Marine Corps Leadership: Empowering or Limiting the Strategic Corporal?
Abstract
The strategic corporal defines the type of Marine required for success in future warfare. General Charles Krulak, former Commandant of the Marine Corps, described three steps for training the strategic corporal: instilling character, providing a commitment to lifelong learning, and leadership. Currently, the Marine Corps is carrying out the first two steps well, but is not doing as well with the third step, specifically with respect to command climate. General Krulak explained that leadership quality may be viewed through a unit's command climate. Commanders should not allow a zero-defects mentality or micromanagement to exist. Unfortunately, a zero-defects mentality and a sense of micromanagement do exist in the Marine Corps and have led to more centralized decision making than was present 10 years ago. Centralized decision making appears to exist to improve force protection and has resulted in a desire to mitigate risks. Although the intentions are good, the rhetoric regarding risk is clouding the issue of force protection because only the symptoms are being discussed and not the disease. Many studies, articles, and real world examples were examined in this paper to determine the unintended consequences of the overly prescriptive decision making that hampers the Marine Corps' development of strategic corporals. Some unintended consequences include a zero-defects mentality that persists in the name of safety, micromanagement found in garrison, and overuse of the word "risk." The atmosphere created by zero-defects, micromanagement, and risk aversion make it difficult to transform the population that make up the strategic corporal -- the Millennial Generation -- into creative and independent decision makers. It is imperative that the Marine Corps continue to recruit strong men and women from society and then develop them into strategic corporals. The primary hindrances to this development are a zero-defects mentality, micromanagement, and misuse of the word "risk."
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 2008
- Accession Number
- ADA490868
Entities
People
- Teague A. Pastel
Organizations
- Marine Corps University