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regulated method exists for early iden0{ cation, development, and assignee ^ those within the normal career yearS[]i;,|i- possess long-term leadership and ^ agement potential. Consequently, only superficial regulation, the rege jy tive leadership process becomes la * incestuous.
Undeniably, a system does
control the assignment of officers ■ . e
rec*-'
sf
afi
fit-
Leadership defies easy quantificat'^. What is it: intellectual, moral, Pr°.^ sional? The semantics of its divlS.]1, make it a topic for perpetual debate clined to run to rhetoric. What is W debate? Within any organization w's to perpetuate itself while achieving! designed mission, a system must ex>- the development of leaders. ^
Although elaborate informal sys exist within the naval service for ^ velopment of successors to the hi? ^ leadership billets within the flag ran^’.jfj-
exis' '
with"1
managed to develop potential, and t £ test officers are promoted by compe selection. ref
However, perceived professions ^ ity is widely accepted as being some toother than this theoretic ideal. At1 |y nior officer level, assignment is 1 ~ ^ the result of alma mater and chance' ^ the officer begins a career progr® those two factors are augmented hy ^ ers. Friendship with peers and sup® ^ who can affect assignments becon increasingly important factor. aS a These informal factors, accept j ,ef- way of life to those viewing the naV3regii' vice as a career, are not formally spl lated. This produces two results. * cgr’s is career conventionalism. An 0 official record is judged by its s’rnJJliirl' to those of his peers. Inflationary ings and reports guarantee “g°od ords. As a result, it becomes more c to have nothing even casually un'lae ii' in one’s record than it does to *>3 celled; for individual excellence ■
92
Proceedings / Novel"
th!en rnas^ed by the overall inflation of fating system.
5t. ar|y recognition of this fact sets the fl~e bor the careerism prevalent today. 0f young officer quickly sees the value ti)jn?ot recking the boat. Conventional Cor)ln2’ conventional performance, and lj0V^nt’onal personality assure conven- gUafa official records. These, in turn,
Point10166 advancement t0 at least the Pfob h°*- Professional tenure—i.e., the 2o.abi|ity of being able to collect on the j,'ear military retirement. t5rJc°nd> cults of personality are fos- °f the lack of a formalized system ser,i ent>fying and developing our future in(lj0r ‘eaders early in their careers. Some 'duals are identified and their ca-
°as for the service and its future is
tw sponsorship, perhaps more accu Upoo considered as patronship, is based He Pctsonal loyalty felt by the patron i)ate,r lhan being rooted in the subordi-
Professional capabilities.
ar,Cement of the personality of one
Ijjj developed through informal actions cern ar§ely outside of the official offi- ^1 management system. Such an infor- Astern flourishes through contacts tssj ^Crsonahties. Having a friendly peer HuJjned to the section controlling assign- Valus when it is time for orders can be ititera '6' ^aving a flag officer with an Nest m your orders can be invaluable. desjr° system will eliminate the human tanCee to stmround oneself with acquain- l°yaltS ’s a*so human to reward past y' Presently, however, officers of folio r 31 every *eve* develop their own ,en.Wers and attempt to manage assign- !tijs !S for their proteges’ benefit. That 0fanaPPens in a void created by the lack l‘vely6rV?ce system to accomplish effec- fr°m a'h!! end raises this phenomenon Nil 3 ^Uman trait to an organizational TQ®m requiring rectification.
Hoday’ acquaintanceship with those eta|i Can Provide career assistance is gen- 2 accidental or familial. More dan- H, ”
r'5reg'w. existing system, thus, breeds 'H pSlTl ra'hcr than true professionally . eerism marks the system with 'Ovality and patronage. Resulting 0f aecine struggles develop along lines Myars°nahty and personal loyalty. The
M nf V/l VZ11V-
l«HCeten results in organizational turbu- Patrom°re often associated with political chajnnaSe after elections. The daisy aSsjgS °f patronage in advancement and i*ci®ment are in evidence at all levels, lng the junior officer’s. f\ a[SUc^ a domino effect should result 'igk tbe advancement of one man at the \rst 'evels of the organization is not Vs6nt,y detrimental. Indeed, this al- °rganizational progress. That such
changes at the highest levels should so haphazardly affect the promotion and assignment of subordinates is the damaging element.
To advance in such an environment demands the skills of a Balkan politician to read correctly the ever-shifting political winds. It is a system which breeds and advances Machiavellians, while encouraging factionalism based on personalities rather than professional substance.
Without objective methods of identifying future leadership within the service, continued reliance on chance and personal patronage will perpetuate the incestuous breeding of future leaders. This will ultimately stagnate the organizational progress of the naval service.
In theory, the organizational structure of the Department of the Navy is one of the less egalitarian in the republic. However, the service continues to assign and advance its officers on the assumption of the equality of their talents and the resulting desirability of developing each officer at the same pace and model.
Ironically, this single ticket-punching career model makes internal service stability nearly impossible. It also further frustrates the identification of excellence because it shrouds individual results in the turbulence of near constant personnel reassignments.
Rare is the commander and staff united for an extended period under the present system. One seems to spend a great deal of a service career correcting the real and perceived discrepancies inherited from billet predecessors, only to have the process repeated by one’s billet relief. The refrain that “it didn’t happen on my watch” will continue to be a common one as long as billet and tour watches are brief. Even for the superior attempting to measure accurately the effectiveness and potential of subordinates, this turbulence and the briefness of career encounters mask excellence as effectively as they cover mediocrity.
The briefness of periods of observation by superiors further nurtures the twin problems of careerism: conservatism and personality cults. In a turbulent organization, once an officer is aboard long enough to understand the problems of his billet sufficiently to warrant rectification, he may have little motive to solve deep- seated problems because his tour is nearing completion. Further, an officer may potentially be risking his own career if he makes an obvious mistake while attempting to institute organizational changes.
Realizing that the risks of initiating change outweigh the career advantages and that accountability for either excellence or mediocrity is inconsistent, mutu
ally supporting personal loyalty becomes the critical element of adhesion in the career advancement system. As the excellence or mediocrity of performance results is overlooked, superficial appearance, the comfort of conventionalism, and loyalty to the person of the superior— trust that such loyalty will be appropriately rewarded—become more important than operational performance.
Obviously, a system that perpetuates conventionalism, advancing leaders on something other than definitively demonstrated performance and accepting a turbulence that affects stability and development, is doomed to an uninspired record of mediocrity.
The armed forces cannot be held solely responsible for the consistent string of overall U. S. military mediocrity—from Yalu to Desert One—since 1945. However, the process of elimination by which the leadership was selected and the inbreeding common to that manner of perpetuating leadership were certainly factors. The conventionalism which marked the prosecution of the Vietnam War by all services begs comparison with the most unimaginative campaigns of history.
In the late 1930s old tenets of the officer corps and its leadership were exploded with the tremendous expansion of World War II. Members of the senior leadership, previously thought to be stalwarts, were swept aside as previous unknowns advanced rapidly. New ideas of management and organization, germinating in less conventional surroundings than a hidebound officer corps, were suddenly introduced. A new type of individual found himself commissioned, even directly into senior billets, from the civil sector. He brought with him experience based on the market places which only measured profit and net effectiveness.
This infusion of fresh blood, new methods, and new ideas was critical in the rapid and successful execution of the war. Throughout World War II, the United States prided itself on its military initiative, imagination, and flexibility as opposed to the perceived traditionalism of its foes.
World War II provided the U. S. military a taste of what was then state-of-the- art business and industrial management. This contributed to the design and logistical coups of the 1940s, and it was in this period that the “military-industrial” equation was formed. It left the mistaken impression that the military had been made management oriented. Such was not the case.
Management as a skill practiced by industry is still normally viewed within the service as separate from leadership. It
,nRs / November 1984
may be granted equality with leadership, may be accepted as a factor of leadership, or may be viewed even as a skill to be learned by a leader. But few accept that ultimately leadership is tantamount to managerial ability.
Industry, concerned with the unforgiving bottom line of profit and loss, has been able to accept that oneness of managerial and leadership skills. Interpersonal expertise, what is normally thought of as leadership, are taught to supervisors as skills required to achieve effectively the profit mission. There are no cliches of “positive” and “negative” leadership. There is only an accounting to determine whether the individual was able to meet the profit mission.
The Japanese have made impressive advances in industry to quantify and formalize the oneness of managerial and leadership skills. Their success in creating worker group identity, loyalty, and subjugation to organizational goals is legend. What the Japanese businessmen have accomplished is no different ultimately than what any commander strives to achieve.
The services have been slow to accept that leadership and management are synonymous. Still heir to antebellum ideals that leadership is an honorific trait granted to certain individuals, there is a natural reluctance to be overly specific in defining it for fear of who may be found lacking. “Leadership” has, as with “professionalism,” taken on an almost mystical meaning. It seems that military officers would rather have the legitimacy of their birth questioned than to have their “leadership” and “professionalism” impugned.
This dichotomy of leadership and man-
“The services have been slow to accept that leadership and management are synonymous.”
agement is perpetuated by two service stereotypes. These stereotypes are the result of the belief that there are at base only two types of officers: commanders and staff officers.
The stereotyped commander is people oriented. He is a doer and a decisive activity-oriented person at his best in combat. The stereotyped staff officer, on the other hand, is oriented toward things or procedures. He is a thinker and a more
passive person normally associated with filling support roles.
The total leader defies such simplistic characterization. Any study of the truly great leaders reflects the range of their talents and supports the synonymy of leadership skill and managerial ability. The great leaders have been men who could conceptualize problems and solutions, systematize procedures to support organization, and convince subordinates to make reality of abstract solutions. Yet this third stereotype, that of the leader- manager, of the individual skilled enough to handle complex staff problems and still possessed of leadership charisma, is not one widely perpetuated as a role model within the service.
This lack of a leader-manager role model is paradoxical when considering the apparent thought underlying the career assignment policies within the service. The career model followed in the establishment of normal, and expected, officer patterns appears based, at least externally, on the recognized necessity for a breadth of experience. This is to develop a well-rounded personality equally adept in command and staff functions. That the result of this well-intentioned policy has become a facade known as ticket-punching is because of the misconception on which it appears founded: all members of the officer corps are possessed of equal abilities and potential.
It may not be possible to identify immediately ultimate potential in junior officers. Those, however, who have the qualities of intellect, perceptiveness, and drive to make them likely candidates for future success in demanding billets soon begin to identify themselves by their performance to peers and immediate supervisors. Unfortunately, the service system takes little note of this development and takes even less action to retain this talent.
It is here that the service system for development of potential is in sharp variance with that of the business or political sectors. In those pursuits where organizational progress is measurable periodically in dollars and votes, young talents able to exert influence on the outcome are maneuvered rapidly through positions of increasing responsibility commensurate with their skill. Success is rewarded with further favored advancement.
Strangely, a solution to the problem of the identification and advancement of those with unusual potential as leader- managers in the military has existed for more than a century. The German General Staff system proved since the 19th century capable of consistently producing leader-managers of the first rank.
The German General Staff was a col
lection of the greatest service talent a able. It was a managed pool of
.vail'
managers filling, or being prepare fill, billets identified as critical for nizational effectiveness. Identified as
irved
elite, General Staff members sei role models for the remainder of the cer corps. A formal institution, the eral Staff was beyond being a cult around the reigning military persona ^ At relatively early stages in their reers, young German officers dern strating unusual staff aptitude and lea manager potential were nominated f°r General Staff. Once through the stf * ing process and accepted as General officers, their careers were care ^ managed to both make the best uS® .£S their talents and to provide opporh*11*^ to develop those talents. General officers were not expected to bee ^ “jacks of all trades.” Rather, their ^ signments and formal schooling we -ve further their mastery of being S‘‘e staff officers. “Staff officer” in that
off>-
n rfl10
text embodied the ideal of the man ^ could command or function on a
with equal adroitness.
This group established an intern:
atiof31 :V6f
standard of military excellence, " j though its troops had inferior ass®tseS. were used to fight against superiortot As a dominant force in the develop^, of the military profession in this cen ,[S the German General Staff, throng^, command skills and access to org ^ tional resources, would probably ^ won World War II, if it had not been ^ circuited at the highest political > [C Had it not been for the un , character of the German political 1® ^
ship and a seemingly innate
A©er11
P
1 "' a St3'
aversion to elitism, the United ^
might have contemplated more ^ ^
tively the character and structure ..
German General Staff model as s
q0$'
thing to adopt for its own military mand system. Consequently, this ^
:t#'
manager archetype is conspicuou j
sent from our present service strU^nSid-
1 Sta
ered adopting the German Gene^^P
This country has specifically c0w: General,
system. In the 19th century, *Vjptob' strategist Major General Emery V U. S. Army, reported on it. Dur1^ fob armed services unification deba lowing World War II that led to t 0( tional Security Act and the forma ^ the Joint Chiefs of Staff, it 'vaSuSpect considered. It is difficult not to s that the Teutoniphobia of the tiro ^ confidence in the maintenance of vVin tus quo, having been good enough^grille war, were central in rejection man General Staff system prop0* the Any suggestion of an elite W1
94
Proceedings / Novel"
ib*r 1
Military Host civil
can be expected to draw an al-
lrTational resistance from certain service quarters. Some of it is °fth3 American egalitarianism. Some angsf r,esistance is that peculiar American
most h °r things martial- And certainly amafiing to the objective study of $pjLjjeneral staff system is the wide- % t 3nd emot'onal inability of Ameri- SoCia,° seParate the policies of National Gen* and operation of the German ^era< Staff.
Germreview °f the benefits afforded the an nation and military by its Gen-
fit
« 11 Germany during Jdays of the General .Sons e(*uca-
j fiddle class and Qfjl^igentsia considered jjj ,Cering as a challeng- § and respectable J^iession. With the Vj Ss*ble exception of ser- h Ce families, such is the view in this Ul*try today.”
cral _ >1(1
-,ul(]S‘aff suggests the advantages that Sila. 6 accrued through adoption of a
>CmodeL
shff m,zotion of excellence: A general ce||erufstem makes an institution of ex- \in Although no system can totally >1^. e favoritism and patronage, es- >eljeng an e’*’e based on demonstrated Vnce does much to remove the (jelQrialization of patronage, creating cli^ Slrable paradox of an egalitarian
h0l.
Sty Station of the service role 'Soffi.n ’he creation of an elite within
[he prc^er corps, a formal role model of
Vd “ '
- ^ 'Sessional officer would be sane-
6i(celie ’^'s model would be based on hofe nce> it would raise the level of c°rps ’°nalism throughout the officer >ans ’hose outside strove either for ,V ey6 °r simPly f°r fulfillment of ser- * lactations.
r'terrrd°f serv’-ce schooling: The N offnation to identify the most quali- Nld ^ers for general staff assignment ph°ols41(6 *’ possible to refine career and make them more demanding. eleVe| °°hng could be raised above Presently perceived of it as only
another ticket punch or preselection for promotion. Progressive levels of demanding schools would be part of the development of the general staff officer. ► Enfranchisement by the educated middle class: A long-range benefit of a general staff could be the enfranchisement of officering as an educated middle class profession. In Germany during the days of the General Staff, sons of the educated middle class and intelligentsia considered officering as a challenging and respectable profession. With the possible exception of service families, such is not the view in this country today. The perception among the educated middle class is that officering is not a suitable lifework for the brilliant, the broadly talented, or the truly ambitious. Unfortunately, there are grounds for this perception. The young man of broad talents can progress more rapidly, gaining more respect and financial remuneration in business, law, or politics than in the service. Officering has never been a lucrative profession, but respect, power, and great responsibility have always been attractions for the talented and ambitious. The seemingly haphazard manner in which the service bestows these attractions and the equally plodding and insensitive manner in which both the average and outstanding officers are advanced and assigned do much to drive the exceptionally ambitious and talented from its ranks. It perpetuates the perception that officering is better suited for the conventional individual interested in security than for the ambitious interested in achievement.
► Perpetually regenerating leadership: Perhaps the greatest advantage of the general staff concept is that it provides a constantly renewed pool of well-rounded leader-managers. In a general staff model, at every level there are officers who have been identified and groomed through schooling and experience to execute with distinction the functions of the grade and billet to which appointed. Such may well be the difference between service mediocrity and excellence.
It is difficult not to believe that there was something the Germans knew that we have missed—or lost—over the past 30 years. Perhaps it is an esoteric aspect of leadership beyond the comprehension of all but flag-grade officers. But maybe it is only a problem in the manner in which we perpetuate our leadership.
Mr. Leader, a graduate of Notre Dame University, served as an infantry officer with the 1st and 3rd Marine divisions and as a commanding officer of a recruiting station. A 1982 Vincent Astor Memorial Leadership Essay contest winner and an MBA graduate of the Harvard Business School, Mr. Leader is presently an associate with McKinsey and Company.
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