NORFOLK, Va. — Halfway through fiscal year 20156, the Navy’s enlisted workforce is in the best shape it’s been since the last drawdown began in fiscal 2003, officials say.
It’s a good time to be a sailor, with bright promotion opportunities and a growing workforce, the personnel brass say. say two of the Navy’s top personnel policy makers and it’s going to stay that way and even get better for the foreseeable future.
“We’re in a steady state now with our end strength predictions for the future,” said Vice Adm. Bill Moran, the chief of naval personnel. “The Navy’s going to go up in total numbers over the next five years.”
Navy Times caught up with Moran on the phone during his April 2 visit to Naval Air Station Pensacola, Fla.
AndWhen the Navy has a stable manpower picture, advancement and re-enlistment stabilize. stabilize at levels sailors can count on. When the Navy grows it’s people numbers, those same chances rise a bit, too.
Fleet manning numbers are up and officials plan are about to cut the ribbon later this year on a new detailing system that will boost numbers and better match sailors to the skills they’ll needed in their next job. won’t just improve numbers, but also improve the fit of sailor’s skills to their next job.
Along the way, Moran wants sailors to get less initial training up front and more advanced training throughout their fleet tours and s well as their careers.
And he’s not the only one saying things in the fleet are slowly getting better.
In the world of Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (AW/NAC) Mike Stevens says he’s seen a shift lately in sailors’ attitudes in the fleet — from the questions they ask and, in some cases what they’re not asking during his fleet visits to the fleet.
“It’s not always what you hear, but what you don’t hear,” Stevens told Navy Times in an April 1 interview here. “What I didn’t hear on this trip was a lot of complaints — there were very few but I didn’t hear much of any discussion about manning or about pay and benefits.
“It leads me to believe that, by and large, sailors are happy and content with their quality of life and quality of service,” he said. “But you can’t take that for granted.” and stop — you ave to keep working.”
But far from resting on their laurels, Moran and MCPON Stevens are still pounding the non-skid in the fleet and pressing the flesh with sailors as often as possible — to keep tabs on the pulse at the deckplate level.
“I told [Moran] that I think that by and large, things are good in the Navy and it’s a good time to serve,” Stevens said. “But if we can ever say it’s great and there’s nothing to be improved on — we’ll need to take a long hard look at ourselves.”
Manning numbers up
What Moran called a “steady state” of manpower became Moran mentioned came clearer with the release of the Navy’s 2016 budget request, which laid out the plan to grow the force over the rest of the decade. The Navy will grow slightly over the rest of the decade.
After 10-years of drawing down to just 316,000 sailors, the service sits nearly 10,000 larger at 325,563 as of mid-April, and its expected to grow to nearly 330,000 by fiscal year 2020.
And after an Over three years focus, fleet manning has been boosted by a combination of carrots (sea duty incentives and higher pays) and sticks (ending shore duty earlier for those with critical skills). The number of open fleet jobs has dropped from 17,000 three years ago to 2,500 today. e’s been able to partner with fleet manning authorities to cut manning shortages at sea to just 2,500 today down from 17,000 in fiscal year 12 and 10,500 when Moran took over as CNP in August of 2013.
Moran credits his predecessor, now retired Vice Adm. Scott Van Buskirk, with getting the ball rolling by identifying the gaps and laying out the strategy to fill them, a plan in the works for years. hammering out with the fleets how they’d quantify gapped billets and the strategy to fill them.
At the end of 2014, the fleet overall had 98.2 percent of its total billets filled with a sailor — and 921.7 percent of those billets had a sailor whose fitted to the billet with the exact Navy Enlisted Classification and paygrade matched those required by their job.But as of the end of calendar year 2014,
And this fall, Moran is he’s set to unveil a new detailing system this fall that that aims to better fit sailors and their existing skills and abilities to open jobs in the fleet.
Billet-based detailing, as it’s called, is how business has been done in the officer ranks for years. Now, working with fleet manning officials, type commanders and individual commands, they’ve defined every billet in the fleet to a greater extent on a level greater than before.
“Once we get this going later this year, it will improve command readiness by sending them the best sailor for the job,” Moran said April 2, while he was visiting Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida. “It will also improve the quality of life and work for the sailor, as they’ll be a better fit for the billet they’re heading for.”
Recruiting and retention
The Navy always has an annual turnover of with about 35,000 sailors who are retiring or getting out each year and it recruitsing the same number amount on the other end to fill their shoes.
But as the service looks to grow over the next five years, Moran doesn’t plan to recruit more new sailors; he , but wants to retain more top sailors to fill the new billets on the way.
“I want to do that by retaining more high-quality people,” Moran said, “ratcheting up our retention numbers where we need to, in the right areas, while not having to bring in more raw material on the front end and have to train them from scratch.”
Manpower officials will He’ll do that, he says, by keeping closer tabs on re-up bonuses, which in recent years have only had semi-annual adjustments for to skills on the list and payout levels.
That’s already changing.
“We’re trying to do it every six months now because we’re a little bit more aware of the trends in the critical skills we need,” he said. “It’s a bit more work for my staff, but it’s more effective in ensuring we keep the right people in the right numbers before it starts to decline to a point it’s difficult to recover from.”
But After years in which a slow economy drove of a slow economy bringing more high-quality recruits to the Navy’s door, Moran says officials are now seeing a slight downward trend in numbers and quality of recruits.
“We’re meeting goals later in the month, each month,” he said. “It’s kind of a trend, and some months are better than others, but overall it’s getting harder to for our recruiting force to meet our goals with the quality we’ve put forward.”
Advancement
Every sailor, Moran said, wants to be able to count on a certain level of advancement opportunities throughout his or her career. And like retention levels, Moran says good advancement opportunities across the board is a byproduct of a steady state or increasing manpower levels.
“Well, certainly this year, more of the same,” he said. “Good opportunity, above the 10-year average, is a pretty good metric for us right now.”
And in fleet visits, he told sailors they can count on favorable a good level of advancement levels for the next few cycles.
“I’m not a fan of large swings in advancement, either in the aggregate or in individual ratings,” Moran said. “As long as there’s a good flow, I’d rather err on the conservative side and save more advancement for the next cycle.”
Much of the angst at the Moran’s level was calmed last year when The Navy reworked the Command Advancement Program last year, limiting these spot advancements by commanding officers to a three-month season each year.
This summer will be the first test of these new CAP seasons, new program, but Moran says that knowing who the CO‘s pick up front will make it easier for manpower planners to sort out quotas for those seeking to advance on each test cycle.
