Articles
Advocating for Apathy
WASHINGTON, DC – JUNE 13: U.S. Army (Photo by Kayla Bartkowski/Getty Images) By Nathan A. Ballinger If everything is important, then nothing is. – Patrick M. Lencioni I’ve spent enough years as a senior noncommissioned...
Lay Your Ego Down (The Lumineers’ Version)
By Joe Byerly I caught The Lumineers in Raleigh this week. During the show, Wes Schultz mentioned that he and his bandmate Jeremiah Fraites have been writing and playing music together for over two decades. If you are a music fan like me, you...
Ep 160- Surviving Separation: Deployments and Relationships with Dr. Galena Rhoades
Dr. Galena Rhoades, coauthor of Fighting For Your Marriage, returns to From the Green Notebook to talk with Joe about the strain that deployments, training, and time apart place on military marriages—and how couples can stay...
The Day I Took Command: Leading Through Crisis and Learning Command in Real-Time
By Joe Hap The call came late. My commander had been in a serious accident. Suddenly, everything I thought I knew about leadership changed. In an instant, I wasn’t preparing for command—I was living it. No ceremony. No speeches. Just a...
Ep 159: Army Directive 2025-18 with Sergeant Major of the Army
In this special Notebook Notes episode, Joe sits down with Sergeant Major Urzua and Sergeant Major Brady to discuss the Army Directive 2025-18, with a guest appearance from Sergeant Major of the Army Michael Weimer. The intent behind the...
The Power of Patience
by CPT Benjamin L. Kenneaster Patience is power. Patience is not an absence of action; rather it is “timing”. It waits on the right time to act, for the right principle and in the right way.-Fulton J. Sheen A Forgotten Principle An article from...
The Walls We Build
By Joe Byerly About a year ago, I got into an argument with my wife that spiraled way beyond what we were actually talking about. It began with a question about where to go for breakfast, but escalated into a full-blown shouting match. She said one...
The Tone Range Fan: A Tool for Leaders at All Levels
By COL Ed Arntson and LTC Erik Miller “We must strive to become experts in the human dimension. Wars are fought on land, by humans, and we must always work to become better at how we interact with one another to build trust and cohesion.” – GEN...
What is Power?
By Joe Byerly Two Army officers stand across from each other. Both are in their mid-50s. One slightly older, but only by a few years. Both wear stars on their shoulders. Both have commanded thousands of troops—the elder, tens of thousands. The...
Ep 158- Turning Groups into Teams: Lessons for Leaders with Dr. Colin Fisher
Author and researcher Dr. Colin Fisher joins Joe to unpack the invisible forces that shape teams—and why leaders ignore them at their own risk. From his book The Collective Edge: Unlocking the Secret Power of Groups Dr. Fisher shows...
Why Military Leaders Should Study Human Nature
By Joe Byerly This is the first question, in a five question interview with author Robert Greene. Joe: You’ve spent decades researching and writing about power, mastery, and war. In your latest book, The Laws of Human Nature, you have written what...
Warfare Has Moved On: The New Rules of War
By Joe Byerly One of my favorite books this year is Sean McFate’s The New Rules of War: Victory in the Age of Durable Disorder. Sean challenges everything I’ve learned over the last 15 years, and I can’t help but wonder if...
Five Army Commanders Worth Studying
This post originally appeared at Modern War Institute on January 8, 2019 By Joe Byerly When we begin our military careers we have choices when it comes to how we’ll develop our leadership abilities. We can, for example, go through our careers...
Want More Military Leaders Reading? Use The Pabst Blue Ribbon Strategy
By Joe Byerly Most military professionals agree that reading plays a critical role in professional development, however, the practice isn’t as widespread as it should be throughout the services. Unfortunately, self-development is about as...
August Cole, Science Fiction, and Whiskey: It’s a Thing
As February comes to a close, where are you at with the status of those New Year’s goals you made over a month ago? Are those resolutions nothing more than a distant memory? Whether it was a plan to exercise more, eat healthy, or finally quit a...
From Hal Moore’s Bookshelf: What He Underlined
By David Moore My father, LTG Hal Moore, passed away two years ago on this day -10 February, three days shy of his 95th birthday. The purpose of this article is to not seek empathy but to use the occasion to reinforce a few beliefs that...
General Donn Starry on Leadership
By Joe Byerly As military leaders we should want nothing more than to give our enemies an unfair fight—with the advantage in our favor. And one way in which we do this is through training our forces. I can’t think of anyone who has written as...
How to Increase Your Professional Reading
We all can agree that reading is good for the brain. Leaders from George Washington to General Patton leaned on books to fill their knowledge gaps, and their efforts paid off on the battlefield. Former Defense Secretary James Mattis reflected on...
5 Lessons Books Taught Me in 2018
Since 2013, I’ve written an annual blog post highlighting my favorite books from the previous 12 months. This year I wanted to try something different. I wanted to share some of the lessons I learned from the list of 40+ books I read....
8 Must-Read Science Fiction Books
Within the last few years, we’ve witnessed the evolution of biohacking, the rise of a state-based social credit system, and a US election influenced by the use of artificial intelligence. Futurists might be able to follow the thread...
Beware of Time Pollution!
By Joe Byerly As a younger Army officer, I used to see a week or two of empty space on the calendar before a major exercise and think: “Perfect! I’ll schedule some training or professional development for the team.” But as...
Army Junior Officer Counsel – Enabling Junior Officers to Drive Change
by Major Chris Slininger The Problem The Army has been facing recruiting and retention challenges, particularly within the junior officer population: Lieutenants, Captains, Warrant Officers One, and Chief Warrant Officers Two. While recruitment and...
Why Senior Leaders Should Compete for an Expert Badge
Photo By Edward Muniz | Col. Michael Stewart reading Coordinates. by Joseph F. Adams I am an expert and I am a professional. – The Soldier’s Creed Cold mud and rain dripped down my forearms as I lay in the prone position and aimed my M80 Claymore....
What is Your Relationship with Time?
By Joe Byerly “I’ll try to find some time.” “I need more time.” “There’s not enough time in the day.” These phrases used to roll off my tongue without a second thought. My relationship with time was…contentious. My calendar dictated my life. ...
Is Your Superpower Actually Kryptonite?
By Mike Shekleton Many of us have seen a brand-new platoon leader, who is in peak physical condition, fall flat on their face during their first time leading platoon PT (physical training). Excited to lead and looking to impress their NCOs...
What Missing a Promotion Taught Me About Success
by Anthony Cannamela In early 2023, I was exactly where I wanted to be. My job was high-stakes, and it pushed my skills every day. When two four-star Admirals proposed an operation using what one described as the “crown jewel” of the U.S. Navy, my...
The Art of Recognition: A Culture of Investing in Human Capital
by MAJ Daniel J. Sprouse Creating a culture where first-line leaders recognize Soldiers for their pursuit of excellence is essential to unit success. While many military leaders focus on awards (such as achievement and commendation medals) as the...
You Built a System. Did You Build Any Leaders?
By Sara Roger Nine business days into this new job, and just one more day before I begin a three-week training exercise with a brand-new team in a different country. Needless to say, the stress is present: I’m against the clock in getting spun up,...
Find Your Power and Use it for Good: Why I Stayed for a Career
by Ryan Cornell-d’Echert “Are you getting what you want from what you do?” One of my colleagues asked that to his students and protégés; it’s a powerful question that has stuck with me. Because military service is an enormous commitment, it is...
It’s All Theory Until We Do It
By Joe Byerly We can have the best of plans. We can have the greatest of intentions. But until those plans and intentions collide with reality—it’s all just theory. Theories aren’t reality. They’re untested. They live in our minds—with plot lines...
4 Tips for Selling Your Ideas
By Joe Byerly Have you ever had an idea you thought was solid gold, but when you presented it to your boss or coworkers it fell on deaf ears? Maybe it wasn’t that your idea was bad. Maybe it was you. Hear me out: Sometimes our ideas ARE solid...
4 Tips from Sir Winston Churchill to Write Better Emails
By Joe Byerly Emails- They are the bane of our existence, but they are how we communicate in the modern world. Each day, military leaders clean out their inboxes only to have them fill back up within hours. Unfortunately, quantity doesn’t...
A Toast to Small Wars Journal
By Joe Byerly Much like many of the biggest comedians today can trace their beginnings back to the same comedy club, there are countless national security writers and senior military leaders who can trace their intellectual roots back to Small Wars...
How to Write as a Thinker-Practitioner
By Vincent A. Dueñas In his treatise, Why Don’t We Learn from History, B.H. Liddell Hart opens the first chapter with a general discussion of history and its merit. In describing the advancements of the conduct of warfare over the course of history...
An Open Letter to Battalion Commanders: How to Use Social Media
By Scotty Autin Commanders- I feel like most of us are missing an opportunity. We’re missing a chance to get the command messages out to audiences and shape the narrative of our units. More so, we’re missing a chance to talk directly to...
Why I Write: Pressing the Button
By Joe Byerly The following is an excerpt from the book, Why I Write: Craft Essays on Writing War, scheduled to be published by Middle West Press in December 2019. The one-of-a-kind anthology from the non-profit Military Writers Guild features...
Feedback Matters: How Poor Communication Can Lead to Bad Job Performance
By Joe Byerly (This post originally appeared on ClearanceJobs.com) Have you ever been caught off guard with a performance evaluation? Have you ever found out that the great job you thought you were doing wasn’t so great after all? I believe that...
Learn and Look Before You Tweet
Some things you should understand before jumping headfirst into the information environment By Larry Kay Last week was “media literacy week,” which unlike national doughnut and Twinkie day, should be elevated to a more prominent occasion given how...
Risk and Reward
By Josh Powers Last week, General Abrams (@DogFaceSoldier on Twitter) published a short article encouraging more senior leader engagement on social media. Titled Social Media: Senior Leaders Need to Get on the Bus, the article provides ten reasons...
Avoiding the Echo Chamber: Digital Media Leader Engagement and Education
By: L.M. Hughes In the wake of #AUSADigital2019, one of the most brilliant conversations I’ve seen on effective leader engagement on social media, led by From the Green Notebook’s very own Megan Jantos, I kept noticing how panelists and...
Podcast
Listen to our latest episode.
Store
Support our work.
Get Involved
Learn how to partner with us.
Lead with the best version of yourself.
Sign up for our emails.