Promotion and PRF Information

[Liquid]

Karl, don't be so dramatic. Nobody forces anybody to check boxes or get AAD/PME done. And we don't make pariahs out of someone who just wants to fly. They just don't tend to get promoted. I had plenty of passed over, continued Capts, Majors and Lt Cols in my units who were outstanding pilots, navs, and officers. They volunteered to deploy multiple times, worked long hours, and were incredible mentors for the young flyers. Some did not want to be promoted and did not do those things that clearly made them competitive amongst their peers. Some accepted continuation, some retired, some separated when the time was right for them. Many regretted not getting the things done (PME/AAD) to be competitive and mentored young officers to just do it. If you only want to fly the line like a Lt or Capt, and don't want to broaden your experiences and skills with education and non-flying jobs, why would you expect to be promoted into ranks and positions of different responsibility and authority that require joint PME, education and staff experience? Granted, as a passed over officer, wanting to fly for the rest of your career, you may be separated to make room (flying time) for younger Lts and Capts. There are no guarantees for flying positions in the service, we all know that. Force structure, funding, requirements, retention and force management policies all change. If you are not suited for advancement or promotion, for whatever reason, the service should consider whether it is best for the service for you to stay, or go. When airlines are hiring and retention is low, continued officers can usually stay as long as they want to. When there are more young pilots then we have flying time to sustain, continued officers will normally be separated (the 157). By law, 100% promotion is not permitted for FGOs. Unless retention is severely low, people will get passed over. No hard feelings, just the law or the reality of resource constraints.

Some people over-inflate their own value to the service when the reality is their mediocre record of performance, limited experience and low potential to perform at the higher grades make them less valuable than other officers being considered. In my experience, the promotion board to Maj and Lt Col usually gets it right and promotes the most deserving. I've studied the records of those above and below the line, and I've compared many records to my assessment of their job performance and promotion potential. I've personally counseled dozens of passed over officers about what was weak in their record and explained why they were not competitive. YMMV, and sometimes we tend to value the wrong things (AAD at Major being go-no-go) but I think it is a decent system that usually gets it right. CSAF is fixing some shortcomings now.

It is a good thing we are letting people separate who actually want to separate, even with ADSCs, since we need to reduce the force. The airlines and ARC will be better off with this talented hiring pool. For the sake of the AF's future, they should not pollute too many young minds on their way out. We need talented and dedicated active duty officers of all ranks to fly our aircraft and fight our wars.

Edited July 21, 2014 by Liquid

[joe1234]

Some people over-inflate their own value to the service when the reality is their mediocre record of performance, limited experience and low potential to perform at the higher grades make them less valuable than other officers being considered.

I would say, ironically enough, that most people over-inflate the value of the service itself to their own lives.

It's sad to see the occasional person who is deathly afraid of leaving active duty military service and the benefits that came with it. Like, "I will die in the street of starvation" levels of despair. And in 100% of those cases, the guy turns out just fine. In the majority of cases I've seen, they end up even better because they were held back from opportunities they never knew existed for them.

All I'm saying is, if you had the drive and aptitude to suffer through the massive hoop-jumping marathon of shit it takes to be an AF pilot, you're probably going to remain well above the median of American society.

[pbar]

I was always amazed when I was in a flying squadron how many dudes bitched about pme, AAD, addition duties, etc. and claimed they just wanted to fly and yet they didn't even take the flying part seriously. Maybe it's just the aircraft I was in but I saw plenty of pilots and WSOs treat it like a flying club and seemingly could care less about employing the jet as a weapon. Never saw those dudes in the vault studying and they knew just the bare minimum tactically to get by a checkride. I can think of a dozen guys like that of the top of my head that I wouldn't get in the jet to go to war with. I didn't like the queep anymore than anyone else but I sucked it up and did it. And I also spent lots of time in the vault and sim trying to be better at my primary job.

I'm with Liquid; from what I've seen over the last 20 years the promotion system is by and large fair but one must recognize how much luck and timing plays into promotion. From what I've seen that's like 50% of the equation right there. Also, remember you don't get promoted, your records do and if they don't paint an accurate picture because you had poor writers for raters...

[Azimuth]

The people I've seen who bitched about the queep and just wanted to fly were the ones instructors/evaluators were against upgrading in TRP because they sucked at flying.

[matmacwc]

Thanks again Liquid, nailed it at even at the FGO level.

Edited July 21, 2014 by matmacwc

[MooseDriver1]

Most recent start matrix I had to fill out required not just the standard 1, but the last 3 PT scores. You can't make this shizz up. As soon as they remove one variable from the equation, they just start measuring another unimportant one to make up for it.

Posted from the NEW Baseops.net App!

[AnimalMother]

Two thoughts:

First, the waste of time created by useless masters degrees and double PME, is only half the coin. The other side of the issue is the use of a system whereby people are offered what amounts to free points for essentially accomplishing and demonstrating nothing-potentially making up for failures in other, more vital areas. So, instead of strictly earning promotion through hard work, success, and competency, we subsidize it to some extent with busywork (I'm generalizing a bit). Second, (and I'm not just trying to split hairs here) I think we should work towards a system that gets it right more than just most of the time. We're talking about deciding who will progress to assume positions of potentially massive responsibility, we owe it to ourselves to be as discriminating and selective as we can. Is it sufficient if we stop most of the sexual assaults in the military? Is it okay if I don't break my taxpayer-funded aircraft most of the time? Of course not. And while these two examples are certainly more easily measured than successful promotion outcomes, I don't think it necessarily absolves us of the responsibility to critique the system to the most exacting standards that we can and improve on it whenever possible.

[sqwatch]

Is it sufficient if we stop most of the sexual assaults in the military? Is it okay if I don't break my taxpayer-funded aircraft most of the time? Of course not.

Ok? No. Realistic? Yes.

[Liquid]

Animal, getting a useless, box checking master's degree is a personal choice. You shouldn't use the wide latitude the AF tuition assistance program gives you to get a master's degree in a subject that you care about, from a university that you choose, in a place and time that fits your needs, to bash the program for being a waste of time. If you want to use a program that teaches you nothing, takes little time and still meets the minimum standard required to qualify as an advanced academic degree (busywork, as you call it), that is your choice. A master's in business, military studies, international relations, history or government will help you be a better senior AF officer. The last thing people should want is commanders and boards discriminating the quality and location of your AAD for promotion to O-6. Setting the minimum standard relatively low for a subjective requirement prevents alma mater discrimination and bullshit assessments about how hard you worked to get your degree, or how often you were published, like we see in the academic world.

Hard work, success and competency are important at promotion boards, but an assessment of the ability to succeed in the next grade is also required. This assessment is subjective because it is predictive. We use stratifications and push lines to explain this assessment. Businesses don't promote merely based on hard work and success at current job. They may pay more to those with experience and a good record (like we do with pay increases in the same grade every two years), but they don't promote to upper management without considering whether they have the skills to succeed at upper management. Agree, we should be discriminating and selective about who gets promoted and I would argue that we are. But I also think the senior leaders need to be the people who determine how to discriminate and select, not the CGOs. What CGOs value at the time may not be what makes them successful at FGO responsibilities.

The best critiques we can make are to point out how our system needs to be improved and how we selected the wrong leaders should be based on the specific leader's shortcomings and leadership failures. When morale is low, unit performance is below standards, resources are wasted, and the mission is not being accomplished, there is an obvious failure of leadership (possibly at many levels) that must be corrected. I think AF senior leadership is trying to correct that rotten core of leadership in the missile community. We should reassess what we got wrong at promotion boards and command screening boards that predicted these officers would succeed when they clearly did not. A useful way for senior leaders to evaluate the performance of their subordinate commanders is to read the anonymous but honest opinions of that commander's subordinates and peers. Unit climate assessments, IG/congressional complaints, face to face feedback, informal feedback (including social media) can all give indications of leadership failures. 360 feedback should be implemented immediately for all commanders. I'm not sure why we are so reluctant to do this. Commanders and senior leaders should be held to higher, more stringent standards and their leadership abilities should be more formally evaluated.

[Karl Hungus]

We need talented and dedicated active duty officers of all ranks to fly our aircraft and fight our wars.

Wasn't trying to be dramatic, and I agree with your points. I've honestly seen a shift in the mindset of our best and brightest, at least in my small corner of the AF. More talented, PME/AAD complete, high strat folks are leaving or actively planning on leaving than even a few years ago. That should be a concern.

Maybe that's not the case AF wide, and it will be years before AFPC has the data to back up that observation. Maybe Welsh's changes are going to cause the fence-sitters to re-think their plans. Maybe the drawdown will coincide perfectly and it'll all be seemless. Maybe it won't and we'll see a stop loss in a couple years. Either way, the machine will keep chugging along.

[Disco_Nav963]

Wasn't trying to be dramatic, and I agree with your points. I've honestly seen a shift in the mindset of our best and brightest, at least in my small corner of the AF. More talented, PME/AAD complete, high strat folks are leaving or actively planning on leaving than even a few years ago. That should be a concern.

"Two." In the last six months, two school selects and a Wing exec I know all applied for VSP or Palace Chase. The good kind too, not pepper grinders. Definitely influenced my own decision matrix.

[Lord Ratner]

"Two." In the last six months, two school selects and a Wing exec I know all applied for VSP or Palace Chase. The good kind too, not pepper grinders. Definitely influenced my own decision matrix.

The absolute biggest factor I've seen driving "fast-burners" to surprise everyone and quit are 365s (or other similar bad-deals), or the expectation of getting one soon.

[Champ Kind]

The absolute biggest factor I've seen driving "fast-burners" to surprise everyone and quit are 365s (or other similar bad-deals), or the expectation of getting one soon.

Bingo.

Dudes have been busting their asses to get as far as they did (different topic as to what they had to do to get there...it was work and time either way) only to be "rewarded" with this great opportunity to spend even more time away from the fam to the tune of 365 days. No way.

Edited July 21, 2014 by Champ Kind

[Liquid]

Wasn't trying to be dramatic, and I agree with your points. I've honestly seen a shift in the mindset of our best and brightest, at least in my small corner of the AF. More talented, PME/AAD complete, high strat folks are leaving or actively planning on leaving than even a few years ago. That should be a concern.

Karl, I hear you. I don't see the exodus in my world yet, but I know it is out there and it will hurt. People are tired and they are sick of the bullshit. The culture of compliance, risk aversion (Korea alcohol ban), infatuation with glorifying support missions and ridiculous move towards complete centralized control are crushing us. There is no end to the deployments, ops tempo or chickenshit priorities, and the airlines are hiring and our skills are in high demand in many industries. Retention is a problem we need to get on now, and listening to those who are disgusted and separating is important. Now, I'm deployed again and life is good. Mission focus, no bullshit, killing the enemy, protecting the friendlies and the innocent. It is why I joined. Protecting what makes our AF great is why I'll continue to serve until asked to leave. If I knew how to put one of those beer mugs at the end I would do that here ___.

[guineapigfury]

If I knew how to put one of those beer mugs at the end I would do that here ___.

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[Liquid]

[AnimalMother]

The last thing people should want is commanders and boards discriminating the quality and location of your AAD for promotion to O-6. Setting the minimum standard relatively low for a subjective requirement prevents alma mater discrimination and bullshit assessments about how hard you worked to get your degree, or how often you were published, like we see in the academic world.

I agree, but I think it will inevitably come to this regardless. After all, when the preponderance of candidates have a master's degree, what's the next "logical" discriminator? Maybe at the O-6 level there's more relevant substance in one's records, i don't know, I can't speak from experience, just playing devil's advocate here. In either case, I think we (the AF), just took a baby step towards the trust tree on the whole master's thing-which is good.

Agree, we should be discriminating and selective about who gets promoted and I would argue that we are. But I also think the senior leaders need to be the people who determine how to discriminate and select, not the CGOs. What CGOs value at the time may not be what makes them successful at FGO responsibilities.

As Ive gotten older and perhaps a bit more mature, I agree with this more and more. However, for this construct to be truly effective, there needs to be a solid foundation of trust, from the bottom up and the top down. Otherwise, people will not accept the "trust me" explanation when/if they fail to understand the root of the issue; leading to disillusioned and disgruntled employees. We are seeing a lot of this right now and it is costing the AF substantially. The fact that many people are continuing to pursue master's degrees is proof positive of this, as are many of the posts on this forum.

The best critiques we can make are to point out how our system needs to be improved and how we selected the wrong leaders should be based on the specific leader's shortcomings and leadership failures. When morale is low, unit performance is below standards, resources are wasted, and the mission is not being accomplished, there is an obvious failure of leadership (possibly at many levels) that must be corrected. I think AF senior leadership is trying to correct that rotten core of leadership in the missile community. We should reassess what we got wrong at promotion boards and command screening boards that predicted these officers would succeed when they clearly did not. A useful way for senior leaders to evaluate the performance of their subordinate commanders is to read the anonymous but honest opinions of that commander's subordinates and peers. Unit climate assessments, IG/congressional complaints, face to face feedback, informal feedback (including social media) can all give indications of leadership failures. 360 feedback should be implemented immediately for all commanders. I'm not sure why we are so reluctant to do this. Commanders and senior leaders should be held to higher, more stringent standards and their leadership abilities should be more formally evaluated.

I hope to see more of this, after all, malicious and public belittlement of subordinates isn't exactly an attribute I generally associate with stellar leadership-not that Ive seen that in the squadron or anything...

Finally, I don't think some people over-inflate their value [to the service], I think most people do. Self-aggrandizement and an inability to accurately self-critique are byproducts of a system that fails to provide honest feedback, and are exacerbated by excessive pomp and circumstance, and obsequious and sycophantic staff officers. But, nowhere have I found this more apparent than in much of the squadron and wing leadership I've served under over the last decade. Most of us know-at least at some level-just how expendable we really are. A lot of brass seem to forget that stuff pretty quickly and may even think otherwise. Our CSAF was fired a few years back wasn't he? His name escapes me right now though...

[MSCguy]

Gen Moseley was the one that was fired, Gen Fogleman was the one that quit.

[Sizzofoshizzo]

Gen Moseley was the one that was fired, Gen Fogleman was the one that quit.

Fogleman was great. Quit to make a point about politicians interfering with military leaders holding their officers to high standards. Wish we had more like him.

[StoleIt]

Fogleman was great. Quit to make a point about politicians interfering with military leaders holding their officers to high standards. Wish we had more like him.

[Seriously]

Fogleman, not Foglesong.

[zach braff]

Fogleman, not Foglesong.

Amazing how many people mix this up still.

"'Man' was grand, 'Song' was wrong..."

Back to the topic... I got a suspense to submit some input for the PRF but I've been out the game for a minute...Are most of the MAJCOMs still C-Zoning or is there a new hot-format on the streets?

zb

[WheelzUp]

Amazing how many people mix this up still.

"'Man' was grand, 'Song' was wrong..."

Back to the topic... I got a suspense to submit some input for the PRF but I've been out the game for a minute...Are most of the MAJCOMs still C-Zoning or is there a new hot-format on the streets?

zb

C-method is still all the rage in ACC. Dunno about the rest.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[StoleIt]

Fogleman, not Foglesong.

Oh thank God!

[Herkasaurus]

Amazing how many people mix this up still.

"'Man' was grand, 'Song' was wrong..."

Back to the topic... I got a suspense to submit some input for the PRF but I've been out the game for a minute...Are most of the MAJCOMs still C-Zoning or is there a new hot-format on the streets?

zb

AMC isn't using it, at least not at my base. Now it's line by line.

Line 1-standard sh!t

Line 2-strats

Line 3-awards

Line 4-combat/deployed leadership bullet

Line 5-7: random sh!t

Line 8: best bullet

Line 9: standard push bull sh!t

Or something to that effect....I can't remember how many lines are in the damn thing. Clearly I shouldn't be promoted