Having spent my career working for the US Army, analyzing the Soviet Army, and being a lifelong Catholic, I often make comparisons among these three institutions.
In my opinion, military and business leaders display a greater dedication to improving institutional integrity and performance that do church leaders. Perhaps this is because military and business failures are immediately observable. In addition, while military enemies actually shoot, and business competitors can capture customers, church leaders, smugly relying on the promise that the “gates of hell will not prevail” Mt. 16:18, don't expect to fail.
The comparison jumped out at me as I read the article by Col. George Reed
on toxic leadership (scroll down to 67 and click for a pdf copy). In 2003 Secretary Thomas White asked the Army War College to assess how the Army could effectively detect how to detect “those who might have destructive leadership styles”. Definitions of toxic leaders vary but include
• “apparent lack of concern for the well being of subordinates”
• interpersonal techniques that negatively affects organizational climate
• conviction by subordinates that the leaders is motivated by personal self-interest”.
Reed reports that virtually every AWC student participating could recall working for a toxic leader. (Would the results be any different in the church or in business?). Reed quotes the cries of anguish when toxic leaders make the promotion list: ‘O my God, how could they have possibly done that to my Army?’
The military culture, with its emphasis on authority, makes it harder for people at the top to perceive dysfunctional leadership styles. The evaluation that counts is the Officer Evaluation Report. Unfortunately the writers of OERs often suffer from “CEO disease’ – “near total ignorance about how one’s own mood and actions appear to the organization…”
The AWC study suggests that, while subordinates are not in a position to judge a commander’s performance, they can help in an assessment of command climate. Command climate assesment programs will decrease the odds of selecting toxic leaders.
The institutional church could perform a similar assessment in selecting pastors and bishops. The odds of this are equal to a “snowball’s chance” in that region of the universe that “will not prevail”.
Herb:
I just found your blog in a search for Jack Shephard's (Lost) Enneagram style.
Like you, I am an Enneagram teacher and I also teach and facilitate classes on meditation, Centering Prayer and spirituality. Many of the books on your site are favorites. Unlike you, I am a Catholic in exile (by choice). The leadership of the structural Catholic Church has reached my threshold of tolerance for immorality and psychological dysfunction, but the spirituality of the tradition resounds deeply for me and the community in which I teach.
Your posts are thoughtful, reflective and a pleasure to read. Thank you for sharing.
With that said, I want to ask your opinion about the ever important question my daughter asked me: what do you think is Dr. Jack Shephard's Enneagram style and why?
Feel free to send an e-mail if you get a moment and if you do, please put Jack Shephard in the subject line, or I may delete an unfamiliar address. Or, your protocol may be posting on your blog. Either way, I would appreciate your thoughts.
Thank you!
Leslie
Posted by: Leslie Hershberger | October 31, 2007 at 02:35 PM