Every Team Member Is A Leader

During my last deployment, I got along very well with my Commanding Officer. In fact, I would say he was one of two of the best Commanding Officers I've ever had. What came as a great surprise though was that the Executive Officer held a meeting each Saturday with the Department Heads and the during the first one that I attended, the entirety of the meeting was devoted to explaining to us that when the Commanding Officer "blows up at us" "yells at us" or the like, that we shouldn't take it personally. This perplexed me along two spheres. First, it's the right and prerogative of any Commander to "blow up at me" if I wasn't executing the mission or if my actions were not aligned with vision. Indeed, any officer should take this as a "corrective learning experience". Second, during every encounter I had with the Commanding Officer, he always respected me. He always saw me as a professional. Never once did he raise his voice to me. It then dawned on me that I never gave him reason to disrespect me in any way. The first time I met him, I came prepared with a checklist and said something to the effect: "Sir, based upon what I've seen and my initial boots on ground assessment, the following is my vision and these are the steps (checklist) that I intend to pursue during my deployment. If they are not in keeping with your vision, please tell me." I actually started this process before I even arrived there through conversations with the person that I was replacing. Every time we met, I brought him a finished product, a way forward, options, different courses of action, costs....risk assessments. He never received any surprises from me. I was never a "yes" man to him. I had been there before. In fact, he knew this and so he knew I had experience. In these LinkedIn posts, I talk a lot about leadership....in business americanus as well as in public administration.. There is a yin-yang relationship between leader and team member. As a team member, I am a trusted advisor to my boss. I have to be eyes, ears and an extended brain for him. In fact, I should be thinking upwards two levels...that is, what my boss' boss wants. Often, a leader has so many things on his plate, that it is almost cognitively impossible for him to keep track of everything. Thus, in effect, every person in the organization....every team member is a leader.