Military Review English Edition March-April 2014 | Page 37

JUNIOR OFFICER DEVELOPMENT
rates, and some environments offer greater learning
opportunities. In any case, relevant job experience
is normally considered essential for placement into
positions of management or leadership within most
civilian organizations. The Army is no different in
this case, with the well-known exception of junior
officer selection: based on education attained and
training received, the Army places individuals from
civilian life into military leadership positions at the
middle point in the organizational rank hierarchy
and pay scale. These individuals become the Army’s

Of the three pillars of Army
leader development, experience,
defined by the current ALDS
as “the continuous progression
of personal and professional
events,” may be the most elusive
to quantify.

junior officers and platoon-level leaders. Prior
military experience is not required. While some
of these junior officers may have prior enlisted
and possibly combat experience before commissioning, this is the exception, not the rule—and
not a prerequisite.
In this officer-commissioning model, two of
the three pillars of Army leader development
(education and training) are governed by service
requirements prior to implementation, but the
third (experience) is incompletely addressed. The
Army has experimented with pre-implementation
experiential leader training through the Basic
Officer Leader Course, Phase II (BOLC II), a
six-week, branch-immaterial leadership course for
newly commissioned officers that ran from 2006
until it was discontinued in December, 2009.7
Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, then-deputy commanding general of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine
Command for Initial Military Training, explained
the elimination of BOLC II by saying that units
MILITARY REVIEW

March-April 2014

needed junior officers sooner, and cutting out
BOLC II seemed the most expedient solution.8
While BOLC II may or may not have provided
junior officers the opportunity to gain organizational experience prior to implementation as
direct-level leaders, its cancellation—or merger
into the current BOLC B, which is similar in
length and scope to the pre-BOLC officer basic
courses—created a void of any proposed experiential preparation for the Army’s junior officers.
This suggests a simple leader development imbalance at the career start point of our most junior
officers.

Where Experience is Needed
Most
Doctrinally, the Army’s approach to developing
experience in junior officers is through on-the-job
training. The current edition of Department of the
Army Pamphlet 600-3, Commissioned Officer
Professional Development and Career Management, published in 2010, states “troop units” are
“where officers begin to develop their leadership
skills…Troop leadership is the best means to
become educated in Army operations and builds
a solid foundation for future service.”9
While learning on the job is essential and