Regarding AR/NG, what does everyone think about the never-ending duty creep?

2016-01-30T17:01:51-05:00

I enlisted into the Reserves, and I can quantifiably report that the duties expected of service members between battle assemblies has ballooned considerably. The expectations of Reservists is becoming indistinguishable from the Active Component, except little of it is paid and the ability to train soldiers hundreds of miles of apart is nigh impossible. My unit even expects monthly counselings.

Response by LTC Stephen F. made Jan 30 at 2016 5:07 PM

2016-01-30T17:07:11-05:00

I hope one day that the national military strategy will consider AR/NG to AC force structure ratios and OPTEMPO SSG Private RallyPoint Member.
the force balance needs to be redressed within law and perhaps the law which dictates force ratios between Combat, CS and CSS and NG/AR percentages should be relooked at.

Response by CSM Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 30 at 2016 7:13 PM

2016-01-30T19:13:55-05:00

It is the nature of the beast. Regardless of compo. The higher up you go the longer your going to spend at work. There is a lot of work to be done in a little time. Reality is Active Duty isn't all that it's cracked up to be. My life literally revolved around my job. I had a government cell, blackberry and my laptop went on vacation with me. There has to be a balance and a happy medium.

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 30 at 2016 11:11 PM

2016-01-30T23:11:01-05:00

I asked my Platoon a question a long time ago. "how hard is it to take a hr or so out of your week to check emails or conduct a little bit of training?" I didn't get too many reasons why they couldn't. I did hear a lot of excuses etc, but then I asked the ones that were complaining how much time they spend of FB, surfing the net etc.
Kind of made a point there, I did.

Response by SMSgt Thor Merich made Jan 31 at 2016 1:10 AM

2016-01-31T01:10:34-05:00

Welcome to the club. Expectations for the Reserves will increase in the future as budgets get smaller. It's not an easy balance of your time between the civilian world and the military world.

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 31 at 2016 3:35 AM

2016-01-31T03:35:05-05:00

Yes, there are a lot of expectations between battle assembly weekends.
Are you requesting compensation for your time? There is money for medical appointments, distance learning, and additional training. If you have maxed out these sources you could always submit a DD form 1380 for points only that will result in pay during your retirement.
As a reserve commander I spend 10-20 hours on unit work (without pay), at the same time if I didn't put in the hours my unit would not be a place my Solders would want to be (I have no full time support at the moment so I'm literally going everything myself).

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 31 at 2016 7:59 AM

2016-01-31T07:59:35-05:00

I think if we as platoon sgts n sql if we are doing councilings and ncoers on our own time we should be able to turn in 1380s for time spent

Response by 1SG Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 31 at 2016 2:27 PM

2016-01-31T14:27:16-05:00

I can speak to this a bit.
The USAR fancies itself as "expeditionary" - ready to go on short notice to fulfill requirements around the world that utilize our skills. Problem is, that requires us to be "more ready" than what we were formerly accustomed to. We have medical requirements and online certifications that must be maintained to a level that allows us to be tasked at short notice.
When the USAR has received tastings in the past, it often struggled to find enough people who were ready, or scrambled to get them ready in a few days or weeks. The solution: everyone stays ready all of the time.
Since there are not enough hours in a drill to even begin to hit all of these requirements, and when leaders try, it is all that they do, the solution was all of these online requirements.
I despise it too, and I think with a bit of thought, more reasonable solutions could be found. But I do think that the senior leaders are aware of the weaknesses of this approach and have at least tried to be creative in finding ways to fund paying Soldiers for at least a portion of this time.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Jan 31 at 2016 9:59 PM

2016-01-31T21:59:01-05:00

All I got to say is when you put on your big boy pants on they come some with deep pockets. I have been in the Guard for about 10 years now. I have dealt with this a lot. It is just something that we should do. It is impractical to think we can handle everything in one drill weekend. Now doing a counselling every drill may be a bit much but we should be able to effectively handle our duties as leaders. We shouldn't spend a whole day doing this but a couple hours a week before drill isn't something unreasonable.

Response by LTC Private RallyPoint Member made Feb 1 at 2016 12:05 AM

2016-02-01T00:05:20-05:00

It will continue. Sadly I am seeing good Guard soldiers fall behind due to their inability to keep up with the Technological aspect. I would challenge Big Army to capitalize on the advancements of tablets and phones and enable soldiers to log-in as simply as they do do Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat.

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Feb 1 at 2016 7:13 PM

2016-02-01T19:13:15-05:00

Ladies and gentleman we are down to 10 Army Divisions. We are in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, with possible future operations in Libya. Our long term and most dangerous enemies are Russia and China. My God we don't have enough soldiers, what the hell! My aid just informed me their are 8 ARNG Divisions. They will be counted on paper and on the battlefield! We cut down on the number of AD soldiers and funds!