1 — First it is important to remember that there are many different types of units at the company level and above. This seems like a blinding flash of the obvious, but it so often gets lost in the bright light of leader development program (LDP) ideas emanating from on high. Furthermore those diverse units are made up of a diverse mix of service members with respect to age, gender, rank, MOS, religion, motivation, etc., etc., etc. This is important to remember because, as I have written before, the military is a human endeavor. Of course I believe that team-building events are an effective way to enhance a unit’s effectiveness. The trouble is choosing the right times, and right events.

A foot march/obstacle course that would motivate an infantry platoon may be looked upon with trepidation by an armor platoon. As much as the cooks may want to participate in something (anything) other than cooking every day of the month, but the dining facility is one place a unit likes to keep functioning smoothly. A reading program that has wide appeal to an engineer company, may be lost on the logisticians. All such events certainly have their place in the profession of arms for all of its members. But the point is that a one size fits all LDP will not be seen as valuable to the entire unit. A leader who owns a LDP should know what makes his or her unit tick — what motivates them, what is relevant to their mission, how they fit into the greater whole, then craft a LDP to match. In doing so, the leader will increase the effectiveness of their unit, as well as their own effectiveness as a leader.

2 — I have nothing against the idea of sharing a meal as a group. Apparently “the process of purchasing the food, cooking, cleaning, and enjoying the meal together…enhanced organizational effectiveness.” But if a meal is ALL that happens and is regularly on the calendar, it just becomes one more mandatory fun day to dread — a bore, and a waste of time and money. (As an aside, I never could understand how it was fair when the battalion’s cooks would be pulled from the dining facility just to have them cook for the battalion’s “fun” event). Even if the leader(s) are the only ones to pay or cook, they could be seen as attempting to buy popularity if there is no greater substance to it.

Shared meals that are valuable are usually not stand alone events. They are generally combined with a professional discussion (brown-bag lunch), or some sort of tradition (dining in), or the end reward after some sort of crucible (FRG cook-out). If a leader gets his or her people together just to eat and stare at one another, they are missing the mark and may breed resentment. The meal must be part of a shared experience, not the experience itself.

3 — The two most important things I believe I provided as a company commander were vision, and top-cover.

I felt it was crucial to have a plan that built upon itself — a vision. Each topic and activity had to relate to each other as part of some larger theme. This was all nested as well as possible with the battalion and brigade events. The brigade laid out a very good system (which I have tried to capture here, and may be familiar to some). Unfortunately the realities of the training schedule made implementation problematic. But the system is designed to be flexible, and a leader with imagination can make it work.

A commander and 1SG are always on the go however, getting sucked up to one meeting or another, executing UCMJ actions, or just trying to stay ahead of all the minutiae that comes with running a company. Therefore they are almost never have time themselves to be the trainers. Rather they give a vision and end-state to the subordinate leaders, conduct spot checks, and inspect the results. It is not cliche to say that NCOs are the backbone of the military and it is their job to train the junior-enlisted, and assist commanders to develop junior officers. As the commander it was a critical function of mine to provide those men and women the space and time (i.e. top-cover) they needed to train their squads and platoons, free from unnecessary distractions within the vision I set for the unit.

It is simple to come up with an LDP, but it is not easy to implement. But the only way to fail is to give up , or worse to just go through the motions and be thought a fraud. Developing leaders does not happen in a vacuum, and is not a one-person show. It is a group effort, that must be integrated into the unit’s operations in any environment. Leaders must determine what messages to convey, figure out the most effective way to convey them, and allow the process it work. It does not always go smoothly, but when it does work it is a thing of beauty. In the end, an LDP is only as effective as the leader who conceives it and the personnel who execute it.