Leadership in the Sea Services is unlike leadership anywhere else. There are few more isolated places than the bridge wing of an independently deployed destroyer at night, hundreds of miles from land, 3,000 miles from home. This type of environment demands strong, ethical leaders capable of accomplishing the mission while taking care of their people. Though there are many different styles of leadership, each effective method can be broken down into a few common, cyclical, and symbiotic elements: trust, loyalty, and success.
Leaders earn trust. Trust builds loyalty. They both ensure success, which in turn strengthens trust. And the cycle repeats, with each element strengthening the other two, growing stronger with each successful revolution—and weaker with each failure. This framework moves away from the traditional hierarchical, top-to-bottom structure, and relies on the flow of trust and loyalty up, down, and across lines of communication and responsibility. To be a successful leader at sea at any level of the chain of command, one must embody this leadership model. Furthermore, as an organization, we must recruit and retain those individuals who show the aptitude to be good leaders, and provide resources along the way to develop their potential. While the following examples are drawn from my time as a surface warfare officer, the underlying principles behind the framework are applicable to all military communities as well as to the private sector.
Founded on Trust
Trust is the bedrock of leadership. Sailors will respect a rank, but they will admire and follow the leader who takes the time to earn their trust. It is far-reaching, applies both on and off the ship, and can be earned (or lost) in several ways.
Professional competence. The ability to do one’s job is the most basic element of trust. At the top, a ship’s commanding officer must instill in his or her crew the trust that he/she is a capable mariner, shiphandler, and qualified tactician with a firm grasp of a ship’s warfighting capabilities. Additionally, they must demonstrate strategic thinking, effective communication, and the ability to lead their crew through any given task or challenge.
Similarly, leaders at every level must be able to trust that their subordinates know their jobs. While leaders certainly play a critical role in ensuring that their sailors receive the proper training to develop professional competence, they play an equally important part by trusting them to do their jobs without constant oversight. When sailors are micromanaged, they will likely make one of two assumptions: either that their chief, division officer, or higher does not trust their abilities, or that the micromanager is not sufficiently competent in his or her own job and compensates by keeping unnecessary tabs on fine details. Both options signal a breakdown of trust.
The one caveat to professional competence is that in the Navy, we are often thrust into jobs in which we have little experience. A new division officer, for example, may be assigned as the main propulsion division officer on board an Arleigh Burke–class destroyer after earning a degree in political science. A new aviator on the deck of an aircraft carrier faces a similarly steep learning curve, and even a first-tour department head needs some time to get up to speed. In these situations, when someone has not had the time to develop professional competence, they must demonstrate the capacity, drive, and eagerness to do so. Once the requisite level of knowledge is learned, trust further develops as the capability is repeatedly demonstrated, leading to reliability.
Reliability. Being capable in one’s job is only part of the challenge: Reliability requires that leaders routinely deliver by accomplishing tasks, meeting deadlines, etc. In other words, leaders must do what they say they will do, and this applies at all levels of the chain of command. If a department head, for example, fails to route a leave request in a timely manner or fails to schedule a qualification board, the division officer will begin to lose trust in his or her reliability and level of effort. Clearly the department head is capable of routing paperwork—he said he would route the paperwork—so what is taking so long? To be fair, perhaps the department head is juggling a dozen different deadlines, but the division officer waiting on the qualification board does not know or necessarily even care about that. These types of delays are often and understandably interpreted as the boss not caring or being unable to follow through. The same can be said in the opposite direction: When a chief asks a junior sailor to get a job done, the chief expects results.
No leader—whether a chief, division officer, department head, or executive or commanding officer—has a perfect record of reliability. Mistakes are made, and people are willing to forgive these to an extent. The key is to follow through on the small things, administrative work being a great example, and reliability on the big things will follow. One leave request may seem like small potatoes, but the time off may mean the world to the first-class petty officer who has been busting her tail to keep the gas turbines running. And if that request is delayed, can you blame her for losing her motivation to keep working so hard? Leaders must strive to embody reliability, encourage and reward reliability in their subordinates, but be willing to accept honest mistakes.
Even keel. No ship, no crew, and no individual is immune to making mistakes. No inspection goes perfectly, engines will break down, and radar systems will need repairs over time. To develop trust, subordinates must know their leaders will react and respond constructively and proportionately. We have all heard of “The Screamer”—the individual who leads through fear and volume, receiving any sort of bad news with tyranny. We have all seen the sailor who gets stressed out by the small things. Developing trust throughout the team requires leaders to present an even keel. They must accept mistakes as inevitable and understand that as long as the safety of personnel, ship, or aircraft was not jeopardized, immediately “flame spraying” subordinates effectively shuts them down and creates an environment of fear. In that type of toxic environment, leaders cannot be trusted to respond appropriately when safety is actually at stake.
Professional development. Ship schedules are hectic, and sailors—officer and enlisted alike—are naturally prone to focus on the next big thing. With big requirements such as inspection and small tasks such as the weekly maintenance report always looming on the horizon, we all tend to move from one job to the next with little room for a breath. Unfortunately, this often comes at the cost of the Navy’s most important resource: its people. Amid the deadlines, leaders gain trust by taking a personal interest in the development of their subordinates. This can be as simple as a department head taking the time to sit down with a junior officer to discuss the pros and cons of the next set of orders, or a chief instructing a chief-select on the proper wear of a new uniform. Simple gestures can go a long way, and demonstrating an interest in subordinates’ professional development is a win-win. For one, leaders can directly impact their team’s level of knowledge. Equally as important, though, subordinates feel like they are valued members of the team and develop loyalty toward leaders who provide them with opportunities for growth.
Character. The most important element of trust is an individual’s character—defined as the sum of a person’s words, actions, and choices. There is perhaps nothing more singularly damaging to the development of trust than a person in a position of leadership who displays a lack of ethical judgment. Leaders must be the noble exemplar, which requires a sound moral compass in the workplace and on liberty. When a department head either encourages or turns a blind eye toward “gun-decking” logs or qualifications to pass an inspection, she is creating a work environment that rewards deceit. Similarly, if an ensign sweeps divisional misconduct under the rug and hides it from his boss, he is only encouraging his subordinates to do the same.
Leaders are in the spotlight, and their actions are heavily scrutinized. Leaders at all levels must consistently make ethical choices, even when they think their actions go unnoticed. Furthermore, the scrutiny extends far outside a ship’s lifelines. A commanding officer may make all the right decisions on board the ship, but the minute he does something inappropriate on liberty, trust is lost. Adultery, DUIs, or even drinking too much during an overseas port visit can immediately negate all the trust earned in the office. Unfortunately, the Navy has seen too many instances of leaders failing in this most important element of trust development. A leader’s good character, which in time will accurately reflect both on and off the ship, serves as the anchor of earning trust.
Trust Begets Loyalty
Through professional competence, reliability, maintaining an even keel, focusing on development, and displaying an ethical character, leaders and subordinates cultivate trust. Once established, trust paves the way for the development of loyalty, manifested in loyalty to shipmates, the ship, and the mission.
Personal loyalty. The most important form of loyalty is that which is developed between teammates. Once established, loyalty to the ship and mission will flow freely. The idea is simple: If I have a boss whom I trust and respect, who I know is looking out for my best interest, I will get more personal satisfaction when I produce good work for that leader. Similarly, when a subordinate consistently provides good support, I am going to look for opportunities to reward the hard work. These relationships can last well beyond a single tour and can develop into years-long mentorship relationships that benefit both parties. Additionally, the relationship between trust and loyalty is symbiotic: Trust allows loyalty, and loyalty strengthens trust. Leaders must work to build camaraderie and loyalty among the team, and this exists at all levels of the chain of command. Work-center supervisors are responsible for developing loyalty among the maintenance team, department heads must do the same in their departments, and commanding officers are charged with building loyalty throughout the command. The inherent isolation of the Sea Services demands that shipmates treat each other like family. Once each member of the team creates this feeling, sailors will become loyal to the ship.
Loyalty to the ship. If shipmates are family, the ship itself is the home. Trust and personal loyalty combine to create an environment in which sailors take meticulous care of and treat their ship as an extension of their own house. A well-trained eye does not need much time at a new command to know whether or not the crew has a culture of ownership. Documenting material discrepancies, tracking discrepancies through to correction, and simply keeping a clean ship are evidence of a close-knit, loyal team. This type of ownership requires involvement at all levels of the chain of command—from the deck seaman reporting a broken lifeline stanchion pin, to the work-center supervisor putting in the work order, to the division officer, realizing the safety concern, tirelessly pushing the correction because he looks out for and is loyal to his sailors. And the leadership cycle continues, with loyalty to the ship enabling loyalty to the mission.
Loyalty to the mission. Loyalties to shipmates and the ship combine to develop loyalty to the mission. When there is a strong sense of family among a crew, sailors are driven to “not let their brothers and sisters down.” They feel a strong intrinsic motivation to succeed. Similarly, when they take good care of their ship, they are motivated to see the ship’s sensors, weapons, and systems perform at a high level during a given mission. The Navy’s 200-year-old battle cry—“Don’t Give Up The Ship!”, Captain James Lawrence’s dying command on board the USS Chesapeake—captures this relationship perfectly. Leaders dictate whether or not those words have any meaning. The most effective leaders will earn trust and develop loyalty, and by doing so, ensure success.
Making Success Possible
The need for leadership stems from the need to accomplish goals, and their successful accomplishment is the final element in the leadership cycle. Everything that comes before success—character, trust, ownership, and loyalty—serves as enablers to success. Accomplishing a goal perpetuates the leadership cycle in that success strengthens trust as people become aware that their hard work has paid off, and strengthens loyalty as people generally want to be on the winning team. Success happens at any level of the chain of command: from the captain leading a crew through a successful deployment, to a search-and-rescue swimmer passing a qualification, to a gunnery officer’s team passing an explosive-safety inspection. Success breeds success, and the small victories will accumulate over time to create a culture of pride in the team’s performance.
There are times, though, when goals are not accomplished, and when inspections are not passed. This is where true leaders earn their pay: How do you rally your team after a failure? First, accept that things can and will go wrong. In many cases, you will be judged more by your response to the failure than the failure itself. Remember to take the blows with an even keel. Assess where things went wrong, identify opportunities for improvement, and implement change while motivating the team to press on. While success is important, short of loss of life and damage to equipment, no single honest failure is the downfall of the team. All the legwork of earning trust and developing loyalty ensures that a well-led team will rebound from setback.
How do we ensure our Navy’s leaders, at all levels, embrace and embody this leadership framework? First, as an institution, we must self-select the best and brightest to our ranks and then reward those leaders who stand out. Although we do not have the best record (our promotion system, for example, despite discussions of an overhaul, is outdated and de-motivating), selection is critical to weed out ineffectual leaders and a retention-reward system is equally critical to keep the best.
Second, we must ensure leadership education is a recurring theme throughout both officer and enlisted development. There are people who believe leadership is something you are born with—this is a dangerous mindset. If leadership were a trait, we would be wasting our time with institutions such as the U.S. Naval Academy and the Senior Enlisted Academy. We are all born with a leadership potential, and how close we get to reaching that potential depends on upbringing, education, experience, and mentorship. An individual’s character develops throughout life. While it is influenced heavily by family at a young age, it is matured and refined through formal education and experience. Unfortunately, the Navy tends to focus primarily on leadership learned through the former, and not enough on leadership learned through academic study and personal reflection (with few exceptions). Leadership study should become a more focused element of at-sea training, and the number of billets available for academic study away from the work environment, such as the Naval Academy’s LEAD program, should be increased.
Finally, we develop great leaders through mentorship. Relationships formed through loyalty should focus on the subordinate’s development over time. Great leaders are not only judged by what they accomplish, but what their students accomplish long after the mentor has retired. We should always be training our reliefs to surpass our own accomplishments.
Many of us are fortunate enough to know how rewarding and inspiring working for an exceptional leader can be. These leaders—commanding officers, department heads, mustangs, chiefs, and petty officers—make their mark regardless of their rank and the circumstances. And every time they complete a revolution of the trust-loyalty-success cycle, or even just an element of the cycle, satisfaction follows. There are few feelings more rewarding than leading a team to success, especially in environments in which isolation and the level of autonomy require exceptional leadership, and in which exceptional leaders are rewarded with a lifetime of professional and personal satisfaction.