Retired Navy Captain J. J. “Yank” Cummings is a fighter pilot, a TOPGUN graduate and a former captain of the USS Gerald R. Ford. He also helped shape Top Gun: Maverick. We asked him how leaders act when uncertainty is high.
Setting the tone
Yank starts with leading under uncertainty and the principles that set the tone. Exceptional teams start with leaders who show they care through action. He has served in the nuclear Navy, the regular Navy and fighter aviation.
Mission and the gemba
Value chain thinking explains the why behind the what. Yank describes how he turned an aircraft carrier around. He used the ship’s 1MC announcing system to communicate the mission and reduce uncertainty. Nobody on the ship is ever mission-less. He went to the gemba, the place where the work happens, without warning.
The debrief
The F-14 community built a high-performance culture. Yank stresses plan-brief-execute-debrief, with the weight on the debrief and an honest recall of what happened. Systems drive behaviors. He closes with how Top Gun: Maverick started on his couch, and the leadership lessons from making it.
A leader who communicates the mission clearly gives the whole crew a shared orientation.
How does everyone on your team learn the mission today?
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Written by Ponch Rivera with AI assistance in production. The full conversation is in the player below.