Commander William Earl Fannin, Class of 1945, Capstone Essay Contest
Keeping sailors from leaving ships is not just a job for policy makers in Washington. All junior officers need to know how and why they are on the front lines of retention in the fleet.
Let the Journey Begin." "An Army of One." "Aim High." These phrases are on television, the radio, and billboard signs everywhere. These inspirational slogans, however, are nothing more than advertisements for the U.S. armed forces. Why does the most powerful country in the world need to advertise? Recruiters are having a difficult time filling their billets, but more important the services are having a harder time keeping their junior enlisted members in the ranks. This has become more of a problem in the past few years and will continue to worsen unless the services try a new approach. To stop this trend, junior officers must know what the problem is, how it is affecting their divisions, and what they can do to stop it.
There is a definite purpose behind the Navy's 495-page Retention Team Manual. For whatever the reasons, numerous junior enlisted personnel are not at all satisfied with their lives in the Navy. Many are getting out right after their initial commitments are fulfilled or even before their obligations are completed. The numbers of senior enlisted are dwindling because few are staying in long enough to reach those higher ranks. According to data provided by Senior Chief Navy Counselor Paul Pierce, a career counselor for the Atlantic Fleet's Naval Surface Force, the Navy's attrition rate for first-term sailors is more than 40%. The reasons for the mass exodus of enlisted ratings are almost as numerous as the individuals who are leaving. Anything and everything seem to have become excuses or opportunities to justify getting out of the Navy.
Just like any advertisement, the armed forces' commercials and posters reflect images that are not always accurate. As motivating as roaring F-14 Tomcats, missile launches, and Aegis destroyers speeding through the waves can be, the real Navy way of life is different. As anyone who has spent even a little time in the armed forces knows, military life can be more difficult than anything one has known as a civilian. As a Navy psychologist and professor at the U.S. Naval Academy, Lieutenant Kelly Murray, explained, many new sailors are disillusioned early in their first tours.
Generally, new recruits join the service poised for the so-called "journey" to begin. Even after the trials and hard work of basic training, they enter the fleet with shining faces and motivation to spare. Proud of the Navy and eager to see the world, they are willing to take on any challenge. Then reality sets in, and they interact with those who have been in the Navy for a little while and who are not hesitant to show the new "boots" what the Navy is really like. The new sailors soon realize their role is to fix planes, not fly them, or to help serve food for an entire crew, or to work on a flight deck for 18 hours a day. Their perception of the situation changes, and soon their attitudes and behaviors change with it.
New sailors also have to realize they are going to be deployed away from home and their families for as long as six months at a time. They cannot go out and do whatever they want, whenever they want. They constantly are being told what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. In addition, the downsizing of the military over the past decade and low recruitment levels have resulted in undermanned ships. The additional responsibilities for those already putting in a full-day's work cause many sleepless nights and burnt-out crewmen. All of this is negatively affecting sailors' hierarchy of needs: physiological, safety, love, esteem, self-actualization, and knowledge. It seems only natural for sailors to want out when their most basic needs are not being met consistently, and they have no power to fulfill those needs. Many are fulfilling their needs outside the Navy.
Unfortunately, many of the occupational specialties never are "nice" jobs. As seen in a recent General Accounting Office report to the Senate Armed Services Committee, the attrition rate depends greatly on what one's primary duties are. Those most likely to leave the Navy early are missile-guidance, control and checkout personnel, and food service and seamanship personnel. Those likely to remain are technical specialists and installation security personnel. Clearly, those with ratings that involve risky, unstable, and demanding work are not going to keep as many people as those ratings that are safe, less-deployable, and appealing.
Finally, significant percentages of enlisted personnel are separated involuntarily from service early. Senior Chief Pierce believes that one reason for this trend is because standards are higher than in the past. "When I came in the Navy almost 17 years ago," he notes, "we had no drug-use prohibitions, no enforced physical-readiness test or body-fat standards, much more 'latitude' for bad personal behavior, and we could also gainfully employ sailors with very marginal educations." The top four official reasons for early separation among men (in order of frequency) are misconduct, medical/physical problems, performance problems, and drugs. For women they are pregnancy, medical/physical problems, misconduct, and performance problems. Other reasons include weight/body fat, alcoholism, homosexuality, and parenthood.
Surprisingly, many early separations are not chance happenings or bad luck. With her experience working with troubled personnel, Lieutenant Murray confirms that some people will go to extreme lengths to get out of their service commitments. She has seen men and women willing to kill themselves, claim they are homosexual, or get pregnant, all to get out of the Navy early. It would seem that some also resort to breaking rules or gaining weight or invent hardships at home. Furthermore, it is even more likely that those individuals unable to cope with the difficult work schedules or prolonged deployments may turn to alcohol or drugs. And some of those measures might not be that extreme. "If Johnny Sailor uses drugs," Senior Chief Pierce explains, "we don't want him, but his employment opportunities on the outside aren't necessarily hurt." If sailors use drugs once or claim they are homosexual, they have found easy ways to get out without hurting their futures in the civilian world. The problem of Navy retention is not just with those who choose not to reenlist at the end of their first tours, but also with those who are unable or refuse to deal with the tours they are serving currently.
The issue of enlisted retention has several significant consequences that make it a problem for all the armed services. First, recruits who leave early are lost investments. For those who leave the Navy early each year, more than $80 million is spent on their training, housing, and pay. For all the services, it costs more than $230 million for separations within the first two months of enlistment. In addition to this high monetary cost, high attrition also drains the services of those who are highly trained and have on-the-job experience. When people are cycling through a division at a rapid pace, more time is required to get them up to speed. It is a chain reaction: when people are not satisfied, they begin to leave; when they leave, those remaining have more work and less experience and eventually become dissatisfied themselves.
Among the most valuable assets available to the Navy to reduce enlisted attrition are junior officers. Ensigns, lieutenants junior grade, and lieutenants work closest to the majority of enlisted personnel. Junior officers have the most knowledge about these people and also have the most responsibility to look out for their needs and problems. According to Lieutenant Murray, junior officers can have a significant effect on the behavior and attitudes of their subordinates. If that effect is positive, it is likely attrition will decrease.
Lieutenant Murray makes it sound simple: "Be a good leader." Although there is no perfect way or single method to become a good leader, it still is the junior officers' responsibility to maintain the morale and welfare of their people. Two of the techniques available are performance and personal counseling. Counseling topics vary widely, from telling sailors they are promotion worthy to working on solving financial difficulties. Junior officers must demonstrate genuine concern for the well-being of their people and give sailors feedback—both positive and negative—on how they are doing. As Lieutenant Murray conceded, junior officers will not be able to prevent some people from leaving, but that does not mean that every effort should not be made.
Because sailors are leaving the Navy because their needs are unfulfilled, junior officers must work to satisfy those needs as much as possible. This could be something as simple as requesting boxed lunches for those who work through a meal or telling the members of a division that they received top marks during an inspection. It also can be a more complicated situation (such as, dealing with deteriorating work spaces not recognized by the rest of the ship) requiring junior officers to develop good relationships with superiors and to use the chain of command to seek the necessary changes. By satisfying even the most basic needs (or by manipulating those needs), junior officers could change sailors' attitudes drastically for the better. When the greatest concern is not where the next meal is coming from or when the next mail delivery arrives, average sailors are more likely to remember the benefits of the Navy and less likely to count the days until their service obligations end.
Finally, the junior officer in a division or department sets the tone and the example for all his or her subordinates. With clear group goals and group vision, everyone can see why they are working and what they are working toward. By setting a good example of expertise and commitment, the leader's attitude will filter slowly throughout the unit. Instead of searching for reasons to leave the group and the Navy, the question should be, "Why would I want to leave?"
There are many things that junior officers can do to help alleviate the Navy's retention problem. First, they must be aware of the problem. Losing trained personnel and members of a cohesive group can be harmful in many ways, and looking the other way while it happens will not help. Next, division heads must work to maintain positive attitudes. Criticism and complaint result only in bitterness, resentment, and cynicism. Third, it is important to set goals and recognize when they are met; encouragement and positive reinforcement can go a long way. Fourth, junior officers must maintain a working knowledge of their subordinates and know what issues are important to their sailors before they turn into problems. Finally, junior officers must be assertive when working issues through the chain of command; subordinates are more likely to work well for people who are willing to work for them.
The Navy also could make a few changes to help the retention situation. First, it must educate new recruits on facts, not stories. The Navy should train recruiters not to work on the quota system but to choose the most qualified candidates and those who have a high probability of staying with the Navy. More funds also should be dedicated to personnel and quality-of-life issues. Finally, it is vital that the Navy ensures its junior officers are well trained and understand fully their responsibilities to turn their divisions from collections of individuals into teams.
Ensign Sullivan will teach chemistry at the Naval Academy Preparatory School in Newport, Rhode Island, before she enters Surface Warfare Officer School in January 2002.