Author: Dan Caine

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The Leader’s Playbook-3: Ned Cullen, One of the toughest people I’ve ever known

I read with great sadness this morning of the passing of Professor Stephen Hawking.

I have had the incredible honor of meeting some very tough people in my life – none tougher than Squadron Leader (Ret) Ned Cullen, MBE, and his Family.

Ned is a Royal Air Force Fighter Pilot and “TopGun” graduate – and one of my best friends in the world.  He looks exactly what you would think a dashing, brave, smart talented RAF Fighter Pilot would look like – reddish blond hair and all.

Ned and I met in 2002 as our nations trained together for a very sensitive, very special mission which ultimately went down in the western deserts of Iraq in March of 2003.

On the first night of the war in Iraq, Ned was there, overhead protecting the UK Special Air Service (SAS) and our special forces while flying in his RAF Harrier jump jet – taking the fight to the enemy night after night.

One evening in April of 2003 Ned came up to me and told me he was not feeling 100% – that his fingers were tingling a bit.  That did not stop him from flying combat missions night after night.

Upon returning to the UK in the Spring of 2003 Ned was diagnosed with Motor Neuron Disease or Lou Gerhigs Disease as it’s known here in the US.

What would stop most people in their tracks… has never… not once… not for one second stopped Ned or his incredible wife Heather, or their Son Rory from attacking life.

There are hard as nails people you meet in your life… and then there is the Clan Cullen.. every single one of them.  

When I think of bravery – I think of Ned.

When I think of courage – I think of Ned.

When I think of tenacity with a huge side of humor – I think of Ned.

When I think of unconditional, never-ending, pure to the core love – I think of Heather and Rory.

Every single day the Cullens attack life no matter what gets sent their way, and every person who is blessed to know them and love them is grateful every day for the chance to be in their lives.

Today is a tough day for the world with the loss of Professor Hawking.  He was a giant of a man.

It is also a day to rejoice at the incredible honor of knowing and loving other giants who even now continue to walk this earth – and yes, I’m talking to you Clan Cullen.  I love you all.

 

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The Leader’s Playbook-2: “I trust you, you will do the right thing, No matter what I have your back”

On September 11th, 2001 I was the Chief of Weapons and Tactics at Andrews AFB, MD assigned to the 121st Fighter Squadron flying F-16s.  My Wing Commander was Brigadier General Dave Wherley.

There are so many vivid memories from that day.  They oftentimes move through my mind like a set of polaroids.  One of the clearest memories is not of the Pentagon burning, or the fires in New York, rather it was the leadership shown by General Wherley.

After the second tower was hit, our Wing, on orders from the White House, scrambled to protect DC from further attacks.

While a group of us prepared to fly, General Wherley coordinated with the national command authority and was passed the rules of engagement that we were going to use during our missions.  They were extremely liberal and put the onus of the decision to shoot or not to shoot on us.  This was completely unprecedented.

After quickly briefing our mission and getting our equipment on, we ran to the operations desk to get our final instructions before running to the jets.  As we stood there, General Wherley gave us our mission, our instructions, and our rules of engagement.  He then paused for a moment, took a deep breath,  and looked straight at us.

To this day, I will never forget his words.

“I trust you, you will do the right thing, no matter what I have your back.”

Never in the history of mankind,  has a leader said a more right thing, to the right people, at the right time.  Period.

In the very toughest of times, it is on us as leaders to remember that it is all about taking care of the team, and boy did Boss Wherley take care of us that morning.

General Wherley was a giant of a man and a great leader.  He loved leading warriors and loved being a Fighter Pilot.

Maj Gen and Mrs. Wherley where they were happiest – together.

Tragically, on June 22nd, 2009  we lost both he and his lovely wife Ann when they were killed in the Metrorail collision in Washington, DC.  They had just left Walter Reed Army Medical Center where they were volunteering and serving our Wounded Warriors.

Our unit misses him but remembers with perfect clarity the incredible leadership example from that morning.

Thanks Boss for the incredible gift of a good example. Never forget.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_F._Wherley_Jr.

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The Leader’s Playbook-1: “What’s your story?”

Most leaders love working with people.  I sure do.

Years ago a young Non-Commissioned Officer asked me a simple question that has given me so many gifts over the years.  He simply asked me, “Hey Sir, what is your story?”.

He didn’t ask me what I did for a living, or what I liked to do with my free time.  He asked me an open-ended question which allowed me to go anywhere I wanted to go and share with him what was on my mind, or what I thought he should know about me.

Leading people is about truly understanding what drives them, what their needs are and what I can do to help them.

Leadership is about supporting those around you – working to solve their problems so they can stay focused on the main thing that they need too.

Leading people is not about sharing your story or talking about you, it’s about understanding where other people are coming from and working every day to improve things for them – not you.

For years whenever I meet someone new I’ve politely asked them “What’s your story?”  Sometimes the words might be a little different, but the theme of the question is always the same.  As soon as I ask it, I just listen and enjoy the answer.

The gifts that this simple open-ended question has given me are absolutely immeasurable.  I’ve learned about what people care about, what they are scared of, what is on their minds, what I can do to be a better leader or friend for them.  It also gives me a great place to pick up a conversation the next time we are together.  This simple question has been the foundation for building hundreds of amazing relationships in life, business, and the military.

Give it a try the next time you meet someone new and ask them “What’s your story?”

And to David C… thanks for asking me that question so many years ago, and thanks for the gifts since then.

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Elements of National Power

There is a lot going on in the news these days.

The turbulence and drama range from the challenges our economy faces here at home, to the potential conflicts in North Korea, to the ongoing combat operations in the Middle East.

Leaders in both business and government must understand the various elements of national power often referred to as “DIME” and know how to drive them.

DIME is an easy to remember acronym for “Diplomatic”, “Informational”, “Military”, and “Economic”.

In the US Government, different Cabinet Departments and Agencies lead different elements of national power.  The US Department of State leads the “D”, DoD leads the “M”, while the Department of Treasury and Commerce each have parts of the “E”.

The informational “I” element of national power is critical but frankly, the US has not done a good job developing a well-coordinated interagency informational program designed to get the word out.  We need work.

Each element of national power can impact the other.  Great companies and great governments will take all elements of power into consideration and develop a solid strategy and a supporting set of plans to optimally design a gameplan that uses the right element of national power for the given situation.

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Making Toast to solve tough problems

Leadership is about working with your team to solve the toughest of problems.  These difficult, nasty, tough multi-domain and complicated problems are often known as “wicked problems”.

A wicked problem needs the very best thinking from your group or team.  The team needs to be able to set aside biases and think deeply about a problem.  As we all know, this can be very difficult to do.

One of your main goals as a leader is to build a great team surrounding yourself with the best and brightest.  (see my previous blog post)  This world-class team can then be set loose on solving the most complex and wicked problems.

One great way for your team to think through difficult and wicked problems is through design or visual thinking.  There is a lot written about it and several leading universities and business schools are offering visual thinking courses.

Visual thinking helps one “see” the problem quickly propelling your team to a much deeper understanding of the actual problem.

Tom Wujec, a Fellow at Autodesk, has been studying visual and design thinking for years.  He’s written four books on the subject and presented a great TedTalk which you can watch here.  You can also visit his website at http://www.drawtoast.com.  His work is a great look at the value of visual thinking.  I encourage you to check it out.

Enjoy the TedTalk and I hope you will spend a few minutes “thinking about thinking”.

Dan

 

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It’s all about the people

I have been incredibly blessed in my life to work with some of the best of the best.  Unfortunately a few times earlier in my career I took this incredible gift for granted.  You realize how important it is to work with great people when you have the opportunity to work with less than dedicated teammates (thankfully a very rare experience for me).

When Steve, Charles, and I started our first company we did not always agree on things.  In fact, there were times that we wanted to kill each other but one thing remained true, we had a deep respect for each other and realized that we each brought different things to the business.  By realizing that, even when it was hard, we powered through some incredibly difficult times and remain, great friends and collaborators, today.

As a leader the most important decisions you will make center on the team that you will build.   I’m most proud of the teams I have been a part of or have had a role in building.

Remember – leading well means driving hard to hire talent that is better than you and be ok with that.

Dan

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On critical and creative thinking

Recently colleague remarked on how interesting it is that Americans spend an incredible amount of time thinking about our physical health and conditioning but frankly no time focused on our “thinking health” and conditioning.   He’s absolutely right.

When is the last time someone sat down and discussed not what to think about something, but rather “how” to think about something?

As a nation, I think our education system should spend time teaching our kids how to think.  They should learn how to both critically and creatively think about issues and problems – not just regurgitate facts from a textbook.  We could do a lot better on this front – and we need too in order to give our children the gift of curiosity as they grow up.

As leaders in business, we also need to ensure that we are fostering an environment that allows creative and critical thinking at work.  Business leaders need teammates that can think clearly, critically, and creatively to solve our difficult business problems.

There is a lot of work to do in this area.

Dan

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Mad Minute: Integration in your business

Integration in business, or lack thereof, is a significant problem in today’s fast-paced business world.  We see it all the time.

Good companies end up having departments operating in silos and occasionally compete against themselves for the same business.  I recently saw this when a major defense contractor had two specific business units competing for the same piece of work – neither aware of the other.  Needless to say, the EVP was not too happy when she realized how much time and energy they had burned.

CEOs, COOs, and other business leaders need to make it a priority to coordinate, synchronize, and integrate business operations throughout the company.  Establishing a normal meeting rhythm can help with this.

For example, at one of my manufacturing companies, we had a daily 15min standup where we talked about the major lessons learned from the previous 24 hours what was coming up each day.  We held this “standup” on the plant floor and all of our key leaders were present.  It went a long way to ensure that we never let things get too far out of sync.

Ensuring your business is integrated will go a long way towards improving your bottom line and improving senior leader communications.

Dan

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Chief AI Officer

Today I noticed that Cerberus Capital Management had appointed Afsheen Afshar as their Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer.  This is a first that I know of and I applaud Cerberus for moving in that direction.

As we look at the future of big-data, AI is the greatest component of translating large data sets into actionable business intelligence and understanding.

Across the board, we are awash with big data and AI is our only hope in turning this strategic resource into a true understanding of the operating environments that we work in.

Checkout the link to the Cerebus press release here.

Congrats to Afsheen.

Dan

 

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Evernote

One of my favorite tools as a business leader and entrepreneur is Evernote (www.evernote.com).

For years it has been a great tool for me to save web pages, images, notes, and other items – all searchable.  In my opinion, it’s a must-have.

Dan