Thank you Jason!

Trust…is earned not given! Cliché but true!
Just a few days ago we had an incident where a 1SG was “showing off” in front of our CSM and being a bit disrespectful to my NCO.

While in the meeting, I pulled the NCO and said, “let them speak, you are doing great, have the right info and the error that he is pointing out is…[Read more]

Thank you Cristian!

I’ve try to maintain everyone informed but also try to take care of things are the lowest level.

I am still learning on how to properly involve my HHC Commander/BN XO, it is a hard transition and I continue to just want to fix everything my self.

Thank you so much Brock! This is a real eye opener!
Being a leader is hard…I am learning that rather quickly and it is quite a challenge yet a challenge I plan on overcoming.

Your explanation on escalation of force makes complete sense…as a Junior Officer I am still learning on what the right thing to do is as far as mentoring others and…[Read more]

Thank you Adam! This is very true and I appreciate your words.
My first disagreement with this NCO turned into me approaching the CSM and requesting to move the NCO; his response, very professional and made me think twice, “ma’am, understand my fox hole first, how would it look on me if I give up on this NCO right away?”.
I was quite annoyed at…[Read more]

cplenge,

Thank you for sharing this document. I think this is a great way for anyone to get an understanding of what their leaders, peers, and subordinates are thinking. Regardless of rank, one would be remiss to ignore the lessons learned outlined above.

v/r,
Rose Bernheim

@brock.j.young, I concur with your assessment about the “forgetting who you work for”. While the Army does serve the American people, this doesn’t mean that we serve the DA Civilians who work in our organizations, at least in the sense of exercising our official duties together. There are military personnel (me, for instance) who are rated by DA…[Read more]

In my experience, civilians working within the military organization can be a challenge, or an asset. In CA, we have both dual-status and Title 5 (non-dual status) Federal Technicians, and while I don’t currently lead any, I have in the past, and have also been one. Like @fightingengineer said, you have to tread lightly when leading civilians.
One…[Read more]

I work at the Range Operations for Grafenwoehr Training Area, Germany. We have about 32 uniformed Soldiers working with over 200 civilian employees along with partners from the Germany Army. Some Civilians are German nationals, some are retired U.S. military, and some are contractors with no active duty service. Working with all these civilians…[Read more]

Heather,

I love your comment that in an engaged team things just happen. What has to be present for things to just happen? Have you ever been in an organization where you felt comfortable to make things happen? Have you been in an organization where you didn’t feel comfortable to make things happen? What made the difference?

Finally, how do…[Read more]

Heather’s responses:

Engagement:
1. Think about your last OPORD. What systems of control do we
commonly use in mission planning? Is there a minimum needed to execute the mission?
I’d argue that the majority of paragraph 3 — Execution — is
mostly a control mechanism by dictating the “who”, “what”, and “when” for
nearly all tasks. For example,…[Read more]

Senior Rater Counseling is very important, make no mistake. However, I have only received one once, when I was in company command. One could argue that this is probably the most important time to receive one though, since company commanders are very influential. The counseling was not written, nor supported by anything concrete. Words and…[Read more]

I’ve never been a staff OIC, nor worked in an S1 shop. However, my time as an AIT commander was very much impacted by the S1 shop. I’m not sure if it is a systemic issue for AG MOS’s, but our S1 personnel were not cutting it, either.

As you’ve seen, patience was mentioned above. I would also encourage this, while also providing counseling,…[Read more]

Thanks, I agree there is a need for solid planning in the NG and sometimes it is lacking…

Its true soldiers get paid for working in NG status, it isn’t pro-bono but it isn’t always enough to keep food on the table.  I have many soldiers who lose money when they are on active duty.  They’re proud of their service and are able to balance the t…[Read more]

This one is very near and dear (perhaps the wrong word…?) to me. My current and previous (command) assignment were heavily impacted by both of these issues.

As far as the leading of civilians, to be clear, I have never been the de facto supervisor of a civilian. However, during my command, I was essentially a counterpart to a GS12 civilian a…[Read more]

Up until recently, my experience with civilians in the Army was a more intense indoctrination into the chain of command than less, due to hiring civilians almost exclusively from a career military or near career background. Having recently attended DPMAP (DoD Performance Management Appraisal Program) training to qualify as a supervisor of…[Read more]