The Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets (VTCC) is the military component of the student body at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Cadets live together in residence halls, attend morning formation, wear a distinctive uniform, and receive an intensive military and leadership educational experience similar to that available at the United States service academies. The Corps of Cadets has existed from the founding of the Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College in 1872 to the present-day institution of Virginia Tech, which is designated a senior military college by federal law.As of August 2021, about 1,200 cadets are currently enrolled in the program
About three-quarters eventually go into various military services (or something akin to them), while the remainder go into civilian positions (typically government but also industry). The Corps is about 80/20 male/female — matching the US Military today.
Next Thursday, I’ll get to make an office call on the Commandant, an old friend and retired USAF flag, and spend a session conversing with a couple dozen students, before addressing the student body of one-thousand-plus. The day ends with a dinner.
All great stuff and a real honor to engage with such a fine program that attracts so many future national leaders. I consider this sort of engagement to be of the utmost importance, because here I have the opportunity to introduce and propagate broadly-framed strategic thinking to the very people who will be dealing with this in decades to come.
Good example: Scott Willians, founder and past CEO of Throughline (contributing the foreword to America’s New Map) was first introduced to me at an event much like this one.
From the foreword he wrote:
When the US Navy sent me to a seminar at the University of Virginia’s Darden School twenty-three years ago, I had no idea how it would change my life. Three Toms spoke in succession: New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman; business author Tom Peters; and Thomas P.M. Barnett, a military geostrategist who was teaching at Naval War College. Friedman and Peters provoked us, of course, to see the world in new ways. But Barnett challenged us to rethink the rule sets defining America’s national security. Using a form of sophisticated visual storytelling that I hadn’t seen before, his material pushed us to recognize America’s role within the world in a whole new way. Like many others in the US defense establishment, I began closely following Barnett’s work …
Fast-forward a few years: I left the Navy and started a Washington, DC– based company, Throughline, dedicated to (a) visualizing leaders’ strategies as they navigate complex realities, and (b) empowering them with innovative and efficient tools to spread their vision. Over the years, our firm has proven just how powerful a good map can be in propagating new thinking, obtaining new funding, and then seeding these new ideas and approaches throughout an enterprise as rapidly as possible. We also believe in the power of brands and have brought brand strategy to many nontraditional organizations. Thomas has long been a voice for reflecting on brand USA and the offer it represents across our world, exploring the kinds of affiliations our Union expertly sustains and those it has trouble accessing. In many ways, it was only natural that Throughline eventually linked up with Thomas: what we’ve been doing for organizations over the years, Thomas has continued to do for decision makers the world over.
Think about that: I basically auditioned for a job during that presentation — just one 23 years into the future! But, if I don’t nail that presentation — knowing none of that, then I don’t get hired almost a quarter-century later and given the support to generate America’s New Map. In retrospect, then, that was one of the most important speeches I ever delivered — not just life-changing for Scott but just as much for me and my family decades later.
This is why I treat every speech like it’s make-it-or-break-it for my career. You just never know.
So who knows what springs from this engagement years from now?
Anticipation. It’s the great internal motivator of strategic thinkers. You don’t do this for today. You do it for many tomorrows from now.
From the local announcement:
From: Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets
Thomas Barnett, author of "America's New Map," will be speaking to the Corps of Cadets as part of the Cutchins Leadership Lecture Series on March 28 in Squires Commonwealth Ballroom at 3:30 p.m. Limited seating will be available for members of the campus community. A New York Times bestselling author, Barnett served in the Office of Force Transformation under the Secretary of Defense as an assistant for strategic futures where he became an authority on globalization and international security. He wrote the New York Times bestselling book, "The Pentagon’s New Map," in 2004, and followed by "Blueprint for Action" in 2005 and "Great Powers" in 2009. Barnett worked as a journalist, is an award-winning professor, and has been featured on TED Talks.
In anticipation of this engagement, Throughline prepared a special handout (front page displayed above, backside just below) which I share here. In an information environment defined primarily by swiping and scrolling your smartphone, it’s always good to share something tangible, because people simply absorb imagery and words on physical paper better than they do on screens.
Back of student handout
Being an inveterate note-taker myself, we designed the backside of the handout to accommodate that instinct.
Why share this engagement when it’s not open to the public?
I run into this problem all the time: people thinking that I’m hard to access when I’m not. It just takes a bit of planning and organization to pull — all of which Throughline is eager to arrange (and does, on events like this).
Point being if you want something like this for your school, or association, or enterprise (public or private), it is easily arranged. Just contact me at tbarnett@throughline.com or my colleague Liz Gaither at lgaither@throughline.com
Note also that I routinely give online briefs to select invitees in what we call our Executive Roundtable series (basically early each month). If you or someone you know would be interested in being included, that is likewise easily arranged.
I have spent three decades-plus traveling the world and giving presentations to every type of audience you can imagine in more venues than I can remember. It is the great joy of my career, so, if you’re open to such engagement, Throughline and I are eager to spread the gospel on what we call the Broad Framing Imperative: the need for any enterprise or state to be able to think — and thus strategize — across the three great structural changes of this century: climate change, demographic transitions, and the emergence of a global middle class.
We believe it is absolutely imperative that we structure America’s sense of national purpose this century around adapting ourselves and the world to these well-underway global transformations. We see this effort as the core of America’s future global leadership.
In my mind, to aim for anything less is to miss out on why it’s so amazing to be alive right now.
