Transcript - THE LEADERSHIP LIST - Rod Beckstrom - Episode 01

UNITED STATES

06.06.2020

Story by George Maurer 

American Forces Network Radio (AFN Radio)

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Transcript:

Tony Scott (announcer): The American Forces Radio Network presents THE LEADERSHIP LIST.
George Maurer (host): Welcome to the very first addition of THE LEADERSHIP LIST...interviews with authors from command professional reading lists. I'm your host George Maurer. Today, I'm featuring a book from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs professional reading list titled, “The Starfish and The Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations,” co-authored by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom. Coming up in today's interview, let go and watch your people shine, how closed thinking led to the most useless job in the world, “President of the Internet,” and why American leadership remains the greatest hope for achieving world peace. I'm very fortunate to have Rod Beckstrom as my guest today. You are the absolute perfect first guest. Welcome, Rod.
Rod Beckstrom: Thank you. I’m pleased and honored to be here.
Maurer: Your resume is truly remarkable. At the age of 24, you created a company called C*ATS Software which helped financial institutions with risk management. You were one of the people who helped develop security and stability for the basic domain structures of the Internet. In the wake of 9/11, you were appointed as the Founding Director of the U.S. National Cyber Security Center, as well as senior advisor to the Director of National Intelligence. And when the United States government needed to create policies for a brand new

battlefield...cyberspace...they called you. And you currently serve as founder and CEO of your own company called, oddly enough, Beckstrom and you guide some of the most powerful institutions in the world on solutions for success and security in the digital world.
Beckstrom: Wow. Thank you. Very kind of you to say. I've been extremely fortunate to have a lot of great leadership opportunities. It’s so funny. I don’t often think about what I didn't do or what I could have done better, so I don't tend to like revel in accomplishments. But I do feel extremely fortunate that I've had so many leadership opportunities. The amazing thing is... the last 24 years or so, I've not set out for any of them. I’ve just let things come my way... including the book. And the book actually led to the opportunity with the Director of National Intelligence(DNI) and serve in the US government.
Maurer: So Rod, what is the metaphor behind The Starfish and The Spider? Why'd you use those two creatures?
Beckstrom: Sure. Well, I was going to give a lecture at Stanford Business School to a group of 60 CEOs from around the world, members of the Young Presidents Organization. And I was introducing these concepts that we had developed and the working title of my presentation was, “The Decentralized Revolution.” And just by chance, I was having dinner with a renowned oceanologist, Doctor Jane Lynch, a couple weeks before and I talked about this concept. And that we're thinking of writing a book about the lecture I’m going to give at Stanford. And she goes, “You have to study the blue linckia starfish! The linckia starfish is the most incredible decentralized organism. You gotta study it.” And so I did the next day. I started researching on the Internet. I'm like wow this linckia is amazing, you know. You can cut off the arms. This just doesn’t regrow the arm, but the arm can regrow an entire new starfish. So it's actually a divisible animal and so I'm like OK, I got the starfish. Then I thought, what creature is centralized. Most animals and creatures are, but I wanted something that kind of looked like a starfish, so I came up with a spider. I contrasted starfish and spiders. And we came up with the story , you know, the spider, if you cut a leg off, it doesn't grow back. It's just a crippled seven legged spider or six legged spider. But if you cut off the head or the thorax, it dies because it's centralized. So these two creatures, the spider represents centralized organisms because if you cut off the head, it dies. And the starfish represents decentralized organisms because if you cut off an arm, you just get another starfish.
Maurer: A starfish and a spider....very good choices. Now, your association with the United States government began shortly after 9/11. Tell me the story of how you became the Founding Director of the U.S. National Cybersecurity Center.
Beckstrom: Yeah, well it all started on 9/11 for me. I was in New York watching the towers burn and I've been inside them probably at least 200 times, because my first software company you mentioned, C*ATS Software, had 15 different clients in those towers. Different firms. So as I watched the towers burn, I was trying to figure out who was probably getting trapped in that building above the fire line and who was below. It was a very horrific feeling and I wanted to go and help and then I realized I couldn't get there. I was at the airport, but I could see the towers with my naked eyes. And yes, I decided to take a moment of silence to think about all those inside who are suffering and the following beautiful words came to me...”it's a small world, it's a fragile world, and no one is safe until everyone is safe and you are called to serve the peace.” And that led me to actually get out of almost all my tech business activities within two months and dedicated my life to seeing what could I do to help counteract what was going on. We built a peace network from that experience. We got these insights on how decentralized networks work, which led to the book, The Starfish and The Spider. It was heavily studied, al-Qaeda, that contributed in any way that the day. And the Director of National Intelligence, I was having lunch with John McConnell, a great man, and then he recruited me to be on his senior advisory group. I was approved by Congress and I was brainstorming with him one day on how to use Game Theory in cyberspace internationally. And he just

said, “You're it.” I said, “What do you mean?” He said, well. I was just having lunch with President Bush and Dick Cheney (Secretary of Defense) yesterday. And we were noticing when the enemy attacks our intelligence and defense facilities in cyberspace, they'll go after one for several months and then, once they are cleaned out of the system, they just move to the next target inside the system. And we're not sharing any information. We’re not coordinating across departments and agencies in intelligence and defense. And so we decided to stand up a national group to coordinate all of the six top centers. I want you to come run it, because you “get it.” What you've expressed with this Game Theory here and what you've done with The Starfish and The Spider. You understand collaboration. You understand networks. You're the guy. You need to come do this. So that's how the conversation started. My initial response was, “Well, thank you very much, but I'm living in Palo Alto and I've got two kids in high school. So it’s not the right time, right place for me to do that.” And he looked at me said, “Rod, the President of the United States and I are asking you to come and serve.” So anyway, that's how it got started.
Maurer: Wow. It's said when the President of the United States asks you to do something, you pretty much do it. Now, was that your take on this?
Beckstrom: Yeah, that's the case and it was funny, I was speaking with another former Deputy Director of the NSA (National Security Agency) at this event. I said, “You know they just asked me to stand up this new National Cybersecurity Center, but I don't think it really makes sense. He’s trying to entice me by telling me it reports directly to four cabinet members, the Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, Secretary of DHS (Department of Homeland Security) and he says, ‘There hasn't been a four-headed position before.’ What do you think?” He goes, “Well, you should interview for the job. You're going to meet some interesting people.” So I went back to Admiral McConnell and said, “OK. I'm only interviewing for the job.” They set up the first interview by phone the next day.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider....values are a stronger binding force than authority.
Maurer: You already touched upon this, but perhaps your biggest challenge as Director of the National Cybersecurity Center was getting the various government agencies to cooperate. What were some of the challenges you had to overcome?
Beckstrom: Well, when I finally decided to take the job. I passed muster with the interviews. I was sitting down speaking with the DNI and he says, “Rod, let me tell you what this job is going to be like.” And I said, “Yeah, tell me.” He goes, “Well, it's like I'm throwing you in a dark room and everybody in the room has got a knife except you.” And he said, “If you just try to be friendly with everybody and just be nice, you're not going to get anything done.” And he goes, “On the other hand, if you're too feisty and you get too much conflict, then you get sliced to pieces.” That was a sobering introduction to the job and it was a quite accurate description except one thing...he told me that all the guys in the room had a knife, but he didn't tell me that the very smart capable women had two knives. And it was a hard situation there, you know. Someone else said, “Rod, you not only jumped into the hottest frying pan in Washington DC, in the middle of the struggle over the authority of this new National Cybersecurity Center....that each one of the components would like to control themselves....you jumped into the hottest spot in the hottest pan. So welcome to Washington DC.” It was pretty hot and heavy in the sense that, you know, when you're dealing with NSA, CIA (Central Intelligence Agency), Department of Defense, DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency), and other intelligence groups and significant parties at the table, there's a lot of power there and cyber was obviously an important activity. So this intense battle is made all the more intense because...I won’t get into all the details....but let’s say it was roughly a balanced battle at the table which meant that it was a real and serious prolonged dogfight. But having said that, we prevailed. We got our CONOPS (Concept of

Operations), not only done, but signed off by the President of the United States... which I'm very proud of....what the team in the interagency group achieved. But let me tell you, it was it was hot and heavy.
Maurer: I can only imagine. Now, getting into the content of your book, a leaderless organization should be absolute chaos, right? I mean how can anything function properly without a leader?
Beckstrom: At the greatest extreme, a leaderless organization is chaos. And if you look at a public riot or a some kind of the mob in response to an action, it's very chaotic action. But most organizations, even decentralized, there is some structure and that's what we figured out through the work of studying al-Qaeda. In working to build a global network of CEOs, that grew to 4000 CEOs taking part in it, we actually figured out there's a set of architectural elements in decentralized networks. Because if there were pure chaos, then we wouldn't call it a network. If you look at cryptocurrencies...Bitcoin is an example of an extremely decentralized currency and it absolutely is a currency in the economic sense but no one's in charge of it. But there is a community who's engaged together and who developed protocol and who help to govern it. So at the extremes....chaos, but pull back a little bit and you start getting structure. And if you keep adding more and more structure, more controls, you'll start moving to the left side of the table. You get to a more centralized organization.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider...the sweet spot leads to the greatest success and it never stays in one place
Maurer: You’re talking about the sweet spot. Many who work in organizations like the Defense Department will never be able to create a true starfish, leaderless group, but they can create what you call a hybrid. And I think that's what you were alluding to here. A balance between the starfish and the spider. How could one achieve that balance in the DOD and what are the expected outcomes?
Beckstrom: Sure, let's take a real quick concrete example, Hurricane Katrina. You know, enormous national disaster that we faced in New Orleans. And look at the response of two different government agencies. One, FEMA, which is extremely centralized, top down and the other being the US Coast Guard. Both components of the same Department by the way...DHS. The Coast Guard is extremely decentralized in the sense that the captain of that vessel and everyone on the vessel and the commanding officer is totally in charge of running rescue operations. Doesn't have to call anywhere for permission on what to do. In fact, he or she is charged with rescuing human lives to the greatest extent they can and only communicating back to get support. And maybe will report in later, but there's no question they're supposed to take action and the Coast Guard were unquestionably heroes in Katrina. It was that relatively decentralized command structure of the Coast Guard that enabled them to do that. And if you think of the primary task of the Coast Guard, which is, in general, rescuing lives or interdicting criminals and drug dealers. It can be a fairly decentralized activity. So, that's one example. On the other hand, FEMA is very centralized and what they suffered from was...trying to feed all the information back to Washington, analyze it, and then have it trickle back down. As a result, they were relatively unresponsive, or much slower in responding to the crisis, and were deeply and roundly criticized. And part of that was due to their whole historic structure. How they were organized and run. I was somewhat involved in helping to study that while I was at DHS...to the credit of Secretary Mike Chertoff, a brilliant guy. When he hired me, he goes, “What do you think of the structure at DHS?” I said, “Well it's the agglomeration of 21 different previous government groups. This kind of centralization is very contrary to what I wrote about.” And he goes, “I want you to come in and help me decentralize this thing in terms of how we coordinate our activities.” So there was some very specific things that I got involved with post-Katrina with FEMA to help link them to social media, we had brainstorming sessions in Silicon Valley with Google and Facebook and Craigslist and other social media groups to learn what they learn in the moment of disasters. And what DHS and FEMA could do for them to actually support them and how are their

platforms are being used. And that led to a marriage or a set of joint working protocols that went into use only six weeks after we met, because another hurricane was heading into Texas at that time. But if you back to the DOD, strictly enforced, the Coast Guard is part of the military even though it's within DHS. You look at the Navy, there's a lot of decentralization in terms of authority onto the vessels. Look at how the SEALS operate. There's a coordination factor, getting them to their mission, but once they're on the mission, they’re largely self-directed. There’s been a lot of interest in the SEAL groups in JSOC (Joint Special Operations Command) in The Starfish and The Spider concepts because of how decentralized you've got to be as you get out there...closer to the battlefront. So I think it's very applicable to the military. It's definitely applicable to cyber security and cyber strategies and, in many other areas, I think it can be applied. I also want to say I think the DOD is an amazing organization. I think it's one of the best run government bodies on the planet. Singapore maybe comes in second. They do an amazing job down there, but the DOD is just an incredible learning machine, a management coaching machine, and having worked in government as a civilian...as a publicly politically appointed officer...I know how hard it is to get things done in government. So I just have to tip my hat to all the good men and women in the services for what they do and how they get things done. And the fact that the DOD and the Chairman are embracing our book is, you know, I'm honored by that and just hope that it contributes to the continued evolution of DOD management strategies and systems.
Maurer: The ranks are certainly full of good people. There's no doubt about that. Beckstrom: Yes.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider...rigid structure squashes creativity. Where innovation is desired, a certain level of chaos is a must.
Maurer: Open systems. Leaderless organizations almost always lead to great creativity and people who want to contribute. How exactly does that dynamic work?
Beckstrom: Wow, that's a great question. You know, I think all human beings want to contribute in life. That most people want to contribute something to their family, their community, their company, the government. Many times people want to contribute, but often people don't have a way to contribute. And well-designed decentralized systems are ones that give people the invitation to participate and then the incentives to participate. They have just enough rules to prevent the abuses that can develop in human systems, so that the participation continues, you know, on a healthy basis. So I think there's just something innate in us...in our psyche... we all want to contribute. When we're allowed to, we do so, whether there’s an Amazon ratings system where you rate the products, or in the eBay community. eBay was the second online company. OnSale was the first, but OnSale didn't trust the buyers and sellers, so they would get the goods from one party, get the money from the other, and then they'd re-ship it and sometimes inspect the goods. Well, that had enormous costs and other people said the eBay model won't work because you have sellers that can be ripping off the buyers. There's all kinds of trickery and thievery that could take place, but, in fact, because you can rate and score sellers, and rate and score other parties, you have access to data about their transactions. The community self-polices largely and so eBay became a tremendously successful company. OnSale is gone, so it's an example of where the centralized approach was more expensive and less effective, and a lighter weight model with community involvement just took off. Then, of course, that model got picked up by Amazon and many other social media platforms, you know, have ratings of different participants, so you know what you're getting into.
Maurer: On the opposite side, we have what you call in your book, “rigid management leaders,” who involve themselves in every single detail. And they create a staff of basically zombies, who will not think for themselves, or

take the mission to heart and I think we've all worked for bosses like that. How does that play into The Starfish and The Spider concept?
Beckstrom: Sure, quick story. I spoke to the National Association of Nurses in Texas a number of years back about the book concepts and then I ran a separate brain storming session with about 15 nurses, men and women from around the country, and talked about what their environments were like, what hospitals looked like, or what were the clinics like where they were. And it was interesting, half of them thought that their doctors ran the clinics like starfish and very collaborative. And half of them said they were spiders. The ones that worked in environments where they were the doctors who were very rigid and commanding, the morale was much lower and mistakes were much higher. There's a huge difference in the culture. On the other hand, the nurses that worked in environments where the doctors respected them in a supportive environment....more collaborative....had much higher job satisfaction. They felt the results were much higher in medical outcomes and far fewer mistakes. So when environments become too commanding and rigid, then then the participants in it, can lose a lot of motivation. Now at the same time, let's say you're prosecuting war. Let's take a DOD example. You know you don't ask every soldier, do you want to invade Iraq tomorrow? You know you have to make a decision. We're going in. These are the different groups, who are going to take these different actions. And in a joint task force operation, there's Air Force and there's Army, there's Marines. And so you have to have a command structure and so the idea is a fascinating hybrid, because you have to have a hierarchal command structure to conduct war when you need to, but you want to build the organization with a lot of collaboration. I think that’s what DOD does and you want to enhance it overtime so that people take more ownership for what they do and it's a constant balancing act. I think for managers and leaders, one of the goals...why we wrote the book.... we wanted to create a tool, so managers would become more aware of their own management style and become conscious of when they should be more collaborative and in what instances, you need to use a directive style.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider...management is a function and a responsibility rather than a rank.
Maurer: The idea of a leaderless organization is so alien to some people, they are unable to even consider the idea. In 1995, this is why a man named David Garrison had to declare himself, President of the Internet...perhaps the most useless job in the world. And you make fun of the idea in the book, but then you found yourself in that exact same position. Please share that story with me.
Beckstrom: Yeah, it's pretty ironic. Well, David's a great guy and he was CEO of an early ISP (internet service provider), the first one to go public. And so when investors were confused and didn't understand that the Internet was so decentralized, they kept saying, “Well, who's the President?” So he just said, “I am the President of the Internet.” So we wrote about that in the book. I interviewed him and we were talking and laughing about that funny story. And then, you know, just some number of years later...not too many...but four years later, I'm asked to talk to Vint Cerf (internet pioneer) and Esther Dyson (investor/business woman) and others...the founders of ICANN...ICANN is a global Internet coordination body, arguably the governor of the three key centralized things that need to hold the Internet together. Namely, the domain names, Internet addresses, and thousands of what we call the protocol registries or technical settings of the Internet. The things that make the Internet one network, as opposed to a million different networks. They make it look like one place. So ironically, I got elected to run ICANN which is a large nonprofit that works with every country in the world on Internet coordination. So people said, “Well, Rod. You wrote about the President of the Internet and you kind of laughed about it in your book. Well, now you're the closest thing.” And then I had dinner with Tim Berners-Lee. Sir Tim invented the World Wide Web browser and the World Wide Web. And he goes, “Right, it's really nice to have dinner with the King of the Internet.” I said, “You created the browsers. You're the King of the Internet.” He said, “You're running ICANN and

ICANN is the most important central resource on the Internet.” And I was like, “Well, Sir Tim thinks this role has some importance. I guess it really does.” It was a great honor to serve that role in the government service that I had the opportunity to do beforehand. It was just amazing training for being in that position.
Maurer: So you got promoted from President to King! Pretty good!
Beckstrom: Yeah, not bad. The reality is when you go to an ICANN meeting, you'll think it's more like chaos. You talked about a lot of shouting and screaming and people arguing over technical standards. And the meetings, they have 1000 to 2000 people. It's very noisy, but out of that cacophony, I can actually say is one of the most fascinating decentralized organizations in the world. It's a multi-stakeholder model. Very complex and engages almost all the countries of the world who are technically involved...that have internet domain names. Over 150 or so, involved in government advisory committees. There's the ISPs. There's internet registries and registrars and civil society. It's very complex and it's very noisy and, at times, seems very inefficient, but it works remarkably well to keep the Internet Domain Name System coordinated globally.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider... a catalyst starts a process, then gets out of the way.
Maurer: You mentioned something in the book called a “catalyst leader” and a catalyst leader requires vulnerability. In an organization like the Defense Department, you're expected to be on top of everything...especially at the highest levels and if someone asks you a question, you better have a good answer. And yes, they teach you to say things like, “I don't have that answer right now, but I'll get back to you.” However, you always run the risk of getting a response similar to.....how in the world is it possible for you to humanely not know that? How in that environment, do you allow yourself to be vulnerable?
Beckstrom: That is a really good question, but you know, I just met so many great people and leaders in the Department of Defense, and a lot of them are extremely humble and genuine humans. I mean even the Generals and Lieutenant Generals and Major Generals...just exceptional people...and the truth is, you can be strong, but also have the strength to express vulnerability and feelings. Now if you're the leader, you're not going to stand in front of your group and say, “I'm feeling really insecure right now and I'm doubting all these things,” but you may go in your office with some of your Lieutenants and sit down and say, “You know, I feel a bit queasy about where we are in this. What’s the best information we have for conducting this mission or taking on this challenge. What do you think we should do here?” And so I think that great leaders lead with the heart. Many great leaders lead with the heart and when you lead with the heart, you do show vulnerability. You show your emotions, positive and negative, sometimes happiness, sadness, anger, and it’s learning how to kind of do that dance in fulfilling your mission and your role and still remain the leader. And it is also why sometimes they say that being leader is the loneliest job in the world, because a leader can't always share all those vulnerabilities and emotions. But then that's also why, you know, you can't talk about sensitive matters, but you can talk about the struggles of your heart. So I just worked with so many great heartfelt leaders in the DOD. Whether it was Hoss Cartwright, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who I met with every month when I ran my job. I think that's one of the things the DOD does really well and I was, in fact, with a group of Major Generals and Lieutenant Generals two weeks ago at NASA at the Defense Innovation Unit. And I'm just so impressed by the leaders that the Department of Defense cultivates and brings up, so I think we can be vulnerable and it's kind of choosing how to, because if you ignore your emotions completely, you're going to have bigger troubles. We're all human beings and you take it to the battlefront. My God, people in the Department of Defense have to deal with life and death matters. One more story I want to share, and, in fact, I'd like to dedicate my remarks today to two people who served in the US military and one was Lieutenant Colonel Drew Briner, who I worked with very closely when we were developing the National Cybersecurity Center. Just a tremendous guy to work with. So intellectually gifted, great manager,

leader, and one day he said, “Rod, I need to sit down with you one-on-one.” And I said, “Yeah, sure.” We sat down and he said, “Well, I'm not going to be here long. So I'm going to be moving off the team and I just wanted to give you heads up.” And I'm like, “Oh, are you getting transferred?” And he goes, “I’m not getting transferred. I'm dying.” He told me he had Gulf War syndrome. Now they're not sure exactly what it is, but he knew his blood and bones were decaying and he wasn’t doing well. We lost him the following year, but I mean this guy gave everything and there's a lot of men and women out there who've given everything. And well, they've lost their lives or lost their health or made tremendous sacrifices. And the other soldier I'd like to recognize today was a foot soldier in World War One who, just as he was approaching the lines, his group got hit by mustard gas. There were a lot of chemical weapons used in World War One and he lost over half his lungs. He was then debilitated for the rest of his life and that was my grandfather, Canute August Beckstrom, who could never run again in his life or really exert himself for more than a few steps, because his lungs just weren't there. They were burned by the gas, and so I want to recognize those two, and so many other men and women who serve this country, too. My family has veterans going back to the Revolutionary War. Our freedom is thanks to people who have laid down their lives and so I wanna recognize all them. And there's definitely emotional moments that certainly came into all those situations.
Maurer: Certainly puts into perspective some of the issues that we get wrapped up into in today's world that's for sure.
Beckstrom: Yes.
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider...one new member in an open network, makes all
other members more valuable.
Maurer: One of the great things about an open network is the sharing of information. We sometimes forget no one person has all the answers and every single person added to an organization brings additional value to that organization. This was something you discussed in your book. Tell me more.
Beckstrom: Well, you know, I'm just so encouraged by the uptake of this book by the military community. I just salute the people in the field. I hope some of them will take a look at this book...one incredible moment for me...General Kevin Chilton was running Stratcom (United States Strategic Command) and he invited me to give a speech in Omaha for about 1500 officers. And I go and I get up on stage. Before I start to speak, I felt really nervous because I said, “My God, I'm talking to people...to the leaders who are prosecuting a war and people's lives are at risk. Am I really qualified to get up on this stage and be a keynote speaker. Because what if I'm wrong and the ideas in the book are not the right tools for them?” I literally was feeling very insecure and doubting myself, you know? Before I got on stage, General Steven Spano of the Air Force. He comes up to me and said,
“Oh, I'm so thrilled to meet you!” I think he's was a Lieutenant General...three star at the time...he goes, “I love your book. It’s amazing and I have everybody in my operating theater read your book. All my officers and it's just been an incredible tool. Thank you so much and thank you for being here.” So he restored my confidence in myself. I was feeling very vulnerable and doubting myself and then to get this beautiful testimony, we’re just like we're the only two guys in this huge room. Everyone else was at lunch and then I settled down and you know and I could then give, hopefully, a good and useful speech. But so I'm very aware of the fact that, you know, no one tool is right for everybody. I hope the book has insights that people in the field, on the ground, can consider. It's, for many people, an enjoyable read and it's something, you know, that they can interpret and contribute to...if they take the time to read it and look at it. I think General Spano told me that he felt that the book really helped describe the adversaries that the US government was facing at the time, as well as, informing them on ways to think about internal operations. So there's a moment of my vulnerability in answer to your question.

Maurer: Sure and I guess the lesson here for you listening, even high achievers have moments where they wonder if they have what it takes to succeed. So we all have those moments. You are not alone.
Beckstrom: Absolutely
Tony Scott: Leadership tip from The Starfish and The Spider...once norms are established among an open
community, those norms are taken to heart and enforced by members.
Maurer: You said the goal is World Peace. We are the leaders of the free world, whether we like it or not. Therefore, we are the only ones who can preserve the peace. Now you and Ori Brafman wrote The Starfish and The Spider to help the world work towards World Peace. How do you envision that process playing out?
Beckstrom: Sure, sure. So you know, peace is ultimately a state of the heart. And I mean for people like me, I'm a deep believer, so I love God and I feel that there's a peace for having that...that transcends all understanding. That's available to everyone in through whatever approach they have to the Divine. I’m very open minded. I come from a Christian background, but I'm very open minded. If you look at conflict in the world, and you need to look at cyber conflicts for a moment, because the cyber war is one that grinds on every second of every day as the top superpowers and others are all engaged in cyber offensive operations. And what I tell people is if you look at what each superpower is doing in that space...it's really driven by sociology and economics at the root of it. Any unresolved issues that those countries have, become manifest. In the same way, we as individuals...we have unresolved traumas from our past, we have pains and traumas from our past and suffering. The very definition of a dysfunctional family....is every family, right? I mean it, so globally, we have these traumas and pains that we carry forward. So America was traumatized by 9/11, right? But what happened was so shocking, it's actually traumatizing. I was slightly traumatized myself. I lost my navigation abilities in New York City for God sake, which is a grid. Streets run North South East and West. I would turn two corners and I would get lost for a day. That's not normal. That's a common trauma, you know. We were traumatized in the way the Russians were traumatized by the fall of the Soviet Union...in the sense of loss they felt. They lost an Empire and so, if you look at say, Russian activities in cyberspace, much of it is trying to be relevant in the world. Trying to be seen. Trying to have a role because they feel like they lost their power and so my look at World Peace....when I look at it, as a world of suffering of people and cultures, who have losses or perceive themselves as victims, we've got to focus on healing those bits. What the US has done beautifully....a masterful example of this is what the United States and its allies did after World War Two. When we ended the war, rather than punishing the losers with reparations and wrecking their economies and humiliating them like what happened after World War One...instead, you know, Marshall (General of the Army George Marshall) came up with the Marshall Plan, and advocated it to the President who picked it up. And we invested in those countries. We helped them develop their own Constitutions. We gave them economic assistance. We brought them into the United Nations as a platform for dialogue, so we basically helped to heal those countries. And now, Germany and Japan, who were our enemies in that horrific war where 50 million people died, are now two of our greatest allies. This is what we have to do in the world and that's my hope and prayer for what we do. And I think that we can do that. I'm personally very emotionally committed to understanding and contributing to improved US-China relations. Clearly, the USA and China are the world's two superpowers going forward and they've got to go through a dance and evolution, so that we create a more stable world. And I think the American values, in many cases, are what the people of the world aspire to, but China is a huge country and it has a role to play, too. So I love America when we stick by our absolutely highest principles that were laid down by our founding fathers in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And I think when we support those kind of principles around the world, and when we use our power judiciously to enforce the rule of law to

create a good environment, then it's a tremendous gift to the world. So, sure I love the United States of America and I think that, like the founding fathers, I want every country in the world to be a great country. I want to support a good and healthy global environment, and I'd like to see the US leading in that way. And leading in a global healing process. One last example, the transition in South Africa was remarkable after the fall of apartheid. And what Desmond Tutu and what Nelson Mandela did with truth and reconciliation as an emotional healing process...they said basically, you can be forgiven...you may have killed someone or five people...as long as you confess your crimes and you disclose them, then you will be forgiven of those crimes and then the victims and their families, at least, can experience the truth and a healing process. And I think that's an example of what the world needs, so I'm optimistic. But I'm a realist, right? I mean you can't have done the work that I've done inside the government and the private sector, in different places, and have not seen the dark side of humanity, but I believe on the light side and I believe that there's a much better future that each and everyone of us can contribute to....because the piece each of us can bring to the table, starts in our own heart. So thank you for that question.
Maurer: Rod A. Beckstrom, co-author of the book titled, The Starfish and The Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations,” straight from the professional reading list of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Thank you so much for your time today, Rod.
Beckstrom: Thank you so much, George.
Maurer: Great insight today. Of course, for a deeper dive on the subject, I highly recommend that you read The Starfish and The Spider for yourself. And thank you for listening to this edition of THE LEADERSHIP LIST. I’m George Maurer and, remember, great leaders never stop learning. Until next time. Bye, bye.
Tony Scott: THE LEADERSHIP LIST is a production of the American Forces Radio Network. Creative consultants, Dave Beasing, CEO of Sound That Brands, a podcast development business, as well as Grant Peters and Tom Arnholt. Additional narration provided by Tony Scott

• Date Taken: 06.06.2020
• Date Posted: 06.06.2020 22:44
• Story ID: 371608
• Location: US