"People don't care what you know until they know that you care." Just one of the many insights on leadership by more than 80 students and faculty members at the Atchison, Kansas campus of Benedictine College from the Commander of the U.S. Army's Combined Arms Center and Fort Leavenworth, Lt. Gen. Robert B. Brown on 27 Oct. during a discussion on his top ten leadership thoughts.
The address was part of the "Leadership Matters" course the college offers and was also attended by members of the Benedictine basketball team and ROTC Cadets. The class is taught by William M. Raymond, Jr., Ph.D. who is a retired Army Colonel and the former head of the School of Advanced Leadership and Tactics (SALT) at Fort Leavenworth.
The ten leadership characteristics discussed included: care, character, vision, TEAM (together each achieves more), empowerment, learning, instincts, humility, mentorship, and "the difference."
Brown encouraged the students to make learning a lifelong endeavor, to seek out a mentor that they can reach out to for advice along the way, and set leadership goals.
"Goals are the key," Brown said. "Failure is not a destiny, you recover from it and you get better from it as long as you keep an eye on your goals."
On the topic of empowerment, Brown explained that while leaders 20 years ago could get away with micromanaging, the complexity of today's world requires empowerment. "It is not easy, and you must build trusted teams," he said.
The difference as discussed by Brown is the ability to understand and incorporate all of the other nine characteristics to become a better leader saying, "Two companies can have the exact amount of personnel, equipment, training and education, but one can be very successful while the other struggles… the difference is leadership."
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