Showing posts with label high performance team. Show all posts
Showing posts with label high performance team. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

IMPLICATIONS FOR ORGANIZATIONAL LEADERS AND UNIT COMMANDERS

 To be effective team builders, organizational leaders and commanders must be able to identify and
interact with both formal and informal teams, including—

  • The traditional chain of command.
  • Chains of coordination directing joint, interagency, and multinational organizations.
  • Chains of functional support combining commanders and staff officers.

Although leading through other leaders is a decentralized process, it does not imply a commander or
supervisor cannot step in and temporarily take active control if the need arises. However, bypassing the
habitual chain of command should be by exception and focused on solving an urgent problem or guiding
an organization back on track with the leader’s original guidance

Thursday, October 27, 2011

Army Leadership From an Army Physical Readiness Point of View

Leadership
“The American Soldier…demands professional competence in his leaders in battle; he wants
to know that the job is going to be done right, with no unnecessary casualties. The
noncommissioned officer wearing the chevron is supposed to be the best Soldier in the
platoon, and he is supposed to know how to perform all duties expected of him. The American
Soldier expects his sergeant to be able to teach him how to do his job, and expects even more
from his officers.”
General of the Army Omar N. Bradley
Throughout history, the Army has had confident leaders of character and competence.
Leaders develop through a dynamic process consisting of three equally important training
domains: operational, institutional and self-development IAW AR 350-1. The process
incorporating these domains provides the following key leadership elements:
fundamental military specialty experience; education that instills key competencies;
personal and professional development goals that enable leaders to develop the skills and
the knowledge and attitudes needed for success. Leaders at all levels should understand
that physical readiness training (PRT) improves Soldier resiliency which is a vital
component of a combat-ready force. This chapter addresses the importance of leadership
as it applies to PRT.

Monday, October 10, 2011

BUILDING TEAMWORK AND COHESION

Teamwork and cohesion are measures of climate. Willingness to engage in teamwork is the opposite
of selfishness. Selfless service is a requirement for effective teamwork. To operate effectively, teams, units,
and organizations need to work together for common Army Values and task and mission objectives.

Leaders encourage others to work together, while promoting group pride in accomplishments. Teamwork
is based on commitment to the group, which in turn is built on trust. Trust is based on expecting that others
will act for the team and keep its interests ahead of their own. Leaders have to do the hard work of dealing
with breaches in trust, poor team coordination, and outright conflicts. Leaders should take special care in
quickly integrating new members into the team with this commitment in mind.

Leaders can shape teams to be cohesive by setting and maintaining high standards. Positive climate
exists where good, consistent performance is the norm. This is very different from a climate where
perfectionism is the expectation. Team members should feel that a concentrated, honest effort is
appreciated even when the results are incomplete. They should feel that their leader recognizes value in
every opportunity as a means to learn and to get better.

Good leaders recognize that reasonable setbacks and failures occur whether the team does everything
right or not. Leaders should express the importance of being competent and motivated, but understand that
weaknesses exist. Mistakes create opportunities to learn something that may not have been brought to
mind.
Soldiers and Army civilians expect to be held to high but realistic standards. In the end, they feel
better about themselves when they accomplish their tasks successfully. They gain confidence in leaders
who help them achieve standards and lose confidence in leaders who do not know the standards or who fail
to demand quality performanc

Monday, September 19, 2011

Standing Orders for Rogers' Rangers-From the Ranger Handbook


STANDING ORDERS, ROGERS' RANGERS
1.  Don't forget nothing.
2.  Have your musket clean as a whistle, hatchet scoured, sixty rounds powder and ball, and be ready to march at a minute's warning.
3.  When you're on the march, act the way you would if you was sneaking up on a deer. See the enemy first.
4.  Tell the truth about what you see and what you do. There is an army depending on us for correct information. You can lie all you please when you tell other folks about the Rangers, but don't never lie to a Ranger or officer.
5.  Don't never take a chance you don't have to.
6.  When we're on the march we march single file, far enough apart so one shot can't go through two men.
7.  If we strike swamps, or soft ground, we spread out abreast, so it's hard to track us.
8.  When we march, we keep moving till dark, so as to give the enemy the least possible chance at us.
9.  When we camp, half the party stays awake while the other half sleeps.
10.If we take prisoners, we keep' em separate till we have had time to examine them, so they can't cook up a story between' em.
11.Don't ever march home the same way. Take a different route so you won't be ambushed.
12.No matter whether we travel in big parties or little ones, each party has to keep a scout 20 yards ahead, 20 yards on each flank, and 20 yards in the rear so the main body can't be surprised and wiped out.
13.Every night you'll be told where to meet if surrounded by a superior force.
14.Don't sit down to eat without posting sentries.
15.Don't sleep beyond dawn. Dawn's when the French and Indians attack.
16.Don't cross a river by a regular ford.
17.If somebody's trailing you, make a circle, come back onto your own tracks, and ambush the folks that aim to ambush you.
18.Don't stand up when the enemy's coming against you. Kneel down, lie down, hide behind a tree.
19.Let the enemy come till he's almost close enough to touch, then let him have it and jump out and finish him up with your hatchet.
--MAJOR ROBERT ROGERS, 1759