The Normandy invasion, and D-Day specifically, is a rich and stimulating source of leadership insight relevant to the challenges (and opportunities) of the current global business environment. Planning, organization, communication, teamwork and initiative amidst profound and increasingly rapid changes in circumstance are as critical now to effective execution as they were in 1944. Throughout the Normandy Leadership Experience we examine key strategic objectives and tactical events which accompanaied them, and focus on the role that leadership played in effective implementation or the lack thereof. We also reflect upon the relevance of these timeless lessons and how each relates to contemporary leadership initiatives in participants’ current roles. Hallmarks of effective leadership and decision-making are explored in the context of the D-Day operations.

Although the potential for relevant take-aways during and after the battlefield experience is virtually boundless, our intent is that each participant would leave with an understanding of the importance of the following in much more detail than when they arrive: ­

• Team and coalition building
• The implications of leader development and succession planning/readiness, both in battle and in the workplace
• Rising to the challenges of ambiguity and uncertainty
• The knowledge, skill, and abilities required for leaders today and tomorrow to navigate through periods of tremendous change and uncertainty
• Communicating a vision that permeates the organization
• Creating an organizational structure which encourages the communication of values/vision/goals. Ensuring that direct reports understand one’s vision/values/ priorities
• Orchestrating and coordinating efforts across cultures, languages, geography, and “territorial sovereignty”
• Developing and using critical and creative thinking
• The impact of “the fog of war” on local (and global) operations
• The selection and development of emerging leaders who will help achieve lofty goals
• Developing an organization in which leaders feel authorized to take initiative and innovate in the face of unexpected outcomes or obstacles
• The readiness of leaders in an organization who feel encouraged and equipped to guide their people through perplexing challenges
• The mandate for preparing leaders with the skills needed to achieve goals and overcome the challenges of the unexpected

The Normandy Leadership Experience begins on the afternoon of our own designated “D-Day”, when meet in Normandy at one of the Bayeux area’s comfortable chateau-hotels, which will serve as our headquarters during the battleifeld expereince. Early that evening we visit the remains of a German installation to gain a perspective from their point of view on the eve of the invasion. Before and/or over dinner, we provide a strategic overview of the Normandy campaign and sketch out the events for the next two days.

The next day, D+1, we concentrate on the British and Canadian beaches, Sword, Juno and Gold, and examine the operation’s logistical challenges using the famous artificial “Mulberry Harbors” at Arromanche to guide our discussions. A highlight of the day will be our analysis of the daring British Airborne coup de main operation at Pegasus Bridge over the Caen Canal, and we will have coffee with Madame Arlette Gondree, owner of the Pegasus Bridge Cafe, who was present the night of the landing as a young girl. The day will conclude with a dinner at one of the many excellent restaurants in Bayeux.

D+2 takes us west to the American sector. We start in the Ste. Mere Eglise area at the epicenter of the complex airborne operations of the elite 101st and 82nd Airborne Divisions, which were designed to secure American egress routes from Utah Beach. Then we proceed to Pointe du Hoc, where the 2nd Ranger Battalion courageously scaled cliffs under withering German fire to neutralize critically-placed shore batteries. The Omaha Beach area appropriately dominates a full afternoon of our attention, concluding at the American cemetery on the bluffs overlooking Omaha and a visit to the churchyard where the first American company to reach the top of the bluffs spent the first night in then German territory. Our wrap-up session will take place that evening over dinner, with a return to Paris the following day.

Stephen Ambrose’s D-Day:The Climactic Battle of WWII is strongly recommended reading prior to the session. We also recommend watching “Saving Private Ryan” or the early episodes of Band of Brothers, the HBO miniseries, and/or, if you are really motivated and like black and white cinema, Darryl Zanuck’s “The Longest Day”.

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