LEADERSHIP

David C. Osborne
PO BOX 38267
Tallahassee, FL 32315-8267
(850) 933-8511
http://www.davidosborne.net

As a soldier in the United States Army I learned some valuable lessons in leadership.

I was fortunate enough to have had a variety of experiences in life prior to entering military service.

As a result of my previous experiences I was able to learn these life lessons faster and more profoundly than the average soldier. This is NOT to say that I was any better than the average soldier, more capable, or even smarter. God has allowed me to experience a wide range of things in a relatively short period of time.

The sad, unfortunate truth is that many people go through life and never experience the reality of going through adversity, emerging with one or more profound life-long lessons learned. One of these life long lessons is so profound and simple, yet many if not most of us go through life NEVER having learned it.

Recognizing leaders is key to the success of any organization, critical to the military mission for sure, but corporations are no exception. I would like to focus this report on Law Enforcement organizations, more specifically the role of politics in Law Enforcement.

While many have tried to separate politics from Law Enforcement. The reality is that they are inseparable. The core of the Judicial branch of our THREE-BRANCH system of government lie squarely in the hands of ALL Law Enforcement Officers regardless of their affiliation with a particular Law Enforcement Agency. By this I mean that we (society) have shifted much PERSONAL responsibility over to COLLECTIVE or ORGANIZATIONAL responsibility. This is not to say that an agency should not be responsible for the actions of its employees such as in the case of IMPROPER TRAINING. This in my opinion is not the issue, but rather a significant part of the problem. Many individuals, especially in the Field of Law Enforcement, have managed to shift their allegiance FROM their OATH where their allegiance belongs, to their AGENCY or “TEAM” where it does NOT belong if a situation exists that would cause an individual to violate his or her OATH to “save the reputation of the team”. This phenomenon is commonly referred to in the Law Enforcement Community as the “Thin Blue Line”. So often Law Enforcement officers are asked to compromise their integrity for the sake of the team. This MUST BE STOPPED IMMEDIATELY!! A person can cross over this “Thin Blue Line” so often that the difference between right and wrong is no longer black and white but different shades of gray.

So what does all this have to do with leadership? A key element of effective leadership is PERSONAL INTEGRITY. We are all human and all make mistakes, the difference between a great leader and some who simply occupies a leadership position is the ability to recognize errors, make the appropriate corrections, learn from it, and strive to avoid the same or similar mistake again. But a great leader never stops there, a great leader will strive to teach his/her subordinates by recalling mistakes he/she made in an effort to keep subordinates or even superiors for that matter from making the same or similar mistake. In some occupations, and especially in Law Enforcement some things simply must be experienced and improvement only comes from that experience over time. However Good Leadership will make these learning experiences positive and good leadership will always breed good future leaders.

Every leader needs to understand the FOUR basic elements of effective leadership. There are many different varieties of this, but I will stick to core basics I learned through my experience.

1> THE LED – in order to be a leader you must have subordinates right? WRONG! All that is required to be a leader is to have someone RECOGNIZE you as a leader! This often is NOT the person who occupies the leadership position in any given organization but is often a person delegated by the person who occupies the leadership position! For example in a training situation the group or individual receiving the training is the LED even though he or she may be superior in RANK to the leader in that particular situation.

2> THE LEADER – this of course is the person recognized by a group or an individual as a leader.

3> THE SITUATION – this is of course the particular situation that the led and the leader are engaged in at the time. Recognizing that we ALL can learn from each other, rank must be respected, but one can NEVER achieve enough rank or experience that he/she cannot learn from someone else.

4> THE COMMUNICATION - this is a critical element to effective leadership, if the leader is not capable or fails to effectively communicate the information that he wants to led to understand than LEADERSHIP ceases to exist in that particular situation.

“The process of influencing others to accomplish the mission by providing purpose, direction, and motivation.” U.S. Army FM 22-100

many people go through life and never experience the reality of going through adversity,

I used to think that but after living a few years I've seen that life gets everyone sooner or later. We all go through some kind of adversity and that should be counted as a blessing. It's when we suffer that we grow as a human and become strong enough to survive in this dangerous place that we call earth.

I am not sure if you are agreeing with me or not :)

My point in that line could have been articulated a little better.. I know many people who learn that "tough times" are OFTEN a blessing not a CURSE, but learn the lesson too late in life, but hey better late than never..

FReegards,

David

While many have tried to separate politics from Law Enforcement. The reality is that they are inseparable. My grandfather's dictionary defined politics as *a plan or course of action intended to affect future events.* Given that definition, those in law enforcement had better have such plans formulated, or they are indicating that they have neither concern for nor interest in the future.

And of course, when they offer poor examples of leadership, they set a lower standard for citizenship as well.

-archy-/-

Thank you for your comments... I trust that I will never forget that.. With God's Help !..May that never be said of me..

FReegards,

David

David, sounds good to me, my advice is to go as written.

Adversity is the best instructor in the world. Once one has been up against it, formulated a strategy to get around it, and promptly executed that plan, a valuable life lesson has been learned.

Wonderful comment concerning Law Enforcement. Once the system degenerates into an "us" vs "them" scenario, the hope of getting anything run smoothly disappears. My other comment is that one should always lead from in front. If you are not willing/able/confident of the particular evolution to be carried out,and able to carry out that evolution as good or preferably better than those you lead, you have no business being the leader. Those who you lead must have absolute, unwavering, fearless trust in the correctness of your judgement. If THEY don't, then you have no business being the leader either.

Keep the Faith for Freedom

MAY GOD BLESS AND PROTECT THIS HONORABLE REPUBLIC

Greg

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