- Howdy.

Today, I'm visiting with Texas A&M interim president, Mark A. Welsh III.

President Welsh, thank you so much for joining us today.

- Thanks for having me, Chelsea.

- As Air Force Chief of Staff, you were responsible for 660,000 active duty servicemen and women.

What did a typical day look like for you during that time?

- They were busy.

And depending on whether we were at home in Washington DC or whether we were on the road, which happened about 65 to 70% of the time, on the road you'd fly in usually the night before.

You'd do a full day visit at the base visiting with the people there, learning about what they do and how they were doing it.

And then that evening you'd go to a dinner with community leaders, get finished with that usually about 10 at night.

Go back and do your mandatory four hours of email.

Go to bed about two o'clock, get up about 4:30 to 5:00 to work out and start over again.

- Not a lot of sleep.

- Yeah, not much sleep at all.

No.

- How did the sheer size of that responsibility prepare you for leading a university as large as Texas A&M?

- I think, probably the two biggest takeaways for me from leading really large organizations is that your decision-making process doesn't necessarily change as you go from smaller organizations to larger ones.

But there are a couple of other factors you have to consider in larger organizations that aren't as big a deal in a small one.

And the first one is, is the plan executable?

Is this great new idea you've come up with in your ivory palace actually executable at Base X in the Air Force, for example?

And the second piece of that was how does it affect every airman?

What is the impact of this on every airman?

And I think you have to have the same kind of thought process here at Texas A&M.

How is the plan executable, no matter how good it sounds in this particular environment?

And how does it affect every faculty member, every staff member, every student?

And do we wanna create that effect?

So that, I thought those, that lesson's pretty transferrable.

- I'm sure there were several pivotal moments during your time in the Air Force, but is there one that kinda comes to mind?

- I'll give you three quick ones.

First one was my first time soloing in an airplane.

That was- - Terrifying or exciting?

- No.

Exciting.

(Chelsea laughs) I screamed the entire time.

I sang the national anthem to myself.

It was really corny, but it had been my dream forever.

It was magnificent.

And I was incredibly capable, just to make that clear.

The second thing was my first combat sortie which everybody, no matter what you do in the military, if you have a combat experience, your first one is intensely personal.

And I'll never forget the vivid details of that particular experience.

And then, the third one is kind of a weird one, but it connected me to Texas A&M and it's when my wife and I went to visit the Philippine Air Chief in 2015, I think it was.

And one of the things he wanted to do was visit Corregidor with us.

So, we flew into Corregidor in a helicopter with the Philippine Air Chief and his wife.

We landed on the parade grounds of the old Army post there.

And I got outta the helicopter and saw the A&M flag flying.

- Wow.

- And was reminded of the story, of course, about the post commander being an Aggie.

And the first muster ceremony held there in the mountain before the Japanese took over the peninsula.

It was really a kind of a wake up call for me and a reminder of the reach of Texas A&M and the impact that's had over a long, long period of time.

- You mentioned flying.

You started in the Air Force as a fighter pilot.

Describe to us the mindset and focus that you have to have for a job like that.

- You have to be willing to work hard.

It's not like work, but it's a lot of hard work.

You have to, there has to be a certain level of confidence that some people might consider cocky.

The mindset has to be when the enemy appears on your radar in combat operations, they don't know it yet, but they're dead.

That's the mindset.

And so, you live your life, you train, you prepare with that in mind.

So, every training mission is a competition.

Everybody wants to be the best.

I would love sitting in a training briefing before the mission, knowing that everybody in that room wanted to take my money on the gunnery range.

And I love knowing that wasn't gonna happen.

We all felt the same way.

And the whole idea was bring the team's performance up so that there was no lowest common denominator.

Everybody was good.

So, it was all about the team, which is something I've always believed in.

And it was just an exciting, competitive, engaging life with people who you knew would die for you.

It's a pretty good feeling.

- You were also commander of NATO's Air Command in Germany.

What were some skills that you gained while working abroad that you might still use today?

- I guess some knowledge would be the first thing.

And that's that there are great people everywhere in this world, in every country, and in every part of life.

And in the military, there's really capable people in every country in the world, whether they're an ally or an enemy.

It's worth knowing this.

In NATO, there are a whole bunch of great partners who for the great majority of them, share our ideals, they share our concept of democracy.

They share our common values and our common view of the future.

They care about their families, they care about their friends, and they have very different perspectives on how to solve problems.

So, the fact that it wasn't an American solution, it was being presented, didn't really matter as long as the solution would work.

And that was a valuable lesson for me.

- You did not go to school here, but you raised a family of Aggies.

How has this university made an impact on you as a husband and as a father?

- Oh, golly.

I grew up in an Aggie family.

My mom went to Arizona State University.

We never, not once in my entire life did I hear those words in our household growing up.

(Chelsea chuckling) My dad was an Aggie.

- Gotcha.

- And we were an Aggie family.

And the indoctrination started really young at my house.

My dad credited his time at A&M for everything good in his life.

So, we grew up feeling that way about A&M and every time we visited, which happened every time we came through Texas between assignments, it was reinforced for us.

Betty and I's kids all went to A&M so all of our children are Aggies.

And the thing we now know, looking back on that, is that this university reinforces the values that we taught our children.

Our children are better citizens.

They're better husbands and fathers and moms and dads because they're Aggies.

It's just a fact.

And I don't know how you can attach a greater value to an institution than it does that.

- Your speech at Muster in 2022 made an impact on several people.

Tell me about the process of writing that speech and why that message was so important to you?

- I think the message was important because first I was so honored to be invited to speak at Muster.

That was shocking.

I had spoken at Muster ceremonies for A&M clubs around the country and a couple overseas.

But that's not the same as speaking at Muster on main campus.

As I started preparing for it, I think the biggest thing was I felt my father there, which really sounds corny.

Unless you're an Aggie, you kinda get it.

And I miss my dad.

I really miss my dad.

So, having him with me through that process was a big deal.

In fact, at one point, one of the weirdest things about speaking at Muster in Reed Arena is that once the lights go out and you step to the podium, all the secondary lights that you can see, if you're sitting there, the aisle lights, the floor lighting, lighting under the stage where you can see people's feet in the front row while you're sitting there, when you step to the podium, there is a very bright light shining in your face and you can see nothing.

It's black.

And so, you're speaking into the void.

It is kind of spooky.

- [Chelsea] Yeah.

- And nobody's making any noise, so there's no response.

And at one point, in fact, I got very emotional at the time of that presentation that wasn't really emotional 'cause I got the feeling I was talking to my dad.

I mean, he was right there.

It was really kind of a wild experience.

I've spoken in a lot of places, but I've never had that feeling before.

- You have served all over the world, yet you ended up here at Texas A&M University.

What initially brought you to College Station and what has kept you here?

- My admiration for George H.W.

Bush and my love of Texas A&M.

I literally have always loved the place.

I mean, since I was six.

And so, those two things came together with an opportunity that a friend here at A&M contacted me about and said, "Would you be interested in competing to be the Dean of the Bush School?"

And I honestly wasn't sure until I was lucky enough to visit campus as one of the finalists for that job and I met the students at the Bush School.

And I went home and I told my wife, you know, I'm not gonna get this job, but now I'm gonna be upset because I want it now because I wanted to be around them.

The greatest thing about not just the Bush School, but A&M, it's like the military in terms of there's young energy here and they're incredibly talented and they believe in the corny things that are all, what A&M is all about.

Just like the people I served with in the military, it's a very comfortable place for a former military person to work.

- Well, you did get the job.

(laughs) You were Dean of the Bush School of Government & Public Service for seven years.

How did that position relate to the offices that you held in the Air Force?

- Very different.

The culture is completely different.

At a university, especially a university with a tenured system, the incentives are different for people.

The way you get things done is different.

I'd spent 40 years in the system and so I knew how to make the easy things easy.

Here I didn't know how to make anything easy.

Titles around universities don't necessarily make sense to you if you haven't been around university.

It doesn't necessarily point to a function that that office does.

So, everything was harder than it should have been.

And to the great credit of my faculty especially, and to the students and staff at the Bush School, they were very patient in kinda educating me as to what I needed to know 'cause I didn't know anything.

So, it was a real privilege.

And the other deans here were phenomenal mentors.

They put up with 10,000 idiotic questions my first couple of years.

- Once you realized that it was gonna be a challenge, I mean, did that kind of excite you that you were now getting to take on this new test at that point in your life?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- I love studying culture anyway and this is a different culture, and trying to figure out how to operate inside the educational system and specifically inside Texas A&M while trying to, you know, make sure I fully understood the Aggie culture, which you can't really understand until you're in it for a while.

It was exciting.

It was a challenge.

It was fun.

I've loved every second of it.

- Once you got past that initial shock of, "Okay, this is gonna be different, this is gonna be a challenge", what were some of the big lessons and the big takeaways that you took from that role?

- I think the same kinda things I learned in the Air Force is I got to do bigger and bigger jobs.

One, that you don't know everything and you don't have to.

You just need to know who does.

And you need to figure out who to trust to get it done right.

At the academic side of a college like the Bush School can be very well managed by the faculty at the Bush School.

The academic direction of Texas A&M University should be set and overseen and redirected when necessary by the faculty at Texas A&M led by the provost.

So, a lot of the lessons translate.

We have staff experts on a number of things who ought to be consulted when we have decisions to make in those areas.

And we should lean on their expertise.

It's just, you know, it's like me trying to talk about being an interviewer.

I dunno how to be an interviewer, but you're really good at it.

(Chelsea laughs) So, I should trust your judgment if we're talking about interviewing things.

Anyway, I just, it's been a joy to do this.

- It was a very quick transition to your role as interim president.

What helped you prepare?

- Lots of previous quick transitions, I think.

You know what, when my wife and I got married, she had never moved.

She moved 24 times in the next 40 years.

So in the military, you routinely move into a job that you're probably not quite ready for.

You join a team that's already operating and functioning, and you're the new piece.

And so, you learn to pick it up pretty quick or you don't succeed.

You learn to transition into new jobs fast.

You learn to be comfortable and confident and kind of expressing yourself in those jobs.

And I think that helped when I came here.

It certainly helped when I stepped into the acting president job.

- What is your leadership philosophy?

- I believe that everyone, everyone here, every faculty member, every staff member, every student is critically important to what we're trying to do at Texas A&M and to the success of this institution.

And they deserve to be treated that way.

I believe that honesty is life.

So, I really believe in our core values.

And I believe that if you haven't laughed at yourself lately, everybody else probably has.

- (chuckles) Texas A&M unfortunately had a summer of negative headlines.

You were brought in and not expected to fix everything immediately, but you were definitely expected to get on top of it quickly.

You've talked a lot about two points.

So doing the right thing, the right way and the importance of academic freedom.

Why do you feel like those have been important to emphasize?

- Well, I think those two things are what the major concerns being expressed were when I was put into the job.

The first one had to do with this concern about outside influencing, making decisions for the university.

Outside influences making the decisions for the university.

And they really can't do that.

We can allow them to influence us to make the right decisions, but shame on us if that happens.

Outside influences or inputs are just that, they're inputs.

And many times from people who love the university have great ideas, great thoughts.

They just might not have all the context related to the decision we're making.

So, we should listen.

But that doesn't mean we have to change our decision if we think our decision's the right one.

So, my point there is just do the right thing.

These are our decisions, it's our process.

We should make the right call and then be held accountable for it.

I'm perfectly comfortable with that.

The academic freedom issue was a big issue 'cause our faculty was concerned that some of the things that had happened over the summer and leading up to the summer reflected a concern about their right of academic freedom.

And I just wanna make it real clear that there's no question in my mind about academic freedom.

It's a constitutionally protected privilege.

And it shouldn't just be for our tenured faculty members, it's for all of our faculty members.

It's for training we do.

There's required training where we put staff in a classroom.

Our librarians need to be able to produce collections that feed academic preparation, that may have materials that everybody doesn't agree with.

But academic freedom gives them the congressionally, or excuse me, constitutionally protected right to present all sides of a particular topic to the students so they learn and understand from that.

It's not something to be scared of.

It's the way education should work.

And I feel very strongly about that as do our faculty, as do I believe everybody around Texas A&M University.

And I just want everybody to be clear on that.

I've actually been talking about three things since I got here.

The first two you mentioned.

The third one is the fact that we can't lose ourself in the problems from this summer and the concerns related to that because we tend to forget the 10,000 great things that are happening at Texas A&M every single day.

And so, I talk about those things a lot.

We've got unbelievable people here doing incredible things, and we should be celebrating that all day, every day.

And that's what the world needs to hear.

- This is a huge university.

A lot of moving parts, a lot of people.

In your short time in this role as interim president, you have been very engaged with the faculty, the staff, the students.

Why is it important for you to talk and to listen, and to be out there in front of this university?

- I think the job of the president is to make sure we support everybody below that level and enable them to do the great things that they're doing all day long.

That's what the staff and I should be doing.

We should be supporting the colleges.

We should be supporting our professors in the classroom.

We should be supporting them in their research.

We should be supporting the staff and their professional development.

And we should all be supporting our students and preparing them to chase their dreams.

That's why we exist.

But to understand all the pieces that are required to do that, I need to talk to the people who are out there doing the job, and I need to listen to their input.

And this concept of shared governance tends to make some people a little bit nervous.

It's a really good thing.

People were shocked when I first got here to the Bush School and I told my faculty members, "Listen, I've been using shared governance my entire military career."

It walk into a room full of really elite military war fighters and tell them how they're gonna die tomorrow, and see how that goes for you.

Everybody needs to have a voice in the way we're gonna approach a problem.

Everybody needs to feel like that voice is valued.

Everybody needs to know how important they are to the conversation and the preparation for the tasks we have coming up.

And it's the same thing here.

We all need to be in this conversation.

I think it's my job to make sure we all are in it.

- What excites you about the future of Texas A&M?

- Oh, everything.

I mean, just everything.

We have this incredible world-class faculty and staff.

We have the greatest students on the planet.

We have unbelievable support from, everybody from our chancellor to the border regions, to leaders of the state of Texas.

In fact, that support's the envy of our peers everywhere.

And all of its connected to this legacy that is equal to the legacy of any institution in the country.

And you add all that together and it gives you a platform to stand on from which you can launch in any direction.

Aggies are already changing the world.

They're gonna keep changing it.

And they're gonna matter wherever they are, whatever they're doing.

And here we get to help 'em get ready.

It's just an exciting place to be.

- President Welsh, I know you're a busy man.

Thank you so much for making the time today.

- Oh, I'm honored to be here.

Thanks.