Idea in Brief
The Problem
The U.S. Army needs its commanders to have competence and character. Yet in a survey of 22,000 soldiers, fully 20% reported serving under a toxic leader.
What Contributed to It
Until last year the service had chosen battalion-level commanders—a linchpin position—by having senior officers independently score each candidate’s personnel file. A file review took about 90 seconds, and the key text examined in each annual performance report was shorter than a typical tweet.
A Better Way
The army undertook an ambitious revamping of its selection process. Each candidate now undergoes four days’ worth of physical, cognitive, communication, and psychological assessments, concluding with an interview carefully designed to reduce bias. The new system holds important lessons for any organization seeking to bolster its talent assessment and promotion practices.
Addressing a class of West Point cadets in 2011, Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates asked bluntly, “How can the army break up the institutional concrete—its bureaucratic rigidity in its assignments and promotion processes—in order to retain, challenge, and inspire its best, brightest, and most-battle-tested young officers to lead the service in the future?” The question was, he said, “the greatest challenge facing your army—and frankly, my main worry.”
