Two of the most common questions we get asked about is “how do I get my people to be more empowered?” and “how do I hold my people accountable”? They are both great questions. You can’t truly address one without the other, because empowerment and accountability are two sides of the same coin.

Perhaps the best illustrations of this is the relationship between Officers and the NCOs in the United States military, when it’s done right. It’s unlike anything you’ll find in the private sector, and it hardly makes sense at first glance. But through generations of refinement, the military has figured out a system that both clearly defines authority and actively promotes empowerment. For all of it’s inefficiencies, the military knows what it’s doing when it comes to small unit leadership.

As one of our Army buddies says it best, “the Army is all about leadership and people.”

We agree.

And since people and leadership happen to be two of the primary ingredients in any world class team, it’s worth digging in to uncover some insights about empowerment and accountability that transcend any leadership situation, across any sector.

The military has two primary pathways to serve within, the officer and the enlisted ranks (a third is warrant officer, which is far less common). Officers must start their journey in a commissioning source like the US Military Academy at West Point (Blayne’s alma mater), while enlisted personnel start at Basic Training. Both have their initial training, both have advanced training, both have specific leadership training courses as they progress through the ranks. And both, are critical to mission success.

This system of dual, mutually supportive leadership is actually a key ingredient to the secret sauce of the Army.

As enlisted personnel progress into formal leadership positions, they become Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) taking on the rank of Sergeant, then continue on into the Senior NCO ranks through time, proficiency, and performance.

Leadership at the platoon level gives us a great illustration of the Officer-NCO relationship that exposes critical insights to how empowerment and accountability work hand in hand.

The platoon is typically composed of about 40 personnel with one officer, the Platoon Leader (PL), and one Platoon Sergeant (PSG), plus four Squad Leaders (who are Staff Sergeants), who each have two Sergeants reporting to them. The PL is typically a Lieutenant, in their initial leadership assignment while the PSG is a Sergeant First Class, (SFC, Brandon’s rank upon exiting service), and in the “middle management” stage of their career.

The PL and PSG must operate as one to generate effective and sustainable results.

Together, the platoon is unstoppable. Divided, the platoon is laughable.

Brandon shares some of his observations from his time in the NCO ranks:

In the Rangers, we have some of the Army’s finest Lieutenants and Jr. Captains running platoons. By the time they arrive, they have already led a PLT, and passed Ranger Assessment and Selection Program. When they do arrive, they are met by NCOs who have most likely “grown up” in the Ranger Battalion.

For example, I was a Private in the 2nd Ranger Battalion and grew up through the ranks until becoming a Staff Sergeant (SSG), leading a 9 man Ranger Assault and Weapons Squad in combat, and then ultimately progressed to become a SFC at the Ranger Regiment’s Assessment and Selection Program (which at the time was called R.I.P.).

Our PL’s were smart, driven, competent, and capable leaders who had experience as PL’s in the Army Infantry, and were now getting their first entry into Special Operations. Basically, they were the very best that the Army had to offer.

As new PL’s (and Rangers), setting the conditions for success was critical. I have seen it done poorly, primarily when pride and identity rear their ugly heads (both on the parts of the NCOs and the officers) resulting in damaging effects on the platoon. The team becomes fractured as unnecessary “battle lines” are drawn between leaders, creating confusion for the men.

And I’ve seen it done well, primarily when both the NCOs and Officers embrace their respective authority and responsibility, creating incredible benefit for the mission and the team. When everyone is aligned in a Ranger PLT, we have a name for that. We call that PLT the “main effort”, the PLT that leads the way for the rest of the unit.

Setting the conditions sounded a lot like clear guidance and expectations from both parties. It was a dialogue.

After seeing this enough times to understand what right looks like, I settled into an approach with new PL’s that came to Ranger Battalion. Later in my career, young Lieutenants I had the honor to teach in Infantry Basic Officer Leader Course, heard some version of this “PL Speech”, which established unity up front, along with clear empowerment and accountability.

Keep in mind, as a Ranger I was in the same unit for 9 years, talking to a newly assigned PL. As a PLT Trainer I was a Senior NCO with 11 years in service talking to young men who had just graduated college. They had been in the Army for about 3 months, and in 2008, they knew they would take an Infantry PLT into combat within the year.

Nearly every one of those young studs asked me the same question, “how do I talk to my PSG when I get to my unit, and how do I empower them?”

I would answer, “well, first, say ‘hello, my name is (fill in your name)’ and go from there. Next, here’s how we would receive our PLs in Ranger Battalion and I hope you experience the same…”

The key elements follow:

One, you are the officer, we are the NCOs. We chose to be NCOs and are proud of that; you have formal legal authority over this platoon (and me), and there is no conflict or discussion about this fact.
Two, we are a team, we fight for one another, we fight besides one another, we do not fight against one another. We may disagree behind closed doors, but we walk out shoulder to shoulder.
Three, you are our critical link to the commander and the greater Task Force, and that is where your authority is critical for the entire PLT. We will not let you fall. Hold us accountable to this. We won’t let you fall because you are one of us, but there will be times that we need you to back away and let us work. We need you to trust us and empower us to do that.
Finally, you have responsibility for this entire PLT, we have responsibility for our Rangers, our squads, and our sections. As a result, you have to stay back from the front line. We need you looking into the entire battlespace, not looking through your weapon sites…Oh, and if you find yourself up front in the stack, I will remove you, and put you back behind us. Because we need you, and we need you to do your part as we do our parts.

Blayne shares an experience from the officer ranks:

I graduated from West Point in June of 2001, ready to be done with school and eager to lead. I was frankly tired of the ‘pretend Army’ and couldn’t wait for the real thing. While I was still in my officer basic course, I sat and watched a TV as the events of 9/11/2001 unfolded. Suddenly, my future role as a platoon leader came into sharp focus. It seemed likely that I’d be leading me into combat - and I wanted to.

In December, I showed up to my first assignment full of energy and purpose. It was finally time to take over a platoon and put all of my training into action. It didn’t take me long to realize that my new platoon sergeant, SFC Avila, didn’t exactly share my level of enthusiasm. SFC Avila was a grizzled veteran of the US Army and had spent nearly 20 years in tank platoons. He’d seen countless platoon leaders come and go over his career, and I don’t think he’d been particularly impressed with any of them. It was clear from the start that he really just wanted me to stay out of the way. In some ways, I couldn’t blame him, at 46 years years old, he was literally twice my age and knew 10x what I did about leading a tank platoon. It is a bit odd for the least experienced person in the platoon to be in charge. On the other hand, I knew, as young as I was, that I had both the skill and the mandate to fulfill my role as platoon leader. For me, it wasn’t so much about authority as it was about responsibility.

At first, I was just frustrated. Who did this guy think he was, trying to shut me down before I ever even got started? But rather than try to wrestle control away from SFC Avila, I decided to take a little time and let things develop. My goal was to do everything within my role to the absolute best of my ability, while soaking up as much knowledge as I could about the tanks, weapons, and the men. I’d qualify ‘expert’ with my rifle and pistol, earn the max score on the physical fitness test, write crisp operations orders, and spend my days turning wrenches with my tank crew. I figured that after a while, he’d acknowledge my leadership (or at least competence) and soften his stance. Well, that didn’t happen, at least not as quickly as I’d hoped. So I finally decided to sit him down and have a heart-to-heart, which he wasn’t super stoked about.

I’ll never forget sitting knee cap to knee cap in our tiny little platoon office to have this conversation. I was nervous and had been psyching myself up all day. Despite my trepidation, the words came out - and this is where I made my stand on empowerment and accountability. I share five points with SFC Avila that I thought he’d respect. And I hoped that, just maybe, he’d come around. I told him:

I’m assigned as the platoon leader and no matter what, I am ultimately responsible for everything the platoon does or fails to do. I take that responsibility seriously.
I am happy to delegate you the authority you need to do your job. I have no desire to do your job. I know that you’re good at it and I need you to be.
I trust you to do a great job and to do the right thing, but we are going to communicate and there is going to be accountability. Nobody is perfect and two sets of eyes are better than one.
We have to be a team. We refine each other. If something needs to be fixed, we’ll figure it out together and speak with a unified voice to the platoon.
We might be going to war. The platoon needs both of us to be doing our respective jobs at the highest level. We are much better off with both of our ‘paddles in the water.’

That day, it clicked for SFC Avila. He told me that although he knew how to run a tank platoon, he wanted and needed me to relay the commander’s intent and provide guidance. He wanted me to plan and write operations orders. He wanted me to make sure that the platoon had the resources it needed to be successful. And he wanted me to have his back. Too easy. From that point forward, we were off and running. And over the next year, we built the highest performing platoon in the battalion.

We were both very fortunate to learn the direct relationship between empowerment and accountability early in our careers. We experienced how they were the driving force behind the sharing and distribution of power within leadership teams. After leaving the Army, we’ve sometimes struggled to emplace this dynamic in the private and social sectors, but have always found it to be worth the effort and highly effective.

Three critical insights into the marriage of empowerment and accountability follow from our experience leading people over the last two decades:

Inextricably Linked: Empowerment and accountability are two sides to the same coin. We cannot have one without the other. Leaders must provide guidance, resources, and support (empowerment) and that must be buttressed by transparent measurement, evaluation, and refinement (accountability). Your people need to know what you need them doing, and they need to know how they are doing.
Delegation and Dilution: Good leaders are comfortable with delegating authority. They can give their people the specific (or diluted) portion of authority required to make decisions, secure resources, and execute the mission. With that authority comes a certain level of responsibility. But it is important to note that the leader always retains full responsibility. Responsibility can be delegated, but never diluted.
Routine Practice: Empowerment and accountability are not acute moments in time. They must be consistently and actively practiced. Accountability doesn’t just happen at mid-year and end-of-year performance reviews. And empowerment doesn’t just occur at task assignment. If you want your people to feel empowered, consistently ensure that they have the guidance, resources, and support they need. If you want to be accountable, you must check in with them regularly to let them know if they are on, or off, course.

Regardless of whether you’re leading a Special Mission Unit, growing a start-up, or running a large corporation, you’re unlikely to accomplish anything meaningful without highly effective leadership - and that requires both empowerment and accountability. Because just like officers and NCOs in the Army, they are two sides of the same coin.

Cover Photo Credit: US Army, 75th Ranger Regiment