This week, as I watched my friends, who work throughout the Department of Defense, begin their administrative furlough days–something I never expected would happen to Department of Defense employees who have a vital mission to do–I’m reminded of former Secretary of Defense Gates’ speeches to young officers at the Air Force Academy and Naval Academy. In the speech he reminded the Sailors and Airmen of Admiral Rickover and Colonel Boyd’s examples, that, in Boyd’s words, they should choose to do something instead of be someone.
In the days, weeks, and months ahead, work life and home life for hundreds of thousands of Department of Defense employees will change. Things they thought where impossible, having become possible, may drag them and their organizations into a sink hole of frustration and despair.
Or, people throughout the organizations could choose to do something and take a stand on long festering problems, speak out for a better future for their organizations, and be bold enough to announce “I have a plan, even if everyone else doesn’t. Let’s get up and get going toward a better future of our own choosing.”
The world has changed. It’s up to us and our actions to decide if that change that is initially for the worse can end for the better for us, our organizations, and our nation.
Do something.
Drive your change.
I stand with you.
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