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Basic Team Leadership Course

1. Introduction

Time Frame: 1 - 2 hours (not playtested)

Map/Mission:

Welcome to Charlie-Mike's Basic Leadership course. This is a highly subjective course, there's so many different theory's and ideas on how to teach this. I built this course with use of research, including experience and learned criteria from myself and others in this group and beyond it.

Goal for today: Is to cover the absolute bare bones basics to get you in the hot seat and get you started for this position.

What this Course Won't do: This course will not give you years of experience and allow you to jump into Team Leader and already be good at it. While some can, that doesn't mean everyone will. Don't be afraid to take the Team Leader Role and fail miserably. Know how to be a good leader? By learning through failing and avoiding how Bad Leaders lead.

Be Honest and up Front with yourself - "Here's what I did well, here's what I need to work on"

What I need from you: Even if you only take 15% from this course. I need you to try it, I need you to learn, and I need you to try to get better each time. You can't learn by not doing.

Everyone has an EGO, work to reduce it here.

If you don't understand something - ask, even mid scenario, learn to ask what things mean.

Some other things I want to hit on:

We Don't allow back seat leading here. If you're an experienced Team Leader - good for you, allow others to learn and build their own way of doing things. If they ASK for help or ideas from you, give a little, don't take the reigns and continue to force feed them with your entire Play book.
If you have feedback about the way they team lead, save it for the AAR at the end of the session, not during.
Be Positive, or save it, stew on it then find a way to make it respectful or don't say it all. "You did this wrong" vs "I feel like you could have done this differently".
Learn to find ways to better communicate. Don't ever lean on excuses of shitty communication skills. "I'm blunt because that's who I am".

2. Team Leader Role

 ❓ From someone here who hasn't been a team leader before:

 What are the duties of the Team Leader?

BOTTOM LINE UP FRONT - Mission is priority, move to and engage the enemy.

 Let's Expound on the Team Leader Tasking
 - Mission Tasking - IN ORDER. 1. What is the mission? 2. What's my team tasking? 3. What are the other teams doing?
 - Know your team  - Who is my AR, who's my RAT, who's the medic, who's my 2ic?
 - Gear check      - Does my team have enough ammo, grenades, smokes, medical to sustain fighting?
 - Location        - Where are we, where are we going, how are we getting there, how are we exfiling?
 - Communication   - What do we have to speak with my team, other teams, and higher leadership? Chain of command - who is my leader, and who is their leader? What are all the Freqs?

- I understand this is a lot, and we'll do some seat time to get you comfortable.

 What are some concerns of why new people don't want to be a Team Leader? 

 - Fear of Failure 

 - Fear of Judgement 

 - Fear of someone telling you're doing it wrong and feeling stupid

How do we get our Team to do what we need them to do?

Words mean things. If I SCREAM AT YOU "DO IT NOW" Most people would become defensive and foster negative emotions.

If we're in the shit and I need to sternly tell you to do what I ask it would be "JAKE, I need you to Move to cover and watch north"

What about when someone's not in the correct formation or not doing something you asked? "Careful guys, we're falling out of formation here". "Hey Jake, can I get you to help us out on this formation?". Sometimes people could have lost track, or unintentionally didn't recognize they were doing something wrong.

What do we do when someone doesn't want to listen? We've asked nicely, we've told them, now we're going to give them the direct question. Be direct, but don't throw attitude. Be calm and direct. "Hey Jake, listen to me, I need you to help us out with the Wedge. Is there a reason why you are having difficulty following what I'm asking for, or not staying in formation?"

If they continued, I would call to my Platoon leadership to ask for a brief halt, and go speak with them and tell them I want a replacement because Jake isn't following commands and not doing as asked. We don't want those types of players here, and we'll have them removed.

I want you all to remember a time when you or others were difficult, acting like a child, pushing the boundaries and making the Team Leader's job rough by not listening. Now I want you to stop doing that and help yourself and future Team leaders out

3. Where do we Start?

 Alright let's do some Hands on: 

 - You are all stacked against cover at a Rock wall.

 - Move your team to the tree line.

 - The enemy objective is off to the ??? location

Alright let's talk about what happened and how to improve:

What could we improve upon?
Where did you place your Automatic Weapon?
What would you have done if you came into contact?
How do we communicate better?
What would you have done if you had a casualty?
What went well?

 Let's do another: 

 - Your task is patrolling to contact in the forest.

 - Patrol from Point A to Point B

 - You will become engaged.

Alright let's talk about what happened and how to improve:

What could we improve upon?
Where did you place your Automatic Weapon?
How do we communicate better?
Casualty actions (if this did happen) what could have done better?
What went well?

4. Let's Kick it up a notch

Now we're going to try some more advanced concepts that I want to ingrain in you

 ❓ With just your small team, how do you enable Bounding?

 - Break your team into buddy teams whether it be two pairs of two, on pair of three and one group of two.
 - In the worst case scenario, you the Team leader become the single man team and have two of your team move forward, you move to them and they push forward.

 I want you to utilize Bounding teams 

 - Your team will patrol from Point a to Point B

 - You will run into the enemy and push through the contact.

 - Conduct Bounds to get past the enemy, or away from the enemy, I'll let you decide.

Let's talk about what happened and how to improve:

What could we improve upon?
Where did you place your Automatic Weapon?
How do we communicate better?
Casualty actions (if this did happen) what could have done better?
What went well?

 Now using two teams, we'll conduct a small patrol. 

 - Your team will patrol from Point a to Point B

 - At Point B, I want you to establish an "OBJECTIVE RALLY POINT"

 - Conduct Bounds to get past the enemy, or away from the enemy, I'll let you decide.