I once referred to this as "Animal Farm" leadership. In that after a while, the rest of the farm cannot discern who is pig and who is man.
There becomes a point, usually after ILP, within the Warrant Officer ranks where most troops don't look at them as people who have their best interests in mind.
Why? Because most times, we put our Warrant Officers in a bad position, in which they are given 2 options moving forward:
- be the person that fights for the troops, but gets shouted down/left in the dust career-wise; or
- be a good "command team partner" and support the boss.
The latter creates an environment where troops cannot discern the Warrant Officers who are supposed to have their beat interests at heart from the Officers that command them.
The ASM's tone deaf comments are a shining example of how out of touch he has become with the struggles of troops on the ground. Why? I would say its not purely that he has been in an ivory tower at CA HQ, but moreso that the process started as the Pl 2IC many years ago, and was reinforced with every step up the ladder.
Perhaps the reason most troops are skeptical that anything effective will be done pay wise with this 2% is that we have these echochambers across the L1s and advising every policy change and update at CMP/CPCC.