in garrison leadership
DESCRIPTION
How to lead Soldiers in garrisonTRANSCRIPT
2 MAY 2013
IN FRO
NT
By JENNIFER MATTSON NCO Journal
As the drawdown continues in Afghanistan, NCOs need to spend more time focusing on and honing their garrison leadership. In the past de-
cade of war, the Army has focused on sending Soldiers downrange, and often as those Soldiers returned to a garrison environment, they were given very little dwell time before ramping up for deployment. As the opera-tional tempo slows, senior NCOs need to return to the basics of garrison leadership.
Command Sgt. Maj. Michael Schultz, command ser-geant major of the U.S. Army Reserve, wrote an article “Back to Basics: the lost Art of Garrison Leadership” where he highlihgtings what NCOs need to know to return to a garrison Army.
“As we move back to a garrison environment, we need to remember that we are a profession of arms,” Schultz said. “We as NCOs are professionals, and we need to ensure our Soldiers are being professionals — both while deployed and here at home.”
Leadership presents challenges no matter what the environment, but they are different challenges. In a gar-rison environment, Soldiers continue to need standards of conduct and good order, Schultz said.
“The challenge of garrison leadership is to install the traditions and battle drills,” Schultz said. “We need to continue to hone our tactical skills and stay sharp while we’re in garrison. We also need to be well-rounded NCOs who respect the traditions of garrison leadership — those things like NCO induction ceremonies, dining in and dining outs and the importance of the Sergeant
Audie Murphy Clubs.”
Bringing back in-garrison traditions require NCOs to learn more about their Soldiers, the his-tory of their units and the distinc-tions of the NCO Corps.
“The garrison
Leading Soldiers in garrison
Command Sgt. Maj. Allan Fairley accepts the USAG Benelux colors from Col. James Drago as he as-sumes responsibil-ity of the garrison from Command Sgt. Maj. Ralph Ford during an of-ficial ceremony on Caserne Daumerie, June 8, 2010. PHO-TO BY KEVIN DOWNEY
TOOLKIT
NCO JOURNAL 3
environment is something we need to refocus on,” Schultz said. “We’ve gotten away from the garrison leadership, and rightly so, we’ve been at war for 11 years, but need to place more emphasis on it as we move forward. There are Soldiers in today’s Army who have never been to a dining in or a din-ing out, who have never seen an NCO induction ceremony or an NCO of the year board. We need to instill in this very tactically proficient Army the traditions of the NCO Corps.”
The focus on garrison leadership shouldn’t overshadow what’s be-ing done downrange. Instead garrison leadership is meant to build NCOs into the competent leaders they need to be while in a deployed environ-ment, Schultz said.
“We still have Soldiers in harm’s way, and we still have Soldiers deployed,” Schultz said. “So the focus still needs to be on the training and preparing our Soldiers to go to combat. We can’t lose sight of that. We talk about garrison versus forward deployed Soldier. With us being at war since 9/11, our Soldiers are technically and tactically proficient, but more technically proficient than we’ve ever been. The garrison lead-
ership lends itself to some of the technical or NCO responsi-bilities that we’ve lost with good reason as we’ve been at war.”
Garrison leadership isn’t simply about catching up on classroom or power point lessons; it’s about getting to know junior Soldiers and instilling them with the Army culture.
“We don’t need a power point or a classroom,” Schultz said. “We need to get outside and talk to our Soldiers about the traditions that we have and to reinforce what they’re learning in Structured Self Development and at the NCO Academies
about the Army history and traditions.”
The lessons NCOs learn in garrison can help them suc-ceed downrange.
“We need to get to know our Soldiers, and we can do that very easily in gar-rison,” Schultz said. “The more an NCO knows
his Soldiers, the more he’ll be able to play to their strengths and understand their weaknesses while deployed. It’s taking time out to do what I call ‘tree time’ — to sit under a tree with your Soldiers and learn more about them and their families. It’s taking time to do sergeants time, where we can all learn more to hone our warrior tasks and battle drills.”
Next MoNth: DeVeLoP A FItNeSS PRoGRAM
In-garrison issues Domestic Violence
Alcohol abuse
Divorce and marital issues
Crimes
Suicide
Felonies
High-risk behavior
Drug use
Financial Issues
Sexual Assault
Sexual Harassment
Garrison leadership opportunities
DINING INS/DINING oUtS
CeReMoNIeS including change of responsibility, change of command and NCo Inductions
ReSPeCtS to the FLAG
SeRGeANt AUDIe MURPhy CLUB
BARRACkS AND UNIFoRM INSPeCtIoNS
SoLDIeR CoUNSeLING
“We’ve gotten away from the garrison leadership, and rightly so, we’ve been at war for 11 years, but need to place more emphasis on it as we move forward. there are Soldiers in today’s Army who have never been to a dining in or a dining out, who have never seen an NCo induction ceremony or an NCo of the year board. We need to instill in this very tactically proficient Army the traditions of the NCo Corps.”— COMMAND SGT. MAJ. MICHAEL SCHuLTz