My Personal “model the Way” Story

Model the Way Assignment

 My Personal “Model the Way” Story

As a military leader I have been challenged over the years to truly strive to ensure that I have taken every opportunity to become the best example of leadership that I could attain.  During my 25 years of military service everything from waking up in the morning to how I raised my children, the military has had some influence in how I lived and conducted myself every day.  Now that my life has transformed into an everyday “civilian” my development as a leader has changed, hopefully for the better.  Leadership development has many definitions and I could probably quote several from my research and personal experience throughout my life, but to me it is enhancing and developing leadership traits that one has acquired over the years.          After this week’s readings I was very interested in the “Model the Way” concept and equated it to the “Lead from the front” adage that our military leadership schools and mentors preach.  It was difficult to pick a Homeland Security or Emergency Management leader and after a few hours of thought I decided “Why not me?”, after all I have experience in emergency management and have “real world” experience as a leader in this field so why not?  

Shared Values

        I personally believe that leadership is learned and perfected, both as a student and a teacher of leadership by the work experiences we are involved in over the span of our careers.  I personally can recount that I have learned and developed as a leader and teacher of leadership by personally and professionally taking on assignments and delegating assignments to challenge and develop both my subordinates and myself.   One of more vivid examples of a great leader in my past that had influence on my leadership journey was an old and loving labeled “ The Salty Chief” that I had served with in Guam.  He was definitely a yeller and strong headed about his values and vision of where the organization, and the people in it, where headed.  Although initially and after I had transferred I despised his leadership methodology, I begin to understand it.  He was never that guy that barked out order and insisted that it be “his way or the highway”.  He would always sit with the Sailors and, in his own rough and roundabout way, ask our opinion or clarification of how we, as a group, should be conducting business.  I later on utilized his methods to mine and my Sailors benefit.          

        Upon assuming my position as a Command Master Chief, I incorporated these methods into everyday practices of trying to incorporate my leadership philosophy and values with the Sailors of the command.  One example of this is I would hold “Master Chief Calls” or meetings with all the Sailors by rank and have an informal “bitch session”.  Once all the concerns were voiced I entertained question and resolutions from the Sailors on how they would “fix” any outlying issues.  At first there were attitudes and looks of shock, but after a few months of consistently doing this, the ideas and involvement increased.  I noticed an immediate change in morale and more requests for involvement in the various command committees and events.  I began to see Sailors walking the deck plates with their heads held up and looking a bit more “squared away”.  Now I do not contribute my actions to this but more so that I gave them an opportunity to share their visions and values and incorporate them into how the command did business.