Ellsworth Air Force Base Command Chief Tia Mullins is a self-professed people person.
“I wear my heart on my sleeve,” she said recently in a sit-down interview from her office at the 28th Bomb Wing Headquarters. But she arrived here – operating at the highest enlisted rank possible in the U.S. Air Force — with more than just good relational skills.
Chief Mullins, 44, was born and raised in South Dakota and has served in the military for 25 years. Her resume is chock-full of deployments, honors and promotions. It’s the trail of a woman who leaned into her goals years ago and followed through. “I love people, but there’s a switch in me,” she said. “If you’ve done something immoral, unethical or illegal, there’s a switch. We’re figuring out why you did what you did and how to make a change. You have to help people through the good and the poor decisions they make.”
Chief Mullins entered the Air Force in July 2000 as a Public Health Technician. During the last two decades, much of her service included duties and leadership positions throughout the public health career field and Professional Military Education. She served as a Public Health Superintendent at Royal Air Force Lakenheath, England, and as a professional military education instructor at multiple air force bases around the U.S.
She deployed in support of Operations Enduring Freedom, Inherent Resolve and Enduring Sentinel. Prior to her becoming the Command Chief, she was the 28th Medical Group Senior Enlisted Leader at Ellsworth, which is the home of the largest B-1B Lancer combat wing in the United States Air Force. As Command Chief, she is the primary advisor to the wing commander and senior leaders on everything from morale, welfare, warfighting effectiveness to base operations, and professional development of Ellsworth’s more than 2,700 enlisted personnel.
The Best Part
Her position at this particular time in Ellsworth history has taken on greater significance as the base experiences fast-paced expansion in preparation for the arrival of the B-21 bomber. “I tell our airmen, we get to be part of this momentous change,” Chief Mullins said. “It’s a lot of hard work, constant construction.
But we get to be part of it.” There’s a tension to manage between building for the future, but not neglecting the current infrastructure needs.
Her favorite work is face-to-face time with the people she is trying to help. “Being with our airmen, going into the work centers, is the best part,” she said. “We call it drive-by mentorship, when I get to have conversations with people and they don’t realize you’re mentoring them.”
Commander Derek Oakley, who will retire from his post in July, takes the same approach. “Commander Oakley and I do walkabouts to see how our airmen are doing and learn how we can improve their lives,” she said. That leads directly to the hardest part of her job. “You can’t solve all the problems,” she said. “You can’t take care of everything. I love people and that’s hard.”
Back Home
It was during Chief Mullins’ childhood that she first stepped foot on Ellsworth — her great uncle was active duty and her relatives brought her to the base. “It does feel full circle,” she said. “It’s surreal.” Chief Mullins is a military leader. And she’s also a mom. It’s both sides of her nature — the soft and the unyielding – that she utilizes in her job and her personal life.
Today she greets visitors in combat boots and an Air Force uniform; her small diamond earrings add a subtle touch of personality. She paused briefly for photos in front of framed flags commemorating 25 years of military service. Her office is orderly and laid out with purpose. Her 18-year-old son Ethan stops by and pulls up a chair. Her face lights up and she smiles as Ethan sits down. She then continues to discuss her career — one shaped by leadership and dedication.
She’s been a single mom since the start of 2009 and Ethan has been by her side for every move. “Anywhere I go, he goes,” she said. “He’s my ride or die. I couldn’t push him off to a babysitter when he was little. So even as an instructor, I went to the schoolhouse to teach in the evenings, and he was with me. He called my students, ‘his airmen.’” Her voice breaks with emotion when she describes the importance of Ethan’s consistent support over the years.
She Made It
“Every assignment, every promotion, I would pull out the book and remind him we did this,” she said. She considers him one of the biggest influences in her climb to Chief. It was several years ago, during a promotion ceremony that Ethan attended with his mom that he noticed the stripes of a fellow female Command Chief.
“He said, ‘I want you to be that,’” she recalled. It was a hill to climb — she was an E6 and would have to work her way to E9. Ethan was onboard — even if it meant moving again, night classes, training, more work on top of more work. She called him from a deployment in Qatar when she got the news she made it.
“I was proud,” said Ethan, who graduated high school this year and plans to attend college in Wisconsin before heading to flight school — he wants to be a pilot.
Chief Mullins hopes their journey will inspire other military families. “I made it to the top with the help of the support around me,” she said. “As a single parent, a man or woman, it’s so important to build a support system really quickly wherever you are. You have to trust and build a network or you’re going to struggle.”
Being a single parent was never a crutch, she added.“I just made it work,” she said. “My stepdad always told me you can do anything you set your heart to. And that is so true. I hope for Ethan it instilled in him
independence and a deep work ethic.” A year from now, when her two-year post as Chief comes to an end, she faces a decision: retire, serve as chief at another base or move to professional military education.
Ethan pipes in — he’d love for her to retire and head to Florida. She’s not sure yet. She’s only halfway through this assignment — still soaking in the authority of the job and facing a year of hard work. “The opportunity to be part of the B-21 coming is monumental,”
she said. “It’s amazing to watch Ellsworth grow. From coming on the base in the 80s as a kid, it’s completely different. I never would have imagined I would be part of this. It’s a privilege.”
They stand for a picture, and she adjusts the collar of Ethan’s shirt — a nod to the fluidity of being both Chief and mom at the same time. Ethan is a head taller than his mom and when the photographer tells them to do what’s natural, he slips his arm over his mother’s shoulder and she wraps her arm around his waist.
Later, his answers about the woman sitting in front of him are short and sweet. He’s not surprised his mom is where she is today. “She made it,” he said with a grin. “When she says she’s going to do something, it gets done.”