Heard a rumor and wanted to see if anyone else heard this and can confirm if there is any truth to this.
The rumor is it is being considered to have OS1's located at stations as the OPS PO.

I have not heard that.

I don't think its a good idea. It would probably be alot of fun for the OS1, but that is a big loss of experience for a Station and I don't think the benefits of having an OS1 would outweigh the loss of a BM1 in their eyes. Besides, we are already a critical rating and that would be alot of billets to add.

not a snowball's chance in........

Well I was hoping Master Chief would comment on this, because I figured if anyone has heard anything about this being legit it would be out Rating Force Master Chief.

Oh and I do think it would be a great thing for the OS1 but like you said it would be a lose for the Sta. Just imagine having all those extra billetts to choose from.... that would be nice.

quote:

I do think it would be a great thing for the OS1

...actually, it wouldn't be at all, and that would be the reason I would not concur with it. Four years of not being able to practice your craft would be destructive to a persons professionalsim and career.

Last time I checked, there are many "four year" billets that are out of rate for OS's. Why not add another one?

The fact that there are so few u/w billets for OS's is a practice that would be destructive to a persons professionalsim and career. Sea time for a rate with so few u/w billets.....

quote:

Originally posted by Mightyz90_93:

quote:

I do think it would be a great thing for the OS1

...actually, it wouldn't be at all, and that would be the reason I would not concur with it. Four years of not being able to practice your craft would be destructive to a persons professionalsim and career.

Recruiting? I know someone who was a recruiter for OOA 10 years then went straight into a "TCIC" Master Chief billet. You could tell he was a recruiter for 10 (or was it 12?) years prior to. I don't think it does well for ANY rate for them to be "out of rate" for more then 12 months max. (my opinion)

quote:

Originally posted by Jinx76:
Last time I checked, there are many "four year" billets that are out of rate for OS's. Why not add another one?

The fact that there are so few u/w billets for OS's is a practice that would be destructive to a persons professionalsim and career. Sea time for a rate with so few u/w billets.....

You need to look at the numbers of sea billets better.

Back to the other part. For the MOST PART, out of rate billets, or Special Assignments, are jobs that must be competed for, where the member is making a consious (hopefully) decision and understands the impact. An in rating billet (ie, a billet labeled as an OS1) that is that far out of character for the profession is a different story.

I always wished and prayed upon a star that the black hulls (INCONUS) would have OS's on board. I'd of sold my soul for one of them.

A lot of folks have thought that. But, having served about two of them, one as a non-rate and one as a plankowner E-6, I can tell you there is ZERO need for an OS on a blackhull.

I, myself, was station on a 180' and believe there's not much need for one. But....maybe....there is on the 175/225's. I mean hell - they do have EKMS "stuff" onboard. Not that it would ever happen, but like I said, if it did - I'd of given my left....toe.

BMs handle EKMS User level stuff at a rate more than 5 times what we do. The Aton BMs can handle that. Never needed a RM/TC for that, now did they?

I have mentioned this before, but you may be right on this one. Close enough anyways that I may suggest a trial run! Of course, not wanting any of you to do something I wouldn;t be willing to do, I would have to volunteer to do it first. YUP - I like it, an OSCM billet on a 225!

I was EKMS Manager and I know that the BM's aboard (175/225/140) would LOVE to do nothing less then get rid of all EKMS responsibility.

I wonder what they would do with those extra 3 hours a month they would gain by getting ride of the EKMS load on those boats?

Training! Um... Training! Training?

Since we are on this subject.. I don't know if its official that the OS rate in fact has a retention issue or not, I soppose the RFMC would know the up to date answer on that, But I believe we can firmly agree that we do at the moment tend to not have as many folks join the Operations Specialist rate as we would like....

Anyway with that said, since we are on this subject of where an OS is needed or can be used efficiently and not just filling a position some other rate can easily do, my question is this, if we do have this retention issue, and this rate recruiting issue, why not just cut back and trim some of these billets that aren't as necessary to be filled by an OS, wouldn't that ease up the pressure on the OS rate and OS's as a whole... (With that said, don't kill me.. im just posing a question as I know people would hate if that would occur as it would cause for less advancement opportunities..)


Also just to play devils advocate, (And yes I know it contradicts what I was suggesting in the paragraph above as it would open loads more of OS' billets) But some of my shipmates were talking about how it would be completely out of rate etc.. yet we have loads of OS's filling VTS positions, that in my opinion have way less to do with the OS rate than would filling an Ops PO billet at a station

Just to piggy back off of what 17831631 stated, I am trying understand the reasoning behind placing an OS wherever shift work is needed. For example, I recently learned that OS's replaced ET billets because it was shift work, not because it was "rate related". What do OS's know about repairing tech equipment? Now we have more billets to fill....seems we are going backwards with our rate, not forwards.

If we are to place OS's in jobs that only require bodies for shift work (not rate related), it will discourage any positive growth.

31/76

Roger on both of your concerns and I am fighting that fight.

Now, as far as shift work goes, the other way around is pretty reasonable. I can not think of a true OS billet for a Petty Officer that is not shift work. That does not mean we have all of the shift work, just that all of the legit OS Petty Officer (and most OSC & OSCS work) just happens to be shift work.

quote:

Just to piggy back off of what 17831631 stated, I am trying understand the reasoning behind placing an OS wherever shift work is needed. For example, I recently learned that OS's replaced ET billets because it was shift work, not because it was "rate related". What do OS's know about repairing tech equipment? Now we have more billets to fill....seems we are going backwards with our rate, not forwards.

If we are to place OS's in jobs that only require bodies for shift work (not rate related), it will discourage any positive growth.

Which ET Billets? I have never heard that one, but I have a hard time believing they reprogrammed billets from ET to OS because of the work schedule....of course it wouldn't be the most bizarre thing I've seen lately.

Believe it. Just know that it was done in what I might call an underhanded way, without running it through the normal clearance process and it was approved and final before I even knew about it. There was a little bit more to it than that, but yes there was a major part of it that looked at OS due to the watch standing requirments of equipment maint.