A destroyer commanding officer mentors a junior officer during a training exercise. The most important thing a new division officer can do is listen—and learn.

Division Officers Can Conquer Cluelessness

Leadership Essay Contest—First Prize, Sponsored by Drs. Jack and Jennifer London Charitable Foundation. Division officers are the bridge between the mission and enlisted sailors, between the “what” and the “how.”

Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Ezra Haddock, U.S. Navy
May 2025
A Coast Guard auxiliarist completes a boarding at sea in the Indo-Pacific. Coast Guard auxiliarists are having a significant effect on manpower, filling critical billets and providing much-needed work-life balance to members.

Retain To Rebuild

Manpower shortages are the most immediate threat to the Coast Guard’s mission success.

Lieutenant (junior grade) Victoria Folz, U.S. Coast Guard
April 2025
A hull maintenance technician trains a seaman on how to use a heptafluoropropane compartment casualty checklist during a damage control training exercise. Righting the checklist mentality would make sailors the best at their trade under the worst conditions.

Right the Checklist Mentality

The trap we sometimes find ourselves in is that we just look at the checkmark, and not what goes into getting the checkmark.

Commander David Reische, U.S. Navy (Retired)
March 2025
Marines at the School of Infantry handling M4 recoilless rifles during their training. Junior Marines take on some of the service’s most dangerous jobs—jobs that require extensive critical thinking—and should be treated as smart and capable individuals.

Treat Junior Marines Better

The next generation of officers must recognize and treat junior and inexperienced enlisted service members for who they truly are—highly capable, valuable team members.

First Lieutenant Grant Boyes, U.S. Marine Corps
February 2025
Coast Guardsmen make repairs to the hangar door locking mechanism on board the USCGC Kimball (WMSL-756). The Coast Guard’s motto, Semper Paratus (Always Ready), has been translated culturally into “do more with less,” which can be disheartening for members.

Redefine Semper Paratus

Our service remains haunted by the curse Admiral Loy emphasized some 24 years ago, even as it is at peak demand domestically and globally.

Lieutenant (junior grade) Marissa Skidmore, U.S. Coast Guard
January 2025
Disciplinary events are a part of Navy life for officers and enlisted members. The Navy Supply Corps School hosted a mock executive officer’s inquiry and captain’s mast to help officers feel more comfortable in these disciplinary situations should they arise.

Coping with Captain’s Mast

The distinction between individual autonomy and collective responsibility in the military environment is a fine line.

Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Jacqueline Hayre-Pérez, U.S. Navy
December 2024
During February 2022 humanitarian aid/disaster relief (HA/DR) operations in Turkey, 2d MEB staff members arrived in Naples and immediately integrated into the Naval Forces Europe HA/DR battle rhythm, and some members deployed to Incirlik with the commanding general to provide additional capacity as required.

Transforming 2d Marine Expeditionary Brigade

This transformation involved setting three conditions: educating the force, casting a vision, and building the organizational mechanism for achieving objectives.

Lieutenant Colonel Joel Rea, U.S. Marine Corps
November 2024
The USS California (SSN-781) returns to homeport in Groton, Connecticut, on 14 February 2024 after a deployment. Leaders in the submarine community can be drivers of retention because leadership styles affect a submariner’s quality of life.

Retention Is a Leadership Problem

Leaders are the driver when it comes to retention, and leadership styles can affect quality of life.

Lieutenant William Parker, U.S. Navy
October 2024
Captain Brett Crozier, the former commanding officer of the carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN-71), was relieved of duty in 2020 after a letter to Navy leaders asking for help as COVID-19 spread throughout his ship was leaked to the press. Although his removal was met with backlash, an investigation found Crozier had not removed infected sailors from his ship fast enough and used “questionable judgment” when releasing sailors from quarantine.

Learn from ‘Losses of Confidence’

It is time to start looking at these “loss of confidence” events more carefully and feed the lessons back into formal training programs.

September 2024