About Tom Ruby

Tom Ruby is CEO of Bluegrass Critical Thinking Solutions. With a decade of corporate small business consulting experience, he looks forward to helping you take your time back and balance your inherent desire to work on the details with your real need to focus on corporate vision. A retired Air Force Colonel who served 26 years on active duty in positions from Squadron Intelligence Officer to Director of Special Programs with a $4 billion annual program portfolio, he carefully crafted expertise in strategic planning, program management and leadership development. He was Associate Dean of the Air Command and Staff College where he developed exchange programs with the NATO School, the French École Militaire, the German General Staff College and Poland’s National Defense University. He served on General Petraeus’ Joint Strategic Assessment Team as well as in three combat deployments. He holds a PhD in Political Science from the University of Kentucky, and actively mentors graduate students through the American Political Science Association. He is widely published and speaks globally on topics from critical thinking, to leadership, to strategy, to morality in warfare.

Ronda – Andalusian Clifftop Treasure

Winding through the mountains of Andalusia, passing miles and miles of olive groves, small villages, and peaks, our excitement approaching Ronda grew each minute. Maite in Malaga told us we really ought to consider rearranging our schedule and spending a couple of days in Ronda. She was right about every recommendation thus far, so we [...]

By |2023-08-23T15:14:59-04:00August 23rd, 2023|Travel|0 Comments

Málaga – City of Surprise and Color

I think I am pretty good at geography and culture. I know that Madrid and Barcelona were in the past and in the minds of millions continue to be capitals of different countries. I know that Andalusia is a province in the south of Spain rich in history and culture. I know that James Joyce [...]

By |2023-07-19T16:52:22-04:00July 19th, 2023|Travel|0 Comments

The Looming Man-Made White Oak Collapse And It’s Surprising Implication for American Spirits

With bourbon production up 435% in the last two decades, the state of Kentucky has a lot to be pleased with. Distillers are building rickhouses as fast as they can. Companies specializing in building rickhouses are backed up. Distillers who once claimed all local grains now claim to be able to source local grains as [...]

By |2023-05-03T09:36:09-04:00May 3rd, 2023|Blog|0 Comments

The Cultural Debris Bavaria Excursion

Cultural Debris Excursions are headed to Bavaira the first two weeks in July! Alan Cornett and I are building on the success of our Genoa Excursion from October 2022 and leading intimate small group trips to Salzburg, Austria and Oberammergau, Germany the first and second weeks of July 2023. Each week is limited to six [...]

By |2023-03-23T12:26:17-04:00March 13th, 2023|Travel|1 Comment

Discovering Cultural Debris; Paying Deep Attention to People and Place

We walk into La Medina, the spice shop on Via San Luca in Genoa and I greet Sabri, the owner. “Salaam, sadiqi. It is so good to see you again.” He steps around the counter and hugs me and says, “It is good to see you, as well. This is your shop.” I tell him [...]

By |2023-01-27T16:47:44-05:00January 26th, 2023|Travel|0 Comments

The Coming Dissolution

In “The Coming Reckoning,” we explored how the United States is fracturing and how that fracturing may be delayed or averted. However desirable it may be to many, perhaps most Americans, that the country remain united, a path towards dissolution appears as a possible avenue ahead of us. While there are countless voices predicting a [...]

By |2022-09-30T08:32:56-04:00September 30th, 2022|Blog|1 Comment

This *Feels* Different

This article appears in the July/August (Vol 25/No 6) edition of Gilbert, the magazine of the Society of GK Chesterton. Please visit the society web site www.chesterton.org and subscribe or become a member! He travels because of his ignorance; it is exactly in that that he shows his intelligence. --GK Chesterton   “Wow. This place [...]

By |2022-08-02T14:14:39-04:00June 16th, 2022|Blog, Travel|0 Comments

Cultural Debris Excursion to Genoa

Friends, Alan Cornett, host of the Cultural Debris Podcast is joining me to host a Cultural Debris Excursion to Genoa in Autumn 2022. This is a small group (6 guests plus the two hosts), highly curated  excursion that will explore the cultural debris of Genoa, Italy. This is a nearly completely missed jewel of Italy [...]

By |2022-06-27T10:57:11-04:00April 21st, 2022|Travel|0 Comments

The Coming Reckoning

With sincere thanks to James Fallows who invited me to write this article and to Ben Speggen who is an excellent editor and made this far better than it was, I am linking to my latest article which was published by the Our Towns Civic Foundation. In this article, I argue that the United States [...]

By |2022-01-04T17:16:18-05:00January 4th, 2022|Blog|0 Comments

Who Will Rebuild The Country

At a recent Sunday family gathering, a young extended family member was telling of his apprenticeship as an electrician. Six months out of high school, being paid to work and learn the trade, he will test out of his second year of apprenticeship in another 6 months and be a certified journeyman. His firm wants [...]

By |2021-12-21T08:47:33-05:00December 15th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

Implications of the Next Big Sort

In our previous post we discussed the Next Big Sort, the one that is happening right now under the noses of sociologists and demographers. That the country is re-sorting itself 20 years after The Big Sort is not as interesting as what this sort will mean for the United States and for the people who [...]

By |2021-08-24T16:40:57-04:00August 24th, 2021|reading recommendation|0 Comments

The Next Big Sort and Back To The Land Movement

Back in January of 2020 we wrote a piece on What to Expect in 2030. The piece still holds up, I think. As far as general predictions go, these are not particularly bold, but they are interesting and not widely written about. But there is one more prediction that we ought to make and then [...]

By |2021-08-09T16:04:42-04:00August 9th, 2021|Blog|6 Comments

Global Integration and Interdependence Was Good Up to A Point – That Point May Have Been Passed

The promises of the information revolution and Third Wave of society ushered in an era of competition and lower prices on an entire range of goods by globalizing the manufacture of products and the democratization of services. This revolution enabled people around the world to participate in the global chain of service and supply. By [...]

By |2021-06-17T18:29:44-04:00June 17th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

The Dirty Details of Strategy Development and Follow-Through

We've discussed in the past on these pages the importance of clear, concise and well, considered objectives in order to have a goal for strategies to achieve. We've discussed the myriad pitfalls leaders struggle with from inability to define their vision and objectives, to the lack of discipline required to see the planning process through [...]

By |2021-05-26T07:31:39-04:00May 26th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

Modernity vs. Antiquity is one debate that could use more consistency

I’ve been reading a lot lately on certain social media accounts about how modernity is better than “the old days” and also about how much better things were back in “the age of chivalry.” I totally get what advocates are saying from both perspectives. I’m not entirely sure those advocates are representing their arguments well. [...]

By |2021-03-17T09:42:52-04:00March 17th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

Politics, Emotions, and Pretend Preparedness

We’ve written about Why We Don’t See It Coming in the past. Very often we are not even aware of how far off we are. A billion is not just more than a million. It is 1000 times more. So when we talk about specific topics and issues, it is important to be precise if [...]

By |2021-02-24T16:32:17-05:00February 24th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

Nice – Heart of the Riviera; Heart of History

We watched Cary Grant and Grace Kelly in To Catch a Thief, recently. Hitchcock's delightfully light and masterful work set in Nice, France, made me long to return to that stretch of the Cote d'Azure, or French Riviera. What a lovely place to visit. To see the mingling of Roman aqueducts and Roman roads with [...]

By |2021-02-17T14:29:06-05:00February 17th, 2021|Travel|0 Comments

Leading Through Crisis – Be Your Best

Colleagues, my latest article appears at the Vital Masculinity Project, who asked me to write about crisis leadership for their journal. I hope you enjoy the article. In any crisis, people in the middle of the crisis almost desperately seek out those who keep their heads about them to be near in the hopes of [...]

By |2021-02-10T12:25:10-05:00February 10th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

The Capitol Attack, How It Was and Can Be Again

The first week of January, 1994, I found myself walking slowly through the Capitol Rotunda with my friend, Bob Gorman. Bob was a small town newspaper editor going through DC, and since I was about to move away, we met for a leisurely walk through the nation’s Capitol building, as one could do back then. [...]

By |2021-01-25T12:47:53-05:00January 25th, 2021|Blog|0 Comments

A Time Before You Die – Lucy Beckett

Friends, this book review is reprinted here with the gracious permission of the Society of Gilbert Keith Chesterton, in whose flagship magazine, Gilbert!, this review can be found in the Jan/Feb 2021 edition. Please become a member of the Society, which I am sure you will find intellectually and spiritually fulfilling. Visit www.chesterton.org for information [...]

By |2021-01-20T13:20:20-05:00January 20th, 2021|reading recommendation|0 Comments

Restored Film of Children on Serbian Farms in 1920

The video linked below titled Children in Serbia 1920 is haunting. A few thoughts about it after watching several times: First, these children were most likely dressed in their traditional Serbian cultural outfits for the camera, which was very likely the first time they were ever pictured. This technology was rare even on American farms, [...]

By |2020-12-17T13:10:32-05:00December 15th, 2020|Blog, reading recommendation|1 Comment

Great Ideas and the Bridge Between the Abstract and Practical

This article was written for Ad Otium, a very good web project and blog, and for whom I am very grateful for the opportunity to write. Please visit this site and read his articles and links. It starts with a heartfelt and seemingly innocuous comment, “I wanna do what you’re doing.” There is so much [...]

By |2020-12-04T12:09:55-05:00December 4th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Unicorns, Narratives, and Really Good Writing

In "The Secret of the Unicorn Tapestries," (The Paris Review) Danielle Oteri heartens those of us who seek contemporary examples of excellent prose, historical accuracy and evidence, connecting ideas in seemingly disparate fields, and a sleuthing tenacity found in Chesterton's Father Brown. This article ought to be assigned reading for half a dozen graduate programs [...]

By |2020-11-23T14:38:26-05:00November 23rd, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Time to Start Pumping the Brakes – Everyone

By Tom Ruby and Scott Bethel It seems to us that the United States is hurtling down a road that forks in the near distance into two roads. The fork on the left leads to civil war. The fork on the right leads to autocracy. We missed the exit for the pluralistic civil society that [...]

By |2020-10-14T13:35:20-04:00September 24th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Leaders, start preparing for Autumn; Start thinking now

Business and civic leaders are working their way through perhaps the most tumultuous year of their careers. A global pandemic, an election year and civil unrest. Yet you don't have the time nor the bandwidth to feel sorry for yourselves, so you go to it and work the issues critical to your job. That's how [...]

By |2020-08-19T15:02:27-04:00August 19th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

The Red Lines In Your Business and Life

Over the past several years I've asked a lot of people in relaxed conversations what their red lines are. In nearly every case, my conversation companion is taken aback by the question. The concept of red lines isn't something they think about. But here's the rub for every one of us. We all have red [...]

By |2020-08-10T15:19:51-04:00August 10th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Thoughts on and predictions for our present crisis

Here are some related thoughts on our current crises. I'm feeling more pessimistic about our country's future than any point in my adult life. I'm not talking about some snowflake angst. I've deployed to combat zones 3 times and have dealt with the pressure of human lives and national security issues my entire adult life. [...]

By |2020-12-17T13:10:59-05:00July 27th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Leaders: Pause and Assess – Are You On Your Flight Path? Does It Need Updating?

by Tom Ruby and Scott Bethel We're now half a year into the Covid-19 Pandemic. So much has changed and so many experts have missed the performance or integrity cut that few people can be certain they have confidence in what is real and what isn't. Now is the time for business and government leaders [...]

By |2020-07-03T13:06:29-04:00June 30th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

The Wrong Predictions We Will Recover From

This Coronavirus pandemic has interrupted individual lives and communal national lives to a degree unseen by younger generations in their lives. Older generations who lived through WWII are nearing the end of their lives and their memories  of their lives during that time are fleeting. That means this pandemic is genuinely a new experience for [...]

By |2020-05-22T18:29:19-04:00May 22nd, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Time for a New Electronic Training Program

Pretty much everyone has tired of the novelty of Zoom meetings and Zoom Happy Hours. And yet we can be assured that we will be conducting core office meetings electronically beyond the foreseeable future. Even after the Covid-19 pandemic is a memory, the effects will linger in the form of working from home and drastically [...]

By |2020-05-18T17:03:50-04:00May 18th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

The Humility We Need To Get Through The Pandemic

Excellent piece in The Atlantic, "Why The Coronavirus Is So Confusing." It gets back to a previous post on the Equation which discusses how to deal with situations in which there are lots of variables. We people are not very good at considering the interaction between multiple causal variables working at the same time. Here [...]

By |2020-04-30T14:18:41-04:00April 30th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Why You Need a Chief Analyst

If the Coronavirus pandemic has taught us anything, it is the importance of evidence in decision-making. Facts abound in the world. Most are irrelevant to any particular issue. But being unaware of the facts relevant to your organizational situation blinds you as a leader. I encourage all senior leaders, especially CEOs and Board members to [...]

By |2020-04-22T15:11:26-04:00April 22nd, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Covid-19 forces changes to our predictions

With time comes clarity. That is the case with much that happens in life. So it is with the Coronavirus. Not with the science of how the virus infects people. That is known. But with how it moves from person to person before they show symptoms, how long it can remain on surfaces, how far [...]

By |2020-04-17T13:50:46-04:00April 17th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Leaders Moving Forward Post-Coronavirus

It is genuinely difficult for leaders today to think ahead to how they're going to lead their businesses, departments, governmental jurisdictions, trade organizations, etc, out of the present darkness of pandemic. After all, they're practically overwhelmed by managing the disruption day-to-day to remain open and active. Here's the thing...Leaders, the preponderance of your focus has [...]

By |2020-04-15T17:28:48-04:00April 14th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

The World Will Change This Year – Leaders Should Prepare Now

By Tom Ruby and Scott Bethel Back in the first week of January, Tom posted some specific predictions for what the world would see in 2030. Not yet half a year into that decade, the Coronavirus Pandemic is accelerating some of those predictions. Sure, there were people who predicted that a pandemic would wreak havoc [...]

By |2020-03-31T22:57:08-04:00March 29th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Progress Report on Covid-19/Coronavirus

We're now a couple of weeks into the Pandemic that is the Coronavirus or Covid-19. It is time for a progress report on where we are and what are our prospects for recovery. First and foremost, we need to remember, reiterate and remind one another that this pandemic is real and not a hoax. It [...]

By |2020-03-25T19:24:45-04:00March 25th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Leaders, Your Career Could Be Defined This Week and Next

With the Covid-19 Coronavirus now in full Pandemic mode, leaders at every level, from political leaders to titans of industry, to small business leaders, to town councils and emergency management planners, all eyes are on you. In times of crisis, people look for someone to follow. In times of crisis, people look around for the [...]

By |2020-03-19T00:21:11-04:00March 17th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Scaling up is good. Its also really hard. Help for thinking it through.

How many of you are in a business whose investors or owners have set an aggressive growth goal for the company? Or perhaps you have been told you're really great at something that you should scale up?  Growth and scaling are natural and good goals for companies. It can be incremental, slowly building more capacity [...]

By |2020-02-26T20:19:44-05:00February 21st, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Be Deliberate In All You Do

There's a mythical person it seems that most everyone wants to be like, the spontaneous, carpe diem, grab-my-overnight-bag-and-go-at-the-drop-of-a-hat person. The person who doesn't overly think things through. The person that feels the best way to start a project is to just start it and go from there. Real life, however, is not so romantic. Real [...]

By |2020-02-10T15:32:28-05:00February 10th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Lessons for a Young Professional

I've been corresponding recently with a young friend I used to work with. We were discussing weekly reflecting. Taking time out to think about where you are personally and professionally. He has really good insight for someone at his stage in his career, far better than I had at the same point many years [...]

By |2021-05-04T10:15:45-04:00January 24th, 2020|Blog|1 Comment

Lessons from Afghanistan to all business leaders

The Washington Post has done a service to its readers and indirectly all businesses in its years-long effort to expose the waste of lives, resources and time the US government alone has spent in Afghanistan over the last 18 years. There ought to be hand-wringing in the halls of the Pentagon and Foggy Bottom and [...]

By |2020-01-16T19:28:36-05:00January 16th, 2020|Blog|0 Comments

Genoa – A Gem Hiding Out in the Open

  If you’re looking for a special place to take a special get-away, away from crowds of tourists and with few Americans, a lovely coast, mountains and the most enchanting city center, then Genoa is for you. With a culture that is at once Italian and deeply unique, Liguria’s capital, Genoa, is a fantastic [...]

By |2021-02-17T14:41:27-05:00December 2nd, 2019|Travel|0 Comments

We Don’t Know What We’re Doing

George Packer, writing on the passing of Leslie Gelb in The Atlantic, quoted Gelb in saying "Foreign policy makes no sense." Packer added: "He meant that our leaders, even ones he respected, often don’t know what they’re doing. They have to make decisions with large but unknowable consequences in ignorance, thinking wishfully, perhaps under the [...]

By |2019-09-11T21:28:07-04:00September 11th, 2019|Blog|0 Comments

John Casciano – Requiescet in Pace

With the passing of Air Force Maj Gen (Ret) John Casciano, the country has lost a leader, a gentleman and mentor for countless men and women over the last 5 decades. A career intelligence officer who rose on a non-traditional path that included both Strategic Air Command and Tactical Air Command, a long deployment to [...]

By |2019-09-04T14:34:00-04:00September 4th, 2019|Blog|0 Comments

On President George H.W. Bush

On Wednesday the 28th of May, 1986, then Vice President George H.W. Bush gave the commencement address at the US Air Force Academy. The speech itself was unremarkable. It was the man himself that stood out to me. He was very gracious. While most of my fellow newly minted lieutenants stiffly saluted and shook his [...]

By |2018-12-06T16:51:58-05:00December 6th, 2018|Blog|0 Comments

Audits Are Really About Trust

In a Christmas Day release from The National Interest, (retired Army General) Tom Spoehr makes a passionate case that the upcoming audit of the Defense Department is unnecessary and potentially wasteful. Sadly, this Op-Ed column is riddled with straw man arguments, false trails and magic pixie dust to deflect the targeted reader, in this case, [...]

By |2017-12-26T20:32:27-05:00December 26th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

Future Dystopias Are Our Past and Present Human Nature

A family member once asked me during a home viewing of The Hunger Games what the point was of watching something that was so fantastical and obviously could never happen. I responded that this was not fantastical at all, but a fictionalization of human history. "When? When did this happen?" Well, I said, how about [...]

By |2017-12-11T21:13:28-05:00December 11th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

Transparency is *Really* Important

Transparency. How much light gets through. Can you see what is on the other side of the divide? Perhaps no concept brings on headaches for senior leaders. Perhaps no concept brings on hesitation from investors. Perhaps no concept makes workers wonder whether their jobs will be secure in the future. Why? Why should I as [...]

By |2017-12-06T21:54:21-05:00December 6th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

Black Lamb and Grey Falcon

I was very intrigued when I read Georgie Ann Geyer's Buying the Night Flight. This woman traveled alone in a man's world from Egypt to Russia to Cambodia to Cuba in her rise as a foreign correspondent. In reading her autobiography I got the sense of her interaction with her environment and the delicacy it [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:01-05:00September 19th, 2017|reading recommendation|0 Comments

Professional and Business Leaders Must Now Declare Where You Stand

Well, this is an interesting time in the U.S., isn't it? For all those who say we should avoid discussing politics and religion at work and family gatherings, you have larger issues to worry about than having to figure out what is interesting about the weather, the early turning of leaves this summer, and the [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:01-05:00August 24th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

On Travel and Its Importance To You

"Someone hauled that wood up here." That was one key point of discussion when our family stood atop the Kofel, a small, but steep granite mountain on the west side of Oberammergau in the Ammergauer Alps of Germany. You don't need to be an experienced mountaineer to get to the top. The [...]

By |2022-06-27T10:59:23-04:00July 27th, 2017|Blog, Travel|0 Comments

Can You Change Your Mind? It’s Important.

If you've read this column over the last few years, you would likely have noticed several themes, one of which is peoples' remarkable consistency in getting in their own way on the road to success. I've written many times that the three most important words a senior leader can say is "I don't know." Once [...]

By |2019-09-11T12:47:02-04:00March 13th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

A Cautionary Leadership Tale

Warning Aspiring Leaders: If you set about bringing down the king, you had better be prepared to BE the king. That means fixing all the issues you were complaining about. Leading, governing is always harder than complaining. Side note: if you're unable to separate your political feelings from the intellectual argument on leadership that follows, [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:01-05:00February 14th, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

Look Around, Leaders. What Do You See?

Look around, leaders. Who do you see? Yes, it is meant to be a loaded question. We are told constantly through the popular culture and through many of our religious cultures that we are to see and value the dignity of the individual and not merely the skin colors or genders. And as far as [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:02-05:00January 31st, 2017|Blog|0 Comments

Are You “That Guy?” Here’s Some Help…

Sorry to say, but if you are, you don't know it, and most likely nobody is going to tell you. But there's hope. You can turn it around. Really. The New York Times piece "How To Keep Your Office Holiday Party From Going Off The Rails" is a good place to start. “Getting on top [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:02-05:00December 21st, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Will You Survive The Unintended Consequences Of Your Good Actions?

One of the truths of all human endeavor, especially in business, is that your actions have consequences. That is, after all, why we make decisions and think about what we need to do to achieve our desired outcomes. And when we do it properly, we are rewarded with success. But what happens when we take [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:02-05:00December 21st, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Be Ready To Answer What You Are Reading

"What are the last 5 books you've read?" I was surprised how often I was asked that question as a young rising professional by my bosses and other senior leaders considering hiring me. Then as I grew older, I found myself asking the same question to my direct reports when I took over a new [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:02-05:00December 6th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Embrace Processes For Business and Governance

Here is a typical situation when a leadership and organizational consultant goes into a new business to help them out. The consultant has a discussion with the client trying to get to the bottom of several issues in the front office. There are multiple paths that needed exploring, but the consultant's process tells him where [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:02-05:00December 2nd, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Some Sociology, Thinking, and Leadership Ponderings…Post-Election

We need to talk. We need to listen. We need to love. Everyone. Our neighbors. Those who aren't our neighbors. The promise of technology, the internet and social media was that people would be able to get together in virtual communities. The reality is that people have used the information revolution to increasingly associate with [...]

By |2020-09-23T13:12:13-04:00November 9th, 2016|Blog|1 Comment

Be A Better Leader By Connecting Ideas

Ideas. The best leaders live in the realm of ideas. Facts and details are great and necessary. But connecting ideas is what advances business and humanity. You've heard me say often that the senior leader's job is to stay above the daily fray and focus on the long-term vision and strategy (see here). I also [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00October 27th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

But Are Facts Enough To Change Minds?

It's better to be right than first. We've talked often here about narratives in the past (see here and here) and why it is so critical for senior leaders to look for evidence when making decisions and developing strategies to achieve corporate objectives. Sunday's Washington Post featured an article titled "Amanda Knox is innocent. But [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00October 3rd, 2016|Blog|4 Comments

We Should Reconsider Who We Call Allies

Perhaps it is time to have an internal dialogue within the Government and between our treaty partners about precision in language about what an ally is and isn't. And if necessary, we ought to take the bold steps of making formal changes to whom we call allies. It matters. I would contend allies and coalition [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00September 22nd, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Some Thoughts For Rising Professionals

Whether you are a young rising professional or are tagged to be a senior leader's executive assistant, there are some very sound steps to help you get through turbulent waters. Few people want to go through the pain of the steps required to rise through the ranks in the corporate world, but those who have [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00August 25th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Fiddling While Rome Burns and The Right to Be Wrong

It has been a difficult week for liberalism in the world. The notion that people ought to respect the election results even if it puts in power those they oppose isn't working. The idea that cosmopolitanism - diversity and respect for other cultures - is better than everyone looking and thinking the same seems to [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00July 19th, 2016|Blog|4 Comments

Some business and leadership lessons from Brexit and what they mean for the future

How odd that the Washington Post said that the biggest "threat" to the European Union is the will of the people. The Brussels technocrats who have steadfastly maintained a distance between themselves and the people of the member countries all for the ostensible betterment of those people through routine and predictable rules of commerce and [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:03-05:00June 27th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

The Social Contract, The Oregon Trail and New America (Yup, they go together…)

Last week I had a very serendipitous convergence. I had fresh in my memory the day two weeks ago that I spoke to the government classes at our local high school. It's not the kids' fault that they didn't know what the social contract is. The overwhelming sentiment among these seniors was that we should [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00May 25th, 2016|Blog|1 Comment

Professional Lessons From a Great Mentor

Last week, I visited a mentor who arguably taught me the most about professionalism in my early career; lessons that have stayed with me until. John Casciano certainly didn't look like the type that would rise to the highest levels of National Security leadership. Short in stature, he certainly wasn't going to rise based on [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00May 23rd, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Once Again, Actions Speak Louder Than Words

When Air Force General Michael Fortney told his subordinate commanders to root our and do away with Queep (http://www.airforcetimes.com/story/military/2016/05/03/2-star-general-puts-wasteful-queep-duties-crosshairs/83873648/), he continued a long tradition of senior leaders trying to Lean down their operations and do away with those meaningless duties that take away focus from the company's bottom line. Unfortunately, his directive is doomed to [...]

By |2016-05-10T18:40:03-04:00May 10th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Truth Isn’t Good Or Bad, It Just Is

A recent publication of the entire results of a 40 year old study on health and diet puts another nail in the coffin of what "everybody knows" regarding diet and heart disease. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/04/12/this-study-40-years-ago-could-have-reshaped-the-american-diet-but-it-was-never-fully-published/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_most-draw5) This post isn't about what we should or shouldn't be eating. It is about truth in research and completeness in our search [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00April 13th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Newsmaker – Reflections On A Republic’s Threatened Defense

Well, it happened again...I have to find space on my reading list by taking off a book to make room for a book that needs to go on it. My own rule is that to keep the list on one piece of paper (front and back), if I want to add a title to the [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00March 30th, 2016|reading recommendation|0 Comments

Critical Thinking For Leaders

In previous posts we discussed how leaders have a responsibility to create organizational clarity, ensure the organization's identity and direction, create an organizational structure to meet the long-term objectives, to stay above the day-to-day fray and let their subordinates do their jobs, and to learn to say "I don't know." That all still applies. But [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00March 11th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Truth Doesn’t Change Based on the Rank of the Recipient

I was overseas in 1997, on assignment in a Middle East country in what could only be described as an "everybody-has-to-go-through-it" temporary assignment. My predecessor had told me that the bad guys had slowly, over time, moved a host of military equipment to locations in violation of UN Security Council resolutions. But those movements didn't [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00March 1st, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Distilling Senior Leader Responsibilities

In previous posts we discussed the importance of senior leaders focusing on the long-range vision and strategy and leaving the day-to-day “doing” to your doers. But through lots of feedback and discussions in the field, it is time to put out another post on how to do that. Leaving the doing to the doers does [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00February 17th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

Some Thoughts On Critical Thinking

The benefit of applying critical thinking methodology to all aspects of life is that you are rarely surprised, and when you are, you can more easily adapt. But the hard part is that, at first, you will be nearly universally scorned by those who either can't or won't think critically. Those that listened heard me correctly on [...]

By |2016-02-11T22:38:50-05:00February 11th, 2016|Blog|2 Comments

Goodness Breeds Goodness…Really

This is my first Maxim for leaders. It seems strange to many that I speak of goodness before market share or process refinement or the importance of a corporate strategic plan. But I put it first deliberately and not for some pretend altruism. Before all else, goodness can make an organization. No matter your job, [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:04-05:00February 2nd, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

More is more. You have to make it better.

More is better, right? More food for less money at the buffet; trackers on every shipping container to know what is inside and where it is in the world; more watts for less money per light bulb; more gigabytes of data per month on your mobile phone plan; more surveillance to help stop terrorist attacks. But [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00January 11th, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

This Week, Review and Renew Your Most Important Truth

Who are you and what do you want to be? Those are the two most important questions any business leader must answer when beginning a new business or job. And it is always important to review what you said when you started and renew your commitment to those answers at the beginning of each new [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00January 3rd, 2016|Blog|0 Comments

How Much Willpower Do You Have?

Roy Baumeister (professor of social psychology at Florida State) and John Tierney (long time science correspondent for the New York Times) call Willpower the greatest human strength in the book's very subtitle. A bold statement, and a challenge to hook both the professional who wants more willpower or the one who thinks he has [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00December 4th, 2015|reading recommendation|0 Comments

Why We Don’t See “It” Coming – Mind Candy

The small ethnic European restaurant in the small town in middle America was hurting. The owner/chef made great food, but tables were empty most nights. The reviews on social media were less than stellar with many pointing out that the restaurant sold out of some top menu items more regularly than they should. After meeting with [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00October 19th, 2015|Blog|0 Comments

Long Lost Gem Refound

Everyone finds them on occasion -- those long lost or never known gems of books that offer profound common sense that we all know we should use, try to use, or actually do use every day.  While reading through Maria Popova's outstanding web site, I was so intrigued by her review of William Beveridge's [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00October 7th, 2015|reading recommendation|0 Comments

Some Dos and Don’ts of Hiring a Consultant

How do you know when it is time to seek an outside view of your operations or to seek advice? And if you do, what should you consider in selecting a partner to give you honest, critical and unemotional feedback and advice? First, allow me to relate an allegorical story that is true in the sense [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:05-05:00September 28th, 2015|Blog|0 Comments

Accept Uncertainty and Thrive

One of the greatest challenges senior leaders face is dealing with uncertainty and ambiguity in all aspects of operations from strategic decision-making to daily tasks. When margins are narrow and your key variables are uncertain, it is naturally understandable to wait for more information before making decisions.  However, the longer a leader waits for information [...]

By |2015-09-21T15:15:28-04:00September 21st, 2015|Blog|0 Comments

Was Huntington Right?

Yesterday's news presented two articles (one by the Washington Post and the other on the blog, Medium) that seemed widely disparate, one about retired general David Petraeus remaining in the limelight well after his ignominious retirement, and the other about xenophobia in Germany against Muslim foreigners. What could these articles possible have in common? Samuel Huntington. [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:06-05:00August 18th, 2015|Blog|4 Comments

The Dangers of Coddling Our Young Minds

The Atlantic just released a much needed and very important long think-piece titled "The Coddling Of The American Mind".  Just at the time I have been considering withdrawing from the academic game due to the issues raised in the article, Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt sound the warning that by stifling all speech - beyond [...]

By |2017-11-23T18:26:06-05:00August 11th, 2015|Blog|0 Comments

There Is No Magic Pixie Dust

The first role of the leader is to develop and maintain clarity of purpose in an organization. That clarity is required no matter the ease or difficulty of the environment or business climate. With clarity must come truth, no matter how difficult it is to accept. Strategic planning is only as sound as the leaders' willingness [...]

By |2015-08-03T12:58:48-04:00August 3rd, 2015|Blog|1 Comment
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