The Best Leadership Trait: Emotional Intelligence

I want you to take a minute and think about some of the individuals that you have worked for or with, in any business, group, or community setting.  Did they inspire you?  Did they motivate you?  Did they make you want to be a better person and create a sense of unity and teamwork?  Now that you have that person in mind, what behavior did they display that made you feel inspired, motivated, and create a sense of teamwork?  Did you feel that they listened to you and understood you and showed empathy toward you?  If so, that person was…

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Star Trek II: Irrational Character vs. Character Who Will Not Lose

No… You can’t get away… From hell’s heart I stab at thee…. For hate’s sake… I spit my last breath at thee.  — Khan Noonien Singh, Star Trek II:  The Wrath of Khan Herman Melville’s Moby Dick is the ultimate “all-destroying but unconquering” revenge story with the protagonist Captain Ahab spending is entire life unsuccessfully destroying the white whale that destroyed his life.  The hauntingly tragic tale witnesses a man so inflamed with emotional rage due to a perceived injustice that he is willing to sacrifice everything, pay whatever cost, and take whatever irrational action to exact his revenge against…

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Invest in Meaningful Relationships

Throughout my military career I have spent a considerable amount of time helping others figure out what motivates them to put on their uniform day after day. For many service members over the past few years, their work environment has transformed from the bloody battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan with constant deployments to the non-combat steady state garrison operations. Adversaries have adjusted their strategy from a barbaric physical combative form into deceptive psychological information operations aimed at crumbling countries from within. This shift in warfare has also transformed the modern service member’s day to day operations to a more non-action…

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War Machine:  Brad Pitt’s Warning on Hubris

Written by:  Pred Published:  12 November 2022 In Iraq, he transformed special operations with what he called systemic negation of repetitive procedural practice or to the acronym-obsessed military, SNORPP. … For three and a half years, he’d been trying to explain SNORPP to the Washington Press Gallery. Narrator, War Machine (2017) There are several words that come to one’s mind when they dwell on Afghanistan.  The United States led a coalition for 20 years and all culminated with the tragic and hastily departure from Kabul Airport in August 2021.  Watching the scenes of people hanging off C17s created a wide…

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Spot On, Mate

Written by:  Pred Published:  29 October 2022 Extremely accurate.  Exactly correct or accurate.  Exactly right.  Hit the target. This is a phrase that has interested the author in his military aviation time.  When one drops exploding steel from aircraft at high altitude, “hitting the target” is of vital interest.  British,  U.S., and Australian aviators from WWII used this phrase to acknowledge how well their bombs struck the targets below.  Aviators are trained to ensure they operate aircraft to deliver weapons from various airspeeds and altitudes.  The goal is to release those weapons so they will fall and land as close…

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Paths of Glory: Kubrick’s Anti-War Lessons on Leadership

Written by:  Pred Published:  22 October 2022 Sometimes there are those military movies that come out of the woodwork that you can not believe is more commonly known or researched.  These movies are such a perfect gift for those seeking the knowledge to simply improve themselves.  Additionally, they provide a critique of military culture, both the positives and the negatives, and also obliterate the common public perception of how military culture operates. These movies usually are not as sexy as those box office blockbusters, but hey sometimes the not so popular things are better for you.  Paths of Glory. Paths…

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