On Leadership and Crisis Management

If you intend to read something today or over the weekend, I highly encourage you to read this transcript from Freakonomics Radio from their story "A Mouse in the Salad." Fair warning, it is a little long, but well worth it all the way to the end. You can also find the podcast download here. It is a very interesting and well told story regarding leadership and crisis management.

On Tuesday July 26th the House Armed Services Committee subcommittee on Military Readiness intends to hold a hearing to explore the future of the aircraft carrier fleet, the depletion of pre-positioned stocks, the grounding of the F-22 fleet, training deficiencies, and unfunded requirements. Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, General Peter W. Chiarelli, General Joseph F. Dunford, Jr., and General Philip M. Breedlove will be giving testimony.

I believe reading "A Mouse in the Salad" before Tuesday will assist folks in setting expectations for the hearing. You'll see what I mean on Tuesday.

A very clever friend of mine described the way the Navy would handle "A Mouse in the Salad."

Navy's answer to a mouse in the salad would have been to initiate a command investigation, then issue a statement that it couldn't comment on an ongoing investigation. The investigation would have been inconclusive, but the waitress would have been fired, the chef censured, the manager promoted, and the customer ignored.

I think he nailed it.