FORWARD
By Colonel Roger A. Wujek (Retired)

For civilian readers, an Air Force Medical Squadron that fails its Health Services Inspection (HSI) is a rare and significant event. It is looked upon as a failure of leadership.  It places the Air Wing in jeopardy of successful mission deployment, and an unsatisfactory score usually portents a death knoll for the career of its commander.

If you were a recently promoted Colonel anticipating your first command, this position would not be the place to start your command career, unless you were a person of exceptional commitment, energy, and resilience, and a career student of leadership.  Such was the case for Colonel Arthur Nicholson, a Medical Services Corps Officer (MSC) who served in a variety of responsible positions over his 32-year career, but never as a commander of an Air Force Reserve Squadron, and certainly not of a medical squadron which recently failed their HSI.  It would take exceptional leadership and unwavering commitment just to get a "Satisfactory" on the next HSI.  Perhaps with superb leadership from an experienced commander it would be possible to eke out an "Excellent."  But for a new commander, in his first command position, with only 18 months of preparation, to rate an "Outstanding" is, well…

L E G E N D A R Y.

In this book "Dancing on the Razor's Edge," Colonel Nicholson shares his leadership technique, "LAP" that was so successful in not simply mobilizing a demoralized squadron to do well, but rather inspiring them to a world-class, over-the-top performance that no one expected.

A "satisfactory" might have been good enough, but good is the enemy of best, and this squadron of exceptional people led by an exceptional leader is a case study validating the effectiveness of practicing Leadership, Accountability, and Professionalism-LAP.  It's a solid program to follow for dependable results in any organization of any size.

PREFACE

This book is a powerful success story about leadership, the practice of Leadership, Accountability, and Professionalism, and the extraordinary turnaround of a failing organization. The organization could have been any organization, but it was an actual Air Force medical examination unit that overcame both failure and probable elimination.  The unit excelled to outstanding success given the injection and practice of some fundamental leadership techniques that galvanized the unit personnel.  The principles and concepts of leadership, accountability, and professionalism were packaged into a phrase called "Practicing LAP." This phrase became the measuring stick for personnel to gauge each other's leadership/followership behavior, and commitment to our stated vision.  Along with Practicing LAP, we applied discipline and old-fashioned hard work to get the mission accomplished.

The topic of leadership has been studied and written about for many years and on many levels.  I have embraced much of the work and writings on leadership and have successfully utilized these principles throughout my career.  Although practicing these principles of leadership yielded the desired results, there was always something missing that addressed the lasting effects of leadership.  As I continued to grow through my leader/follower experiences in my career, I developed an approach coined "Practicing LAP" that both yields desired results and sustains those results beyond mission success.  This book is therefore about the packaging of some very basic techniques and disciplines of leading that facilitated the extraordinary success of an organization.

Accordingly, this book is neither an autobiography nor an instructional manual for practicing leadership.  However, it is a very intriguing story about a particular unit, in its darkest moments, and a commander growing together to achieve great success.  At times, throughout the book, I have shared very personal and sensitive situations in an effort to expose the origins of my leadership development, its practice, and the impact that it has had on my tenure as a Commander.

I am writing about this phenomenal experience because I feel compelled to share the leadership lessons learned with potential or seasoned leaders, both military, and civilian.  My hope is that we may see ourselves in a place mentally (virtually), before we get there in reality. Additionally, I trust it will help each of us hit the replay button to re-familiarize ourselves with our own lessons learned.

During the planning and writing of this book, I went through the process of laying out the lessons learned, and subsequently organized them in the form of chapters.  The chapters are laid out to reflect, sequentially, the significant events that took place over an eighteen-month period.  From a leadership perspective, eighteen months may seem like a very short time for some people, but to others who have been in the trenches of a highly intense, do or die, win or lose it all situation, eighteen months can feel like a lifetime.