Junior Officers: leaders in training, leaders in life

As a junior officer (JO) it can be said that this is the most important time to experience and train in the development of becoming a successful leader. The junior officers of today seek knowledge and guidance from their peers to incorporate in their professional careers. The Junior Officer Leadership Development and Training Seminar (JOLDTS) has become the ideal forum where a young officer can be a part of an influential experience in achieving that goal.

Now in its seventh year, Junior Officer Leadership Development and Training Seminar (JOLDTS) once again gave junior officers an experience of a lifetime during the ROA National Convention in Salt Lake City, Utah. With an agenda that included outdoor leadership, group communication and problem-solving exercises, career workshops, and senior leader speakers, JOLDTS has provided new insights for junior officers. The focus of JOLDTS is to bring together officers from the various Reserve Components and get them to work together, according to Col Carl T. "Tom" Obenland, USAF (Ret.), director of JOLDTS.

The first day, junior officers participating in the Challenge Day at Ft. Douglas, Utah. The day included a series of outdoor group exercises designed to sharpen leadership, communication and problem-solving skills. JOs are challenged to work together with people they do not know, who are from different military branches of service. The exercises are unique and often require the ability to think "outside the box."

These exercises often include activities that reflect the JOs' career duties. CPT Straus Scantlin, USAR, who is a safety engineer for Oxy Vinyl Chemical Company in Deere Park, Texas, was impressed with an exercise that involved rolling a golf ball through a half-pipe into a bucket. Participants are given different sized pipes and are required to roll a golf ball about 15 yards into a bucket. After doing a practice run, Captain Scantlin and his team used some unconventional methods with the attitude that "not every solution is a standard solution."

Captain Scantlin saw major similarities in the exercise and his line of work. "The engineering aspect reminds me of looking at things from the left and the right," he says. "I deal with toxic explosive chemicals. Trying to keep it in the pipes and protecting the environment is our main goal, so you have to think inside and outside the box and figure out a way to perform safely, efficiently, and with the least man power available."

"The best thing I got from it [Challenge Day] was working with different personalities," said Maj Steven G. Tree, USAFR, regional intelligence Reserve advisor, who is a project manager. "I have about 150 IMAs with about 150 personalities that I have to work with. I have Reserve leadership, I've got Active Duty leadership that I am trying to advise and provide guidance to, as far as Reserve programs, and handling different situations. This [event] gave me the opportunity to work with different personalities in different situations."

Leadership and teambuilding skills were put to the test as participants worked together with the one purpose of successfully completing an exercise each as a team.

Second Lt Robert E. Sinclair, USAFR of New York is an accountant/financial planner. He enjoyed the exercise where he was blindfolded and could not talk, and had to be guided through a maze.

"It involved communication skills without talking and we really had to rely on our leader to do it," he says.

JOLDTS KEYNOTE SESSION

There is a friendly heated debate going on with keynote speaker LTC John S. Reed, USAR, 96th RRC, and a small group of lieutenants who have stayed after Colonel Reed's talk on the philosophy of Karl Clausewitz. Reed's presentation, "Is Clausewitz Relevant to the Global War on Terror?", has sparked a post discussion among these JOs on the cause and effect of certain events taking place during the Iraqi War.

Karl Clausewitz was a Prussian Army officer who fought against Napolean during the Coalition Wars among Austria, Prussia, Russia, Britain, and France that became known as the Napoleonic Wars. Clausewitz was a military intellectual who spent many years writing down [a series of] ideas about the nature of war that were not designed to teach people how to fight, but how to understand war as, what he called, a "total phenomenon."

"What I was trying to tell the JOs, is that when they exit company grade officer status, become field grade officers and go to military education courses in the future, the more they understand Clausewitz, the more successful their military education experiences will be," says Colonel Reed.

Lt Regan Ramos, USAFR, Stimulated by Reed's discussion, asks about the "center of gravity" against global terrorism, referring to one of Clausewitz's philosophies that Reed discussed.

Reed believes that the better junior officers understand the philosophies of Clausewitz, the more they will understand "war," as American citizens in uniform.

LEADERSHIP IN CHANGING TIMES

"A leader is a person you would follow because you would not go by yourself..."--Joe Barker

"What is leadership?" MG Craig Bambrough, USAR (Ret.), former DCG USARC, asks the large group of junior officers. General Bambrough sternly proposes this question again and junior officers begin to respond with their personal opinions on "leadership."

"... Take care of your soldiers and they will take care of you," General Bambrough expresses his opinion to the approval of all the JOs in attendance.

To kick off his discussion on "Leadership in Changing Times," General Bambrough first provides a breakdown of what it takes to be a leader. He tells the junior officers that it takes such attributes as "vision and hope," and defines each level with examples from past to present.

Bambrough often reads excerpts from books on famous leaders and brings a storyteller style to the discussion as he literally acts out a scene from a passage, so that the junior officers feel as if they are actually at the historic event.

General Bambrough has them in training, painting a picture through his experiences of what and how they should be as a leader.

PROMOTION PROCESS

Brig Gen Paul Cooper, USAF (Ret.), enjoys the opportunity of being one-on-one with his attendees. On this day, General Cooper wants these Air Force junior officers to gain insight into the promotion process and what steps they should take to be more competitive.

What makes this unique is that General Cooper is revealing to JOs his experience as a panel leader on a promotion board and telling them what the mindset is on the panel in determining promotion approval.

"It's a matter of what you're doing now, not what the job calls for" on meeting criteria for promotion, he explains. "I will look at what you have done from your last promotion."

General Cooper even passes out sample "Officer Performance Reports" and lets attendees know the importance of enhancing their position description, showing all levels of responsibilities.

IRAQI DIARY

Junior officers assembled to listen to LTC Kevin Riedler, USAR, Infrastructure Security Planning Group, Coalition Provisional Authority-Baghdad, recount his experiences in his "Iraqi Diary" presentation.

Colonel Riedler vividly recalls his tour of duty in Iraq. He speaks of the highs and lows of his tenure but always with a military optimism that he was proud to serve.

It becomes an insightful presentation, as he refers to personal snapshots of his travels in Iraq, projected on a big screen. He speaks of the atrocities that Saddam Hussein inflicted on prisoners in his prison system and stressed the importance of "family" to the Iraqi people.

Junior officers leave with a military education that he concludes about how the importance of wearing the uniform and your actions represents what the world sees you and your country as.

Col Carl T. "Tom" Obenland, USAF (Ret.), ROA's director of JOLDTS, says that the Salt Lake City JOLDTS was the "best of the best," and adds, "A special thanks goes to the services for their continued support of the JOLDTS program." Colonel Obenland also acknowledges the help and support of the Army Reserve's 96th Regional Readiness Command, Ft. Douglas, Utah, for the JOLDTS Challenge Day exercises and the Air Force Reserve's 419th Fighter Wing for arranging the visit to Hill AFB, Utah. He further adds that plans are already under way for the 2005 JOLDTS to be held in New York City, July 26-30, 2005. The next joint officer seminar programs will be held in conjunction with ROA's Mid-Winter Conference in Washington, D.C., February 13-16, 2005.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Reserve Officers Association of the United States
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group