This First Draft Is Worth A Close Read
CDR Salamander creates a neologism I’m not too happy about, but the basic idea behind it makes sense and the lengthy post has many threads I’d like to see tied together. (It rambles, but stick with it.) He’s railing against, among other things, business- and buzzword-minded leadership against historical parallels. There’s always a tension between innovation and the basic understanding that there’s nothing new under the sun–but that’s not what Salamander’s griping about. He’s looking at the leadership trends and finding the trends wanting.
I was thinking about something similar on a run today. COL McMaster’s gotten no nod for a star. Rickover wouldn’t have gotten a star if he hadn’t gotten some friends on the Hill. Boyd of course didn’t get a star. The only way Mahan (who had a command at sea far from first rank) got a star (and not running-the-navy stars) was that Mahan was really popular at the right time. Change agents tend not to have other attributes needed for that level of leadership, and the fact that they’re change agents prevents that promotion as well. Some capable people who can think big thoughts are just weird. Boyd finessed the issue by assuming the world was made of people that “do something” and people that “be somebody”, and forcing his acolytes to make that choice, while he retired as a colonel and stayed a lowly staffer in a tie. This goes on rather commonly–Sims nearly killed his career as a lieutenant before Roosevelt personally intervened–such that people who make change in a bureaucracy do not tend to rise to run the organization. (Sometimes the person running the organization causes that change, which is a special case. Zumwalt’s example may be worth discussing.)
However, I think that Boyd posited a generally true but overall false dilemma; one can do and be…if one’s the right kind of person at the right time. (Me, I tend to the Sinatra corollary of the Boyd/Plato argument.) And quite frankly multistar admirals are merely midlevel bureaucrats with nice uniforms and personal cooks; they can’t change an organization like an agile bulletproof captain with an agenda and a group of followers can. A one- or two-star far from DC can cause change in a small place…provided the change sticks when the admiral gets relieved a year or so down the road. Seen that; seen it work, seen it not work, seen it backfire.
The big question, if you’re one of those people looking at being Influential, is what you really want to shoot for. You get maybe one shot. What are you going to do with that shot, given the opportunity?
9 Responses to “This First Draft Is Worth A Close Read”
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August 30th, 2007 at 6:11 am
I have had similar thoughts. There is a paradox in this discussion I’m having trouble wrapping my mind around. I think he has it generally right, that the debate isn’t about change itself, rather a well formulated set of reasons how, what, and why to change.
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.
August 30th, 2007 at 5:14 pm
Well, if Chap doesn’t ban me … here is my thought on this.
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.
August 30th, 2007 at 6:11 pm
Fair enough–that’s counter to 2xFOS and Kaplan’s assertion, but also makes perfect sense. I’ve got some additional ideas about the man and his situation based on some conversations but won’t put them on this circuit. The Kaplan article may also, in a sense, be a preemptive strike to push him to a star; you know, putting Big Army on notice in the paper.
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.
August 30th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Agree – wonder if the “preemptive strike” will hurt or help. My sources and sense is that McMasters is in either way. We’ll see.
August 30th, 2007 at 8:12 pm
BD,
That is why there was a “If Chap doesn’t ban me line…” in comments over at my place. PARTY FOUL!!!! Cut-n-paste comments!!!
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.
August 31st, 2007 at 3:57 am
Big Dave’s insights into McMasters is very insightful and I wonder what he thinks of Nagl’s chances, given his knowledge of the Army.
One point to be made, Mahan never made flag on the active list. He made it through seniority on the retired list and never actively served as an Admiral. His service on the Navy board and the Joint Board was in a retired status.
I was really struck by the George Marshall firings mentioned in the Kaplan article. Chap you and I discuss this a few years ago and wondered whether we would have time to get rid of the bureaucrats whose chief skill lies in fighting the Pentagon budget battle and replace them with a fighting captain ala Mitcher. Nearly five years into this and we are still in a peacetime mode. Bring on Marshall! We need him to clear the decks.
August 31st, 2007 at 4:16 am
Jerry,
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.”
August 31st, 2007 at 4:47 am
The Marshall firings are pretty germane, I think, since over the last decade or so I’ve really not seen many deck clearings. The administration style at secretariat levels seems to be to let the guy stay too long, from Treasury Secretary Thompson to you name it. I’ve only seen a few GOFOs fired–mainly Sestak and aberrations like that one star from Abu Ghraib. That’s rather odd for a wartime footing (although I don’t follow Army, who’s had the most friction over the past six years).
This article (found on van Steenwyk’s site with a critique) talks about the phenomenon a little:
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.
September 2nd, 2007 at 12:46 pm
The most ironic thing is that those cloaked in the most colorful banners of “Transformation” are those most strenuously doing all possible to defend the status quo…
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.