Posted on May 23, 2023
Top enlisted soldier says NCOs need to ‘be where your boss isn’t’
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Capt Obvious. I had to depend on my Sr NCOs to be out and about and let me know what needed to be done. I did "management by wandering around" and my footprints were all over the squadron BUT, I was only one person.
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SFC Casey O'Mally
One of the big messages here always seems to get lost in translation: trust.
Every Officer I worked for or under operated with a stated standard of "trust, but verify." But almost all of them had an operational standard of "guarded skepticism." My assessments were always accepted as a STARTING POINT for evaluation. Great, SFC. Now go get me metrics that prove it. OK, now that you have given me metrics, do it again, and I'll be by to make sure you were doing it right.
And if your assessment from the ground up disagrees with my assessment from the top down, your metrics are obviously not valid.
Now, not all of my Officers were like that. But the majority were.
We saw this come to a critical and catastrophic failure in Afghanistan. Not a single leader on the ground thought the ANA had the will to fight without US support.
Show me a leader at or below the Company level who thought the ANA had the will, cohesion, and national support to stay in the fight without the US and I will show you a liar. But Senior leaders trusted their own judgment more than the leaders on the ground.
Yes, the CSM needs to circulate separately from the Commander (as does the XO). But the Commander needs to listen to more than JUST the CSM and the XO. Subordinate Commanders and CSMs/1SGs should be heard and trusted just as much, if not more. Especially when discussing the things they do/see day in and day out, as compared to the "inspection ready" views the Commanders/CSMs/XOs get when they do their circulation.
Every Officer I worked for or under operated with a stated standard of "trust, but verify." But almost all of them had an operational standard of "guarded skepticism." My assessments were always accepted as a STARTING POINT for evaluation. Great, SFC. Now go get me metrics that prove it. OK, now that you have given me metrics, do it again, and I'll be by to make sure you were doing it right.
And if your assessment from the ground up disagrees with my assessment from the top down, your metrics are obviously not valid.
Now, not all of my Officers were like that. But the majority were.
We saw this come to a critical and catastrophic failure in Afghanistan. Not a single leader on the ground thought the ANA had the will to fight without US support.
Show me a leader at or below the Company level who thought the ANA had the will, cohesion, and national support to stay in the fight without the US and I will show you a liar. But Senior leaders trusted their own judgment more than the leaders on the ground.
Yes, the CSM needs to circulate separately from the Commander (as does the XO). But the Commander needs to listen to more than JUST the CSM and the XO. Subordinate Commanders and CSMs/1SGs should be heard and trusted just as much, if not more. Especially when discussing the things they do/see day in and day out, as compared to the "inspection ready" views the Commanders/CSMs/XOs get when they do their circulation.
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