Leadership in Unexpected Places (eBook)
196 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
9798317821241 (ISBN)
Jon Michaels spent close to ten years on active duty with the United States Marines as a captain and naval aviator. He flew the CH-53E Super Stallion and was deployed twice overseas, then finished his military career as a flight instructor teaching new lieutenants how to fly. He then attended graduate school and received a master of business administration degree. After working with his family's jewelry business, Jon transitioned to the energy and environment space, where he has since been dedicating his time and efforts. He lives in San Francisco with his wife, two sons, and dog. He is also the author of Say Yes: Foundational Lessons from Combat Town, the Quigley, and Taking Invisible Paths.
What if the best leadership lessons don't come from CEOs, politicians, all-star athletes, or celebrities-but from people you've never heard of?Leadership in Unexpected Places goes beyond the usual big names you see online the ones everyone posts about and instead shares stories you likely haven't heard but won't soon forget. Each one offers inspiration, along with practical lessons you can apply to develop your own leadership style. You'll read about: - The man who volunteered to be imprisoned in a notorious Nazi concentration camp, Auschwitz, and led a secret resistance by using fake carpentry skills and even lice to torment his captors. - The hidden biases that cause us to follow the wrong leaders and how to find better ones. - How a small-town firefighter knew exactly when to call "e;Mayday"e; to save a trapped colleague inside a burning house. - An inner-city chess team and their determined coaches who defied expectations and won a national championship. - The psychology behind why authenticity and reliability not fame or charisma are the real foundations of leadership. - A young woman who learned to swim with a rope tied around her waist and went on to shatter expectations (and maybe invented the bikini and a new type of swim goggles along the way). If you've ever wondered what kind of leader you want to be or doubted you're "e;ready"e; to lead these stories will show you that real leadership starts with character, not a title. When it's time to lead, don't look up. Look around. You'll find leadership in unexpected places and extraordinary power in ordinary people.
Introduction
“The CO wants to speak with all officers in the ready room in fifteen minutes. Be there.”
Thus came the directive from our squadron executive officer (XO), informing us of the commanding officer’s intent to meet with all the squadron pilots. An unplanned, all-officer meeting on short notice certainly provided a clue that something was up. It didn’t take long to find out what it was.
We gathered as ordered. The ready room is the heartbeat of squadron flight operations. It’s where pilots conduct pre- and post-flight briefings and the operation duty officer monitors flight progress. The daily flight schedule is posted and tracked on a giant whiteboard at the front of the room. There is a constant flow of officers in and out, and the crackle of the radio and near-constant ringing of the phone make for a busy space.
The rows of seats quickly filled. The XO called, “Attention on deck,” as the CO entered. The CO directed us to sit and began his comments.
“One of our sister squadrons down the flight line is heading to Iraq next week. Due to an unexpected situation, they are short two pilots. We have been asked to provide replacements who will become part of that squadron and join them for the deployment. These are typically six months, but the reality is it could end up being much longer than that. No way to know how long it will be or when these volunteer replacements might come back.”
It was the spring of 2003, and the United States had recently started war with Iraq. This was a period of high operational tempo, as the military was coming off a year of heavy activity in Afghanistan in response to the attacks of September 11, 2001. My fellow squadron pilots and I hadn’t been involved in any of that activity because we were part of a training squadron. We were responsible for instructing recent flight school graduates on how to fly the CH-53E Super Stallion helicopter and providing refresher training to more experienced pilots who were coming off land-based assignments.
“I need two volunteers,” the CO continued. “Come see me tomorrow if you are up for it.”
There it is. Decision time.
I went home that night and thought about my options. I didn’t need to volunteer and could easily have ridden out my remaining time on active duty staying just where I was, teaching new lieutenants to fly. It was an important job and carried the benefit of being able to go home every night, as training squadrons don’t deploy overseas. Rather, they train the pilots who then go to squadrons that deploy overseas.
I had been on active duty for eight years. After having been stationed previously in San Diego and twice deployed overseas, I was settling into my new assignment as a flight instructor in North Carolina. It was during that time I decided that while I loved being a Marine, I didn’t want to do it for the rest of my career and instead started making plans to leave active duty. Graduate school, a master’s degree in business, and a civilian career were next for me.
Then again, no one joins the Marines to sit through two wars on their couch. Two wars? Yep, we were talking about more than just Iraq, and this was an additional reason the decision immediately in front of me weighed heavily. Just a week after the attacks of September 11, I had orders to leave my San Diego unit following a six-month deployment to the Persian Gulf. No 9/11-related military operations had started in that week, so I checked out of that squadron as planned, packed my belongings, and made the drive across the country from California to my new unit in North Carolina. Just a week after I checked out, though, the unit I had been with was given orders to head to Afghanistan. So, by just a few days, I missed deploying as part of that campaign. My timing was either really good or really bad, depending on how you look at it.
That was the first war I missed. Here we were again, about eighteen months later, and this time I had a choice to make about deploying to a war zone.
How do I begin to think about this decision? What will guide me in the next twenty-four hours?
Decision time
Decisions, both big and (seemingly) small, are often hard to make. There is context to consider, information to seek out, and multiple perspectives to evaluate. One must take in all available information and combine that with our prior life experience, learnings, and intuition to help guide us to a decision.
Publicly shared lessons from other leaders, while likely not having encountered the exact same situation and decision point, who have shared their personal philosophies, leadership approaches, and decision-making constructs can seem like valuable resources. It makes sense, as there are lots of famous people who routinely share their leadership advice and suggestions. Why not look to them for help and follow their advice?
Many thoughts swirled through my head that night back in 2003—you might call it a casserole of ideas—as I took a hard look at myself and my options and thought about how to make that decision. I could do the easy thing and stay home. I could do the harder thing and volunteer to deploy. As a Marine officer, how do I be the leader I need to be? I can tell you, though, what I didn’t think about. I didn’t think about the NFL quarterback or the Super Bowl MVP and the lessons we are routinely told about what made them successful. The latest CEO to grace the front page of the Wall Street Journal was not top of mind. I’m an avid reader of history, though I have to admit that how Abraham Lincoln assembled a team of rivals and led our country through the Civil War did not impact my thinking as I grappled with the decision immediately in front of me.
Why are those among the types of people that immediately come to mind when the topic of leadership arises? The politician. The CEO. The superstar athlete. I think it’s because there is a tendency to seek easily identifiable and readily available sources of inspiration. We don’t, however, understand the problems and issues that come with looking to popular—or what I’ll call celebrity—leaders for advice. We are not carefully examining the biases that we are all susceptible to and how they will cloud our thinking. It’s almost as if our brains have been hijacked by who we think we should follow, and we ultimately end up looking in the wrong place.
Instead, I suggest looking to the everyday leaders all around us: to the historical figures we may not have heard of before but have accomplished great things; to the seemingly ordinary people who surround us and can offer inspiration in a more relatable way than a celebrity leader. I am going to challenge you to think about the world in an unusual way—to think differently about who you look to for leadership and inspiration.
Part 1 sets the scene and describes examples of famous and noteworthy people who are often served up by the megaphone of social media as leaders to emulate. The problem, though, is that many aren’t the leaders they are made out to be. Those who are may be worthy of study, but their fame and notoriety make it too difficult for us ordinary people to internalize their lessons and follow their advice.
Part 2 contains the profiles of five everyday leaders with impressive accomplishments. This journey starts with the story of a Polish farmer who volunteered to go to the infamous Nazi death camp Auschwitz to uncover information about the growing horrors that were beginning to unfold there. Next comes the story of a housewife turned environmental activist who organized her community in Love Canal, New York, to fight against toxic waste contamination, leading to the president of the United States creating a nationwide program to prevent this from happening again.
The next chapter examines our natural tendencies to look to famous people for leadership and inspiration and the well-established biases we fall prey to that cloud our thinking. That is followed by the story of a modern-day volunteer firefighter from a small New England town who leads the department with commitment and determination. From that small town, we travel to New York City’s Harlem neighborhood and meet an unlikely team of junior-high chess players who at first glance might not be expected to know the difference between a bishop and a parish priest. Well, the Raging Rooks proved their doubters wrong and offer valuable lessons through their story. After that is an examination of why it makes sense to look to everyday people for leadership advice and inspiration. Our final profile takes us to the English Channel, where a young woman attempts an audacious first.
Part 3 is where all these individual lessons come together. These chapters identify the common leadership themes among these ordinary people and how everyone can strive to benefit from the examples they set.
Leadership doesn’t have to be hard. Leadership doesn’t have to be intimidating. It can be approachable and accessible. It should be fun and rewarding. What can help is a simple set of relatable stories, experiences, and role models to learn from. This is especially true for those early in their professional careers who are working to develop their own leadership style and approach. By looking at the everyday...
| Erscheint lt. Verlag | 19.11.2025 |
|---|---|
| Sprache | englisch |
| Themenwelt | Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Beruf / Finanzen / Recht / Wirtschaft |
| ISBN-13 | 9798317821241 / 9798317821241 |
| Informationen gemäß Produktsicherheitsverordnung (GPSR) | |
| Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt? |
EPUB (Ohne DRM)Größe: 2,1 MB
Digital Rights Management: ohne DRM
Dieses eBook enthält kein DRM oder Kopierschutz. Eine Weitergabe an Dritte ist jedoch rechtlich nicht zulässig, weil Sie beim Kauf nur die Rechte an der persönlichen Nutzung erwerben.
Dateiformat: EPUB (Electronic Publication)
EPUB ist ein offener Standard für eBooks und eignet sich besonders zur Darstellung von Belletristik und Sachbüchern. Der Fließtext wird dynamisch an die Display- und Schriftgröße angepasst. Auch für mobile Lesegeräte ist EPUB daher gut geeignet.
Systemvoraussetzungen:
PC/Mac: Mit einem PC oder Mac können Sie dieses eBook lesen. Sie benötigen dafür die kostenlose Software Adobe Digital Editions.
eReader: Dieses eBook kann mit (fast) allen eBook-Readern gelesen werden. Mit dem amazon-Kindle ist es aber nicht kompatibel.
Smartphone/Tablet: Egal ob Apple oder Android, dieses eBook können Sie lesen. Sie benötigen dafür eine kostenlose App.
Geräteliste und zusätzliche Hinweise
Buying eBooks from abroad
For tax law reasons we can sell eBooks just within Germany and Switzerland. Regrettably we cannot fulfill eBook-orders from other countries.
aus dem Bereich
