Page 232 - The extraordinary leader

A Case Study in Leadership Development–The U.S. Marine Corps • 209

knowledge that leadership indeed gets passed around, the Marines’ approach
to training everyone to be an effective leader is the most logical one.
Brigadier General Douglas O’Dell was describing the new Marine Expe-
ditionary Brigade antiterrorist battalion, created in the aftermath of the
September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He remarked, “This is, in my view, not
a general’s war, a colonel’s war, or a captain’s war. This is a corporal’s war. It
will be fought in back alleys and on rooftops around the world by small units
and individual units of Marines.” 14
Let’s enumerate some of the benefits of the broad-scale development of
leadership.

● Employee commitment soars. Imagine the effect on the level of
commitment of everyone in the organization if they realize that the
organization really cares about them and is willing to invest in their
development. Retention research consistently shows a high level of
correlation between people staying with an organization and
opportunities for development.
● Bench strength increases. Calculate the value of the bench strength
this process produces. The organization can now reach everywhere
and find people trained on the basics of leadership behavior. No
longer is the organization held hostage by a few high potentials whose
threats to leave become grounds for enormous concessions or
exceptions.
● Overlooked talent is discovered. We contend that some extremely
successful leaders would have been overlooked under the usual
processes of selection. This way, everyone has an opportunity to be
grounded in good leadership principles, and because of hard work and
tenacity, some “late bloomers” will show up as great leaders in the
future.
● The culture is reinforced. The exposure of everyone to senior officers
of the company most certainly builds the leadership skills of the junior
people but also reinforces the culture. Nothing is as powerful as
models of behavior, but often the officials of an organization remain
very removed and distant from the front-line people. The influence
that comes from close contact over many hours is orders of magnitude
greater than listening to a prepared speech from an executive in the
company cafeteria.