Strong organizations are built by strong leaders
The Leadership, Diplomacy and National Security (LDNS) Lab partners with organizations to strengthen leadership capacity through character-driven leadership, immersive learning, and practical application. Every engagement is designed around your organization's leadership goals and the real-world challenges your leaders face.
Why Organizations Choose LDNS Leadership Development
Organizations invest in leadership development to build stronger leaders, strengthen organizational culture, and prepare teams to navigate today's most complex challenges. Every LDNS engagement follows a proven process that combines preparation, practitioner expertise, applied learning, and organizational integration to create meaningful and lasting leadership development.
Every engagement is led personally by Lieutenant General (Ret) Benjamin C. Freakley and Ambassador Michael C. Polt.
Character-Driven Leadership
Every LDNS leadership development engagement is grounded in Character-Driven Leadership.
Character-Driven Leadership is a commitment to do the right thing, the right way, for the right reasons.
The essence of leadership is trust. To earn and sustain that trust, you must be a character-driven leader.
Participants develop a common leadership framework that serves as the foundation for discussions, applied leadership experiences, and organizational integration.
Understanding Your Organization
Before every engagement, Lieutenant General (Ret) Benjamin C. Freakley and Ambassador Michael C. Polt personally meet with organizational leaders to understand your leadership goals, organizational culture, mission, values, leadership challenges, and organizational goals.
They review your organization's mission, strategic priorities, and leadership environment so that discussions, examples, and leadership lessons reflect the issues your leaders face every day.
Rather than delivering a generic program, they intentionally connect leadership principles, discussions, and applied experiences to your organization's leadership challenges and strategic priorities.
The result is a leadership development engagement that is immediately relevant, practical, and applicable to the decisions your leaders make every day.
Leadership Through Multiple Perspectives
The most effective leaders examine complex challenges from multiple perspectives.
Lieutenant General (Ret) Benjamin C. Freakley and Ambassador Michael C. Polt, co-founders of the Leadership, Diplomacy and National Security (LDNS) Lab, bring complementary leadership perspectives developed through distinguished careers in organizational leadership, diplomacy, higher education, and public service.
Lieutenant General (Ret) Benjamin C. Freakley brings decades of experience leading complex organizations, developing leaders, making high-stakes decisions, and building high-performing teams.
Ambassador Michael C. Polt brings decades of experience leading U.S. diplomatic missions, negotiating across cultures, building international partnerships, and helping leaders navigate complex global challenges.
Together, they guide participants through thoughtful discussions that examine leadership decisions through complementary leadership perspectives while connecting timeless leadership principles to today's organizational realities.
Leadership Development in Action
Participants examine:
- Different leadership styles
- The context in which leaders made decisions
- Complex leadership challenges
- Competing priorities
- Ethical dilemmas
- The consequences of leadership decisions
- Practical application to today's organizational challenges
Rather than studying history for its own sake, participants use it as a leadership laboratory, strengthening judgment, decision-making, and character-driven leadership.
Participants leave with stronger judgment, greater self-awareness, and practical leadership insights they can immediately apply within their own organizations.
Leadership Development Experiences
Every LDNS leadership development engagement follows the same proven methodology. Organizations select the applied leadership experience—or combination of experiences—that best supports their leadership development goals.
Experiences may be offered individually or combined into customized leadership development engagements based on your organization's objectives.
Gettysburg
Leading Under Pressure
Examine how leaders make critical decisions amid uncertainty, conflicting information, and extraordinary consequences—and apply those lessons to today's organizational challenges.
Washington Monument Walk
Leadership in Times of Crisis
Examine how America's leaders confronted ethical dilemmas, national crises, and competing priorities, and what their decisions mean for leaders today.
Mount Vernon
Vision and Character
Explore how vision, humility, and character shaped George Washington's leadership and continue to influence organizations today.
Theodore Roosevelt Island
Leading Change
Explore courage, innovation, resilience, and decisive leadership through Theodore Roosevelt's approach to transformational change.
Eisenhower Memorial
Strategic Leadership
Examine coalition building, long-term thinking, and leadership across complex organizations through the example of Dwight D. Eisenhower.
U.S. Capitol
Leadership Through Public Service
Explore leadership where governance, public service, negotiation, and competing priorities converge.
Bringing Leadership Home
Every leadership development engagement concludes with a facilitated integration session that helps participants translate leadership lessons into practical actions.
Organizations are encouraged to have their CEO, president, or senior leader facilitate this discussion, connecting the experience directly to the organization's mission, leadership priorities, and future direction. Lieutenant General (Ret) Benjamin C. Freakley and Ambassador Michael C. Polt contribute to the discussion as appropriate, reinforcing key leadership principles while supporting the organization's leadership discussion.
Leadership Development Outcomes
Organizations benefit from stronger leaders who are better prepared to build trust, make sound decisions, and lead teams through complex challenges.
Participants leave better prepared to:
- Build trust within their teams and organizations
- Make thoughtful decisions in complex and uncertain environments
- Lead with integrity and accountability
- Strengthen organizational culture
- Develop future leaders
- Apply character-driven leadership to real-world challenges
Designed for Organizations
Whether your organization has five leaders or five hundred, effective leadership begins with character and grows through meaningful discussion, reflection, and application.
LDNS partners with organizations to build stronger leaders, strengthen organizational culture, improve decision-making, and prepare teams to navigate complex challenges with confidence.
Organizations we serve include:
- Small and growing businesses
- Corporate leadership teams
- Government agencies
- Military organizations
- Nonprofit organizations
- Higher education institutions
Let's Start the Conversation
We welcome the opportunity to learn about your organization's leadership goals and discuss how LDNS can design a leadership development engagement that meets your needs.