WASHINGTON — Then-Capt. Chris Slininger sat at a computer in Bath, Maine, in March 2023, tense but excited about changing careers while on leave. Bath, a quaint, picturesque New England town of 8,000 that sits on the edge of the Kennebec River, two hours south from Slininger’s hometown of Hampden.
He had served in the Army for three years as an artillery lieutenant and later as a staff officer and company commander. Nearing 10 years on active duty, he hoped to transition to become an Army Strategist. Yet, after three application attempts, the service didn’t select Slininger for the Army strategist program. He decided to make good on his promise to his wife that he would leave the Army if he didn’t land that career.
While on leave, Slininger explored employment opportunities at General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, a shipyard that builds destroyers for the Navy, through Skill Bridge, a program that connects veterans with government partners.
The opportunity looked promising, so Slininger, whose father, mother, and brother all served in the U.S. Armed Forces, decided to leave the Army to pursue government contract jobs.
However, shortly after making that decision, he received an email from Col. Kris Saling, then director of innovation for Army Human Resources Command, who read an article he’d written on how the Army should reform junior officer experiences.
Slininger published a 4,000-word article in the Army University Press titled, "A Call to Modernize the Army Experience," Slininger penned article as a response to an exchange between three captains, who wrote articles on why they separated from the Army, and a senior officer who wrote a reply article that Slininger felt “missed the mark.”
“It did not come off in a good way,” said Slininger, who formed the Army's first Junior Officer Counsel on April 1. “I was one of many upset people.”
Slininger said the captains’ essays addressed junior officer concerns on career progression, company command experiences, and toxic leaders. In contrast, the senior leader’s reply suggested the problems stemmed from Soldiers’ “perceptions” and that the junior officers should ‘reframe’ their thoughts.
Slininger’s essay offered counterpoints suggesting junior Soldiers faced real challenges and needed tangible changes. He detailed how the force should tailor its job requirements around a junior officer’s skill and talent instead of tasking every officer with leadership positions that don’t suit their strengths. He also suggested that officers begin training for their future careers while still cadets.
However, Slininger recognized that suggesting these ideas wasn’t going to be enough to drive the change in the Army. He thought the concepts needed to be revised to better support junior officers.
In 2022, while attending a Military Mentors conference, he met Navy Lt. Cmdr. Liz Elrod, who told him about the newly formed Navy Junior Officer Counsel. It gave junior officers a collective voice and platform to provide direct counsel to senior leaders on critical issues, including improving junior officer and enlisted retention.
“I started mulling that around in the back of my head, trying to figure out how that may or may not look in the Army,” Slininger said.
Slininger noted in past assignments that he encountered leaders who often didn’t make time to listen to junior officers. “The operational tempo was unrelenting and didn’t make room for it," Slininger said. "Or sometimes I just had counterproductive leaders who didn’t value my perspective as a junior officer.”
“Suck it up and deal with it was what kind of what was expected,” he continued. Slininger suggested that kind of motivation may work in the short term, but over the long term, it has detrimental consequences.
“Eventually, any officer will ask themselves, why would I continue to do this when I don’t have to?" Slininger said. "Why serve in an organization that doesn’t care about me enough to change to improve my situation?
“Today's junior officers really want that focused, devoted attention from a mentor to listen and understand what they're looking for,” he added. “That’s what I was trying to get across in my essay.”
In 2024, his ideas finally reached the Pentagon. The ideas Slininger proposed intrigued Saling and another personnel leader and they invited him to pilot them.
The Army requested that Slininger form its first service-wide Army Junior Officer Counsel, or AJOC, based on the pitch for change he submitted in an Army journal article in 2023.
The counsel allows junior commissioned officers to voice their ideas to Army senior leaders and drive change on issues that matter to them. But to Slininger, the counsel means more.
Through group meetings and town halls, different generations of Soldiers can connect and share perspectives, from newly trained junior officers to generals and senior Army officials. The counsel can transform how the Army develops and retains its junior officers from the grades of 0-1 to 0-3 and warrant officers in the ranks of WO-1 to CW-2.
“[The counsel] presents the ability for junior officers to bring ideas from the grassroots to the Pentagon and learn how the Army actually runs,” Slininger said.
Currently, in its pilot stage, Slininger hopes to make the counsel a permanent staple as the service-wide organization for young officers. Chapters have already formed at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, Fort Stewart, Georgia, and Army Garrison Rhineland-Pfalz Smith Barracks, Germany.
Now, Slininger plans to expand the counsel's reach in the Army Reserve, led by Capt. Kristen Karl and add more junior warrant officers to the counsel.
Slininger decided to stay in the Army three weeks from his separation date. He said AJOC gives him confidence that the Army cares about its officers’ perspectives and is willing to listen and act on some of their recommendations.
Now, he hopes the counsel will help junior officers across the Army find a place to learn and gain enterprise-level leadership skills to reach their full potential and drive change.
Maj. Chris Slininger contributed to this report.
RELATED LINKS:
Army Junior Officer Counsel drives change from the ground floor
Social Sharing