Work life balance, and the war to maintain it

There's a pretty simple reason I work hard to maintain a work life balance. For over 20 years, I served in the Army National Guard (19 years) and Army Reserve (4 years). My weekends were planned in advance. I was required to attend at least one weekend of training per month, plus two weeks a year. During my first 19 years of service, these weekends were predictable, and often conflicted with family events. I missed parties, picnics, baptisms, weddings, and funerals. My time wasn't mine. I was part of a higher calling.

For my final 4 years of service, I was in an Army Reserve unit. I was the senior NCO for the combat arms team in a training unit. We worked with Guard and Reserve unit leadership to improve their battle planning skills. Our unit had a small contingent of Regular Army members who were full time, and managed the logistics and much of the execution around training. 

This unit was different than any unit I served with. Everyone was a senior person in some way, and we had a mixture of military specialties assigned. When we were training a transportation unit, we could pull together a team with transportation expertise, and supplement it with whatever specialties that would supplement the core skill set. As with any organization, we had many stars, and many dregs. We also had people who would come up with a hardship at the last minute, and our Army contingent would reach out and grab people to fill the holes in our roster. 

I remember one phone call I took in my office from one of our Army team. It was a Wednesday afternoon. "Master sergeant? This is Major Bloviator. I have you booked on a flight out of Newark Airport at 1700 hours this Friday afternoon. Your flight will land in Portland, Maine. Rendezvous with Major Shrek, and staff Staff Sergeant Whiner. Major Shrek is authorized a rental car, and will drive you to the training site". I was silent for a moment. "Sir, I am not scheduled for this training. Did you check the schedule?" We paused so he could execute a perturbed inhale... "We had (name redacted) come up with an emergency, something about a pool filter and whatever. So I picked you to replace him". "But Sir, I have plans this weekend.." "Too bad master sergeant, this is for the flag. Suck it up!" I bit my tongue, and took the assignment. These same Regular Army members, who told us to suck it up, usually made it into their offices at the crack of noon, and were back on the way home before Judge Judy was on TV. "Suck it up" was a one way street for them. But I digress, and I vent. 

I picked up the phone and dialed, waiting for my honey to pick up. "Honey? I know we were supposed to go hiking this weekend, but I just got orders to head to Maine... I know honey, I'm real sorry... I can't, the major is a dick, and won't budge... I'll make it up to you. I promise" I hung up the phone, knots in my stomach, vowing to retire as soon as I could. That was the summer of 2000. 

In 2003 I found myself mobilized with the same unit, and under the same operational tempo. Fortunately, I stayed in the US. After about 6 weeks on the road, I was home on a five day pass for Easter. I arrived home at about 9:00 on Saturday morning, and didn't have to be back on duty until Thursday morning. My honey and I had plans. She took off of work. We were excited to have 5 days together, and would try to ignore the underlying tension of knowing I'd be gone again for weeks on end after I went back on duty. Our only communication was texting and irregular calls. 

Easter Sunday we lounged around, preparing to head off to her parents' for the day. My official Army cell phone rang. It was my commander. He related how there was a problem on one of the teams, two soldiers were having some personality issues. He wanted me to travel with them to see if I could be a psychologist, and help figure out how to have two grown men not argue constantly. The rest of the team was threatening to leave them on the side of the road. I like that plan, but had to go with my commander's plan. I needed to be at Fort Dix for a 0600 hour departure for Fort Bragg. That meant I had to return on Easter evening, so I could pack my gear, and make the van departure on time. 

It wasn't fun for me and my honey. She now had three days off, and she'd be alone. I was home for one night. I looked forward to the receipt of my 20 year letter. I vowed to get my life back, and never give it up again. I'd left too many good times on the table. Watching them pass without my participation. The rest of my mobilization was more of the same. At least I was in the US. Things could always be worse. 

When my 20 year letter arrived, I was eligible to retire. It took me about 6 months to finally do it, but I did it. It was a very difficult decision to make, and I feared I'd lose the friends I made while serving. I feared I'd miss the high operational tempo I lived with for over 2 decades. I retired from the Army Reserves at 41 years old, which is rare. Most people either get out at less than 12 years service, or stay until they age out, or are forced out due to physical limitations. My decision to leave was a good decision, and I have never regretted it. Life is too short to let someone else control our time for us. At least too short to allow others to control it for too long.

Are you presently fighting for work life balance? How much of your time outside of regular office hours are yours? How do you maintain balance?

If you enjoyed this blog, please feel free to share it with your social network using the buttons below.

_______________

Striving for mediocrity, and why outcomes can't be guaranteed

No one wants to be in last place, but someone must. Being last has a stigma, and has caused many to get upset. Yet for thousands of years, these losers went on with their lives, and found areas where they could win. If they were bad at basketball, they may have focused on science. Some people with great potential in science may have become ditch diggers. Some people with no potential become politicians (I won't bother to link to the pitiful resumes online, you can find them yourself).



Back in the early 90s, I was attending an Infantry Basic Non-Commissioned Officers course. There were about 30 of us taking the course, and I knew many of the other soldiers attending. There were many days of classroom study and discussions, and some field work. This course was memorable for many reasons, one being that I contracted Lyme Disease from a tick that wasn't known to carry it at the time (I was diagnosed and treated early, and it has not returned).

One of the course requirements was to complete a night land navigation course. This module required each soldier to navigate at night through the woods to locate a placard attached to a tree, and at each one, refer to a cue sheet to determine a new direction and distance to the next placard. This was a timed event. I was surprised to hear that we'd be doing this in teams, and the instructors chose the teams.

On the night of the exercise, I was half of a two person team. Or was I 90% of a two person team? All other teams were 3-4 people. I looked at the person I was paired up with, and felt the fear of failure start seeping in. He was what we referred to as an "oxygen thief", or someone who was a waste of perfectly good food and air, at least in terms of their service in the military. (Although I later met TSA agents who were reservists, and I realized that I hadn't seen what a real loser looked like.) Throughout the course, he had many excuses as to why he couldn't run, walk, march, or do most anything else. His uniform looked like he just pulled it out of a duffel bag, and he kept misplacing his stuff. This couldn't be right, how did I get paired up with him?

After consulting with the instructors, they confirmed that the roster was correct, and I couldn't change teams. Of course anyone who knew me back then, knows I can be challenging in a discussion (okay, maybe that hasn't changed much). I had taken my share of unpopular positions in debating the instructors during class. I saw this team assignment as a payback for verbally dragging the instructors across the floor, and off the slippery slopes, and kicked myself for precipitating this.

When our time to start the land navigation arrived, my team mate and I headed off together. He had asked to lead to the first point, so I allowed him to do this. Each person knows how many paces on each type of terrain totals a kilometer, and most field soldiers wore beads on their vests to count the distance. As each kilometer was walked, one bead would slide down the rope. It is second nature to any good field soldier.

About halfway to the first point, SSG J. declared we had arrived, and began looking for the placard. I questioned him on the distance, and when he confirmed we walked the distance, I told him I thought it was farther. I had been counting my paces, and knew we hadn't arrived. He insisted, and wandered in the dark woods looking for the placard that didn't exist. I eventually convinced him to follow me, and we set off for the real location. After a short time, his poncho came untied, and then he started dropping stuff. He lost his flashlight, pulled a leg muscle, heard carnivorous wild animals, and asked if we should go back to the rendezvous point. He kept banging his legs on branches and cursing. The clock kept ticking.

A glance at my watch had me wondering if we should just admit defeat and head back. But that's not how I'm wired. There was a decision to be made, and I made it. I advised SSG J. to grab the back of my gear with one hand, and to not let go. He grabbed on, and I took off on the course. I dragged him through the course, in some places pulling him over downed trees by his straps. "We" completed the course within the cutoff time.

The soldiers who failed were given a retest. An instructor put a glow stick 100 meters into the woods, and the soldiers were sent into the woods to find it. They only had to say the color of the stick when they came out of the woods. The pinnacle of mediocrity had been achieved.

Everyone passed the course, and I was disgusted to see SSG J. on the promotion list ahead of people I knew to be much better leaders. Who suffers from this inequity? First the people who could have passed the course on their own, were now competing with a person who needed someone to pull them through. The soldiers this person eventually led were also victims of the equal outcomes the training tried to guarantee. If he couldn't do the basics himself, how could he lead others in accomplishing them? Luckily, this was before the war on terror, and hopefully he retired before his services were needed.

What this taught me, is that trying to guarantee an equal outcome is not a good approach to having a better organization (or society, for that matter). Each of us are born to a family, and some families have more than others. We each have different interests, abilities, and determination. How we apply ourselves to the challenges in life will determine the outcomes in our life. There is no law or policy that can change this, nor can we normalize the variables that we each experience. Illness, accidents, genetics, bad decisions, and sometimes the complete randomness of natural events will ensure that there is no equal outcome, even when we attempt to make all of the variables equal.

When we take away grading systems, we encourage striving for mediocrity. When we take away rewards, we encourage mediocrity. If we only have pass/fail, why put in the extra effort? If I were an "A" student, why should I put in more effort beyond what it takes to get a "C", if my "A" puts me on equal footing with those who attained a "C"?

If we can count on a handout to keep us from having to provide for the necessities in life, how can we expect people to apply efforts to better themselves, and in turn grow our society? If I have an idea that will change lives, and reward me financially, why should I bring it forward if the implementation of the idea will force me to hand over the majority of the reward to support others? This is how we encourage mediocrity, and lose innovation.

We are each individuals, and each of us have the right to pursue happiness. There is no right to find happiness. When we think that we are due happiness, we must remember that life isn't fair, nor is a bureaucratic government fair. Taking from one person to give to another is immoral. Individuals choosing to give to another is genuine.

If you like this post, please share it with your social media network using the buttons below.

_______________________

The difference between an event and a lifestyle

Most people who know me, know I served 23 years in the reserves. I served 19 of those years in the National Guard, and my last 4 in the Army Reserve. When I joined the National Guard, physical fitness tests were a joke. I was in a mechanized infantry battalion, serving in the battalion operations section. Most years the physical fitness test was conducted at a desk.

A senior NCO would pull out the Army Physical Fitness Test score card, and have me fill out the personal information. He'd then ask how fast I run, and I'd say "real fast". We'd negotiate the time, and he'd fill in the information for my 2 mile run. We'd then negotiate the push-ups and sit-ups, with the card finally completed and turned in. The only time I broke a sweat was when the air conditioner broke.

View Army Physical Fitness Test and over 3,000,000 other topics on Qwiki.

Then things started to change. The Army standards were slowly enforced, and the physical fitness test cycle followed the Regular Army's twice a year schedule. The Army also instituted regulations where a test could only be administered by someone who had already passed the test. It became real obvious that staying in shape was very important if you wanted to continue to serve. But there was still some of the "good old boy" shirking of the rules happening, but not nearly to the scale as it was in the past.

Then Iraq invaded Kuwait, and there were huge call ups of reserves. At the mobilization sites, units were losing up to half of their numbers due to physical condition and weight issues. Suddenly the idea that compromising fitness standards to keep unit rosters full, left the units unable to perform their war time mission. And overnight, the standards changed. It was a great time to be a junior NCO, because promotions suddenly became available as the unfit were sent out of the service.

Up until this time, most people I served with treated the annual (and then semi-annual) physical fitness test and weigh-in as an event. The lifestyle the lived was sedentary, and fitness was not a thing to think about. They would mark their calendars, and a month before the test, they'd have one dessert after a meal instead of three, and dig their sneakers out of the garage and shuffle around the block a few times. After the first few days, they were generally crippled over, and feeling the pain. Even after several weeks of occasional preparation and dieting, many would still fear failing the test, so they'd get a "profile". This medical form kept them from having to take the test for a specific period of time. These were usually for some undiagnosable ache or pain, and would provide the person with a few more months to pretend they were getting ready for the test. The event caused dread. It was something to train for, and then they could stop exercising again for 5 months.

A small percentage of the soldiers would live a fitness lifestyle. A fitness lifestyle is one where decisions around diet, and time to exercise are worked into the person's life. Approaching fitness as a lifestyle turned the physical fitness test from being a dreaded event, to just another opportunity to exercise. As a person who lived a fitness lifestyle, I could determine how much effort I exerted for the test, and knew that I could put in minimal effort and still pass the test. Sometimes I did this in protest, maybe doing 41 push-ups when the minimum was 40, or I'd jog slowly and cross the line with time to spare. They wouldn't call it "the minimum", if it wasn't good enough. Striving for mediocrity.

On transferring to the Reserves in 2000, I was asked by my new Sergeant Major if I would be able to pass the physical fitness test at the next drill (a month later), so I could help administer the test for the rest of the unit. I chuckled, and said I could pass it right then, in my battle dress uniform, with the combat boots on. He asked if I had been training, and I said that I lived the lifestyle, so the event was just recording the workout for that day. We became instant friends, and much to his disappointment, he was no longer the fastest NCO in our unit.

Much of life is like this. We know what we should be doing to have a great quality of life, yet we postpone doing the necessary stuff until it resembles a wall we must climb. Transitioning from inaction to action can appear to be insurmountable. We dread the pain. Yet we know that once we get over the initial pain, we will find the happiness that is found in the lifestyle. This applies to many aspects of life. Inaction is self perpetuating.

Is being healthy a lifestyle for you, or are you still waiting for that one event to motivate you? Be the lifestyle. This journey called life is not a dress rehearsal.

If you like this blog post, please share it through your social media channels by using the buttons below.

The balance between pleasure and pain

Balance is so important in life. I'm not referring to unfortunate accidents where people fall from buildings, although this balance is important (as you can see by the CDC data to the right). I am referring to the balance needed to maintain a healthy and satisfying life.

Pain has a place in our life. As a youngster, we learned that sticking our hand on the hot stove top hurts. From that point forward, we didn't stick our hand on a hot stove. Sometimes learning about heat related pain comes later in life, like the time I used a wet pot holder to take a tray of cookies out of the oven. My honey was saying "don't use tha..." which was interrupted by my "AAGGHHH!!" as the steam burn ripped through my fingers. She applied some ice, and explained how steam is created.

Another pain we experience is when our body sends signals to us that something is wrong with it. This can be related to some incident, such as hitting our thumb with a hammer, banging our elbow on the door frame, or stubbing a toe on the dining room table leg. I offer up these examples from experience, no gratitude on your part is required. I will guess that you have examples to add to this list.

Some of this pain is enough to send us to the medicine cabinet, looking for the Ibuprofen, or in some extreme cases, the left over bottle of Codeine from the last time we had a real pain and the doctor prescribed something for it. If this fails, we call the doctor, and make an appointment.

This is a logical and normal way to deal with pain, and we hope this doesn't happen to us. There's another kind of pain that few people are willing to endure. It is the pain of growing, the pain of learning, and the pain of self-improvement. I also offer these from experience, no gratitude on your part is required.

It may be hard to think of pain as something we learn from. A common quote I hear from people who exercise, is "no pain, no gain". I prefer the quote "ignore pain, no brain". For the past 30 years, I have been forced to endure pain as the cost of membership in first the Army National Guard, and then the Army Reserve. For a short period after retiring in 2004, I avoided the pain, and the cost was high.

It is easy to come up with reasons to avoid the pain of exercise. I have a name for the alter ego who often fights me - "the excusinator". His sole purpose in my life is to stay in my mind, and look at the temperature, precipitation, Internet, fireplace, as well as any slight discomforts in my body. He then uses these to tell me a story that will keep me from getting off of the couch, hunt out my Vibram Five Fingers, and put in some miles. He also tries to hide my yoga mat, make my bicycles (fleet) look like medieval torture machines, and reminds me of the food that is at my disposal in our fridge.

Exercise hurts, and can be dangerous. At least that is what our excusinators tell us. Last year while bike commuting, a person pulled up next to me at a red light (I was making a left from the left lane - a novel concept), and he was going straight in the right lane. He said to me "that's dangerous, be careful". I replied "it's not as dangerous as not getting exercise, and the stress of sitting in a car in traffic". He paused for a moment, and then agreed with me.

I see many people who avoid pain by seeking pleasure. Their pleasure is in watching endless hours of television, eating junk food, and staying up late robbing their body of rest while doing this. The things they think bring them pleasure, actually bring them weight problems, family relationship issues, and the pain associated with these problems.

This past week, the American Heart Association asked us all to be aware of heart disease. Yet what is heart disease? It is a symptom of a laundry list of behavior-related health problems. Overeating, a sedentary lifestyle, Crackberry induced stress, and an insane level of distractions all add up to a health crisis. The American Heart Association lists 7 things to do decrease your likelihood of getting heart disease. But I have condensed these into two: be mindful of what goes in your body, and exercise.

After retiring from the Army Reserve in 2004, I stopped exercising, and threw myself into the pleasure side of life. I gained about 30 pounds, my asthma came back with a vengeance, my knees hurt, and I was not happy looking in the mirror. I expressed my concern to my honey one day, and she said "why don't you pretend you are a Soldier for the rest of your life?". So I did that. I resolved to be able to pass the Army Physical Fitness Test any day of the week. I realized it had to be a lifestyle, not a scheduled event.

Exercise hurts. But not nearly as much as the many issues you will face if you don't exercise. My first few exercise attempts were painful, and I had "the excusinator" running in full force. It was a rocky start, and I still occasionally have short periods where I succumb to life's temptations, and don't exercise. But I come back to it, and each time I come back to it I realize more how within 30 seconds of starting to exercise, my brain gives me some nice dopamine, and other natural chemicals that reward us for doing something good for us.

I used to run to see how fast I could get, and was disappointed when I wasn't improving. Then last year I started to just run for fun, and not let my running time matter. In a 5k last year, I tried running with a smile on my face. I set a personal record. Two weeks later I ran with the smile on again, and a funny thing happened. I beat my previous personal record.

I learned something from smiling while I ran. We will never be the best we can be at something until we truly enjoy it. It is in the enjoyment of an activity that we subconsciously apply the energy necessary to excel. So when I run, I never run at a pace that hurts, nor do I ride my bike at a pace that hurts. This doesn't mean that I hold back, it just means that I give my energy to the task at hand, but respect my body in the process. Ignore pain, no brain.

When on the mat doing yoga, I often feel pain. It can be a prolonged downward dog, or some difficult twist that causes the ligaments and tendons to implore the excusinator to petition me for release. But we learn what is a real pain, and what is a pain caused by our inner voice, and we settle into the pose, putting the excusinator on notice that it isn't allowed to control the body. As we teach ourselves this control of the inner voice, we experience the pleasure at the edge of pain. The sweet pleasure our body experiences as we return to a recovery position rewards us for the pain. And each time we practice, we recalibrate the limits of our body as well as our minds. The recalibration of our minds is where our growth comes from.

Life is all about our free will, and the choices we make. Are your choices creating a better life for you, or are they setting you up for the pain that has no reward of pleasure? 

A framework for individual performance feedback

I was recently asked to participate in defining a new performance management process for a group I work with. In the first couple of meetings, we had a free ranging, and often emotional discussion around what is not working in the current process, and what structure would support the implementation of a good process. I for one find that performance management is often focused on treating everyone the same, when we all know we are each different.

After the first couple of meetings, I began to mull over performance appraisals, and what about them doesn't work. One of my strengths is that I see patterns in most things in life, and use these to identify frameworks. If we can identify and put a name to something, it is much easier for us to address it. So as a recent meeting started, I began to jot some notes about how performance feedback works in the real world. The following table is the draft I presented to the team, and it was accepted. I may make modifications to it, but for now, this is my framework for understanding performance feedback.

In most organizations, there are three types of feedback. Impromptu is immediate. The reason for the feedback is fresh, usually based on an interaction in a meeting or as part of an initiative. Threshold-Driven is based on feedback at intervals during or after a project. This is a triggered event, and can be based on the size, complexity, or duration of a project. It can also be based on a certain number of issues surfaced during a project. Periodic performance feedback is generally used to identify individual performance trends, and is typically set to occur at certain times of the year. It is usually conducted to document performance for the human resources function, and to allow the person being evaluated to agree, rebut, or modify their approach to completing their work in the next rating period.

Source defines how feedback is initiated. Feedback can be unsolicited, meaning that the person receiving the feedback hasn't asked for it. The feedback is coming anyway. This is usually precipitated by an event, and can be positive or constructive. Solicited feedback is when the person being evaluated, their performance manager, or human resources requests feedback.

Feedback is then provided through a Channel. Direct feedback is when the person being evaluated receives the feedback directly from the person providing it, and they have an opportunity to contextualize the feedback and discuss it. Indirect feedback is when a colleague provides feedback to the individual's boss or colleague. This feedback is usually viewed as under-handed when the feedback is derogatory.

The above table is mix-and-match, meaning that feedback can be defined by selecting any one value from each column. Periodic reviews may have a mix of Source and Channel, but each instance of feedback is defined by one value from each column. Love it, hate it, or disagree with me, (in the comments section please) but this is how feedback occurs in an organization. Does your organization differ from this framework?

My most formative professional experience in life is derived from my 23 years of service in the Army Reserve. When I first joined, all performance reviews (periodic) were graded as exemplary. If you received anything less than exemplary, your career was over. In the late '80s, the Army changed how the evaluations were conducted, and after a few review cycles, the process became more equitable, and people could use their evaluations to work on improving their performance. Leaders could use the performance feedback to determine order of merit.

The Army utilizes an After Action Review (AAR) process that is focused on fixing issues that arise during and after missions. These are threshold or event driven feedback processes. In these AARs, issues are addressed in the open, and people who caused the issues learned that it was better to learn from their colleagues in the open, than to have them complain behind your back. Everyone shared in the success or failure of a mission, and as a result, the meetings are very productive. These AARs address issues, not people. But all missions and projects are executed by people, and people learn to change their performance for the good of the team. Many issues raised in these meetings allow units to redefine processes and workflow.

When looking at organizational maturity, my observation is that an immature organization (this has nothing to do with workplace wedgies, it means they don't have stable processes) has primarily impromptu, unsolicited, indirect feedback as their primary performance management system. This supports a dysfunctional culture, and breeds a damaging political climate. If Harry doesn't like what Fred did, Harry goes to Fred's boss Mary to provide the feedback. Fred may or may not ever receive that feedback, and many times if he receives the feedback, he knows that Harry provided it, and workplace trust takes a hit. Or Mary takes the comments as facts, and modifies her view of the Fred (or of Harry), causing Fred to be treated differently, without him knowing why. Without trust, the culture changes, and dysfunctional habits grow exponentially.

I observed a fantastic method for shutting down the impromptu, unsolicited, indirect feedback. Several years ago while managing projects, I was providing impromptu, unsolicited, indirect feedback (okay, I was complaining) to a new department head about a site director from a different office who often monopolized my time. She looked at me thoughtfully, and asked "when you said this to 'name withheld', how did he react?". I was stopped dead in my tracks, and learned that if I couldn't provide feedback directly to the person who needs the feedback, then the problem is mine, not the other person's. I added this to my management toolkit, and have pulled it out many times when confronted by someone complaining about someone else. I've even offered up this tool to others who are facing this challenge. Try it, you will like it.

As an organization matures, it will usually adopt a periodic, solicited, indirect process. A process of this type provides the centralized human resources function with what they perceive as a fair and equitable way to gather and analyze feedback. The data generated is used to create nice colorful bell curves for leadership to place in PowerPoint presentations. Periodic feedback is great, but feedback must be timely to be effective. Also, in order for people to maintain anonymity, much of the feedback lacks context. If the feedback lacks context, it is generally not actionable.

Organizations which implement only periodic performance feedback systems may have a hard time getting people to learn from the experience, and can create morale issues. Periodic reviews allow people to save up their constructive criticism for a point in time, and by saving it up, they deprive the person being evaluated of the opportunity to improve their performance when the issue occurs. As the only mechanism for feedback, the periodic review falls short in many areas. This can be said of utilizing any one performance feedback system as the only system.

It is my strong belief that the best way to improve performance is to encourage a culture that appreciates impromptu, unsolicited, direct feedback as its primary way for a person to evolve in their role. To implement this, both the person providing feedback, and the receiver must leave their egos out of the discussion. The feedback must be impersonal, factual, and clearly state the impact the issue had on the team. The person receiving this must appreciate that the person providing the feedback is simply trying to improve processes, or address an issue, and it isn't personal. If they disagree with the feedback, they must be capable of disagreeing without damaging trust (see "P.S." at the bottom).

As humans, we should have the opportunity and desire to continuously improve. This is where the direct conversations with colleagues becomes valuable. Adding periodic reviews captures performance trends, and should highlight areas of strength, and areas of improvement - that the person is already aware of from the direct conversations with their colleagues.

Moving to an open environment where people are willing to have the difficult conversations isn't an easy cultural shift. But as I stated up front in this post, once we can put a name to something, addressing it becomes much easier. What is your preferred method of receiving feedback? What is the worst way you received feedback?

P.S. - None of the above addresses what is probably the most challenging issue to address in performance feedback systems, which is the quality of the comments in a review. I will address quality of the feedback in a future blog.

The Application of Don't Ask, Don't Tell to many aspects of military life

I was forced into an awkward moment in 2003 while sitting in a van with a lieutenant colonel I was mobilized with. A few minutes earlier, there were 6 of us in the 15 passenger government van. Now there were just two of us in the van, me frantically scribbling in my notebook, and the officer turned to me and made his revelation. I didn't want the weight he laid on me, I would rather have avoided his confession. This was truly a TMI (too much information) moment.

A couple days before, I was driving one of our team vehicles across Fort Bragg, and spotted a bird in a parking lot. I quickly turned around, and found a spot to get my binoculars on it. At first I thought it was a misplaced Semi-Palmated Plover, but quickly noticed the second ring on the bird's neck, and that it was faking a broken wing to lure me away from a nest. This was a Killdeer.

I had burned some precious minutes, and now late back to the team site. I hustled back to the van, and headed in to the office. Our commanding officer was waiting outside of the quonset hut we had commandeered as our operations center, talking to a few other people. "What took you so long?" the colonel asked. "Sorry Sir, I saw an interesting bird and wanted to verify what it was." The other soldiers he was talking to broke out laughing, and the colonel got in the van and left. I headed to my desk, and got back to the administrivia needed in my role as NCOIC to keep a 35 person training team moving.

The people I spent most of my time with knew of my birding. I would often carve birds out of wood on our long van rides from one end of First Army's Area of Operations to the other. At times I'd carve at my desk, and occasionally "flip a bird" at our commander. We went back over 20 years, so it was all in good fun. They were cool with my talking about birds, and didn't have a problem with my occasional side trips, or when I gushed about how gorgeous a Long-Tailed Duck is. I was accepted on my team as an equal.

Back to the story -  I find myself in a van, with a lieutenant colonel at a rest area in Maryland. We are the last two in the van. He had driven the last leg of the road trip, so he was in the driver's seat. I was on a bench seat in the back. He turned to me and said "Master Sergeant, please don't tell anyone, but I am also a bird watcher". And just like that, WHAM!. I am stuck holding his secret. I am open about my life choices, but he isn't, and now I have to keep his secret. Don't Ask, Don't Tell for bird watchers. It was a heavy load to carry.

This cloak of secrecy forced on bird watchers must change if we are to be a truly inclusive military. Bird watchers should be completely accepted as equal members,. We have the right to defend this great republic. Some brave soldiers take pride in their lifestyle, and even blog about the birds they see while deployed in Iraq. This brave person was my inspiration for birding in the open while in my BDUs (okay, and occasionally in my APFUs), and I hope together we can take birding out of the closet and into the mainstream of our military.

Do you support open birding in the military? I do.