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7 Golden Rules for Great Leadership
“How will I ever be able to teach that?” I asked one of the instructors. In late 2001 just after 9/11, I was taking part in the first Martial Arts Instructor-Trainer course in Quantico, Virginia. We were learning to be black-belt instructors of instructors in this new mixed martial arts program the Marine Corps was rolling out.
The head of the program, a charismatic and tough-as-nails Force Recon Colonel named George Bristol had just given a talk to all of us on “the shadow,” that brief speck of time between thought and action. When he explained it in his inspirational warrior/scholar sort of way as he often did, it was deeply inspiring.
Soon after I was thinking about the surreal nature of what I’d just heard and said “Man, I hope we don’t have to teach that.”
The instructor I was speaking to, also a Sergeant said “no, you don’t have to. That’s what he does because that is him. You do what is you when you teach.”
And I did. I mixed in my own style and personality in the years that followed. I learned later this is generally called authentic leadership — painting with proven principles of leadership while using your own colors.
