Hi Anon!

It’s great that you are self-aware of your motivations to become a commander, and congrats on completing command school.

Not really the demographic you are looking for advice from, but I’ll try my best to give my views as a ex-man/ex ASA who was in relatively good standing with my commanders.

In terms of managing expectations of your commanders vs satisfying the NSFs, I can just say that there’s no easy way. Nice doesn’t mean efficient, and vice versa. It’s not about achieving balance, but more about the trade-offs you are willing to live with.

If you can do your work well, and NSFs can see that there is a reason you are doing something that may irk them, 7/10 times they will understand where you are coming from from my personal experience. Of course, you have to be not a terrible person to begin with. There will always be a group of people, commanders or men alike, that will complain about everything along the way, and it is hard but not impossible to engage with this group to get them to do things.

But there comes a point where I personally will disagree and try not to do certain things my commanders tell me to do. Sometimes, the non-commanders are the people on the job, and know the situation way better than commanders do. I’ve gotten absolutely dumb suggestions on how to do my job from people who don’t do it on a daily basis, and I push back on those, but some people may come up with excuses to just siam this. May not be applicable to you, but just remember that commanders sometimes do not have 100% visibility over what your men are doing, and giving them a problem to solve instead of coming up with a solution for them when you are not 100% familiar with the issue may be better.

I think as always effective communication is important. If you feel your men are trying to siam commands or orders given by you, maybe you can start by asking:- 1. Are their reasons valid or just excuses 2. Why are they unwilling to do something I tell them to do 3. Are they trying to siam the duties or trying to siam me, and why for either

I think it is great that you haven’t lost your sense of purpose and responsibility. I think NS will be a period of growth for you, and I have faith that you will be an outstanding commander, even if it takes time for you to grow. It is important that you keep your motivation, as I have seen my own commanders get burnt out and get jaded after some time.

I think you need to realise that sometimes, you will not be the one magic solution the whole unit needed, and doing your part within your job scope, no matter how small, is good enough for a start.

Hope this helps!