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 …
36 Short Stoic Versus for the Commander/Leader
For the past several years I have been reading, researching, and thinking a great deal about the ancients and their unique way of looking at leadership. It’s interesting to realize there is indeed nothing new under the sun. All the great leadership books, thoughts, theories can be traced back to the ancients. Today there is …
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Bringing Chaos to Order: A Philosophy for Innovation
Life’s A Dance…until you get punched in the face: DeMarco Banter
Life is a dance— you know the song: “Life's a dance you learn as you go... Sometimes you lead, sometimes you follow Don't worry about what you don't know Life's a dance you learn as you go… That’s cute. Do you believe it? I know dancing is a popular metaphor for life, and I am …
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May the Best Ideas Win: By J. William DeMarco
Eisenhower took office at a time of wars both cold and hot. One of his first actions was a complete rethinking of foreign policy.  Can we learn from Ike’s example? By J. William DeMarco. Link to published article in Stanford's Hoover Digest: https://www.hoover.org/research/may-best-ideas-win Study history, study history. In history lies all the secrets of statecraft. —Winston …
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The Future Leader We Need Now: DeMarco Banter
As the USAF prepares for new challenges and opportunities of the coming decades, it faces sobering 21st-century realities: pandemics, rising state on state competition, global centers of power have become more distributed and the terrorism threat more dispersed. Most importantly, the emerging environment is demonstrating a trend that could prove to be the defining one …
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Crisis, Complexity, and Confusion: Making Change in Large Organizations—DeMarco Banter (video)
With all the COVID impacts, I had the opportunity to speak with the Society of British Neurosurgeons Symposium on making change in large organizations. Click Here
Innovation and a Culture Of Conformity: DeMarco Banter
“Success no longer goes to the country that develops a new fighting technology first, but rather to the one that better integrates it and adapts its way of fighting …Our response will be to prioritize speed of delivery, continuous adaptation, and frequent modular upgrades. We must not accept cumbersome approval chains, wasteful applications of resources …
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Clones and Bad Ideas
We're all clones All are one and one are all We destroyed the government We're destroying time No more problems on the way -Alice Cooper A version of this post also appears on Cambridge's Judge Business School's Blog The Play-Doh Factory Remember Play-doh? If not, Play-Doh is a children’s modeling clay used for arts and …
11 Reminders For Busy Leaders: Just Say NO To Status Quo: Neo-DeMarconian Memories
A short one this week--I found some old notes from our time in the UK. I had these on my desk and just found it to be a great reminder--almost 9 years later. I believe these were originally from Terry Starbucker's site and I still like 'em Learn From History (So You Don’t Repeat It) …


