NCO Strategy

length 700 words, Font Arial, 12 pt, Margins 1″, spacing double format 4-5 paragraphs, 1st person narrative

use personal experiences and future leadership expectations, describe the NCO 2020 Strategy. Describe possible obstacles or barriers that you forsee and how to over come them.

ANSWER

The NCO 2020 strategy targets training, experience and education of non-commissioned corps to enhance talent, leadership, commitment and competency. The NCO highly appeals to me as an individual because of the individual perception it bears. The strategy was launched in December 2015 and contains three lines of efforts (LOE) that are it has become fundamental for every officer to understand them. These LOEs include a focus selection, training, education and promotion, abbreviated as (S.T.E.P), talent management and opportunity development and highlighting the role of the NCO and taking pride in being part of the organisation and the NCO creed. The NCO has benefits that stretch beyond the army and into the general population making it highly recommendable to every NCO officer to read and understand while at the same time spreading its benefits to others. However, some have felt that the strategy focuses on excessive education in areas that were not always considered important. This essay uses personal experiences and future leadership expectations to describe the NCO 2020 Strategy while pointing out possible obstacles or barriers that can be foreseen and how to overcome them.

My understanding of the NCO is that we have to get back to basics where an officer has to make time to perform a duty like housekeeping, taking care of garrison duties, maintenance on both organisation and personal equipment, a focus on personal mental health among many other basics that an adult has to possess to be productive. Every part of this is equally important, for instance, training that focuses on physical training and abandons counselling relatively makes the physical training pointless. In other words, this is an all-round strategy aiming to improve the officers both as individuals and as an institution.

There are numerous benefits that I have observed with the strategy in action and are as follows. First is the improved discipline which reflects on the low levels of drug and alcohol abuse, better handling of equipment and even more tolerance within peers. Good discipline for anyone in the army is fundamental owing to the nature of the job where five seconds could define the line between being dead and being alive. Secondly is the enforcement of simple standards that appeal to our innate humanity such as kindness, politeness and professionalism with seniors, peers and subordinates. And lastly, it the ability of the strategy to enhance communication among different factions of the military where senior officers get to mentor young officers while working with different department officers to ensure a wide range of experiences and perspectives.

The strategy cannot be without challenges with the main our being the undermining by most of the officers who think of the strategy as too basic to be taught. Similarly, lack of acceptance by others because of the feeling that to succeed in the army is a subject of physical prowess and not discipline, pride or hygiene and other components mention in the strategy. This presents a problem because any strategy has to receive support from those it is intended for or face complete failure. Perhaps the initial target of these skills is to develop the need for them to all NCO officers, make them understand that while they may be basic, they are not often guaranteed to all officers.

In conclusion, the NCO 2020 strategy is crucial not only to the current generation of officers but also to the future generation and how they perceive themselves and the institution in general. The strategy is crucial and commitment by every officer is fundamental to the success and productivity of every non-commissioned officer.

References

Bailey, L. W., & Bankus, M. T. (2014). NCO 2020. MILITARY REVIEW.