Battlefield Leadership utilizes history to shape today’s business leaders.
The Greenville-based company specializes in providing experiential leadership training to business executives nationwide. Retired Col. Kevin Farrell, president and CEO of Battlefield Leadership, said the qualities of a successful leader can be found throughout history.
“Battlefield Leadership uses historic events and figures to illustrate the timelessness of the human condition; that is, that leadership always matters and that individuals always want to be part of a high-performing team,” Farrell said. “Individuals want to be respected, and they want to be part of something bigger than themselves.”
Farrell joined Battlefield Leadership in 2012 after retiring from a career in the U.S. Army. He served for more than 30 years in uniform and was also a tenured professor at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Today, Farrell uses his leadership experience and academic background to help individuals and organizations reach their full potential.
Battlefield Leadership lessons
Battlefield Leadership’s clients receive more than a basic history lesson when participating in a leadership development program. Business executives have the opportunity to immerse themselves in historic events while standing on the battlefields where they occurred in order to glean important leadership lessons.
Farrell and his team offer experiential leadership programs at more than 30 battlefields and historic sites across the United States and the world. Program sites include Gettysburg, Little Bighorn, Pearl Harbor, Yorktown, Normandy, Waterloo and more. The battlefield programs can be customized to fit a client’s specific needs and can cater to groups ranging from 12 to 40 individuals.
Each battlefield program is facilitated by a military historian with Battlefield Leadership. The facilitator will walk through the events of the battle and discuss the successes and failures of key military leaders involved in the conflict.
Program participants are then guided to connect the lessons and themes from the battle to their personal experiences as leaders in a business environment. Sarah Huber, vice president of U.S. sales for Pulmonx, a California-based medical technology company, said anyone who leads a team can benefit from the principles taught by Battlefield Leadership.
“Leadership is a journey and not a destination. You have to work on it all the time,” Huber said.
The Battlefield Leadership team also travels to corporate headquarters to facilitate leadership workshops, executive coaching, keynotes and other customized engagements. Farrell said the firm developed webinars for companies as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“When clients sign up with us, it’s a significant investment, but they’re getting something that they can’t get anywhere else,” Farrell said.
Committed clients
Battlefield Leadership’s clients range from Fortune 500 companies to municipalities and philanthropic organizations. Some of the company’s past clients include USAA, Milliken & Co., State Farm, Elliott Davis, and BASF. Farrell said the mainstay of the business is derived from high-level C-suite executives at large corporations, but the team can also service other levels.
“One of our clients, when I started with them about 10 years ago, they were $500 million a year in revenue. This year, they’ll be a $10 billion company, and they attribute that to their investment in leadership,” Farrell said.
Farrell and his team strive to conduct approximately 100 leadership programs and engagements each year. Approximately 85% of the programs organized by Battlefield Leadership are for repeat clients.
One of the ways Battlefield Leadership reaches new companies is through its open enrollment programs. Farrell said companies will often send one employee to participate in the program before committing to planning a larger trip for their leadership team. The planning process for a regular leadership program can take from three and eight months to complete, depending on the location and size of the group.
In November 2025, Battlefield Leadership conducted an open enrollment program in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Attendees, including Rusty Smith, chief of the South Spartanburg Fire District, had the opportunity to learn leadership lessons tied to the events of the Civil War’s Battle of Chickamauga and the Battle of Chattanooga. After going through the program, Smith said he plans to hire Battlefield Leadership to conduct a workshop for the rest of his fire department.
Looking to the future, Farrell hopes to continue growing Battlefield Leadership while also maintaining the high-quality leadership training for its clients. He said Battlefield Leadership would not exist if companies didn’t see value in its offerings.
“Everybody on our team is very passionate about leadership and helping organizations and individuals get better at what they do. That’s what drives us,” Farrell said.
Bio
Retired Col. Kevin Farrell is the president and CEO of Battlefield Leadership, a leadership consulting and training business headquartered in Greenville. He has led more than 400 leadership experiences with the company.
Farrell previously spent more than 30 years serving in the U.S. Army. During his military service, Farrell led soldiers in three wars and commanded a 1,000-soldier combined-arms battalion in East Baghdad, Iraq. He holds a Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star and the Combat Action Badge.
Farrell was also a tenured professor at his alma mater, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. He holds two master’s degrees and his doctorate from Columbia University. He also wrote a book, “The Military and the Monarchy: The Case and Career of the Duke of Cambridge in the Age of Reform.”
Program sites
Battlefield Leadership offers leadership programs across battlefields and historic sites across 33 American states and nine countries.
