JJ DID TIE BUCKLE

Justice is about displaying fairness and impartiality in all matters. From discipline and reward, task assignment, and maintaining accountability within the group, being consistent will build trust in your team and earn their respect. Choose no favorites. This applies to both the ones you like and the ones you dislike.

Judgement = Knowledge + Experience + Logical reasoning ability. Also known as Critical Thinking, this trait requires the ability to perceive and understand the information and facts around you. It also requires you to apply the correct theories, estimate consequences, and make reasonable conclusions.

Dependability means your team can rely on you in any situation to support, lead, follow, train, take responsibility, help, or otherwise assist when you are needed. Being dependable is directly related to being present with your people, and always available to them. Moreover, dependability is performing our own jobs so well that our peers or superiors need not get involved in our duties. This is the standard. Become the standard.

Initiative is a leading action and describes the ability to act without being told to because you have identified a need or opportunity that beckons your contribution. Initiative is proactively seeking and taking responsibility and is a quality you instill in your team members through example and coaching.

Decisiveness is the leadership ability to make timely decisions from judgements, with confidence, to settle a matter, set a direction, and have the resolve to follow through with it. People do not follow indecisive leaders for very long. They sidestep them or they learn how to manipulate them. 

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Tact is the ability to discuss or engage in difficult or problematic situations without causing offense. Tact is being direct, transparent, factual, and clear about observations and expectations, without being rude or judgmental.

Disagreement, debate, and correction to standards and expectations are necessary in defining and upholding standards, plans, roles, methods, behaviors, and outcomes. Be respectful and tactful when challenging other’s ideas and contributions, especially in public settings. Tact is a valuable skill to develop when disagreeing with aggressive warriors like Marines, or strong-minded bosses, because the consequences of failure are often severe and immediate.

Conversely, and when you’re feeling froggy for a fun time,

“Tact is the ability to tell someone to go to hell in such a way that they look forward to the trip.” ~Winston Churchill

Integrity is the human quality that demonstrates honor, follows moral principles, seeks truthfulness, and adheres to honesty with everyone. It is tested mostly in the absence of anyone. If someone is missing this trait, they should pursue another path in life because they’re a piece of shit. They can go lay under a tree and fertilize it.

Enthusiasm is defined as the genuine attitude of interest, confidence, and optimism a person displays in the performance of their duties. It’s observable and contagious.

That’s great when everything is bright and shiny and the road is all gold bricks. However, you must also learn to welcome the hardships, joyfully and enthusiastically! When we choose to do difficult things in life, they come with challenging problems to solve. We are also required to do things we dislike because they are necessary. These include enduring cycles of boredom, feeling stress, and navigating chaos. In those moments it’s easy to feel unmotivated, irritated, and overwhelmed.

Look beyond the current situation, towards your future self, in a better place, then smile back at your problems, and get on with it! Joyfully embrace the suck and then outperform it! It doesn’t matter how you feel, it must be done, and these are your Sets & Reps! Enthusiastically improvise, adapt, and overcome. Semper Gumby! 

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Bearing is your stoic presence. You demonstrate it with your professionalism and the impression of confidence and capability you carry in yourself. Your bearing is reflected in your tone, posture, neatness of attire, gait, and overall presence.

Bearing is your guide and compass. Your True-North vision, reasons, and commitment to principles, traits, values, and constancy of purpose. Maintain perspective and strive onwards and upwards always.

Bearing is what you display under pressure instead of losing your temper. Never let them see you sweat. It’s your keen observation to details, facts, professional tact, and enthusiasm in the face of betrayal, lies and deceit (BS), disorder, and chaos. Bearing has limits. Refer to Judgement and Tact.

Marine leaders eat last.

Unselfishness is providing for the needs of your subordinates before yourself and ensuring your advancement is not at the expense of others or their due rewards. This includes the need for your time and attention, food, rest, vacation, supplies, furniture, resources, opportunities, validation, wage increases, and promotion.

Unselfishness is also taking initiative and being useful and helpful without the requirement of a reward or validation. Unselfishness is unattainable without integrity. As leaders, we must keep that selfishness in check in ourselves and others, by using integrity and judgement, and seeking the welfare of our personnel, team, organization, and customers first. You can be selfish all you want in your downtime while you’re doing Sets & Reps!

Courage is the ability to move forward with mental clarity and unyielding purpose in the face of fear and danger. Courage is also the quality of standing up for and saying what is right even in the face of criticism or threat. Courage is also the trait of seeking understanding despite the fear of being viewed as incompetent or challenging.

Moreover, courage is seeking and taking responsibility. It’s the ability to take initiative and accept challenges more difficult than you are currently ready to take on. Always believe goals are within reach, and achievable, with the proper discipline and effort. A little faith and courage will take you on adventures of honor, glory, good times, and treasure. 

Knowledge is defined as the understanding and skills acquired by a person through experience or education. Knowledge is evaluated by competence and effectiveness in the execution of duties related to that field of knowledge.

Business is about solving your customers’ problems with your services. Therefore, problem solving is the number one role of leaders. The ability to learn and apply knowledge quickly and effectively is directly related to your ability to earn. Continually learning to gain new knowledge or enhance current knowledge is a lifetime requirement. 

The more you know and understand about your role and how it relates to everything else in the organization, and the rest of the world for that matter, the less problems you will generate for yourself and others. Moreover, the less problems you will tolerate or accept from others.

Semper Fidelis: Always Faithful. The Marine Corps Motto.

God, Family, Country, Corps. In that order.

Loyalty is an allegiance and faithfulness that is steadfast even in the face of any temptation to renounce, desert, or betray.

In leadership, loyalty is an oath you maintain towards your team and your superiors. This is the highest level of trust. Your team members and leaders must trust that you will support them even when they fail, and you must trust that they will support you when you fail. Loyalty requires integrity and dependability.

Loyalty is also the belief that commitments will be honored even though you or others may privately or openly disagree with the decision. Loyalty applies to all meaningful relationships in life.

In leadership, endurance is the physical, mental, and emotional fitness and fortitude needed to withstand the stress and hardship of your daily life, chores, and responsibilities.

Leadership can be absolutely exhausting work. It’s sometimes like herding wet cats across thin ice, in a blizzard, …. at night, …. uphill, …. both ways. Refer to Enthusiasm and Bearing for more help on this topic.

Sets & Reps!! Eat clean, stay fit, stay rested, stay sharp, stay joyfully froggy. 

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