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Empire, leadership development, innovation, creativity, and warfare. Maybe I worry about it too much, but when we look at the history of the world it seems the decline of empire is usually due to a decline in leadership and leader development. Perhaps a decline in the strong advocacy of stellar leadership and bold ideas and …
I'm sure all the "old" folks out there recall the phrase "It's the economy, stupid." In the realm of leadership... we might look at this infamous phase in a deeper and slightly new light. While on a U.S. National Level.... it appears to still be about the economy (more or less, COVID, etc)... but on a …
Continue reading "It’s the Strategy, Stupid…or How Did I Get Here? DeMarco Banter…"
Or…what would Sir John Glubb Pasha say…Part 1 History has much to teach and offer in terms of empire’s rise and decline. Great empires of the past such as Britain, Spain, Islam, Rome, Persia, and Babylon rose and fell over a period of centuries. Even Niccolo Machiavelli’s 1532 signature work, The Prince was a study …
Continue reading "The “Enlightened Rebel’s” Guide to Empire: DeMarco Banter"
Very cool to be on Paul Bright’s “Bright Insights” Podcast—thank you for the invite Paul—wonderful to talk with you. Click here: https://link.chtbl.com/Demarcopart1 iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/k-is-for-knowledge-part-1-with-bill-demarco/id1468714783?i=1000488364213 From Paul’s Show notes: I'm very excited to bring you part one of this discussion with retired Air Force Colonel Bill DeMarco, Chair of Air University's Leadership Department and forerunner of …
Driving home the other day, Creedence Clearwater Revival’s epic tune “Have You Ever Seen the Rain” was on the radio and it got me thinking. What is the song about? Clearly it is the end of a happy time—but to what end? A quick Google search reveals it is actually about John Fogerty’s brother Tom …
Continue reading "Have You Ever Seen The Rain? Or The Decline of Empire Part II: DeMarco Banter"
“Reason shows us there is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” ― Seneca, Letters from a StoicFailure is an inside job--inside our head. So is success--all depending on how we define it. If we want to achieve, we have to win the war in our mind first. We can’t let the …
Continue reading "Stoic Thinking and Failure: Adjust Your Thinking–DeMarco Banter"
A bud of mine, Josh Zaker, passed this piece to me over 8 years ago and I came across it again just the other day. It was written for Foreign Affairs in the Spring of 1957... amazing at how relevant Dr Kissinger's words are still for us 63 years later. I have pasted the conclusion …
Continue reading "Strategy and Organization by Henry Kissinger Foreign Affairs (Apr 1957)"
In all the classes we teach here at ACSC on leadership—mentoring is always a topic that comes up. In the past decade or so—there has been increased talk of “coaching” vs mentoring and honestly, it is an interesting conversation. I worry at times we get stuck in the minutiae and forget the big picture—what are …
Personality has a lot to do with how we understand Niccolo Machiavelli. We have talked about how misunderstood the man may have been here on the blog many times. Recently I picked up a somewhat newer translation of The Prince with an introduction by Tom Butler-Bowdon and reading through Butler-Bowdon's intro it only confirms my …
Continue reading "Leadership: Machiavelli The Misunderstood: Neo-DeMarcoian Thought"
With Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) we find ourselves in interesting times—one might even say unprecedented; but I work with academics, and this was mentioned on a text the other day to which the response was, "These are actually precedented times." What does that even mean? Unprecedented: never done or known before. Precedented: Provided with or having …
Continue reading "Thucydides, The Plague of Athens, COVID-19 and Leadership–DeMarco Banter"
