What is this strange thing called VA?
Tis it some form of alchemy?
Don’t talk to me of such things, you heathen magicians
After 10 years as a CI, I have never once thought I would benefit from going into uniform. The uniform didn’t attract me to return to this once fine organisation. I get the same respect and recognition from the cadets, if not more in some instances. For the foreseeable future, I will not be looking to go into uniform.
#ChangeMyMind
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I always say to my team that there’s no pressure or expectation to go into uniform.
However…
We exist to provide the illusion of having joined the RAF, in effect. Our cadets could choose many organisations and they come to us mostly because of the unique theme we provide (and some activities that go along with it).
Our cadets rock up in uniform every night and throw themselves into it.
It is significantly harder to sell that illusion if all the staff are in civilian clothes, just as it might feel less immersive if all scouting staff opted out of wearing the shirt and woggle.
The staff wouldn’t be presenting in the same way the other members were expected to.
Does it mean they can’t do the job well? No.
Does it mean there’s a greater disconnect of theme and less immersion? Yes.
Edit: And while I understand why people frequently say that CIs are the backbone of the organisation, this is not actually desirable in a uniformed organisation.
CIs may currently be the backbone, but without staff going into uniform we’d cease to be the RAFAC.
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And to add to the above, I hear many people say it’s the extra perceived commitment or training burden (on top of what they already give) that puts them off taking what has become an unnecessary step into uniform.
That’s why, in my opinion, we need to lower the perceived bar to entry with the junior ranks and perhaps allow more local training on the uniformed basics to be considered acceptable to get people going.
For example, completing the junior cadet and first class syllabus (or something similar, which we already provide and they could actually help teach as they learn).
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Personally I would go the other way and get rid of NCOs completely.
You have Civilian instructors to run the training & then officers to command & long term planning.
If you to start trying to ape the reserves with all the ranks then perhaps the way fwd is minimum educational qualifications for those who wish to apply.
The life cycle of a volunteer is a lot shorter & with so many volunteer organisations on the scrounge if we tried to add this level of bureaucracy we would hemorage & just be left with the mediocre & the cultists.
But when looking at retention, a key part of that is recognition and reward.
So having more ranks you can move people through when they have given competent service over a sustained period is a way to do that for very low cost.
Our current expectation of a SNCO promotion every 4 years exhausts that rapidly while implying it has very little value.
And moving to all officers could be an interesting discussion, but you’d then need to trap people in ranks that imply very little experience if you were to avoid flooding those higher ranks.
And I can’t see it making our uniform vs non-uniform split better if the options are civilian or CFC.
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Building on @OC.1324’s point about recognition and awards: being in uniform means CFAVs would be recognised with the CFM, clasps, etc., and qualification for coronation and jubilee medals. CI service gets no recognition at all.
That is one of the strands but it needs to be meaningful recognition & reward.
I had a cadet Cpl tell she was particularly bothered about promotion to cadet Sgt become it held very little meaning outside of cadets which is true - it just maintains the illusion of advancement .
In a volunteer organisation people also need to be able go down rather than just up & out. This is a very different mindset to regulars & reserves who can treat it as second job. This can lead to a false sense of entitlement that
So the guide would be
Training rank
Substantive rank
Extra responsibility
Specialist responsibility
Going back to topic with ratio of officers to NCOs I don’t think there is an ideal on as it comes down to the individual skill experience & circumstances of the people on the Sqn.
Interestingly 25 years ago we didn’t have SNCOs just WO - introducing more to get people into uniform. this hasn’t worked so perhaps we go the other way this time.
Banging the same drum I’ve banged before
Adopt the PI as entry level for uniform.
Then PI-> Sgt or PI-> Plt Off
We can then leave CIs as almost its own pathway for those who want it.
How about PI as universal entry?
After initial training different options and recommendations are made for further development: including CI, enlisted, and CFC.
i.e. CI isn’t the default but one of three routes.
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I’ve given this some more thought. If we had uniformed junior ranks, for those straight off the street who want to go into uniform, then DE SNCO entry could be reserved for those with suitable experience (including experienced CIs).
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i think the SNCO promotion route isn’t ideal.
the 4 years is a minimum time frame, but neither is it automatic, the matrix does need to be applied.
however it then creates some SNCOs attending events/courses/camps they have no interest in, simply to “tick the box” - from the “Cadet benefit” point of view, who cares if it gets more CFAV bums on seats turning up?
but it makes the promotion process a formality rather than actual reward.
for a WO who sped through promotion in 8 years they could be early 30s with no where to go for the next 30 years of volunteering unless they take the commissioned route, which isn’t suitable for all.
this isn’t to take i think the 4 years should be increased to 6 years (or further) but i do feel there should be more on “merit”.
we promote our Cadets based on merit more than tick boxes, i know at our Squadron (and previous I have been on) we have considered the maturity of the Cadets, and general experience and attitude over a tick box minimum expectation.
so why apply the same to CFAVs?
(the issue being is, how do we consider such factors. for the Cadets we promote based on space available as every 2-3 years the SNCO team renews through the natural process of Cadets aging out. CFAV don’t have that same frequency of turnover, many sticking around for 20-30 years.
promoting CFAVs in the same manner as Cadets would require a more structured approach and limit the number of WO/FS/Sgts each unit had based on the CFAV team size.
a friend of mine has always been keen with the idea of introducing the Chief Tech rank into the SNCO structure.
it allows a SNCO who only has interest in one area (be that shooting, fieldcraft, First Aid, Radio, or whatever) to be recongised as a “specialist” without having to tick boxes of the matrix they have no interest in.
I like this idea, and recognise a few Sgts who this could apply to. Keen to be in uniform but who have no interest in promotion, happy in their own specialist bubble, acting as a SME on a Squadron or Wing level.
dealing with volunteers it is a challenge and the ideal case would be to have more rigid TORs for each rank and thus create a known role for each person within their rank (much like in the RAF, Sgts do X roles, FS do Y roles, WOs are responsible for Z).
but as volunteers it is so hard to create a rigid format. some attend once a week, others twice, some on a rotation that suits their work shifts or family life and so difficult to rely on Sgt Bloggs to do X role when they are travelling on business (their 9-5 job) for two weeks.
as such the mix between SNCOs and Officers is far more blurred with the CFAVs which the RAF and HQAC struggle with.
in the half dozen Sqns I have been on, none have rigidly set roles by rank, or even flavour of uniform, with the exception to “command” is by an officer and ceremonial/drill stuff by the SNCOs. the rest is whoever is best placed through available time, competence, eagerness or personal interest to pick it up.
on one unit the “Sqn Aviation Officer” could be a Sgt who works for himself as a tradesperson and happy to take the Cadets to AEF and VGS when the dates come around, be it weekend or weekday having the freedom to do it.
At another it could be a Flt Lt, who is also a commercial airline pilot and can work their shifts around the need to be available for midweek slots.
(the latter example was true for one unit I have been on)
the ability of both could be matched, yet the piece of cloth on their should implies much more difference.
i think this is very true.
with an RBL hat on, people can dip in and out of Branch Committee roles as they please. being free of rank their is no expectation that the person who is X role will take on Y when the Chair person steps down, there isn’t the same “natural” sucession of everyone moving up one.
a Poppy Appeal Organiser (sorting out the selling of poppies and supplying wreaths) could do the role for 5 years and then decide it is getting too much and step back to “general committee member” and it is straightforward.
The same is true for Branch Chairperson. indeed most County Chairs are on a 3-year rotation (although my branch’s previous Chair was in place for 30 years!)
but in that volunteer environment there is opportunity to step up and down. there isn’t that culture with the ATC as demotion is a bad sign
This could be an argument for having people climb and peak at sgt as a sign of competence and experience, with just FS for key unit admin roles and CFC for command.
That way, everyone with experience would be recognised as such as a sgt without it flooding the organisation with WOs (and everyone would understand that they were ranks held alongside a particular post, adding to their authority while holding said post).
With all that reach from leveraging the NCO ranks, your need for CFCs could be heavily restricted, even using NCO ranks at wing as the standard (save perhaps your threat to life activity leads and key leadership).
Then you don’t have to worry as much about an organisation flooded with officers no longer holding those key leadership roles, as you’ve already nudged the split back in favour of the NCO ranks.
Edit: I feel like the ACF lean into their NCO ranks much more too, with officers typically kicking in at company level (or sometimes a JO leading a det, but certainly not “normally”).
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I don’t think this is quite the case as local 2lt & lt are expected to lead detachments. It’s just the reality is that the ACF don’t have the personnel anymore.
I think they have also abolished PI with new staff becoming SIs within a couple of months if that.
Sea cadets are an interesting one as PO is the default except ex-cadets becoming Midshipmen.
But their CPO & WO is more work than becoming a S/Lt so a lot of people either stay as POs including Unit ICs or commission.
A SCC WO is as rare as hens teeth.
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Seems to be the case - with Coy led by a Major and a Cpt as training officer (and usually a CSM too). Not sure if they are scaled for more officers but I’ve seen more floating around locally at Coy level.
Operationally too detachments are (nominally) smaller than Squadrons so it makes sense, plus they have the paid CAAs to cover a lot of the work we ask CFAV to do.
Being able to take 18 year olds as CFAV helps with the NCO pipeline. I’ve seen 18 y/o PIs, Sgts and even one who was running a Detachment before they turned 19, but I’ve not seen an ACF officer that young.
I ran a detachment as an SI (that’s sergeant instructor in this case, not service instructor) while I was a student at 19 or 20. We also had 2Lts who were students and our CAA was a Lt in her early 20s for a while (until an ex-regular WO2 took over).
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I’m hoping it’s an AI that put pilot wings on Ava’s sleeve and not someone who should know better.
I’m looking at this and thinkg that this might actually not be AI, just someone who doesn’t know flight suits as I think I’m seeing Wings on Dash’s sleve as well and AI tends not to include at hints of things 90% out of view but that is a white mark with a black border coming to a point like the other wing on the sleeve.
I think they’re banking on anyone older than the target audience looking at it for 1/2 a second and going “nope, not for me thank you very much!”