SECNAV to Implement Sweeping Changes

[Brett327]

. I think this level of immaturity is what makes senior leadership - people who have bought into the organization for a career - frustrated. Feeling like you want to do something fun like fly your whole career is legitimate, but refusing to understand why the Navy won't afford you that opportunity is being thick-headed.

This.

They just feel the way that they feel

It's sounding more and more like you just feel entitled to only have to do the personally fulfilling fun part of the job. You'll write awards, and otherwise take care of your troops, but you'd really rather not suffer through anything quite so pedestrian that might distract you from being personally fulfilled.

Is my characterization off base or unfair? That's what I'm hearing based on what you've posted here.

 

[Python]

Is my characterization off base or unfair? That's what I'm hearing based on what you've posted here.

It is off base, but not unfair. I can completely see why you get that impression. It's not a sense of entitlement. I'm not even advocating one approach to this business over another. I was merely offering a perspective. A perspective that several members of this board (and others that aren't on AW) share, but are too afraid to say because of fear of reprimand or an explanation "officer first, aviator second."

I understand it's officer first, aviator second. I understand that this is how our institution works, and should work.

There's nothing wrong with wanting a career. There's nothing wrong with wanting to expand your horizons with a golden path tour. I'm just expressing that there's nothing wrong with: 1) wanting to join because you want to fly 2) not enjoying the non-flying part of this business. Everybody still MUST do their responsibilities, and do then well. And everybody must understand they are part of a big picture. Not everyone must feel ashamed for not wanting the golden path, for not enjoying the "pedestrian" things, and for being passionate about the flying part of their job.

 

[Brett327]

It is off base, but not unfair. I can completely see why you get that impression. It's not a sense of entitlement. I'm not even advocating one approach to this business over another. I was merely offering a perspective. A perspective that several members of this board (and others that aren't on AW) share, but are too afraid to say because of fear of reprimand or an explanation "officer first, aviator second."

I understand it's officer first, aviator second. I understand that this is how our institution works, and should work.

There's nothing wrong with wanting a career. There's nothing wrong with wanting to expand your horizons with a golden path tour. I'm just expressing that there's nothing wrong with: 1) wanting to join because you want to fly 2) not enjoying the non-flying part of this business. Everybody still MUST do their responsibilities, and do then well. And everybody must understand they are part of a big picture. Not everyone must feel ashamed for not wanting the golden path, for not enjoying the "pedestrian" things, and for being passionate about the flying part of their job.

Appreciate the clarification, as I'm trying to wrap my mind around what I'm hearing here. In the grand scheme, there's lots of stuff I'd rather not do, but I do it because it's part of the job. It's the price of admission, and oftentimes... its just the right thing to do. If I'm doing my job right, I'm able to narrow that leadership/JO disconnect you spoke of. Part of that is providing an institutional education. Another part is making sure people have realistic expectations. Sounds like there's more work to be done.

 

[Pags]

But active duty Navy guys do conduct the DT and OT on those radars to make sure Raytheon is giving the end user in the fleet a radar he or she can use.

And you need user experience at OPNAV to write requirements that make sense and get the fleet what they need. And user experience in the PMA to provide that perspective to the engineers, etc. without active user participation the acquisition system is left just guessing.

 

[IKE]

without active user participation the acquisition system is left just guessing.

...and there are at least 10 wrong answers for every real solution.

 

[jtmedli]

So if no (or few) aviators want to achieve command at sea, where do you suppose the Navy gets leadership that has familiarity with flight ops and air capabilities? We learned the hard way in WWII that we need senior leadership who understands this aspect of naval warfare, and this is even more true now than it was in the 1940s.

What I think Brett has been alluding to is that the Navy needs its most talented officers to eventually move out of the cockpit in order to maximize overall naval warfare effectiveness. This isn't about any individual's desire to have more fun flying, and everything to do with putting people with the right background in the right positions. If you stick around for 20 years being a super-LT, you're blocking a spot for someone who will be willing to step into those bigger roles. Theoretically this could be properly managed, and thus could make a guy like you more happy, but what is the payoff for the Navy to go through the hassle?

I don't think there's anything wrong with liking your JO job, but I would hazard a guess that the animosity toward the "I just want to fly my whole career" mentality stems from senior leadership believing that they have explained the above to said JOs in much greater detail, and yet they still stubbornly refuse to accept/understand their role in the organization.

You're a little off the mark here man. I never said anything about "flying your WHOLE career". I said we need to stop acting like wanting to fly is something to be ashamed of. And I never said that people couldn't be taken out of the cockpit. I said that they should stop BS-Ing us with promises of grandeur because we took some boat job we didn't want and to give us jobs that actually make us better aviators. Furthermore, the guys who are gunning for the big "command at sea" gigs are jet guys (cv skippers for the most part and whatnot) who, as mentioned earlier, aren't the ones going to these boat jobs so that aspect of your argument doesn't really hold water.

 

[Brett327]

I said we need to stop acting like wanting to fly is something to be ashamed of

Who in your community is telling you this? Detailers? Front Office? What has been your own personal interaction with someone that led you to feel this way?

the guys who are gunning for the big "command at sea" gigs are jet guys

True, but of the RW guys who screened for major command at sea (your John Funk, Dan Filion, Rick Snyder and Dana Gordon types), how many of them did a disassociated boat tour before commanding a big deck amphib or ESG? I don't know the answer to that, but it would be interesting to know.

 

[hscs]

But active duty Navy guys do conduct the DT and OT on those radars to make sure Raytheon is giving the end user in the fleet a radar he or she can use.

And we screen the folks pretty heavily for the DT portion beforehand and then send them to school before they can DT....

Not sure about outside the helo world, but OT wanna bees have to go thru the nom process.

For the previous discussions, I have spent 5 years in reserve squadrons and 10 years in active squadrons. Without a doubt, the folks that cared the most about getting the mission done and took care of the people that helped them get that mission done were in the reserve squadrons. OBTW - those officers were the same ones that never left the cockpit.

 

[jmcquate]

I would guess that an Aviator before screening for command of an LHD does a deep draft tour.

 

[hscs]

I would guess that an Aviator before screening for command of an LHD does a deep draft tour.

Nope.

 

[insanebikerboy]

True, but of the RW guys who screened for major command at sea (your John Funk, Dan Filion, Rick Snyder and Dana Gordon types), how many of them did a disassociated boat tour before commanding a big deck amphib or ESG? I don't know the answer to that, but it would be interesting to know.

I know several guys that have screened for deep draft command/nuke pipeline and none of them did the "boat tour" disassociated. I'm sure they are out there, but I'd be surprised if they are the norm vice the anomaly.

 

[bert]

No doubt, but does a skilled, highly trained worker at Google/Amazon/Wherever get fired for deviating from it?

Honest question.

Some of the answers you got to this are a little off base. Silicon Valley companies are much more accepting of people who just want to do their job and don't want to go on some management "golden path."***


*** Which isn't meant to imply that the Silicon Valley culture doesn't have its own problems. It's just that an up-or-out golden path to management isn't one of them to anywhere near the extent you see it in the traditional defense contractors.

 

[nittany03]

*** Which isn't meant to imply that the Silicon Valley culture doesn't have its own problems. It's just that an up-or-out golden path to management isn't one of them to anywhere near the extent you see it in the traditional defense contractors.

That doesn't exist virtually anywhere in the private sector. But the private sector also has the luxury of outside hires. You can do your job for many different companies, and can at least hypothetically tell yours to fuck off if you don't like the culture. Not that it's necessarily always that easy to do that in real life, but still. I've had professional job placement types tell me that most civilians' best shot at upward mobility is going from company to company, specifically because you're not locked into "your next step after X is Y," or getting stuck in some "flat" organization where the chances for making manager are basically nil unless you kiss the right asses. Of course, that fits squarely into what you'd think a person like that would say, so consider the source.

Either way, the "golden path" is partially a result of having to hire a new CNO every fourth class of Ensigns, and then spend 30 years finding him/her.

 

[sevenhelmet]

Either way, the "golden path" is partially a result of having to hire a new CNO every fourth class of Ensigns, and then spend 30 years finding him/her.

Is this really the mentality at Big Brass HR Staff? Or is it more along the lines of organizational inertia, e.g. "this is how it's always been"? If it's the former, why? Do such HR planners really believe that a top-tier leader won't rise to the top naturally? Or that it takes literally 30 years of grooming to pick a leader (who by the way, is presided over by someone who may have spent less time on active-duty than whales are pregnant, but that's beyond the scope of this particular sidebar...)

 

[armada1651]

(who by the way, is presided over by someone who may have spent less time on active-duty than whales are pregnant, but that's beyond the scope of this particular sidebar...)

Marine Biology Level 100 must be one of the GMTs I blew off last year because that reference is lost on me. I guess that probably makes me a bad leader.