Examining the Development and Selection Process for Senior Enlisted Personnel in the U.S. Navy

Abstract : Over the last several years the Task Force Excel Performance Vector Research Team (PVRT) has been working on developing scientifically-based tools to support Navy efforts to re-engineer performance management, performance appraisal, and advancement programs. During Fiscal Year 2002, the PVRT successfully developed a new performance management and appraisal system for all supervisory and non-supervisory personnel in the U. S. Navy (Hedge, Borman, Bruskiewicz, & Bourne, 2002). That effort was followed by development of new Flag Fitness performance dimensions and Executive Mentoring products designed to support senior Navy leadership. The PVRT is also involved in preliminary activities to examine the Navy's current advancement system, and recommend ways to enhance the system by emphasizing factors most predictive of career advancement (Borman, Hedge, Bruskiewicz & Bourne, 2003; Hedge, Bruskiewicz, Borman, & Bourne, 2004). These activities are an important part of the Navy's strategic human capital management transformation, and reflect the Navy's drive to adopt a systematic and comprehensive approach to their most important asset --their people. Because there is an obvious link between personnel quality and operational readiness, an organization's approach to strategic human capital management must be judged by how well that vision, strategy, and process help the organization achieve results and pursue its mission. For the Navy, people are an indispensable element in mission accomplishment. They not only play a critical role in determining the organization's performance capabilities, but they also represent its institutional knowledge base and help define its culture.