Leaders from the U.S. Army Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention Academy and the Center for Army Leadership hosted a professional forum for more than 200 participants from across the Combined Arms Center and SHARP enterprise Oct. 30 in Marshall Lecture Hall at the Lewis and Clark Center.
The forum focused on organizational leadership and climate issues, with speakers and discussions highlighting the Army profession, factors for sustaining a positive climate, and upcoming changes to the SHARP workforce.
Cailin Crockett, deputy director of the Army’s Directorate of Prevention, Resilience and Readiness, and Jill Londagin, Army SHARP Program director, offered opening remarks and emphasized the significance of the forum’s topics to all participants.
“What a SHARP professional does is critical to the health, function and lethality of our Army,” Crockett said. “Transformational change is not easy. It’s deeply messy but so necessary.”
Col. Travis Jacobs, SHARP Academy director, and Jeff Bevington, chief of SHARP Academy Leader Development, Education and Training, described this transformation and its impact on the SHARP workforce. The current structure positions full-time sexual assault response coordinators and victim advocates at the brigade level, with collateral duty sexual assault response coordinators (SARCs) and victim advocates (VAs) assigned to battalions. Within the new organizational structure, lead SARCs will be assigned to installations.
Jacobs encouraged SHARP professionals to provide more than just data. He said SARCs and VAs should work with command teams and be able to advise commanders regarding SHARP issues. Even though the SHARP workforce is changing, he said the role of the SHARP professional remains in that program managers, SARCs and VAs are still the experts who can ensure shared understanding across the ranks.
“People skills are the key to success of this transformation,” Jacobs said. “The role of the SHARP professional has not changed. You are still the eyes and ears for the commander to understand risk.… Change is hard, but you are the agents. The SHARP program runs on leadership.”
Janetta Harris, CAL instructional systems specialist, expanded on the topic of transformation by describing the leading change process. She highlighted the importance of addressing the need for change and communicating a vision to stakeholders. She also reviewed some of the reasons why change does not become instilled, such as the reasons for the change are not clearly articulated or there is little buy-in from organization members.
The ramifications of a perceived negative change might include very little to no follow-up/follow-through and an increased level of frustration among members of the organization, Harris said. For change to be most effective and long-lasting, leaders must determine how best to institutionalize the change. She provided examples including modifying policies or procedures, including the change as part of routine meetings and battle rhythms, and updating tasks and projects to account for the change.
“Over time, the change will start to feel natural and there will be less resistance,” she said.
Harris also presented on innovation, empowerment and communication strategies. For communication, she focused on vertical dialogue, information flow up and down the chain of command; horizontal dialogue, the communications that happen laterally across teams; and communications outside the chain of command with external stakeholders.
She reminded members of the audience that the Army expects all leaders to be lifelong learners and to develop expertise in support of the Army profession. She reiterated the CAC commanding general’s belief that, “Feedback is the breakfast of champions.”
“We all should be willing to listen, reflect, learn from feedback and seek opportunities to act upon it,” she said.
CAL Director Lt. Col. Nathen Branen explained the tenets of a profession and addressed some fundamental questions such as “What makes a profession?” and “What do all professions have in common?”
SHARP Academy students in attendance had the opportunity to answer the questions
and provide some insights of their own. The students discussed how SHARP professionals fulfill the requirements of a profession as described in U.S. Army leadership doctrine by providing a vital service to society, establishing and upholding an ethic, enforcing discipline and standards, and developing and applying expertise.
Branen also provided an overview of the Army profession and its five characteristics: honorable service, stewardship, trust, military expertise and esprit de corps. He described one model for the audience: TRUST = (Service + expertise + stewardship) x consistency. From that trust, he said, units can create esprit de corps.
The forum closed with a panel discussion on climate, culture and counterproductive leadership. Harris told the audience that all leaders are susceptible to counterproductive leadership behaviors, especially during times of stress, high operations tempo, chaos, ambiguity and confusion.
Branen left attendees with the lesson of the thermostat versus the thermometer. A thermometer is passive, he said. It accurately measures the temperature but does nothing about it. Conversely, a thermostat also provides an accurate measure, but it adjusts the temperature to the desired conditions.
“Army leaders should be like a thermostat,” Branen said. “Be accurate and take an active role in adjusting the conditions to the desired end state.”
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