Military leadership for engineers: A comprehensive look at leadership from army doctrine to engineering course work

Abstract

Engineers and engineering educators realize that engineering is a team effort and leadership is inherent to a team's success. Engineering project completion from ideation to implementation requires engineers to provide influence in an often-complicated group of multi-disciplinary professionals. In other words, leading is inherent to success as an engineer. ABET recognizes this reality with student outcome number five where students must demonstrate, 'an ability to function effectively on a team whose members together provide leadership, create a collaborative and inclusive environment, establish goals, plan tasks, and meet objectives. Because engineering has traditionally not been considered a leadership profession, many engineers and engineering educators may be unfamiliar with, or even averse to leadership principles and processes. One profession that may be a resource for leadership principles and insight is the Profession of Arms, and more specifically, the U.S. Army. Officers and soldiers are often referred to as leaders and as an organization, the Army maintains a high degree of public confidence. Unfortunately, less than one percent of the U.S. population serves in the military and recently, there are concerns that the Army is becoming a family business; many of those serving come from families with a record of service. As a result, engineers and engineering educators may be unfamiliar with or misperceive the principles of leadership within the Army because 1) they have no affiliation with the Army or 2) they have gained a perception of military leadership through what they see in Hollywood. The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive overview of Army leadership through the lens of the United States Military Academy at West Point (West Point). Leadership principles, education, and training are reviewed from guiding doctrinal principles through an institution-level leader development system, and into specific coursework that focuses on leader development. Finally, the paper situates these leadership principles in the capstone design experiences of students: a venue within undergraduate engineering education where leadership is often addressed. The goal of this paper is to make more explicit how leadership works within the Army and West Point, to give engineering educators additional tools and models that they may consider in developing engineering leadership programs and processes within their own institution.