MISSION REPORT: FORT FUBAR
(CLASSIFICATION: TRIPLE STAMP CLASSIFIED)
SITREP: Train to Time, Not to Standard
Did you even read my article title? What sort of “cotton headed ninny muggings” would say such a thing? Of course we must train to the standard. After all, the Army defines a standard as “the way things should be.”
As a company commander I noticed that my unit was “training to the standard.” Notice those quotation marks. On the training schedule, we had one hour blocked off for individual movement techniques (low crawl, high crawl, 3-5 second buddy rush, etc.). What I witnessed was each of the soldiers doing the technique once or twice, and then taking a long break, smokin’ and jokin’ stating that they had “trained to the standard” by completing one or two repetitions of the exercise.
When Steph Curry practices free throws, he doesn’t shoot until he makes one and then stop. That would technically be achieving the standard. The standard was to make a free throw. Of course he doesn’t stop at one made free throw! He practices until his technique is perfect! So how did I remedy our “train to standard” problem? I made my unit train to time. If we had individual movement techniques scheduled for one hour, then by God, we were going to low crawl, high crawl, and 3-5 second buddy rush for one hour! And this sort of repetition is what turned my company around.
Nothing builds proficiency like, repetition and rehearsals. Every mission should be rehearsed. Every Army Warrior Task should be repeated, repeated, repeated until it becomes second nature. I especially see this with young officers. The tendency to assume that because they practiced something a few times, that they have it down pat. Our LTs maybe get two Annual Trainings worth of actually leading soldiers. Our BN commanders may get one AT or JRTC/NTC rotation where they get to maneuver their companies. And more egregious is the fact that our BDE commanders may never get an opportunity to actually maneuver troops until they deploy (as often we don’t train at BDE echelon). This makes getting repetitions in for leaders even more important! How can we expect our leaders to be proficient if they don’t ever get reps maneuvering their units?
Growing up in the army I often saw that we let those who were our weaker performers get more reps at leading. This was to make them better and get them up to speed. But we did this at the peril of not letting our more stellar performers get reps. It’s perhaps more important that your superstars (who are your actual leaders) get reps, verses those who may never actually lead in the first place. But I digress…
We’ve all heard that practice makes perfect. Some take that saying further to say, “perfect practice makes perfect.” Amateurs practice till they get it right, but professionals practice till they can’t get it wrong. And we in the Army are professionals. We are paid to train to fight and win. Enforcing the timeline and ensuring your troops are maximining every available second of training time is the best way to ensure your units are ready to fight.
So how do you implement this “train to time” thing? To take this TTP further, as a leader (specifically at the company level) you should be providing your subordinates with a detailed timeline and require that your subordinates in turn have a detailed timeline of their training that maximizes every second. This timeline should be published well in advance (think 180 days), discussed (aka training meeting), and resourced. This timeline should also be posted in common area for all to see (most notably your soldiers who will execute it). This helps with expectation management and good communication.
Just like completing a yearly training calendar, you start by putting all of the months up on a white board. Then fill in the location where you will be training and how many MUTAs each month will be. Follow that up by inserting all of the mandatory training for each month (PHA, IWQ, SRP, etc.). Once that’s on the board, you begin to build your plan. Break down the four quarters of the year labeling quarter one (Q1) as crawl, quarter two (Q2) as walk, quarter three (Q3) as run, and quarter four (Q4) as assess and retrain.
In Q1 you should be doing individual tasks that build proficiency toward collective training. In Q2 you should be doing team and squad level missions that are accomplishing collective tasks. In Q3 you should be doing platoon and company level missions that accomplish your BN METs. This will culminate at your Annual Training. Once you evaluate how well your unit did at each echelon, meaning you analyzed their proficiency at individual and collective tasks, you will then use the remaining months of Q4 to work on the areas in which you determined your unit was weak.
For each of these months, you will create a “by the hour” timeline of what training will be done and how long you will spend training each task (the length is subjective based on your leaders’ experience on how long they need to train that task). Warning: this takes a lot of work upfront. However, once it’s done, your plan is on auto pilot and makes everyone’s life so much easier! You will be leaps and bounds ahead of your peers if you do this method. And then next year, you repeat the process! The only difference is you should have new guidance from your commander on what training (or METs) they want to see emphasized.
Now you have trained to time! You have a lethal force that has repeated over and over the individual and collective tasks that ensure they are combat ready. You have planned so far in advance, that resourcing is a breeze, and everyone has sufficient time to prepare because they knew the plan 6 months ahead of time. Remember that training to time means maximizing repetitions and rehearsals. It means squeezing every available drop out of the limited time you are given to train. So get out there, train your troops, and let ‘em know it’s not over till the timeline says it’s over.
“You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.” — Charles Buxton
Love this article? Great! Let me know and I’ll produce more. Hate this article? Well, it’s probably ‘cause you just want to smoke and joke instead of train like a real warrior. Why don’t you go ahead, respond, and let me know why I am wrong.
*This article was written by FUBAR 6. All opinions expressed in this article are that of the author. This article is not endorsed by the Department of Defense, the United States Army, or any other state or government agency. Comments to the author can be submitted below.
If you’re Infantry and in the National Guard, here is your training plan for every year. You’re welcome…
