Army Times
Published: 12/18/2000
Category: Newslines Careers
Page: 15

Big Changes Ahead For Enlisted, Warrant Officers

By Jim Tice

Senior NCOs will be slotted for seats at the Sergeants Major Course earlier in their career under one of several approved policy changes involving the enlisted and warrant officer personnel systems.

Other major changes approved Nov. 20 by Vice Chief of Staff Gen. John M. Keane will expand the college degree-builder program to all enlisted MOSs, and provide new professional development guides to enlisted soldiers and warrant officers.

The changes were proposed by the Army Development System XXI Task Force, an organization chartered by Gen. Eric Shinseki one year ago. The task force will determine enlisted and warrant officer personnel requirements as the Army moves through Transformation and the fielding of the Objective Force in the next decade.

"If we do this successfully, it will be smooth and transparent to soldiers, rather than knee-jerk and dramatic," said Col. David Cutler, director of the ADS XXI project.

One of the major problems faced by ADS XXI designers is that they do not know the specific equipment and doctrine that will be used by the Objective Force 10 to 15 years from now. Second, the world situation that will influence U.S. military strategy and requirements, "is vague, at best," Cutler said.

"However, it is not important that we come up with a perfect set of recommendations now, but rather that we put in place a system for making self-assessments and needed changes."

The task force has developed 56 recommendations, organized into 26 initiatives. Eleven of those initiatives are considered relatively straightforward and noncontroversial, and were approved by Keane Nov. 20 for near-term implementation.

The remaining 15 are complex, and even controversial, in the sense "that they poke at the Army culture a bit," Cutler said. They are pending approval by Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki.

Perhaps the most controversial surrounds the Future Combat System, the fighting vehicle platform that will be used by the Objective Force in various design configurations. "When we end up with the efficiency of having one platform, then it raises the question of whether or not we should have more than one MOS to support that," Cutler said.

"Right now we have two branches with (Armor and Infantry) MOSs for Bradley Fighting Vehicle soldiers. Do we want that in the future?" he asked. 

"Well, that's an issue that leads to the strategic and doctrinal decisions that eventually can affect the culture of the Army, because they could affect the content of the branches.

"A cultural underpinning of our history is branch identification, and some of these decisions could modify that," Cutler said.

Included among the hot-button issues that will go to Shinseki within a few weeks is a plan to revamp the service's warrant officer structure, much as the NCO structure was changed after the drawdown.

"We're just not able to sustain the high percentage of senior warrant officers-CW4 and CW5-with what the current documented structure calls for," Cutler said. "We know that with the behavior of the warrant officer corps, many officers just do not stay in the Army long enough to serve in the higher grades."

Under the ADS XXI initiative, warrant authorizations would be brought into line with the service's actual inventory of officers. If approved, this will require the downgrading of some senior positions to the mid-grade ranks.

In a related initiative, ADS XXI would provide for the routine retention of warrant officers who are twice passed over for promotion to chief warrant officer 4 and 5.

Under current law, these officers can be retained on active duty through a formal, and some say stigmatizing, board action called Selective Continuation.

The proposal would require a change to federal law, which in turn would require the coordination and approval of the Defense Department and sister services.

Earlier training

Among the key enlisted initiatives already approved by Keane is one designed to ensure that the technical training given to soldiers in NCO Education System courses is delivered at the right time in their careers. This means that under impending changes to NCOES, soldiers will receive certain types of training-such as staff skills and digital proficiency-earlier in their careers.

In a related initiative, the Army will be programming senior NCOs for attendance at the Sergeants Major Course sooner than what's currently done. Typically, this will reduce the training gap between the Advanced NCO course, which occurs upon selection for E-7, and the Sergeants Major Course, which occurs upon selection for E-9.

The change also will provide the Army with a deeper bench of soldiers who are ready to serve in sergeant major positions. Right now, the Army does not have a ready bench of NCOs for such duties, because master sergeants must be in promotable status to attend the nine-month resident course at Fort Bliss, Texas.

Cutler said that under the current system, it takes the Army two years to move a soldier into a sergeant major job-one year to select for promotion, and a second year to attend school.

While the details have yet to be worked out, Cutler expects that nonpromotable master sergeants with at least one year in grade will compete for school attendance, probably before a centralized selection board.

The Army has the capability to increase the training load of the Sergeants Major Academy by nearly one-third, officials said. Other approved initiatives involving professional development call for the standardization of the career MOS guides available to soldiers, commanders and personnel managers.

Within the enlisted force, these guides vary in detail and usefulness from career field to career field. ADS XXI will standardize guides across all MOSs.

Within the warrant officer corps, it will require the rewrite of professional development goals, similar to the branch and functional area guides in DA Pamphlet 600-3 for commissioned officers.

"These will not be career road maps in the sense that if an officer does all the recommended training, assignments and professional development, he will be guaranteed promotion.

"It is a series of goals and experiences we want the warrant officer to have," Cutler said.

ADS XXI officials anticipate that the new career guides will become part of DA Pam 600-3, which probably will be renamed "Officer Development and Career Management."

CHANGING THE SYSTEM

Here are the ADS XXI initiatives approved for implementation Nov. 20 by Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. John M. Keane:

System changes:

Accelerate the job classification documentation process.

Warrant officer issues:

  • Tailor technical training to units and assignments.
  • Publish professional development guide and update other career policies.
  • Provide specialty training to those assigned to force development positions.

Enlisted soldier issues:

  • Account for additional skill identifiers and manage identifiers by skill level.
  • Refine the NCO education system to include more opportunity for master sergeants to attend the resident Sergeants Major Course.
  • Review and publish professional development objectives.
  • Provide a college degree builder program for every MOS.
  • Update MOS entry requirements at least every two years.
  • Implement new procedures for assessing the vocational aptitudes of recruits.
  • Adopt reasonably equitable grade pyramids across all MOSs.

Here are the ADS XXI proposals pending decision by Chief of Staff Gen. Eric Shinseki:

System changes:

Standardize MOS codes for commissioned officers, warrant officers and enlisted solders.

Warrant officer issues:

  • Roll back active component structure to better match authorizations to inventory.
  • Assign officers by grade.
  • Retain fully qualified officers who are twice passed over to promotion to CW4 and CW5.
  • Expand the recruiting sources for technical services for technical service officers.
  • Access qualified enlisted soldiers into the tech services at five to eight years of service, rather than 10 to 11 years.
  • Promote senior NCOs to CW2 upon graduating from the Warrant Officer Basic Course.
  • Educate commissioned officers and NCOs about the role of warrant officers.

Enlisted soldier issues:

  • Develop multiskilled soldiers.
  • Combine MOSs with similar functions, and reduce the current inventory of 241
  • specialties to less than 200.
  • Quantify MOS qualifications, and link to training resources.
  • Assign command sergeants major to training positions.
  • Provide leadership development feedback to soldiers.
  • Provide structured self-development guides to soldiers.
  • Increase the flexibility of the promotion system to meet changing
  • requirements in force structure and authorizations.

End

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