Speed of Need - Dr. Vik Bebarta ’94

Curiosity. Vulnerability. Humility. Confidence.

 

SUMMARY

For Dr. Vik Bebarta ’94, those qualities aren’t competing leadership styles, they’re complementary. He has tested that philosophy everywhere, including leading teams through moments when decisions had immediate consequences. His advice for the next generation? Stay curious. Take chances. Take care of your people.


DR. BEBARTA'S TOP 10 LEADERSHIP TAKEAWAYS

1. Lead With Compassion During Uncertainty. Great leaders recognize when people are most vulnerable and provide the clarity, reassurance and presence they need.

2. Train for Chaos, Not Comfort. Preparation and discipline allow leaders to remain composed, make decisions and guide others when circumstances become unpredictable.

3. Build Strength Through Diverse Experiences. Exposure to different environments, perspectives and challenges develops the adaptability necessary for effective leadership.

4. Put People Before Career Advancement. Meaningful leadership sometimes requires making difficult professional choices that honor responsibilities to family and personal priorities.

5. Follow the Mission, Not the Uniform. A leader's purpose and capacity to serve can continue long after a particular position, organization or career chapter ends.

6. Move at the Speed of Need. When lives and missions are at stake, leaders must combine urgency, collaboration and disciplined action to deliver solutions when they matter.

7. Turn Experience Into Systemic Improvement. The greatest value of a difficult experience comes when leaders convert what they learn into changes that benefit others.

8. Lead With Humility, Curiosity and Vulnerability. Confidence becomes more effective when leaders remain open to questions, acknowledge limitations and create psychological safety.

9. Choose Purpose Over a Perfect Career Path. Careers rarely unfold in straight lines, so leaders should remain open to opportunities while staying committed to service and meaningful impact.

10. Care Boldly, Lead Bravely and Keep Growing. Effective leadership requires the courage to act, the humility to examine what could have gone better and the discipline to keep improving.

 

CHAPTERS

00:00:00 - Introduction: Dr. Vik Bebarta’s Leadership Journey

00:01:32 - From Small-Town South Carolina to the Air Force Academy

00:03:54 - A Father’s Illness Reveals a Calling to Medicine

00:07:39 - Training for Chaos: Leadership Under Pressure

00:10:23 - Why Diverse Experiences Build Better Leaders

00:12:09 - Leading Medical Teams in Combat

00:13:44 - Choosing Family and Redefining Service

00:18:24 - Building the Center for Combat Medicine

00:21:27 - Sgt. Alwyn Cashe: The Moment That Changed Everything

00:25:34 - The Speed of Need: Accelerating Medical Innovation

00:29:54 - Leading With Humility, Curiosity and Trust

00:33:26 - Finding Your Own Path: Advice for Future Leaders

00:36:35 - Caring Boldly, Leading Bravely: Lessons for Life

 

ABOUT DR. BEBARTA

BIO

Dr. Vik Bebarta ’94 is an Air Force Academy graduate, physician-scientist and leader in military and civilian medicine. He serves as chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, founding director of the CU Anschutz Center for Combat Medicine and Battlefield Research, and strategic lead of the Marcus Institute for Brain Health. A colonel in the Air Force Reserve, Bebarta served 14 years on active duty, including multiple deployments as a combat physician. His work focuses on accelerating medical innovation, improving battlefield trauma care and translating military medical advances into lifesaving solutions for civilian communities.

Dr. Bebarta’s approach to leadership was shaped by personal loss, the demands of combat medicine and a commitment to serving others during their most vulnerable moments. His experiences treating wounded service members in Iraq reinforced his belief that urgency, collaboration and a willingness to challenge established practices can transform lives. Today, he brings those lessons to medical research, organizational leadership and the development of future leaders, emphasizing curiosity, humility, adaptability and what he calls the “speed of need.” His philosophy reflects a simple but powerful commitment: care boldly, lead bravely and never stop learning.

 

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FULL TRANSCRIPT

OUR SPEAKERS:

Guest: Dr. Vik Bebarta ’94  |  Host, Lt. Col. (Ret.) Naviere Walkewicz ’99 

Lt. Col. (Ret.) Naviere Walkewicz 0:02
Sometimes the direction of our lives becomes clear because of a specific moment in time that imprints us. For Dr. Vik Bebarta, those moments ultimately revealed not only his calling, but what it means to serve. I’m Naviere Walkewicz, Class of ’99. Long Blue Leadership starts now. Dr. Vik Bebarta, Class of 1994, is an Air Force Academy graduate, physician scientist and chair of the Department of Emergency Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. He’s the founding director of the CU Anschutz Center for Combat Medicine and Battlefield Research and serves as strategic lead of the Marcus Institute for Brain Health. A colonel in the Air Force Reserve, Vik served 14 years on active duty and deployed multiple times as a combat physician. His research and leadership have focused on turning lessons learned in the military into advances into trauma care, brain health and emergency medicine; work that is intended to improve not only care for those you serve, but for patients everywhere. I think I got that right. Did I get that right?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 1:05
Right, you did. Yeah, nice job. Good summary.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 1:08
Welcome, welcome to Long Blue Leadership. This is a treat for us.

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 1:11
Same for me.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 1:13
We’re thrilled. Wonderful. We have so much to cover today, and really, the key is we want to dig into your leadership journey because this is what our grads and our listeners and viewers really love to hear. So, would like to kind of jump into, you know, your path at the Air Force Academy was varied, right? It moved very differently than maybe you imagined. Maybe we start there.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 1:32
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I grew up in in South Carolina and I’d never been to Colorado.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 1:36
Ever?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 1:37
Ever. I sure as heck hadn’t been here. And I grew up in a small town, immigrant family and didn’t know much about the service academies except for a guy I worked for in the summers had gone to the Air Force Academy, and that a friend of my brother, one had gone to the Naval Academy, one had gone to West Point. It’s about all I knew, and when I was looking for colleges, I said I really want to do more than go to classes, but a little bit of adventure, a little skydiving, a little survival training, and that’s what led me along the path to service academies.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 2:08
So, you know, that’s kind of a unique perspective for someone who maybe really didn’t have a ton of exposure. Did you have any? Were your parents influential in any way, or mentors when you were a young kid that also helped kind of steward you in that direction?


Dr. Vik Bebarta 2:21
Yeah, you know when I was growing up in the small town called Denmark, we had a close family member who was in the Army, was in Vietnam, and he was our scoutmaster for Boy Scouts, Gus Eubanks, and he was very sort of focused on the military, and it was always forefront of mind, you know. As Boy Scouts, he trained us about military principles. I think that was the early start growing up. And then seeing some of these folks in our community, small community, 4,000 people, who had gone off to service academies, and how that was interesting and cool. And a friend of mine actually was very big into flying, and because all those things together sort of got along the lines of maybe going into the military. Uniquely, though, again, immigrant families — me, my brother, my parents here — so we didn’t have anybody in the military except for my aunt, who was in the Indian army back in India, who I hadn’t met yet. But she was one of the first women who had joined the military at the time. My mom’s family was all first, lots of first engineers in the military, or in in the military, first engineers, first Ph.D., those types of things. And so she was one of the first women that went into the Indian army. So I knew that, but I’d never met her at that time.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 3:40
Well, I’m seeing some of these things of, you know, standards of excellence coming from your family already. So you know, you mentioned, you know, survival training and jump and pilot, but that’s not what you’re doing. Let’s talk about how that kind of happened. You’re in medicine.

Dr. Vik Bebarta 3:54
That’s right. Yeah, I think, you know, early on I didn’t know what I was going to do. As my mom, who passed away last year, would say my primary goal, even in high school, was to be a rock star. Yeah, exactly. I think that carried through my junior year.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 4:12
Any particular band?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 4:13
A little bit of AC/DC, then Guns N’ Roses, and those times. So I think at some point she told me, which I don’t remember it. Like that’s not going to work in a real career. So, but when I was younger, when I was a eighth grader or so, my father got ill, and he was sick for about four or five years. He ultimately passed away when I was a high school senior, and so I think that influence of that time, and seeing my father ill, and seeing the physicians that took care of us, inspired me to move in that direction and move into medicine.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 4:56
What was it in particular about, I guess, I mean, that’s such a difficult experience to go through any time in life, but especially I think in those years at high school, you know, you’re about to transition into like what you’re going to do as an adult. What was it about those positions and that experience that kind of imprinted you, maybe unknowingly?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 5:15
Yeah, unknowingly. I think at the time I didn’t realize it, and, you know, my dad had gotten ill, and so my mom sort of had to step in and help figure this out, what’s going to happen?.And you know, she had two young teenagers, and she was very smart. She had two PhDs. You know, one from India and one from here. She was raising two boys in a new country. At the same time, this is a very complicated medical illness that my father had, and while she’s very smart, she was also very scared. And in front of the doctor was a woman who was a mother of two young boys and a wife to a husband who was really ill, and he saw that, and he saw that he could be there in a very vulnerable and scary moment. I saw that too. I think that’s what mapped out my plan, not just to be a physician, but more so to be there when people are at their vulnerable moments and when they’re most scared, whether it’s in medicine or whether it’s in leadership, that you can help explain things simply where they’re in that scared moment. I think that was what really moved me into medicine and actually framed my medical career, but also my leadership career too.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 6:35
Wow! So when, while you’re a cadet, did that kind of come into play, or did it happen while you’re a cadet or after graduation? Because I know the medical path from the Air Force Academy isn’t always as clear as, you know, I want to be a pilot. I meet these requirements and I have a pilot slot.

Dr. Vik Bebarta 6:50
That’s right. I think for medicine, I think when I went to the academy. So this is nine months when he passed away before I went to the academy, and then I still didn’t know what I was going to do, but somewhere around my sophomore year here, I thought medicine was the way to go and started moving in that direction and taking the classes and trying to get some observerships downtown. And then I was fortunate enough at the end of the Academy to get a medical school slot and then move in that direction fully to go to medical school.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 7:22
Wow! So once you started down that path, what are some of the— I don’t know, I think I’d be curious because, you know, we think about newer leaders, right? They become second lieutenants or they’re early in their career journeys of leadership. What did that look like for you on the medical side? I’m curious on what that looked like.

Dr. Vik Bebarta 7:39
Yeah, I think, you know, a couple things that really stood out to me is how well the Academy has prepared me for that. We joke a little bit at medical school that the medical school is easier than the academy.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 7:50
Really?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 7:51
Far easier, less busy.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 7:53
You’re like, I have all this time.

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 7:54
Right. Exactly, which is a mistake because I had too much time, and we were in D.C. for med school. I think a lot of us probably— a few of our classmates went to med school in D.C. We probably went out a little bit too much our first year of medical school, but it also gave us a sense of leadership, a sense of the ability to work under stress. You know, we always talk about how you don’t train for calm; you train for chaos. And in medical school, there’s a lot of busyness there. It’s not quite chaos, but the Academy training gave you the opportunity to, you know, be calm in those situations, plan ahead. It’s all going to be OK. We’re going to figure it out. Which was very different than my colleagues who are not from service academies.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 8:38
I can imagine that, right? You know, this is. I don’t know if this is dating me, and I don’t know if this is still accurate now, but I remember at times when I would be at certain, when I was active duty, I would be at certain either bases or classes, and someone in the medical field, excuse me, would be coming to that class, and they would be like, "How do I wear this on my uniform?” Because you’re not obviously doing that all the time. Can you talk a little bit about like how it feels to still be serving in the military, but in the vein of, you know, medicine? It’s a little bit different. Like, do you still feel that same, “I’m doing my part of the Air Force mission.”?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 9:09
Yeah, that’s a great question. You know, so when I left the Academy, it was really about 10 years later when I fully put my uniform back on. So with medical school, and we do after medical school, we do residency for more years and fellowship training. So in that 10 years, I had buddies that were leaving active duty, you know, that were pilots, and I was just sort of starting my military journey. And so all those 10 years, it was a little challenging because you feel you’re a part of it, but you’re actually not doing it. And so there were months here and there over those 10 years where you go down to Texas or go do some training in aerospace medicine, and that became a little bit of challenge because you’re not really sure if you’re a civilian if you’re military, even though you know you are. And that was hard. Where my colleagues who were active duty were wearing the uniform and training, and I had folks that were not military were doing what I was doing, and you know, just being a normal civilian.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 10:05
Do you feel that that was part of how you develop? How does that affect your leadership development? Did you feel like you were developing it differently with a more of a civilian mindset and understanding that? So it actually was opening up your aperture more broadly, or do you feel like maybe you were missing a bit of the, you know, kind of the hierarchical structure of the military.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 10:23
Yeah, I firmly believe in leadership development — that the varied experiences are very important in development. There’s a book called Range that talks about how if you have many different experiences, or if you’re an athlete, you have— many different sports make you a better athlete. I think the same thing for my leadership, and that helped me through this transition with being a civilian in the military. Having these different experiences, the civilian engagement while having military principles and military training together, set me up years later to be a better leader, both for the military and in my current civilian leadership roles as well.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 10:59
Amazing. So you mentioned that, you know, you kind of fully put on the uniform about 10 years later. Was there a moment in time when wearing the uniform where you kind of felt that military and medical background really just kind of come to this apex with like, “Wow, I really get this. This is, you know, this has come together in a way that I wouldn’t have never imagined.”

Dr. Vik Bebarta 11:17
Yeah, it’s a great question. Looking back at the moment, I didn’t realize it, but looking back, you know, when I entered back into active duty, it was right around 9/11, so the deployment tempo was high, and I was in emergency position, an ER doc, and so high demand, especially to Iraq and also to Afghanistan. So in those moments, those first moments, then that sort of confluence of in the military and the medical career, emergency physicians came together at the right moment for me, almost like a time in a bottle over those early years.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 11:56
You talked about leadership development and range, right? So now, when these two are coming together, did you find yourself, you know, developing more rapidly? Were you experiencing things from a different vantage point now that you had those come together? I’m just curious how it affected your leadership.

Dr. Vik Bebarta 12:09
Yeah, I think, you know, in those moments when we were deployed— so when I really understood what being in the military is about was being deployed, and at those moments, you— we were all out of training, recently out of training. We deployed to Iraq; I was the chief of the emergency department, which is basically a big tent, but was the busiest hospital since the Vietnam War for casualties. And you didn’t have a lot of time to learn, so we all were learning together, sort of collective wisdom, and you had to make decisions that were highly consequential, which in many other instances you may have learned 10 years later or five years later at a slower pace. We were learning those lessons day by day, hour by hour. And so the ability to be adaptive, to be curious, to be vulnerable in those challenges, to take care of a team that was under a lot of stress, they were away from home — you’re talking to dealing with casualties that were, you know, young men and women that were, you know, dying or could be dying. It was a very hard time for them and you had to lead them through those moments. I think I grew a lot personally and professionally over those periods.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 13:24
And you were still active at that time, correct?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 13:25
Correct.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 13:26
So, how did that time serve you? So, you made a decision at 14 years to go into the Reserve. Yes. Can you talk a little bit about that one: that decision to, you know, to navigate your career differently, because I think that’s an area where people in general are like, should I stay inactive? Should I go into the Reserve or Guard? Just curious on your own personal transition.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 13:44
That’s a great question. You know, I was active duty 14 years. I enjoyed every— I enjoyed most minutes of it. Yeah, it was very an operational time when I was— meaning it was a high tempo and very focused on the war and what’s going on and all the things I did, both research innovation and clinically with emergency medicine. But at 14 years we’d come to the point— I had a great opportunity with the military to move. Very fond of the joint operations and the joint environment, so we’d be moving to D.C. to be leading a joint program almost worth a billion dollars. But our family had been through a lot. We deployed a lot. I deployed a lot, and my wife had been through several deployments, taking care of kids when I wasn’t there for much of it. And I felt continuing potentially in that environment may be selfish, and that I need to focus on what they needed as they were coming into high school and the stresses they had. I could probably make a career without having to do this full time. That was a hard decision because I had great sponsors and leaders in the military. I had a great opportunity. I thought that was the right thing at the moment to do, uncertain of what I would do at the time. But I will say I wanted to continue to serve in some way. I think the Academy — of the many lessons carries through us, is we all have different careers, but it definitely carries the need to serve in some way after, and that to me was important and be respected for the military time I’ve given. So our consideration was to lead the military to the great wide world to figure out what to do at the time. And I will say, you know, I talked to a lot of people, and I don’t think— you should definitely not feel you have to serve 20 years, but you should also definitely leave when you feel fulfilled, and so, and not stay beyond that. And so at that moment, it was the right time for us to leave. Different for other people.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 15:49
Thank you for sharing that. I think, you know, it’s a topic that many may think about, but not spend a lot of time talking about. And so, I think, just in sharing how you navigated it, I think it was smart you had all those conversations, and I think those two points, making sure that you are, you know, you feel really fulfilled, and I think the service component is really important. So I want to talk about what you transitioned into because when you did find yourself in the civilian world while still working as a reservist, I think that when you talked about the range of experiences you’ve had and your desire for, you know, being adaptable and being flexible and moving quickly from learning seems like that translated pretty well into what you’re doing now. Let’s talk about that a bit.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 16:29
Yeah, I think when I left the military, active duty, went to the Guard for some time and then to the Reserve, I one hint namely not to deploy away from the family and not to move every three years, and then do some research and see patients. And so that was a pretty low bar. But we looked at opportunities in industry, and in pharma, in community practice and academic practice. We found that in Colorado, it really represented what we’re looking for. The bosses I was going to work for understood what the military did, and the community of Colorado was supportive of that. But I will say the first couple of years was hard, as many people leave that could do that transition, that loss of community and shared experiences. it was hard the first two years. I think mostly because I conflated wearing the uniform with mission, and I thought they were the same. And what I learned is I could take off the uniform, that was tremendously important, and still have mission and purpose. Once I found that, which took me a couple of years, I really accelerated to provide that service to the community and to the nation without wearing the uniform full time.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 17:44
That’s really helpful, and I think, you know, probably worthwhile for those that are in the medical field to be, to know that there are paths outside of the traditional way of, “I serve 20, you know, however many till I retire and then move on.” And so I think that was really helpful that there are those pathways. So I’m curious in your in your current role now, and maybe let’s talk about your work with the I want to say this right: the combat medicine and battlefield research. I think that work is phenomenal and I’ve had an opportunity to listen to your TED Talk, which is fantastic, but I’m curious if you can talk about, you know, how you’ve seen, you know, your leadership develop in this space because you’re moving at a rapid pace, and you’re trying to bring others along with you.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 18:24
Yeah, yeah, it’s interesting. So when we thought about, we call it the Combat Center, Combat Medicine Research Center, called Combat Center at University Colorado. At the beginning, when I left active duty, I had some frustrations that, you know, we have folks that are dying on the battlefield, and we could do things better and faster. We can bring the smartest scientists, the biggest companies, onto these problems, capability gaps, requirements, and solve them faster than what’s typically taking 17 years, and so a long time. And, you know, folks who are, you know, in elementary school are waiting until they’re in college before they get these solutions or answers, and that’s not fair to them. That’s not fair to our warfighters who are on the battlefield now, and they won’t see them until they retire. And so I felt that urgency to solve those. So I thought, you know, could I bring together, you know, folks who are, you know, smart researchers, companies who are bringing good technologies in the military together? At first, that idea was brought to me, and the leader said, at the University of Colorado, said, "Hey, would you do this?” And I said, "Absolutely not.”

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 19:28
Really?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 19:29
I said, "I’m not deploying. I’m not moving. I want to just do research and take care of my patients.” So they said, “Fine. We think it’s a good idea.” And so they came back two weeks later and they said, “I think we should do this.” And I said, “Absolutely not.” I got just too busy, but by the third time I came around, I thought that we actually had the team to do this in the will, but a lot of other people did not believe this was a thing, and so even early on, I thought of more of a startup mentality. Like we can bend the arc of, you know, combat casualty care, warfighter medicine, but I think this is how we need to do it. So we went to the lion’s den and went to the bear cage and said, you know, we, you know, “Resource us, we can do this.” I went to the military and everyone said, you know, “Who are you? What is this?” And we were able to bring together what was called the combat center, basically aiming to save lives on the battlefield and back home. So for every military innovation is a civilian mirror. For every injury in the military, whether it’s PTSD or suicide or bleeding or tourniquet needs, there’s a need in our community. So bringing the things that save people on the battlefield back home to our backyard, in our rural communities, in our states like Denver or Aurora or Colorado Springs, applying them there, that I realized was a novel idea that many people did not know. But I was highly passionate about it, and we’ve been quite successful in launching that entire paradigm.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 20:55
Wow! And it makes me think back to your dad, and you know, in his battle and the time. I mean, obviously, 17 years wouldn’t bring a solution in that case, but certainly shortening it down would get you know people have better chances at some of that.

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 21:09
For sure.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 21:10
I’d love to talk about maybe some of what you’ve learned in this in this role, right? Because part of it, you know, you’re saying what is happens on the battlefield and how we can improve it. We can do it back home. I’m curious if there was ever a moment on the battlefield that has either changed or shaped the way you’ve done some of the work for the combat center.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 21:27
Yeah, that occurred to me Oct. 17, 2005.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 21:33
You have a specific date.

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 21:34
Specific date because I took care of Sgt. First Class Alvin Cash. He was a young sergeant, army sergeant, and this was in Balad, Iraq. I was chief of the emergency department, and he had gone out and patrol, and he was in a Bradley vehicle, and he got hit by an IED. He escaped unarmed, uninjured, but then went back and pulled all of his soldiers out of that vehicle. When the medevac or dust off helicopter came to pick him up, he said, “I’ll go last. You take everyone else.” So I took care of him and all of his soldiers after that, and he was burned badly — 85% of his body was burned, which is basically a death sentence. But had he not done that, his other soldiers would not have lived as they did, and so that moment stuck with me. I actually went back and journaled about that that night in our little plywood hut that we had near the tent. And I remember the next day the commander came and talked to us and shared the story as well that Sgt. Cash had— Sgt. Cash went on and received the Medal of Honor from the president just a few years ago. But I remember that moment because, you know, one: I could never do what he did. It was very heroic, and two: I realized that in a moment we could change health care. We don’t need to wait 17 years or five years or 10 years. We could change it in a minute, because that night we all got together from the entire theater from all the countries that were in Southwest Asia and CENTCOM, and met together and decided how we can improve burn care that night. Changed the guidelines for the military, the Department of Defense, changed them within weeks and months across the world and how burn care is done. I was like, why can’t we do this for many things: for cancer care, for trauma care for brain injury, for suicide, but that moment crystallized what we can do for health care, and that changed my career, my progression and all the stuff we’ve done since then for 20 years now.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 23:33
Wow! What an incredible— I mean, what a hero first of all, and then just what an incredible story that changed you. Would all of those people have gotten together had that not happened? Did you already meet regularly, but then you had this incident that you actually focused on? I’m just curious how that was.


Dr. Vik Bebarta 23:55
That’s a great question. That incident galvanized us to come together. And there was a mentality of agility of getting things done, a bias to action that we had to take right then at that moment, that was one big example that moved me. But over weeks and days and months, as we were deployed and many of the physician surgeons and whatnot that were there, that was the type of mentality we all had. In fact, we always talk about that Balad, Iraq, where the Air Force theater hospital was in a very joint environment, that was a genesis of a lot of health care innovations that we all see today in our community hospitals and trauma centers now. It was the bedrock of a decade of leaders who were in health care executives across the country who went on to be generals and commanders and CEOs and deans and chairs out of that window. I have a picture of five people I deployed with, and every single one of those people who were from different backgrounds — docs, nurses, family medicine — who are now executives in health care because of that moment, because that’s the mentality we had as we had to fix this right now, and it was a pretty powerful time to be a part of that group, and I think that’s how we led. And that moment was one hard example, but there were other small ones that led other types of leaders in that space.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 25:08
I literally got chill bumps when you talked about the five, you know, five people in your photo and how they’re literally leading change because of the ability, you know, their position and their leadership in those different roles. When we talk about the speed of impact, like what you’ve been able to do. Can you share, you know, have there been any kind of truly other instrumental ways that you’ve moved medicine faster because of this work?


Dr. Vik Bebarta 25:34
Yeah, you know, I think, you know ,I speak to this. I call it the speed of need, and beating the—

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 25:40
Speed to need?

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 25:41
Speed of need.

 

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 25:42
Speed of need. Got it.

 

Dr. Vik Bebarta 25:43
Speed of need and beating the bottlenecks of bureaucracy. The speed of need meaning we have someone there. You know, in emergency medicine, you don’t have time to admire the problem, and neither in combat medicine. You got someone bleeding in front of you. Someone’s got brain injury in front of you. You need to make a decision right now. You can’t wait. So that’s the need, and we need to move to that speed. We shouldn’t wait 17 years or five years for those solutions. We need to push those forward, and that’s how we operate. We operate in our combat center— we operate with trust, like, people trust us. We get the phone calls from D.C. or Ukraine or Iraq or anywhere else. They call us to help solve those problems. We are highly collaborative, meaning you can trust us to work with you all to solve those problems, whether it’s industry or government or another country. And then we believe in urgency and impact, and we move fast in that way. So whether a couple solutions that we’ve talked about around tourniquet use, that was one of the early training things that came out of TCCC or tactical combat casualty care, and how to move those from military medicine, unfortunately, into our civilian communities where we’re having mass shootings and shootings in schools and applying those and training those. Whether it’s moving whole blood transfusions or blood transfusions right up to the field and the point of injury in in our battlefield situations in our civilian hospitals and our ambulances today. And how do we reduce suicide, particularly military firearm suicide? Highly prevalent in our military communities and our dependents as well. How do we get those solutions in working with gun shops into our civilian communities to making sure we can reduce firearm suicide in those communities as well?

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 27:24
I was actually going to ask you because when you talked about the speed to need, especially in an emergency or on the combat field, it’s very visible, right? And so then I thought about, well, what about the speed to need for the into the medical needs that aren’t so visible? And I think about how in our you know just in our country, in our nation, the prevalence of suicide, and I think about you know post-traumatic stress and those things that maybe aren’t so visible. I’m just curious how do you how do you work towards the speed to need for that?


Dr. Vik Bebarta 27:52
Yeah, I think the, you know, for us, you know, we want to understand the problem. So we actually work back from the problem and then forward with science. So we take a look and what is the most pressing prevalent issue, PTSD or PTS or suicide, and then now how do we solve that? How do we bring folks together, which we really think is important, from science, from industry, from both sides, from the military, from commanders who are not medical, the young enlisted, to senior enlisted together, what is the challenge that we’re having, and then come up with solutions that are actually we can implement, and that’s where they think the challenge has been is: What works and how do we implement them? We got a lot of things that work, but the commander, a young E4, E5, won’t implement that and won’t use that. It ain’t gonna work. We do a lot with different technology and wearable solutions and metadata and whatnot, and some of those work quite well, but for TSSCI situation, those aren’t going to work that well. But maybe for our communities and bases in garrison, they actually work quite well. OK, and so we try and find the things that we can implement and move not just through practice. You know, sometimes we talk about how speed saves lives, but where it’s really important is speed with purpose changes systems. Systems change practice. Practice changes communities and generations and families. And so we try to look at that impact and bring that. But it’s about bringing folks together who want to take action from different backgrounds and then developing the rigor as well as the urgency together to move that that speed of need.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 29:26
Wow, that’s fascinating, and I think that’s really helpful the way you presented it that way for us to think about all of those ways that things can be affected and changed. One of the things that’s been on my mind is I’ve thought about the dichotomy of you being a colonel still in the Reserve, and you know leading this at the combat center. Are you the same leader in both places? And meaning, what I mean by that is, are you still implementing the same tools to move your teams on both sides of the, you know, uniform or not uniform? What does that look like?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 29:54
Yeah, I love using my military experience and knowledge and training that we’ve had over the years, from the Academy all the way to now, to our civilian leadership roles. And you know sometimes people think of military colonels as being ordering people around and telling people what to do, but as we know, the great leaders that go from good to great, they lead with curiosity and vulnerability and humility and confidence together. So I like bringing those best pieces of our military training into our civilian leadership health care community and helping train my health care executives in the same tools. And it’s always refreshing and almost disarming because they think of someone who’s in you know Air Force, a military colonel, lieutenant colonel, thinking they’re going to kind of boss people around, and they find it disarming when you’re leading with vulnerability and you’re leading with, you know, ways to communicate and trying developing psychological safety to make decisions. It’s almost more important and more valuable to them to see that.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 31:00
Would you say that as far as the responsiveness and, you know, the team kind of trusting you, have you seen that more impactful on the civilian side because you’re working so closely with maybe someone who’s disarmed by it, or more so on the military side because you know they’re kind of used to that already?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 31:19
It’s a good question. I think the, on the civilian side, they find it very empowering, and like you said, disarming, and has a lot of credibility to them. On the civilian side, what is very unique— and that’s why I believe strongly in military-civilian partnerships, because what I can bring from the civilian side to the military, when I look at changing policy and practice, and education, training and training combat medics, whether they’re, you know, our pararescue men or whether they’re you know IDMTs or 68 Whiskeys or 18 Deltas, is how the civilian aspects work, and what doesn’t or doesn’t work, what technologies, what communication, what innovations work? And bringing them into leadership styles on the military, I think that confluence is very important. And that, to me, the military civilian partnerships are very important. It’s the reason why we’re working with the Army Surgeon General’s Office to bring together a big partnership for the Army, and we’re doing one for the Air Force Academy as well. At CU, taking the best of health care delivery and health care leadership on the CU/UCHealth side to the military, the Army, and the Army is going to bring the best of military leadership in skill training for combat care to the to the civilian community. It’s the nice— it’s the perfect mix of both. I think it’s really important to look forward, as we look to our near peers, you look to these future battle scenarios that we’re going to have, we must bring the best out of the civilian care and our military care together, at least in medicine.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 32:49
Well, I was going to ask how you were bringing things from the civilian side to the military side, but you already answered that. So, way to think ahead of what I was thinking. You know, I want to talk about— you have a son at the Academy. Class of 29. You know, when we think about legacy, and, you know, what you’re doing in the medical field, is almost its own legacy because you’re creating things and doing things now that, well, you did it 10 years ago. You sped up, you know, when I think about the burn care, et cetera. Like you’re you’ve been building a legacy in this space. What does it mean to you to have a cadet at the Academy, and how are you building that legacy and kind of sharing what you’ve learned through him?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 33:26
Yeah, one: Don’t think about legacy. We got a lot of work to do right now, so we’re still looking forward. But I am proud and excited for him. He chose his path to come to the Air Force Academy with many options, and what I did say is, and I’ve told him this, is that, you know, “This is not, you know, my path. This is your path.” And I want him to choose his own path in whichever direction he wants to go. I also said, “You should take as many experiences as you can.” And one thing that I, you know, would have learned back to my 18-year-old self is the Academy provides so many opportunities and experiences that we’ve all benefited from. I didn’t take advantage of all of them, and I had— I didn’t have a plan B. I had plan A, which is to get through the Academy, to study hard, I boxed for a few years, and to go and to move in whatever it would take me. I think in hindsight, having that diverse experience of opportunities that the Academy offers, and so many more now than we had, that would make me a better leader, a better doctor, whatever he wants to do, pilot, cyber, you know, whatever he wants to do, physical therapist, you know, whatever he chooses to do in his future career, and I wish I had done a better job with that.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 34:38
Do you think that, and I— with me also having cadets at the Academy, part of it’s like, “Oh, it’s Mom or Dad saying it.” But do you think that that has resonated with him? Has he kind of taken that and tried to explore different things?


Dr. Vik Bebarta 34:50
Yes, I think he definitely has taken that to heart. I think he’s working hard, he’s studying hard, he’s joining different clubs, probably too many clubs, which is OK. But I’m proud of that. I’m proud of him taking chances, taking risk, choosing to be vulnerable in different situations, and he’s mentoring others. He really aspires to lead. He wants to be a cadre so he can lead others. He wants to be a mentor and a coach to others, and that’s where I think the Academy does a really good job. And I could see him very focused on service and helping others, and I’m pretty proud of that. I think I’m pretty proud of what he’s chosen to do in whatever direction. And that’s what I’ve said to him and to other cadets as well: is that there is not a straight path. There’s different ways to get where you want to go, and I think, you know, try not to stick with the path, but stick with the mission and the service, and the, you know, organizations change, commanders change, commandants and superintendents change, but what continues the path through is your service and where you get there. And so, if he can continue to focus on that, then he’ll find his way, whatever it is, and all these cadets will, and it will not be straightforward. Mine was not. I have a very iconoclastic approach, very nontraditional to get where I’m at. But that made me a better leader today, accepting those challenges and being vulnerable and taking those chances and risk in things I didn’t think I’d be good at that are sure helping me now.


Col. Naviere Walkewicz 36:19
Well, that is really helpful. I think hearing how you might suggest, you know, our current and up-and-coming leaders, our cadets, et cetera, approach some of those ways now. I’m curious how you, as a ’94 graduate, what are you doing now to be better every day as a leader?


Dr. Vik Bebarta 36:35
I tell you what, I think being a leader now is important as it was 10 years ago, 20 years ago in the Academy, and learning to grow is key. So for me, two things really important: It’s beginner’s mind, which means staying curious in my conversations with folks that work with me, my patients, their families, learning what they need. That beginner’s mind and curiosity is really important. Secondly, I firmly believe around obstacles isthe way, and I think that sort of stoicism and that ability to know it’s not going to be straight, it’s going to be curved, there’s going to be challenges, and not going to work out that way, and that’s OK. So those things are really important for me. You know, the third thing is just around sort of holistic personal growth, and that’s around reading. That’s around now getting seven hours of sleep, working out, staying fit and taking care of yourself. You take care of yourself, you can take care of your people. You take care of your people, you take care of your family. I think those things are really important for me. You know, some of the principles around being curious as a leader, being vulnerable as a leader, being confident and being humble, I think all tied together. I think they’re a loop, and those are really important as leaders to grow, but really continue to grow and lead. Take chances and take risk with your people. I think that’s hard sometimes, even though we came from the military and a combat experience, sometimes it can be fearful to do that, but I always say, you know, weighing more not about your setbacks, but your comebacks. So that means taking some risk and then realizing that you’ll be better for it going forward.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 38:14
I’m a visual listener and learner, and so when you said it’s a loop, I literally started to see what you were talking about. You know, about being vulnerable, about being confident, about being compassionate, about taking risks, being confident. Like, I think that’s really helpful, and you never know what the moment calls for, and so having that ability to you know loop around is really fascinating. This has been wonderful. Is there anything that we haven’t covered that you’d love to share with our listeners and viewers?

Dr. Vik Bebarta 38:41
You know, one thing for us, our tagline for our Department of Emergency Medicine, tying back to this loop of humility and curiosity and vulnerability and competence, is, you know, we say, you know, we’re caring boldly, leading bravely, is how our tagline is. And that, to me, can be applied to several things in leadership. But for us, for example, caring boldly is taking care of that patient at 3 in the morning after that gunshot wound or accident at their most vulnerable time, which is hard to do, and then leading bravely then to us is that next week looking back and say, “How could I have done that better?” And being vulnerable to say, you know, “I think I could have done that better.” And that happened to me a lot when we were deployed and we’re taking care of these casualties. Or 18, 19 years old, learning as we go, and improving care as we go, and making sure that we’re better leaders the next day, the next hour, the next month. That continuous personal growth is important, and that’s what I espouse to our current leaders, to my kids, and to our cadets and young leaders in this space as well.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 39:46
Vik, this has been amazing. I am so grateful for your time today, for you sharing your story, even dipping into having a cadet here and how you’ve even shared that with him as well. I think some of the things that really stood out to me, and I’ll share it with our viewers and listeners as well. You know, I think when you talked about range earlier in that book that you, know you, read, being able to understand the things that you can take from different sides of your experiences, finding those best practices and galvanizing them, and then sharing them with others who maybe haven’t experienced them I think is really powerful. I love, I think, how you lead with vulnerability, but you do it in a confident way, right? I don’t— it’s not coming from a victim mentality, or you’re coming from, “I can be in this space with you, and I understand. But I’m confident that I can help you,” right? And I think that’s really powerful for leaders to hear. And just, I really appreciate how you really approach this with just such humility and just such energy. And it’s been a wonderful conversation. Thank you.

Dr. Vik Bebarta 40:40
Yeah, thank you. It’s been a great opportunity to be here. You’ve done some amazing work, bringing some great leaders here together. I’m really honored to be one of those folks that get a chance to talk with you.

Col. Naviere Walkewicz 40:50
Well, thank you. And if you know of others who are in their leadership journeys, especially not just in medicine, but this is one way to really look at that, be sure to bring them to our Long Blue Leadership podcast series. You can get there by going to usafa.org/longblueleadership. You’ll hear from Dr. Col. Vik Bebarta, Class of 1994, and many others. As always, we appreciate you listening to us. I’m Naviere Walkewicz, Class of ’99, and we’ll see you next time on Long Blue Leadership.

 

KEYWORDS

Vik Bebarta, Dr. Vik Bebarta, Long Blue Leadership podcast, Air Force Academy graduates, USAFA Class of 1994, military leadership, leadership development, leadership lessons, combat medicine, battlefield medicine, emergency medicine, University of Colorado School of Medicine, CU Anschutz, Center for Combat Medicine and Battlefield Research, military medicine innovation, combat casualty care, military healthcare leadership, physician leadership, leading through adversity, leadership under pressure, adaptive leadership, purpose-driven leadership, servant leadership, leadership through humility, vulnerable leadership, psychological safety, military to civilian transition, military civilian partnerships, trauma care innovation, speed of need, medical innovation, Sgt. 1st Class Alwyn Cashe, Medal of Honor, Iraq War, Balad Iraq, leadership through service, continuous improvement, curiosity in leadership, Air Force Reserve, leadership and resilience, caring boldly leading bravely, Long Blue Line, Naviere Walkewicz.

 

The Long Blue Line Podcast Network is presented by the U.S. Air Force Academy Association & Foundation