S-3 division of labor

So I've been in my current position for about five weeks now, and it's kept me very busy. At the end of June, there was a two week stint while most of the primary staff was in Thailand that was particularly nerve-wracking. Being one of the few officers around meant that I had to fill in blanks on a lot of other people's tasks.

These days, I stay until between 6 or 7 o'clock to send out the daily orders. Once I get home, unfortunately, there's not much to write about apart from work, and of course I try to put that out of my mind as much as possible.

With (most) everyone back, though, I've had one early mystery solved: what it is that I'm supposed to do. What's "my lane," in Army parlance, and what is not. People tend to get offended when you step on their toes, but you don't want the opposite to happen, either -- letting things fall through the cracks.

So to me, that's a very important thing -- understanding both my area of responsibility and what belongs to others. Especially since the head of the S-3 shop is a fellow captain (that the way logistics battalions are set up), I'm particularly keen on this concept.

Let's begin by explaining who works in the S-3 shop: three captains, a master sergeant, some sergeants first class, and some junior enlisted guys. The most senior captain is the official "S-3," the top guy. To mitigate the level of friction you get from three captains in the same shop, this person is typically post-command, with year of time in rank.

The S-3's job is to handle the big picture, long-term focused things. He'll draw up the long term calendar, develop the quarter training focus, and -- in Korea, at least -- figure out what our role is in these big exercises you read about in the newspaper.

The "operations officer" (as it's listed on the MTOE), or "current operations officer" is concerned with day-to-day orders. There's been a lot of direction from higher in the past couple months, for example, regarding sexual harassment and sexual assault. It's the operations officer's job to "digest" them and either relay the information to subordinate companies, assign it to a single company, or divide it up among two or more companies.

The role of the "plans officer" is more difficult to describe, but our shop has been using this person in a more "utility" role -- taking on larger projects that would otherwise have diverted too much of the other officers' attention. For instance, we recently had a one-week battalion-wide training exercise, and he took care of all the details. If the shop has only two officers, it's this slot that typically left unfilled.

The master sergeant is the "Operations Sergeant," and is the senior ranking NCO in the shop. They've typically finished their first sergeant time, and are the S-3's primary point of contact for arranging details. They also supervise the rest of the enlisted staff -- the schools NCO, the land & ammo NCO, the CBRNE NCO (chemical weapons expert), and whoever else.

Now, everything I've just explained is extremely fluid, especially in Korea. Due to the constant arrival and departure of personnel, responsibilities are heavily influenced by personal strengths, personalities, longevity in position, and command-directed responsibilities. (i.e. If the boss keeps coming to you for something, guess what -- that's your new responsibility.)

Despite the time requirements, I'm actually quite happy in my position. That doesn't necessarily mean that I want to stay in it for a really long time, but I enjoy the fact that at the end of the day I have something material to show my efforts.