Army Leadership Development Paper

The United States Army has been known for developing leaders for generations. After a decade of war and conflict in places such as Iraq and Afghanistan, the army has altered its expectations of “what right looks like in a “leader” and rightly so. With downsizing and the constant turnover of soldiers the U.S. Army must seize the opportunity to improve consistency and effectiveness of leader development. The Center for Army Leadership’s annual assessment of attitudes and perceptions on leader development (CASAL) identified “Develops Others” as the lowest-rated leader competency for the fifth year in a row. Just over half of Army leaders (59 percent) were regarded as effective at developing others by their subordinates. The CASAL further …show more content…
The survey found moderate levels among civilian supervisors regarding the following: Only 48% were satisfied with the priority the organization places on leader development and developmental training. A little over half (56%) agreed they are provided a real opportunity to improve their skills, less than half (43%) were satisfied with the availability of opportunities to expand the range of their skills (43%) and with developmental assignments that offer experience in other functions in the organization (39%), and less than half (46%) indicated they were satisfied with the way their supervisor creates or calls attention to leader development opportunities. Nearly eight out of ten (78%) agreed that supervisors/team leaders in their work unit support employee development. This is an interesting finding, because while the percentage of agreement is favorable, it is unclear how respondents conceptualized supervisor support for development. Opportunities to improve existing skills and to expand skills through developmental assignments and experiences are useful informal methods of development, but the ratings reflect much lower levels of civilian satisfaction (i.e. the points listed