Wednesday, January 05, 2011
Accountability of Command?
Yesterday the Navy relieved a commander for actions taken 2-3 years ago. Today the Army relieved a BCT commander because his leaders lost confidence in his ability to lead. Along with the commander, the CSM was also relieved. What do you think? Is this a growing trend within the military? Are we going to see it happen more frequently? While no details are currently available concerning the 172nd Commander, it is undoubtedly tied to his superior's perception of his ability to lead the organization. That perception was either created from firsthand observations or secondhand reports. Has the horizontalization of information exchange increased leader accountability? What impact does publicized reliefs such as these have upon your own philosophy of leadership?
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According to Acting V Corps commander Brig. Gen. Allen W. Batschelet, Col. Frank Zachar was relieved of command, “… due to loss of confidence in his ability to command.” General Batschelet stated, there was no specific incident that led the Army to relieve Col. Zachar and CSM French. “There weren’t any illegal, immoral or unethical activities,” he said. “His (Zachar’s) leadership style wasn’t really effective and over time the command here lost confidence in his ability to command.”
Based on the studies in leadership, there are a few reasons a commander will be relieved from duty. One, of the reasons is the command climate, like of leadership and guidance to the Soldier’s i.e. team building and the like of confidence and communication between the higher command, and Soldiers.
The commander climate set the tone for the unit and the direction in which it will go. Poor leadership will cause the morale of the Soldier to go down. To no end the command team, will subsequently establish specific, obtainable, measures of performance and measures of effectiveness that logically move the division forward toward the envisioned end-state. Combining the commander vision, with culture and climate will improve the morale of the Soldiers. However, it is vital to that the morale of the Soldier is good. My assumption is that General Batschelet, conducted a command climate assessment of the unit, and found out that the Soldiers did not trust or have confidence in the command team and they would cause Soldier to lose their lives. I assume that the command team had problem with team building.
According to The Rocket Model, “Is both a prescriptive and diagnostic model of team building… In that, it tells leaders what steps to take and when to take them when building new teams. This was a new team and it takes a lot of hard work to bring a team together. The model can also be used as a diagnostic tool for understanding where existing teams are falling short…” Remember, the key to a successful organization is teamwork and team building. While us vs. them attitude is sometimes healthy, as many tour with the battalion and brigades, it can be taken too far and produce an air of entitlement. Some key personalities also contribute to this negative dynamic, mainly, Col. Zachar and CSM French the leader. If the command team of Col Zachar and CSM French had used this method the command team will be still in charge. Finally, command team must have clear and concise communication to be an effective unit
There are two types of communication, verbal and non-verbal communication. Both forms can be effective, if you know your boss and what makes him/her uncomfortable. However, officers must be able to understand the boss’ intent and observe their attitude when they’re unsatisfied with your performance. When the boss and the subordinates do not have a good line of communication, verbal or non-verbal, it will cause problems in the organization: It is imperative to have effective communication in situational awareness and understanding. Col Zachar and CSM French was ineffective when it came to verbal communication and it caused confusion between the Soldiers and superior officer in the chain command.
Bottle line the relationship between the boss and the subordinate is important to the success of the mission; however, the leadership must have trust in the command team. Brig. Gen. Batschelet lost the trust of the command team in return relieved them for not building a good climate for the Soldiers deploying to Afghanistan. The command team like the leadership and guidance needed to lead Soldiers into combat. Finally, the command team likes the communicating skills to needed to be an effective team as a division commander and CSM team. This is the reason why, I feel the command team was relieved from the position as the Division Commander and Command Sergeant Major.
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