Hello. My name is Jeff Small. I was a presidential appointee in the Trump administration where I worked as a senior advisor to the 53rd Department of the Interior Secretary, David Bernhardt. I’m currently the chief of staff for US Congresswoman Lauren Boebert, was previously the executive director of the Congressional Western Caucus, and I’ve worked for numerous congressmen, governor candidates, and US Senate candidates throughout my 18 years working in politics. I grew up in Colorado and have worked in DC for the last 12 years.

My wife, daughter, and I live in Northern Virginia. If you’re taking time to watch this video, I’d like to get to know you and I would encourage you to reach out to me. In the eyes of many in the world, this every 4 year ceremony we accept as normal is nothing less than a miracle. In America, we understand that a nation is only living as long as it is striving. Only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger.

This great nation will endure as it has endured, will revive, and will prosper. Whether we go forward together with courage or turn back to policies that weakened our economy, diminished our leadership in the world, America’s future will be in your hands. Today, the main topic I’ll be discussing is how to staff your principal. If you had 4 days to plan and execute a roundtable with the president, the secretary, and to get 50 top sportsmen and conservation leaders to fly across the country for the event, could you pull it off? Will you and your boss have a secret signal to keep things moving or extract them from uncomfortable conversations?

We know your boss well enough to know what things make them most comfortable on the road, including their favorite snacks, drinks, meals, and bathroom stops. While this wasn’t the case with my particular principle, did you know that staffing your boss could entail ensuring they have a holding room next to the room they will be speaking in with a glass cup with chilled water, no ice, all the local daily newspapers, and other comforts? These are some of the questions and topics we will dive in today as we discuss effective strategies for staffing your boss. Today, we’re going to walk through 4 imperative components to adequately staff their principal. Know the preferences and expectations of your boss.

Always anticipate their needs. Know the schedule and be able to adapt quickly to changes. Know the president’s agenda and your agency’s policy priorities and initiatives. The first component is to know the preferences and expectations of your boss. What is their preferred method of communication?

When is the best time to approach them? On the hill and in the house of representatives, the typical preferred communication methods are email, text, or even signal chat. But when you work for the federal government, everything you put in an email, text, or note is foible and releasable to the American people. At Interior, we had a ton of in person meetings, which allowed us to speak a little more freely about the topics of the day. I would always advise you to show up at least 5 minutes early for meetings as we always start on time.

You would also pick up some good info in that time before the meeting started if you got there early and paid attention. Every morning, I was one of 15 political appointees who would join the secretary for an 8:40 meeting in the conference room. We’d go around the room and each person would update him on 2 to 3 important things. He could ask questions and he would also make assignments. And I quickly learned that the secretary typically knew much more about the subject folks were updating him on than they did.

He didn’t like folks to be long winded, and he would call you out if you weren’t prepared and hadn’t done your homework. At Interior, we had a ton on our plates and so much that we were trying to get done that we didn’t have time to waste. We would do another short 10 minute check-in at 3:45 to make sure there weren’t any wildfires or other important matters that needed to be discussed. While the 8:40 meetings could be intense at times, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I was in the action, got to interact with the secretary and senior staff every day, and I knew what was going on in the building.

Because there was so much to do, other appointees typically had to work through their supervisor, their chief of staff, be in an actual meeting with the secretary, or request a meeting on his calendar in order to interact with him in person. A lot of information flowed through the chain of command and a lot of other appointees would rely on me and the 14 other political appointees in the 8:40 meetings to tell them what was going on and what we’re going to focus on that day. Getting to know other preferences and expectations of your boss is also important. How quickly do they expect you to respond to a text or email? Typically, secretary Bernhardt expected you to respond that same day within a few hours unless there was something urgent.

What format do they like their schedule in? Secretary Bernhardt had his schedule on his phone, but he also liked to have a hard copy of the schedule on his daily folder with the memo and other items we prep for the day. What format do they like briefing papers in? We had a very specific format for briefing papers that included pictures of attendees, all the interactions with the attendees, as well as specific blurbs on policy and policy changes. Expectations cannot be met if they are not adequately communicated.

I came in a little later to the administration, so by the time I got there, a lot of these processes were already in place. But I have spent a lot of time with my supervisor and other folks who knew the secretary well and that were in charge to learn his style, how he liked things, and what the expectations were. And if you listened to him, he would also convey the expectations. If he told you to read the entire weekly report to the secretary prior to a meeting, then you better have read it and know it well enough to answer a question if he called on you. A new political appointee should take steps to learn things like this from the start, and you shouldn’t come in acting like you know everything to avoid starting off on a bad foot.

It It is critical to get to work on day 1, and there are numerous steps you can take to become a well oiled machine as fast as possible to advance the president’s agenda. The time goes very fast, especially when you’re dealing with regulations, the federal register, career employees, and implementing policy changes. The next component to effectively staffing your principal is to always anticipate their needs. What can you do to make their day and their job easier? What can you take off their plate?

Anticipate not only what they need, but what questions they are going to ask. If you work for someone for a fair amount of time, you will learn that they always ask x y z. Identify that and prepare accordingly. If you’re on the road a lot with them, then it’s helpful to know what things make them most comfortable. Knowing their favorite snacks, drinks, meals, and even what bathrooms they think are typically the cleanest are all helpful things.

You are there to make their life easier. The 3rd component is to know the schedule and be able to adapt quickly to changes. Memorize the schedule and make sure your phone is charged and always have the calendar at the tip of your fingers. Know what’s next on the schedule. Preparation and organization are critical, but in politics, things don’t always go as planned.

You may not be the scheduler, but you need to be able to think on your feet and find quick solutions. Finally, the last component, and maybe the most important is know the president’s agenda and know your agency’s policy priorities and initiatives. While staffing your boss, it is likely that folks will chat you up as well, especially as they are eagerly awaiting their chance to talk to your boss. If they ask you a question, you need to be able to respond without looking like a deer in headlights. You need to be able to articulate recent wins for your boss, the agency, and the administration.

We always had a running accomplishments list. And the weekly reports to the secretary were also very helpful in this regard. Being knowledgeable of the administration’s successes and goals is one way you can play a key role in helping advance your boss and the president’s agenda. And speaking of carrying out the president’s agenda, never forget that is why you’re there and that is why political appointees exist. Secretary Bernhardt saw a LinkedIn post I did early on about being excited to work for him in the department, and he reminded me that I worked for the president first and foremost and essentially told me to update my LinkedIn post.

This was a valuable lesson, and Secretary Bernhardt constantly reminded all of the political appointees that we were there to help carry out the president’s agenda, that we worked for President Trump, and that President Trump was the boss. To recap, know the preferences and expectations of your boss. Always anticipate their needs. Know the schedule and be able to adapt quickly to changes. Know the president’s agenda and your agency’s policy priorities and initiatives.

One final note. If you’re someone who is staffing a principal, chances are you will have a decent amount of face time with your boss. Always keep it professional. They are your boss, not your friend. Now let’s talk about staffing your boss during on-site meetings.

At DOI, I was a senior advisor to the secretary and worked in external and environmental affairs. My primary duties involve managing meetings and interactions with governors, county commissioners, as well as the oil and gas industry, mining industry, cattlemen, and other stakeholders and elected officials. In this role, I also work closely with the scheduling team, advanced team, communications team, and the secretary’s security team to ensure everything on the secretary’s calendar and all his interactions and events were planned out well and functioning perfectly. Your principal may know more than you, but you want to be prepared and also want to make sure that they are prepared by providing substantive, informative, and concise content in the memo you write for their meetings. We had an excel tracker that tracked every interaction and request with every elected official and stakeholder in every state.

All these interactions went into the memo. When staffing important meetings, here are a few tricks I picked up. I would always meet a governor or other visiting guests and their team out in front of the building. I’d shake their hand and welcome them immediately when they exited their vehicle. Remember, you represent your boss and you’re responsible for making a good first impression.

I would typically start making my way to the front of the building 20 minutes before their arrival and would be texting with the governor’s federal affair person, so I knew almost to the second when they were pulling up. I would have already talked to security earlier in the day and given them all the names, everyone that would be entering the building with the governor to expedite entry. And security would also accompany out front to safely escort the governor and his team in. This was many governors’ first time visiting the building, so it was important to make them feel comfortable and welcome, Be extremely professional. Make sure I did my homework and knew their priorities.

That I knew their ass. That I knew what everyone looked like and their names. And also that I knew something interesting about them. All of this information should also be included in the memo for my principal, including pictures of the people that are going to be in the meeting. Everything you prepare for your principal, you also serve as a resource for you to make that good first impression.

Once we took the elevator up to the 6th floor, I would typically take them to the secretary’s conference room, text the secretary’s assistant we were there, and then we would continue to make small talk. Use this time to make your principal and the administration look good. Tell them about all the important things being done for their state and any of the other policy accomplishments they might find interesting. Most often, the secretary would then come in and sit at the head of the congress table and run the meeting from there. But occasionally, he would tell us to come back to his office and we would meet there.

During the meetings, I’d be actively taking notes, ensuring I was getting everything down the secretary was saying we were going to look into and follow-up on. And following the meetings, I would make sure I tasked out assignments to the right folks to make sure we got the answers and worked on the governor’s request. The governor’s asks and anything important they said would also be written up in a weekly report to the secretary that came out Thursday evenings. Now, let’s talk about staffing your principal at events. When driving on the road with your principal to events, it’s important that you let them set the tone and let them initiate the conversation.

Their time in the car is valuable. They should be catching up on text, emails, phone calls, or preparing for their next meeting, not listening to you talk about what you had for dinner last night. At the actual event, it’s important to always be near or by their side, but you also don’t want to be in all the pictures. You should dress the part. Don’t drink at events.

Never speak poorly of anyone in attendance. Use your manners. You know the drill. It is extremely important that you know the names of the people that will be interacting with your boss. And ideally, you should know where they met or the last time they interacted.

If I thought the secretary might not remember a certain person’s name, I tried to whisper it to him as they were approaching or before we approached a group. And if that wasn’t feasible, I’d say, mister secretary, you remember Dustin with the Farm Bureau as they were walking up and then let them shake hands and talk. Other items I’ve always had with me when staffing the secretary at events included some of his business cards in case he forgot them, my business cards, a pen, numerous challenge coins as he liked to hand those out, and also a clipboard with a few blank pieces of paper, and also a sign up sheet for a newsletter that I would pass around to attendees. When staffing the secretary at events, follow-up is key. I would try to get any good pictures from the photographer that same day and email them immediately to the people we met with.

I would also make sure I was taking good notes on conversations and that we’re following up on the things that we needed to be followed up on and tasking those out to the different bureaus. It’s important that you are also willing to be the bad guy and extract your boss from conversations when necessary to stay on schedule or ensure that one person isn’t taking too much of your principal’s time. The secretary and I developed a signal over time that came in handy for these purposes. Staffing for roundtables was similar and another important part of my job at DOI. I put together different roundtables with the secretary in the DC building and out in the field that range between 25 50 attendees.

Much of my work is in the preparation phase, and then the secretary would run the actual round table with me sitting next to him at the head of the conference table. I would have to lean on the relationships I’ve built over the years to get cell phones and reach out to the different participants. Having said that, most people were pretty excited to drop whatever they were doing in order to participate in a round table with the secretary. There was one particular sportsman and conservation round table that I got a call from the White House, and they indicated they wanted us to host the very next week. I had about 4 days to contact 50 participants and get them to book flights from wherever they were throughout the country to fly to Colorado to join a roundtable with the president and secretary.

Now, let’s talk about walk and talks for a minute. Walk in talks can occur before an interview, meeting, or important phone call. Often, walk in talks occur when a commitment has popped up last minute and you aren’t as prepared to brief your boss as you normally would be. You typically have a limited amount of time with your principal before they need to go live. In these instances, you don’t want to be long winded.

You want to quickly tell them the issue, why it matters, and if time allows, give them 2 to 3 additional bullet points. If your principal wants more information, they will ask you. They may also want to quickly practice and run something by you. Be honest, give them good advice, and always be concise. These jobs are extremely competitive, and they are a privilege.

At Interior, while there are approximately 70,000 employees, there are only 90 or so political appointees. The deep state is real and this was a challenge for all appointees as secretary Bernhardt discusses in his recent book. If your principal has written any books, buy a copy and read it. If they’ve done interviews or other writings, familiarize yourself with those prior to starting work. If you can better understand your principal’s mindset and how they communicate, this will help start the relationship off on the right foot.

If you’re interested in working at an agency, you should also get a copy of the Plum Book and talk to someone that has actually worked at that particular agency so they can help you identify the top 2 to 3 appointed jobs you’re qualified for and most interested in. I’ve enjoyed spending time with you today, and I wish you the best of luck in the next conservative administration and in your future endeavors. Again, I’m Jeff Small. Please reach out to me anytime if I can ever be of assistance. Thank you.