Thoughts on leadership

In all, I spent 13 years and 9 months in the service of these United States. I was really proud to wear the uniform most of the time, and I am thankful that I had more good times than bad in my tenure.

Yes, there were lots of times that were just plain stupid, a few times that were really bad, and some years that were mostly milquetoast.

With that said, let’s talk about leadership in the ranks. While I spent almost 14 years in the Air Force, I also spent 7 1/2 years working for the Army as a civilian. In that time, I was around a lot of officers. They ranged in rank from O-3 Captains to O-10 General officers. Fort Leavenworth is an officer’s Post; it is one of the few places in the Army where officers are equal in number or outnumber the enlisted. Also, most of my immediate civilian leaders were retired Army officers.

This was fascinating to me because the Air Force’s view of officers is a lot different. First off, there are a lot more of them per capita because, unlike the unusually sensible Army, which uses Warrant Officers (who cannot command) for the bulk of its aviators, the Air Force insists on all pilots being commissioned officers. Predictably, most USAF officers are more focused on being good pilots than good leaders, and as a whole, the Air Force focuses a lot more on technical training than leadership training.

The Army and Marines are polar opposites. They focus on building the leader first around technical skills. A highly technical and mechanized military is a very recent development; most of the military's heraldry and tradition are from previous generations. But the Air Force is young and has none of this tradition.

What does this have to do with anything?

Well, because these men and women don’t stay in the military forever. They wind up all over the place. When I worked at a Target Distribution Center from 2006-2008, just after leaving the active-duty Air Force, a good third of the floor leadership were former Army officers from nearby Fort Riley. A lot of them didn’t want to spend the next decade in Iraq, so they got out to try out the corporate world. I don’t blame them.

Some were really good, and others were really bad. Leadership isn’t a good fit for everyone.

To be honest, I was tired of being a manager and leader, so my first year of freelancing was a welcome relief. But then you start to realize something: you don’t get away from it. If you put yourself out there as a newsletter writer, social media personality, etc., and people come to you for advice, you are a leader. It is just the way things go. Some people lead, while most others want to be led (which is something I will write about at length later this week).

Seriously, most people want someone to lead them. That’s why, in the year of our Lord 2024, a lot of people on both sides of the aisle think they can vote their way out of our current problems as a nation. Bruv, there is no voting our way out of it. You just wanted a leader that you could agree with 51% of the time, and sleazeballs kept coming up to feed at the trough while you looked for a benevolent leader.

So, if people come to you looking for answers and solutions, congrats! You are probably a leader. You don’t need military training to be a good leader; the military assumes most people are terrible leaders, so it molds them into what it wants them to be. You don’t need that. You just need to show up when people need you. My experience around the military was pretty good, but for the most part, the leadership was okay at best. And frankly, that is everyone’s experience. Just don’t think that leadership isn't a thing anymore because you’ve exited the formal workforce. If anything, it might be more important out here in these uncharted territories of the WiFi money world.

We’re all looking for good leaders, but it might just turn out that what the world needs is you, so keep showing up.