# Which Navy NCM Trade is Best?



## Timmy449 (17 Feb 2021)

I am strongly considering a re muster to the Navy, possibly looking at NCI OP or NES OP.
I was wondering if anyone had any input on the pros and cons to each trade or even some other trades I haven't mentioned.
Also, I am a very poor academic student. Will the trade courses pose a challenge for me?


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## Furniture (10 Mar 2021)

Why not Met Tech? You get to sail with the RCN, but aren't trapped in the OPs room, and you also get to spend time with the artillery, and the Air Force. 

You might be surprised by how much your academics improve when it's your job. I was a straight 50-60% student in High School, and have managed to do very well for myself as a weather forecaster and inspector in the Met Trade.


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## Timmy449 (10 Mar 2021)

Thanks for the response, I currently work in ATC so I have a very good idea of the Met tech position. It definitely seems like a decent trade for sure, my concern would be ending up on a airbase, it seems kind of similar to what I do now, I am just looking for a bit more excitement.
Do you generally get a say in which element you serve with, or do you go straight to where your needed?


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## Furniture (11 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> Thanks for the response, I currently work in ATC so I have a very good idea of the Met tech position. It definitely seems like a decent trade for sure, my concern would be ending up on a airbase, it seems kind of similar to what I do now, I am just looking for a bit more excitement.
> Do you generally get a say in which element you serve with, or do you go straight to where your needed?


You get sent where needed, and the first couple of years are generally on an airfield. That said, it can be 2-5 years of that, then sailing on a ship if you want to, when you get your forecaster course as a Cpl/MCpl. Sailign has been the highlight of my career, so I definitely am not trying to steer you away from the navy, just wanted to present another option. 

There is also the opportunity to go to one of the Artillery units, where you get to do the fun army stuff for a few years before bouncing to another place/element.


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## dimsum (11 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> Thanks for the response, I currently work in ATC so I have a very good idea of the Met tech position. It definitely seems like a decent trade for sure, my concern would be ending up on a airbase, it seems kind of similar to what I do now, I am just looking for a bit more excitement.
> Do you generally get a say in which element you serve with, or do you go straight to where your needed?


Re:  Your concern about ending up on an airbase.

Is it because of location (ie. you want to be in a bigger place like Hfx/Esq), or you don't want to do any of the trades that are found in an airbase?


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## Timmy449 (11 Mar 2021)

Furniture said:


> You get sent where needed, and the first couple of years are generally on an airfield. That said, it can be 2-5 years of that, then sailing on a ship if you want to, when you get your forecaster course as a Cpl/MCpl. Sailign has been the highlight of my career, so I definitely am not trying to steer you away from the navy, just wanted to present another option.
> 
> There is also the opportunity to go to one of the Artillery units, where you get to do the fun army stuff for a few years before bouncing to another place/element.



Okay, that sounds like a pretty cool career and you have really enjoyed it. I also see the trade is very in demand right now. I will defiantly look into it. Thanks.


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## Timmy449 (11 Mar 2021)

dimsum said:


> Re:  Your concern about ending up on an airbase.
> 
> Is it because of location (ie. you want to be in a bigger place like Hfx/Esq), or you don't want to do any of the trades that are found in an airbase?


Not necessary, I mean it is not ideal for me personally to be posted to places Cold Lake or Greenwood, Navy posting locations are pretty good IMO, but it is more the day to day and travel involved with sailing I find appealing.


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## dimsum (11 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> Not necessary, I mean it is not ideal for me personally to be posted to places Cold Lake or Greenwood, Navy posting locations are pretty good IMO, but it is more the day to day and travel involved with sailing I find appealing.


Ok.  Have you considered AESOp then?  There's a chance for Greenwood but there's a ton of travel.  And hotels are nicer in LRP, but if you really want the ship experience there's MH.


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## medicineman (11 Mar 2021)

Given the folks I used to work with, I'm going to go with Clearance Diver.


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## Timmy449 (12 Mar 2021)

Yes AESOps definitely have a good go, have considered it for a while. A difficult QL3 from what I understand.


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## Timmy449 (12 Mar 2021)

medicineman said:


> Given the folks I used to work with, I'm going to go with Clearance Diver.


Clearance Divers do some really cool stuff for sure, from what I understand you need to be in pretty good shape for the job too.


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## Ping Monkey (12 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> Yes AESOps definitely have a good go, have considered it for a while. A difficult QL3 from what I understand.


+1 for AES Op. 👍

Handsdown, the best career move I ever made.  I regret not being able to remuster from the Navy to AES Op earlier (stoopid VOT restrictions... ).

If selected as a CH148 AES Op, you'll probably get more sea-time than most sailors too.

I'm too far removed from the trade to offer any relevant QL3 advice, but there's a couple of AES Ops on this site who can give you the inside scoop on QL3.  Even if you're only considering it, I strongly suggest asking any topical questions to the AES Op sub-group or Facebook page.  They won't steer you wrong.


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## dimsum (12 Mar 2021)

Ping Monkey said:


> They won't steer you wrong.


AES Ops not steering you wrong?  

There's a "Pilot - Radar" joke in there somewhere...


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## dimsum (12 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> Yes AESOps definitely have a good go, have considered it for a while. A difficult QL3 from what I understand.


Aside from what Ping Monkey said, AES Ops are the one group (besides Medical Officers) who I've never heard anyone say "I wish I was still [former trade]". 

And that includes Pilots.


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## Lumber (12 Mar 2021)

Ping Monkey said:


> If selected as a CH148 AES Op, you'll probably get more sea-time than most sailors too.d


AESOP is definitely the best NAVY NCM trade.


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## dimsum (12 Mar 2021)

Lumber said:


> AESOP is definitely the best NAVY NCM trade.


Do you know something we don't?


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## Furniture (13 Mar 2021)

Lumber said:


> AESOP is definitely the best NAVY NCM trade.


The navy had a chance to reply, they apparently didn't have any input.


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## Lumber (13 Mar 2021)

Furniture said:


> The navy had a chance to reply, they apparently didn't have any input.


Our apologies. Compared to our force size, we've got a lot going on!


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## Furniture (13 Mar 2021)

Lumber said:


> Our apologies. Compared to our force size, we've got a lot going on!


I've spent enough years at sea to know there are at least 3 bored NESOPs surfing the web all day, and the NAVCOMS are dumping buckets of bandwidth over the side at every watch change. They had time... lol


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## Lumber (13 Mar 2021)

Furniture said:


> I've spent enough years at sea to know there are at least 3 bored NESOPs surfing the web all day, and the NAVCOMS are dumping buckets of bandwidth over the side at every watch change. They had time... lol


This is sadly accurate, and I'll elaborate on that with the post I've been trying to write.


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## Lumber (13 Mar 2021)

Timmy449 said:


> I am strongly considering a re muster to the Navy, possibly looking at NCI OP or NES OP.
> I was wondering if anyone had any input on the pros and cons to each trade or even some other trades I haven't mentioned.
> Also, I am a very poor academic student. Will the trade courses pose a challenge for me?


Navy chiming in here. There are 8 "navy" NCM trades aboard ship. NCIOPs, NESOPs, SONAROPs, NAVCOMMs, BOATSWAINs, WENGTECHs, MARTECHs, and Stewards. There are several other NCM trades that serve aboard ship (cooks, met techs, med techs, HR/Fin Admins, Supp techs) but these are not what we would call "hard sea trades" meaning if you joined as one of those, there's no guarantee you would sail. 

I'll try and give you a list of pros and cons for most of them from a general perspective. Problem is that my opinion will be very subjective, and as an officer my point of view is very different form those in those trades. 

In general:

Ops Trades (NESOPs, SONAROPs, NAVCOMMs, NCIOPs,:
Pros: you get to do cool stuff like fire naval guns, control aircraft, and track submarines. 
Cons: you only do this cool stuff when at sea on exercises. The rest of the time (and pretty much 90% of the time alongside) you're probably going to be bored. it gets better the more senior you get; the more responsibility you get the busier you will be, but for the first few years, lots of boredom day to day, unless your ship is working up. 

Engineering Trades (MARTECHs and WENGTECHS): 
Pros: you get to actually do your job everyday, fixing and maintaining cool equipment that has a direct impact on everything from quality of life to operations.
Cons: you are busy every day no matter what, and you have to spend a lot of time dumbing down and explaining to non-techs why gun no go boom, or ship no go zoom.

Boatswains: 
Pros: the teamwork and variety of jobs. Bosns are our watch on deck (helmsmen, throttlemen, lookouts, bosn'smates), they are our machine gun operators, they are our small boat drivers, they are our small arms maintainers, they are out seamanship experts without which we could not RAS which is critical to sustained operations.
Cons: there's never enough of you and watch on deck is actually pretty boring.   

Stewards: this one I'm going to leave for someone else if they want to chime in.

Since I haven't looked closely at each trade's training curriculums, I can't say for sure which one has the most academic training and which do not. In general, just about everyone of those trades has some form of academic training, and the level of academic training gets greater the more senior you get. Stewards, for example, and in charge of accounting for non-public funds aboard ship, but not until they are senior stewards, so they might not start as a very "academic" trade, but it does eventually. If I was to say which one had the least amount of academics across the trade from S3 to PO1, I'd have to _guess _Boatswain. MARTECH, WENGTECH and SONAROP would probably have the greatest amount of academics.


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## Furniture (14 Mar 2021)

Lumber said:


> Navy chiming in here. There are 8 "navy" NCM trades aboard ship. NCIOPs, NESOPs, SONAROPs, NAVCOMMs, BOATSWAINs, WENGTECHs, MARTECHs, and Stewards. There are several other NCM trades that serve aboard ship (cooks, met techs, med techs, HR/Fin Admins, Supp techs) but these are not what we would call "hard sea trades" meaning if you joined as one of those, there's no guarantee you would sail.
> 
> I'll try and give you a list of pros and cons for most of them from a general perspective. Problem is that my opinion will be very subjective, and as an officer my point of view is very different form those in those trades.
> 
> ...


In my experience as a Met Sgt on ship, what you describe is pretty accurate.

To the OP,

As an operator you'll be bored alongside, and might get to do your job at sea. As a WEng or MarEng you'll get to do your real job more, but you'll spend a lot of "down time" fixing the boat.

You really need to do some soul searching, and figure out whether you want to turn wrenches, and be in the engineering spaces, or whether you'd rather spend your time in the mushroom farm. Either way your opinion/expertise will be minimized by people with less time/experience, so it should be PAR for the course in your current trade.


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## Lumber (14 Mar 2021)

Furniture said:


> "spend your time in the mushroom farm."


Hey we keep the lights on now during the day


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## Weinie (14 Mar 2021)

Lumber said:


> I'll try and give you a list of pros and cons for most of them from a general perspective. Problem is that my opinion will be very subjective, and as an officer my point of view is very different form those in those trades.
> 
> 
> Engineering Trades (MARTECHs and WENGTECHS):
> ...


Ah, you SOB, you made me spit coffee all over the floor (just avoided my laptop at the last second.) That is funny.....and true.


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