[July 17, 2019] Abraham Lincoln once said that any man could withstand adversity but to “test a man’s character, give him power.” This is a visionary idea from a great man, but by no means new. It has long been recognized, long before recorded history, that the make-up of a person – their mental and ethical traits –… Read More »
[July 16, 2019] There’s an old joke that circulates in the Public Works Department of most large cities. It goes something like this; If King Kong fell off one of our buildings, our road crews wouldn’t be able to find him. If you ever heard the phrase, “That’s not my job,” you are not alone in discovering that… Read More »
[July 15, 2019] As a young boy, I had a lot of fun in the Boy Scouts of America. Along the way, I learned about the meaning of a person’s character, leadership skills, the importance of physical fitness, and that while most people are different, they still have similar needs and wants. I suspect these lessons are already… Read More »
[July 14, 2019] Yes! Not only can leadership be taught to kids successfully, but it is also being done all the time; we don’t call it leadership training. I am often at odds with parents who say it’s impossible to teach kids leader skills. The problem is not that teaching skills is important; character development is more crucial… Read More »
[July 12, 2019] Just last week, I was talking to several U.S. Army Privates stationed in Hawaii. Both were in the service about a year but wanted to tell me the difficulties in learning about how to be better soldiers. Like the old advertisement, they wanted to be all you can be. What they did not know was… Read More »
[July 11, 2019] Leadership comes in many styles, and sometimes it hits you that even an occasional oddball style can work well if enough hard work and thinking are correctly applied. It reminds me of the time, as a young child, I was in a small mud pit with a bunch of other boys and a greased pig.… Read More »
[July 10, 2019] Recently we rightly celebrated D-Day, the Allied invasion of France that began 75 years ago in June 1944. But it was a year earlier, with the invasion of Sicily that the real battle for Europe began. On this date, July 10, 1943, the first elements of American and British troops landed on the southern coast… Read More »
[July 9, 2019] I fell for the ruse. As a new Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army, I made a classic mistake on the “simulated” battlefield. I had ordered my Infantry Platoon to attack an enemy position that was fake and learned, the hard way that things are not always as they appear. “Hence that general is skillful… Read More »
[July 8, 2019] He surprised me. It was the end of our Basic Combat Training, and we were about to graduate as newly minted Privates in the U.S. Army. All of us had survived the crucible of two hard months of training and were friends. One Private from Cajun country in southern Louisiana asked me a surprising question;… Read More »
[July 7, 2019] I’ll soon be headed to Boy Scout camp with a number of 11-year old boys; who will be away from home for their first time. Anyone who has been around young boys (or girls) who are about to spend a week camping without their family, knows that it can be a daunting task. That is… Read More »