[October 27, 2017] I was excited to be selected as a U.S. Army Company Commander for the first time; something all officers properly look forward to in their development as a leader. Fortunately, my Battalion Commander was a good man who took the time to speak frankly with me and give advice on how to be successful. One piece of advice was for me to prepare three envelopes.
That make-three-envelopes piece of advice was a humorous way for him to speak about how leaders react to adversity; good or bad. The three envelopes is an apocryphal story of a person recently hired to replace a leader who had just been fired. For a good detailed description of the story see link here. In shortened form, those three envelopes each contain oversimplified advice on how to handle mistakes in a specific order (blame the outgoing leader, blame your coworkers, make three envelopes).
A constant theme here at theLeaderMaker.com has always been that a person’s character tells us about how that person will handle difficult issues, hardship, and controversy. Furthermore, the development of a person’s character comes from many sources but ultimately a set of key traits determine whether that leader will be good for or bad for their organization.
When a person makes a mistake, we can learn much about their behavior by how they handle that mistake. When confronted with a mistake, the behavior of that person shows how responsibility and blame are dealt with. The choices are 1) to either step up and own the problem or 2) to reach for that envelop.
The best people step up. Junior leaders are often taught that making mistakes is bad for their career and hurts their leadership role.1 While there is some truth to this, the main takeaway lesson for leaders is that they should not be afraid to make mistakes. When mistakes are made, they admit it quickly, take action to fix it, learn from it, don’t dwell upon it, and move on.
Bad people step away. A common reaction is to blame others for their mistakes and if possible to sacrifice others to protect themselves. Rule number one in good leadership is to never blame the other guy for failures where you have responsibility.2 This is exceptionally immature and does not resolve the problem. Doing so damages that leader’s reputation and is an indicator of a second-rate character.
My Battalion Commander told me that I had those three envelopes available to me every day. The next time I made a mistake, it would be best if I never opened any of them.
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- https://www.theleadermaker.com/unafraid-make-mistakes/
- https://www.theleadermaker.com/never-blame-guy/