Crown Jewel of the Navy Information Operations Commands

During my career, the Naval Security Group had commands that over time had become known as the crown jewels of the NSG.  U.S. NSGA Edzell, U.S. NSGA Misawa and G80/GX/NIWA immediately come to mind.  What would you consider to be the crown jewels among the commands of Fleet Cyber Command/TENTH Fleet today?

Edzell no longer exists, Misawa is on its way out and G80/GX/NIWA is the last of the group but transformed into Navy Cyber Warfare Development Group (NCWDG - Nick Wedge). NIOC Georgia and NIOC Ft Meade are gaining prominence.  But, are they the crown jewels?  You call it.

Opposite ends of the spectrum

Over the past month I had two very different conversations with two very different COs in our Information Dominance Corps.  The subject of my blog came up and I swear I didn't bring it up.  In one circumstance, the XO brought it up and in the other, the CO brought it up himself.

One CO said he was simply too busy to read my blog or any others.

The other CO said he was too busy not to read my blog and others.

This reminds me of the survey a few years ago on the blog about readership.

People who read this blog can be divided into four groups.

• 25% like it for the right reasons.
• 25% hate it for the wrong reasons.
• 25% like it for the wrong reasons.
• 25% hate it for the right reasons.

I'm not sure which group concerns me more.

And, there is another group out there that lurks through the blog and is afraid to admit that they check the blog just to make sure they haven't missed something important about the community.  In any case, I welcome all reader and comments - please limit the profanity.

What Makes A Good CO?

Recently, submarine command course instructors from the United States, Great Britain, The Netherlands, and Norway, as well as senior submarine training officers from Australia and Canada (who have submarine forces but currently have no independent submarine command course) met for three days in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. While there has been a lot of beneficial engagement between the courses’ students and teachers in the past, this landmark opportunity brought all the teachers together to compare and contrast their courses, and to discuss the benefits and nature of future collaboration. The following questions were discussed: Based on the accumulated assessment of the students you taught during your assignments, what are the common threads and characteristics that distinguish the best prospective commanding officers from the worst? What is different about those who ‘get it’ from those who don’t? Submarine command courses prepare officers for submarine command through a process of both teaching and assessment. The price of failure can be high, and while success allows assignment to command, it does not guarantee a successful command. The Submarine Command Course is neither a warfare course nor an academic exercise. It tests leadership, professional knowledge, the desire for excellence, aggressiveness, and a hunger for submarine command. The central focus of the Submarine Command Course is to teach future commanding officers to make good command decisions. Generally there are two types of decisions: analytical and intuitive. To make analytical decisions one weighs options, balancing risk and gain. This type of decision-making is well understood, and is used often by submarine commanding officers. While this is a necessary strength for command, it is neither sufficient, nor a good predictor of tactical or leadership performance. Intuitive decisions are made after one detects cues and patterns that emerge from complex situations, and then chooses a course of action that likely will be successful. The action chosen is based on experience-the person has seen similar situations and draws on a “library” of responses (mental models). Based on recognizing the situation that faces him, the decider quickly converges on a course of action and runs a mental simulation of the action. If the simulation ends with success, he executes that option. If the simulation is not successful, he quickly makes adjustments to correct the difficulty or tries another model, running through the process again, until he finds a successful course of action to take. It is important to realize intuitive decisions are made quickly compared to analytical decisions, and the decider is not comparing options. If the first projected course of action works, he executes. Knowledge of intuitive decision-making is not well understood, but has applications in most tactical and seamanship scenarios. As a simple example, a CO may recognize the patterns emerging from a crossing situation. (“That contact has a zero bearing rate and port angle on the bow, and will collide with me if nothing is done.”) He then projects a mental simulation of his action based on the “mental models” he has developed through his experience. (“I should turn to starboard now.”) If the projection results in a satisfactory result (“I will get off his track by 2,000 yds, and he will pass safely down my port side”), he executes his decision. If the projection does not have a happy ending (“I will run aground”), he chooses another option to consider (“I should slow and let the contact pass ahead.”). Even in this simple example, one can see that there are several correct courses of action. The CO, by virtue of his experience, quickly can converge on a mental model that will work. We have borrowed this model for intuitive decisions from Dr. Gary Klein1, which serves to provide a useful structure in enhancing intuitive decision-making. Using the situation facing the student in the Submarine Command Course, we can identify some elements of success: Good COs can process a lot of data, prioritize important cues, and recognize patterns-they have good situational awareness. They can sift the valuable and pertinent cues from the chaff, and maintain their focus. They can then recognize patterns emerging from those important cues. This applies to concrete and abstract situations. The arrival angle is getting lower; the noise-to-sound ratio is going up; I can hear him on the underwater telephone. This is a closing contact. There is nobody giving clear orders, the officer of the deck and junior officer of the deck are not agreeing on contact solutions; the fire control technician of the watch keeps asking for more observations; and the sonar supervisor is reassigning trackers to all contacts. My control room party is not certain of the contact situation. For the last six months, I have had to intervene personally during the execution of too many evolutions throughout the ship. My teams are not properly preparing themselves for the tasks at hand. The combination of prioritizing the cues and recognizing the patterns is situational awareness. Good COs have a rich library of mental models from which to choose, evaluate, and then decide. They can quickly converge on a successful response – a course of action that will work. Their mental simulation process is robust-anticipating the complexity of the scenario-they do not oversimplify and miss important aspects of the problem. Their mental models, and hence their decisions, are based on technical expertise and experience. Their “gut” is actually a finely tuned pattern-recognition instrument; they “sense” things are wrong based on very subtle cues. (This is another idea that Klein discusses well.) Good COs look for “decision-rich” opportunities. They want to be challenged and to make decisions. They are ambitious and enthusiastic. They make the most of every situation and are not content to sit on the sidelines. Thus, their pattern-recognition ability and library of mental models grow at faster rates than more passive officers. In clutch situations, they want the ball. They want to be leading, making decisions, learning, and advancing. This applies to personal development and team leadership. This enthusiasm is infectious, and this spirit spreads to their entire crew. Many prospective commanding officers who struggle with the course, on the face of it, have had very “rich” career histories-i.e., good commands and good operations. Our conclusion is that they struggle because they did not make the most of their tours and did not seek out experience. Things ran relatively well under good leadership, and thus it was possible to avoid making decisions. These officers have little “actual experience” and are not well suited for command. Good COs are honest about evaluating themselves relative to the situation. They constantly look to improve their position in the scenario. They are natural “assessors” and “learners.” They must be brutally honest about acknowledging their own limitations and capabilities. They are able to take criticism-of themselves and their ship. This ability is founded on a solid self-image and a confidence that they can overcome any situation, once they honestly face the truth. They are secure and confident, not arrogant. They are fully aware of the limitations of the process-incomplete information, uncertainty, perceptual differences, and personal and team weaknesses. They look for any input for improvement, but pride themselves on being the most aggressive hunter of good observations. They want to improve. They are passionate about collaboration inside and outside the lifelines. They look to share best practices and achieve synergies of effort. Going beyond compromise, they collaborate to find the optimum position. Once the “best solution” is found, it is quickly captured and fed back into the process to eliminate bad practices and to formalize good ones. They focus on actual performance not personalities. Good COs have strong command presence-a quiet self-confidence. They pass on their knowledge and experience to their operational teams in terms that the team will understand. Their “briefs” are to the point and enhance decisions and effective, efficient execution. These briefs are “to” their team, not “at” their subordinates. This ability to communicate, in combination with the situational awareness, honesty, and confidence mentioned above, forms command presence. Good COs possess endurance and fortitude. They know the most important changes require tremendous investments of personal time and energy and can take months or years. Short- and long-term fatigue are anticipated and accommodated. They know that even in this environment, there will be times when things go wrong-even badly wrong. Only an eternal optimist believes that everything always will run smoothly. Good COs know that a plan is complete only if it recognizes it may go all wrong. They must bounce back when things go wrong. It is in these situations that commanding officers’ assessment skills and fortitude will be most brutally tested. These qualities are absolutely non-negotiable if the commanding officers are to retain their positions because if they fail to inspire their crews in the aftermath of a disaster, they will lose their sailors’ trust immediately and irrevocably. Many of those who struggle in the Submarine Command Course demonstrate a clear pattern of characteristics. They include the following: They cannot see the way ahead in complex situations. They do not prioritize cues, recognize patterns, or develop responses. They appear to be overwhelmed. They are intolerant of uncertainty and are unable to act without “all” the information. These officers are often solid analytical decision-makers, because there is perceived “certainty” with methodology. These officers tend to look for “checklists” even in situations in which checklists do not cover all the bases. They are unable to apply past experiences to new situations. This is a form of low pattern recognition, because they cannot see the similarities with past situations and have a small “library” of mental models from which to draw. They have weak assessment abilities. We have found the insecure prospective commanding officers are defensive and resistant to inputs. Thus, a downward spiral emerges: the individual is weak, therefore insecure, therefore resistant to input, therefore becomes weaker. . . . They tend to go it alone when challenged to produce answers. Collaboration is unnatural to them. They have no passion for command. We have asked students who are struggling: “Do you want to command?” Even at this late juncture, many answered “no.” Clearly in these officers there is no drive to get the experience required to command.

This is an incomplete list of some qualities of successful commanding officers. These qualities are inherent in some more than in others. It is possible, by having a structured understanding of intuitive decision-making, to detect natural command potential and to foster it in all junior officers (even those without strong natural abilities). We believe professional development and training that focus on building confident decision-makers can grow these qualities where they are weak, more quickly identify those officers who may not have what it takes to command, and help the naturally gifted officers to soar. Editor’s Note: All these officers are submarine officers involved in the training of prospective submarine commanding officers and executive officers. Reprinted from Proceedings with permission; Copyright (c) April 2005 U.S. Naval Institute/www.navalinstitute.org. 1.) Klein, Gary. The Power of Intuition: How to Use Your Gut Feelings to Make Better Decisions at Work. New York: Currency, Doubleday. 2003.

I like this from Seth Godin

 

On the hook

Mentorship works for two reasons. Certainly, the person being mentored gains from advice and counsel and even access to others via introductions, etc.

But mostly, it works because the person with a mentor has a responsibility to stand up and actually get moving. The only way to repay your mentor is by showing the guts it takes to grow and to matter.

Interesting to note, then, that the primary driver of mentor benefit has nothing to do with the mentor herself, nothing beyond the feeling of obligation the student feels to the teacher. Whether or not the mentor does anything, this obligation delivers benefits.

Check out what Seth Godin has to say HERE.

Good Advice over at JO RULES

Faced with inevitable change, those who accept the change have the most power to shape the details. It’s not about self-interested conformity or passively accepting defeat; it’s about making decisions based on how things are rather than how we would wish them to be. It’s about seizing the initiative.

When you have legitimate concerns about an order or a policy, you have the right and the obligation to make those concerns known. Be tactful, as the surest way to have your opinion arbitrarily rejected is to frame it as a complaint. Once you’ve voiced your concerns, your duty is to make it work. Fighting it will just cause chaos, but even some of the most harebrained schemes can be saved by determined chiefs and JOs. Think of it as a challenge– if there’s only one person on Earth that could make this plan work, is it you? Who knows, you might even find out that you’re not always right.

Lots more HERE.

Change is much easier to digest if you become a part of the change.  There's always this - from General Eric Shinseki:

"If you don't like change, you are going to like irrelevance even less."

LT Jon Paris is a 2005 graduate of The Citadel and a Surface Warfare Officer.

The CNO’s Rapid Innovation Cell is a group of junior leaders tasked with being innovative and coming up with disruptive solutions."

 

He has done some serious thinking about innovation and shares his thoughts HERE.  It's worth your time to read what he has to say.

Smartest person in the room

I met with a small group of IDC officers recently and one of my fellow Captains wanted to make sure all of us understood he was the smartest guy in the room.  It wasn't a declarative verbal statement. But, you readily understood his intent. He professed his sincere apologies for arriving late to our meeting.  It wasn't long before he made it known that his schedule was way overbooked and he really didn't even have time for the meeting we were currently involved in and he would have to depart early.  Thank goodness one of his Sailors brought him his coffee and he had time to take a few sips before he jaunted off for his next meeting for which he was already late.  Good thing he was a Captain and those 40 Sailors didn't mind waiting.  Quite the busy man.

I have a NEWS FLASH for you Captain (or anyone else for that matter).  Think you're the smartest person in the room?  More than likely you are not.  

Success versus significance

John Maxwell makes a good point about success versus significance.  The successful officer is adding value to his own career and the significant officer is adding value to the careers of others.  I was exchanging ideas with a fellow former CO a few days ago and we discussed "command tours" and measuring the success of our commanding officers.  Virtually every O5 command tour ends with the award of a Meritorious Service Medal and O6 command tours typically end with the award of the Legion of Merit.  

What evaluation has really gone into the decision to award these significant medals?  Are all of these COs successful and equally so?  What is being rewarded?  Time in command?  Achievement?  Does it matter?  Is it our business?  Is it your business?

Apparently not too much, especially if every departing CO is earning one.  A recent award tightened my jaw a bit as the departing CO left behind a command in shambles.  The new CO would never admit to it, but he inherited a command in near total disarray.  The former CO left behind a dismal retention record, no record of mission achievement, >15% command PRT failure, no CPO selectees in the past three cycles and not one single accomplishment that his Sailors could point to with pride and say - "We did that!"

A journey from success to significance takes time.  It requires patience and commitment.  It doesn't happen by accident. You must be purposeful in adding value to the careers of your Sailors.  You are there as CO to accomplish the mission and to see to it that Sailors perform up to their potential.  If you have a bunch of Sailors with "unlimited potential", you're leaving a lot of potential on the deck-plates unrealized.  Strive for significance.  Your Sailors deserve your best effort.

Commander Sean Heritage has written about SUCCESS versus SIGNIFICANCE HERE.

Silence of my Shipmates

"What has hurt the most are not the actions of my seniors but the silence of my Shipmates in the face of those actions."

Note from afar.

A date which will live in infamy.

More on handwritten notes from John Coleman at Harvard Business Review

It may seem nostalgic, but I still believe there’s room for the handwritten note in personal and professional communication. They cost something, mean something, and have permanence in a way emails and text messages don’t. They let the people in our lives know we appreciate them enough to do something as archaic as pausing for 15 minutes to put pen to paper in an attempt to connect and sustain a relationship with them. I still remember that note — and many others I’ve received over the years — and perhaps in writing personal notes to our friends and colleagues, we can reach out to others in a way that creates a lasting, positive connection.

 

Try it, you may like it.

CNO Presents 2013 Vice Adm. James Bond Stockdale Leadership Awards

WASHINGTON (NNS) -- The annual Vice Adm. James Bond Stockdale Leadership Award ceremony was held in the Pentagon Hall of Heroes Dec. 4.

Cmdr. Richard N. Massie and Cmdr. Leif E. Mollo received the award which recognizes two commissioned officers in the grade of commander or below who contribute to the improvement of leadership in the Navy.

Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jonathan Greenert was the guest speaker at the ceremony and presented the awards.

"It's about people; people who are willing to lead and people who are willing to step forward and say 'I want to write about somebody who is my peer who I think is extraordinary'," said Greenert. "Taking time to do that in this busy world is remarkable in its own sense."

Massie, commanding officer of the USS Maine (SSBN 741) Gold Crew was the Pacific Fleet winner. Massie was highly successful with the integration of women onto submarines.

"I was overwhelmed and truly proud of my crew. This was another success and another testament to the great things that that crew has done," said Massie.

Mollo, commanding officer of SEAL Team 4, was the Fleet Forces Command winner.

Mollo led SEAL Team 8 as its mission changed from Afghanistan to Africa before being hand-selected to command SEAL Team 4.

"The recognition all should go to the warriors and support personnel that I served with at SEAL Team Eight and SEAL Team Four. They inspire me every day by their courage, their perseverance and their dedication," said Mollo.

Both officers were nominated by their peers and selected from nine finalists.

You can read about the prior years' winners HERE.

Boxing the Compass - Finding our True North and staying true to it

Most of us have come to understand that leadership is about character, not characteristics.  We know what our values are and sometimes struggle to stay true to those values when we see that our seniors continue to progress while not demonstrating that same strict adherence to our Navy core values.  

Some in our community have found strength in maintaining their 'true North' by creating something they have called their personal "Board of Directors" (BoD).  Entrepreneur Bill George has a decent book out called TRUE NORTH GROUPS.  He knows that, with the challenges we face these days, we require additional help to stay on track.  We cannot rely on just ourselves or our commands to help us stay on track.  We need Shipmates in 'our circle of trust'  with whom we can have in-depth discussions and share intimately about the most cherished things in our lives and careers while we serve our country around the world.  

Whatever you choose to call it, you need to have Shipmates you can count on in the toughest of times - the people who will follow-through on things 'because they said they would.'

The truth

I see man’s mind cannot be satisfied unless it be illumined by that truth beyond which there exists no other truth. 

Dante - Paradiso IV.124-126.

That is what motivates me.  The search for the truth of the truth - truth absolutely.

The Role of the Chief Petty Officer in the Modern Navy

There have been a great many questions, examinations, re-examinations, and discussions of the role of the chief petty officer in the modern Navy. Commanding officers, junior officers, petty officers, and enlisted men are saying that chiefs just aren't what they used to be. The "used-to-be" status referred to is that fabulous position occupied by the chief petty officers in the pre-war Navy wherein the chief's word was law to subordinates and his ability to get things done a trade-mark to his superiors.

Proceedings Magazine
April 1957

You can read the entire text HERE.  Some things do not change - much.