I've had a rough time transitioning from a worker who works to a supervisor who supervises. There are parts of it that I can do fine; I can usually keep people pretty busy, even when it's slow. I can answer most job related questions that folks ask, or I'll know who to turn to if I don't know.
Unfortunately when it's busy, or when an exceptionally difficult task [for a young airman] comes up that an old fart like myself could handle easily, I want to roll up my sleeves and join the fun. Grrrrrr! I need one of those electric dog collars that shocks me when I get try jump in and accomplish something that I should be tasking a young airman to fail miserably at. And by failing miserably, I mean in the crawl-walk-run sense. After all, some old sarge at my first assignment tossed me into the fire, allowing me to screw something up royally for the first few times, until finally after much perserverance I had the necessary skills and knowledge to git 'r done.
But that isn't the part of the job that I hate. Freaking paperwork. If I could clear cut the Amazon rainforests solely for the purpose of denying the U.S. Air Force the necessary raw materials they need to produce the endless forms I must continuously fill out, I'd invent some fuel efficient hybrid-electric bulldozer. Hey, if I'm gonna wipe out a gazillion species of life, I might as well make a minor concession to the hippie-types, right? Eh, maybe not. Make it a diesel.
The part of being a Sergeant that I do like is quarterbacking a crisis. When something big is happening, I enjoy the atmosphere and the sense of urgency. I love seeing training and mentoring pay off; a skill that an airman has developed playing a critical role in accomplishing the mission.
Unfortunately, getting to that point requires 1.3 acres of dead trees to document training and perform feedback sessions, not to mention the write-up to make sure the leadership acknowledges the airman's performance.
Maybe that's why I tend to give them time off from work.
Where's so-and-so?
He [or she] is off today.
Why?
Because he [or she] busted his [or her] butt for the past four weeks.
No paperwork required.
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