First Responder Leadership Podcast

For decades, first responders have been trained to call a Mayday when they're trapped, lost, running out of air, or facing an immediate physical threat.

But what happens when the emergency is happening inside?

In this episode of the First Responder Leadership Podcast, Conrad Weaver sits down with retired Fire Chief Darryl Cleveland, whose nearly 40-year career included service as a paramedic, firefighter, engine company captain, battalion chief, fire chief, and assignments aboard EMS and fire helicopters.

Darryl reflects on coming up in a fire-service culture where mental health was rarely discussed and "suck it up" was often the prevailing attitude. He shares how cumulative trauma followed him into retirement, why leaders need their own trusted peer networks, and how vulnerability from the top can give others permission to ask for help.

One of the most powerful ideas in the conversation is simple:

Mayday isn't just physical.

First responders are trained to call a Mayday before a physical emergency becomes fatal. Darryl argues that leaders should create cultures where their people can do the same when they're struggling mentally and emotionally.

The conversation also explores the impact the career can have on spouses and families, the identity shift that happens after retirement, and the lessons Darryl wishes he'd understood when he first became a chief.

His advice to his younger self?

Everything's not a ten. Slow down. Listen more. Give people grace.

How first responder mental-health culture has changed during Darryl's career

Why previous generations of leaders were often unequipped to recognize trauma

The cumulative effect of repeatedly witnessing things human beings were never meant to see

Why company officers have enormous influence over whether people feel safe asking for help

Moving beyond "Everyone Goes Home" toward helping people be home healthier

Why mental-health resources must actually connect with first responders

The value of peer support and chaplaincy

Why chiefs and senior leaders need their own peer networks

The importance of vulnerability from senior leadership

Calling a mental-health "Mayday" before the walls come down

How unresolved occupational trauma can affect spouses and children

Making conversations about mental health as normal as checking the apparatus

Darryl's book, These Hands: A First Responder's Journey from PTSD to Healing

The difficult transition from a first responder identity into retirement

What Darryl would tell himself on his first day as a fire chief

1. You can't fix what you don't know.

2. Normalize the conversation before the crisis.

3. Leaders need peers too.

4. Vulnerability gives others permission to be human.

5. Call the Mayday early.

6. Everything isn't a ten.

Darryl Cleveland is a retired fire chief with nearly four decades in the fire and emergency services. During his career, he served as a paramedic and firefighter for 32 years and held roles including engine company captain, battalion chief, and fire chief. His experience also included flying aboard EMS and fire helicopters and serving as part of an urban search and rescue task force deployed to New York City following September 11.

He is the author of These Hands: A First Responder's Journey from PTSD to Healing, a deeply personal account of occupational trauma, family, faith, PTSD, and recovery. The book also incorporates perspectives from his wife and daughter to illuminate how a first responder's experiences can affect the entire family.

Darryl describes the title as coming from a moment when he looked at his own hands and considered everything they had experienced during his career—the people they had carried, the scenes they had touched, and the work they had performed.

These Hands: A First Responder's Journey from PTSD to Healing is available on Amazon.

Email: [email protected]

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

Episode 005 - The Leadership Problem we can Actually Fix - Maggie DeBoard

Former Police Chief Maggie DeBoard spent 38 years in law enforcement, including 13 years as a chief of police. Looking back on that career, she believes one of the greatest threats to first responder wellness isn't always what happens on the street.

Sometimes it's what happens inside the organization.

In this episode of the First Responder Leadership Podcast, Maggie joins Conrad Weaver for a candid conversation about organizational stress, leadership development, emotional intelligence, authenticity, communication, and why first responder agencies need to rethink how they prepare people for command.

Maggie argues that agencies traditionally promote people because they're technically and operationally proficient—but rarely evaluate whether they're prepared to care for, communicate with, and develop the human beings they're about to lead.

And that can have consequences throughout an organization.

Maggie also gets personal about her own experience as a chief. She discusses the cumulative weight of command, what she eventually learned about taking care of herself, why leaders need boundaries, and why even chiefs need trusted people outside their organization who can challenge and support them.

The conversation ultimately comes back to a simple leadership principle:

Healthy organizations require healthy leaders—and leaders have to be willing to work on themselves first.

Maggie DeBoard served 38 years in law enforcement, including service as a deputy chief in a large Virginia agency and 13 years as a chief of police. During the latter part of her career, leadership, organizational culture, and first responder wellness became central focuses of her work.

Today, Maggie continues that mission through the Foundation for First Responder Wellness and Resiliency, which is working toward developing a trusted nonprofit mental-health resource for first responders, including often underserved 9-1-1 communicators.

Learn more: foundationfr.org

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

003 - LIVE a Legacy: Why Leadership is About WHO you Build, not About What you Build

What if the goal of leadership isn't to leave a legacy—but to live one every day?

After 34 years in public safety, Chris Cowan has learned that some of the most important leadership lessons come through failure, loss, and the willingness to change.

In this episode of the First Responder Leadership Podcast, Chris joins Conrad Weaver for a candid conversation about moving from transactional leadership to relational leadership, building human capital, creating healthier organizational cultures, and choosing significance over success.

Chris shares the deeply personal story of Officer Drew Barr, whose line-of-duty death became a defining moment in his leadership journey. He also explains why leaders need to "hunt the good," why people should be treated as team members rather than employees, how leaders unintentionally contribute to burnout, and why wellness must begin with the example set at the top.

From listening to the newest person in the room to creating systems that protect the physical and mental health of first responders, this conversation challenges leaders to rethink what leadership looks like in practice.

Because leadership isn't ultimately about what people say about you after you're gone.

It's about how you show up today.

Chris Cowan has spent more than three decades in public safety leadership. He served 29 years with the Richland County Sheriff's Department, leaving as deputy chief, before becoming the first police chief for the newly established Cayce Police Department.

Today, he serves with the University of South Carolina School of Law's Excellence in Policing & Public Safety Program, an initiative focused on advancing the policing profession and developing current and aspiring public safety executives.

Throughout his career, Chris has coached, mentored, taught, and worked with public safety leaders across the United States and internationally.

His leadership philosophy centers on developing people, choosing significance over success, "hunting the good," and living a legacy every day.

https://sc.edu/study/colleges_schools/law/faculty_and_staff/directory/cowan_chris.php

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

004 - The Leader in the Mirror: Why Self-Leadership Comes before Leading Others with Max Gomez

What if the hardest person you'll ever lead is yourself?

In this episode of the First Responder Leadership Podcast, Conrad Weaver sits down with Canadian law enforcement professional Max Gomez for a candid conversation about leadership, emotional intelligence, identity and the personal responsibility that comes with leading others.

After nearly 20 years in policing, Max has experienced both good and poor leadership—and says he's learned from both. But one of his biggest lessons has been recognizing that leadership development ultimately begins internally.

Max shares how years in law enforcement affected the way he viewed other people, his relationships and even himself. He describes the moment he realized he was looking at the very people he'd sworn to protect as though they were the enemy—and why failure ultimately forced him to reconsider the man, husband, father, officer and leader he was becoming.

Conrad and Max also explore the tension between servant leadership and accountability. Caring about your people doesn't mean avoiding difficult conversations. In fact, good leadership requires both compassion and clear expectations.

They also discuss what happens when leadership fails. Max explains why unclear expectations create organizational dysfunction, how unresolved conflict becomes a “lumpy rug” that everyone can see, and why poor leadership can become a serious wellness issue for first responders.

For aspiring leaders, Max offers an important warning: examine why you want the promotion. Leadership isn't a reward for being good at your current job. It's a responsibility to the people you're being asked to lead.

Why leading yourself may be harder than leading a team

The connection between emotional intelligence and effective leadership

How first responder culture can reshape identity

Reacting versus responding under pressure

Why vulnerability can strengthen leadership

Servant leadership without abandoning accountability

Why leaders must establish clear expectations

How to lead up when your boss isn't leading well

The danger of toxic leadership

Why unresolved conflict damages teams

How leadership and first responder wellness intersect

The danger of seeking promotion for status or validation

Why a great officer doesn't automatically become a great supervisor

The daily practice of becoming the leader your people need

Am I becoming the person—and the leader—I want to be?

Leadership isn't simply about rank, title or authority. It's about influence, responsibility and the willingness to continually examine the person in the mirror.

Listen to the full conversation and share it with a first responder leader who needs to hear it.

First Responder Leadership Podcast

https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxgomeznet/

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

001 - Are We Ready? Preparing to Lead When the Unthinkable Happens with Kristen Ziman

Former Aurora, Illinois Police Chief Kristen Ziman spent 30 years in law enforcement and led her department through the 2019 Henry Pratt Company mass shooting—an event that killed five people and left five officers wounded.

But Kristen is quick to reject the idea that great crisis leadership begins when the crisis starts.

It begins years earlier.

In this conversation with Conrad Weaver, Kristen shares how asking one simple question—“What’s the worst thing that could happen, and are we prepared?”—changed the trajectory of her department.

She explains why leaders must prepare for what they cannot predict, why organizations drift toward crisis when leaders ignore warning signs, and why every leader eventually faces what she calls a “moment of reckoning”: the point where you know something needs to change and must decide whether you have the courage to act.

Kristen also speaks candidly about something she got wrong: taking care of everyone around her after the shooting while failing to take care of herself.

This is a conversation about crisis preparation, courageous leadership, organizational culture, mental health, vulnerability, accountability, and what it really means to take care of the people in your charge.

You'll hear Kristen and Conrad discuss:

Kristen Ziman spent 30 years with the Aurora Police Department in Illinois, rising through the ranks and becoming chief of police in 2016.

During her tenure as chief, she led the organization through the 2019 Henry Pratt Company mass shooting, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the civil unrest and protests following the murder of George Floyd.

After retiring at the end of 2021, Kristen turned her experience toward helping other leaders and organizations. She is an author, keynote speaker, consultant and coach focused on leadership, culture, courage and the moments of reckoning that shape organizations.

She also co-hosts the Hollow Bunny podcast.

https://kristenziman.com

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

Fire service leader and author Jason Yerkovich joins Conrad Weaver on the First Responder Leadership Podcast for a candid conversation about self-leadership, servant leadership, firefighter wellness, organizational culture, and breaking the generational patterns that influence how we lead at work and live at home.

Jason shares how a personal crisis forced him to examine his own leadership blueprint—and why becoming a healthier leader begins with three things: awareness, ownership, and action. 

What if some of the traits that make you successful on the job are the same traits creating problems at home?

That was one of the difficult realizations fire service leader and author Jason Yerkovich faced after separation and divorce forced him to examine his life.

Jason began looking at the patterns he had inherited—the ways he communicated, responded to stress, handled conflict, and related to the people closest to him. Eventually, he came to a powerful realization:

The fire service didn't create his unhealthy patterns. It exposed them.

In this episode of the First Responder Leadership Podcast, Jason and Conrad Weaver explore the connection between personal wellness and professional leadership. They discuss servant leadership, trust, micromanagement, empathy, family, culture change, emotional health, and the danger of becoming highly successful at work while struggling with the people who matter most at home.

Jason offers a simple framework for changing those patterns:

Awareness. Ownership. Action.

He also challenges first responder leaders to think beyond their own careers. Sometimes leadership means planting seeds for a culture you may never personally get to enjoy.

Because ultimately, leadership isn't about rank, authority, or being the person in charge.

It's about serving people.

And sometimes the hardest person you'll ever have to lead is yourself.

1. Self-awareness is a leadership skill.

2. What works at work may not work at home.

3. Leadership is serving.

4. Trust requires giving people room to lead.

5. Culture change is bigger than your career.

6. Wellness isn't selfish.

Jason Yerkovich is a fire service leader, author, and advocate for servant leadership and personal growth. Drawing from his career in the fire service and his own experiences with divorce, therapy, family, and personal transformation, Jason explores how inherited patterns can shape the way first responders communicate, cope, build relationships, and lead.

He is the author of Carrying the Fire: Break the Pattern, Lead with Purpose and is developing the Built Not Inherited podcast, focused on leadership, families, relationships, and the patterns people carry through life.

His leadership philosophy centers on self-awareness, personal ownership, empathy, service, and helping the next generation become better leaders.

Connect with Jason: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-yerkovich-7783882b1/

+++++

The First Responder Leadership Podcast is presented by First Responder Wellness Solutions, equipping first responder leaders to lead better, live healthier, and build stronger cultures.

Take the 30-Day Healthy Leadership Challenge

Join the First Responder Leadership Mastermind

Join the First Responder Leadership Network

© 2026 First Responder Wellness Solutions, LLC. All rights reserved.

Introducing the First Responder Leadership Podcast!

This show is built for the men and women who lead in public safety — from emerging supervisors to seasoned command staff.

Hosted by filmmaker, leadership coach, and First Responder Wellness Solutions founder Conrad Weaver, the podcast features candid conversations with leaders from law enforcement, fire, EMS, 911 communications, and beyond who understand what it means to lead when the stakes are high.

Each episode goes beyond leadership theory to explore the real challenges leaders face: making difficult decisions, building trust, navigating crisis and change, developing people, protecting their own health, and creating cultures where teams can perform — and thrive — under pressure.

Through practical insights, hard-earned lessons, and honest conversations, the First Responder Leadership Podcast will challenge you to grow from the inside out and become the kind of leader your people want to follow.

Lead better. Live healthier. Build resilient cultures.