Is the Suggestion of this Dated Article Valid?

[wallythenycat]

Want To fix Aviator Retention? Don’t Promote Them

Recently, a brace of articles published in Proceedings and elsewhere have argued that naval aviation is perched on a precipice of impending retention disaster. Aviators, especially those in the strike-fighter (VFA) and electronic attack (VAQ) communities, increasingly eye leaving the service at...

blog.usni.org

 

[nittany03]

It's honestly far from a flat-out bad idea, but the devil is in the details. Especially the bit about "this might be illegal." Military promotions are governed by the Defense Officer Personnel Management Act of 1980, and any bright idea that conflicts with this isn't seeing the light of day without lobbying Congress to change the law. Not impossible, but also not easy.

My own personal opinion? Yes, it's cosmically stupid to assume that every JG who gets winged must ultimately compete for CO or get out, and that any misstep along the pipeline from NIFE to fully-qualified fleet aviator can completely derail a career and that this is OK. Problem is, to get buy-in to change the system requires persuading people who succeeded within the system, which means they're likely to cock their head and ask you what the problem is. After all, they could hack it, why couldn't you?

Of course, the rebuttal is some outstanding officers I've worked with over the years who put on senior rank in the reserve side of the house because they either didn't want to or couldn't play by the active duty rules.

 

[Brett327]

It isn't about assuming that every JG could be a good CO/CAG/Admiral, but it IS about ensuring that we have an adequate pool of qualified people from which to choose those positions. Some people really get lost in the sauce on this issue, mostly because of Peter Pan syndrome.

I run into this topic a lot these days... People who have had reasonable success at upward mobility are generally satisfied with the status quo, while those who have been left on the career cutting room floor, for whatever reason, are very vocal in their criticisms of our promotion system. This should surprise no one. Though I do agree that our promotion process leaves lots of room for improvement... even some fairly radical overhauling, we should all be extremely wary of anointing those with prominent chips on their shoulders with any real credibility on this topic.

This will be blunt, and unpopular with some, but allowing the losers of the game come up with the rules for the next round of play probably isn't a winning strategy.

 

[wallythenycat]

So, would be the solution if an aviator wants to keep flying, but either does not have the ability or inclination for senior command? Is it best to get out after the MSR and fly for the airlines then?

 

[sevenhelmet]

So, would be the solution if an aviator wants to keep flying, but either does not have the ability or inclination for senior command? Is it best to get out after the MSR and fly for the airlines then?

In short yes, although there are other ways to fly after the military, and a few non-CO flying jobs to be found here and there. But if flying is all you care about, airlines deserve a good look.

A lot of guys I served with found their preferences changed as they progressed through their career. Some guys actually want/need a break from flying after DH, and look forward to the second disassociated / joint tour. Those guys are typically on the CO track, so they have something to look forward to.

My main gripe with our promotion system is how dependent it is on timing, and how that can punish people for taking detours such as higher education. You shouldn’t be able to count noses on day one and predict the outcome of your DH tour. More flexibility to identify and select talent from the non golden-path crowd might be a good thing.

 

[Gatordev]

This will be blunt, and unpopular with some, but allowing the losers of the game come up with the rules for the next round of play probably isn't a winning strategy.

Blunt, yes, but I'd also argue it's painted a little too broadly. I agree, all of the people who "got cut" shouldn't be the ones to make the rules. But there's plenty of individuals that chose to not make the cut by just leaving the game because they found a better option elsewhere (within the military) because they didn't like the current system they were in.

Admittedly, I don't know what that percentage of people is. Is it 10% or 40%? My info is more anecdotal, but the number I can come up with after 60 seconds of thinking about it is significantly greater than 1, and those individuals left their JO tour (and a couple, their DH tour) as a competitive #1 EP. Of course, not everyone had the same reasons for side-stepping the path.

I think what does happen when this discussion comes up is people like to classify the players into two groups: 1) those that made the effort and succeeded and 2) those that didn't make the effort (for whatever reason). I'd argue there's those (like me) that continued to make the best effort, and continued to be rewarded, but wasn't even remotely putting that effort in to continue to climb the ladder and didn't care about the path.

@Brett327 , I'm not saying you are saying that, as I recognize you made the comment "for a multitude of reasons." The overall gist of my post is that it's not binary, and there's lots of people who may be willing to work hard and produce a fantastic product, and are recognized for it, but they're happy to do that as a non-promoting line pilot (assuming policy allowed that).

 

[wallythenycat]

In short yes, although there are other ways to fly after the military, and a few non-CO flying jobs to be found here and there. But if flying is all you care about, airlines deserve a good look.

A lot of guys I served with found their preferences changed as they progressed through their career. Some guys actually want/need a break from flying after DH, and look forward to the second disassociated / joint tour. Those guys are typically on the CO track, so they have something to look forward to.

My main gripe with our promotion system is how dependent it is on timing, and how that can punish people for taking detours such as higher education. You shouldn’t be able to count noses on day one and predict the outcome of your DH tour. More flexibility to identify and select talent from the non golden-path crowd might be a good thing.

Thank you for the detailed response.

Does the Department Head tour for an aviator mean being a squadron XO? It would be great to get a master's degree full time, if possible, while in the navy. However, it would not be cool if taking a two year detour at NPS or a civilian would hurt one's career.

 

[gparks1989]

Of course, the rebuttal is some outstanding officers I've worked with over the years who put on senior rank in the reserve side of the house because they either didn't want to or couldn't play by the active duty rules.

I think one of the most interesting - and arguably difficult - ideas is greater utilization of the reserves. My experience is vanishingly small, and I'm at a hardware unit, but I really enjoy the reserves and see tons of promise with it (i.e. something I could do as second career). I'd love to see a system where people (or whole units) move seamlessly between SELRES and AD. That's probably a pipe dream with lots of difficulty, but I think it would go miles for talent retention.

There's been a lot of ink spilled about the Navy's promotion and career management system. I have lots of issues with it: inflexibility, the degree to which timing can effect (i.e. fuck over) people, adversarial relationships with the detailer, phrases like "but that PEP tour in Australia is a career killer." Having said that, it's kinda like Churchill's quote about democracy being the worst system except for all of the others. It generally works, and the FITREP rankings that I've seen have been pretty fair and reflected the quality of the individuals. By no means perfect, but pretty good.

Some of the ideas (like perma-LTs flying forever) are poorly thought out (see comment about Peter Pan syndrome...yes I know the USAF does it that way, but I also know that the USAF is suffering from major retention issues as well). And what's more I'm not convinced they'll solve the problem.

 

[gparks1989]

Thank you for the detailed response.

Does the Department Head tour for an aviator mean being a squadron XO? It would be great to get a master's degree full time, if possible, while in the navy. However, it would not be cool if taking a two year detour at NPS or a civilian would hurt one's career.

DH = middle management
XO = second in command who will fleet up to CO.

That rule applies to fleet USN squadrons.

As for the education, it's been talked about a lot. Opportunities are out there, timing is everything, some are more career beneficial than others. Also a gripe for lots of people who ultimately separated.

 

[Brett327]

Blunt, yes, but I'd also argue it's painted a little too broadly. I agree, all of the people who "got cut" shouldn't be the ones to make the rules. But there's plenty of individuals that chose to not make the cut by just leaving the game because they found a better option elsewhere (within the military) because they didn't like the current system they were in.

Admittedly, I don't know what that percentage of people is. Is it 10% or 40%? My info is more anecdotal, but the number I can come up with after 60 seconds of thinking about it is significantly greater than 1, and those individuals left their JO tour (and a couple, their DH tour) as a competitive #1 EP. Of course, not everyone had the same reasons for side-stepping the path.

I think what does happen when this discussion comes up is people like to classify the players into two groups: 1) those that made the effort and succeeded and 2) those that didn't make the effort (for whatever reason). I'd argue there's those (like me) that continued to make the best effort, and continued to be rewarded, but wasn't even remotely putting that effort in to continue to climb the ladder and didn't care about the path.

@Brett327 , I'm not saying you are saying that, as I recognize you made the comment "for a multitude of reasons." The overall gist of my post is that it's not binary, and there's lots of people who may be willing to work hard and produce a fantastic product, and are recognized for it, but they're happy to do that as a non-promoting line pilot (assuming policy allowed that).

Completely valid, and yes, I’m painting with a very broad brush, but that’s the kind of general approach the service has to take in formulating policy.

 

[FormerRecruitingGuru]

Completely valid, and yes, I’m painting with a very broad brush, but that’s the kind of general approach the service has to take in formulating policy.

I know someone real well in the OPNAV / N1 world, especially officer promotions, who would like to talk to you about this…

 

[nittany03]

Blunt, yes, but I'd also argue it's painted a little too broadly. I agree, all of the people who "got cut" shouldn't be the ones to make the rules. But there's plenty of individuals that chose to not make the cut by just leaving the game because they found a better option elsewhere (within the military) because they didn't like the current system they were in.

The problem with this idea of splitting everyone up into "winners" and "losers" is that it assumes that the hypothetical person in question had complete control of all the circumstances that they needed to succeed, and this is never true. If the Navy brings someone in, they may be an outstanding nuke SWO and a crappy aviator or vice versa. Or perhaps a great helo pilot and not a great P-3 pilot. Or perhaps they had the misfortune to end up in a toxic unit that stunted their development. Yet there's no ability for these folks to recover. In the private sector, I've seen people who I thought were absolute lazy slugs light up like a Christmas tree and start rocking it when they got shifted to a new job and manager. It was about psychological fit for that person to show off their skills, and they succeeded because a good manager recognized this and shifted them to a better role. The active component in particular acts like this doesn't exist and that people are all replaceable widgets.

There's also the Peter Principle to keep in mind here . . . just because someone is a great individual contributor in the cockpit does not necessarily mean that they're going to be a great DH or a great CO, or that they won't end up succeeding by kissing up and kicking down. Our current system absolutely allows for that. Abstractly, these are also people who would have been best left at their previous rank, yet when they flame out, we now have to train their replacements, which is foolish.

One thing I sometimes note in discussions about this is an underlying vein of contempt for the ideas and contributions of those that "didn't make it." It's a toxic feature of the aviation community and the active side that I absolutely don't miss, and I believe it directly flows from what happens to the brains of people who spend careers "winning" in an zero-sum up-or-out stack-ranked environment.

 

[DanMa1156]

This will be blunt, and unpopular with some, but allowing the losers of the game come up with the rules for the next round of play probably isn't a winning strategy.

I agree with your overall point, but maybe we should consider those who are talented and could have made it (i.e. DH selects that opted out at their 10-11 year mark) but chose to leave.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is that not the point of the article? Some people just don't want to DH or go to CO/XO. We lose tremendous talent. We could still find a way to filter out the wheat from the chaff, but there has to be a way to retain some of our top talent in the cockpit.

For this Jan 31st highwater, our #1 EP wants to go to the airlines and our #2 wants to leave for Federal Law Enforcement. How can we retain them? My CO charged the DH's with "show the JO's how much fun you're having," and I really do try to keep a good attitude - I still love flying - I love the ready room, I pay my mess dues and do the mandatory fun (that more often than not I enjoy), I take the ribbing from the JOs (largely deserved!), but when they see me and some of my peers staying till 2100-2200 or coming in on weekends, they don't want to do it. So, perhaps we could find a middle ground for those who don't want to promote but we retain as top talent. Some people will still want to promote and be DH/XO/CO. Let's just find a way to keep those who are in the middle ground of "talented, but not looking for increased responsibility."

Edit: I see @Gatordev made a very similar point and you responded.

 

[nittany03]

I think one of the most interesting - and arguably difficult - ideas is greater utilization of the reserves. My experience is vanishingly small, and I'm at a hardware unit, but I really enjoy the reserves and see tons of promise with it (i.e. something I could do as second career). I'd love to see a system where people (or whole units) move seamlessly between SELRES and AD. That's probably a pipe dream with lots of difficulty, but I think it would go miles for talent retention.

The problem you run into is that people are probably going to have a stunted civilian career. If the individual in question is OK with that, then great. The private sector has its own flaws, and one of those is that a lot of recruiters and hiring managers really look down on ping-ponging back and forth between professional fields. So if I'm a software developer, mechanical engineer, or lawyer on the outside and I want to "move seamlessly" back and forth with being, say, a nuke SWO or aviator, my civ career is probably going to be stunted or DIW because it's looking like I "can't focus" according to a civ recruiter.

Being a reservist is already hard, and I think it'd only make it harder if folks were trying to eke out a civ career with a resume that has numerous multi-year jumps out of their field back onto active duty. You'd probably at best have a core group of people for whom this works for them, sort of like the "professional reservists" who jump from MOB to MOB to ADOS and so forth without really having a civilian job.

 

[gparks1989]

The problem you run into is that people are probably going to have a stunted civilian career. If the individual in question is OK with that, then great. The private sector has its own flaws, and one of those is that a lot of recruiters and hiring managers really look down on ping-ponging back and forth between professional fields. So if I'm a software developer, mechanical engineer, or lawyer on the outside and I want to "move seamlessly" back and forth with being, say, a nuke SWO or aviator, my civ career is probably going to be stunted or DIW because it's looking like I "can't focus" according to a civ recruiter.

Being a reservist is already hard, and I think it'd only make it harder if folks were trying to eke out a civ career with a resume that has numerous multi-year jumps out of their field back onto active duty. You'd probably at best have a core group of people for whom this works for them, sort of like the "professional reservists" who jump from MOB to MOB to ADOS and so forth without really having a civilian job.

? agree. Trying to do the career pivot alone is hard enough, as I’ve discovered. To say nothing of balancing the reserves. The reality is this works best for airline pilots or DOD contractors.

Nevertheless, my idea opens up avenues for flexibility, educational opportunities, time at home etc. I also see EWOs and Pilots who are separating but are not retained at the SAU/209 because of limited slots. Some of that is for the better, but the reality is some solid individuals are being lost at the same time that the NAE is suffering retention issues.

I don’t think this is a simple solution, but I think it’s compelling.