Drill situation opinion

Everyone Uniform and Drill
1

Hi All,

right I am looking for some advice/opinions about a situation the other night at the squadron regarding drill and if I could of done something different.

first question to get you going - should drill be commanded by experience or rank? I know that in many other areas of the corps then there is COC but with regards to teaching/conducting drill is there any need to use a ‘rank structure’ or should it be done by experience and yes I do understand that rank is determined in most cases by experience. However I would rather a cadet who knows AP818 inside out and who is very good at it teach rather than a cadet SNCO or doesn’t know much about drill.

This similar situation happened the other night when we had a cadet SNCO teach/take drill to prepare for competitions etc but this Cadet NCO didn’t know everything in the routine and tried teaching certain movements when they didn’t know themselves, we then had another cadet NCO trying to intervene saying how to do it then they started having a debated discussion in front of the cadets and did not look professional and undermined what they knew.

After I witnessed this situation I let them carry on what they were doing instead of stopping them and then brought them inside to have a quiet word about how to be more professional because cadets are looking up to them.
However, I came up with a solution that might make things better and want some advice before it happens again - I explained that if they are any problems conducting drill, instead of discussing about what is right in front of cadets, let the NCO/cadet taking the squad carry on (even if this drill is wrong) and then discuss afterwards what would be right afterwards away from cadets ears, and then make adjustments next time round.

One of the cadet NCO’s agreed with me but the other did not and thinks it would be ok if they carried on discussing in front of the cadets.

so my other question would be, what would you do in this situation? would you let the most experienced cadet/NCO command the squad?

2

You need to have somebody who knows the drill movement driving the teaching of that drill movement. Personally I really don’t care whether that is an SNCO DI, non-DI, officer, CWO or the lowliest cadet; so long as they know their stuff use the skill. Ideally a DI will be the lead but not everybody has one available and (in my experience) not every DI knows what they are talking about.

Within that model criteria, and all else being equal, it is best to have the ranking cadet taking the lead while the junior can assist. They do of course all need to be singing from the same songsheet before they start.

To get to that stage they will be best coming together as a pool of “experts” and sorting out the message before they try to deliver the lessons to the whole squad.

Depending on the purpose of the drill session you cuold split by abilities and have people of whatever rank teaching within their capabilities. If you are practicing for a drill competition remember that the drill coordinator can be of any rank.

2 Likes
3

Quite right.

The ideal would be that you never have someone instructing who gets it wrong, but in the real world it happens.
We have to minimize any chances of error and it’s a judgement call regarding what to do in the type of situation you describe.
It is never a good situation to have two NCOs arguing in front of their juniors so that needs to be stopped firmly.
It is also never a good situation to stand by while someone teaches, and cadets practice, an incorrect drill movement.

I’d say that it sounds as though the NCOs need a drill refresher session with a subject matter expert to avoid potential errors and conflicts in the future.