Developing Operational Leaders for the 21st Century

摘要

Advancements in Information Technology (IT) and Network Centric Warfare (NCW) have promising potential for the military in the 21th Century. While technology offers a distinct advantage to the military, leadership is still a critical aspect of our fighting force. This will not change as we transform our military throughout the 21th Century. The development of operational leaders will continue to be a significant challenge for our military in the coming years. There are many implications to fighting, operating, and developing leaders in an environment of information sharing, networking and easier access to information. One of the problems that we see is the temptation for micromanagement. Some observations about recent conflicts offer evidence that senior leaders are tempted to micromanage based on the capability that information technology provides them. Although there are many other factors that influence this decision, IT certainly facilitates their choice. If we continue to succumb to this temptation and establish a trend in our culture, we will create poor learning environments for the development of operational leaders of the future. The environment created by micromanagement will, among other things, stifle creativity and innovation, and limit the development of decision-making skills required for operational leaders in the 21 Century. This work makes some observations about the effectiveness of the leadership styles used in Kosovo and Afghanistan as background information, and it examines the possible implications of micromanagement on leader development for the future.