Military Politics, Work Place Politics

Some people have a war going on in their heads (memory stress or work stress of one type). We call this competition in the US. Competition can be explored by looking at the winners and the losers. However most will learn more if we look at who military employees compete with and if there is too much or too little competition. The work place contains a broad set of behaviors, some unwanted behaviors, and some unwanted reactions. We could call some of these behaviors competition, harassment, abuse, supervision, and the human resources system or the employment system.

The military is not that different from the business world. In fact early modern management came out of the military and we know it as Theory X management style or the factory management system. Anyway the military system is highly developed as all military systems have become.

Some people have a war going on in their minds because they are harassed by other people or leaders in the system of competition for advancement. Politics are heavily involved, but the focus is on what skills or experience a soldier or employee has. By the way there are both soldiers and civilians in the military system.

Everybody has formal Military Occupational Skills (MOS), although there are different names in different services and for civilians. And your competition in the work place all know where you have been, how you were educated, and what military skills and background you have. You can't escape this process and these judgments.

And the system, wise as it is, has built in an expectation of complaints and grievances. This is to be expected with all the hierarchies being defined. In fact of course you can compete in the world of ideas from people outside of your agency, at different headquarters organizations, people with technical degrees in engineering, quality, or even law. And then there are career political appointees. So it is not just noncommissioned officers, officers, civilians, contractor experts, and organizations with peerless reputations that all compete for dominance. You also compete in your job with your own formal job series/job description, previous experience, training classes, whether you retired already from military service and at what rank/grade, and this defines or limits your career and your ability to compete.

One point is you can be a soldier or civilian in a military career and be trapped/defined at a certain promotion level and no resolution but to leave this employment. This is called having a dead end job or a dead end position.

And it makes sense within the military. We have career tracks. Certain fields understand logistics better than others and better fit the career track. Combat soldiers and combat veterans can only go so far without crossing over into other fields. Money and finance is an important field for instance, but many people will not be able to cross into the field and there are few slots/jobs that pay over $60K a year. Career development and advanced training are vital to reward people and promote the right people. Cronyism and nepotism are discouraged.

Another point is that complaining, networking, politicking and talking with those in management with the power to hire you, send you to training, or change your circumstance. You could say the squeeky wheel gets the oil.

Complainers and whiners are strongly competitive unless they become whistle blowers in which case all bets are off. People that file grievances are looked at a little differently in my opinion. The old patriarchy did not like grievances. But the system has always had strong competition and that means there were public or private complaints.

Still in my opinion many leave the military with a war going on in their heads. Not from combat, not from a deep seated animosity or grievance, not anything dangerous or abnormal, just a lot of memories of eating crap. The world of competition is very much alive in the US Military and the US.

There is a subset of the work force that doesn't complain and may not engage in communication or discussion about relationships in the work place. We might say there were people that submerge issues or thoughts about relationships with supervisors and others. These might be negative or unwanted reactions.

Of course another point is that supervisors and managers are people that are doing well with competition and politics. This is kind of the definition of having an edge when you already are part of management and have a management career.

Now Capitalism is built seemingly from competition, so this is all well and good. Free enterprise, individual property rights for all regardless of race, creed, and color seems the way to go. And we have constitutions and laws to regulate, monitor, and control corruption of the government money trough.

The biggest surprise in Military politics and competition in the work place is the US Contractors that serve as experts. To me government and military experts lose out on the knowledge, skills, and expertise when we pay corporations or consultants to do the government core functions and other non core function. If you want the best government, if you want to avoid regulatory capture, if you want to avoid corruption, then we all need to increase the visibility of contractors and consultants within the Department of Defense. Recently there was a law suit filed by an employee of many years within the Office Management and Budget due to conflict with contractor expertise. So it seems that Lobbyist write the laws for congress and run government budget and financial offices.

How will regulators in the military and government do their jobs, if they compete with outsiders under the guise of consultants hired by their chain of command. How will government employees learn to negotiate, manage, and control military and government programs without the opportunity.

We conclude that contractors and consultants in the government and military should have a lot of visibility. We might be served better by limits of corporate contractors and consultant in the military and government. Remember when too big to fail banks became consultant managers for the financial bailout that they caused? Remember that lobbyist wrote the laws that made the last financial crisis possible? Remember the failures of war, the embezzlement of funds scandals of war, the over charges by defense contractors to the government, the failures of intelligence for going to war, remember the contractor in the Balkans earning $100K to sweep the warehouse, and remember the words of Smedley Butler and President Eisenhower? We need to limit the involvement of corporations in government, act to reduce the revolving door between corporations and government jobs that regulate industry, and we need to be aware of regulatory capture by corporations.

US Military, Military Politics, US Government, US Lobbying, US Ethics, US Politics, Capitalism, Competition, Regulatory Capture, Revolving Door,