What Makes a Great NATO Leader: Five Lessons from a Decade Inside the Alliance

Image created from Gemini

After more than ten years across NATO organizations at all levels, and nearly four of them as DCOS Operations and Intelligence at SHAPE, I’ve come to believe that great NATO staff officers and non-commissioned officers are not defined by rank, résumé, or national pedigree. A mindset characterizes them. The following five lessons will stay with me long after I leave uniform, because they are the traits that consistently separate the good from the exceptional.

1. Leave National Agendas at the Door

The most effective NATO officers understand that they are not representing their nation’s Olympic team, instead, they are playing for Real Madrid. That club fields players from thirteen different countries, yet every one of them gives 100 percent to the team, not to their flag.

NATO is no different. The best staff officers shed national agendas the moment they walked into the building. I could usually tell within minutes whether someone was speaking for their capital or for the collective interests of 32 Allies. The officers who thrive and who move the Alliance forward are the ones who put on the “club jersey” every day.

Photo taken from Ricardo Albarrán article here

2. Achieve Information Dominance

The luxury of slow decision cycles ended on 22 February 2022. The Alliance now operates in the most challenging security environment since the early 1960s, and Russia contests NATO and its partners daily across the hybrid spectrum.

Modern NATO staff officers must be able to absorb information, make sense of it, and provide strategic recommendations in hours not weeks. The speed of understanding is now a core competency. The Alliance cannot afford another strategic surprise like 2022.

3. Embrace New Technologies

The analog world is gone. The technologies being developed and employed in Ukraine are redefining modern warfare, and NATO staff officers must adapt just as quickly.

Tools like Maven Smart System funded by the Nations and now operational within Allied Command Operations are game changing. They allow ACO to operate at the speed of our adversaries. PowerPoint and shared drives are relics of a slower era. Software‑driven, data‑fused, AI‑enabled systems are the new baseline. Officers who resist this shift will be left behind.

Image created wtih Gemini from publicly availabe NATO photos

4. Use the Strategy

NATO’s Deterrence and Defence of the Euro‑Atlantic Area (DDA), approved in June 2020, is a gift to the Alliance. It provides the framework to compete in peacetime and defend in crisis or conflict.

Every NATO staff officer, especially those in Allied Command Operations and Allied Command Transformation, must understand and apply this strategy. It is the connective tissue between political guidance, military planning, and daily operations at the edge of the Alliance. The Strategy must be lived on daily basis.

5. Operate in a 360 Degree Environment

The era of regional stovepipes is over. NATO leaders must understand the entire Area of Operations from the High North to the Black Sea and the geography, threats, and dynamics that shape it.

The Alliance needs midfielders: officers who see the whole field, understand every position, and can shift seamlessly as the situation demands. Study the environment. Know the agreed threats Russia and terrorism and arrive ready to contribute from day one.

Final Thoughts

NATO’s strength has never rested solely on its capabilities, budgets, or platforms. It rests on people; the staff officers who translate political intent into military action, who keep the Alliance aligned in moments of crisis, and who ensure that 32 nations can act with one mind and one purpose. The demands placed on them today have been higher than at any point since the Cold War, and the margin for error is far smaller.

The officers who will carry NATO through the next decade are those who think beyond their flag, master information at speed, embrace new technologies without hesitation, anchor their work in strategy, and understand the Alliance’s full 360‑degree environment. These traits are not theoretical; they are observable, repeatable, and essential.

If NATO is to deter, defend, and prevail in the security environment we now face, it will be because its staff officers choose every day to play for the “club,” not the nation and because they bring the professionalism, humility, tactical, operational and strategic mindset that the moment demands.