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Should be called Special Service. SS for short.
Army Reserve Restructuring
- Thread starter FJAG
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Reserve Special Service or RSS. Just to add confusion.
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Fossil
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So they won't be seen in the field, especially on weekends, because 'so much office work'?
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Sigh. My predecessor was one of those . . . and he didn't even use the "office work" as an excuse - just that he only worked Mon to Fri. The unit hated his guts. Luckily so did the SSO Dist at PER time. His career was short lived.So they won't be seen in the field, especially on weekends, because 'so much office work'?
daftandbarmy
Army.ca Fossil
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Sigh. My predecessor was one of those . . . and he didn't even use the "office work" as an excuse - just that he only worked Mon to Fri. The unit hated his guts. Luckily so did the SSO Dist at PER time. His career was short lived.
We had a couple of good ones... a couple of decades apart
MilEME09
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sounds like the RSS techs we have had as of late, sadlySo they won't be seen in the field, especially on weekends, because 'so much office work'?
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I always like to think that I was one of those. I did manage to more than quadruple the regiment's live fire field time. We did that by leveraging MilArea's unexpended annual ammo allocation each year by holding a winter indoctrination live fire weekend at the end of March (which in itself needed to leverage nearly 100% of the Area's available winter clothing and tents etc) and by supporting GATES live fire armoured battlegroup exercises. We always managed to field a full battery. One can't help having happy gunners when you can get six guns to fire 400 rounds on each of two days.We had a couple of good ones... a couple of decades apart
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Can't fully blame them. Many units try to use them for anything and everything, resulting in them getting burned out too. How many RSS techs want to go out on a weekend exercise, which they will have to fight to get the time back on, where they make up 1/3 of the people showing up?
From what I saw, the reason most put their backs up quickly on doing anything outside of direct tech work was they would use and abuse them. Much like the full time Class B troops. The difference being if the full time Class B troops wanted to keep their contracts they did it without complaining.
MilEME09
Army.ca Fixture
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maybe for some units, but we have been trying to get them out to mentor and get the reg force perspective on how to do our jobs in the field, and they are compensated with days in lieu at my unit. Frankly if your complaining about burning out from one weekend a month with the reserves when the rest of us are doing it, working a completely different job monday to friday, perhaps you need to rethink your employment in the CAF?
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In my experience being out with them had attendance pick up because the exercises ran better.
Compensatory time off is just proper leadership. Our regiment ran two weekends per month and our RSS established workweek had every Monday off with Tuesdays as well if it was a long weekend. Effectively every month had two one day weekends and two three day weekends. None of my folks had kids which made that pretty easy.
In fairness - reservists working a full time job and then going out on weekend exercises + parade nights get paid extra for that time. A reg force member working full time and doing so gets nothing extra. I feel like building RSS schedules around working with their respective units is the simple solution to this and the only I've one seen, but this is coming from a combat arms perspective not a tech one.
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A Tuesday to Saturday schedule?
PrairieFella
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A Tuesday to Friday schedule woth the expectation to work a weekend or two a month.
MilEME09
Army.ca Fixture
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which is still a lighter schedule then being posted to a field formation
PrairieFella
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Meh. No skin off my ass if guys get a bit of a break.
I use to work a 8-9 hr day Civi job, Drive 1-1.5hrs Go to Parade Night, train until 10-1030, Drive home and go to work in the morning.
They should be getting time off in lue. If they are not then that is a Leadership issue that needs to be fixed. I know our RSS staff worked modified schedules and had a flexible work schedule.
Many Reservists have to take vacation to go to training in the summer, I know when I was in the Reserves the money I earned on Evening training once I finally got paid went to paying for booze and gas to get to work and enjoy a bit afterwards.
I know my unit used to give the full time staff one day off to compensate for a weekend ex. I never got the math how working an extra two and a half days turns into compensation for one.In my experience being out with them had attendance pick up because the exercises ran better.
Compensatory time off is just proper leadership. Our regiment ran two weekends per month and our RSS established workweek had every Monday off with Tuesdays as well if it was a long weekend. Effectively every month had two one day weekends and two three day weekends. None of my folks had kids which made that pretty easy.
MilEME09
Army.ca Fixture
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Probably came down to what they could give without affecting day to day operations to much. Continuation of business has to be factored in, cant give every one Monday and Tuesday off, otherwise if something urgent came uo no one would be there to manage it.
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It doesn't. That's just screwing people.
The regiment I worked with also paraded each Tuesday and Thursday night. Tuesday was admin and Thursday training. My clerk and I attended both evenings and in compensation didn't come in until noon on those days. My trg WO and Bdr storeman came in only on Thursdays and in the same way had the morning off.
I never asked for permission to give compensatory time off and in some ways I didn't even look at it as that. It was me setting the schedule of work for my people as this wasn't just a unique one time event but the way the unit ran from September to June. There's nothing that says that your butt has to be in its chair Mon to Fri from 0800 to 1600. I directed our schedule and advised both my RegF SSO Dist (my real boss) and the CO of the unit what it was. There really was no discussion about it.
Incidentally my boss was a cool guy. He was a RegF QOR major and ERE when the battalions were dissolved. He just continued wearing the QOR uniform until he retired. I presume on the books they carried him as a Patricia.
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Incidentally my boss was a cool guy. He was a RegF QOR major and ERE when the battalions were dissolved. He just continued wearing the QOR uniform until he retired. I presume on the books they carried him as a Patricia.
Don't know what time frame this occurred, but (while rare) it was not unheard of for soldiers whose regimental affiliation had been removed from the Regular Force to continue to wear that brass (and sometimes unusual dress items, e.g., highland headdress etc). I recall seeing it in regs, but it was entirely within the rules. Regimental affiliation remained until such time as the member was posted to an establishment of a new regiment, which meant a battalion or battle school. Those who continued on ERE until retirement remained affiliated with their original regiment - mostly long in the tooth unlikely to go back to a battalion or be promoted. In the days that we still published the "Officers List" (up to the late 1980s) there were still officers whose regimental affiliation was noted as RHC and QOR and I remember seeing a Reg Force Sergeant wearing Black Watch brass (on a green beret and in work dress) in Calgary in the late 70s.
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