10 Leadership Lessons From Hal Moore

This week's leadership lesson is inspired by the move, "We Were Soldiers", starring Mel Gibson. The movie is based on a real life battle during the Viet Nam War. Mel played Lt. Col. Hal Moore, commander of the 1st Battalion of the 7th Calvary. On November 14, 1965, Lt. Col. Moore, and 450 of his men, were dropped by helicopter into the la Drang valley. They were immediately surrounded by around 2,000 North Vietnamese soldiers. Thus began the first full-fledged battle between U.S. and North Vietnamese soldiers. Over the next two days U.S. soldiers were killed but they inflicted around 1,200 casualties and forced the Communist forces to withdraw.

The movie, and the battle on which it was based teaches us 10 leadership lessons:(You can read General Moore’s book.)

1. Be head strong.
   1. when the setbacks come (and they will), a leader picks themselves up and keeps moving forward.
   2. There's always a way. Either you find one, or you make one.
   3. If you think you might fail in a given situation, then you already have. A leader must exhibit the will to succeed no matter what. Mind you, you might now FEEL that way, but you have to exhibit to your team that you DO feel that way.
2. Lead from the front.
   1. The real-life Hal Moore said, “A leader must be visible to the people he leads. He must be self-confident and always maintain a positive attitude.”
   2. "Managers" tell you, "Go do that thing I want you to do.". A LEADER says, "Come on. Let's go do that thing we need to do."
3. There IS a link between self-discipline and self-confidence.
   1. More from Hal Moore, “A man who has more self-discipline has more confidence in his ability to do the job. There is a close connection between discipline and confidence.”
   2. When you're placed in charge, treat your subordinates with respect, dignity, and common courtesy. Being placed in charge doesn't instantly make you the smartest person in the room.
4. Make decisions fast.
   1. This comes into play when you're pressed for time. Go with your "gut", trust your instinct.
   2. When you DO have the time, get all of the information you can, weigh the pros and cons, and come to a tentative decision. But don't announce it - sleep on it overnight and then re-evaluate it in the morning when you're rested.
5. Empower others.
   1. Delegate the decisions that you don't HAVE to make to subordinate members of your team.
   2. Make sure they know what needs to be done and by when. Make sure they know about any constraints.
   3. Make sure they have the resources to get the work done that you're delegating.
   4. Make sure that you GIVE credit when your team performs well. Conversely, make sure you TAKE the blame when they don't.
6. There are proper places for recognition and reprimanding.
   1. This comes down to the tried and true nugget you've all heard. "Praise in public and punish in private."
   2. NEVER tell your team they're "screwed up". If you do, then they are. Why? Because you're the leader and you said so.
7. Take responsibility.
   1. As a leader, you'll get plenty of praise and recognition. When things go wrong, as mentioned in #6, YOU take the blame.
   2. When someone under you fails, generally you're at least half responsible for their failure. Were your instructions clear and understood? Had you trained that person sufficiently? Did you give them the resources they needed to accomplish the job? Did you put them in a "no win" situation?
8. The importance of learning and listening.
   1. A leader must be a lifelong learner.
   2. Leaders that fail are usually those that think they know everything already. They resent having to learn something new or adapt to a new situation.
   3. You don't learn only from good leaders. Chances are you'll have far more bad leaders during your lifetime than good ones. Try to learn something from everyone.
   4. You also learn by listening. When you listen, you become twice as smart because now you know what you know PLUS what the other person knows!
9. Introspection and initiative.
   1. We all engage in "self talk". It's up to us to determine what kind of talk that is. A leader's self talk needs to be much more self-aware. A leader needs to ask themselves, "What am I doing that I shouldn't be doing? And what am I NOT doing that I should to influence the outcome in my favor?"
   2. The idea behind introspection is to drive initiative.
   3. There's always one more thing you can do to influence the outcome of a given situation. After that, there's always one more thing, and on and on and on.
10. What goes up, must come down..
    1. A good leader aims to make their subordinates truly feel that they are valued members of the team.
    2. The same loyalty that goes "up" the chain-of-command must also go "down" the chain. Make sure you GIVE the loyalty you EXPECT.
    3. I believe it was Simon Sinek that talked about his visit to a Marine Corps unit. The Colonel in charge told Simon that he could always tell what kind of Lieutenant the platoon had by the way the Marines referred to him. If they referred to him or her as "our" Lieutenant, that Lieutenant was doing a good job. If they called him or her "the" Lieutenant, they weren't doing as good a job.