Related<\/span>\n\t\t\t\tWatchdog: SWO ship-driving test scores continue to lag<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t A report this week raises questions about the sea service's ongoing efforts to shore up shoddy seamanship and ship handling skills.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/aside>\n\t\n\n\n
Newly minted SWOs can feel like they have been dropped into the middle of the ship with little to no guidance from higher-ranking SWOs dealing with their own deluge of work, according to the lieutenant, who recalled having \u201ca made-up job\u201d on her first ship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s often easier for more seasoned SWOs to just do jobs themselves than take the time to teach a junior officer how to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe say that SWOs eat their young, and it\u2019s true,\u201d the lieutenant said. \u201cThey\u2019re essentially told to figure it out. It\u2019s a double-edged sword of people in the upper chains having no time to train the ensign and then they get mad because they\u2019re not trained.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some go-getter ensigns \u2014 the type of officer the Navy would want to keep \u2014 end up eyeing the exit because of the lack of meaningful work or purpose, she said, while some who are content to do nothing end up sticking around. The lieutenant recalled the situation of one junior officer on another ship who also had no job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cShe was just walking around asking people if they needed help,\u201d the lieutenant said. \u201cShe had nothing to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Junior officers also suffer from imposter syndrome, according to the midgrade SWO, who recalled his own early days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI felt really dumb,\u201d the SWO said. \u201cI kept getting popped from job to job. You spend so much time trying to cultivate value in yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A lot of junior officers never get to do the job they thought they were going to do, he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt\u2019s called a surface warfare officer,\u201d he said. \u201cA lot of people go through their entire time as a (division officer) and never encounter that \u2018W\u2019 at all. It\u2019s the surface admin officer or the surface PQS officer. When does the rubber meet the road? It never does.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nSailors aboard the guided-missile destroyer Sterett raise the anchor chain in preparation for getting underway in 2017. (Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nThe midgrade SWO attributes a lot of these problems to the diminished fleet size and not having enough ships to accommodate everyone and allow junior officers the chance to really learn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019re in a constant bum rush to deployment \u2026 on a sprint to meet all these requirements the fleet doesn\u2019t have the capacity to reasonably meet,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019ve got a bunch of junior officers in washed-out jobs that don\u2019t really reflect the kind of opportunity we\u2019d want them to have, on ships that are strung out and undermanned.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNone of that is a recipe for success.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Still, the SWO said he is hearing good things about reforms to basic and advanced division officer courses, as well as increased simulator training the Navy stood up following the 2017 collisions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf the fleet and fleet manning were different, I think that the training that\u2019s in place, all the simulators, I think we could do a really good job,\u201d he said. \u201cWe just don\u2019t have the time and we don\u2019t have the ships. \u2026 It\u2019s just this death spiral of personnel and force structure decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Navy officials told GAO they were aware that \u201cover-commissioning\u201d junior SWOs increases competition aboard ships at sea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those officials argued to GAO that such practices can be beneficial, \u201cas it provides additional personnel to conduct ship-board duties while at sea.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The sea service has expanded the amount of classroom training for junior SWOs, while constructing new simulator-based training facilities and no longer assigning junior SWOs to ships in extended maintenance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Junior SWOs have also had their first at-sea assignment lengthened from 24 months to 30 months, according to GAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHowever, these changes may have exacerbated the issue of hindering training opportunities at sea, since they ultimately reduce the number of ships new officers can serve aboard, further increasing the number of new SWOs aboard ships at sea,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The midgrade SWO said he thought the Navy would be courting disaster if it started commissioning fewer junior SWOs, because the results would be horrendous if the same number quit down the line, leaving massive holes in the force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Adding to the glut is the fact that more than 20 percent of newly commissioned SWOs are on a career path that will see them leave the SWO world and transfer into other Navy jobs that don\u2019t accept newly commissioned junior officers, such as intelligence and cryptologic warfare.<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe recent GAO findings are not news for the Navy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After the 2017 fatal ship collisions, the Navy\u2019s Strategic Readiness Review noted that over-commissioning junior SWOs \u201cdirectly contributed to declining SWO readiness,\u201d according to GAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A parallel Comprehensive Review \u201cnoted that the U.S. Navy\u2019s practice of over-commissioning SWOs makes it challenging to build proficiency and experience in ship-driving.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Navy could better capture the effects of these practices if it pulled data from the Surface Warfare Mariner Skills Logbook, which since 2018 has required SWOs to document their ship-driving and related experience in a handwritten logbook.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But GAO found that to date, the Navy hasn\u2019t analyzed logbook data for insightful trends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
SWOs and family don\u2019t mix<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n
While sexism remains a recurring concern in a male-dominated military, the female lieutenant said she doesn\u2019t think that explains why female SWOs leave the Navy at such a clip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey want to leave because they want to have a family,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd SWO life doesn\u2019t offer a good family environment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If a female SWO is on sea duty aboard a ship and becomes pregnant, she is removed from the ship but still listed as part of the ship\u2019s crew, and it takes time to refill the billet, according to the lieutenant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This leads to resentment among the other SWOs on the ship because they must pick up the slack, she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI know of women who have purposely gotten pregnant and women who have accidentally gotten pregnant, and they were both treated like trash,\u201d she said. \u201cMost women want to get out so they don\u2019t have to plan their family life around when the Navy allows them to have a baby.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While female SWOs aren\u2019t sticking around, the number of SWO women is more than three times higher than female representation in other Navy officer communities, the GAO found.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But while Naval Surface Forces gathers information on SWO separation rates by gender, \u201cit has not used this to develop a plan to improve either overall SWO retention or female SWO retention,\u201d according to the GAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cNavy officials told us that they have not identified specific actions to increase female SWO retention rates, and they do not plan to identify specific actions that may increase female SWO retention rates because they do not consider gender as a factor when developing plans to increase retention,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n\n\n\nShips from Destroyer Squadron 26 maneuver into formation during an exercise in 2014. (Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nGeneralist vs. specialist<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n
An age-old debate in the SWO community revolves around whether officers should be generalized, jack-of-all-traders or authoritative specialists on a given ship system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Big Navy has long snubbed the idea of SWO specialization, but by a margin of four to one, SWOs surveyed by GAO said they would prefer specialized career paths.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Junior officers reported a higher likelihood of staying in if they could specialize as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe generalist SWO career path may have worked well 50 years ago, but waterways are becoming increasingly congested \u2026 combat systems and tactics are becoming more technical and pressurized with our now-peer superpowers like China, and we generally have too few resources (people and ships) to meet the Combatant Command operational demands,\u201d one SWO told the GAO. \u201cWe should have specialized SWOs in ship navigation, tactics and combat systems employment, and in engineering.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Part of the rationale for a generalist path is that a ship\u2019s commanding officer needs to be knowledgeable on all parts of their ship, but according to the GAO, just 22 percent of surveyed SWOs wish to become commanding officers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Junior SWOs indicated to the GAO that they were more likely to stay in if they could be on a path \u201cthat does not provide the opportunity to command a ship.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Count the female lieutenant among those in support of SWO specialization.<\/p>\n\n\n\nEnsign Soon Hyung Kwon, right, receives his surface warfare officer pin from Chief Cryptologic Technician (Technical) Eugene Parker on April 29, 2021, aboard the warship Cole as U.S. Fleet Forces Command head Adm. Christopher Grady looks on. (Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Theodore Green\/Navy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u201cIt should be a topsider and an engineer,\u201d she said. \u201cA topsider who has spent [his or her] whole career fighting the ship should command a ship.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019ve personally had COs who did their whole careers as engineers, and then they know nothing about communications or satellites or guns because they\u2019ve only done engineering,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Navy has failed to assess these alternatives, according to the GAO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWithout evaluating other career and proficiency models for potential benefit, the U.S. Navy may miss opportunities to develop and retain competent and proficient SWOs,\u201d the report states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rear Adm. Trinque defended the generalist path in an interview with Navy Times and pointed out that junior SWOs who currently don\u2019t want to command a ship may feel differently further along in their careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI recognize the surveys and the work the GAO has done, and I think it would be interesting to track some JOs and whether their attitudes change over time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
To Martin, the retired SWO now at Rand, a major problem in SWO retention and career progression remains \u201cthe lack of clarity about what the Navy would like its officers to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSurface warfare officers by and large do not spend most of their careers doing surface warfare,\u201d he said. \u201cThey\u2019ll be performing subspecialty billets or serving on headquarters staffs or learning strategic concepts, which are all good things, but do take time and may sometimes have a whole lot more to do with promotion potential than service on ships.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trinque defended those off-the-water aspects of a SWO career for the breadth of experience it offers an officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe ability of a SWO to do that in a flexible way is far, far greater than that of a naval aviator and submariner,\u201d he said. \u201cNothing against those communities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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