My April Visit to the United States Military Academy at West Point NY

I was very fortunate to visit the United States Military Academy at West Point NY April 15-18. I was invited by COL Sean Hannah, who is the Director of the new Army Center of Excellence for Professional Military Ethics. The visit went very well.

First, the weather was perfect and provided a serene setting in the Valley of the Hudson River to my push to implement better ways of developing leaders, particularly adaptability. I was well received by everyone I spoke and lectured to. COL Hannah ensured that I had a full schedule the entire time and met with members from four departments, as well as had lunch or office calls with numerous faculty members. COL Hannah had read and distributed Raising the Bar as well as various papers, briefings and the Adaptability Handbook throughout the academy. It was an honor as well to have several faculty give me feedback on the material, and how the ideas would help them get better in their development of our future leaders.

The biggest honor was getting to teach part of CPT Paul Lester’s (PhD) class on Leadership to a group of seniors. I discussed my journey in pushing the ALM throughout the Army and various tools to teach adaptability. They provided excellent feedback on how effective the tools from Raising the Bar would be if they had been introduced to them earlier.

Finally, I have been invited back in August to teach my workshop “Deciding Under Pressure and Fast” to new instructors. I look forward to that as well as working with the many fine officers and NCOs I met with on how to develop adaptability in our future leaders. This visit was a great way to begin the spring and summer seasons.