 Good morning. It's great to be here with you. This is intended to be a dialogue so I look forward to after some prepared remarks to talk to you and find out what's on your mind and see how the key challenges of ethics and moral reasoning Land in your mind and how you work your way through them So there's a number of different perspectives that we can talk to this morning I'd like to share with you two years ago. I retired into the Dallas Fort Worth area Returned to the area that was my home of record where I started each year the the Dallas community hosts the military ball and It's an opportunity for retirees to try and figure out if they can get back into uniform they they spent a lot of time together and the occasion was an opportunity to Recognize two great military leaders in the Dallas Fort Worth area one was Ross Perot Who is a name familiar to everyone and the other was Sam Johnson was a retired colonel? Who had been a Thunderbird pilot combat pilot both Korea Vietnam shot down prisoner of war and now a member of Congress? long-standing representative from the Dallas Fort Worth area. I had an opportunity to recognize them their achievements their Contributions to both the the national security Effort as well as to the local community It was a heady affair to stand between these two giants whose names I grew up with as as a young person in the Dallas area To cite them in front of the audience and to applaud them With with all the accolades that we could possibly muster up for people who had earned it over the course of a lifetime As soon as it was over. I I stepped out and was on my way To the parking lot to get my car and head home. I didn't need to see the retirees dancing and Just just the idea of the thought of it was something that I was just going to move along I'm sitting there Standing there on the curb kind of waiting to get the car when I noticed a car pulled up And a lady got out of the car and started heading in my direction now mind you this is You know this is one of those events where we're in our full full dress our dinner dress So complete with metals and stripes and all kinds of different recognition symbolically placed on our uniform I noticed that she was heading in my direction and I You know, I had entertained those conversations that I was anticipating while on active duty as retiree I was going to step aside and let those who were currently serving have an opportunity to engage the public and talk to Them about their service or where they had been over the course of their career. So I I stepped Aside so that she could pass through now having been an aviator in background I could recognize constant bearing and decreasing range and I noticed that she corrected as well and she was headed in my direction So I thought well, this is going to be a conversation about someone in her family who has served and she'd like to recognize Me symbolically and to thank me for what I've done and again I prefer to let those who are currently serving to enjoy those conversations and I I stepped aside again With the hope that she would just kind of continue on but she corrected as well now. It's obvious I'm going to have a face-to-face conversation with someone who I actually preferred not to have one with but I thought well Maybe it's the maybe it's the uniform the campaign the metal there's something that she recognizes that she wants to talk to me About I attempted to make another step to the right and and she corrected as well She walked directly up in front of me with words that I'll always remember She looked at me square in the eye and she said I parked in valet here the keys So don't make any assumptions about what the general public Understands when they recognize you and thank you for your service. I don't think they have a clue what they're recognizing and In fact, you can stand right in front of them in a full uniform and they wouldn't even know you're in uniform So so that's Texas. That's Dallas Fort Worth if you think about the body of experience that you develop over the course of your career and you think of it in terms of a narrative rather than a series of rotations and duty assignments Then there's a new dimension to the whole discussion about what you've experienced and what you've learned over the course of your lifetime you develop a worldview and To come back here and to have an opportunity to talk to you about ethics the temptation is to parse out just the ethical component of that discussion and leave out all the context if You look at biography as the as the story of a personal narrative Then you can see how context influences the way you think and how you approach things There will be defining moments over the course of your personal life as well as your professional life that stays with you and Influences the way you base your decisions and that's essentially how we're going to get to a discussion about ethics moral reasoning judgments building confidence of for those who you serve and Those who you work for in the course of my lifetime I had a couple of select experiences that that have just simply stayed with me I'm in the first class at the Naval Academy as As an upperclassmen or as a senior or a firstee when the first group of women arrived in In the summer of 1976 It's the class of 80 eventually in the fleet in the first Squadron where we bring men and women together in an operational setting on deployed aircraft carriers Over the course of my time in the Navy I Eventually come back to the Navy Naval Academy and serve as a department chairman in the Department of Leadership Ethics and Law and Even though I have almost 35 years of service We tend to come back over the over discussions typically in a bar and we talk about Our experiences in one experience that we often talk about is serving as a department chairman at the Naval Academy Why is that? Well, I remember when I got the call that I was going to the Naval Academy. I was minding my own business I was not looking for orders. I got a call while I was in maintenance control Signing out an airplane to call a detailer and when I first heard the news about going to chair a department at the Naval Academy I was very reluctant because number one my academic preparation had been in international relations and Number two, I didn't know what what leadership ethics and law really was I thought it was a fuzzy area and I didn't see the hard discipline behind it And so I was skeptical and I had a lot of reservations. I Came to enjoy it to embrace it and realize I was given an opportunity to preview the people who I would work with and serve It was a remarkable experience from 1996 to 1998 for me I had arrived in in February of 1996 and Within three weeks, I had a member of the department said hey I just submitted an article to the Washington Post that you might want to read this weekend and it turned out to be page one of the commentary section above the fold with a cartoon that said Annapolis adrift and The whole discussion the whole premise of the article was that there were two messages that the Naval Academy was delivering at the time one was the message for the external audience and the other the more subliminal message was one for the internal audience and essentially the two messages did not compliment each other and in fact one undermined the other So this put in motion a series of events that became very very difficult for the Academy It became very difficult for those who supported Annapolis and it opened the gates to a number of national news media outlets that then descended on the Naval Academy conducting the interviews While midshipmen were trying to go to class very distracting about that time While the public relations machine was trying to respond and react to all the events that were taking place generated by the article News of investigations that had been ongoing that most of us were not aware of were being released one was a drug ring and the other was a car theft ring and All of a sudden with the news that we had midshipmen that were under active investigation and soon to be Arrested we realized that The weight of the article took on new meaning because it appeared like the premise in the assertion seemed to be true So that that is my first month or so being on being the chairman of the Department of Leadership Ethics and Law Which in the article was cited as a leader list department then the chief of naval operations Delivered and addressed to the Naval Institute for their annual meeting and he was booed off the stage three weeks later. He committed suicide and Then another series of events taking place with midshipmen behavior Going over the wall and then getting Every infraction ended up with all kinds of news media associated with it and the question inevitably came back to me What are you teaching them because everything associated with all the stuff that we read is about leadership ethics and law Why can't we get it right? So over time We really work this issue really tried to sink our head into it and understand what was going on One of the things that we learned with time was that when we looked at the demographics of My class my cohort group and compared them to the class of 2000 at the time About 86% of my class my classmates came from what we called a traditional home where there was a single income earner For the class of of 2000 that number was 5% So what we were saying was that in the course of a transition in a young person's life to go from high school to college The scores were off the charts. They were highly competitive. The attrition rates were significantly reduced over time And they were solid good good students and performing well but the transition that was taking place from Being a civilian to being in the military was much different It was different in the sense that In my cohort group when it came to the discussion of values ethics Moral reasoning the challenges associated with being a young person in a community environment What took place in my house in the neighbor's house and across the street and at the recreation center and at church and at school Was not that much? Variance when it came to understanding what was right and what was wrong In fact if we got into trouble we wanted our punishment right away. Whatever you do. Don't tell dad For the class of 2000 when someone got in trouble the first thing that we were going to do is we're going to go get character witnesses Because I'm a good guy and you need to see all these people behind me tell you I'm a good guy What does that really mean? Well, that means that when it comes to accountability responsibility Consequences associated with actions and choices that we took We we want to we want to mulligan. We want to set that aside because I'm a good guy So therefore it shouldn't apply to me, right? So by design the Academy puts artificial pressure on individuals to see what happens when they fail See what happens when they're under the gun by design. We're given an exhaustive list of tasks and things that we have to do and have to report on and we come up short by design and The whole idea is to see okay when things are going so well What kind of decisions are we going to make and how honest are we going to be with ourselves and those around us because after all We're no longer talking about something that's artificial We're talking about something that's part of our our our being who we are and what we do once we are underway and graduate so the idea is That we need consistency in the way we think in the framework in which we make our decisions and it starts in this artificial academic setting where we Test ourselves and then we see how we do under pressure and then we see that we really do need to rely on each other to help each other guide each other and then Police each other when it comes to the standards and morals that we use in the course of our careers Those are good habits that we start But if we're inconsistent if we're inconsistent with the message that we deliver in the classroom and the actions that we Tolerate in the dorm or Bancroft Hall now. We're undermining more than we realize Because after all this is a discussion that most people have not had over the course of their time growing up The formative years the definitive Experiences that individuals have don't have the support of a full-time family member for a lot of reasons and and that's not to Cast judgments. That's just the reality of where we are 23% of the kids that we were looking at had carried a weapon in high school, which is a statistic that was just Extraordinary difficult to comprehend and understand why until you start getting into the neighborhoods This was an active experience for kids that were going through the ethics class They had to participate they had to write they had to write each week and and the whole idea is that we would we would start the week off with a discussion of the classical writings and then bring them forward With the remaining classes during the week with members who had had operational command And so we would use the case method to try and root out now how people anchor their decisions Typically in the first three weeks it would be pretty straightforward, but after three or four weeks The midshipman would get frustrated going. Hey, I just I just want the right answer What is the right answer? Well the right answer In real life is that it's got to withstand the scrutiny of your peers It's got to withstand the judgments of those all around you That your decisions have to be anchored in some logical form of reasoning that take you to a conclusion that can withstand the judgment of peers and That's that's difficult. We can be really really tough on ourselves It's not like we need to to broadcast it to the media to get lots of people involved in it We can be Pretty difficult judges and juries here But that's our environment and that's the formula that has made us work together well and when we undermine that with our behavior or with the judgments that we make over the course of our Experiences whether they're operational or whether they're in the classroom or even if they're personal Then It's not as if we can be two or three different people. It's not as if we can pretend that what goes on Liberty stays on Liberty, which was a long-standing Sort of mantra that we heard when I was growing up in the Navy. It doesn't work that way people can see right through that so when in the course of my career I had opportunities as was mentioned in the introduction to live in the Middle East and To work as the vice chief and work some of these issues at a much broader higher level and then to go out into the Pacific and then work again with leaders sailors 125,000 sailors we have 2,000 aircraft in the Pacific 189 ships it's about 11 billion dollar operating budget When you put all that together those vested with confidence to be in command Play a huge role in representing national interest on the world stage yet 17 people were fired in the 2010 2011 time frame That's an extraordinarily large number because I have to look at each one of them individually And after you do one of those you don't want to do another but to go through 17 was Was extraordinarily painful for all of us who were there for their changes of command when they assumed leadership? standing next to their families applauding them for their accomplishments and Casting our vote of high confidence in all that they could do to realize the experiences that they had and the potential that they could give to the service of the Navy and the nation and How disappointing it was to realize that you know we had the the bulk of it was misbehavior personal misbehavior commanding officers who were Fraternizing with midshipmen who were aboard ship way too much to drink way too loose of an environment a command climate that really called attention to Just how judgments were made. I mean this is typically what happens when when we start to conduct an investigation We look at the climate of the organization. We try and assess How people view their leadership and how leadership exercises its judgment and I can tell you When when we started an investigation like that and we realized that we've got a real problem that everyone's been tolerating Then we can't move quick enough in order to get that cancer out of the system So that people can get a fresh look at new leadership and try and write the ship When we have to relieve a commanding officer it there's a toxic sort of quality that can poison the whole Wardroom ready room organization, and it's the sort of thing that I would prefer To play a much more active role than a reactive role. I mean think about it You've got so many different tools in the toolbox here To wait until someone gets to the point where they cross the line and they've gone to a place where they can't return In terms of retaining the judgment and the confidence of people around them That to me is a failure on many different levels So while in operational command of a carrier strike group, I Will cite an example or two of what I'm talking about My from my experience in my in my view what I have learned over the course of time is you have to be actively involved in this discussion you can't simply wait for for For some person to come up who's now Limited the number of tools and responses that you have in your toolkit because now all we're talking about are consequences and punishment By being active The first thing that we do is we demand a dialogue in in the world that we're in today with the social networking With email with chatting and texting It's too easy to bombard people with information Especially if it's too high a level too generic too many platitudes It doesn't stick But if you're active and you're involved you can see Indicators your instincts will tell you hey, there's something I heard or there's something that I saw and You know what once I see it once I hear it. It's now mine It now becomes a referendum on my judgment because now I'm aware So what am I going to do about it? In strike group command of the John C. Stennis The air wing commander at the time had the brilliant idea to run folks will follies when we were on our way to deployment Folks will follies is an opportunity for a lot of levity a lot of humor You can't come in with a thick enough skin for these sorts of things But the idea is to poke fun at each other and to walk away Laughing relaxed and get on with work It is not it is not an opportunity to cross the line It is not an opportunity to demean someone it is not an opportunity to put someone down Whether it's a senior or a subordinate so there's rules and For those who are in positions of leadership and command or for those who are just part of the audience It's an opportunity to enjoy But it's also a requirement to stand up and say no No, that wasn't funny and no, I'm not going to tolerate it and no not in my organization so the typically these are these are skits and Each squad and representative has a group of people that will go up and try and entertain the entire audience Typically the funniest ones are the edgiest ones and so the art form here is to figure out how to be funny without crossing the line and for those Who have you know who have tried to speak in public before you know Some of the funniest things are the things that are just going on all around you and the question is whether or not you see it in this particular case a helicopter squadron that had Six female pilots got up and started to talk about Things that they wanted everyone to laugh at the only problem was it was just laced with innuendo and So finally I had to stand up and go no It's not funny and you know what I've deployed with all your parents most of them are dependents and so I know your families and We don't have to do that. We don't have to talk that way to be accepted in this culture I'm responsible for the climate here And so let's just be real clear where I stand on it. I Guarantee you and your families that you will have a professional atmosphere here so that you can succeed And you don't have to compromise yourself or your personal principles in order to be part of this organization That's not how it works here and then I sat down. I had one other challenge over the course of the deployment and that's On the hangar Bay while working out. I'm listening to a couple of guys talking behind me And and I realized they're talking about one of my shipmates a female and you can imagine how the conversation went I stopped I turned around and said no That's my shipmate end of story About that time a gentleman walked by with workout gear on and he's got a picture on his shirt And is in the picture is of a skeleton hand with the digits to indicate the finger And so he's walking around the hangar Bay like you know Hey, I can do this and I walked up to him and said where'd you get that? He goes well This is this is just the representation of a CD cover and I like their music. I Said I want your shirt I'll give it to you at the end of deployment and bring your master chief with you And so that Circulated around the ship and that's the first week of deployment and you know what it may be a little bit of Old Testament It may be a little bit a New Testament, but it worked I didn't have to take anyone to mast which to me is the indicator of being active I didn't have to put anyone in hack or give them punishment In fact, what we did is we set the tone for this thing right away And we don't allow ourselves to compromise. That's what that is what is important And the reality of it is you know when I presented him his shirt at the end of deployment All folded up nice and neat with the master chief present. He said everyone heard about this Well, guess what? That's the way it works Okay, a big organization a small organization word gets around when leaders care when leaders are active and when leaders are involved So it shouldn't come as any surprise to you when there's challenges associated With the climate in your organization. It's gonna happen. The point. I'm leaving you with today is we all have a stake in the outcome We all have a role to play The whole idea of being loyal to something some institution that's larger than oneself That's learned behavior. That's what I have Come to understand over the course of my time in servers And it began with an understanding at the naval academy As I realized this transition from being a civilian to being in the military is not something that can simply be assumed away That everyone's going to adopt the same sort of approach that they learn in boot camp or they learned during plebe summer and then We don't have to have this conversation until until something happens years later That's not the formula for a good or a good organization a good organization a healthy Organization one where we don't have to carve out a discussion on ethics We don't have to have a stand down to talk about behavior Is because it's part of our day-to-day life. We police ourselves We insist on a certain standard and we care and we let people know that When we do that we're being active. We demand a dialogue We don't just shotgun email out to people and then don't ask what they think in time This plays out You know in some pretty interesting ways for me. I flew with the navy flight demonstration squadron for three years And the challenge associated with being in an organization like that Is the chemistry in the room So it's one thing to start out 20 feet apart with two airplanes at 2 000 feet and then 150 flights later to be 24 to 36 inches apart 150 feet off the ground The way we get there is not just simply by flying we do a lot of debriefing So oftentimes the debrief can last longer than the flight by an order of two or three times Two hours three hours in a debrief is not unusual And the reason why we do that is not because we want to it's because we have to We work in an environment where we've already narrowed down the margins here To try and keep it safe to give something that's presentable to the public that everyone can be proud of The idea is not to scare people the idea is to get six people to do the same thing For 45 minutes from the time they salute until the time They they land and walk back from the aircraft That simply cannot be assumed away everything is filmed we go frame by frame and we demand performance And the way we do it is we have to talk about it And we and we cannot tire Of talking about it. We cannot allow ourselves to grow weary because it's too hard to get back in front of this person and say It's not right yet I don't want to have to come up with new words to describe the same thing that I saw yesterday But guess what when you do that when you invest yourself in your organization and that person in front of you You're mentoring you're teaching you're building a team And that will last with you a lifetime You have to be actively involved The ethics and moral reasoning piece to it is just another component to a broader set of responsibilities that we have After all, where does this all begin? We come from so many different diverse parts of the country and the world We have different socioeconomic backgrounds. We have different education levels and yet When you see this come together, it's extraordinary when you see what people can do That volunteer you unlock something that's really quite extraordinary It begins with the answer to a simple question And that is do you solemnly swear That you'll support and defend the constitution of the united states against all enemies foreign and domestic That you'll bear true faith and allegiance to the same that you take this obligation freely without any mental reservation Or purpose of evasion and that you will well and faithfully discharge the duties or the responsibilities you're about to enter So help you god 70 words 70 words that come from the the first continental congress And if you go through those 70 words, there's only one word that's repeated and that's faith The idea that contracts and legal instruments were not enough for those Who swore their allegiance to this new form of government where everything was at risk To believe in something that is not self-evident Faith we have faith in each other We have faith in our mission We have to have faith in our leadership If we don't have that if we lose that then we lose the covenant I'm in the private sector. No one talks this way They talk in terms of contracts They talk in terms of severance packages They don't talk in terms of obligations that individuals have to each other. This is unique Recognize it as being unique And then when you get out you can help me park cars, okay? Okay