Some believe that good leadership is a trait that people have from birth and that it cannot be learned. It can be argued that for a majority of Soldiers who are considered good leaders, they were actually forged through a wide variety of study, experiences, good self assessment skills, mentorship over a period of time and who also have strong resiliency tools. In this essay you will be presented with why the most important and most helpful block of instruction within phase one of the Distant Learning-Intermediate Level Education (DL-ILE) is the C131 Leadership Development and Assessment module. Leadership Development is essential for one’s success as an officer in the United States Army. Leadership development comes from a variety of ways that will be discussed in detail within this essay. Also, you will see the need of having good assessment skills to be a successful leader. The last trait needed to be a good leader that is discussed within the C131 module is the need to possess resiliency tools. The C131 Leadership Development and Assessment module is the most important module within the C100 series and arguably will provide the greatest assistance to the student in their duties as a field grade officer over the next ten years of their career.
Field grade officers are commissioned to lead, to be decision makers, to manage projects and/or personnel, and to command units. If you lack in the ability to lead or your leadership traits are weak you will likely fail as a field grade officer. As mentioned above it is believed by most that leadership is not something that you are born with but instead an attribute that is shaped through years of learning, self assessing, and critical mentorship throughout one’s career. Lear...
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...en years of their career. Supporting facts have show that good leaders are not born, but build from institutional training, self study, operational experience, self study, mentorship, self assessment, and strong resiliency skills. As defined in ADRP 6-22,”Leadership is the process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation to accomplish the mission and improve the organization”.4 Purpose, direction, mission accomplishment, and improvement within the organization; this is why the C131 Leadership Development and Assessment module is so important.
Works Cited
1. Headquarters, Department of the Army, DA PAM 600-3 Commissioned Officer Professional Development and Career Management (Washington D.C., 2010), 7.
2. Idib., 8.
3. Headquarters, Department of the Army, ADRP 6-22 Army Leadership (Washington D.C., 2012), 7-1
4. Idib., 1-1.
The United States Army has been a leader in military prowess on the world stage since its inception in 1775, and with such a record, it is reasonably assumed that there must be solid foundation within the organization working to maintain the high level of performance. The Noncommissioned Officer Corps is one institution within the Army that serves as a large portion of this foundation that makes it the fighting force that it has always been, and the noncommissioned officers have been an integral piece since the very inception of the Army. The Prussian General Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, organizer of the Noncommissioned Officer Corps, encapsulated this idea when he coined the noncommissioned officer (NCO) as the backbone of the Army. (Arms, 1991) In an Army that is continuously adjusting to world around it while maintaining its status as the military leader to all other nations, the Noncommissioned Officer Corps has always provided the platform for continuity through a growing rank system based on its original core, an evolving training program to develop effective leaders, and a creed that moves us forward while remembering the rich history of the corps that came before us.
“Military leadership qualities are formed in a progressive and sequential series of carefully planned training, educational, and experiential events—far more time-consuming and expensive than similar training in industry or government. Secondly, military leaders tend to hold high levels of responsibility and authority at low levels of our organizations. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, military leadership is based on a concept of duty, service, and self-sacrifice; we take an oath to that effect.”
CF02,Full Range Leadership Development. (2012). Maxwell Gunter AFB. Thomas N. Barnes Center for Enlisted Education (AETC)
CF02, Full Range Leadership Development Student Guide. (2012). Maxwell-Gunter AFB. Thomas N. Barnes Center for Enlisted Education (AETC).
Dwight David Eisenhower (1955), the 34th President of the United States, gave an explicit definition of leadership, “The job of getting people really wanting to do something is the essence of leadership….” The Army, like any other civilian organization, defines different levels of leadership depending on a size of a unit a leader is in command of. Tactical and organizational leaderships are two first interconnected levels of leadership in the Army. Both levels of leadership have many commonalities regarding duties and responsibilities; yet they are very different in the way the leaders develop themselves, train, and take care of their soldiers.
Many definitions exist on what leadership is. Despite the many differences in definitions, they all describe the leader as someone who influences others. Leaders transform individuals around them allowing them to work to their full potential. In order for a leader to be successful they must be knowledgeable, self- confident, and effective communicators. These characteristics will create a positive workplace environment that results in an increase in productivity. Leadership is not defined by titles or salary. Leaders must acquire their skills and continue to improve on them through learning. Good leaders provide a vision and help motivate others to make that vision happen. The leader must be effective and successful in creating a strong institution.
As our forefathers before us stated, ‘‘No one is more professional than I. I am a Noncommissioned Officer, a leader of soldiers. As a Noncommissioned Officer, I realize that I am a member of a time honored corps, which is known as “The Backbone of the Army (“The NCO Creed writing by SFC Earle Brigham and Jimmie Jakes Sr”). These words to Noncommissioned Officer should inspire us to the fullest with pride, honor, and integrity. The NCO creed should mean much more than just words whenever we attend a NCO’s school. For most of us this is what our creed has become because we learn to narrate or recite. The military from the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Coast Guard has an overabundance of NCOs who fall under their pay grade of E-5, E-6 and etc. Yet somehow there still not enough leaders. I believe that the largest problem afflicting the military today is our lack of competent leaders, ineffective leader development, and how we influence our subordinates under us who are becoming leaders.
My leadership can expect a top tier performer who strives to be one of the most competent Non-commissioned Officer’s within the unit. I will do this by adhering to the regulations, unit sop’s and any other guidance which governs my section. I will ensure my soldiers do the same, holding them to strict but attainable standards and expecting nothing less. I will teach, coach, counsel, and mentor these soldiers-teaching them what a leader is and grooming them to be leaders also.
Regardless of the career you choose in your life, whether it be an accountant or a Soldier in the United States Army, someone, somewhere most likely had an influence to bring you to that decision. The Army defines leadership as the process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation while operating to accomplish the mission and improve the organization (JP, p. 1). Now imagine you are a young Private, in one of the most dangerous places in Iraq and you have constant leadership changes, and not much support from your direct leadership. I am sure at this point you can imagine, it is not the best scenario to be in. Throughout the duration of this essay you will read about Sergeant First Class Rob Gallagher and Sergeant First Class Jeff Fenlason, their leadership abilities, and the techniques they attempted to use to resolve the issues in this Platoon that was in a downward spiral after losing many leaders to the hell of war.
As an officer in the United States Army, it has been imperative for me to understand every facet of leadership and why it remains important to be an effective leader. During this course, I have learned some valuable lessons about myself as a leader and how I can improve on my leadership ability in the future. The journal entries along with the understanding of available leadership theories have been an integral part of my learning during this course. For all of the journals and assessments that I completed, I feel it has given me a good understanding of my current leadership status and my future potential as a leader. All of the specific assessments looked at several areas in regards to leadership; these assessments covered several separate focus areas and identified my overall strengths and weaknesses as a leader. Over the course of this paper I will briefly discuss each one of these assessments and journal entries as they pertained to me and my leadership.
Non-Commissioned Officers are deficient in vital areas of leadership due to a lack of training. This leads to inexperienced Soldiers becoming inexperienced leaders. The NCO corps needs to develop and enforce comprehensive interactive training that will challenge the next generation to achieve a functional level of communication skills before advancing to leadership positions. This will generate leaders who can write effectively, speak meritoriously and teach adaptively while training others to do the same.
Over the years I have learned many lessons in leadership from different NCOs and civilians I have worked under, as well as various commanders. It is my hypothesis that the leader who will most affect one’s career is that first leader who spends the time to mentor the young Soldier. The leader who had the most influence over me was Staff Sergeant James M. (J.J.) Johnson, Junior. He was not the best NCO in the world, but he was the consistent NCO in my world. I met him at my first duty station, Operations Company, U.S. Army Field Station Korea (OPNS Co., USAFSK) in September, 1983. He was one of many NCOs in a very tangled and confusing chain of command, but he was identified as my squad leader. I learned all about event oriented counseling from him, and that there are promotions and demotions. After serving a year at the Field Station, I PCSd to the 102nd MI Bn, 2nd Infantry Division at Camp Hovey, participating in the QuickFix Platoon, a heliborne collection and jamming platform. I hit my first re-enlistment at the 2nd ID and chose USAFSK as my assignment of choice. My platoon also decided that I had grown enough to be boarded for Sergeant, so that was my reward for a wonderful tactical year.
In the United States Army, there are two categories of rank structure, the enlisted corps and the commissioned corps. The enlisted corps within itself contains leaders, who are referred to as Noncommissioned Officers, or NCOs. These individuals, whose ranks range from Sergeant to Sergeant Major, are responsible implementing the guidance and command policies provided by the Commissioned Officers and commanders in their units. NCOs are also responsible for the welfare and training of junior personnel. The US Army provides regulations and manuals with step by step guidance for the most trivial of tasks, but it fails to spell out specific and concrete information on how to be an NCO. There are publications, such as “The Creed of the Noncommissioned Officer” and regulations on leadership, but they lack specificity and objective instruction for how to accomplish the aforementioned responsibilities of an NCO. The knowledge and skills of an NCO are instead acquired through training and experience, the products of which are NCOs of varying quality. A good NCO is one who knows and fulfills the written laws and regulations of Army doctrine, has the character of a good soldier and leader, and is able to strike a balance between written law and doing what is right even if the two seem to contradict one another.
“An Army leader is any one who by virtue of assumed role or assigned responsibility inspires and influences peoples to accomplish organizational goals. She or He motivates people both inside and outside the chain of command to pursue actions, focus thinking, and shape decisions for the greater good of the organization.1” But for him to do that effectively and efficiently , he has to be prepared, shaped and refined. There are few institutions to prepare such leaders and CGSC is one of those institutions which are mandated, organized and equipped to prepare such leaders. In implementing its mandate, CGSC has programmed ILE common core C 100 to provide foundations for effective leadership development. The lessons covered in this block of instructions are important pillars of leadership development and impact on officers differently depending on the fields/specialties and the level of positions held. This paper therefore attempts to discuss the relevance of critical thinking and problem solving, group decision making, overcoming biases, planning and order production lessons on my future assignment as a logistics staff officer.
level of Precedence and standards in the formation. The roles of the non-commissioned officer is