And it also seems that its those with the best understanding of the past are the ones who oppose the “Transformationalialists” the most…

Go figure.

This article (found on van Steenwyk’s site with a critique) talks about the phenomenon a little:

Trap No. 3: Staying too long with the existing team Some leaders believe the workers they inherit deserve a chance to prove themselves, but Watkins warns that it’s not recommended to retain team members with a record of mediocre performance.

“Leaders are brought in to improve performance by imparting new ideas, making tough decisions and instilling a can-do spirit of achievement,” he says.

Defense: After a few months, it’s the leader’s responsibility to ensure he or she has the best team, Watkins says. “This is not to say that new leaders should be unfair, expect miracles or seek to terminate people summarily. They should impose a time limit — typically two to six months, depending on the severity of the problem — for deciding who should be on the playing field.”

Frankly, if a leader doesn’t have horizontal and vertical buy-in by the time he becomes settled in the job, then he’s not going to make change happen. I’ve been that change preventing agent at times as well as the change agent; beware the Iron Major. Seems to me one way to cause that change you want is to selectively replace people, not just the ones who don’t cut it at that moment but also the ones who can’t see where you want to go or want to go there. Caveat: that’s after actually listening to those people, who may actually know what’s going to kill the change, and then following your own counsel.

The length of the Clinton administration made it such that by the time Clinton left, all the Reagan appointees were pretty much gone, and the new administration had to deal with a lot of people who were acceptable to the previous administration. This made for some interesting dynamics, and was the closest thing to a deck clearing I saw during that time.
I’ve seen related examples involving hiring who you know rather than the right guy you risk by not knowing. I think Powell’s bio mentions a couple of cases; so does IIRC MGEN Smith’s Pentagon book.

Nagl is USMA 88′ (top of his class – Rhodes Scholar) and a cearly a track guy getting all the right jobs in the Armor community.

He has got 4-6 years before he is in the game for GO.

That’s all I know as opposed to McMasters who is loved by many of the Big Army key players … already in.

On Soup with a Knife … my view is Nagl gets some of it very wrong. Kinetic ops do not open the door for engaging the people. It is the other way around … living with the people (as we are doing here in parts of Afghanistan) … gives you the trust of the people and the human intelligence to conduct effective ops against the enemy.

Finally … it is silly to seperate the Pentagon budget fighetrs from the true warriors. Generally … they are one in the same. Look at Patton’s interwar peacetime efforts or Arleigh Burke for God’s sake. If we promote the RIGHT values then the rest take care of itself (see my piece We Believe in Command not Staff).

From Patton … “There are no garrision Soldiers or battlefield Soldiers … just good Soldiers and bad Soldiers.”

Anyway – I refer to my comments back to you at my place.

Thanks for the kind word and the link Chap – and for recognizing the “First Draft” aspect of that post. Sat down, banged out 5 minutes. Left to take care of business-of-the-ship, banged out another 10 minutes -spell checked and posted. Didn’t want to keep Bookie waiting, you know.

You make a very good point about “suffering for your art” so-to-speak. Billy Mitchell is another example.

I think the key point you have that I’ve been riffing on is “some innovative thinkers make it, some don’t”. I figure most folks have One Big Idea and sometimes circumstances make that idea more relevant than others.

A business example (not because it’s business but because it’s human beings) used at MIT is this case study, showing a real life experience where the guy who innovated didn’t have the people skills to drive any change.

A great and important intellectual discussion. Unfortunately … Kaplan … Salmander and ALL involved don’t have a clue on this one.

Col H.R. McMasters is my brothers classmate … West Point 84. Now while every Colonel is looked at for General … so McMasters was technically passed over twice … he has been a Colonel for whole three years.

hmmm… how many 84′ guys have been selected for General … oh none. Anyone who knows anything about Flag/GO selection knows that the earliest guys this year were 82′ right now … so his chance is one or two years out.

Trust me on this … Kaplan article or not … McMasters is on the flag/GO track and has been for more than ten years. Some innovative thinkers make it, some don’t. The Army loves Direclection of Duty … because in the end he fed them their favorite thesis … the half truth that “the war was lost in Washington … even before the first units were deployed.”.

Right now McMasters is in and leading the JCS Iraq Advisory Group … and he WILL be a General. So misplaced academics at this point. On to the next discussion.

COL McMaster is a good example, do most people not already assume to know the reasons?

Leadership, and what amounts to the business of human capital, is in my opinion the most important place to start the discussion, but I don’t get the impression the discussion is limited to only leadership. When one moves on to basic business processes including contracting, financial management, and weapons acquisition I think the same paradox exists.