Advice if possible

So you all know I volunteer with the Army Cadets.

My immediate superior (who is the company training officer) has put me through a number of courses he thought I was ready for and sure enough I have passed them. However, we have a new Company Sgt Major who is ex-regular (ie a retired soldier) and I thought he and I got on fine and he didn't have a problem with me.

Tonight my superior (the training officer) tells me that at the last weekend where I was running the range there had been a problem with the scoring on the shooting. Apparently the cadets I was testing were supposed to have been tested on a different length of range in order to pass their test. I was not told this, I was told to run them through the test on the 25 metre range. So I did that. There were no safety issues, there was no problems, I was told I was clear and concise and the kids all knew what they needed to do.

My Company Commander was there, two adults who are both experienced on ranges were there and none of them had a problem with the way it was run, or with the tests.

The Company Sgt Major claims I am incompetent and apparently is up for weeding out the weaker adults and sacking them...I'm one of the ones in his sights. He claims I was incompetent cause I run the tests wrong.

The problem is I was told this in confidence, so I can't go to anyone with it at the moment. I've been told not to worry but to be honest I can't help it, my new Detachment Commander (that's my new immediate superior) has said that he has never heard anyone else have a problem with my work and not to worry but....it's knocked my confidence and it's not great as it is.

I'm just at a loss, I'm seriously tempted to say sod it and quit but at the same time I don't want to let this guy win. I want to be able to prove him wrong. I know I have problems remembering stuff, so I have paperwork coming out of my ears when I go to a weekend. I'm rubbish at map and compass work cause I just don't get it, I can do admin...not a problem but I just don't know how else to make myself better at these lessons.

Any ideas or should I just ignore him and do my best as usual?

Sorry this is so long.

A little tip for the specific issue(s) you name.

Ensure you create a scheme of work/lesson plan which will clearly identify

Where
What
When
How
Why
Who
Which

of the activity

If you do this and submit it to your "line manager" they will have an opportunity to identify any anomalies BEFORE the event and thus you will be protected from any accusation of incompetence.

I find formal lesson planning is a useful tool even for quite "trivial" things as an "aide memoire" .

The other tool I would use would be asking for feedback from both students and others as you would after providing a course in order to identify areas of improvement.

Approaching your activities in this way will

a) demonstrate professionalism
b) enable you to concentrate on the technical issues at hand rather than the individual personalities involved

We all have to work with people with whom we may have differences of opinions and my approach is always "how can I develop a relationship with this individual" and look on it as a "personal development" challenge!

HTH

Oh hon....... make sure you have some kind of proof that what you were doing was exactly what was required.... if you do that, the guy won't have a leg to stand on..

x0x

I have a risk assessment which shows what the point of the shoot was. Also the general orders for that weekend which also show that there was a shooting test to be performed even though it was the wrong length of range.

Even the Company Commander was happy with the way it was run, or if he wasn't happy he didn't tell me he wasn't happy with it.

I was at the point of last night handing in my kit cause I can do without the bullpoo politics. However, at the same time I don't want to cause I do enjoy cadets, I know I need to prepare more so going to ask hubby to let me rehearse lessons on him, see if that helps, make more lists of kit I will need to have ready and so on.

Thanks for the advice, I've got next weeks plan organised and I'm going to practice it till I have it in my head and don't have to rely on sheets.

At a time when fewer and fewer adults are willing to help out in such organisations you'd think he'd be a wee bit keener to keep everyone happy! My daughter has just quit cadets as she didn't like the new CO, such a pity after 3 years. I would advise you to stick it out if you can, try and get your OH to help out with the skills you need to work on and don't let the booger win

Our OC is lovely, very dry sense of humour

I keep telling myself if he had a problem with the testing or with the way I ran the range he would have told me cause he's not shy that way. The only time he took me aside was to tell me that I'm doing the safety precautions too often and that's not a bad thing just a bit of a waste of time.

Also if there was a major problem with anything I was doing I would have been told by now and there would be no bones about it either. The adults I spoke to last night, one my old detachment commander who I've worked with for the last two years and my new detachment commander (worked with him on and off over the last two years), neither of them said there was a problem, the new guy said he's never heard any adult complain about me...they know I can be scatterbrained sometimes and I have a memory like a sieve...so I'm likely to have lists coming out of my ears but they don't have a problem with my work.

OH knows I've worked my backside off to overcome all the problems I've had so he's more than supportive...I think he may get to know more about cadets this way though

slightly different, but I worked for a firm for 10 years and was highly regarded. MD retired and his son took over. Life became unbearable and I eventually left.

Sometimes it's nothing you do that is wrong, just that new brushes tend to want to sweep clean.

What I'm trying to say is don't beat yourself up about it wondering what you are doing wrong because sometimes, just sometimes you are doing nothing wrong at all