The Rock

Words have tremendous power; Power to influence, motivate, agitate, bring joy, and the list is endless. Little did I realize the power of my own words as I stood on a large rock looking out over one thousand Soldiers. The ability to uplift, inspire, and instill hope by standing on a large rock given a passion, the right words, and a genuine concern made a world of difference.

This book is intended to provide my personal views on a component of leadership that I feel is most often overlooked: Motivation. My basis is simple; the only definition of leadership that I have gained great comfort and familiarity with over a 21 year military career is the Army’s definition. In the Army Leadership manual, FM 6-22, the Army defines leadership as the process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation while operating to accomplish the mission and improving the organization.

There are scores of great leadership definitions and many do not gravitate far from the principles outlined in the Army definition. For simplicity’s sake, this definition is my basis. In it, there are several guidelines regarding what a leader needs to do in order to obtain high levels of motivation: understand people, align and elevate individual goals, learn about others’ capabilities and limitations, etc. I could not personally or professionally agree more. One shortfall in most military manuals is describing “how” a leader is to accomplish a certain task. If there are no instructions to tell you “how to”, how do you know if you are getting it right? The answer is you won’t. Therein lies the beauty of not providing a “cookie cutter” solution. You learn in some cases through discovery learning and in others you rely on and refine the limited experience you may have. Eventually you arrive at a viable solution. Still for some, especially young leaders without the benefit of years of experience or those with very diverse organizations to figure out, they may need a “how to” manual, but if it is not available, discovery learning may be the only option. Discovery learning is a difficult part of daily life.

This book provides my view of how I aspired to focus on the motivational aspect of the Army definition to achieve the proper balance between purpose, direction and motivation. I believe there has to be a balance between the three components of leadership. An imbalance only leads to a semi-dysfunctional organization. I have been a part of high performance organizations, but morale was extremely low. Individuals knew they had to perform or perish. The motivation was simply to get to the finish line and move on. There was no investment in motivation, only purpose and direction.