To be an exemplary leader, there are times when making the right decision may not be the most popular choice. In this episode of Veteran Led, drawing from his own experiences, John Berry underscores the notion that true leadership goes beyond simply being liked or respected individually. John explains how leaders who prioritize building strong relationships with their team members create an environment of trust and collaboration, leading to a sense of unity and loyalty within the team.
Welcome fellow veterans. From the tip of the spear to in the rear with the gear, I went from active-duty Infantry to reserve-component logistician. I’m your host, CEO, entrepreneur, trial lawyer, and Lieutenant Colonel Retired, John Berry. The military lessons that I learned helped me grow an eight-figure business that has maintained consistent annual double-digit growth, landing on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest growing companies in America every year for the past seven years and has allowed me to continue to serve America’s heroes.
We know from our experience in the military that leaders who command respect generally get better results. As a young lieutenant, I wanted to know how I could command the respect of my team. I didn’t know how to do this, but I observed several of my peers and the attempts that they made, and I found that there were three types of lieutenants. The first was the lieutenant who needed to be liked. The second was the lieutenant who demanded respect. And the third was the lieutenant who sought to be both liked and respected. The first lieutenant was the happy-go-lucky, somewhat lazy lieutenant who would go out drinking with the soldiers and the NCOs, joked with them, had a good time.
Everybody seemed to like this lieutenant, but nobody wanted this lieutenant in charge of anything. The second type of lieutenant was the one that demanded respect. And this lieutenant was a for the rule and enforced every single rule, even when it made no sense. And this lieutenant could get the team to do what was required because the team knew that there were consequences. They understood that if they didn’t meet the standard, this lieutenant would take action. The third type of lieutenant was a lieutenant who wanted to be both liked and respected. This lieutenant personified the ultimate team player. His neatness of dress, care of equipment, level of physical fitness, and great attitude every day made the team like him but also respect him. They understood that he would accept nothing less than excellence from the team, and they gave excellence. And when this lieutenant made mistakes, they wanted to support him because they understood that this lieutenant was a true leader, a leader who understood the importance of being liked, but more importantly, also took the actions necessary to earn the respect of the team. So as a young lieutenant heading to my first duty station, pondering what type of leader I wanted to be, I received a phone call from one of my buddies.
Now, the three of us had planned to live in the same house at Fort Hood. We all knew which duty station we’re going to. And the way Infantry Officer Basic course works, you have team members who are going to Bradley Leader course, Pathfinder course, Mortar Leader course. Nobody arrives at their duty station at the same time. Everybody else had arrived. I was the last one to the party. And I said, John, look, one of our buddies from West Point is going to move in with us, so we do not have a room for you. However, our brigade is deploying in two weeks, and your brigade is going to deploy after us. So, here’s the deal. If you just stay here for a couple of weeks on the couch, you can live in our house rent free so long as you help our roommate maintain the place, help pay utilities. We’ll let you stay on the couch and then you can pick the room, stay in any room you want. And then when you deploy, you can just leave your stuff here. You can store it for free. This was an offer to good to refuse.
So I moved in. After just one week, right before 05:00, the door bursts in and my roommate came into the house and into the living room. He was saying things that I didn’t understand. He was upset; he was distraught. And I said, What’s going on? And he said, John, my career is over. I said, Come on, you’re a second lieutenant. How bad can it be? What responsibility could you have that you messed up so bad that your career is over? And he said, we’re doing Bradley table 8, night fire. I’m the officer in charge of the range. My platoon sergeant is the NCOIC. And when my platoon sergeant fired, he went outside the range fan, and he shot an Apache longbow on the adjacent range. Whoa. I asked, was anybody injured? And he said, no. No one was in the bird, but the bird was still hot because it had been in the range. And that’s how the thermos picked it up. He was rightfully scared, and an investigation ensued. Shortly thereafter, the Company Commander and his Battalion Commander were called into the Division Commander’s office to discuss what had happened. At that moment, as a battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Brown stood up and said, Sir, this is my fault.
I am the battalion commander. These are my soldiers. I was responsible for the rest plan. I was responsible for the range. Anything that happened falls on my shoulders. When word got back to the battalion about what happened, Lieutenant Colonel Brown reached hero status, not just within his battalion, but within the entire division. This battalion commander took responsibility for the actions of his team, and he was not going to throw anybody under the bus. It was his battalion, and he let the division commander know it. What appeared to be a career-ending accident turned out to be a career-defining moment for this battalion commander. He took responsibility. He established that hero status that then gave him leadership capital, which he carried on throughout the deployment. Fifteen years later, when I attended the battalion command pre-course in Fort Leavenworth, a Lieutenant General Brown took the stage, and he talked about that very incident and told us that as a leader, there will be things that will happen beyond our control, that we must take responsibility for, that we must take accountability for, and that while they may seem like they’re career ending at the time, they will not end our careers, that that is part of leadership.
Part of leadership is dealing with the failures, dealing with the setbacks, and taking responsibility for everything, even the things that we aren’t present for, even the things that we don’t see happen, even the things that we don’t expect to happen. Today, as a leader of my company, General Brown’s words ring clear. My job is to make the vision a reality, and I have to have the leadership capital invested in the organization and in the individual team members to make that happen. We would all love to pay our teams as much as we could and give them unlimited resources. But the reality is, as a leader, we must be the steward of the organization’s resources. And that means we are going to have to say no from time to time. We are going to have to make tough decisions on who gets what. And if we have that leadership capital, the team respects that decision. As we grow our organization and build a bigger future for our team members, we are going to outgrow some of our best team members. And that’s going to send ripple effects and fear throughout the entire organization. People are going to feel like they’re not safe.
They’re going to feel like the organization was disloyal to the great team members who they outgrew. The reality is if you have that leadership capital and the team trusts you to do what is in the best interest of the organization, they will trust your decisions. As leaders, it’s our job to ensure the team hits its targets. And there will be times when we are off course and not hitting the target, we will have to change our course. We will have to recognize and have difficult conversations about how our actions are not meeting the standard, and we will have to convince our team that they need to give more of an effort. And that’s where the leadership capital will also need to be cashed in. Look, teams love you as a leader when they’re succeeding, but when the team is failing and you have to hold them accountable, they may hate you. And the reality is they can hate you so long as they respect you. They respect that you will do what is in the best interests of the team, that you will take care of the organization, and that you will take care of them.
As I look back over the past five years at the biggest decisions I made that had the largest impact on the growth of the firm, none of them were unanimous amongst the staff, and most of them were unpopular. The reality is that if I had not invested the leadership capital, if my team did not trust me, I would have faced so much resistance that those decisions probably wouldn’t have been worth making, and they probably never would have become a reality. As we come to the end of the podcast, I want to answer the question, what type of leader did I choose to be as a lieutenant? And the answer is in my actions. On one of my first field problems, we had been running sticks lanes all day. The next task was to set up a patrol base before running more lanes in the morning. Now, no one was supervising. The first sergeant wasn’t there, the company commander wasn’t there, the XO wasn’t there. It was just my platoon. And it started to rain. And we wanted to set up our little poncho hooches and crawl up with our poncho liners and just rack out.
But I made sure that we set up a patrol base, that we did it to standard, and that we started our priorities of work. I could have done nothing. I could have said, Guys, let’s get some sleep. But I knew that if I was going to train my team, I would train them to standard. And I knew that if I did that, they would respect me, not because I was great at what I did, but I knew what was right, and I would make sure that the team was trained to standard. And that made all the difference. The leadership capital that I earned by putting the team through the paces carried with me through our first deployment, and I didn’t do everything right. I made a ton of mistakes, a lot of stupid mistakes. But I found that as long as my team understood that I would maintain the standard, that I would treat them well, that I would take the wrap when I screwed up, but that I would hold them accountable for their actions, I knew that they had my back.
After Action Review. As a leader, you decide who you will become.
Do you want to be the leader who is liked, the leader who is respected, or the leader who is liked and respected? Number two, moments of crisis are opportunities for a hero moment. When there’s a crisis in your organization, that is your opportunity to step up as a leader and start earning some of that leadership capital with your team. Number three, winning solves all problems, but you find out whether you’re a leader based on how your team reacts when you’re losing. Three down. Number one, when your team is succeeding, they will love you. When your team is failing and you hold them accountable, they’re not going to like you, but they must respect you at that point. Number two, your most important decisions in the organization will likely never be unanimous or popular. Number three, when you lead an organization, bad things will happen that are beyond your control, but it is still your responsibility to fix the problem and to move the organization forward.
Thank you for joining us today on Veteran Led, where we pursue our mission of promoting veteran leadership in business, strengthening the veteran community, and getting veterans all of the benefits that they earned.
If you know a leader who should be on the Veteran Led podcast, report to our online community by searching @veteranled on your favorite social channels and posting in the comments. We want to hear how your military challenges prepared you to lead your industry or community, and we will let the world know. And of course, hit subscribe and join me next time on Veteran Led.
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