The WAY to WOW Shows
When Aggression Backfires
July 22, 2025
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[0:02] Who are you and where are you going? What do you want? [Music] Hello and welcome to Business Lessons from the Military. I'm your host, Kevin Beml, and I'm here every uh Tuesday. Today is Tuesday. Uh it's been a long week already. uh at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time to talk about uh uh military history doctrine uh military leaders and

[0:39] their practices from which uh I distill lessons that we can apply to our businesses and careers. And so today is the uh anniversary of the battle of Atlanta. Um, pardon me. It is the uh 150 uh sorry 61st anniversary of the Battle of Atlanta and I'm going to talk about the history of that battle and then give you some

[1:14] thoughts about lessons that you can take from it to to apply to your professional life. So, um, if you've ever seen the movie, um, Gone with the Wind, it's it's it's, you know, an absolute classic, as as was the book by Margaret Mitchell. Uh, the movie was made in 1939. It famously starred, uh, Clark Gable, um, as Rhett Butler, and I'm going up on the name of the woman who played Scarlett O'Hara. Oh my gosh. Um but anyway uh so uh and and it

[1:51] was it came out in what is widely regarded as the greatest year in Hollywood history 1939 uh there were so many amazing movies that came out that year including uh the Wizard of Oz um Mr. Smith goes to WA or I'm sorry um It's a Wonderful Life I believe was that year as well and there were there were some others. Uh and and the reason I raise the issue of that movie is it essentially reenacts um the burning of Atlanta which happened subsequent to to the Battle of Atlanta

[2:29] and and the basically the the burning of Atlanta was staged by the burning of a bunch of old sets on a backlot on the MGM backlot. So, uh, uh, the the the Battle of Atlanta was in some ways a turning point in the American Civil War in that, uh, it it caused a a shift in morale, uh, from which with with the the morale of the of the South uh, declining um, and the morale in the North um,

[3:05] improving uh, and and and That was kind of the final shift, if you will. Um, there had been times when it had kind of gone back and forth a little bit, although in general the morale of the Confederacy, I think, was better uh throughout uh the Civil War. It was one of the reasons why the Confederacy was able to hang in as long as they could or as long as they did in the face of a tremendous industrial and manpower advantage that that the North had. Uh but you know once once morale started to

[3:41] decline and continued to do so um it you know for all intents and purposes the war was over for the Confederacy and and indeed a year later or approximately a year later uh an armist was signed at Appamatics uh between uh uh General Ulysiz Srant and General uh General Lee. and and and the Civil War ended. So, uh the the Civil War uh was I mean the the Battle of Atlanta uh was fought on

[4:17] July 22nd, again 1864, 161 years ago today. It was it was actually fought just outside of the city of Atlanta, although today that would probably be part of the greater Atlanta metropolitan area. And it was part of a larger campaign called the Atlanta campaign which was a series of battles uh le led by Union General uh William Tecumza Sherman um aimed at capturing what was widely viewed as a a vital Confederate city. Um the and the reason it was

[4:55] considered so vital was it was a major rail junction. Uh the the the Confederacy started out the Civil War with just a small percentage of the railroad mileage that the North had, which was a tremendous disadvantage for moving troops, for moving artillery, for moving supplies. Um and at for and for what railroad network the South did have, Atlanta was a a significant hub. Um it was also a site of of a of um of

[5:33] you know a large amount of manufacturing. So there a lot of factories based there. Um there were supply depots in Atlanta and um and and so you know to to lose Atlanta was to lose that manufacturing capacity and to lose uh the the various supplies. um um ammunition. That's what I was trying to think of. Ammunition, clothing, etc. Uh all of which were in short supply in the Confederacy as as what turned out to be the end of the Civil War u approached. And then finally, Atlanta

[6:10] was symbolic of the heart of the Deep South, the heart of Dixie. Um it is today uh the I think the largest city um in in the the south. Although Florida is part of the deep south. Florida has a a a different kind of vibe I think especially southern Florida than than the rest of of the south. And but it um uh so Atlanta really is sort of you know Atlanta uh Memphis and and New Orleans

[6:48] are probably the three uh key cities uh in in were the three key cities in the old south. Um and and so the loss of uh one of them was a major uh blow to the morale of the south. uh and and um and and um so you know hence that that shift in in kind of emotional momentum that I mentioned at the beginning. So uh the um I I mentioned the date of the battle and

[7:23] its location east of east of Atlanta in Georgia. Uh it it was fought between the uh Union Army of the Tennessee under Major General John B. McFersonson uh and and um the con uh the army the Confederate army of Tennessee under uh General Bell John Bell Hood. I'm going to talk about the two generals in in a couple of minutes so you can sort of compare and contrast them. So, but in the sort of setup of the battle, so there was um several weeks of of

[7:58] skirmishing and maneuvering kind of around Atlanta in June and early July. Uh Sherman uh closed in on the city and uh the con confederate general Joseph E. Johnston um he had been conducting a strategic withdrawal uh to delay um Sherman's advance. um and to um maintain the the integrity and and the wholeness in that sense integrity of his army. Um but um President uh Confederate

[8:33] President Jefferson Davis um replaced him replaced uh uh uh um Joseph Johnston on July 17th with uh a general he thought would be more aggressive and that was John Bell Hood who then fought the Battle of Atlanta 5 days later. So, um, Hood launched a series of counterattacks on on Sherman, reversing essentially the strategy of Johnston, who was making these strategic withdrawals. And on July

[9:11] 22nd, he tried a surprise attack on the Union left flank. Um, and and it was it was just a a a sweeping attack. So, so Hood Hood basically made this this bold move um from the sort of south and east of the city attempting to hit the Union on its left. Um and and and there was fierce fighting as you might well imagine. Um Union General James B. McFersonen was actually killed uh in the early stages of the battle. He was among

[9:48] the highest ranking Union officers uh to die in combat in the Civil War. Um and and but you know despite being surprised by um Hood's flanking movement um Union forces held. There was heavy heavy fighting centered around a bald hill um later renamed McFersonson Ridge for obvious reasons um and Decar Road and Union reinforcements under Major General John A. Logan um um engaged in the

[10:23] battle and they helped repel the Confederate attacks and in the end the Union Army prevailed. they held off the attack and and the Confederate forces had to withdraw. The the losses were were high especially for a battle of that day. So casualties among Union forces were about 3,700 and among Confederate forces the attacking forces were you know one and a half times that around 5,500 soldiers. Um so you can see total

[11:00] casualties were you know approaching 10,000 uh soldiers which you know this was not World War I style warfare where you would have literally hundreds of thousands of casualties. Um there weren't machine guns and and that kind of rapid fire weaponry. Uh nonetheless the the casualties were were very high. So in the aftermath of the Battle of Atlanta, um the city didn't fall immediately, but the Union forces uh under uh General Sherman continued to

[11:37] tighten the noose around the city. And after weeks of of siege and further battles um notably at Ezra Church and Jonesboro, Atlanta did fall on September 2nd, 1864. So roughly, you know, about a month and a half, well, yeah, about a month and a half after the uh battle of Atlanta. So, and as I mentioned, the fall of Atlanta was a major turning point in the war. It boosted nor northern morale and it also uh basically

[12:12] helped President Lincoln secure his bid for reelection. we tend to think of because Lincoln is considered perhaps, you know, is considered one of the probably two greatest presidents of the United States ever, uh, President Washington, President Lincoln. We tend to think of his re-election as being, you know, in the bag. It was not. It was, it was a very contentious election. There were many people who thought that Lincoln not only should not win, would not win. Um, but in in the end, uh, he

[12:49] he was reelected and of course he was assassinated approximately, uh, what about a year and a half later. Um and and and in the end the the the loss of of the battle of Atlanta and the eventual um capture of the eventual fall of Atlanta um really dealt a massive blow uh to the Confederate war effort from which it essentially they it the Confederacy never never recovered. Um and and it it led directly to their uh

[13:24] to their defeat in the war. So, the Battle of Atlanta is immortalized in artwork, including a a quite massive 360deree cycllo drama called the Battle of Atlanta that's in uh that's housed in Grant Park in Atlanta. Um, it became a symbol of the destructive power of modern warfare and total war strategy, especially Tcumza's march to this uh I mean Sherman uh Sherman's march to the sea um in in 1864 after the fall of Atlanta. Uh Sherman basically just he

[14:02] did this massive march to the to the Atlantic Ocean. It was called the March to the Sea and it was just scorched earth tactics. nothing was left existing in his path basically. And it it still resonates in southern memory the the brutality of of the warfare conducted by Sherman. Uh and and um and and you know from from the north side um they wanted to show the south that that continued fighting was pointless. that

[14:39] um you know the war would keep getting worse and worse and worse and so they needed to surrender. Um but in the event it did take a number of months uh until until there finally was a surrender at Appamatics. So that's the history of the battle. We'll take a quick break and then I'm going to talk about um some lessons that we can learn from it. America is a maritime nation. Our freedom and security depend on strong sea services. The Beverly Hills Council of the Navy League stands with our Navy,

[15:15] Marine Corps, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine through community support, education, and advocacy. For over 120 years, Americans of all walks of life have heeded our call. No prior military services required to join our mission. the Beverly Hills Council of the Navy League of the United States. Help us support those who serve at sea. Visit navyleague.org. So, this is Business Lessons from the Military. I'm your host, Kevin Bemmel,

[15:50] and I was just talking about the history of the Battle of Atlanta, which took place 161 years ago today. and it it led it eventually uh to the fall of Atlanta and then Sherman's uh march to to the sea. Uh it w it it was a major turning point in the American Civil War and it it it led on to the Confederacy's uh defeat. So, um, I I I put together, uh, five lessons that we can learn from the Battle of Atlanta that that to apply

[16:26] to our our businesses and and careers. And the the first one I I essentially um hinted at um in in the the uh uh title for this episode when I said when aggression uh backfires. So, um, uh, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, um, he he replaced, uh, General, uh, Joseph Johnston with the more aggressive, uh, General John Bell Hood.

[17:02] And I think that, you know, in if in in Jefferson's mind, um what he wanted was was a more uh you know, someone more vigorous to take on um you know, General William to come to Sherman. Um, what I think that that Davis failed to recognize was that the the South's strategy really was better played to not lose as opposed to

[17:38] winning the American Civil War. Um, and and this this is something that is is essentially true anytime the United States gets involved in major combat operations. Um, as a people, we Americans don't have a lot of patience for war, especially brutal war. Uh if you if you look at uh uh Vietnam, um as long as we were winning and casualties were low, um support among the American

[18:13] public was actually pretty high. It wasn't until there started being uh ever high higher uh nightly death tolls reported in the news and a a sort of lack of um of strategic and even operational and tactical gains that the American public turned against the war. Right. And and you know, for for all we could discuss about what uh President Franklin Delano Roosevelt did right or wrong in World War II, uh the one thing

[18:50] he did well was he kept the American public, generally speaking, united in its effort to win World War II, which was an effort that took, you know, almost three years. Okay. So we entered we formally entered World War II in December of 1941 and uh the war ended the war for Japan ended in August of 45. So I think uh 42 43 44 about actually I'm sorry about about um about four years a little less than four years. Now if you think about

[19:28] it that that's a that was a long time uh for the United States to be involved in a war. We were o involved in World War I for only about a year and a half from April of 2017 until November of 2018. Right? And the Korean War, we were only involved there for approximately two years. So if the Confederacy had been able to convince the North that the war was just going to go on and on and on, I think that it it could have potentially

[20:03] um met its strategic objective, which was of course secession. uh in in the event the kind of aggressive leadership exhibited by Hood uh was misplaced and Johnston's uh Johnston's um strategic withdrawal would have been more likely to have led to the to the overall victory that the Confederacy uh was seeking. So the same thing is is true in the business world. So, uh, as an example,

[20:39] um, if you're familiar with the company Yahoo, so Yahoo, if you think back about 20 years, was one of the tech darling companies of its time. Um and but in the early uh 2010s, Yahoo cycled through um through aggressive CEOs, including Scott Thompson and Marissa Mayor. They pushed big initiatives uh costly acquisitions and and redesigns and and all of that. The problem was, and I know someone who was working at Yahoo at the time, um,

[21:15] they did not address the fundamental strategic problems like the increasingly ir irrelevance of its core products and how adtech uh was was reshaping how the internet was used. So, and that's how Google came to dominate the online ad business. And you don't you almost never hear about Yahoo anymore. You may see a few people who still have Yahoo emails, but that's pretty much it. So, while the while these aggressive CEOs made a lot

[21:50] of short-term noise, they were not successful in in staunching the long-term decline of Yahoo. And so nowadays, the company is pretty much nowhere. Okay. So I think that what one of the things we can learn from the change in Confederate uh generalship is that that that bold aggressive moves that do not solve root problems in a business actually hasten the decline rather than turning things around. So

[22:28] whatever whoever is going to lead a business, the focus has to be on what strategically needs to be done in order to fix problems. Whether one needs to be aggressive in implementing that strategy or needs to be more uh considered and and paced in executing that strategy. that has to that that the pace of of of the implementation needs to come out of the strategy and what needs to be done. Okay. So, uh you know strategic

[23:03] leadership I mean sorry aggressive leadership can is all well and good but it's aggressive leadership is not going to overcome bad or incorrect strategy. So I think that's one of the key lessons we can learn from the battle of Atlanta. So the next lesson um has to do with the fact that General James B. McFersonson was killed um in the battle and he was the commanding general. However, uh his subordinates, including John Logan,

[23:40] acted quickly uh to to stabilize uh the the um the North's uh um defense of their positions and and he did so without getting orders from, you know, from headquarters. So the fact that he uh had the the the gumption, if you will, right, and and and had the cognizance of the overall battle to be able to respond when the senior commander was killed, the that that decentralized command

[24:17] became crucial to the the northern forces holding their positions and eventually prevailing in the battle. Now, this was an outgrowth of if if you saw my show last week, I talked about uh Napoleon's uh core uh structure, how how Napoleon reorganized the French army based on building individual cores core within the overall army. And these core were were designed to act fairly autonomously

[24:53] and therefore be able to take advantage of what was happening in their sector of the battle in a more assertive way within the overall strategy that Napoleon set. So you see this um this um army organizational scheme, this army philosophy, strategic philosophy playing out here now, you know, roughly 50 years later uh in the American Civil War by where the senior again the senior commander is killed and so the

[25:29] subordinate commanders need to step up to the plate and do what's necessary in order to in order to move through to victory. And indeed, John Logan did that and he was one of the key reasons why the Confederate attack was repulsed. So, in in a in a business example, um back in 1982 when Johnson and Johnson uh was going through the the the crisis of um people taking Tylenol that had been laced with poison. So there were um um

[26:08] uh uh local managers, local product managers who decided to pull Tylenol from the shelves even before the corporate headquarters ordered the broad recall of Tylenol that became the the the national policy. And what this did is it it it may have uh first of all prevented additional deaths. Number one. Number two, it showed that um at least at the local managerial level, they were going to make principled decisions uh

[26:44] about product management and and take the steps that were necessary um to protect uh J&J's reputation. And and this is important because uh had that not happened the the the again the deaths could have been the death toll toll could have been higher and the damage to to J&J's reputation could have been much much worse um than it ended up being. So the the the business lesson from this, the the broader business lesson is that we need

[27:19] to give our people the authority they need in order to make timely decisions because they're closer to the market than than than we are if we're at the top of the leadership uh you know pyramid. uh and they have data and and a sense of what's going on in in their in their area that that we probably don't have even if we're a small company. Okay? We need to empower our people to make decisions.

[27:55] I've talked about this before. Visav is the Marine Corps with what we call the strategic corporal. Uh corporal will will lead a rifle team. That's the smallest uh Marine Corps unit. and they learn to engage in active leadership from the really from the very lowest ranks. So a corporal is an E4 I believe. Uh so it's it's the fourth level uh um of enlisted ranks. It's a very low level. These are very young young men. They're in their late teens or early

[28:30] 20s, very early 20s at the most. And so by by empowering our people to make decisions and backing them up, right? So it's one thing to say you make the decision. It's another thing to then even if they've made an incorrect decision or an ill-advised decision to not essentially punish them for taking the initiative. Right? And so it's it's important that um that that when a subordinate does make an incorrect decision that

[29:07] we we we first of all uh look at well okay they took the initiative and and and that's good. That's what we want them to do. uh and now let's parse through why they made what turned out to be an incorrect decision and help them improve their decision-making ability. Okay, so decentralized command uh can can save the day. Um third, overextending can lead to collapse. So, um, Hood's offensives, um, especially this big, you know, sort of flank,

[29:43] sweeping flank attack he made on, uh, Sherman's forces, they really, um, depleted his army's strength. They weakened Atlanta's defenses and and in the end, they they essentially led to the the fall of Atlanta and all of the follow-on events. And so although he although you know Hood was was being very aggressive in in trying to counter uh Sherman's attack, the end result was the Confederate forces were far worse off because they they were far too

[30:20] overextended um by by this aggressive move. So an example of this in the business world is we work um under the CEOship of of Adam Newman. So um we work uh um uh went on a a huge global expansion. They burned through billions of dollars um leasing premium offices worldwide um and and and expanding the space they had available far out outstripping

[30:56] revenue growth and infrastructure. And so in 20 in the 2019 IPO uh that that collapsed it exposed that the company had had overreached just on a way too huge scale basically. Uh and and it really forced what ended up being a a a an enormous contraction of of rework, I'm sorry, of we work. They they ended up shedding, you know, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of square feet of space that they had leased and and they they had to shrink

[31:33] their footprint significantly. basically Newman was um you know fired as CEO and and the the this company that was once the darling of these sort of uh shared office uh companies is is not anything like that anymore. In fact, you rarely hear about we work any longer. So the fact of the matter is uh growth is good but and the but is important right but essentially means okay what I said before you know isn't isn't 100 is is

[32:10] certainly less than 100% true but if it outpaces systems if it outpaces capital if it outpaces uh demand for your product or service then you know it becomes a a huge huge liability and so you know just like on the issue of of of strategy trumping aggressive action. So growth measured sustainable growth is far better for the long-term viability

[32:45] of a business than pushing a growth strategy purely for growth's sake. Okay. And I'm going to talk about relate an item related to this in just a minute, but I want to talk about um actually I'm going to let me talk about this other one. I'm going to change the order. I have my points here. So, uh the fact of the matter is victory may take a long time and a business is best to prepare itself for the long game. So, uh, the Battle of Atlanta, uh, first of all, there was weeks of of skirmishing

[33:21] and setups before the battle. Then there was this this sort of pivot point of the battle itself on July 22nd. And then there were several more weeks after the battle that eventually led to the fall of Atlanta. Right? And so what Sherman understood was he didn't need to be overly aggressive. He didn't need to be uh um uh overextending his his his army uh for the sake of splashy

[33:57] headlines. Uh what he needed to do was follow a solid strategy of incremental gains knowing that this was the shest road to victory and and and and just you know resigning himself to the fact that it was going to take time. And as much as as President Lincoln was pushing for decisive action and and a faster pace of battle, uh William, General Sherman kind of kept his own counsel in that regard um and gave a steady string of of small

[34:34] victories that when taken in total led to the fall of Atlanta, the march to the sea and eventually to the northern victory in in the Civil War. So in the business world we can see this in Amazon's u you know two decadel long plan uh plan to get to uh dominance and and I remember in the early days of Amazon saying to people they they haven't made money it's been five years eight years 10 years it's like they're they're never going to make any money right how

[35:09] foolish was I Right. Amazon is now one of the largest companies in the world. It dominates the online selling market. There there's no question that it does. Its nearest competitor is is Walmart, which is is trying to catch up, but still has a long ways to go. And and the fact of the matter is Amazon was willing to operate on razor thin profit margins while it reinvested in infrastructure and logistics and technology

[35:44] and and and people like me just mocked the fact that it was not profitable. Um but when it got involved in cloud cloud computing and developed the prime program and became the fulfillment the online fulfillment force that it is for thousands and thousands of individual sellers who essentially sell through Amazon. It just became a dominant force in in the you know in the online sales world. Right? So this the the business

[36:20] strategic takeaway is patience wins. Okay, you you look at if we were to compare the strategic approach of wei work versus an Amazon clearly Amazon's approach is superior, right? And and and and there so if we work had been more patient, right? It may it it could have become the a dominant company uh by now but it chose it chose not to do that. It chose headlines and and and and you know

[36:55] staggering growth over the long-term viability of its business. Whereas Amazon and and it was it was under the guidance of Jeff Bezos during this time. he chose, you know, slow and steady wins the race, and that's almost always the the the the the that's almost always the case. So, there may be times when sprints are appropriate, but the sprints have to be made within the longer term strategic vision of a company. Okay? And in the end, we we need to remember victory takes time and so we need to

[37:30] prepare for the long game. So, that that's the fourth fourth business lesson. And then the fifth one is moral victories don't pay the bill. Okay? Now that's not to say that moral victories have no value. They do have value. Sometimes they can hearten our people. Um and and and um you know in in the in the case of um the Confederacy, while this this broad sweeping flanking attack that Hood launched, it was very much in in character with the Alain that

[38:06] con that the Confederate army was known for. Uh the problem was strategically it was it was I don't want to say it was doomed to failure, but it was unlikely to succeed. Um as as I mentioned a few minutes ago, the Confederate forces were overmatched. They they just didn't have the the the depth of forces to take on Sherman's army. they would have been better off pursuing the strategic withdrawal that Johnson Johnston had started rather than you know sort of

[38:42] throwing caution to the wind and attempting this this very you know dashing attack on on the northern forces with the hope of sort of reinspiring their people. So in the end um Hood had had you know tactical flare um but he lost ground, he lost men, he lost strategic momentum. uh it led to the fall of Atlanta where manufacturing capacity and and this and and military stores were lost and and and so you know even had he won a temporary moral

[39:19] victory against Sherman um he wasn't going to he he wasn't going to defeat Sherman not not in the long run. Okay. And and an example of this from the business world is Blackberry. So, uh, it it it's hard to remember and and if you, you know, you may not have been around during this time, but but BlackBerry really had early smartphone dominance with their their screens and their their little keyboards and such. And for years, BlackBerry touted its superior security and its keyboard design. And

[39:54] it's it had this core of very loyal users. In fact, there were that the that's where the term crackberries came from because people would be on their Blackberries all the time sending messages and such. And and yet, you know, where are Blackberries today? Nowhere. And it's because as touchscreens and and the um iOS and Android operating systems came along that proved to be much more flexible and much more dynamic platforms for smartphones. um they just absolutely

[40:29] eclipsed BlackBerry and and so you know Blackberry was sort of touting you know how how how good we are and and and and how we we've been dominant. You know the problem especially in technology is just because you're dominant today does not mean you're going to be dominant tomorrow. And so BlackBerry would have been much better off, you know, instead of touting where it was at the time, looking at what does the future really hold and what do we need to be doing to change our strategic direction in order to stay not just

[41:05] viable, but to maintain our lead, okay, which it did have at the very beginning of the the sort of change over to smartphones. So in the end, the fact that Blackberries were a more secure platform and BlackBerry was right about that, it did didn't mean anything because it didn't translate into market relevance or even more important revenue. And so Blackberry eventually uh collapsed. And again, where are they today? The answer is is nowhere. So,

[41:40] uh, these are the these are the the the the business lessons, takeaways, um, that that I derived from the Battle of Atlanta. I'll review them real quickly. So, don't replace strategy with aggression. Number one. Number two, decentralized command can save the day. Number three, overextending can lead to collapse. Number four, victory may take time. Prepare for the long game. And finally, um, when all is said and done, moral victories don't pay the bills. So, those those are the things I I would

[42:15] have you take away from today. I'd love to hear your thoughts, comments, good, bad. Uh, all my links to social media will be in the show notes after this episode posts on YouTube. Would love to hear from you. My email address is there as well. Uh now for tomorrow, Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time is people making money and it's going to it's our monthly economic echoes where I talk about the economic data from the preceding weeks and there's there's a lot of economic news and I am going to be talking about that um albeit not from

[42:52] a political standpoint from the standpoint of we we need to live and we work in the economy and so how do we make good decisions for our families and ourselves. So, I hope you'll join me tomorrow, Wednesday, at 10:00 a.m. Pacific time. If you like today's show, uh please tell a friend or family member and invite them to join. I'd love to have them. Uh I'd very much appreciate um your referrals in in that regard. And that just leaves me to uh thank you very much for joining me and to sign off as I always do. Marie

[43:28] darling, you are my bell. Courage at all.