Turning Down OCS for Another Branch & Your Record

[Igloojam]

Its a difficult decision and if I could do it all over again, I would have made different choices. I wasted the time of a lot of good people and perhaps taken the spot of someone who pursued Army OCS with more commitment and passion. I take accountability for my actions and I apologized personally to my Army recruiter with humility, respect, and honesty.


I should have done more research in regard to the MOS placement process, and unfortunately, there is no AW board to refer to for information for Army OCS. With that being said, I will not be taking the Army opportunity. Whatever my future holds for the Navy SWO, I am prepared to handle it. If anything, I can always apply a 2nd time for the Navy. All in all, I am enjoying my civilian job and it would not be the worst thing to wait another 6 months for a 2nd try to a goal I am really passionate about.

Honorable move man... but ya... somebody probably wanted that army slot real bad. Lesson learned and good luck with future SWO selection.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

Its a difficult decision and if I could do it all over again, I would have made different choices. I wasted the time of a lot of good people and perhaps taken the spot of someone who pursued Army OCS with more commitment and passion. I take accountability for my actions and I apologized personally to my Army recruiter with humility, respect, and honesty.


I should have done more research in regard to the MOS placement process, and unfortunately, there is no AW board to refer to for information for Army OCS. With that being said, I will not be taking the Army opportunity. Whatever my future holds for the Navy SWO, I am prepared to handle it. If anything, I can always apply a 2nd time for the Navy. All in all, I am enjoying my civilian job and it would not be the worst thing to wait another 6 months for a 2nd try to a goal I am really passionate about.

when it comes to recruiting (no matter the service) they always account for attrition, whether that attrition is medical, OCS drop, or just not ship, it happens, if they end up with less attrition then the services just push people to the next FY, so the spot you had was going to be filled one way or another.

 

[exNavyOffRec]

Honorable move man... but ya... somebody probably wanted that army slot real bad. Lesson learned and good luck with future SWO selection.

I actually put this on the Army recruiter, as a recruiter no matter what the service if you do your job explaining the process and the what the person will be doing you won't have a person that decides not to go, and I speak from experience. I had a kid right when I started recruiting that I sent to board and he was selected, he just seemed eager to apply so I half-assed explaining everything, in the end he didn't think the USN was for him, and I realized he wasn't right for the USN.

 

[inabearsuit]

I had looked at the Army prior to the Navy finally selecting me (after 2 years of waiting to board), but the big red flag - as you have mentioned - was the fact that the Army does not let you choose your job. I recently redesignated to SWO, and I can tell you that you will dip your feet into a lot of different fields - and the SWO career path has a lot more options now than 10 years ago. But, it's also stressful until you get your SWO pin and you won't be sleeping much. If you really want to be a leader and experience a variety of job areas, SWO is a good option.

I will say to be careful in future endeavors with recruiting, if you end up looking at other branches, I don't think recruiters or board members will look kindly upon someone playing different recruiters off each other. I nearly did this, and was warned (as a heads up, unofficially) to avoid doing that. It seems like you've set yourself with the Navy though - so stick to that.