Blue Collar Smart Guest
Founder of Heart of a Warrior Ministries, Author
Twenty-nine years in the Navy, a seminary vice presidency, and a book for men who sold the business and no longer know who they are
Background
Dr. Gregory Bourgond is the president and founder of Heart of a Warrior Ministries, a Christian organization that helps men live with integrity and honor. He spent 29 years in the U.S. Navy, moving up the enlisted ranks to senior chief, stepping away to pursue his education, then returning as a direct commission officer and starting at the bottom of a new ladder. He retired as a lieutenant commander in 2000. Alongside that he put in ten years in defense and commercial business, including work at Hughes Aircraft, training ships in anti-submarine warfare, and running a car dealership.
His academic record runs just as long. He earned a bachelor's degree in psychology from Chapman University in 1979, a Master of Divinity from Bethel Seminary in 1983, a Doctor of Ministry from Bethel in 1997, and an Ed.D. from Nova Southeastern University in 2001, followed by post-graduate studies at Harvard in 2003. He served as a dean and vice president at Bethel Seminary and as assistant to the provost at Bethel University, and has taught as an adjunct professor at Bethel Seminary and the University of Northwestern – St. Paul. His books include A Rattling of Sabers, Leadership Beef Jerky, and The Winter of Your Life, co-authored with Russ Olmon.
At 78, Bourgond says he is squarely in the winter of his own life, and he came on Blue Collar Smart to talk about what that season is actually for. He and Hugh Hornsby worked through the identity question waiting for every owner who sells, the four seasons of a working life, and the giftedness audit he uses to help men decide where to point forty years of skills and scars. He also told the story of the cement lion he hugged at twelve, after a judge made him choose a parent, and the vow he made there.
Key Insights
01
Bourgond has watched it for years: when the work is taken away — by a sale, a downsizing, a role replaced by technology — the man underneath has no answer. His fix is to separate the two before the event does it for you. Write down who you are in language that never mentions the company.
02
You will spend time with the grandkids, except they are adults with families. You will travel, until you have been everywhere. You will fix your golf game, except the handicap does not improve at any age. Then the real question arrives, and most men meet it unprepared.
03
Seven years into his seminary run, Bourgond resigned because other people's emergencies had taken his calendar. He proposed 70/30 — 70 percent on work that gave him life and produced results, 30 percent on what it took to get there. A week later the provost rewrote his job description.
04
Teach a process alone and the results are linear and additive. Teach it against real character and Bourgond argues the results turn exponential. The line he borrows: it is not what you do that determines who you are, but who you are that determines the quality of what you do.
05
Everything accumulated — talents, acquired skills, values, accomplishments, failures — becomes raw material. Bourgond's phrase is moving from shotgun to laser beam. Run an honest giftedness audit, ask three trusted observers what they see, then build an actual plan with scope and timeline.
Featured Conversation
Episode 13 · October 8, 2026
Gregory Bourgond talks with Hugh Hornsby about the four seasons of life, why identity in work fails, and how to plan a winter season that still matters.
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