Navy to Use ITEMPO to Track IAs

By Senior Chief Mass Communication Specialist (SW/AW) Bill Houlihan, Navy Personnel Command Communications
(Last Reviewed Friday, January 26, 2007)


Task Force IA and Navy officials are ensuring Sailors assigned to Individual Augmentation (IA) billets are being accurately tracked and rewarded for their service.

Effective immediately, all Sailors ordered away from parent commands will receive accurate recognition in blocks 29, 41 and 43 of their evaluation or fitness report.

Block 29 specifies a Sailor’s primary and collateral duties, while blocks 41 and 43 are areas for promotion recommendation and comments on performance, respectively.

Chief of Naval Personnel Vice Adm. John C. Harvey Jr., in a message released in October, said Task Force IA was specifically chartered to quickly and thoughtfully design and implement a system to award credit for IA tours.

“The effort, talent and dedication expended in this war,” said Harvey, “cannot be measured in man-days or some other form of arbitrary accounting system.”

Harvey stipulated that unit commanders will immediately begin documenting their IA Sailors through the ITEMPO reporting system, which is a vehicle to enter and archive each Sailor’s deployed events. The Sailor’s parent command will input the IA start date, projected end date and Unit Identification Code (UIC) for the IA assignment. Use of ITEMPO will ensure Sailors individually deployed in support of the global war on terrorism (GWOT) are compensated in terms of time at sea when they return to their home units, stations or ships.

Capt. Mike Saylor, Navy Personnel Command’s (NPC)Augmentation Division (PERS-46) director, said one of the challenges his team has faced is dealing with the fact that not all IA orders have been written in his shop. That had resulted in some IA Sailors flying under the PERS-46 radar, said Saylor. With ITEMPO now employed, every Sailor assigned to CENTCOM will receive credit for their IA duty.

Advancement points, exam flexibility, and follow-on coast assignment guarantees have all been approved, depending on the length of time spent in various locations. Specific guidelines and information on IA incentives can be found on Navy Knowledge Online in the Individual Augmentee section.

Saylor said that in addition to the incentives now offered to Sailors on IA, new Navy Enlisted Classifications (NEC) and Additional Qualification Designators (AQD) have been added to support GWOT.

More than 25 NECs are now based in major mission areas, such as Improvised Explosive Device (IED) suppression, Detainee Ops, Civil Affairs or Embedded Training Team Member. Additionally, 128 AQDs have been assigned to support GWOT.

Saylor also said there has been significant process improvement in regard to the notification and training of Sailors tabbed for IA duty.

“The IA process has matured over the past year with numerous increases in efficiency,” Saylor said. “The collaboration between OPNAV, Commander, Fleet Forces Command and NPC has been instrumental in achieving our common goal for advanced notification, better defining requirements and making sure personnel have the right training prior to deployment.”

Saylor said the Task Force is now focusing on sourcing IA assets to the global force manager, providing better capacity models to leadership and working to further integrate the newly-established Expeditionary Combat Readiness Center.


This article provided by LIFELines.

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