Category Archives: Leadership

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Starting with “No, But, or However” (Habit Series #5)

The fifth habit that Marshall Goldsmith discusses in What Got You Here Won’t Get You There is all about telling people they’re wrong. Leaders do it, a lot, and often without realizing it’s happening. This habit is also about telling the truth and providing clarity, but before we dive into the details, imagine this scenario.

Habit

Mr. Roger Astin, exercise scenario manager of U.S. Army South,
briefs a group of multinational officials during PKO North ’08, MANAGUA, Nicaragua. Photo by Maj. Tim Stewart.
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What Combat Leaders Need to Know About Neuroscience

We remember the books that change us…that alter our thinking, move us emotionally, or reveal unseen, enlightening perspectives. Powell’s My American Journey did that for me. So did Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything. And when I read Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking in 2007, I recall connecting so many new insights that I didn’t have enough book margin to capture them all. The relevancy for the military profession spilled off of the pages and sparked an intellectual curiosity that has lasted for years.

The topic is neuroscience and the breakthrough discoveries that its researchers have made in recent years. As neuroscientists publish fascinating papers about how the brain functions, authors like Gladwell, Jonah Lehrer, David Rock, Joseph LeDoux, and others translated their work into digestible language with real world application. From decision psychology to organizational efficiency to change detection and management, new understanding of the brain is changing how we live our lives.

But as I made connections from neuroscience to the military profession, specifically tactical combat leadership, I found few resources to aide the service member, Dave Grossman’s On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society and Warrior Mindset being the most useful. So I decided to embark on a personal quest to publish something that references neuroscience to improve military leader performance. What resulted was my first published article and a Master’s thesis on the topic. This post is an adapted version of that endeavor.

Neuroscience

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What’s Your Leadership Narrative?

Check out my new guest post, on From the Green Notebook

Earlier this year in a podcast interview with Leadership on Tap, I mentioned that I was wrestling with the concept of a “leadership narrative.” This was the term I used to describe the summation of personality traits, competence, experience, beliefs, biases, and opinions that one uses to communicate as a leader. Leadership narrative is the tangible expression of one’s leadership DNA.

As I compiled my thoughts into a blog post, Joe Byerly graciously offered to host it on his blog, From the Green Notebook. After lots of discussion and editing, I’m very pleased to invite you to read, How Effective is Your Leadership Narrative?

Please check it out and if you have a moment, we’d appreciate if you could share it with your network. Thanks and have a great weekend!

Leadership Narrative

Click the image for “How Effective is Your Leadership Narrative?”

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Leadership Speed and Why It Matters

In another post, I shared some of the guidance I issued during my company command time years ago. In How Do You Spot a Leader?, I suggested the notion that leaders naturally move faster than everyone else.

If you are a leader and you find yourself moving slowly throughout the day, you are probably not doing enough to help out the team.  Most of the time, leaders dart from one event to the next, or are focusing to create a new product/presentation that will help the team.  They are always looking to identify problems in the organization and tackle them quickly, so that the organization can become better or more effective.

Leaders create and disseminate energy throughout the organization to keep it moving in the right direction and responding appropriately to the environment. There is an inherent risk, however, for naturally driven leaders who move quickly towards success. Today, I want to talk about this risk.

Leadership

Paratroopers with the 82nd Airborne Division’s 2nd Battalion, 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment, sprint to emplace an M240-B machine gun as they demonstrate crew drills to Afghan National Army soldiers prior to a foot patrol May 8, 2012, Ghazni Province, Afghanistan.
U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Michael J. MacLeod.
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Making Sense of Battalion Command Selection

Every year, hundreds of officers approach a professional development milestone that will determine whether they achieve what many consider a lifelong goal. That milestone is the Battalion Command Selection Board. Though they’ve put in hard work over countless hours to become competitive for this board, most officers are uninformed about how the Army selects battalion commanders and slates them to specific units.

Even officers I worked with at Human Resources Command were not aware of the intricacies of the process. This post aims to close that knowledge gap by explaining the Centralized Selection List (CSL) process. It is immediately relevant for Army officers competing for battalion command this year. It is ultimately relevant for anyone who wants to compete for battalion command at some point in his or her career.

The full version of this infographic is available at the end of this article.
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Work and Life

Advice for finding a balance

I listened to this yesterday and thought it was impactful enough to send out as perfect Sunday personal growth material. It’s from the EntreLeadership Podcast, which is Dave Ramsey’s creation and in the Top 20 Business Podcasts on iTunes.

Two aspects in particular make this podcast powerful: the big name influencers they interview and the clips of Dave Ramsey giving priceless leadership and business advice. I’ve used more content from this podcast than any other, as it is highly relevant military leaders. Several times as an Operations Officer, I’d listen to an episode on the way to work, and then immediately implement its insights.

Dave RamseyThis episode is all about finding purpose and meaning in life, which requires that we deconflict work and life. Dan Miller, author of 48 Days to the Work You Love, talks about how to live a life of meaning, then Dave Ramsey follows with in-your-face advice for figuring out how to keep your family while being successful at work.

His philosophy is one that leaders can take to their units tomorrow and make a difference with. It’s well-worth your time…and theirs!

For the EntreLeadership Podcast episode, click here.

To access Episode #110 through the iTunes Store, click here.

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When the Military Profession Isn’t

by Tony Ingesson

Ever since Huntington published his seminal The Soldier and the State in 1957, the concept of a military profession has been embraced by military educational institutions worldwide, and particularly in the West. I argue that the focus on professionalism in general, and Huntington in particular, obscures the timeless complexity of military decision-making and leadership by reducing it to the status of a profession.

Military leadership actually demands considerably more than what most professionals have to cope with, due to the fluidity of political policy and the need to prevail over an adversary.

profession

The Fort Sill Marine Corps Artillery Detachment’s youngest Marine, Pfc. Todd Nichols, 18,
salutes the U.S. flag as colors are posted during the USMC birthday celebration Nov. 7, 2013. Link to photo.
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Stop Calling Your Soldiers Your Children

And stop telling your subordinates to treat them that way

And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;

Shakespeare’s St. Crispin’s Day speech from Henry V is one of the most iconic speeches ever given. It, perhaps better so than any work save the Illiad, captures what it is like to be a fighting man (or woman).

It’s refrain about a “band of brothers” has been repeated and echoed countless times: Eisenhower’s “in company with brave Allies and brothers-in-arms on other Fronts” on D-Day, HBO’s mini-series of the same name, and in countless addresses by senior leaders to their formations prior to crossing the berm in Iraq.

The idea of soldiers as brothers-in-arms – of the fraternity of arms – goes back well before Shakespeare to the feudal era and possibly even earlier. The concept of shared struggle, and thus equality, is essential to the concept of American soldiering and always has been.

And yet, under multiple well-meaning commanders in both active and reserve component, I have been instructed to treat my soldiers as my children. Not as my brothers or my sisters, but my children. As a troop commander, I once argued the point with my squadron commander that my soldiers were not my sons and was told “you know what I mean” – and I did.

And what he meant was wrong.

posts

An Army Special Forces member fires a Mark 19 belt-fed grenade launcher at a training target on Eglin Range, Fla., Oct. 30, 2013.
U.S. Air Force Photo/Staff Sgt. John Bainter.