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book cover for The Green Beret Way: Leading Elite Teams Under Extreme Conditions

The Green Beret Way: Leading Elite Teams Under Extreme Conditions

Book One

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Book 1 of The Green Beret Way

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Pub Date 7 Apr 2026 | Archive Date 15 Jul 2026


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Description

What leader hasn’t wondered how to get the best out of people? How to access and employ the potential of employees?

Above and beyond the thousands of business books on shelves, The Green Beret Way introduces a revolutionary, practical, and groundbreaking leadership system forged in combat, diplomacy, and crisis and built around a different kind of Special Forces mission: winning people - not just battles. Drawing on more than forty years leading and advising elite teams around the world, retired U.S. Army Special Forces lieutenant colonel (Green Beret) and former U.S. diplomat Robert Schaefer reveals how Green Berets succeed by building trust and influence with people who speak different languages, come from different cultures, don’t work for them, may not like them, and sometimes have been trying to kill them—and still get them to choose to do what needs to be done.

Through vivid real-world stories and clear, repeatable frameworks—including a groundbreaking Fear Inoculation Training method that treats courage and composure under pressure as trainable skills rather than personality traits—Schaefer shows readers how to build unshakable rapport and communication across deep differences, lead with courage and clarity under pressure, and harness teamwork to accomplish what others think is impossible. He distills eight decades of legendary Special Forces success into concrete tools for today’s fractured workplace, where leaders must align Gen X with Gen Z, bridge cultures and worldviews, and lead people who can walk away if they don’t believe in the mission. In doing so, The Green Beret Way evolves beyond today’s popular servant and empathetic leadership models—which are necessary but not sufficient—by explicitly integrating purpose, mission clarity, and outcome ownership into the core of the system rather than leaving them merely implied, offering the next evolutionary step in leadership.

More than a memoir and more than a business book, The Green Beret Way is a field manual for anyone who is tired of abstract leadership theory and old top-down models that no longer work. It offers a revolutionary, groundbreaking next step in leadership, proven in the harshest real-world conditions, and a path to becoming the kind of leader people trust with their careers, their families, and their lives, and to building organizations that consistently win when the stakes are highest, not because they have to, but because they want to.

The Green Beret Way is the next evolutionary step in business: beyond command-and-control, beyond empathy-without-outcomes, to a leadership system where purpose, people, AND performance are all designed into the core.

What leader hasn’t wondered how to get the best out of people? How to access and employ the potential of employees?

Above and beyond the thousands of business books on shelves, The Green Beret Way...


A Note From the Publisher

The Kindle version is available for pre-order at $9.99 and Kindleunlimited readers will be able to read for free for 3 months following publication. The book will be supported by ongoing keynotes and personal appearances, plus a broader leadership training ecosystem (SKOOL courses where the book is required reading) and content distribution via thegreenberetway.com and our YouTube channel. Honest reviews are appreciated on NetGalley, Goodreads (any time), and Amazon beginning on/after release day.

The Kindle version is available for pre-order at $9.99 and Kindleunlimited readers will be able to read for free for 3 months following publication. The book will be supported by ongoing keynotes and...


Advance Praise

“Schaefer excels at parallelling military leadership lessons with how-to principles for business leaders, and his appealing frankness—and welcome touch of humility—keep the material challenging but encouraging at the same time… [a] precise guide to business success.” - Booklife

“Conversational and direct in his writing style, the author makes the Green Berets’ EPIC leadership techniques accessible to lay readers…Schaefer is an encouraging presence, offering healthy helpings of inspirational phrases…An engaging and unique approach to leadership.” - Kirkus Reviews

“Schaefer’s approach is unique because no other book models its principles on the Green Beret system, drawing important connections between military systems and how these approaches can translate to effective leadership in civilian life… will be a major attraction to military service people, business leaders, and anyone interested in applied leadership principles and Green Beret experiences.” - Midwest Book Review

“Schaefer excels at parallelling military leadership lessons with how-to principles for business leaders, and his appealing frankness—and welcome touch of humility—keep the material challenging but...


Marketing Plan

The Green Beret Way (Robert W. Schaefer) will be marketed as a practical leadership field manual for leaders who must build trust and influence under pressure, across differences, and without relying on authority. Pre-publication efforts focus on building early visibility and review momentum through a multi-channel ARC and reviewer outreach strategy. We are running an active ARC review campaign via Booksprout and expanding ARC distribution and reviewer recruitment through additional platforms and reviewer communities (as appropriate for business nonfiction), including options such as BookSirens, BookFunnel, StoryOrigin, and targeted outreach to book bloggers/vloggers and Bookstagram reviewers. We are also recruiting advance readers through professional networks and leadership communities. Early third-party reviews are already secured (Booklife, Kirkus Reviews, Midwest Book Review), and those excerpts will be leveraged across the NetGalley listing, metadata, thegreenberetway.com, and author platforms (Goodreads, Instagram, Amazon Author page).

Launch and post-publication efforts are anchored by ongoing real-world visibility and direct audience reach. Robert is a founding member of Horse Soldier Bourbon and gives frequent keynotes and personal appearances (multiple per month), which consistently drive direct sales and awareness. This platform has already produced substantial back-of-room sales (400+ copies in three months) ahead of publication. In parallel, we are building The Green Beret Way ecosystem on SKOOL, including courses where the book is required reading, supported by the book website and an active YouTube channel. We have dedicated promotion resources in place (professional publicist and marketing team) and significant paid promotion investment planned (over $100k). We are also pursuing recognizable endorsements from senior business leaders, including confirmed participation from the President of Raymond James. Success will be tracked through NetGalley activity (requests, downloads, feedback), ARC participation and completion rates across channels, review volume and quality on key platforms, and post-launch sales/readership indicators.

The Green Beret Way (Robert W. Schaefer) will be marketed as a practical leadership field manual for leaders who must build trust and influence under pressure, across differences, and without relying...


Available Editions

EDITION Paperback
ISBN 9780980239577
PRICE US$22.95 (USD)
PAGES 204

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