Corps ASM
An Update Nine Months In WO1(CASM) Daniel McNeil is a third of the way through his tenure as the Corps’s Senior Soldier. This month he provides an update on what he’s working towards at the moment.
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hope all of you, your fellow Soldiers and those dearest to you are keeping well through these very challenging times. It is an absolute privilege to have been asked to write in The Craftsman as the Corps’s Senior Soldier and something I certainly never thought I’d be doing 20 years ago as I walked through the gates of the Army Training Regiment Pirbright. I have been Corps Artificer Sergeant Major now for a little over nine months and it has been a hugely rewarding and often very humbling experience. I didn’t realise the scale and complexity of the work that occurs in the small team that is the Regimental Headquarters when I came into the role, but I certainly do now. The REME Skills Review is one of the Corps’ biggest projects right now; at its heart is the belief that we have top class REME engineers and technicians, but we need to move forward to ensure that we provide our people with the right skills to realise the opportunities offered in an Army that is changing quickly. The Skills Review’s intent is to highlight that, by regrouping, upskilling and/or reskilling, we have the opportunity to address an emerging capability gap before it impacts on our ability to support an Army that is undergoing modernisation and transformation at pace. Over the initial third of my tenure, I have focused on getting after a few things that were important to the RSMs, ASMs and SSMs when I asked for their input during the respective WO1 Forums held at Lyneham very early in my tenure. The common threads from all of these cohorts were: that we needed to communicate a bit better than we were doing across the Corps; our trade training has got to improve to better reflect the needs of the Field Army we serve; we needed to improve on how we welcome our Soldiers into REME. I believe we are making progress on all fronts thanks to the efforts of
The Corps ASM, WO1(CASM) Daniel McNeil the RHQ, our Trade Champions, the MTI Champion and the newly announced Recruiting Champion. Keep an eye out for some notices advertising some of this good work in The Craftsman Magazine very soon. The Corps Colonel has also pushed me hard over the last few months to have a look at our Mental Health Plan and how we can better support OPSMART, which went to full operating capacity in Nov 2020. Our new plan for 2021, aptly titled ‘Lifting the Decks’, will shortly be released to Commanders across our Battalions, Workshops, LADs and organisations. You may have already signed up for the ‘Lifting the Decks Virtual 10K’ which is part of our push to advertise the plan’s release, get people out exercising and even earn a medal for your troubles: a healthy body = a healthy mind. The tenpoint plan will provide Commanders with a simple toolkit to use as, how and when they see fit. It isn’t a tick box exercise - just a few helpful suggestions, strategies and available courses to ensure that we are all prepared to assist when that person chooses us to confide in that they are not doing ok.
“Trust them and delegate more to them – they will deliver.” The recently appointed Recruitment Champion, WO2(AQMS) Gary Hooson
8 craftsmaneditor@reme-rhq.org.uk
I have now visited over 40 REME units and the common takeaway from everywhere I’ve been is that our Soldiers are impressive people and the ethos of ‘Soldier first, tradesman always’ is clearly as true today as it was in 1942. I was in the North West of England recently and was fortunate enough to spend some time with troops from 1
