The home stretch

I'm about to enter the last phase of my command time -- the change of command inventory -- and quite frankly I have *no* idea how this is going to go.

Part of the problem is that, when I took command, I didn't have any idea what I was doing. I didn't make people sign their hand receipts, and didn't draw up any shortage annexes. I was told, "Make sure you go by the TMs," but didn't know how to access them. I was a mess from the beginning.

Things didn't get any better after I took command, as I spent 4 out of my first 6 weeks away from my company, and got no command inspection in the first 90 days. So I really had no idea how things were supposed to work or what controls I was supposed to implement.

I picked up a lot of equipment from the maintenance company that closed down last year, but I'm not really sure I floundered around a lot, too. In January I started a 100% inventory, but didn't know how to approach things -- I worked off of PBUSE component listings, not the technical manuals, and wasted a lot of time.

My personality didn't help out much, either -- given the choice of working on things that I see versus going out and trying to learn about problems I don't see, I will choose the first one almost every time. I'm an analyst and a "hard worker," but not a people person. Finding mentors is really difficult for me.

The worst thing that can happen now is that I lose a month's base pay for negligence and my orders to my next duty station get deleted. That's still not the end too big a tragedy if I can transfer to Foreign Area Officer later in 2016, but I'd rather avoid as much pain as possible.