My leadership philosophy has two pillars, caring and ethics. These pillars are held together with systems that make routine activities routine.
The first pillar of my leadership philosophy is caring for soldiers. There are four sub-components of caring: freedom, development, openness, and families.
Freedom means trusting my soldiers’ intelligence and ingenuity by allowing them the freedom to exercise initiative. Initiative cannot come without risk of failure. I recognize that failure will occur and I will not penalize honest failures.
I acknowledge my personal obligation to ensure that soldiers have the skills required to execute their given mission. Professional development and challenging, realistic training will give them the necessary skills to succeed in their missions.
I care about my soldiers’ thoughts and ideas. I am open to new ideas and suggestions and encourage input and different points of view during the decision making process. By involving subordinates in the decision making process I will gain buy-in and commitment.
Finally, I care about my soldiers’ families. Without family support no soldier can serve and endure the hardships of Army life. A loving and supportive family allows deployed soldiers to focus on the mission and come home safely.
The second pillar of my leadership philosophy is ethics. Choose the harder right over the easier wrong. I have a no-tolerance policy regarding ethical behavior.
2008-10-21
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George Moore’s Leadership Philosophy
ReplyDeleteThe values that I am passionate about are duty, honor, and integrity. These ideals were instilled in me through positive and negative events in my life and affect me in such a way that they align my priorities and what I believe. When I joined the Army I did not view myself as a leader or role model. However, I had pride in my uniform and constantly strived to have the shiniest boots and a crisp uniform, but I remained outspoken and somewhat rebellious. Through all of my shortcomings, someone saw a spark in me and gave me a chance to become an officer. During my first year of ROTC it became clear what it means to be a leader of men and women; I was literally transformed. I understood then, with crystal clarity, my duty, what was expected of me, and tried my best to be a shining example.
My upbringing compels me to embrace duty spiritually, which helps me to do my duty physically. To use a Christian analogy, there comes a time in everyone’s life when they have a cross that they must bear. Duty can sometimes be as heavy as a mountain, but as a leader, one must accept that responsibility. Doing my duty means accepting responsibility for my actions and those entrusted to my care. There have been times during combat that I feared for my life and the life of my men; however, accepting my duty to lead men into combat and bring them home, helped me do just that; lead my men in to battle and accomplish the mission. Duty compels one to make the hard choices to do what is right against the easy wrong, setting the example, and possess honor and integrity.
I find it difficult to separate honor and integrity; thus, I feel that they are interwoven and can not exist without the other. Modern times, especially here in America, where the mindset of “the ends justifies the means” have relegated honor and integrity as secondary values . Headlines in the recent past of corporate leaders cheating to increase the bottom line, investor ponzi schemes, and derivatives bundling, illustrate my point. A person without honor or integrity can not be trusted, relied upon, or expected to do their duty. The ultimate test is combat. If an individual is not honorable and has no integrity in a garrison environment, how can a leader entrust the lives of America’s sons and daughters to such a person in combat; the thought is reprehensible! A person without honor and integrity is can not be loyal.
My loyalties are God, family, Army; so my priorities are the same. My parent’s divorce during my childhood has caused me to set my family as a top priority. I am a firm believer in marriage and family. I am loyal to my wife, my kids, subordinates, superiors, and peers and expect reciprocity.
Empowering subordinates to effectively accomplish the mission is important to me. The current operating environment forces leaders at lower echelons to be adaptive and capable to seize unanticipated opportunities. Subordinate leaders need to understand that they can try new things and I will underwrite minor mistakes to allow for learning to take place in training that allows them to be more creative in developing solutions to tactical problems. CPT Joe Nolan, my Company Commander when I was a platoon leader, was big on coaching, teaching, and mentoring. I feel that I was fortunate to develop under his leadership and that growth was significant in my development as a leader. I want to foster that same type of development to for all with whom I interact.
I am very competitive, but understand my limitations and how my actions can affect the team. I believe in teamwork and know that sometimes I have to make sacrifices for the team. I’m a full believer in hard work, but working smarter is always better than harder. I will have an open mind and I am always interested in a different point of view. If you have an idea, tell me! I know, don’t know everything.