Officer focused on the mission, not the people

Looking back, I was a harsh leader. I should have carried myself differently and treated the people under my command with more dignity.

I had a woman who came to me one time. She knew our unit was about to be deployed.

“I don’t want to be deployed again right now,” she told me.

She explained all of the reasons why…

•  Her kids were in a difficult season.
•  Her marriage was suffering.
•  She had recently (in her mind, though she had been home the expected amount of time) been deployed, and was just now able to make some progress helping her kids and rebuilding the relationship with her husband.

“We’re all going,” I told her. And— “I even go on these deployments. I practice what I preach!”

Now, to be candid, I had the ability to exclude her from the deployment. And I should have.

I told her, “We’re all going— and that includes you!”

She reminded me, “Sir, if I get pregnant then you can’t deploy me.”

“Now that you’ve told me that,” I replied, “and since I know that’s your motivation for getting pregnant, I’ll go ahead and document this conversation and throw the book at you if you do that in order to dodge this deployment!”

I should have just given her the time she needed and not placed her in that position.

And she was only one of many that I passed over for promotion or made things difficult for because they were worried about their family.

I should have handled so many of those decisions differently.

Carrying post traumatic stress from the things I encountered during deployment… that’s one thing. But, the guilt & shame I carry over how I handled so many of my people is another altogether.