General Montgomery Meigs provided a senior leader’s perspective on leadership to students and faculty from the Command and General Staff College in Eisenhower Auditorium this afternoon, drawing on his 35 years in the Army and leadership experiences in the academic and business communities. Paralleling the college’s leadership development classes, General Meigs discussed the roots of effective leadership and team-building from a historical perspective. He also described how changes in society and technology will increase the demands on our leaders in the future and described several challenges in detail.
In the future, perceptions about leaders and organizations will become more important than ever. Leaders will also have to manage subordinates who are all too anxious to please and may even become impediments. At the same time, senior leaders will have to exert indirect leadership more effectively and learn to depend on their subordinates. Leaders will often receive conflicting guidance and it will be the leader’s problem to sort through ambiguous problems and uncertainty. He was particularly salient on his point about ambiguity and General Meigs encouraged students to embrace uncertainty as an opportunity to exercise initiative and creativity. Leaders will be held accountable for both their own conduct and the conduct and performance of their organizations. General Meigs also expressed his opinion that the current generation of military leadership faces the most challenging set of problems to confront the nation since the end of World War II. He was particularly emphatic about the central importance of morality as leaders try to address these difficult issues they will face in the future. Adding to the complexity of this environment, future leaders will have to learn to rely largely upon themselves for leadership development.
General Meigs provided several concluding thoughts. What leaders pay attention to means more than what they say and leaders should ensure that they use their time wisely and position themselves where they can get the perspective they need. He emphasized that leaders should never leave a deficiency uncorrected, since this habit establishes a new standard of performance for subordinates. Finally, he affirmed that leadership needs to be a selfless act, and that leaders must always place the good of the organization and of their subordinates before their own. Leadership can be a lonely task but leaders should learn to draw strength and insight from their peers and their fellow commanders. General Meigs’ comments were well-received by the audience and reinforced many of the concepts discussed during our leadership and history lessons.
Brian Mehan
MAJ, SF
CGSC, SG 10B
9 Comments on "Gen. Montgomery Meigs, USAR, Ret., provides senior leader perspective to students"
I also agree with the point that Derby and Joe made about the presentation lacking depth in any one area. General Miegs covered a lot of topics but could have powered down on two or three points and really exploit those. Also more recent examples may have assisted in making some of his points.
General Meigs’ leadership presentation was an affirmation of the leadership block of instruction. Based on the existing depth of the leadership curriculum, the budgeted dollars to bring in General Meigs could be better spent on a more broadening topic. His points were valid but overall lacked in depth. He has built a strong resume since retiring from the Army which could have been leveraged to bring a larger perspective to his presentation. Overall, the presentation was below average compared to the broadening perspectives brought by other guest speakers.
GEN (Ret) Meigs presentation had the potential to be much more than it actually was. I admire him for his many accomplishments, not only in service of our country, but in the private sector as well. He did indeed bring up some good points on leadership that meld with what we have learned thus far in Leadership classes.
However, I also feel that his presentation was incomplete. Is it situations that make leaders great? For example, Grant at Shiloh? Or is it an inner quality and drive that makes great leaders? Like Patton. (On a side note, John Bell Hood was not killed on day two at Gettysburg. He was wounded severely, but went on to command the Army of Tennessee. In which as it’s commander, he destroyed it at the Battles of Franklin and Nashville in December 1864.) I beleive that a case can be made for both, the situation and an inner strength. But, he seemed to shy away from making that next step to really give his opinion.
I agree with many of the points made by the previous blogs. I would have liked to have heard much more than was presented. Perhaps if GEN Meigs was to talk for non-attribution, the talk would have been better and more meaningful.
Derby raised a great point in mentioning that GEN Meigs did not talk about leadership and responsibilities when one does not have authority. I think the same could be said of nearly all our guest speakers. Many mention that we will spend most of our careers in non-command slots, and that we need to be informal leaders, but few give significant insight into how to accomplish that undertaking. If possible, it would be nice to have a speaker to cover the topic of how best to lead when you are not the commander (or perhaps even XO/COS).
General Meigs brief re-enforce some of the things that we have been going over in our leadership class: when ambiguity exists, good leaders gain situational awareness/understanding and then proceed to take the initiate. It would have been nice to hear some of his own life experiences or other examples in which we could relate to in our future as officers.
While GEN (ret) Meigs attempted to solidify and reinforce many of the leadership traits that are both illustrated and communicated in our current doctrine, I feel like he failed to really establish an overall topic and main thesis that effectively applied to today’s fight,and the issues that today’s leaders will face. One of the main tenets that he offered was that there were many things that were “innate to one’s psyche”; that is, that character and balance are innate traits that all leaders must develop. He also postulated that it is up to the individual to develop these character traits on their own. He never really got into any viable discourse as to how one should go about developing these traits, if his theory is that one needs to truly work on these by themselves.
Additionally, many of his examples of leadership in support of his arguments were very dated, generally speaking of officers and missions from the Civil War and his own experience from Desert Storm over 20 years ago. When asked for some more concrete examples of recent leaders, GEN Meigs was unable to give any. Finally, I was really hoping that GEN Meigs would talk about leadership and responsibilities when one does not have the authority. It is lot easier to make the kinds of leadership decisions when one is in a position of authority; unfortunately we spend a majority of our careers not in command, and yet he expects us to still develop an hone these skills. Having the responsibility to do something without the authority or the ability to do it is a surefire recipe for failure without properly understanding what is actually needed.
Bottom line – while the subject could have been an outstanding topic for all of us here, the lack of focus in his argument, the presentation itself (with limited answers to the postulated problems) and the dated material made it a less than worthwhile brief.
GEN Meigs gave the audience some perspectives and takeaways on his experiences as a leader and attributes that make up a good Army Officer. While I did find it interesting that many of the concepts and ideals we hold today have not changed, he did not introduce anything new or give any depth or detail into his speech. In the future I would recommend more examples from his career and have questions for the audience or discussion points to generate questions following his speech.
GEN Meigs covered several topics during his briefing. The main point that made an impact with many of the students is during times of ambiguity, leaders must take initiative and capitalize on this opportunity. Leaders must take charge and lead from the front. It is also imperative to Army leaders, especially senior leaders to visit the troops on the ground. Otherwise, the senior leader will not have the situational awareness to make realistic and competent decisions.
General Meigs overview of his leadership appoach / philosophy provided some additional perspective to the ILE leadership curriculum, but it unfortunately lacked concrete examples or methods that might assist students develop their own leadership styles. For example, one of his key points was that truely exceptional leaders distinguish themselves by that certain something–an “x” factor–that intuitively leads them to make the right decision at the right time. He used Grant’s success to highlight this x-factor. However, he never explained if and how leaders might develop in this area. The net result was that I felt he informed us about the well known (there is a certain something that distinguishes exceptional leaders at critical moments) but did little to enable us achieve it. It would have been helpful to hear his perspective shaped by his 35 years of military experience.