Changing Napoleonic Leadership in the Department of Homeland Security: The Identification of Toxic Leadership Behaviors and How to Facilitate Change to Those Behaviors

This report has been professionally converted for accurate flowing-text e-book format reproduction. This Professional Studies Paper (PSP) is written from available literature on toxic leadership and negative workforce behaviors, and how it correlates to practices within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). Additionally, I studied CBP's training data related to emotional intelligence and provided recommendations for improved training requirements. I use Napoleon as a key example of toxic leader behaviors because he was universally known as a leader who, some would argue, lacked emotional intelligence. I also use Napoleon to illustrate that lack of emotional intelligence is an issue that has plagued leaders for centuries. One could argue that Napoleon's success was due to his military strategy, self-confidence, and drive. Some historians, such as Owen Connelly, argues that Napoleon "blundered" his way to the top. Although it is true that Napoleon had drive, his success could have been due to another psychological motivator known as narcissism. Napoleon's lack of self-management or control over his mental state led to his inability to consistently implement a grand strategy while considering its ends, ways, means, and risks. A leader like Napoleon will be ineffective if he/she cannot accomplish their stated ends (i.e., objectives, strategy or grand strategy). In fact, I propose that the mental stability of a leader greatly affects their ability to implement strategy. I conclude this paper with five recommendations that I will submit to the CBP Office of Training and Development (OTD) for consideration. The first recommendation involves adding emotional intelligence training to all of CBP's supervisory training. The second recommendation proposes adding active listening training to supervisory training. The third recommendation suggests using 360 feedback data for self-awareness immediately after departing from a supervisory position and six months to one year after assuming a new position. The fourth recommendation argues for a field-training course similar to how public affairs training is conducted. Course curriculum would include emotional intelligence, active listening and negotiations training. The negotiations training would complement emotional intelligence training because working with people and analyzing and addressing challenging situations is a requirement for strategic leadership. When discussing social capacity, Browning notes that leaders must have the ability to influence, persuade and negotiate effectively. Finally, the fifth recommendation is to consider including CBP's National Clinical Director (Ph.D.) in development discussions and training recommendations. This subject matter expert can lend valuable insight to future EI training discussions and considerations.

This compilation includes a reproduction of the 2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.