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Be A Winner, Not A Whiner
A Civil War lesson in how not to be
There are some people you just don’t want working for you.
Like the guy who is great at keeping a neat desk and a tidy office, but is just horrible at actually accomplishing something?
Or that woman who always “dresses to impress,” but never really does anything impressive, or even productive.
Then there’s that other guy who always points fingers when something goes wrong and is quick to shift blame onto someone else.
Sure, we’ve all met someone like that. Sadly, we’ve probably been that person a time or two. Hopefully, though, we don’t add to the problem with an inability to self-reflect and self-correct.
Usually these wretched personality traits result in low production, poor efficiency, maybe low morale. Sometimes it forces employees to pick up slack that they shouldn’t have to.
But sometimes, the fate of a nation is in the balance.
Civil War General George McClellan exhibited all the traits that supervisors hate in an employee.
McClellan had every one of the bad traits I mentioned above. And when he put on the trappings of leadership, the result was disaster.
McClellan was a general in the United States Army early in the Civil War. If education and looks were any indication, McClellan should have won the war. He had graduated near the top of his West Point class; worked as an elite engineer on the Mexico City campaign of 1847; toured European battlefields; and was a railroad executive.
After the disastrous Union loss to Confederates at the Battle of Bull Run in July 1861, President Abraham Lincoln looked about for someone to reorganize and revitalize the disillusioned Army of the Potomac, which operated around Washington, D.C.
He chose McClellan.
McClellan had re-entered the army at the start of the war, and he had some minor success in western Virginia. Lincoln thought his pedigree fitted him to lead the army.
