Command at sea for a Coast Guard officer can come as early as lieutenant (junior grade). While it may be true that “you can’t understand command until you’ve had it,” as fictional Lieutenant Keefer so aptly expressed in The Caine Mutiny (Doubleday, 1951), that does not mean young officers cannot prepare for it. For those who strive to command, observing, studying, and practicing the characteristics that will prepare them for “the thrill of taking over their first ship” is essential.1
Former Secretary of Defense and retired Marine Corps General James Mattis frequently challenged leaders to “learn from others’ experience . . . especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men.” I owe a debt of gratitude to the three commanding officers I have served under, as well as to other former commanding officers with whom I have served, for shaping and nurturing my career as a professional mariner and for showing me how good commanders look, sound, and act.
Get Your Hands Dirty
During a patrol toward the end of my first tour on the USCGC Valiant (WMEC-621), I was standing watch as officer of the deck and was startled when I looked up from the horizon to see the captain on his hands and knees on the forecastle. A bucket of soapy water and green pad in hand, he was scrubbing away vigorously with nothing but the breeze for company. As the first lieutenant, you can imagine the horror that overcame me. I made a quick call to the chief’s mess to alert my chief. Within minutes the forecastle was awash with nonrated sailors, armed with scrubbing tools and abrasive pads. By an act of divine mercy, I was relieved early, and I hurtled down to the forecastle to mitigate my shame.
After scrubbing every inch of the forecastle for an hour or so, the cleaning party petered out and I was able to talk to the captain. I stammered an apology, trying to explain and assure him that the deck department would take care of it and he would never have to clean again. Like something out of a movie, he blithely replied, “I know I don’t have to, but I wanted to. I just saw some running rust I didn’t like so I decided to take care of it.”
The crucial takeaways here are twofold. Both servant leadership and “you get what you inspect” are facets of leading by example, something that is vital to great leaders of men and women at sea. By scrubbing the decks himself, the Cinderella skipper sent a clear message that the material condition of the ship was of the utmost importance and the ship being under way was not an excuse for the veneer of running rust over the forecastle. Inspections, even informal ones, communicate priorities and lend credence to the idea that if something remains wrong long enough it becomes invisible, which it had.2 Everyone in the deck department had adopted the mind-set that in-port was for work and under way was for watch. Fortunately, where my leadership had failed, the captain set the example and set in motion a paradigm shift. Every few days, the ship was scoured with soap and freshwater to combat running rust and salt buildup. “Don’t let the salt build up” was now the standard.
The second and even more important lesson is that few things energize a crew and earn their respect as much as a leader willing to get his or her hands dirty. As with anything, this should be done sparingly, as it is not the captain’s job to clean the ship; it is his or her job to ensure the safe navigation of the ship, the accomplishment of the mission, and the safety of the crew. In this case, the captain reinforced the essence of servant leadership. His willingness to carry out any order he would give, particularly for an unpleasant task, meant a lot to the men and women under his care.
As a junior officer on a Coast Guard cutter, servant leadership has a vital place in your leadership quiver. You typically have a good pulse on the crew because you stand watch with them and are closely involved with the day-to-day running of your division or department. While it may not be your job to turn wrenches or wield power tools, learning how and when to set the example and get your hands dirty can be a powerful display of servant leadership that you can carry with you to all levels of leadership.
Stick to Your Guns
Shortly after the forecastle scrubbing incident, my captain became concerned with the material condition of the ship and we held near weekly material inspections with all the officers and chiefs as operations allowed—a significant departure from what we had done in the past. These inspections also took place on the weekend during what was traditionally holiday routine, much to the ire of the crew. It seemed a no-brainer what would happen here; the captain was going to get his arm twisted by the chiefs’ mess because the inspections were a burden on the crew and were not that important.
The topic was the scuttlebutt for days. One night on watch, the quartermaster of the watch, a third-class petty officer, even assured me knowingly that “the chiefs would take care of it.” Yet, the next week there was an inspection. And the week after that. And the week after that. The grumbling petered out, and Saturday morning became the day material inspections took place. I cannot say for certain what happened, but it is clear the captain stuck to his guns. The easiest thing would be to let everyone sleep in Saturday morning. Young leaders often struggle with saying, “We’re going to do this because it is the right thing and it is important.” It is human nature to want to be well-liked. But the captain ultimately is responsible for ensuring that standards are upheld. That means you cannot back down from an unpopular decision if it helps accomplish the mission.
Go the Extra Mile
Driving the crew to work hard to meet high standards does not mean you cannot take care of your people. “Taking care of your people” is a tortured sentiment, but there is a reason it is so often repeated: it is important. Looking out for your people does not mean cutting them slack and doing their work for them; it means channeling their sustained, excellent performance into avenues that help them advance and, in times of personal struggles, being there for them. I am not implying that to be a good commanding officer you need to give unearned evaluations and awards at every turn, but you should demonstrate your ability and willingness to go the extra mile for your people.
A notable instance from my first tour occurred after a successful counterdrug patrol. At sunset quarters, every member of the 80 person crew, including the junior officers, received an individualized Commandant’s Letter of Commendation for their contributions to the cutter’s success during the patrol. In the Coast Guard, enlisted members advance based on annual service-wide exams for their rate, coupled with a multiplier that comprises award points, time in grade, sea time, and an average of their performance evaluations. The rub is, only individual awards count. All the unit awards in the world do not mean a thing when it comes to advancing.
Instead of writing a generic unit commendation that would have counted for nothing, the captain had personally written 80 Letters of Commendation to ensure each and every crew member was rewarded for their hard work and dedication. I will never forget the looks of jubilation and gratitude on their faces when the crew realized they were each receiving individual awards.
Looking out for your people also means going to bat for them, even if it puts you into an uncomfortable spot. It often takes moral courage to truly look out for others. Shortly after I was relieved as executive officer, one of the crew members broke the curfew imposed while we were assigned to U.S. Central Command. Senior leaders strongly recommended that the crew member be punished for an alcohol incident. The captain strongly opposed classifying the behavior as an alcohol incident. He did not seek to bend the rules, he merely explained that it did not meet the criteria because alcohol was not a causative factor in breaking curfew.
In my limited experience, I did not think there was much we could do to convince senior officers. I later found out the captain had to sit before officers very much his senior and explain his judgment, but he held firm in his decision. The member who had broken curfew gratefully received his punishment and continued to be one of the most productive members of the crew until his departure.
Some might consider these grand gestures and say, okay that is a quaint story, but how do I practice this daily? Providing members with every opportunity to excel, ensuring they have work–life resources available to them, and maintaining a dialogue on their personal lives are gestures endemic to caring, conscientious leaders.
Cultivate Command at Sea
One of the most critical roles of a commanding officer is as a mentor to the officers and enlisted under his or her charge. Investing heavily in the mentorship and training of your crew breeds fledgling officers-in-charge, executive officers, commanding officers, and, more broadly, professional mariners. More than any drug bust or search-and-rescue case, the legacy you leave by encouraging and coaxing the next generations of Coast Guardsmen or sailors has impact. Serving as a mentor to someone can be as tangible as coaching a junior boatswain’s mate to his or her first deck-watch-officer qualification or nurturing a young junior officer who has expressed interest in continuing to go to sea.
The Coast Guard is the nation’s oldest continuous seagoing service, and cutters will always be its heart, but the number of professional articles that decry the profession as obsolete or one that eats its own young suggests that cuttermen are becoming rarer with each passing year.3
Rhetoric is not the community’s only foe: a majority of Coast Guard Academy graduates matriculate to major cutters after graduation but after their first tour afloat do not go within five nautical miles of a cutter for as long as they can. The emergence of full-fledged career paths in fields such as cyber security, intelligence, and deployable specialized forces combined with the Spartan conditions of life on a cutter compared to shore duty are enough to entice the best to become landsmen.
Consequently, when a commanding officer does come across a junior officer or enlisted member who expresses an interest in continuing to go to sea, it is paramount to cultivate and nurture the passion and talent that surely would wither if left to its own devices. This does not mean special treatment, but it does mean providing these members opportunities to grow and develop. I was fortunate to have several commanding officers and executive officers who took an active role in my development. Knowing that I harbored ambitions to continue serving afloat in command cadre roles, they ensured I was equipped with the right tools and had formative experiences to draw on, whether it was shiphandling, serving as a department head, or boarding officer experience.
These mentors coached and encouraged me through failures, whether it was a failed boarding or struggling to meet prerequisites for a necessary school, when it would have been just as easy to say nothing. Most important, they provided examples of effective leadership and command. They taught me secrets to success as a leader, such as when to get your hands dirty, stick to your guns, go the extra mile, and to never, ever let the salt build up.
1. James Stavridis and Robert Girrier, Command at Sea (Annapolis, MD: U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2010.)
2. Anonymous, “Inspections Communicate Priorities,” JO Rules, 29 July 2013.
3. Brian Smicklas, “Demise of the Cutterman,” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings 141, no. 8 (August 2015). Lieutenant David A. Adams, U.S. Coast Guard, “Coast Guard Is More Than Cutters, ” U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings 143, no. 8, (August 2016).