April is a great time for chief petty officers to reflect on their history and proud heritage. The rank was created on 1 April 1893, and for the last 117 years, countless men and women have joined the "most exclusive of all maritime fraternities." While many chiefs choose to leave the Mess each year to pursue opportunities in the officer corps, their roots remain in the enlisted community.
Remembering where you came from is a common theme instilled in new chiefs during Initiation rituals. This link to one's past is an important leadership trait that helps chiefs understand Sailors and maintain proper perspective. When a chief chooses to leave the Mess for service in the wardroom, we also expect they will remember their enlisted roots and the lessons learned as a chief. Serving chiefs commonly judge and react to these officers by this very standard. Those who maintain that emotional connection are easy to identify; so too are the ones who've forgotten where they came from.
Feelings differ, but many chiefs are not happy when their brethren leave the Mess for the wardroom. Their community is a tough fraternity to join, and the decision by some to trade anchors for officers' devices is not always popular with those they leave behind. In most cases, the animosity shown those applying for commissions is in fact good-natured teasing, and also in most cases the pursuit of a commission is not a rejection of the Mess so much as a search for diverse professional challenges. Considering the restrictions of many enlisted ratings, service as an officer can open the doors to many new adventures, new duty stations, and enhanced responsibilities.
It's easy to forget or never know that a particular officer is a former chief. Very often we don't know those in the wardroom well enough, and sometimes their performance conceals their past. But the majority of these officers don't forget where they came from. Each time the Chief Petty Officer Retirement Creed is recited, "all chief petty officers past and present" eagerly rise. Active-duty, retired, and former chiefs alike anticipate this evolution, and at the risk of sounding condescending, those serving as officers probably look forward to exercising this connection to the Mess, and well they should. It's a small but important expression of an unbreakable bond.
Initiation events in most Messes exclude former chiefs, but it need not be so. There are limited areas where they should be included for two reasons. First, chiefs and officers must work together, and officers with experience in both communities can help bridge the divide through training new chiefs and in day-to-day operations. Second, if we continue to preach "once a chief, always a chief," then our deeds must match our words through inclusive events whenever appropriate. This outreach could pay dividends for both groups. Officers who completed Initiation and were accepted into the Mess earned their anchors and have valuable experience. Including them in carefully chosen and designed training evolutions can help bring the Mess and the wardroom closer. Improved relationships between these former Messmates should eventually spread to the rest of the officer community.
Each of us needs to remember where prior enlisted officers, particularly prior chief petty officers, came from. Serving chiefs typically respect them more than other officers, and they usually serve with a greater emotional connection to enlisted Sailors and chief petty officers. Officers without prior enlisted service, particularly commanding officers and admirals, also need to remember that these officers are different from those without the same experiences. Warrant officers in particular should not be treated as the most junior officers in the wardroom; they deserve particular respect as technical leaders in their communities. Those serving in other programs (such as limited duty officers and direct commissions into the medical community) are also not typical junior officers; they are experienced professionals with significant technical and leadership experience that must be put to good use.
In many ways, recent changes like the command master chief program have somewhat blurred the line between chiefs and the wardroom. The separation between the two is an important part of our heritage, but their shared experiences should be recognized and appreciated. If nothing else, just don't forget where they came from.