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MCPON: Commands are failing sailors

The Navy’s top enlisted sailor is concerned that not everyone in the fleet is taking the Perform to Serve re-enlistment program seriously — and it’s hurting sailors.

“PTS is critical and fair when it gets executed as designed,” said Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (SS/SW) Rick West. “The problem I continue to see is that many commands don’t submit a PTS request at the 12-month point, per existing guidance. When this occurs, we put our sailors at a disadvantage for selection and approval. Bottom line: This is unsat, that’s a leadership failure, plain and simple.”

Since the program began in 2003, 151,364 sailors have been approved to re-enlist in their existing ratings, 85 percent of the applicants, while 10,072, about 5 percent, were offered the chance to stay with the condition they change ratings. Just 6,351 sailors, less than 4 percent, have been denied the chance to re-enlist and were sent home. The rest of the 177,836 sailors are still under consideration in the system.

In 2008, 24,943 of the 29,680 applicants were allowed to stay in rating, while 1,439 were offered a chance to convert and ship over in a new rating. Another 825 sailors were sent home. The rest of the sailors stayed in the system.

But that is changing. With retention at a 10-year high, the Navy’s personnel officials are “stabilizing” the force and are increasingly getting picky on who gets to stay.

Already, the numbers of “in-rate” approvals is steadily declining down from 3,147 in October to 1,603 in December. In the future, many sailors will have to convert ratings to stay on active duty, and an increasing number will not get any approval at all.

In addition, since October, the number of sailors being sent home has increased drastically as high retention clogs ratings, forcing the Navy to approve fewer sailors to ship over.

Just 53 sailors got the word in October that they would not be able to ship over.

That number jumped to 193 by December and to 342 in January — and officials say the increases aren’t over yet.

But what upset West is that of those sent home since October, 66 percent did not get their full six “looks” — their commands had failed to get them into the system on time — and the average sailor getting a discharge only got four chances out of six.

West says deck-plate leaders need to be counseling their sailors on how the system works. They also have a responsibility to counsel their sailors on the realities of their own rating — whether there’s a good chance to get approved in the rating, or if they should seek to convert to another rating if they really want to stay on active duty.

“PTS is a CPO mess responsibility,” West said. “It’s up to the chiefs to know how the PTS process works and push to ensure we engage in the process early and often. More importantly, it’s up to the Navy counselors to make sure our sailors understand it.”