http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/black-hawk-down/ A discussion of geopolitics, broadly defined, from an American's perspective. Mon, 07 Jul 2008 04:58:27 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=MU http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/black-hawk-down/#comment-2029 Mr. O Sun, 20 Apr 2008 10:37:41 +0000 http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/?p=129#comment-2029 In my un-educated opinion, it seems that reflection, being one of the most potent illuminators we have, is a luxury for leaders, not managers. Managers are crisis oriented and can't afford to take time away from managing to think creatively and consider possibilities. They are not "built" to consider a wide range of options, or use history in present context. Leaders, to me, seem to be in a position where they are somewhat insulated from the chaos of the organization and thus can spend their time, reflecting, contemplating, reading the after action reports, and most importantly, finding the right path. At the top of our military, along with the contractors, do we have managers or do we have leaders? . . <em>Fabius Maximus replies: In my experience the manager-leader duality is more of a textbook dichotomy. Almost any person with responsilbity for others, except for infants and toddlers, has the responsibility to manage and some opportunity to lead. At each time and place, the need for one or the other may compel attention -- an each person has a different preference when choosing between these roles. Still, I have seen busy managers replace by another person who relies more on leadership -- and vice versa.</em> In my un-educated opinion, it seems that reflection, being one of the most potent illuminators we have, is a luxury for leaders, not managers. Managers are crisis oriented and can’t afford to take time away from managing to think creatively and consider possibilities. They are not “built” to consider a wide range of options, or use history in present context. Leaders, to me, seem to be in a position where they are somewhat insulated from the chaos of the organization and thus can spend their time, reflecting, contemplating, reading the after action reports, and most importantly, finding the right path. At the top of our military, along with the contractors, do we have managers or do we have leaders?
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Fabius Maximus replies: In my experience the manager-leader duality is more of a textbook dichotomy. Almost any person with responsilbity for others, except for infants and toddlers, has the responsibility to manage and some opportunity to lead. At each time and place, the need for one or the other may compel attention — an each person has a different preference when choosing between these roles. Still, I have seen busy managers replace by another person who relies more on leadership — and vice versa.

]]> http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/2008/01/27/black-hawk-down/#comment-1010 Opposed Systems Design :: Wehrmacht Lessons Learned :: February :: 2008 Thu, 21 Feb 2008 02:10:48 +0000 http://fabiusmaximus.wordpress.com/?p=129#comment-1010 [...] the discussions of institutional learning… What was of key importance in [the process of bringing German reserve units up to the [...] [...] the discussions of institutional learning… What was of key importance in [the process of bringing German reserve units up to the [...]

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