Are you a good staff member?
Suggested Reading
FM 6-0, Commander and Staff Organization and Operations
Pages 2-1 through 2-34 based on printed document (PDF pages 21-54)
Overview of staff organization and roles within a headquarters, including expectations and responsibilities by position
This week’s Study: CCIRs
All excerpts below are from FM 6-0
Guided Discovery
I did not join the US Army with a plan to make it a career. And I didn’t.
When I separated from active duty it was not because I had a robust plan for my civilian career, rather I had a strong belief that I would not enjoy the next few years of a military career.
As a young Captain, I had already had a company-level command (typically you do not get a second command) and the next role I had any real interest in - Foreign Area Officer - was only available to Majors (a promotion that was many years away). It was almost certain that the next three to four years would be spent doing staff roles. To me, this was none of the leadership opportunity I was seeking and all of the administrative nonsense I dreaded. Anything in the civilian world would be better.
A jaded perspective, to be sure. I was impatient.
But it was not a unique perspective. Most people do not actively seek out administrative work and for those inclined towards a career of increasing leadership responsibility, being on staff looks like an off ramp or detour.
Is it?
2-2. Staff activities focus on assisting the commander in accomplishing the mission. Staffs support commanders in understanding, visualizing, and describing an operational environment (OE); making and articulating timely decisions; and directing, leading, and assessing military operations. They make recommendations and prepare plans and orders for their commander.
Staff time is an opportunity to develop knowledge about how a larger organization is or is not successful in advance of becoming responsible for leading that larger organization.
Instead of an off ramp or detour, staff time is rotational development to give exposure to complexity before assigning responsibility for complexity.
2-4. Staffs support and advise their commander within their area of expertise. While commanders make key decisions, they are not the only decision makers. Trained and trusted staff members, given decision-making authority based on the commander’s intent, free commanders from routine decisions. This enables commanders to focus on key aspects of operations.
Good leaders empower their staff to act as an extension of the commander. The ability to build and strengthen a staff is a core leadership skill. And this skill is best developed by leaders spending time being on staff. Live the experience to learn the experience.
The ability to discern what information is relevant and critical to decision-making is fundamental to a leader’s success in navigating overwhelming complexity. Being on staff is the learning opportunity to be a relevance filter for a more senior leader and get practice making recommendations.
2-6. Staffs keep units outside their own headquarters well informed. … As soon as a staff receives information and determines its relevancy, that staff passes that information to the appropriate headquarters. The key is relevance, not volume. Large amounts of data may distract staffs from relevant information.
A leader of a large staff must have a complete understanding of what constitutes a good staff and what it means to be a good staff member. That understanding is gained, in part, by taking advantage of opportunities to be a good staff member.
Are you a good staff member?
Have you sought staff roles or actively avoided them? When are staff roles attractive?
What in charge, how do you feel when a staff's expertise exceeds your own in critical areas?
The worst case scenario for staff roles is administrative tasks and boredom.
The best case scenario? A lot of work.
2-8. Staff members have specific duties and responsibilities associated with their area of expertise. They must be ready to advise the commander and other senior leaders regarding issues pertaining to their areas of expertise without advance notice. However, regardless of their career field or duty billet, all staff sections share a common set of duties and responsibilities:
Managing information within their area of expertise.
Building and maintaining running estimates.
Conducting staff research and analyzing problems.
Performing intelligence preparation of the battlefield.
Developing information requirements.
Advising and informing the commander.
Providing recommendations.
Preparing plans, orders, and other staff writing.
Exercising staff supervision.
Performing risk management.
Assessing operations.
Conducting staff inspections and assistance visits.
Performing staff administrative procedures.
There is a lot of work and opportunity to learn for a leader on staff if the full set of duties and responsibilities are embraced.
Much of this week’s suggested reading in FM 6-0 is spent in defining staff roles, but analysis with a non-military lens provides tremendous lessons between the acronyms and technical nomenclature:
Characteristics of Effective Staff Members
Basic Staff Structure and Requirements
How to Build Your Personal Staff
How have you prepared for staff roles?
What do you expect from those on your staff?
Is there such a thing as too much staff coordination?
How should a leader distinguish between staff members who anticipate your needs versus those who create dependencies?
Characteristics of Effective Staff Members
To be a staff member is to be part of a team.
2-30. The commander’s staff must function as a single, cohesive unit—a team. Effective staff members know their respective responsibilities and duties. They are also familiar with the responsibilities and duties of other staff members.
One of the training techniques used with junior officers is to train them on all the activities performed the servicemembers in their command. If you are an artillery officer, you learn all the positions on the gun line, in the fire direction center, and in observation. Not because the officer will need to perform the activities themselves, but because the learning generates an appreciation for the integrated and dependent responsibilities of the entire team.
Staff members, with more seniority, do not need to be trained on every activity in the headquarters, but they are expected to be familiar with all parallel functions. In addition to having familiarity the complete responsibilities and duties of the staff, staff members are expected to exhibit the follow personal characteristics:
Are competent.
Bring clarity.
Exercise initiative.
Apply critical and creative thinking.
Are adaptive.
Are flexible.
Possess discipline and self-confidence.
Are team players.
An unsurprising list.
But consider it another way:
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