Learn from My Mistakes: What I Wish I Knew Before Becoming A Lieutenant

摘要

I believe the Army does not prepare its junior leaders for what they will face when they arrive at their first duty station. This means that most of what you need to learn becomes on-the-job training/learning. With that in mind, there were a lot of things I wish I would have known prior to arriving at my first duty station at Fort Bliss, TX. I started learning what I still needed to know when I first became a platoon leader. I conducted platoon- and company-level field-training exercises and multiple live-fire exercises where I actually learned how to maneuver a platoon-sized element as part of company operations in the unforgiving deserts of New Mexico. I also participated in a National Training Center rotation prior to a nine-month rotational deployment to Camp Humphreys, Republic of Korea (RoK). I learned a lot, but I wish I had known more at the beginning.