Guidelines for the Leader and Commander

Featured on The Jocko Podcast

“The finest little handbook on leadership and training ever written.”

--Col. David Hackworth, author of the bestseller About Face

Guidelines for the Leader and the Commander is an enduring classic. Written by the Army’s premier trainer of the twentieth century, this is a wide-ranging collection of principles and maxims to guide the building, training, and leading of any organization, with a focus on the individuals who make up that organization. Clarke intended the book to enlighten and instruct leaders, and those who aspire to leadership, in every profession and every walk of life. Thoughtful as well as concrete, pithy and often conversational, Clarke’s book resonates today.

The late Gen. Bruce Clarke, a graduate of West Point with an engineering degree from Cornell and a law degree from LaSalle, was a decorated combat commander under Patton at the Battle of the Bulge in World War II. He retired from the army in the 1960s, having held ranks from private to four-star general and earned the Distinguished Service Cross, three Distinguished Service Medals, three Silver Stars, and three Bronze Stars.