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Old 09-05-2017, 14:01   #10
HardRoad
Quiet Professional
 
Join Date: Oct 2007
Location: Georgia, Florida and North Carolina (its complicated)
Posts: 92
G2G advice - FWIW 2

If and when you do get to a team, if you're still interested in the commission route, some things to think about:

I'd urge you not to make a final decision on whether to go for a commission until you've been around a while and can talk over a couple of things with yourself (and maybe your mentors.) If and when you do get to a team, you need to look at your team sergeant, your warrant and your peers, and honestly assess whether you have what it takes to lead men of that caliber well.

Also, that’s when you have to decide what you want to do with your life - the best piece of advice I ever heard on the enlisted / warrant vs. commission route was "You have to decide what you want to look back on when your military career is over. Do you want to have been a shooter and a doer, or someone who managed the shooting and doing?"

That's a deeper question than it seems - and not only because managing pays better in the long run. A senior NCO or warrant in SF may have developed a lot of informal (referent and knowledge) power over their career, but they're not going to be making the final decision when it comes to the force - that's for senior officers. A lot of junior officers and NCOs will look at a given situation and say "the Regiment should do that better", but only the officer will ever eventually be in a position to really do anything about it.
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