Early Frocking - Good or Bad?

[helolumpy]

Plus if you are frocked early, you just become cannon fodder for the senior Hinges......don't do it.

-ea6bflyr

A frocked O-4 gets an O-3 "Selected" FITREP, therefore he/she is not ranked against O-4's.

To answer the original question, the only possible hazzard to being frocked is a higher level of expectation from others now that you are wearing the new rank. Otherwise, it's a good thing.

 

[robav8r]

Personally, I have only seen O5's frocked to O6 iot assume a major command or start the associated training track. I have also seen CO's frock O2/O3's while at sea if their promotion data was to occur before the end of deployment.

 

[BusyBee604]

To answer the original question, the only possible hazzard to being frocked is a higher level of expectation from others now that you are wearing the new rank. Otherwise, it's a good thing.

IMO, that can be a good thing also, by performing up to those expectations... after all, that's why your name was on the selectee list.
BzB

 

[Renegade One]

Are there any advantages or disadvantages to getting frocked early to O-4? I have an opportunity to move into an O-4 billet soon within my command but i'm not sure how that would affect career timing (if at all), and if there are any other issues involved.

YGBFSM! If you don't want the promotion...just say no. Otherwise, "cowboy up", and assume the new rank and the responsibilities that go along with it. If you're getting all weepy-eyed about your loss of membership in the "JOPA"...you can still act/behave like a JO and see how far that takes you. Luckily for you...LCDRs are still considered JOs within the US Navy. Except by the O-3s and below. Don't ask me why...
Oh...congrats. What you do with that "head nod" from your Service is up to you. Think ahead...not backwards. And remember ALL of your brothers and sisters who, for myriad reasons, never got the chance to move onward and upward.

 

[Gatordev]

Personally, I have only seen O5's frocked to O6 iot assume a major command or start the associated training track. I have also seen CO's frock O2/O3's while at sea if their promotion data was to occur before the end of deployment.

The Shoes would do it if someone was rolling into an O-4 billet. The CHENG on my second cruise was a LT who was only one year ahead of me. He transfered to a Cruiser as the CHENG there. Fast forward several months later, and I show up on the CG for an exercise, there he is wearing O-4 and amused by the whole silliness of it.

Lumpy pretty much summed it up. You're in your own FITREP category and if it will help you navigate the cubicle jungle easier, might as well take it. Don't worry, when you put the oak leaves on, you only feel dirty for a few months.

 

[KBayDog]

Don't worry, when you put the oak leaves on, you only feel dirty for a few months.

But you are dirty.

Forever.

 

[Gatordev]

But you are dirty.

Forever.

Oh, no doubt. But fortunately they give you extra cash to keep trying to get clean. I guess in the end, it's a wash.

(see what I did there...)

 

[helolumpy]

When I got LTJG pinned by the CO of HT-18 (USMC Col) he made a statement that I will always remember; "the gold ranks, suck".

Keep that in mind.

 

[KBayDog]

But fortunately they give you extra cash to keep trying to get clean.

Don't spend it all in one place.

 

[Recovering LSO]

It's a job at a joint command HQ. People don't take you very seriously here as an O-3.

how much more seriously will you be taken as an O-4? Again, that question is coming from an O-4....

 

[Recovering LSO]

YGBFSM! If you don't want the promotion...just say no. Otherwise, "cowboy up", and assume the new rank and the responsibilities that go along with it. then a bunch of other stuff

did you read the same OP as the rest of us?

 

[scoober78]

People don't take you very seriously here as an O-3.

Perfect!

 

[helolumpy]

In the Joint world, there is a big difference between O-3 and O-4. For everone but the Navy you are now Field Grade not Company Grade anymore. O-4's wear scrambled eggs except in the Navy and USCG.
In the Army an O-4 is the XO of a Battalion.
In the Marines and O-4 is the XO of the squadron or battalion.

There difference between O-3 and O-4 in the Army and Marine Corps is comperable to the difference between O-4 and O-5 in the Navy.

 

[Recovering LSO]

Sure. But I'm curious what JHQ puts enough thought into the O-4s it hires that frocking would be required.

 

[Renegade One]

did you read the same OP as the rest of us?

I absolutely did. Actually wondering if you did.
I'll tell you plain...I DO NOT understand all the hemming and hawing and associated bullshit about taking every opportunity for higher rank and responsibility just as freaking fast as the Navy offers it to you. I must be missing something here...and if it's nothing more than "the bros won't love me no mo'..." then get over it. They never really loved you anyway...you all just huddled together against the storm. Now...some of the storm has passed for you. Just try to not make it any worse for the JOs still getting blown about.