Eric's 2005-2006 MilVets VP bio statement

Who am I? I’m your Vice President - again. I’m also a New Yorker, so I’m lucky enough to live at home and stay close to family while I attend Columbia. There’s good and bad in that; the good is more important. I’m a political science major. If I were actually Ivy League smart, I would have taken my best shot at a real science or math or a field like economics or philosophy. But I’m not and I need to graduate somehow. Since I don’t know how to hack school computers like Matthew Broderick, poli sci it is.

Why did I join USMilVetsCU? Besides being the guy who started the group, I served on active duty for 4 years in the United States Army as an Intelligence Analyst, S2 type, from PVT to SPC (P) with time out as a USMAPS cadet candidate and West Point cadet.

How do I view my military experience today? Under conventional circumstances, I wouldn’t have volunteered. I wasn’t a Boy Scout or JROTC cadet, and I wasn’t a fan of the US military growing up. I joined the Army for selfish reasons: the personal challenge, the benefits and a second chance. I received all that and more. I learned some things, I did my job and my duty, and I served my country honorably. I even led soldiers.

How do I view my time as a soldier? It was hard more than it was easy and it wasn’t fun. It was a privilege. As for the Army itself, my memories are of a peacetime Army; at least it was peaceful in Korea. With the war experience our soldiers have had since 9-11, with everything that’s changed since I ETS’ed, I can’t rightly say it’s my Army any longer. While Oscar was fighting as a Ranger in Afghanistan, it was my Army. While the regular Joes and Janes – my kind of soldiers - were crossing into Iraq, it was my Army that I watched on CNN and MSNBC. Today, I can still say those are my people, and in a few cases, friends, but it’s not my Army anymore.

Final thoughts: It truly is selfless service – a lot of love and pride goes into soldiering. It doesn’t matter why someone joins or where he came from, or how much he enjoys (or suffers) his duties. It doesn’t matter who’s making the tough decisions in the White House. Soldiers are part of a heritage that is older, deeper and more essential than the republic for which they sacrifice. Soldiers are of the people. They are the primal embodiment of the social contract we make with each other to be a civilization. Now, and in all times, our soldiers, marines, sailors and airmen deserve the American people’s gratitude and understanding. As Vice President, I trust that we’ll do our part in the Columbia community to represent and support our brothers and sisters still in uniform.

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Addendum: Eric's basic leadership principles

I learned these leadership principles as a soldier:

• Do my job and my duty.
• Take ownership.
• Accomplish the mission.
• Improve my craft (technical and tactical proficiency).
• Set (define and exemplify) the standard for my soldiers.
• As a baseline, work at least as hard in my lane as my hardest working soldier.
• Recognize when to micromanage, when to pitch in, and when to get out of the way.
• Know my soldiers.
• Take care of my soldiers.
• Create leaders from my soldiers.
• Peer leadership.
• Active followership.
• Respect the enemy.

I carried over those principles and added the following leadership principles as a creative student activist / campus organizer with Students United for Victory/America, Columbia ROTC advocacy, and MilVets:

• A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and the beginning steps are no less than creation.
• Inspire with Vision.
• Do.
• Seize opportunities with aggression and intelligence, for I understand opportunities multiply as they are seized.
• Learn the parameters of the operating environment and its players, and continually update my intelligence.
• Defining the problem frames the solution.
• Strategize and outline a framework to be filled in. Start with the goals, then work backwards from there.
• Be imaginative and think big, even if we can only act small for now.
• Identify the group's organic needs and the mission's needs. They are related but not the same.
• Know my own strengths and weaknesses to fulfill the needs.
• Seek out teammates and resources to fulfill the needs.
• Communicate and foster a culture of communication.
• Articulate the 'why', not just the 'how' and 'what'.
• Knowledge is power and actionable information is lifeblood.
• Extroverted outreach and public engagement and a highly visible public profile change the social operating environment and create beacons to attract support, opportunities, and like-minded people.
• In weighing risk versus reward, I give more weight to why do than why don't do.
• Uncertainty is normal.
• A risk-averse, zero-defect mentality that seeks certainty is a self-restricting handicap that's not necessary.
• Push the envelope.
• At the same time, prepare to mitigate risks and recover.
• Account for unintended consequences as best I can in my risk analysis.
• Failures, mistakes, and defeats - if processed tactically - advance the learning curve for victory.
• OODA and learn.
• Have a future-time orientation and think ahead to the medium term, long term, and horizon, though horizon plans are inherently fragile.
• Cost permitting, act to set up future maneuvers even when the near-term benefit is obscure and the future maneuver is only a tenuous possibility.
• Anticipate and plan ahead.
• Put out as many fires as I can before they start, because I'll have my hands full with the fires that inevitably flare up.
• A good enough solution delivered on time is better than an imaginary perfect solution.
• Do the best I can with what I have to work with.
• Logistics and cost/benefit analysis.
• Be creative.
• Improvise to stretch resources.
• Where appropriate, design a group action to serve multiple purposes.
• Don't reinvent the wheel if I don't have to; observe what other groups do effectively and tailor it to our mission.
• When inventing the wheel is necessary, innovate.
• Strengthen the organizational base for longevity and growth.
• Every group action, in addition to its near-term benefit, should produce building blocks for the group and/or the mission.
• Timely event follow-up is important to invest the production from the event.
• Productive publicity from an event is more important than a well-attended event.
• Design photogenic events and take high-quality pictures.
• Grow the brand and guard the group's public identity.
• Control the narrative.
• Constantly network.
• Gather good people.
• A good team, well led, in the right structure is greater than the sum of its parts.
• Group intelligence and capabilities should multiply when combined.
• Know my teammates and position them to be their most productive.
• Balance leading from the front with facilitating teammates and accept that facilitating them means equal-or-more personal effort with less personal credit.
• Give credit where credit is due.
• Mold a team of aggressive, smart leaders who initiate, take ownership of the mission, and do.
• Prepare the group to continue mission without me.
• As best I can, staff my team with people I trust, but also recognize people I don't trust who could be useful.
• Protect myself and the group from the people I don't trust but use for the mission.
• Identify the people who play reindeer games and do not help the mission. They are cancers. Do not tolerate them. Neutralize them as soon as possible.
• If a mission-essential subordinate is doing a bad job, I can try to rehabilitate him, but I will fire him if the problem persists.
• Organizational structure is a practical constant, so make it as ergonomic as possible.
• Bureaucracy obstructs when done wrong and facilitates when done right.
• Be meticulous with the details of management, records, and organization.
• Set out criteria and goals.
• At the same time, adapt and be flexible; change and surprise are normal.
• When shit happens, make it an opportunity.
• Acting for the good of the group or mission may entail a decision that clashes with a personal belief.
• Activists seek controlled destruction as a necessary stage of creation.
• Activist passion is rocket fuel for the mission because it's explosive, so handle with care.
• When activist destruction succeeds, make sure to follow up with activist creation.
• Disappointment with the return on investment and frustration are normal.
• Near-term success does not guarantee long-term success, and the same goes for failure.
• The disposition of a leadership decision (a/k/a gamble) may only manifest years later.
• The most important leadership principle was my answer to 'What are you prepared to do?'.*

*Answer: What was needed to complete the mission and accomplish our goals. And it was exhausting. The scene from The Untouchables where Jim Malone extracts a "blood oath" from Elliot Ness in the pew was basically my negotiation with Oscar when he recruited me to be his vice president in Spring 2005.

I hope this helps future MilVets leaders who come across it.

Be a creator.

Eric Chen