Show Them What Right Looks Like

[September 10, 2026] Call it what you want, but showing people what right looks like is the proper way to be a good leader. Some call this “mentoring” or “leading by example.”

The problem with these later concepts is that they don’t tell the story of what a leader does from the moment he steps into the position. Additionally, they are vague and don’t tell the whole story of what a leader does day in and day out. Leadership philosophy is good, but it only takes us so far.

This is where experience comes into play. Experience is a key element of effective and moral leadership. It’s effective because the leader has already seen what works and what doesn’t. It’s also moral because those same past methods have been tested and proven to be moral or not. That experience makes good decision-making easier.

That work starts the minute you walk through the door. People are not waiting for your philosophy briefing. They are watching how you stand, how you speak to the most junior person in the room, whether you are on time, and whether you cut corners when no one important is watching.

The Army used to put it simply as Be, Know, Do: first, be the kind of person worth following; then, know the work well enough to teach it; then, do it in plain sight. If those three are out of order, the unit learns the wrong lessons immediately.

A common line in the profession is that the standard you walk past is the standard you accept. That is not a slogan. It is a daily effort to hold the line. Walk past sloppy work, late reports, a rude remark to a subordinate, or a safety shortcut, and you have just taught the organization that “right” is optional. Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner call the same duty “model the way.” Jocko Willink calls it “extreme ownership.” Different labels, same burden: you own the example, whether you intended to set one or not.

Competence belongs in that example. A leader who is decent but incompetent cannot show anyone what right looks like in the work itself. In combat engineering, in a shop, or in an office, people copy the methods they see more readily than the speech they hear. That is why a seasoned leader uses experience to demonstrate the standard for the task at hand: how the job is planned, how risk is handled, and how the after-action review is conducted without excuses. Character without skill is still just talk. Skill without character is a hazard.

Mentoring, if it is any good, comes after the demonstration, not instead of it. You pull someone aside and explain why you did what they just watched. You correct without humiliation. You praise the specific thing that was right, not the person in general. That is the unglamorous part the textbooks skip: the same standard applied on Tuesday afternoon, when everyone is tired. Leading by example is not a pose for the hard days. It is the habit that makes the hard days recognizable as still under control.

When those junior people leave your organization, they will believe they have seen what right looks like. Major General Larry Lust said that years ago, and he was correct. That is the job we sign up for as leaders.

Experience gives you the pattern. Morality tells you which pattern is worth repeating and the path to follow. Showing them is how both are transferred into doing what is right. If you will not do that yourself, do not be surprised when the next leader inherits a unit that never learned it.

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Please read my books:

1. “55 Rules for a Good Life,” on Amazon (link here).
2. “Our Longest Year in Iraq,” on Amazon (link here).