[August 28, 2014] Telling me that there are “evil people” who may want to kidnap me as a child, my grandmother said to never talk to strangers. Likewise, I learned about a few “bad” things in the military. Despite me describing them as bad, if lessons come from them, then a positive outcome has been achieved. Here are 12 “bad” things I learned in the military:
1. “Toxic” Leaders Truly Exist. These leaders have a corrosive effect on any organization and they are not necessarily easy to discover. However, once light is shed on them, action must be taken by senior leaders to immediately remove that leader from their position that poisons the company.
2. Systems, Standards, and Procedures are Imperfect. Nothing is perfect and nothing works well without direct and focused effort of people to ensure success occurs. Democracy, for example, is the best political system ever invented but it still has major problems that must constantly be retooled to make it better.
3. Leader Training is Inadequate. Wherever I go for leader training, military or civilian, it never fulfills its potential. Teachers and instructors always seem to teach to the lowest common denominator (or what they believe is the lowest intellect). This is a voluntary restriction that is unnecessary and harmful to the best and brightest.
4. We Don’t Require “Respect” of Others. We teach it, we talk about it, we even make up handy diagrams with it … but we do not enforce the respect of others. When overseas, in peace or war, troops should be taught and closely supervised to respect other cultures and the people living there.
5. Moral Courage is Lacking. There is great emphasis on physical courage but little in the way of moral courage is encouraged. The opposite is true. We discourage moral courage in the leader. Our culture of careerism means that taking risks and making mistakes will put a damper on your promotion potential.
6. Discussion of Difficult Topics is Discouraged. As we have recently seen in American senior political leadership, discussions of racism, sexism, etc. are discouraged through name-calling and threats to one’s job.
7. Character is Less Important than Who You Know. This is an age-old complaint but still valid. One cannot be successful without knowing who can help you. This has a positive side also but here I mean it in the sense that leadership characteristics are sacrificed for less admirable ideals.
8. Investigations are Used to Hinder Leaders. I’ve written on this before (links here, here, and here) but it demands repeating. Investigations are a political tool used by the unscrupulous to tie the hands of leaders. Little is being done about it.
9. Reading of Professional Publications is Declining. Despite our best efforts, leaders simply read less and therefore will be less likely to absorb important lessons of the past. This trend has been around for a while and shows no sign of abating.
10. Emotional Leadership is on the Rise. Instead of taking an unemotional and professional tact at leadership, many are seeing the encouragement of emotion in leadership. Some see leadership as being an attack on individuals and when combined with lower mental resilience, makes for a toxic brew in an unhealthy command climate.
11. We are Less Mentally Resilient. Due to less stress in our society, people are less able to withstand shocks in life. From “road rage” to “workplace shootings” we are seeing a breakdown in worker’s ability to handle anxiety and trauma. More on this in previous posts (links here connecting to 5 posts).
12. The Rise of Narcissism. It’s not loving oneself that is the issue but the fact that more and more people have an entitlement mentality, are self-absorbed, and are simply unprepared for life. Skyrocketing narcissistic characteristics are frequently rewarded in the military and in business. In particular this is occurring in senior leaders (link here).
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[Here is a link to “12 Things I learned in the Military”] https://www.theleadermaker.com/12-things-i-learned-in-the-military/