This has turned into a bit of a RM thread so I will put my 2 pence worth in.
As a wing and region SME I can see what activities are being created on SMS. With my wing had on I can say it is always the usual suspects who do not share activates on the cadet portal. It is an admin burden to add them but it as much mess than organising the activity yourself. As an SME I would think it would be good to have the option to share directly to the cadets but this should be done as a last resort and not a given.
There will always be clashes with events. There are only 52 weekends in the year and since December we have lost 4 to HQAC stand down (good and bad) and the Red weather warning. Thee is only so much time and everything cannot be done. I have never been to RIAT as it always clashes with Nijmegen. My choice.
Every sqn is abroad church, you will get cadets interested in most activates and some who will be badge chasing after the perfect brassard. There is no right or wrong, there are only cadets and that is why we are here.
RM is one of those activities which you love or you don’t see the point. As one of the former I see how the cadets develop and grow during their training and it has been the making of many. Some things in the RAFAC can be too easily achieved these days. RM is not one of them and that is a good thing.
Any OC who says it my trainset I get to decide what my cadets do is my opinion a great big Richard Head. As OCs we should be encouraging cadets (and staff) to get as much out of the corps as they can. Try something new, you newer know you might like it. Yes there will be times where thinks have to be managed and choices have to be made and time managed. If you as a OC cannot spare a couple of cadets for an activity then you should be looking inward and out outward for the issues within the RAFAC.
Don’t add their unit, just search for them and add them to the event.
I think it’s quite unknown that a unit does not need to be added for staff (or Cadets) to be added, and the units just controls who can see it in SMS to share to CP.
Or you have staff who have taken umbridge with the wing so are not interested in supporting, neither lazy or incompetent- just militant.
If a Sqn or Sqn staff team feel that a wing is not supporting them & they are being hung out to dry to fend for themselves why should they support the wing event.
It is completely down to the staff on what activities they wish to advertise and encourage.
Staff could allow the event to be advertised on portal after it became over subscribed. Or not mention it on final parade so it is crowded out by others. Or even deleted the Sqn from the event itself so they completely disappear. I suspect that unless you were looking you may not even notice that they had done so.
With op in you can see what Sqns are not participating & then you can challenge. Sqn Cdrs know it’s visible so bear this in mind.
With Op out you probably still won’t get those Sqns participating but they’ll go under the radar.
If they are not offering those wider events, then what else are they not offering?
If the issue that your event isn’t being pushed & supported then unfortunately that’s life and the nature of volunteers. As long as the places are being filled by cadets then that’s the main thing.
Everyone has a different philosophy on what’s important in the organisation (which is fine) , but you need the support of the Sqn Cdrs to make it a success.
TLDR: I am all for the opt-in system. We are a busy squadron, and as others have said there are times when you need to control the activities that cadets are invited to. However, the process to be able to opt-in needs to be much easier.
As an OC, it would be useful for me to have an email, each time my unit is invited to an activity, with an option to ‘unsubscribe’ if squadrons didn’t need that facility. On that email could be a link or button, that would enable me to quickly publish to Cadet Portal if I wanted. One-click, review the info presented, done.
Usually, when we don’t publish events it’s because we were unaware they existed. It’s a big admin burden to check Cadet Portal every day for new activities so we rely on emails to have an event advertised. Half the time these come through before the event is on SMS. Even if it is, I very rarely get emails with the SMS link to the activity, which would help speed things up. Sometimes I might read the email while I’m not on the squadron, not have the time to log in and find it on SMS. This means sometimes events get forgotten.
In my experience, most of the time it’s because activities get missed, rather than people maliciously not publishing events or being ‘lazy’. There simply aren’t enough volunteers on many units to constantly check SMS, manually find activities and do this.
Just to add a couple of things - I myself was utterly surprised myself by how much I enjoyed my first time at Nijmegen.
It coincided with the former commandant’s overt support for RM.
I’ve seen first hand the enthusiasm by staff at HQAC, Region and (many) at Wing.
I’m very fortunate to have had some terrific WRMO and an extremely supportive RRMO.
What I have also encountered though is possibly best described as a staff exhibiting a sense of having their authority “threatened”.
As an example - Wing staff wouldn’t support an activity - that was closely read over by our RRMO and found to be more than satisfactory.
This, at best, then sows the seeds of confusion as you have senior SMEs (who know better, because they’re more qualified / competent) being over-ruled by Wing bods…
When pointing this out, rather than being told “well, if the RRMO is happy , crack on” - I got an answer along the lines of “so what?!”
To me, the whole point of a chain of approval SURELY is to make sure that people best placed to make decisions do so…
Or - am I just restating the usual arguments around common sense…?
As CCF scum who doesn’t use cadet portal I thought you got an email when added to an activity?
I still get emails saying my unit has been added to some nonsense activity from HQAC even though I can’t push it out to my cadets as they don’t have portal.
Does that not happen in the ATC or is it just something we get in CCF to compensate for not having portal?
We don’t get an email when a squadron has been invited to an activity at the moment. It’s interesting to see that the infrastructure is there to support that though.
As you say, sometimes there will be activities you aren’t eligible for, because it’s easier for someone just to invite everyone. In that case, I think opt-out buttons (like you get for spam emails) would be useful.
No its not. If it a Corps activity it should be advertised. I would say that you should have a very good reason for not allowing cadets on a fully authorised RAFAC activity.
We don’t advertise niche activities through CP, we ask the sometimes one or two relevant cadets and add them on manually if they want to go. We’ve had events added where no cadets are qualified to go. I could advertise those on CP, but if any of my cadets signed up you’d be swearing at me for having ineligible cadets trying to get on your activity.
The nature of volunteers is that you cannot compel them to advertise or promote any activity. There is no action that could be realistic taken against an individual. We rely on the illusion of a chain of command & control as that makes the whole thing work.
In practical terms wing staff have little influence over a Squadron that doesn’t want to comply.
There is no method of tracking & if Sqn said okay we’ll tick box advertise but we’re not dealing with the TG forms you are effectively blocked. You would also have a hard arguing against a squadron that didn’t advertise an activity if the activity was already over subscribed by the time that Sqn came across it.
There a myriad of ways for events to be avoided & blocked at Sqn level & very little the WSOs & SMEs can do to counter.
What can be done is actually challenge those Sqns who are not advertising on Portal. It takes time, patience & negotiation skills, to convince rather than command or coerce.
But the operational command of activities for a Sqn to take part in rests with the Sqn Cdr not WSOs, Sector or SMEs no matter how passionate you maybe about your area.
Ask yourself - are you annoyed about the lack of advertising in cadet portal because you feel cadets are missing out, because your event isn’t getting promoted as must you would like or is it that you feel your role as a WSO or SME is somehow challenged by Sqn Cdrs having a different philosophy?
As an organisation we need to be more bottom up rather than top down. & we need to challenge appropriately to give the cadets a good experience & make sure they don’t miss out.
Changing things so you feel like your event at WSO level advertised may make you feel fuzzier that your events are being put out there but it doesn’t address the issue of cadets being discouraged from events.
The current system puts the onus on the OC to opt in & take responsibility for their Sqn attending events. If they don’t then that needs to be addressed & picked up. This means more work for the SMEs in challenging OCs but that’s why they’re wing staff.
The vast majority of us do not want cadets to miss out, but the way we ensure this is putting the responsibility on the OC Sqns rather than over indulging them & allowing them to coast.
WSOs & wing events should be enablers not a “everyone will follow orders “
We do the exact same - case in point is wing road marching. Apart from about 8 cdts the rest of the Sqn has less than 12 months service.
Didn’t advertise on cadet portal but asked on final for interest cadets to make themselves know. Two cadets now going to the Netherlands in July. Cadets not missing out & not advertised on portal.
I have to say I broadly agree with this; it should be a case of challenge and discuss.
Largely I don’t deal with cadet events so I don’t have the portal issues of others as I mainly train CFAVs, but when I do if someone doesn’t share it I haven’t got time to challenge and coerce. If they miss out, they miss out.
Maybe if I was consistently having to cancel courses through lack of bids I might go on the ‘promotional’ offensive but if that’s not the case then I’ll just fill courses with people who do share it.
Fundamentally I’m not fussed who gets the places - I’m just interested that the opportunity spaces are taken up. If 123 Sqn gets every cadet through a mountain bike session with me cos no other sqns shared it, good on em.
@Dad2james
I dont want to be the grim reaper here.
But didnt you leave the org…in which case, why are you pushing this so hard from thr event organisers point of view?
Fair enough if your kid is still in, bring the moans from the parent POV. But if you’re no longer a CFAV then why are you bringing up intricate ruling on sms?
Still want to be a cfav?
Approach a different unit near you maybe?
Going to respectfully challenge I think there is interest in this activity - it’s different, it’s outside & doesn’t involve being in a tent.
The two cadets on my Sqn interested in the road marching we’re proactive in pushing for it despite there being no experience or interest from the staff. I’ve had other cadets push for it as well. I personally rate RdMg higher than sport but that’s personal preference and (on my part) a bit of activity snobbery.
If the activity is being run & the cadets wish to go then crack on. Its just that (in my view) the decision to advertise should be with the Sqn Cdr and not something we are forced to advertise, particularly if it might impact Sqn activities.
If a squadron refuses to allow cadets to receive opportunities which are at wing level because they’ve had a falling out with wing staff then surely something must be wrong. I’ve heard of cadets being refused to have their name ‘put in the hat’ for activities because their OC has had a falling out with the person organising the event, all that does is stop the cadets from getting the most out of the organisation
Although my own unit commander was never a factor in my decision to leave - far from it, they were always very supportive of my endeavours.
Leaving was infact extremely difficult and painful emotionally and mentally.
I’ve since been approached to ask if I would go back etc - but by friends - and not the people that caused the issue - that’s a post for another day…
Although this subject has been very RM focussed - I was REALLY trying to address all activities in general, as it isn’t just RM that seems to be ignored…
Hence - looking for different opinions on the merits of releasing activity direct to cadets… and possibly find technical solutions that could be passed back up th CoC, for the betterment of the organisation.
In the example i was thinking was a struggling squadron that were breaking themselves to provide support & to the wing events but when asking wing for help got fobbed off & ignored.
In the end the Sqn stopped supporting the wing events & focused on itself. Yes Cadet missed out on wing events but they eventual got an active Sqn back. In that example it’s the Sqn vs the wing & thankfully not personalities.
However I have heard where staff with grudges against another staff have taken it out on that Sqns cdts by not selecting them or being over harsh on paperwork (or even belittling the Sqn). This is never acceptable & if not challenged just becomes toxic for everyone.
The important bit for staff, particularly officers is the need to challenge situations & operate in an open honest & transparent manner as possible. This is how you resolve issues rather than letting them fester like slimy Mildew creeping across your bathroom tiles.