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The Bowe Bergdahl Thing

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Bergdahl - 1 This morning I am a little angry.  I apologize up front if any of our readers are upset about what I am going to say here, but I participate in this forum and I am going to use it. I have to admit I am a little torn over what has transpired in regard to Bowe Bergdahl.  I am torn because I am former military, I am a patriot, and I am a father.  Additionally, I feel like we have not heard all of this story.

This is not about me, so I really don’t want to address my role in the Navy.  But let me be clear, I would not have expected this to happen to me.  If I had been captured, I would have followed military protocol, and the rules of the Geneva Convention, and would have dealt with being a POW.  So having said that, it would never have happened because I would not have wandered away from my base.  A FORWARD OPERATING Base, without my body armor or weapon.  I feel like the vast majority, I would guess 95% or better, of currently deployed or enlisted military men and women would say, “You would have found me dead of multiple gunshot wounds, laying in a pile of my spent brass”.

I cannot and will not speculate on why Bowe Bergdahl would leave his base, or why he would leave his base without his weapon or body armor, but IF that is what he did, then he is not a hero or a POW, he is a deserter.  And if he is a deserter, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, Punitive Article 86 states the following:

“Any member of the armed forces who, without authority, fails to go to his appointed place of duty at the time prescribed, goes from that place; or absents himself or remain absent from his unit, organization or place of duty, at which he is required to be at the time prescribed; shall be punished as a court-martial may direct.”

So it seems to me,

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Seriously, why do we lead?

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Seriously why - 1Why do we lead?

This will mark the second time today and the fourth time in the past two days I have started, renamed and changed this article in an attempt to get my point across. I realize that in December of 2012 I authored a very tongue in cheek article about “Why would someone want to be a leader?” However, this time, I am seriously asking the question “Why do you lead?”

What deep down causes you or gives you the need or the drive to lead. I don’t think I am talking to business owners because their leadership drives the bottom line. I think I am talking to normal guys like you and like me, fathers, 9-5-ers, husbands, and weekend warriors. Why do you do the things you do?

Seriously why - 2I don’t want to blow my own horn here. I mean to be as humble as possible. But I try to set the right example for my kids. I try to be the leader I think they deserve and want or need. What I mean by all that is, if someone needs help and I am able to provide it, I try to help them. Everything from running to the dance studio at 9:00 pm because a mother has left her dome light on and her car battery is dead, or if one of our elders has trouble getting from the car to door of the church, or if my neighbor who had a stroke years ago, needs help around the house.

But I have realized that I may do these things for selfish reasons. I feel as though in my head, I would want someone to help my family if I was not available. Maybe it is also a little pay it forward as there are folks out there that have helped me in the past.

I heard once, that true character, was the act of doing something for someone who could never repay you. I wonder, could I change that a little bit, to suit leadership?

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Waiting on the World to Change

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Waiting on the World to Change - 1Well, I can honestly say that I don’t think I have ever heard a John Mayer song sung in church before the pastor got up to preach. Tomorrow, I won’t be able to make that statement. The song immediately preceding the message was “Waiting on the World to Change”. And many of you will instantly recall the lyrics.

I will forego evaluating the use of John Mayer music in a worship setting. I will only say that the band in church this morning did an excellent job with the song and played it with heart, soul, and passion.

This song is often misunderstood. Do a little internet research on the song and you will quickly see that it has folks who can be fairly polarized in their views on whether it is a statement, an expectation or a parody. Mayer himself has been somewhat elusive on the meaning behind the lyrics.  That’s some clever writing and marketing right there.

Waiting on the World to Change - 2One stanza says this:

It’s not that we don’t care
We just know that the fight ain’t fair
So we keep on waiting
(Waiting)
Waiting on the world to change

So what is my point and what is the relevance to Leadership Voices?

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Leadership Language: Old & New – Part 1

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LL Old & New Part 1 - 1We can attract people with our language and we can turn them off just as quickly with the words we use. Which ones are the right ones? Which ones will not only connect but communicate what we are intending? Furthermore what “baggage” do the words we use carry with them? I want to take a moment and consider the importance of words in leading others and how the right words can make something stick but just as quickly the wrong words could result in the loss of our influence and leadership in someone’s life.

There are certain words that I read that quickly turn me off: “Vision-casting, BHAG’s, Successful, Daring, Significant” and more. Now don’t get me wrong I see the value of each of these words. I have incorporated what they represent into my own life and leadership and I have taught them to others. However I do often shy away from people using them because of the abuse of them and the “used car-salesman” (no offense intended) impression that some leadership experts carry with them as they teach others how to manipulate (hm-hmmm, I mean lead) others. So is there anything wrong with these words? No. But when I use them could I just as quickly be turning people off to the message I carry because they are perhaps judging me in the same way I have just mentioned? So does that mean we need to get rid of these words, redefine them, redeem them or replace them? And is it really that important?

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Loneliness in Leadership

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Lonely Leadership - 1In February of 2012, Harvard Business Review featured a story acknowledging that it is lonely being the CEO. The article noted that it’s isolating at the top.  Now, if you are at all like me it is a little hard to feel sorry for CEOs on a regular basis.  What with their power, prestige, influence, and wealth — the common man’s perception is that they have it all. They must be the happiest people on the planet.

All those trappings of success notwithstanding, business leaders face some genuine troubles, not least of which is loneliness.

The author of that article cited survey findings from the CEO Snapshot Survey that “half of CEOs report experiencing feelings of loneliness in their role.  And 61 percent believe that it hinders their performance. This was particularly acute with first-time CEOs and young leaders.

Lonely Leadership - 2Maybe you are also like me in that you don’t really care if billionaires like Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos aren’t reaching the pinnacle of Maslow’s hierarchy!

So why am I writing about this?

I would suggest that any leader’s isolation and feelings of loneliness have negative implications on their personal performance, and perhaps more importantly, on how they interact with others. Because it is not just big corporate CEOs who experience this kind of loneliness.   It is team leaders, entrepreneurs, pastors, and community leaders also. And this impacts the bottom-line for organizations.

This loneliness springs from a feeling that they have no one “at their level” to talk to.  They have no “peers” in their view.  They have no one to confide in.  They have no one to bounce ideas off of and no one to turn to for advice.  They also have no one holding them accountable for their actions and deeds.  This isn’t good for decision-making, culture, performance, or the long-term health of the organization.

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Coming Attractions: Leadership Language

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CA - Language - 1As a leader, am I hanging on to the past or am I grabbing on to the future?

This is an important question to consider because it speaks to our nature, to our ability to change, and to our willingness to adapt in order to become an effective leader. It also speaks to the everchanging landscape of language when it comes to leadership.

In the coming days I will be taking a look at leadership and the language of leadership. Some will call this language “buzzwords” and they would be correct. And although I think that there is more to leadership than language, language is vital as it is the most common medium of communication. And it is the shared language of the communicator and the “communicate-ee” that facilitates the transmission, reception and the all important feedback loop.

CA - Language - 2Are there leadership terms that are standing the test of time? If so, what are they? Are there leadership words that have faded with the whims of pop culture?

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Sacrificial Leadership

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Sacrificial Leadership - 1Real leadership often involves sacrifice. And it is the sacrifices of those that have lead the way and who have forged a path to freedom and liberty that we remember today. Now is also a time to remember those who today stand a watch that allows me to grill hamburgers in my back yard today and then lay my head on my pillow tonight in safety and security.

One of the fallacies that exist today is that the higher one goes in leadership within an organization the more freedom they will have to do what they want. Nothing can be farther from the truth. In fact it is quite the opposite. The higher one rises the less personal freedoms you have and the greater your responsibility is to those who you lead and serve.

Sacrificial Leadership - 2Rodney Mills captured the essence of sacrificial leadership when he wrote on the subject of Being a Servant Leader – A Theme last September. Out of the 8 points he made, the very first one on the list was that being a servant leader requires sacrifice. That is counter culture for many of us. It is counter to human nature that you would run into a burning building while others are running from it. Nevertheless there are brave men and women who do that every day. So, developing a spirit of self-sacrifice is possible. It just isn’t intuitive.

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The Eyes Don’t Lie

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Eyes Light Up -2I subscribe to a lot of blogs.  Most of them are about leadership and topics related to leadership.  But I subscribe to some that have nothing to do with leadership at all.  (Or, at least, that is what it thought.)

My niece, Ashley Barnette is an active blogger, a wife, a mother, a college professor, and probably a bunch of other stuff that I don’t know about.  And this week she wrote an article entitled Do Your Eyes Light Up?  I really would like you to go and take a look at her original article.  It is very thought-provoking to me and it causes me to examine some of my actions and activities.  I won’t give you all of the details of the article because I want you to go and read it.  And while you are there, leave her a comment or a word of encouragement.  As writers, we often go for extended periods of time without getting any feedback on the pieces of our soul that we lay bare from time to time.

Her article asked the question, “Do your eyes light up when your child walks in the room?”  And that is a great question.  It speaks to us about our willingness to focus on them and the value that we place on our children.    But I was drawn to look at the equation from the other side.  Perhaps it is because my children are all grown and I don’t have that exact kind of relationship with them any longer since we are all adults.

Eyes Light Up -1My question would be do your children’s eyes light up when you come into the room?  I am blessed right now to have 2 of my grandchildren and our daughter living with us right now.  And I cannot begin to express the joy that I feel every day when I come home from work and walk in the door.  They come running to me squealing “Papa!” at the top of their little lungs.  And they leap into my arms as I stoop down to scoop them up.  And the look in their eyes . . . Well, to say that it is “bright” is an understatement.  It makes whatever went on that day seem so very insignificant.

And the eyes don’t lie.  

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Leadership Lessons from Gilligan’s Island

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Gilligan's Island - 1If you were stranded on a deserted island…

Have your children ever asked you this? I think that they think it is some sort of a riddle.

“Daddy what are the three things you would take with you if you had to be stranded on a desert island?”

They are always surprised when I tell them that it would be a boat, fuel and food.  What I find interesting is that they are always surprised at my way of thinking.  My daughters would apparently have the best wardrobe and electronics stores on this uninhabited inhabited island, but who knows.  So as I ponder this, this weekend, I think true leadership is sometimes like being on an island.  Sometimes you are the only one with the plan, you are the only one who knows the mission and at some point you may be the only one committed to the journey.

So growing up in the era I did, the only “real” deserted island I ever had any knowledge of was Gilligan’s Island. Now as you think of the players on this award winning “documentary” you realize that there could not have been a better team assembled to deal with the rigors of being stranded on an island. This is really not where this was headed, but lets go with it for a minute, I only want to address the two obvious leaders from the island, The Skipper and The Professor.

Gilligan's Island - 2As the captain of the SS Minnow when the group set sail on the infamous 3-hour tour out of Honolulu, it would stand to reason that the Skipper would emerge as the group’s leader. After all, the captain of any ship should serve as the positional leader of the team.  However in this case, I don’t believe he wanted to be the leader.  I do think he felt responsible for their “predicament”.  When truly he was the one that saved them from dying in the storm. And a feeling of responsibility is a great place to start.

Gilligan's Island - 4The Professor turns out to be the cerebral member of the group with an advanced education and an overall serious-natured intelligence. The Professor might be perceived as a likely leadership candidate for the group. However, book smarts and leadership savvy are not one in the same.  Just because he used his intelligence to make their life on the island easier, he was not necessarily the leader.  But he was a great resource to the team and the leader.

The problem with much of what happened on Gilligan’s Island is

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Wanted: Full-Time Fathers

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Wanted Full-Time Fathers - 1Early this week I was able to reflect on the impact of a Godly mother on children and on their development into adulthood and hopefully she is impacting them to become leaders who are molders of the culture and not simply being squeezed into the mold (culture) that society holds out for us.  That is a long sentence.  But it is necessary because it sets up my thoughts as we begin now to look toward Father’s Day in just a few weeks.

I have this picture in my mind of men who are out of work during the Great Depression who are holding signs saying “Job Wanted”.  Those must have been terrible times.  To want something so bad, to need something so bad, and yet not be able to get it must be damaging to the soul.

Wanted Full-Time Fathers - 2And that image makes me think of what must go on inside of the little heads of children who do not have a father.  Or maybe they have a biological father.  But he is not a real father.

I have too many thoughts inside my own head and some of them are so raw that I will not burden you with them today.  But we are approaching Father’s day.  And fathers are wanted.  Fathers are needed more than ever.  And they are as scarce as jobs during the Great Depression.

What are your children thinking when they see you?  Are they looking for a “full-time” father?  Are you content to be just a “part-time” one?

Photo credit: austinevan / Foter / (CC BY 2.0)
Photo credit: Don Hankins / Foter / (CC BY 2.0)
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