The Importance Of Counseling In The Army

After entering his office, we spoke for over an hour about leadership, professionalism, and standards of conduct. In the Army, formal counseling is supposed to happen at set intervals; but, this rarely occurs once you become a Non-Commissioned Officer, or Sergeant. This was the first bit of one on one professional development that I had received in years. It was an important event. Additionally, it set the tone for the unit I was entering and let me know my limits. Furthermore, the counseling gave me a set of standards to live up to. The counseling was given by a man with eighteen years of experience serving his country, First Sergeant Bradford Bygness, a true professional. Six months after I arrived to the unit, First Sergeant selected me for “team elite,” this was his term for his Headquarters Platoon. The …show more content…
This is what First Sergeant and I had worked so hard on planning and preparing for. This was our culminating event. First Sergeant was beside me every step of the way, sharing his knowledge and developing me further. We set up every range together and ensured that the targets worked correctly. We managed the evaluators that I had previously trained, and ensured they were conducting their duties to standard. We pushed truck crews through the gunnery lanes, and worked with them to improve their performance during the after action reviews. He often told me that I pushed the crews too hard when they needed time, and gave them too much time when they needed a push. There is a balance that I was just beginning to learn. It was exciting, seeing all of your effort and hard work transform from a plan on paper to something that worked on the ground. The whole time I was transforming from the soldier with some knowledge to the subject matter expert that everyone came to when they had questions. We completed the training event with minimal complications, most of them I was ready to solve on my