Is it Better to be Feared or Loved as a Leader?

In my first year of ROTC our instructor posed us the question "As a leader, would you rather be feared or loved?"  After several minutes of debate filled with logical fallacies, personal anecdotes, and poor reasoning, the class was stumped for an answer and more entrenched in their opinions than they had been at the start of class.  Our instructor swooped in with the trick answer of "Why not both?", claiming that a Platoon Leader and Platoon Sergeant together could play both sides of the coin for maximum leadership.  At the time I nodded my head, told myself that as the PL it was my job to be loved, and moved on.

But years after that class, the question still plagues me.  I still hold firmly to the belief that I had in that class: being loved will drive your followers to go above and beyond, being feared will drive your followers to do just enough to avoid punishment.  Picturing a young private alone and unsure, I believed that him loving me his leader would drive him to not just clean his weapon to the standard, but until it was carbon free.  He would clean his weapon to impress me.  If I were a feared leader, he would have no reason to clean it beyond what was acceptable.  He would clean it enough to avoid my wrath, and be done with the task.  So I still believe that without any confounding factors, a leader who is loved beats one who is feared.  But leadership doesn't happen in a vacuum.

A friend who was in that first year ROTC class and who recently attended Ranger School wrote a piece Tax Summary 2012 in which he talked a little about the dichotomy of leadership between love and fear.  The post is incredibly well written, deep, and touches on a myriad of topics.  I plan to write several more responses to different parts, but for now we will focus on leadership in combat.  Doris writes:

when it comes to the lethal small unit missions Ranger school trains for, masculinity inspires more confidence in the troops and more fear in the enemy. It enables longer movements through harsher conditions in shorter times. I’m not going to bother to explain this any further, because any soldier reading this will agree with me, and any non-soldier reading this doesn’t have much leg to stand on. I’m not sure why this is: perhaps it is due to human nature, or perhaps it is due to deeply ingrained sexism. But for the time being, it is absolutely true.

 Now this made me think.  Is it really better to be loved?  Is Doris wrong?  Couldn't you just inspire your subordinates with the best OPORD brief ever seen, and get them to go above and beyond for you during your mission?  Maybe being feared is better? Sometimes?  For the past week and a half I have been thinking about that article.  I've thought about it, talked with friends, and thought about it more.  This post is my attempt to articulate my findings and provide a justification for my updated view on leadership.

My new view on leadership: Why not both?  Yes I have reverted to the trick answer, but this time I recognize the ability for the same leader to inspire both fear and reverence.  I still believe that given the best circumstances, and enough time inspirational leadership will drive your subordinates farther than distress based leadership.  But leadership doesn't happen in a vacuum.  We don't have infinite time in combat[1].  We have a very short amount of time to impress upon soldiers what needs to happen or where they need to be.  In that situation trying to inspire them to do something is not the ideal way to do it.  In fact it would be more efficient to scream at them to move rather than to 'inspire' them to move (I am not even sure how to do that).  In doing so, you might even 'inspire organized violence' (to again quote Doris) in your soldier, so that after they move they will be more aggressive with the enemy they find there than they would have been if you had coaxed them into moving.

Being a 'feared leader' doesn't mean you have to be malicious.  It means being blunt and loud and ignoring other's feelings.  Sometimes that method of leadership is what is needed.  In fact calling it being feared isn't entirely correct.  You don't have to kick your subordinates in the direction you want them to move, you can yell and curse and be extreme in that regard.

So I have been inspired to change my view of leadership.  I now recognize the place of fear-based leadership.  I still believe that inspirational leadership is the better to use in general, and fits my personality better, but it isn't the only answer.

I intend to write more about this (and much more about Tax Summary 2012) in subsequent posts, but I want to get this piece out as a starting point.


[1] Neither I nor Doris have been in combat, but I believe that we can both speak intelligently on the subject.