Been thinking about leadership in general recently. Over the course of the last few months’ things have gone “poorly” WRT leadership at work. I keep finding that when I inadvertently apply my personal standards to others most typically leads to disappointment. Me, I learned my leadership style in the Army. SSG Mike Brown was my first Squad Leader. First thing he said to me when I met him was “Don’t unpack your shit, we’re deploying to Saudi”. My reply was “Do I have time to go grab a beer, or are we leaving now?” He said I’d fit in just fine. He was someone who didn’t talk much and he was a REALLY big proponent of leading by example. He came over from the 82nd and really missed the whole “Airborne” thing… Probably why I was fairly intent on doing that myself. But in any case he did things like carry one of the M-16/203’s. His reasoning was that he wanted the extra firepower, knew he could put the rounds where he wanted them and we used the Smoke grenades to mark for fire, etc. so he could more accurately direct the Squad’s firepower onto target… But it also had the effect of letting EVERYONE know that he was willing (and able) to carry the extra load and that he was not asking his people to do anything that he was not doing himself. I was comfortable carrying the other one because I also knew I could put the round exactly where I needed it to go, and I didn’t mind carrying the heavier rifle. My 203 wound up being a big part why I got my Catch-22 award (Bronze Star). Some advantages to being bigger and stronger… But in any case, I learned that you do things in a certain way. You don’t eat until your people have been fed. You don’t sleep until your people already have. And you do everything you can to protect your people, no matter what. That is NOT the case I am finding here. Mind, I do everything I can to protect my people, I just no longer have as many. Glad some are finding jobs elsewhere, but at this point the environment I am finding myself in is pretty toxic environment. I took a day off Wednesday and got some work done around the house. And clear my head a bit. Helped, I spent yesterday at an IT conference. Got a LOT of impromptu “meetings” in with the various other IT folks there, including almost all of my contacts in the End Point Management groups… We’re all in a holding pattern, with one of the teams actively resisting the “Power Plant” thing because there is no one they trust up there. Shame, they DO all trust me, but I’m not there so… We’ll see how this all plays out I guess. Kind of hard dealing with the pointed questions of why I was not in certain meetings recently… Not sure how best to answer those questions as I am waiting to have my current position, or better yet my next position “clarify” my role in this area. Right now, especially after receiving official reprimands about my activities in this area, I’m not doing much publicly… Still doing what I need to do in order to actually DO my own job of course, just being quiet about it. So, Chaotic Good for me, per usual…
Gaming, need to get in some more practice games. I have some solid builds I think will do well… But not entirely sure what fits best for me… The ARC-170 build I think. Not plug and play, but I think it has a chance against most things. TIE Defenders will be an issue, but… Well, they are an issue for most things, so… S&V I have some strong contenders… We’ll see what I end up flying I guess…
Oh, the casual “Hanger Bay” event is 19 November at the Armored Gopher! Come on by if you can…
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