Hi Ken,

Again, a very good point. The Marines certainly do use ritual to good effect but I did not know that the Army was a ‘ritual-free’ service . When I read your post, however, I was reminded of Shinseki and berets, which stands as a warning of the dangers and difficulties of trying to introduce new symbols.

The underlying points in your posts are important: to change a service culture involves a wide range of mutually reinforcing measures/initiatives (of which we have been discussing only a few), with an understanding that the specifics of any such package will differ across the services, and that it will take considerable time and concerted effort (which means continuity in leadership support). A daunting project for any service or its leadership to take on……


TT