Is it just me or do you have to kiss as much a** as possible to gain rank, and if you actually take care of your troops instead of those above you, why does that impact your career so much nowadays? Didn't it used to be that the more you took care of your people the better a CO you were?

You have to be able to do both. These are not exclusive. You can take care of your men and a$$ kiss at the same time. You gotta multi task. Sometimes a$$ kissing can save your guys a lot of pain too.
Don't think of it as a$$ kissing because if you do, you're doing it wrong.
Just think of it as keeping your higher ups happy.

What do mean by kiss butt? Generally, in any organization civilian or military being diplomatic pays off.

My experience is that those who are exceptionally competent also have the brains not to pee on their Commanders freshly shined boots.

No, as in a sense of people I see fail to do the job they're assigned, so they get put working in back office, which pisses me off. Seeing people rewarded for incompitence and laziness, then while working back office they do nothing but chit chat with the higher ups and end up getting SrA BTZ which is kind of like a step promotion of sorts. Yet the people who've been doing their job right for the whole time get screwed because that stripe is gone now. How is that fair at all?

Happens in a lot of workplaces that.

I genuinely want to follow you, Secure, but you lost me.

I frankly don't understand your general complaint. Do you have an issue with the annual personal evaluation system? If so, on what grounds?

That varies a whole lot between services. I'm as ignorant as a virgin on her wedding night on all the services except the army.

The current NCO evaluation system for the Army is great. Unless, you actually experienced the flowery nonsense of the early 80s, you don't have a point of reference. It now boils down to did the NCO do his duty? If he exceeded his duty, then specifically point how, preferably objective not subjective. Comments of "exceptional" were dismissed by a promotion board if you didn't have a good objective case.

It also required written counselling all along the rated period. I liked that. It isn't fair to rate some one as pond water without informing them that they need to change far in advance.

They tried to change the officer evaluation system with the Atlas Shrugged Rating. That was a joke.

The system we're working with in the Air Force or at least my base is extremely flawed. I work away from my base, too far away so where back office doesn't see the work we do. They then complain that we don't work enough, and that we need extra training. They see what's on paper not what actually happens. If you screw up where I work, you don't work there anymore you go to back office. Back office gets you noticed by higher ranking officers, are you getting what i'm saying yet Lavite?

Secure: "are you getting what i'm saying yet Lavite? "

Not really, but I'm a pretty dense Southern boy. 9/10 of any evaluation is selling yourself to your rater. You should be rubbing every accomplishment and success in their noses. Don't presume they have a long memory.

That is especially true in the situation you described of working off site.

We do that, but it doesn't matter because we're not seen. Everyone who gets the step promotion works somewhere on the base, rarely does anyone off the base get it.

The classic dilemma.
The best leaders may not always be the greatest diplomats.


Don´t fret it Secure, once you get one from the outpost into the offices you lot will get all the credit that is due.

//KJ.