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Although Tom Williams is still in the US Army, he’s already planning for retirement. But it’s not simply a case of figuring out what he wants to do; it’s more of a way to start helping people now, in addition to later.
Williams’ career journey has spanned his beginning as an enlisted soldier to an infantry officer to an entrepreneur developing a comprehensive leadership course that includes personal wellness and team care as part of the plan to lead employees to a successful outcome for all. He has developed an online course called “War Forged Leadership Master Class” to educate current and potential leaders on how to lead, not simply manage, their employees
“The motivation to do this is that if I do a good job, people have better lives in the military. Maybe I’ll help people’s lives on the civilian side, too,” Tom says. “Really, it’s all about helping people for me. I mean, sure, making money is great. Having a great reputation is important to me, too. But at the end of the day, if I can help people, I’ll feel more fulfilled. So that’s really what it’s all about for me.”
The army taught Williams how to think critically. He has been an airborne intelligence analyst, which means he examines and evaluates information and explains it to his commanders to help them make military decisions. Now he’s using these critical thinking skills to help all leaders, from military to veteran and civilian business ones.
Tom Williams was also an integral part of the 82nd Airborne Division’s 2016 deployment where US President Donald Trump credited his unit with the military defeat of ISIS in Iraq. Using his battle-honed skills, he is embarking on a new path in life. Two, in fact, as an educator with the online course and as an author with a book that expands on and details in more depth the lessons of the class.
One truism of the military is that the real leaders actually, you know, lead their troops into battle, while the managers stay behind and let their personnel take all the risks. As US Navy Rear Admiral Grace Hopper once said, “You don’t manage people, you manage things. You lead people.” Williams looks at this concept in his upcoming book.
“Chapter four is going to be knowing your people,” Tom says. “If you don’t go talk to your people, they aren’t going to know you. Because with all of these micro-interactions that we have with people over time, people categorize you in their brains, and that matters. If your troops or your employees don’t really know who you are, how can they trust you?”
This particular idea of staying in close contact with the people you lead is so compelling and essential that Williams goes over it again in another chapter, focusing on a closely related issue.
“The next one is the power of performance counseling. This chapter is about how powerful it is just to sit down with people once a month or maybe quarterly or semi-annually, whatever people want to do. Give them your metrics on how they’re doing along with ways to improve.”
When Williams was stationed in Germany, he found that in Stuttgart, no one opened up their shop until 10 or 11 o’clock. They’ll close the shop for a two-hour lunch later in the afternoon, and then they’ll be off work by five to spend evenings with their families.
“They don’t even work on the weekends,” Tom says. “And then there’s me and I’m doing all-nighters to write this book because I’m in a time crunch. I want my legacy to be that people adopt that lifestyle because the big thing is we as Americans are so bad with our lifestyles, working all the time and neglecting the work-life balance.”
Tom Williams’ ultimate purpose with the book and the course is to educate future business leaders and to make sure established ones understand the best way to lead, not simply manage, the people who make their companies successful. The publication date for his book is January 2024.
