this is the code word and gave me the code word and suddenly the whole machine started to kick in and you understand, you know how efficient these things are when, when they're working, and amongst that complete chaos and people, people sometimes find navigating through chaos really difficult.

Speaker 2:

I'm, I feel I'm quite blessed that I'm calm by nature and the more chaos I'm in, the calmer I get. I'm very focused but I'm very calm and I think it's not to be fazed by that. And when I did the debrief in Rome, one of the Father David, who had done a lot of the operational stuff with me, he said, without a doubt, he says I feel that we had the intervention of the Holy Spirit in getting these people out. And if you'd asked me that 20 years ago, would I have believed that? Probably not Now, with probably a little bit more years on and maybe a little bit more wisdom. Yeah, I do. I believe that. I believe in that sort of stuff and I think at times in a modern society a lot of that sometimes is lost to a large extent.

Speaker 1:

But that deep faith for me allows you to navigate some of these really difficult challenges yeah, it's fascinating and, from what I'm, my interpretation of listening to what you're saying is that that you do take care to look after yourself and that there's a yeah if. If it's not faith for for somebody else, it is for you. But there is that purpose, that deeper calling, so that it's something bigger than yourself, as other than you, but that you hate. You're able to have that clarity because you take that time to talk to your dog, walk in the mountains and watch minions, um, which is, yeah, a great film, all of them, um, me and my kid to know, but, yeah, no, fascinating stuff and the is. Is there anything you would like to, any thoughts that you'd like to leave us with to start to wrap this conversation up?

Speaker 2:

I think so. I remember coaching one guy who was a very, very successful salesman, but he would come home from his work and he would sit in his car for 30 minutes before he could get into the house because he was that tightly wound. And he came over to the house and I said right, I want you to do something. You'll probably think I'm completely mad, but I want you to read the Gruffalo to me. And he looked at me and goes you're mad. I went no, no, I'm not. I said I want you to read the Gruffalo, as if you're reading this to your daughter. And he read it cover to cover in a minute. I thought, wow, you are really wound up. And I said I thought, wow, you are really wound up. And I strike. And he wasn't using his voice, so his voice was just monotone all the way through. And I said we're going to do that again, but you're going to take five minutes to do it and then you're going to take ten minutes to do it. You've got to paint a picture in your daughter's head of that Garfalo and the adventure through the wood. And he left it and we did that as as our first session. He went home, he talked about it and he says and he started to do that when he was reading stories to his daughter at night. And he says he said that was transformational.

Speaker 2:

I think we all underestimate the power of our voice and the power of our words, and I think a lot of us I say this very often when I'm teaching negotiators is God gave you two ears and one mouth. You need to use them in that proportion, and a lot of us don't. A lot of us don't actually listen to what's being said to us because we've got our heads particularly nowadays, when there's so much information at our fingertips and all the social media stuff, we don't actually listen. So for me, taking that moment to actually listen to somebody, my daughter comes back from school and a Friday night we sit around the kitchen table and she wants to go on her iPad. We say no iPad, and she'll say right, let's talk about our feelings Now. For a Scotsman, I don't really want to be doing that. So, daddy, how do you feel today? So, daddy, how do you feel today? So, so for me, I is. I find it hilarious, but I find it heartwarming that she, at a young age, is able to listen to emotions and be really attuned to it and I think we can do ourselves a favor by doing that. But also by just taking that moment in time just to listen to what other people are saying to us, because they might not be in a good place, and by listening to other people you can make a huge difference.

Speaker 2:

My last negotiator job as a cop was on Princess Street in Edinburgh. Negotiated a job as a cop. It was on Princess Street in Edinburgh, the Walter Scott Monument, which has got a staircase inside it, right at the top. I was walking down the street and there was a guy hanging off the railings at the top. I was off duty. I went across, climbed up and helped the young cop and it was a soldier who'd just been released. They finished his service and he probably had undiagnosed PTSD and he wanted to kill himself. He had been trained in interrogating prisoners in Iraq.

Speaker 2:

So as soon as I started talking to him he knew exactly what I was doing. He had married his childhood sweetheart, he had six beautiful children and I talked to him and I never gave up for two and a half hours until I got him back over the barrier and he was a little bit smaller than me and I said to him this is camille. And I gave him a big hug and he burst out crying and I was crying too. I said do you need help? Every year he sends me a text just says thanks Awesome, on the anniversary of it. So for me, we have a huge power as human beings to listen to our fellow human beings. Sometimes it might not be a good space, but that moment of listening to people can actually help enormously, yeah completely, andy.

Speaker 1:

Mate, thank you very much. It's been fascinating to listen to you and get to ask you a few questions. If people are interested in reaching out or if you've got a website, and I'll put those links in. But if you would, yeah, um, yeah, it's been a pleasure to speak to you and thanks for sharing some of your, your stories and insights, andy. Thanks, alan, it's been a pleasure.