Restore Progress Through Mentoring
By Captain Wayne P. Hughes Jr., U.S. Navy (Retired)
If our best officers are not enlightened early in their careers, they will leave the Navy to do something they think is more rewarding, such as making money. The loss of a talented officer is invisible in a system that can only work with what it has. To restore progress in the U.S. Navy, I believe we should adopt a method of grooming leaders that has worked in the past: Having the best senior officers mentor the best junior officers, quietly and almost invisibly.
When I was a junior officer, two things kept me in the Navy, which at that time did not seem to be preparing me for a career of excitement or even danger. The first was an executive officer of my first ship, who proved to me in many late-night discussions that there was more to being a seagoing line officer than being a good officer of the deck. This Rhodes Scholar also recommended that I take graduate education in the then-new and scarcely known field of operations analysis.
The second thing that kept me in the Navy was early command. This was the result of mentoring by a detailer who believed I had a promising future. Contrary to my own career plan, he ordered me into the mine force as the executive officer of a minesweeper for my second tour of duty. This led to command of a small coastal minesweeper at the very moment I was promoted to lieutenant. I have been told that command today can be a stifling experience. I thought there was some of that during my time in the mine forces, but it didn’t take long to feel the rewards, and after my first command as a very junior lieutenant I knew I would not leave the Navy before I had had my own destroyer.
Change Through Mentoring
The best known model of successful mentoring is U.S. Army Major General Fox Conner, who nurtured the careers of George C. Marshall, Dwight Eisenhower, and George Patton in the face of unimaginative Army opposition (see Lieutenant Commander Jason Shell’s December 2015 Proceedings article, “Leading Outside Command,” pp. 52–57). Marshall in turn kept a list of the most promising mid-grade officers and as Chief of Staff was famous for putting good leaders in positions of authority—not perfectly, but successfully.
I believe that our SEALs are the best current Navy example of selection, training, strong performance, and currency. They are a component of the U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM), a self-contained command that has close control over its procurement, tactics, and operations. SOCOM has taken the lead in promoting unmanned aerial vehicles, the technologies of silent operations, and stealthy attacks. The U.S. Marine Corps is a close-second example of successful mentoring and training combined with an emphasis on combined-arms combat training.
To foster change through mentoring, Navy leadership must:
• Choose officers with a broad, all-encompassing perspective rather than those who are the most proficient fighter pilot, missile officer, or nuclear submariner. At the same time, it must anticipate our most vital emerging communities and let officers become operational experts by having repeated tours in them. Cyber warfare, unmanned vehicles, and coastal combatants are three such emerging fields that entail unique skills for swift progress.
• Understand that mentoring is a combination of one-on-one tutoring and team development. At the Naval Postgraduate School, for example, one-on-one thesis advising has been the norm, but recently team projects have become appreciated as a strong way to teach officers with different skills how to work together to advance complicated, multifaceted designs of systems and operations.
• Not expect an error-free process. A current weakness of Navy decision making is to promote officers who have never made an obvious mistake rather than look for those with courage and imagination. A young officer who had had an exchange tour in the Norwegian Navy once told me that it was a fleet of small combatants famous for flitting at high speed among fjords, shoals, and islands to defend a dangerous coast. He said a Norwegian officer who had never run aground was suspected of being too cautious for promotion.
A skeptic might have two objections to the concept of mentoring. The first is that it has been tried before, so it must have been found wanting. Two Chiefs of Naval Operations, Admiral Elmo “Bud” Zumwalt Jr. and Admiral Vern Clark, both promoted specialty development and mentoring. I think both would have succeeded and kept the Navy vibrant if the three rules here had been understood and inculcated. The second objection is that mentoring breeds favoritism and leaders can be blind to manipulation by clever junior officers. This is true: Mistakes will be made. No system is perfect, but if we are going to improve current decision making, which has become too risk-averse, there is probably no correction that is free of mistakes.
Current Programs
The Navy does offer some opportunities for mentoring by assigning aides to flag officers, but aides gain experience in administrative efficiency rather than in improving tactics and technology. A more focused program for senior officers was initiated by Admiral Tom Hayward beginning in 1981, in which the CNO selects promising captains for a year of study and the introduction of new ideas in a Strategic Studies Group (SSG) in Newport. Partly for mentoring and partly to add the energy and free thinking of junior officers, the SSG now invites five or six lieutenants from the Naval Postgraduate School to join the captains for part of the year. However, it is no longer policy to include graduate education as an important stepping-stone for future leaders.
When I was a junior officer, we knew that taking two or even three years away from career development at sea was seen by Navy leadership as valuable—even essential. Now as a professor at the Naval Postgraduate School, I see that quota-filling rather than career development has become dominant. In the recent past, selection by detailers has also been used as a retention tool. The P-Coding system has become a liability that destroys the concept that education is for career development. It would be better if the Navy only sent officers who were highly likely to rise to senior command and only in curricula specializing in the skills deemed most valuable.
In the past, space technology and astronaut education was a program that served well. An antisubmarine-warfare curriculum was well formulated and attended until the collapse of the Soviet Union. Our undersea-warfare curriculum (including mine warfare) was maintained for two decades during a hiatus of interest. It attracted few students until the Navy once again appreciated the value of submarine and mine warfare as well as autonomous unmanned undersea vehicle technologies.
Currently the most valuable curricula are probably computer technology, information science and technology for cyber war, unmanned systems, military tactical and campaign analysis, special operations, and total-ship system engineering. Graduate education is not mentoring, but as I said, my graduate education was shaped by an early mentor. Overseeing the selection of our most promising future leaders will go far toward restoring flexibility and adaptability to all aspects of our Navy.
Dean Emeritus, Professor, and Captain Hughes teaches campaign and tactical analysis at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. He wrote Fleet Tactics and Coastal Combat, published by the Naval Institute Press, and is a Proceedings distinguished author.
More Than a Number
By Lieutenant Commander Cary Godwin, U.S. Coast Guard
The U.S. Coast Guard conducts dangerous missions every day. Whether it’s search-and-rescue operations using small boats or helicopters, a cutter servicing an aid to navigation dangerously close to shoal water, or a marine inspection team on a commercial tanker vessel, Coast Guardsmen must assess and manage risk to safely and successfully complete each mission. The unwritten motto of the early Coast Guard was: “You have to go out, but you don’t have to come back.” Today we say: “You don’t have to go out, but if you do, you have to come back and bring all your equipment back so you can do it again tomorrow.” It is imperative to protect your people and assets in order to provide continued service to the country, and this is accomplished through proper risk management.
Managing risk does not mean being risk-averse. Every mission involves inherent risks, and the maritime environment is often unforgiving. Rarely is it a sunny, calm day that the Coast Guard is called to provide assistance to a mariner in need. The service developed the team-coordination training and the Operational Risk Management (ORM) program following several accidents, most notably the sinking of the fishing vessel Sea King off the coast of Washington in 1991; a Coast Guardsman was lost when the vessel capsized as it was being towed. The Coast Guard’s ORM program has matured over the years and is entrenched in nearly every aspect of Coast Guard operations and planning.
Current Requirements
The ORM program requires unit commanders to follow a seven-step process for mission planning and execution. The steps are: 1) identify mission tasks, 2) identify hazards, 3) assess risks, 4) identify mitigation options, 5) evaluate risk versus gain, 6) execute decision, and 7) monitor situation. The ORM instruction provides two standard tools to help quantify risk as part of Step 3. The first tool is called the Severity/Probability/Exposure (SPE) Risk Assessment Model and uses a formula to determine risk as a function of severity, probability, and exposure. Severity is an event’s potential consequences measured in terms of damage, injury, or impact on a mission measured on a scale from one to five. Probability is the likelihood that potential consequences will occur measured on a scale of one to five. Exposure is the amount of time, number of occurrences, and number of people or equipment involved in an event expressed in time, proximity, volume, or repetition measured on a scale of one to four. Each category is assigned a risk number and multiplied to attain a total risk-factor number using the formula Risk=SxPxE. Based on the final calculation, the risk level is assigned one of five levels ranging from Slight to Very High.
The second and most preferred risk-assessment tool is the Green/Amber/Red Risk Assessment Model, commonly referred to as the GAR. The GAR addresses more general risk concerns involving planning operations or reassessing risk as milestones are reached. The GAR incorporates six elements or categories including 1) supervision, 2) planning, 3) crew and watchstander selection, 4) crew and watchstander fitness, 5) environment, and 6) event or evolution complexity. Each category is evaluated and assigned a risk number between one and ten. All six categories are added together for a final risk calculation and, using the GAR Evaluation Scale, assigned the risk level as Green (low), Amber (caution), or Red (high).
Unfortunately, those who know little about ORM often put an exaggerated emphasis on completing the GAR, recording a number, and “checking the box.” In doing this, you’ve only completed three steps of a required seven, and if you don’t act on the risk assessment or continuously monitor the event for change or additional risk, what good is it? Simply completing the GAR risk-assessment model does not equate to managing risk. After completing the GAR, you must take steps to mitigate the risks if possible, determine if the gain outweighs the risks, make the go/no-go decision, and continually monitor the situation.
Different Processes
The ORM instruction also breaks down risk management into three levels: 1) time critical, 2) deliberate, and 3) strategic. I believe that the time-critical process is the most misunderstood level and likely the result of a “check the box” mentality. Simply put, this is a quick mental or verbal review of the situation as it unfolds using the basic risk-management process without recording the information. This process should be used when making decisions in a time-compressed evolution such as a man overboard, an emergency situation, or when there is an unplanned event requiring an instant decision. Time-critical risk management does not mean the seven-step process is ignored; it is only condensed and there is no documentation of a SPE/GAR or official briefing. The hazards are still identified and assessed, mitigated, evaluated, and a decision is made, often within seconds. Poor planning or complacency are not acceptable excuses for routinely using time-critical risk management.
Deliberate risk management applies the complete process, and each step is documented in some manner. Examples of deliberate risk management include routine operational planning, developing standard operating, maintenance, or training procedures, and planning damage-control or disaster-response strategies. In fact, the majority of risk management occurs well before the event, evolution, or operation begins. Still, the entire seven-step process must be completed to reduce risk, increase the level of safety, and improve the likelihood of mission success.
The strategic risk-management process identifies hazards through diagramming and analysis tools, and tracking of hazards associated with a system or operation over the long term. Strategic risk-management applications include extended, complex operational planning as well as introducing new equipment, materials, missions, or major replacement assets. Strategic risk-management practices are also used to identify trends such as increased accident rates or in determining the root cause of a significant mishap event. An example of strategic risk management in practice includes the Coast Guard’s implementation of more stringent cold-weather survival-gear maintenance-and-wear requirements following the 2001 Station Niagara boat capsizing where two Coast Guardsmen lost their lives in the icy waters of Lake Ontario. The analysis identified deficiencies within the Rescue and Survival System and quickly enacted changes necessary to protect Coast Guard personnel operating in cold-water environments.
If used as designed, the ORM program is an extremely valuable tool in managing risk and ensuring safe mission execution. Operational commanders must also possess a thorough understanding of the ORM process to provide their operational units with necessary adequate support. It isn’t the GAR score that’s most important; it’s the decisions made based on accurate risk assessments and taking all available precautions both before and during the execution of the mission. There may be times when the risk is extremely high and there are no options to mitigate the risks and, given the totality of the situation, the gain still outweighs the risks. Remember, the GAR does not determine mission success: It is simply a tool within the entire ORM process.
Lieutenant Commander Godwin currently serves as the commanding officer of the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Mobile Bay (WTGB-103) homeported in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, and is responsible for executing aids to navigation and icebreaking missions throughout the Great Lakes.
Deciding on ‘Places of Refuge’
By Jeffrey Slusarz
The Marine Area Contingency Plan (ACP) is a protection plan for sensitive site areas and booming as well as protection strategies for a major oil spill. Part of the ACP is a section called Potential Places of Refuge (PPOR). Its standards and guidelines were initially developed by the Pacific States-British Columbia Oil Spill Task force and the Alaska Regional Response Team Places of Refuge Subcommittee. Both sets of guidelines were used to develop the standards for U.S. Coast Guard Pacific Area when addressing a PPOR incident, as well as the National Response Team’s guidelines for one.
When an incident occurs that could involve the international border, a response will be activated according to the appropriate Joint Canada/U.S. or Joint Mexico/U.S. Response Plan. Similarly, if a Place of Refuge incident is likely to involve more than one area plan, existing cross-jurisdictional protocols will be activated.1 This area plan incorporates a decision-making process and recommended procedures for appropriate authorities and vessel masters to use when requesting a place of refuge. The guidelines incorporate the ones regarding places of refuge for ships in need of assistance adopted by the International Maritime Organization, and assume use of the Incident Command System to manage the incident.2
A place of refuge is defined as a location where a vessel needing assistance can be temporarily moved, and where actions can then be taken to stabilize the vessel, protect human life, reduce a hazard to navigation, and/or protect sensitive natural resources and/or other uses of the area. It could include constructed harbors, ports, natural embayments, temporary grounding sites, or offshore waters. A vessel moved to a temporary grounding site must be removed after the completion of emergency actions. There are currently no preapproved places of refuge identified in California.3
Leaking vessels may need to be brought into a harbor or anchored or moored in protected waters to make repairs to stop the leaking of oil or other hazardous substances. Likewise, vessels that have lost power or steerage may need to go to a place of refuge for repairs to prevent a shipwreck that could result in the loss of fuel, hazardous substances, or other cargo. Taking these actions would help prevent or minimize potential adverse effects to the public, the environment, and resource users.
An Ideal Place?
There is no single place of refuge suitable for all vessels and all situations. Decisions must be made on an incident-specific basis because they encompass a wide range of issues that could vary. For example, each incident is unique in terms of vessel size, fuel carried, and reason for assistance; information relevant to a specific location may be incomplete or out-of-date; weather and sea conditions are variable; fish and wildlife resources are mobile and may or may not be in an area as anticipated; the locations of other activities such as commercial fishing and subsistence use vary over time; and resources such as salvage vessels available to respond to the incident vary over time.
The best location for a place of refuge at any given point in time is dependent on incident-specific characteristics and real-time input by appropriate stakeholders. When considering such decisions, the captain of the port (COTP) will need to consider multiple interests including operational concerns, human health and safety, natural resources, security, resource users, and land owners and managers.4
If time allows, the COTP will activate a unified command under the Incident Command System for the decision-making process. The decisions to direct or permit a vessel to seek a place of refuge, as well as the decisions and actions implementing those decisions, will be based on the best available information and professional judgment. Options include: the vessel remaining in the same position, continuing on its voyage, moving to another location farther from shore, being intentionally scuttled in deep water, or moving to a place of refuge.5
The incident-specific places of refuge decision-making process recognizes that while the timeframe for the COTP to make decisions varies, it may be divided into the following three categories:
• The vessel’s situation requires immediate action, leaving no time for consultation with the state on-scene coordinator, natural resource trustees, or other appropriate stakeholders.
• The vessel’s situation requires rapid action, leaving time for consultation with the state on-scene coordinator, natural resource trustees, and other, but not all, appropriate stakeholders.
• The vessel’s situation requires timely action, and there is time to consult with the state on-scene coordinator, natural resource trustees, and all other appropriate stakeholders.6
In conclusion, the purpose of the Guidelines for Places of Refuge Decision-Making is to provide a decision-making process to assist U.S. Coast Guard COTPs in deciding whether a vessel needs to be moved to a place of refuge and, if so, which one to use, and a framework for developing pre-incident information on potential places for inclusion in appropriate sub-area contingency plans.
These guidelines address places of refuge decision-making throughout California. They are consistent with the December 2003 International Maritime Organization Guidelines on Places of Refuge for Ships in Need of Assistance and the Pacific States/B.C. Oil Spill Task Force “USCG Pacific Area/Pacific States/BC Oil Spill Task Force Area Plan Annex for Places of Refuge.” These Guidelines provide the COTP with a process that will help expedite places of refuge decision-making, and ensure stakeholders and other technical experts are consulted as appropriate. This in turn, helps ensure that the COTP has appropriate input, and the best available information, prior to making a place of refuge decision.
1. U.S. Coast Guard Pacific Area/Pacific States/DC Oil Spill Task Force Area Plan Annex for Places of Refuge, 12/2004, www.oilspilltaskforce.org/.../PlacesRefugePlanAnnex.pdf.
2. International Maritime Organization Resolution A.949(23), “Guidelines on Places of Refuge for Ships in Need of Assistance,” 5 March 2004, www.marine-salvage.com/documents/Places of Refuge.pdf.
3. Region 9 Regional Response Team Guidelines for Places of Refuge Decision Making, 25 April 2005, dec.alaska.gov/spar/PPR/pwspor/pwspporpart1texttables.pdf.
4. Ibid.
5. Commandant’s Instruction 16451.9, USCG Places of Refuge Policy, 17 July 2007, www.uscg.mil/directives/ci/16000-16999/CI_16451_9.PDF.
6. USCG Pacific Area/Pacific States/DC Oil Spill Task Force Area Plan Annex for Places of Refuge.
Mr. Slusarz is currently the Marine Area Contingency Plan Coordinator for Coast Guard District 11. This entails the oversight of six area planning committees within California. He served with the U.S. Coast Guard Reserve for 28 years.