Reservist

ISS1 2015

Reservist Magazine is the award-winning official publication of the United States Coast Guard Reserve. Quarterly issues include news and feature articles about the men and women who comprise America's premier national maritime safety and security

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paC polish: My eyes opened in advance of my phone's alarm clock. Staring at the shadows on the ceiling, I contemplated my options. Do I get out of bed and disturb the pre-dawn stillness around me? Or do I allow the nervous energy that had been gradually building for three days to take over and kick me out of bed? Recognizing that going back to bed would be futile, I threw on some sweats without turning on the light, splashed cold water on my face in the sink across the hall, and made my way down the hill to Two Rock Coffee Company as the doors opened for the day. A pleasant woman eagerly greeted me as if she had been awaiting my arrival. "You must be part of the new Reserve class that arrived last night," she said. How could she know this? In my pre-caffeinated state, I mumbled my order and attempted to thank the woman as she continued to welcome me. Making my way back up the hill toward the barracks, the realization that I was actually attending Chief Petty Officer Academy (CPOA) at Training Center Petaluma was starting to hit me. On Friday I didn't have orders or more than an inkling of what CPOA entailed. Yet here I was as a last-minute addition to the Reserve Class 36 roster, early on a Monday morning, mentally preparing for the two weeks that would eventually become among the most fulfilling of my Coast Guard career. paC Masson: I woke up early, too, but that shouldn't be surprising — my brain was still on Ann Arbor time. This isn't to say I, too, didn't immediately stumble down to the Two Rock for a quick blast of caffeine. Why didn't I remember to pack a coffee maker? First day of class: paC polish: Functioning as a traffic cop of sorts, an instructor opened the theater doors and ferried me to one of three "liaisons" standing behind a glass display case. A confident and impeccably uniformed chief searched for my name on the list before him then said, "You're on my team, which is the yellow team." I didn't know what any of this meant yet, but I had my first taste of the academy. Eventually, I would come to learn that teams comprise a group of students that would work together on challenges and projects. Additionally, the chief who provided the team information was not only one of our instructors, but my team's primary conduit—or liaison—to the academy. Making my way into the theater all I wanted to do was to meet more of my classmates. I worked my way down one of the aisles as if I were taking part in a conversational receiving line, hoping to find out as much as I could about people's backgrounds, civilian careers, units and hometowns. paC Masson: One of the more interesting observations made later by BMCM William Lindsay, the CPOA school chief, was the marked difference between how reservists interact during this initial meeting in the auditorium, as compared to their active duty counterparts. The active duty members tend to settle in and wait for the program to begin, he said, while the reservists spend more time introducing themselves and talking about what they do in the civilian world. He attributed part of the difference to reservists' experience at figuring out each others' strengths when they're unexpectedly gathered together for events like deployments. a vision of leadership excellence story by paC John Masson and paC Rachel polish BMCM William Lindsay, the energetic school chief at the Chief Petty Officer Academy in Petaluma, has some definite goals for the school he leads. "My vision for the Chiefs' Academy is to be the premier leadership academy of any service," he says. "It starts with the us. We are such a small service that we need to be operating at top efficiency." That doesn't mean that new chiefs who have the Chiefs' Academy on their training "to-do" list —which is to say all of them, as the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard Steve Cantrell has made amply clear — need to be overly anxious about what awaits them. Lindsay talks a lot about leading with heart, and kicks off each class, active and Reserve, by telling students that they will leave school with the skills and knowledge they need to more effectively lead their crews. And that may be even truer for reservists. "The level of experience that a reservist brings is what makes a Reserve class different," Lindsay says. "We're talking about a whole plethora of outside world experience. This isn't just the Coast Guard. This is the civilian sector, as well. Reservists are bringing in that real-world experience." The vast majority will also have a universally positive experience while they're at Chiefs' Academy. That was certainly the case for BMC Pat Howerton, who graduated this summer with Reserve Class 36. "It was a great opportunity for a lot of chiefs to get together and share their experiences and what's going on in their neck of the woods," says Howerton, whose civilian job is with Customs and Border Protection and who serves as Senior Enlisted Reserve Advisor at Station Marblehead, Ohio. "You find out we're all experiencing the same things. You find out quite quickly that there aren't really any isolated issues." For Howerton, the secret of the Chiefs' Academy was how the course somehow finds a way to take nearly all students out of their comfort zones. "You came to rely on your classmates to help you through it, whether it was the ropes course, building the PowerPoint presentation, or preparing the speeches we all had to give," he says. "That helps develop that camaraderie. That camaraderie, that teamwork that helps you come together as a chief's mess." For the reservists, that sometimes means good-natured ribbing on such Chiefs' Academy staples as the high ropes. Firefighters might remind their law enforcement classmates: "Hey, you climb that ladder like a cop!" And then immediately line up to shout encouragement while the classmate successfully overcomes the obstacle. Lindsay says such mutual encouragement is exactly the point. "To see a group of chiefs from all around the country starting to learn more about who they are on day one, then seeing the bonds they develop during their time here is incredible," Lindsay says. "We don't want you to come to a two-week school. We want you to come to a two-week 24 RESERVIST � Issue 1 • 2015

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