Walden University - EDUC 6145 Week 2 - Post Mortem Review
Background
While serving in the United States Navy I was assigned for 6 months to do maintenance on fire fighting and safety equipment for my division. The position is titled Damage Control Petty Officer. The position is rotated between junior enlisted people during the year. The work entails making sure doors on board the ship are watertight, battle lanterns have fresh batteries, fire fighting stations are inspected for discrepancies, and all lights in passageways (hallways) leading directly to outside the ship are turned from white lights to red lights at sunset. The lights are changed in color so the white light does not give the position of the ship away at night when a door leading to an outdoor deck is opened while at sea.
Events
The number of pieces of equipment were outside the ability of a single person to work on. I complained to the Division Office. The office assigned me to train everyone in the division to do the work so at any time the work was outside my ability to complete would be completed by a helper. The training took a long time and documenting the training took up extra hours from an already filled schedule. The project worked in part and failed in part.
Some of the men did not want to do maintenance on fire fighting equipment or extra work outside their normal work load.
The following occurred:
1. Two technicians smeared watertight putty all over a door while pretending they completed making sure the door was water tight. That smearing was vandalism of military property and waste of government resources. Nothing in the instructions for the door maintenance required smearing the putty all over the door.
2. One technician kept giving me excuses why he could not complete his signed work So that I would have to keep walking back to this work center multiple times to find out the status of the work. One day while I was inspecting a ladder the technician stood by while his subordinate yelled at me that he did not do that type of work. The subordinate used obscene words in his discussion.
The norm for the job I had was for prior technicians to simply falsify the paperwork claiming the maintenance was done when in many cases not done. I refused to falsify the paperwork. Finally, several weeks went by and a supervisor told me the instructional material could no longer be used in unofficial paper copy form (Greer, 2010, p. 9). So the project ended. If the technician did not have an official copy of the instructions he could not do the work. Because there were only two copies of official paperwork for use and one for backup only one person could do the work at a time
What did I learn?
1. I faced a labor dispute by 5 out of 15 technicians.
2 The time to train others could have been used to just do the work myself.
3. The real problem was senior officers and senior enlisted using junior enlisted technicians to attempt to do more work than manpower availability allowed (Walden University, LLC., n.d.).
4. Junior enlisted needed an attorney on board representing them to stop the abuse.
I am reminded of the words of Gardner and Allen (2021):
"Preparing people in organizations with the right knowledge and skills to identify, respond, and overcome challenges faced by disruptions due to globalization, competition, or pandemics can help organizations adapt more quickly" (p. 1).
Preparing to do the work is as important as doing the work.
References
Gardner, J. & Allen, S. (2021). Project Management Competencies in Instructional Design.
Online Journal of Distance Learning Administration. 24(2).
https://ojdla.com/articles/project-management-competencies-in-instructional-design
Greer, M. (2010). The project management minimalist: Just enough PM to rock your projects!
(Laureate custom ed.). Walden University Canvas.
https://waldenu.instructure.com
Walden University, LLC. (Executive Producer). (n.d.). Project management and instructional
design [Video file]. Retrieved from https://waldenu.instructure.com
Hello Christopher, and thank you for sharing your post mortem review. I can see how this project could cause frustration. It is unfortunate it was expected of you to falsify paperwork, and not properly do the job. This sounds like a hazard and like it could lead to legal complications. I think it is great you took it upon yourself to train others in ensuring this job was completed in a standardized way. However, the "buy-in" was not there, which is no fault of your own. Was this project ever revisited with more success?
ReplyDeleteHello Kari,
DeleteFor some time this year I did not understand what the word "gaslighting" was. I looked it up several months ago. Gaslighting occurs when one person tries to make another person appear to be the cause of wrong or doing something wrong or belittling the person in an important matter. I did not realize in my 20s that the technicians who did not buy into the project were gaslighting me. Trying to make it seem I was doing something wrong by instructing them on how to do the maintenance, assigning them to do the maintenance, and document with their names the maintenance being done. What I faced was a labor strike hidden inside ugly behavior. I many times wish I had a higher rank so I could have held each person who was abusive accountable.
Christopher
Hi Christopher- I really enjoyed your post-mortem review! Your experience as a Damage Control Petty Officer highlights complex challenges in task delegation, accountability, and resource constraints. I appreciate your candidness about the obstacles, especially concerning labor issues and the cultural expectation to cut corners. Your commitment to documenting maintenance accurately shows strong integrity and dedication to quality—key traits in project management.
ReplyDeleteI particularly agree with your emphasis on proper preparation, as mentioned in your Gardner and Allen reference. Training and skill-building are crucial for effective teamwork, especially in safety-critical roles. Your point about the need for legal support for junior enlisted members is also vital, addressing systemic issues that can impact morale and project success.
Thank you for sharing!
- Amanda N.
Hi Amanda, You wrote "... impact morale … ". The top 3 reasons people leave the military is the lifestyle is harsh. The second reason is the impact on morale of people when the wrong supervisors and coworkers control the situation. People leave rather than suffer the same abuse emptying our ranks of sometimes not always better people. The third reason people leave is to pursue better opportunities. Christopher
Delete