For the last decade the Navy personnel retention situation has followed a downward spiral despite many noble efforts and well conceived plans. STAR and SCORE, for example, have been particularly effective. Without these and other actions, the rising tide of problems would have passed flood stage. These solutions, however, have deferred but not deterred the growth of the problem, and the problem now has reached the top of the list.
A year and a half ago, Navy Secretary Paul Nitze told a congressional committee that retention in the Navy of high quality and highly trained officers and men was the most serious problem facing him. It was, however, one far too complex for him to act upon without a searching examination—a detailed study of causes and effects. For this purpose he decided to establish a special group.
In a memorandum of 22 December 1964, the Secretary set forth the charter of a Policy Board and a Task Force. The Policy Board was structured to advise him and the Task Force was to function as the working group.
He charged them with two basic functions. First, to identify and examine the major factors bearing on retention of high quality officers and enlisted personnel. Second, to develop a plan for attacking these retention problems which was to include specific recommendations, a program to implement the approved recommendations, and the identification of the specific government offices or activities which are presently empowered to implement such actions.
The Secretary in this same memorandum outlined for the Task Force an unprecedented breadth for its study. He specifically charged that it must examine opportunities for education and training, as well as promotion and advancement; that it must study personnel distribution policies; the relation between fleet manning and retention; sea/shore rotation policies including overseas duties; fringe benefits for both officer and enlisted personnel; habitability afloat; personnel support facilities and housing ashore. He directed that it look into the Navy/Marine Corps Public Image within as well as outside of the service; all aspects of compensation, working hours afloat and ashore, and prerogatives of rank of officers and petty officers and their relationship to retention.
He made one major assumption in structuring this study and that was that current JCS readiness criteria would remain unchanged. He enjoined the Task Force from making a full scale pay study as he did not want it to become preoccupied solely with pay. The effort was not very far down the street when the Secretary further broadened the mission by stating that anything that improved the naval service he considered as favorably affecting retention.
Countless officers have, with tremendous insight and on uncounted occasions, sat in the wardrooms of the Fleet in untold numbers of bull sessions, pointing out this or that shortcoming of service in the Navy. What they wouldn’t have given to have a chance to set matters straight! With the charter he gave them, the Secretary of the Navy provided just such an opportunity for a group of officers to translate their wardroom expertise into action-oriented programs designed to improve conditions of naval service. He assembled this group in his immediate office. It included representatives from the warfare specialties, the staff corps, and a representative of the Marine Corps; he gave it unlimited authority and funding and he turned it to.
The Task Force was headed by Admiral John M. Alford, U. S. Navy, and finally consisted of a total of 22 officers.
The Policy Board that the Secretary appointed to assist him in monitoring and evaluating the efforts of the Task Force consisted of the Secretary as Chairman, the Under Secretary, the Chief of Naval Operations, the Commandant of the Marine Corps, the Chief of Naval Personnel, and several other top military officers in the Navy Department, three Assistant Secretaries of Defense and two Deputy Assistants. Thus the lines were drawn for a year’s hard work.
During its data gathering phase the Task Force reached certain findings. Most of these will come as no surprise to anyone who has given serious thought to the problem. Any well informed officer or bluejacket might come up with the same findings without detailed study. But in this case, it was especially important that the Task Force proceed on soundly based and logically developed findings—not just unsupported opinions.
To ensure that this would result, the Task Force used a wealth of information from many sources—from statistics provided by the Bureaus and offices of the Navy Department, from surveys conducted by BuPers and by the Institute of Naval Studies, and from a public image survey conducted by an eminent firm in the field of public opinion sampling. It further made important use of the thousands of letters elicited from naval personnel and their families, and the symposia which the Task Force conducted in San Diego, Norfolk, and Quantico for officers, enlisted personnel and their wives. It used detailed statements of specific problem areas prepared for the Task Force by the individual Corps and specialist community sponsors; and the wealth of background information derived from numerous studies previously conducted on various facets of the problem. The Fleet and Type Commanders made valuable inputs. A number of enlisted personnel who had advanced particularly thoughtful proposals were brought to Washington to give their views to the Task Force. After analysis of this large body of accumulated information, the Task Force made certain basic findings which can be summarized in eight major points. (These points and the comments that follow pertain only to the Navy and do not apply to the Marine Corps.)
• The Navy’s worldwide commitments show every likelihood of expanding. The tempo of operations caused by this circumstance and shortages which exist in the manpower force, coupled with current manning practices, create a vicious cycle; undermanning leads to exploitation, which leads to frustration, then to low morale and finally to low retention. This leads to further undermanning and instability. The loop is thus closed and the vicious cycle continues. A lessening of Fleet readiness results.
• The Navy’s retention problem is selective. It creates an experience gap in certain officer and enlisted groups.
• Inadequate pay and family separations are predominant factors in low retention. Many small items which contribute to a lack of job satisfaction are a major secondary cause.
• In allocating its resources and apportioning its funds, the Navy has always been forced to compromise. Unfortunately, minimum criteria for personnel-oriented programs have frequently been breached, lowering standards of Bachelor Officers’ Quarters, barracks, other housing ashore, and habitability afloat. Substandard facilities have adversely affected retention.
• Officers and enlisted personnel want high promotional standards and a credible opportunity to advance at a rate commensurate with their individual abilities.
• Educational opportunity is a vitally important career incentive.
• Manpower management has also suffered from a lack of resources, consequently, the state of the art of manpower management has outdistanced the methods the Navy has employed in handling its people.
• In the public mind, there is not enough knowledge of the fact that the Navy plays an important part on the defense team in preventing, fighting, or winning a war. In its view, the Navy is characterized as a fun-loving, easy-going, rather comfortable organization. The inner image of the Navy is no better. It is shaped by many of the shortcomings cited above and by some policies, directives, and procedures which unnecessarily demean individual dignity and status, a condition often induced by an excessive administrative workload or by the impersonal and unimaginative management which often stems from a large bureaucracy.
At the outset, the Task Force had hoped that its recommendations would all survive a cost effectiveness treatment. In the end it was apparent that many of the recommendations developed in response to the findings could not do so. This is simply because of the flexibility of the human element of the problem—a flexibility which permits the man to take up the slack, when resources are not sufficient.
If this old familiar trap was to be avoided, it was necessary that criteria and standards be established, which, as moral obligations, would become a basis for planning and action. This would permit the Navy to measure up to the standards of a good employer which were defined by President Lyndon B. Johnson in his 1965 pay message, as follows:
A good employer is one who demands excellence and rewards it; is fair and just; respects the dignity of his employees; insists upon ethical standards and sets a good example; practices no discrimination; welcomes fresh ideas and new approaches; fulfills his responsibilities to the community; provides opportunities for growth and challenge; combines prudent business judgment with enlightened policies on compensation and benefits.
In the face of this charge and in view of its findings, the Task Force developed 130 recommendations. Of these, 115 were recommended for approval by the Policy Board and subsequently approved by the Secretary on 25 January 1966. Five were deferred for further study. The essence of the recommendations and their supporting rationale is as follows: The Navy’s retention problem is selective in both the officer and enlisted structure. In the officer communities it is focused on the middle grade officer and is particularly acute in the surface line. When the Task Force examined the problem, the Navy had only 55 per cent of its required surface line lieutenants and 58 per cent of the surface line lieutenant commanders on board. There were also serious shortages in other naval officer communities—a growing, acute shortage of junior officers in the aviation line for example. At the time the Task Force examined the problem, the Navy was 1,900 pilots short in the Fleet, and retention rates among pilots were down, while requirements were up.
The Navy is seriously short of experienced career petty officers in more than 20 of its enlisted ratings. At the end of fiscal year 1965, the Navy was over 45,000 career petty officers below its stated needs. This was almost 20 per cent fewer career enlisted personnel than the Navy says it needs for proper manning. Said another way, out of every five career petty officers in the Navy’s personnel allowances, only four were on board to do the job.
These shortages are more serious in some work areas than in others. For example, in the electronics equipment area, the career shortage is over 20,000, or 45 per cent below Navy needs. In the communications area— e.g., radiomen, radarmen, and signalmen— the Navy is over 14,000 career petty officers short, or about 37 per cent below its stated requirements. There are rates in many rating groups, such as boilermen, IC electricians, and quartermasters, which are suffering from career shortages of considerable size.
Why do these shortages plague our Navy which usually manages to achieve its total manpower needs, through voluntary enlistment, each year?
First, the Navy has not been permitted to develop the number of petty officers it says it needs because of a petty officer ceiling established by higher authority. For example, the Navy’s stated requirement is 60 per cent of its enlisted force as petty officers. The ceiling of the past several years has allowed less than 55 per cent. There is thus a built-in shortage of over 5 per cent in our petty officer numbers in spite of all our retention efforts.
Secondly, the very serious career shortages in areas such as electronics and communications, as well as in individual ratings in other areas, come from inadequate retention of first- term petty officers. We are all aware of the fact that many of the technical specialties which are required in ever increasing numbers by the Navy, are also in great demand by private industry. The blandishments offered by industry to young first-term petty officers in technical ratings are enticing and have been effective in luring many of these young men out of the Navy when their first hitch is up. Many of the Task Force recommendations are addressed to making the Navy more attractive so that the pull of industry’s enticements will not meet with the same degree of success as has been the case in the past.
A third cause of enlisted career shortages stems from a growing Navy. Over the past five years, the Navy has been in a continuous personnel growth situation. This has involved growth in total numbers, as well as in career petty officer needs. In addition, the ships and aircraft of the Navy are becoming more and more complex. This, in turn, increases the number of experienced men required to operate these units. For example, in a heavy cruiser equipped with guns, the ratio of petty officers to non-petty officers is about 44 per cent. In a guided missile cruiser, this rises to 52 per cent, and in a nuclear-powered cruiser, it is 64 per cent. In other words, out of 1,000 men in a gun cruiser, 440 must be petty officers, while in a nuclear cruiser the number of petty officers per 1,000 men rises to 640, an increase of 200, or nearly 50 per cent.
Similar increases in petty officer needs exist in most types of ships and aircraft squadrons, with the greatest rise being in FBM submarines where the petty officer needs are 92 per cent.
To correct these career shortages involves a tremendous replacement training effort in most Navy enlisted skills. This further aggravates the problem, for to carry out this important training requires many topnotch petty officer instructors, who, of necessity, must come from the fleets. An additional drag on enlisted strength involves the thousands of men who are in the training pipeline—attending these many courses, on their way to school, waiting for classes to begin, or on their way back to their units after completing school. The time spent in the pipeline, which can be over a year in some cases, is all nonproductive time, from which the Navy achieves little or nothing insofar as manning its units are concerned.
In both the officer and enlisted structures— although in many cases numerical requirements are being met—shortages across the board have affected seriously the Navy’s selectivity and hence the quality of the manpower force. Officer selection opportunity last year in the line, for instance, was 100 per cent to lieutenant (j.g.), 95 per cent to lieutenant, and 90 per cent to lieutenant commander, and it is not getting any harder. This does not speak to any meaningful selectivity in the officer corps, and the effect on officer quality is obvious. In the enlisted structure, advancement opportunities are inconsistent. In the over-populated ratings, advancement flow is entirely too low—there is just too much selectivity—which is demoralizing for personnel in these overcrowded ratings. On the other hand, the advancement opportunity in the critical ratings is much too high. As a matter of fact, it is so high as to demoralize the best performers in these ratings. It has also contributed to a decline of petty officer prestige, as many young men, rated quickly, tend to lack the maturity and military experience to lead other men.
In looking at shortages and in establishing the definition of the problem early in the endeavor, the Task Force ran smack into the knotty problem of justifying requirements. In establishing the existence of the retention problem, shortages had to be measured against stated requirements. If the stated requirements could be successfully challenged, then the statement of the retention problem was without a viable foundation. Thus, the acceptance of the statement of requirements by the people in decision-making positions was crucial to the entire endeavor. The Navy’s methodology in determining requirements was challenged early in the effort and while the Navy’s statement of the problem was eventually accepted, it became obvious to the Task Force that the Navy must amplify and expand its present efforts in billet analysis evaluation and validation if our requirements are to continue to find acceptance. This is of transcending importance and the Task Force structured several recommendations to do just this.
In response to the finding on the overextension of human resources at sea which sets up the previously identified vicious cycle, the Task Force made several recommendations. One was that the Navy do away with the term “allowance” and establish “complement” as the basis of manpower needs of the Navy. Changing terms of reference, it is well recognized, does not increase manning one bit. On the other hand, measuring a unit’s personnel readiness against a single standard of war readiness is, in the Task Force’s view, more realistic. Saying that a unit is at 90 per cent of allowance is not as revealing as saying that it is at 75 per cent of complement or 75 per cent of its true war-manning readiness.
To get at the heart of the manning problem, the Task Force recommended that the Navy seek an increase over the present permanent OSD ceiling of petty officers by 44,000, most of whom would be applied to the forces afloat. This would increase the quality manning of the fleet to a significant degree. It would give the fleet personnel flexibility and increased stability which it needs to alleviate the terribly debilitating effect of turnover, which last year reached 51 per cent. Of course, once authorized, there will be a problem to build to this strength.
All evidence which came available in the course of the study effort emphasized and reemphasized that inadequate pay and family separations are predominant factors in low retention. While the Task Force was enjoined from making a full scale compensation study, it did address these findings in several ways.
The problem of family separations was examined with infinite care. The Task Force reluctantly concluded, that given the present tempo of operations which are brought about by heavy national and international commitments, the very nature of sea power makes repetitive family separations a condition of service that is inevitable.
Recommendations were made to soften this unavoidable trauma to some degree by providing more time in overhaul for leave, and liberty, by transferring certain ship’s force work responsibilities to the yard for accomplishment, and by providing, at government expense, round trips to homeports or equivalent distances for personnel whose ships are overhauling away from their homeports.
Another recommendation sought to liberalize duty section requirements of ships in their homeport to provide more time off. Fleet Commanders have already taken action in this regard. In the Pacific Fleet, for example, many ships have been authorized to go to a six-section watch while in home port.
Since family separation is an inevitable condition of naval service, the requirements of a good employer imply a responsibility that sufficient compensation be provided to ease the pain. Accordingly, a recommendation was structured to provide sea pay for officers and men, based on a fresh concept.
This new pay would be based on the cumulative years of service spent at sea, regardless of rank, or rate or marital status. Starting at a relatively low level, it would rise in 2-year increments until it reached a substantial maximum for 15 years of sea duty.
In its inquiry into personnel support facilities—barracks, BOQs, housing, and habitability afloat—the Task Force found that facilities afloat and ashore are substandard in most cases.
To improve fleet habitability, it was recommended that adequate growth factors be developed for new ships. The Commander of the Ships Systems Command has indicated that space—as outlined in steel—is now the cheapest commodity in naval construction. It is estimated that a 20 per cent increase in ship size for the incorporation of growth space will add only 5 per cent to the cost of the ship. Therefore, it appears imprudent to build ships with inadequate living accommodations at the outset, to say nothing of not allowing for inevitable expansion.
For ships already in commission, another recommendation speaks to the resumption of the habitability improvement program. It would fund habitability improvements separately for ships of the Fleet to eliminate the present situation wherein such projects are forced into competition for funds with essential maintenance requirements—the main feed pump, the gun director or the air search radar. Invariably, without separate funding, the habitability items are the first to go when the money squeeze is applied. They just cannot compete when the engineering plant must be repaired.
To keep abreast of changing conditions and new developments, the Task Force recommended an annual review of environmental control standards—or habitability criteria. Through annual review, the Task Force hoped that these criteria would be maintained current and that up-to-date standards could be applied more readily and more directly in new construction and conversion programs.
In regard to personnel support facilities ashore, it was found that the BOQs and barracks are, by and large, gravely inadequate, both from the point of view of their present physical condition, and from that of the standards to which they were built. It was, therefore, recommended that prime emphasis be placed on modernization and renovation, and that a vigorous effort be pursued to obtain an enlightened set of standards for new construction. Tri-service criteria that are responsive to this recommendation have recently been approved in OSD. These promise a significant step forward in bachelor accommodations. Not only will floor space per individual be substantially increased, but also the unit cost will be increased. They will be superior to any Navy facilities existing today.
In the area of family housing, the Task Force recommended an increase in the present cost limitation on such units. The present average unit cost of $17,500 developed some seven years ago is not enough today. In addition, it was recommended that the government provide 25 per cent of the furniture required for government quarters.
Probably the most imaginative recommendation in this area was a proposal setting forth a home ownership plan whereby the Navy would subsidize the purchase of a home for its career personnel in exchange for an extended period of obligated service. The recommendation was enthusiastically received in the Department of Defense where it is now under study.
Pursuant to the finding that officers want a chance to excel and to have the opportunity to advance at a rate more commensurate with their individual abilities, the Task Force developed a distributed zone promotion concept which speaks to this identified desire in a very comprehensive way. It envisions selecting from a particular group over a predetermined number of years instead of making selection from a group essentially all in one year, and separating officers when they are no longer in contention for promotion. This system has the advantage of maintaining all officers on active duty in serious contention for promotion; it envisions severance of officers no longer in contention prior to 20 years service with adequate separation compensation and with a better opportunity to get situated in a second career; it permits the establishment of fixed mean experience levels for each rank which would improve billet definition; and it permits officers to advance at a rate which is more commensurate with their individual abilities. Because of the complexity of this concept, the recommendation was deferred by the Secretary of the Navy for further study. It, however, has become an input into the Department of Defense compensation study presently under way.
On a short-term basis, the Task Force recommended that deep selection be pegged at those levels which were envisioned by the Bolte Legislative proposal, that is, at 5 per cent to lieutenant commander, 7.5 per cent to commander, and 10 per cent to captain, and that guidance to selection boards be clear and decisive that officers in, below, and above the zone be selected on the same “best fitted” basis. Past practice of selecting only the head-and-shoulders officer from below does not appear to be in consonance with law.
In regard to the Task Force finding that education is a vitally important career incentive among young Americans today, an entire series of recommendations was designed in both officer and enlisted areas to reinforce the Navy’s qualitative position in this significant field. In addition to recommendations which speak to amplifying the Navy’s in-service education possibilities for officers such as the Undergraduate Education Program and the degree completion program, the Task Force strongly recommended enhancement of off-duty educational opportunities for Navy people. Specifically, it recommended a significant expansion of the Tuition Aid and the Polaris University Programs. The latter is an educational program developed by Harvard University for Polaris submarine personnel to permit officers and enlisted men in those units to take extension courses from Harvard University leading towards a baccalaureate degree. The technique employs both live instruction when such instruction is available in the base area and the use of kinescope courses for administration on board ships at sea. A pilot program is currently underway in the USS Boston to test the application to surface ships. Another test is in progress on board the aircraft carrier Constellation. If results are favorable, it will be expanded to large numbers of ships.
For enlisted personnel, it was concluded that an associate degree is a reasonable educational goal for which a man could strive during his service career. This degree is provided after two years in a technical school or junior college. A guide to an associate degree would be published to describe the path to this educational goal for each rating. It would be provided by accreditation of service schools, Polaris University courses, correspondence courses, off-duty education, and finally resident courses at selected junior colleges.
Also in the educational area but relating to education for dependents, the Task Force recommended that the Cold War G.I. Bill which has been enacted by the Congress be amended to permit the assignment of earned educational benefits to dependent children after 12 years of naval service. Additionally the Task Force recommended that renewed efforts be made to induce state legislatures to permit military dependents to attend state universities and colleges at state resident tuition rates regardless of the home of record.
The Task Force looked long and hard at the techniques applied to Navy manpower management.
Manpower management has ever been hampered by shortages—ceilings on personnel and not enough money. The methods, the functions, and even the basic concepts were carefully examined.
Unrestricted line officer billets ashore have generally been divided among the three warfare fields on a more or less proportional basis. Task Force analysis revealed that 40 to 50 per cent of these billets could be filled by any unrestricted line officer. It, therefore, recommended a complete overhaul of this system to provide a generalization of unrestricted line billets wherever possible. That is to say, the only billets reserved for a particular warfare community, would be those which clearly require an officer with that warfare specialty.
Companion to this deficiency, is a similar shortcoming in the designators applied to officers themselves. In attempting to gather statistics, it was not possible, without examining each record, to determine the degree of qualification of surface officers, nor to separate them from submarine officers, Waves, or plain miscellany. The Task Force, therefore, endorsed a new designator system which would assign a designator to officers not qualified in a warfare specialty and would further provide for discrete designators for each warfare specialty. Of even greater importance than improving management effectiveness, the new system will make possible for the first time a qualification program for the surface line officer. The Surface Combatant Officer School, also a vitally important Task Force recommendation, will provide the first step in this qualification process, by preparing all newly commissioned surface officers for their responsibilities as division officers prior to reporting to their first duties. These two steps together should be important morale builders for the surface line community. They should go a long way to bring the surface officer into parity with the aviators and submariners, at least in the areas of group awareness and identification, if not in compensation.
A basic function of officer management is career planning. It is a function that has been performed in the past by the individual himself, for the most part. A fundamental recommendation calls for the establishment of a Career Planning Board in the Bureau of Naval Personnel. It is envisioned that this board would identify qualitative officer billet requirements. It would channel officers into viable career paths to meet these requirements in a way to maintain a proportional distribution of talent among various broad career fields, it would monitor the individual officer’s career progression to assure that they are not sidetracked, it would act as a board of appeal, and otherwise serve the interests of the officer corps. It is confidently expected that this enhancement in officer career management will result in the development of a higher degree of expertise by officers in career fields ashore, in a more even distribution of talent in the various functional areas, and in a clearer understanding of career needs and career objectives.
In its long-range concepts, the Task Force sought first to identify basic realities of present-day life. It is apparent that only the smallest percentage of officers or enlisted men can truly retire when they leave the service. Usually, the financial demands on them are near a maximum at the time of retirement, demands for which retired pay is simply not enough. They must seek a second career. Many pass their productive peaks (in the Navy) before completing 20 years service but must continue to serve to be eligible to retire. They are truly economic captives of the Navy. By that time, with their most productive years past, job hunting becomes more difficult. Given these basic facts, the Task Force sought to devise concepts which would provide an intermediate length of service, perhaps eight to 14 years, for those for whom the Navy will not be a one-and-only career. The incentive for an intermediate length of service would be a significant separation compensation on severance.
The opportunity for such a nest egg, while still completing military service at a very young age should induce many who now leave after about four years service, to seek this intermediate career. By this means, that middle experience gap, where the Navy is so short, could be filled. The increased experience level in the fleet would permit a sizable reduction of the number who serve 20 or more years. Fundamental to this effort must be a careful validation program to eliminate any billets which can be spared and to set the required experience level—or grade—of every billet at the lowest level consistent with fleet readiness.
These Task Force ideas are also fundamental inputs to the OSD Compensation Study now underway. If adopted, they will measurably increase the productivity and readiness of our manpower force and greatly enhance the quality, status, and pay of those who serve full careers.
The Navy’s image, both the inner image— what we in the Navy think of ourselves—and the outer image—what we project to the general public—is far from satisfactory.
It was found through the auspices of the public opinion survey that the Navy’s reputation as a first-line fighting organization has progressively diminished since World War II. Misleading impressions are created by movies such as “Mr. Roberts” and TV programs such as “McHale’s Navy,” which show officers as simpletons or tyrants, sailors as fun- loving, easy-going men with little discipline and a soft life. The nature of its image inhibits the ability of the Navy to attract and retain the high quality people it needs. The external image cannot be repaired unless the internal image is first bright and shining. All of the Task Force recommendations will contribute to this end. To improve the inner image further, additional recommendations were developed which speak to four basic needs.
• The first need is to correct deficiencies in information flow within the Navy—to overcome lack of understanding of goals, missions, and values of a career. One of the primary targets is to be the wives. A Dependents Information section has been established in CHINFO to focus this effort.
• The second need is to enhance the physical image—build the prestige of the Navy man. The Task Force has recommended a complete revitalization of military standards in the Navy. This revitalization effort requires the formulation, dissemination, and vigorous enforcement of a codified set of standards pertaining to military evolutions, military etiquette, smartness, and cleanliness.
• The third need is to remove unnecessary irritants in service life and improve service to the individual. To this end the Task Force had several recommendations:
A pilot program is underway to provide banking and check cashing facilities afloat.
Family service centers were recommended for all bases to pull together in one location all those activities required to serve families seeking information assistance or with specific problems—when a husband is deployed, or at the time of reporting to or departing from a station.
Many irritants are believed to stem from an excessive administrative load which, through its demands on the time and energies of officers, acts as an impediment to leadership. A number of proposals were directed toward removing such impediments. This would be one of the advantages of law centers located at naval bases where most court martials would be tried.
• The final need of the inner image is to seek out and eliminate practices which degrade the dignity of naval personnel. It was recommended that the Navy Inspector General be given the responsibility for conducting a continual review of policies, directives, and procedures with a view to identifying and eliminating those which demean the dignity and status of naval personnel. The manner of conducting administrative searches afloat and ashore, practices which challenge the word of an officer, practices which put undue pressure on naval personnel such as improperly conducted charity drives, are examples of the type of things he will look for.
The collective effect of all of the recommended Task Force actions is designed to improve the conditions of naval service—to increase its rewards and raise its standards. Success in these efforts will be evidenced in a new order of no-nonsense toughness of mind, body, and spirit—and better oriented and better motivated naval personnel.
A look at history will show that severe personnel problems have arisen with cyclical regularity throughout the life of the Navy. Many blue ribbon boards have studied these problems. Too often the fine solutions they have proposed have not been fully implemented because of a shortage of resources—resources which were demanded by high priority problems. Therein were sown the seeds of a more aggravated crisis.
This is the fear of many in regard to the Retention Task Force—that bright promises will fade to forlorn hopes, as the money required for these programs is spent elsewhere and the rubber man stretched again.
The very nature of the recommendations and the severity of the problem make it evident that there will be no quick improvement brought on by their implementation. It will require several years for their effects to be felt. Furthermore, it is inevitable that the austere funding policies made necessary by the Vietnamese hostilities will slow down implementation of certain of the recommendations. However, as the Secretary of the Navy stated in Notice 5420 of 14 February 1966, the implementation of approved recommendations for solving the retention problem must be initiated as expeditiously as possible.
In order to co-ordinate the implementation of approved recommendations, a group of the original Task Force headed by Rear Admiral Nace reported for duty to the Chief of Naval Personnel as an implementing group. This group has developed a comprehensive Program Management Plan to ensure the orderly implementation of all approved recommendations. It is the Secretary’s desire that unlike many fine recommendations structured by other boards in the past which were duly reported, approved, and then not carried out, these recommendations will be implemented. This is the basis for the hope that this time it will be different.
Certainly, there is good reason for hope. In the months since the board reported its findings and recommendations, the number of corrective actions already implemented are indicative of the benefits to be derived from the survey. In fact, the list of accomplishment is sufficiently impressive, even now, to be offered as realistic proof of the results which may be obtained from this Navy-wide effort.
In addition to those listed below, all other recommendations save one are also in various stages of implementation.
The one recommendation, “Change the distribution control of Fleet shore duty from the Fleet Commanders-in-Chief to the Chief of Naval Personnel subject to the concurrence of the Fleet Commanders,” has been disagreed with by both Fleet Commanders and thus no further action on it is contemplated.
• Utilize the non-continuation provisions of Title 10, USC 5734, with continuation boards convened for rear admirals at the five and ten-year service points and separate approximately 50 per cent and 100 per cent of rear admirals at these points respectively.
Provide increased opportunity for officers and enlisted in-service education by:
• Continuing to assign the maximum number of qualified officer applicants to the Undergraduate Education Program, using civilian colleges or universities to meet billet requirements in excess of those available at Monterey.
Establishing a degree completion plan to enable officers to complete their baccalaureate degree requirements, of one year or less, at a civilian college or university.
• Accelerate the recruitment of college graduates for the Naval Aviation Officer Programs with the eventual goal of eliminating candidates with less than a college degree (NAVCAD’s/OCAN’s).
• Enhance capability of the Bureau of Naval Personnel to establish viable career patterns based upon identified long-range requirements, to exercise more positive influence over the career management of the officer corps, and to ensure that the individual’s career follows well delineated and accepted career patterns by establishing a permanently constituted Career Planning Board in the Bureau of Naval Personnel.
• Eliminate the active duty base date as a requirement for determining SEAVEY eligibility, and base the requirement solely on years served on arduous sea duty.
• Modify the eligibility requirements for overseas duty to permit assignment to such duty regardless of dependency status.
• Tour personnel in all duty classified as preferred sea duty in a manner similar to that in which personnel are toured in overseas and CONUS shore duty billets.
• Vest in the Chief of Naval Personnel the sole responsibility for determining and designating the various types of duty for rotation purposes; under his direction, develop the criteria for and establish a list of all ships, units, and activities that are either sea or shore duty for rotation purposes.
• Redesignate selected enlisted TAR billets as U. S. Navy billets to be filled to allowance by personnel of appropriate deprived ratings to improve sea/shore rotation for these ratings.
• Establish a goal to assign all non-school designated recruits and “A” school graduates of the seaman/fireman apprenticeships to sea duty on completion of recruit or “A” school training as appropriate. Where this is not feasible, insure that these personnel are toured ashore and serve an appropriate period of time at sea in ships during their first enlistment.
• Accept the concept of an Enlisted Career Education Plan.
• Establish an Associate Degree as a desirable educational objective for Navy career enlisted personnel and promulgate as Navy policy.
• Initiate discussion with junior college officials to determine specific programs that can be implemented on a pilot basis in cooperation with Navy “B” schools, and the feasibility of establishing an Associate Degree Completion Program.
• Re-enforce and amplify the Selective Training and Retention (STAR) Program.
• Resume funding of Habitability Improvement Program.
• Direct an annual review of environmental control standards.
• Adopt Tri-Service criteria for bachelor housing.
• Make awards and decorations more meaningful by delegating to commanding officers of ships and units the authority to certify eligibility for the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal and Vietnam Medal.
• Assign to the Naval Inspector General (NIG) responsibility for conduct of a continual review of all Navy policies, directives, and procedures, and the implementation thereof, with a view to identifying and eliminating those which unnecessarily demean the dignity and status of Navy personnel. Areas for initial consideration are:
Impediments to Navy personnel access to rights to correspond through channels and rights to take advantage of Request Mast.
The conduct of administrative searches afloat and ashore.
Practices which challenge the word of an officer.
Charity Drive practices which deviate from Navy policy that response to drives be voluntary.
• Conduct a review of the Navy’s internal and external information programs to determine requirements to evaluate resources, and to develop a plan for remedial action.
• Increase prestige attendant to petty officers and career status by requiring oral administration of the petty officer appointment form on assumption of petty officer status and subsequent advancements.
• Revise Uniform Regulations (NAVPERS 15665) to make provisions for bag inspections for enlisted men applicable to pay grades E-l through E-4 only.
Revise the customs for formal oral address, including the introduction of enlisted men, and for written address, to provide for addressing petty officers (less E-7, 8, and 9) as “Petty Officer______” and for addressing non-petty officer grades as “Seaman______,” “Fireman______etc.,instead of last names only.
• Increase household effects weight allowance for enlisted and officer personnel.
• Modify the present Dependents’ Medical Care Act to provide comprehensive inpatient and out-patient care including care for nervous and mental disorders for dependents and retired personnel.
• Maximize use of computers in the formulation of Fleet employment plans and operating schedules to facilitate rapid determination of optimum deployment periods and schedule changes.
• Establish a billet for the Leading Chief Petty Officer of the Navy.
• Establish “Family Service Centers” at Navy shore stations with major emphasis at areas of Fleet concentration to assist new arrivals or persons with special problems in obtaining the personal services that they require. (45 centers have been established with personnel support approved.)
• Re-establish a dependents’ information section in CHINFO with the responsibility for emphasizing the flow of information to Navy wives and families.