All The Right Moves: Your Next Move

By: Fast CompanyWed Dec 19, 2007 at 12:42 AM

What to do on Monday morning: tactics to find a great job (or leave a lousy one)

In Panama, we would move large groups of POWs at night, because there was a dusk-to-dawn curfew in effect. It's dark, and you see these muzzle flashes in the window -- pockets of people trying to pick us off. You had to be prepared for potshots: the "for whom it may concern" bullet. All it takes is one.

In some situations, you can dodge bullets. The advice "Keep your head down and keep moving" really works. It's difficult to hit somebody who's moving from street to street. The shooter has to anticipate where you're going. You don't want to hit the panic button and just open fire. We were in Panamanian neighborhoods with lots of high rises, and you can't just turn your automatic weapon on a building. If you do, you'll have to evacuate the building and help those people. Meanwhile, your POWs are untying each other. In an instant, you've made the situation worse.

You want to get out of harm's way -- turn down an alley for cover -- because you're responsible for your soldiers and the POWs. If someone meets you with overwhelming firepower, that's one thing. Otherwise, you want to suppress the enemy. While it's happening, you never actually think, "Okay, we could die here." Adrenaline and instincts take over, and you don't think about the danger until later.

The most fearful situation isn't the actual firefight. That's what you've trained for. It's the silence before the bullets start flying. It's deafening. You're thinking, "I know the bad guys are here, but where are they?" Once they fire, you can bring in the mail, because they just gave up their positions.

You create your own luck through training and preparation. You want to be in the best physical shape and as alert as you can be, so you can adapt to the enemy's tactics. It reminds me of one of the commanders in Iraq who said, "We won this battle back at Camp Lejeune six months ago."

The troops always complain about having to keep their vests and helmets on when nothing's happening. But if you don't do it every time, it won't be habit. You'll lower your guard, and that's when you're most vulnerable. You need to have a healthy paranoia: Never underestimate the situation you're in.

Jim Tully is the founder and CEO of Orion International, which specializes in placing former members of the military in the private sector -- more than 14,000 veterans in the past 11 years. A graduate of West Point, Tully served in the Army Rangers in the late 1980s and saw action in Africa and Central America.