The Meaning of Leadership

I don’t think any other profession focuses as much on leadership and hierarchy as the military. Every rank in the chain of command down to team leader is a position of leadership. Even when there are only two people, one is in charge of the other - either designated or by date of rank. But what is leadership and what do leaders do?

Leadership is a long-term process of getting people to accomplish goals by providing purpose, direction, and motivation. Kouzes and Posner, in their book The Challenge of Leadership, describe leadership as a relationship. It is a relationship between followers and their leader. Effective leadership development requires mutual recognition and acceptance of leader and follower roles. Every leader in the military is also a follower. To be a good leader, one must be a good follower. Leadership is a reciprocal relationship between leaders and followers. There cannot be one without the other.

Purpose is the reason to achieve a desired goal. Followers expect and deserve leaders to provide clear purpose. To do this, leaders must understand the mission and the objectives and should frequently communicate them to their followers so they can start the process with the end in mind. So often followers don’t understand the mission but do what they are asked without question. In such cases, initiative is stifled.

Kouzes and Posner conducted a survey with over 75,000 people to determine what traits they look for in their leaders. 71% selected “forward looking”. In other words, providing purpose. Leaders determine the course of action necessary to achieve the mission and communicate instructions, orders, and directives to their followers. They must ensure that followers understand and accept direction.

Providing clear direction involves communicating what to do to accomplish the mission: prioritizing tasks, assigning responsibility for completion, and ensuring followers understand the standard. Although followers want and need direction, they expect challenging tasks, quality training, and adequate resources. They should have appropriate freedom of action to achieve the mission. Providing clear direction allows followers to adapt to changing circumstances through modifying plans and orders, but that does not mean micro-management. Followers don’t always need guidance down to the details. Leaders need to learn when to provide detailed guidance and when to focus only on direction. It is a difficult balance best learned through experience.
Leaders match their teams to the work required. Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) define most routine tasks. As new missions arise and priorities change, assignments will differ. Higher-level positions, like battalion commanders, have a staff to help perform these assignments and prioritization functions. Lower level leaders don’t have this luxury.

Leaders should provide direction from both near-term and long-term perspectives. Critical actions that must be accomplished immediately require a near-term focus; however, many missions and objectives tend to be long-term. Near-term tasks and crisis can consume inexperienced leaders and cause them to fail to achieve the long-term missions. Some tasks can become so routine and repetitive to the point of numbing the brain and killing a leader’s innovation and initiative.

When tasks are difficult, adaptive leaders identify and account for the capabilities of the team. Some tasks will be routine and require little clarification, while others will present new challenges for the team. Often there is a tendency to assign the same task to a follower that is knowledgeable on the task. When leaders do that, it removes any challenge and hinders development and learning. Leaders should challenge their associates with new and exciting tasks from time to time.

Good direction depends on understanding how tasks are progressing so the leader knows if and when to provide clarification. Most followers have a desire to demonstrate competence in their work, so leaders need to be careful that they do not reduce this drive.

The military does a great job of teaching leadership, but we are kidding ourselves if we think we know all there is to know about leadership after attending a couple of military courses. Part of being a good leader is making a study of leadership. The above paragraphs are just a short summary of one aspect of leadership; the definition and roles of leaders. Authors have written volumes on leadership and still haven’t covered all aspects. Leaders must make studying the art of leadership one of their personal priorities. Coupling the knowledge gained by studying with actual experience is what makes a good leader.