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Several recent C-D posts got me kicking around some things I'd like to see what the rest of you think about. I served 23 years in the USAF (aircraft maintenance) so these thoughts/observations are from that perspective:
- Up-or-out makes good sense when our rather short 20+ year retirement eligibility is taken into consideration. But what about sperate career ladders for those that want to be technicians vs. those who wnat to move into leadership positions. For example, I've known some very good E-6s & E-7s who had lots of technical skills and were better out on the flightline bending wrenches and training the younger troops than they were pushing reports around on a desk. Same for officers; some pilots just want to fly for their entire careers. Others are happy to move from the cockpit to a command position. Should we have seperate career ladders?
- There are some military specialties; Special Forces, EOD, infantry that are pretty much a young person's game. But most specialties aren't that demanding and could be performed by military members much older than someone in their late 30s-early 40s. Is our 20-year retirement too generous?
- I enjoyed working with my counterparts in the air forces of our allies; the RAF, the Canadian Forces & the Luftwaffe. As an E-5 in my late 20s, I looked at the equivalent ranks of our allies and found many of them to be much older and having much more experience on their particular aircraft. In the USAF, I felt like I was being promoted to my next job just about the time I was really starting to get good at my current job and on my current aircraft.
If you look at how fast the Army has been promoting people in the last few year you would be amazed. I've met several E-6s who have been in 4-5 years. What will they do for the next 15 years? Spend 10 or 20 years (if they stay in till 30 years) as an E-9?
The USAF promotes the slowest of all the services.
I am old enough to remember the Dead Enders, 1955 the rank and MOS structure were changed and there were many NCOs in obsolite MOSs holding rank under the old structure. MSG E-7, SFC E-6,
SSG E-5. they were told they had to change career fields to move up and chose not to. I enlisted in 1961 and there were still plenty of them around, mostly in Communications. Apparently no one cared about up or out then.
I always enjoyed E-6, above that was too much paperwork. As we sais in Policework "they made a good Policeman into a lousy supervisor
I am old enough to remember the Dead Enders, 1955 the rank and MOS structure were changed and there were many NCOs in obsolite MOSs holding rank under the old structure. MSG E-7, SFC E-6,
SSG E-5. they were told they had to change career fields to move up and chose not to. I enlisted in 1961 and there were still plenty of them around, mostly in Communications. Apparently no one cared about up or out then.
I always enjoyed E-6, above that was too much paperwork. As we said in Policework "they made a good Policeman into a lousy supervisor
Boompa, I believe yours is a pretty good assessment; many military specialties need LOTS of boots on the ground, far fewer behind the desk. That's why I sometimes thought that (in spite of it being a pretty good deal) maybe there are some military jobs where you'd have to either serve longer than 20 to be able to retire or that the same "up or out" standards for promotions might be at different intervals. (but maybe that'd be difficult/impossible to implement fairly...)
I have always thought there should be separate avenues when it comes to Senior NCO's, in the Army.
Unfortunately the Army looks down on knowing only 1 job....does not matter how experienced you are in that job. So, the up or out can hurt people in the Army...
I agree that some are made for paperwork and some are made to be out with the troops...BUT, in the Army, that is a no-no...
The current Army promotion system, from E-2 to E-9, IMO is pretty much screwed....
Sorry, I'm rambling....I know....but this cold medicine and beer are making me fuzzy headed..
The majority of the jobs in the Navy and Air Force are all technical based. What needs to be done is to remove the E-8 and E-9 ranks and make people who want to move up into these positions become either warrant officers or limited duty officers. A career path can be deviced for them breaking them into warrants if they don't have a 4 year college degree or officers if they do. This will do several things ...
1.) A need to have less 22 to 24 year ROTC butter bar types leading a bunch of men in their late 20's to mid 40's who by this time have more education, training, and experience both life and mission specific. A lot of these new officers actually have non-technical degrees but majors in business admin and logistics. These are great degree's if they are running PSD and disbursing but poor in an engineering or flight line type jobs. Also their is a great deal of resentment to these people who are being put in charge of someone who by this time in their career is old enough to be their father or mother.
2.) Allow people to serve 30 as an E-6 or E-7 with the last 10 years giving them a permanent base or geographic area for a reduced retirement of 5 to 10% and a non-deployable status. Also this ensures many of these guys would be manning the service schools which is where they should be at this point in their career.
3.) Give all enlisted a annual salary bonus for completing a technical engineering degree/certifications in their field. For example a E-6 as a electronics technician in the navy would get a $5000 a year for an associates EET degree and $10000 for a electrical engineering degree and 15k for either a masters or a P.E. and 25k for a PhD. This would give people a huge incentive to further their education and would put them on an equal footing with their peers in the defense contractor field. Maybe a 1k bonus annually for each cisco, microsoft, comptia / Airframe /Power certification they hold.
4.) This would also allow the military to recruit engineers and computer science majors who are desperately needed in the enlisted ranks and pay them equal to what they would get going into the civilian world right out of basic. It would also reduce training costs greatly as each one of these types could skip 1/2 of their initial A and 3 level school training and move right into their 5 or C school level equipment training.
5.) E-6 would be the senior technical rank and E-7 would be the shop supervisors in charge of 14 to 20 men.
6.) Another idea would be to extend retirement to either 30 years or age 58 with the last 10 years on a non-deployable status.
The majority of the jobs in the Navy and Air Force are all technical based. What needs to be done is to remove the E-8 and E-9 ranks and make people who want to move up into these positions become either warrant officers or limited duty officers. A career path can be deviced for them breaking them into warrants if they don't have a 4 year college degree or officers if they do. This will do several things ...
1.) A need to have less 22 to 24 year ROTC butter bar types leading a bunch of men in their late 20's to mid 40's who by this time have more education, training, and experience both life and mission specific. A lot of these new officers actually have non-technical degrees but majors in business admin and logistics. These are great degree's if they are running PSD and disbursing but poor in an engineering or flight line type jobs. Also their is a great deal of resentment to these people who are being put in charge of someone who by this time in their career is old enough to be their father or mother.
2.) Allow people to serve 30 as an E-6 or E-7 with the last 10 years giving them a permanent base or geographic area for a reduced retirement of 5 to 10% and a non-deployable status. Also this ensures many of these guys would be manning the service schools which is where they should be at this point in their career.
3.) Give all enlisted a annual salary bonus for completing a technical engineering degree/certifications in their field. For example a E-6 as a electronics technician in the navy would get a $5000 a year for an associates EET degree and $10000 for a electrical engineering degree and 15k for either a masters or a P.E. and 25k for a PhD. This would give people a huge incentive to further their education and would put them on an equal footing with their peers in the defense contractor field. Maybe a 1k bonus annually for each cisco, microsoft, comptia / Airframe /Power certification they hold.
4.) This would also allow the military to recruit engineers and computer science majors who are desperately needed in the enlisted ranks and pay them equal to what they would get going into the civilian world right out of basic. It would also reduce training costs greatly as each one of these types could skip 1/2 of their initial A and 3 level school training and move right into their 5 or C school level equipment training.
5.) E-6 would be the senior technical rank and E-7 would be the shop supervisors in charge of 14 to 20 men.
6.) Another idea would be to extend retirement to either 30 years or age 58 with the last 10 years on a non-deployable status.
I'm liking all but number 6.
Issue there is those of us who were/are ground ponders.
Many bodies (like mine) don't hold up for 20, let alone 30.
The majority of the jobs in the Navy and Air Force are all technical based. What needs to be done is to remove the E-8 and E-9 ranks and make people who want to move up into these positions become either warrant officers or limited duty officers. A career path can be deviced for them breaking them into warrants if they don't have a 4 year college degree or officers if they do. This will do several things ...
1.) A need to have less 22 to 24 year ROTC butter bar types leading a bunch of men in their late 20's to mid 40's who by this time have more education, training, and experience both life and mission specific. A lot of these new officers actually have non-technical degrees but majors in business admin and logistics. These are great degree's if they are running PSD and disbursing but poor in an engineering or flight line type jobs. Also their is a great deal of resentment to these people who are being put in charge of someone who by this time in their career is old enough to be their father or mother.
2.) Allow people to serve 30 as an E-6 or E-7 with the last 10 years giving them a permanent base or geographic area for a reduced retirement of 5 to 10% and a non-deployable status. Also this ensures many of these guys would be manning the service schools which is where they should be at this point in their career.
3.) Give all enlisted a annual salary bonus for completing a technical engineering degree/certifications in their field. For example a E-6 as a electronics technician in the navy would get a $5000 a year for an associates EET degree and $10000 for a electrical engineering degree and 15k for either a masters or a P.E. and 25k for a PhD. This would give people a huge incentive to further their education and would put them on an equal footing with their peers in the defense contractor field. Maybe a 1k bonus annually for each cisco, microsoft, comptia / Airframe /Power certification they hold.
4.) This would also allow the military to recruit engineers and computer science majors who are desperately needed in the enlisted ranks and pay them equal to what they would get going into the civilian world right out of basic. It would also reduce training costs greatly as each one of these types could skip 1/2 of their initial A and 3 level school training and move right into their 5 or C school level equipment training.
5.) E-6 would be the senior technical rank and E-7 would be the shop supervisors in charge of 14 to 20 men.
6.) Another idea would be to extend retirement to either 30 years or age 58 with the last 10 years on a non-deployable status.
Sounds like the old Army Specialist system that had specialists from E-4 to E-9 all of whom fell in between the ranks of PFC E-3 and Corporal E-4. It didn't work out.
Obviously this doesn't work for the ground pounders in the Army or the Marines. But let's face it in the current military there is a huge divide between the technical people and non-technical ranks aka the shooters. The military has 3 classes of enlistment jobs. The shooters, grunts, and techies. It doesn't take a long time to teach somebody to load bombsa aka a grunt, on a plane or fuel one however it takes years to understand the powerplant and airframe side and to trouble shoot it aka a techie.
Most of the jobs have become so technical that most junior enlisted only become competent in their 3rd and 4th year of their enlistment which shows you how much money is lost through turnover because of advancement and opportunity to make more $$$'s on the civilian side. Also the people in these jobs hold higher security clearances which cost 100k to process than a infantry man who doesn't. If you look at the news lately a huge amount of vets are unemployed with almost all of them being combat vets aka infantry. There are not a whole bunch of jobs out their for them. Whereas most techies find their skills are in high demand on the outside world.
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