I loved hearing this from a detailer buddy of mine recently :
“There really isn’t any such thing as a bad Information Warfare/Cryptology assignment. There are only different kinds of good assignments.”
I’m not going to argue with that. Sign me up for another tour.
I Like The Cut of His Jib 
Captain,You are way funny. I fell out of my chair when I read this.
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Any tour is only as good or as bad as you make it.
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I think being the detailer might be the difficult tour. I can imagine there are some days where you have to assign someone to a billet that nobody else wants. I do agree w/ \”LCDRLDO/6440\”….the tour is only as good as YOU make it.
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I was never an officer but we enlisted men had assignments by detailers as well and I found that every tour that I was assigned was an aid to my career, whether I liked that assignment or not. We enlisted individuals always said such things were “the needs of the NAVY.” And I still believe that to be the truth.Navyman834
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Needs of the Navy.Career progression requirements.Individual desires.That's it.
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In no particular order, right….?!
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@ Justin,That's the order the Navy has specified.
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I'm on my 13th tour and haven't had a bad one yet so I agree with Navyman and LCDR/LDO in that each tour is what you make of it. But I'd add a little detail to the detailer's statement. You can make the best of all of our jobs, but some aren't as good when it comes to career progression. IW officers have milestone jobs that make them more competitive, and I'd argue we have them at all pay grades. Performing well as an LPO at sea is going to make a PO1 a CPO a greater percentage of the time than LPO ashore. No hard and fast rules, but with equal performance, odds are usually with the ones who earn and take the hard jobs. Getting promoted isn't/shouldn't be the only factor in what job you choose, but on this count not all jobs are created equal. So all of our jobs may be good in some way, but being competitive for promotion may not be one of those ways. CDR May
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I have a problem with the term \”milestone jobs\”.
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Commander May,It pleases me to hear that some Sailors still believe in the needs of the Navy. If one is unhappy because of a duty assignment or duty assignments maybe he/she should consider leaving the Navy. In civilian life one gets to choose what they want to do, they do not have man overboard drills, General Quarters or condition watches lasting many days on occasion, Med and Westpac cruises of up to a year in duration, endless watch standing or even leadership attributes to display on a continuous basis. All you have to do is watch your back and make the stockholders happy.Very Respectfully,Navyman834
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We seem to be having trouble getting O4s and O5s to serve in Sea Duty milestones. What message is that sending?
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Some must consider those billets \”less good\” assignments 😉
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Our capabilities at sea are \”meh\” and playing SWO isn't professionally satisfying.
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Maybe USFF/IFOR one day will get out from under the thumb of SPAWAR and actually force SPAWAR to implement what our Sailors need and get OPNAV to resource it correctly. I think folks still rather go to sea than be stationed at FCC/C10F.
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If playing SWO isn't professionally satisfying, perhaps you're in the wrong profession.
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Agreed. It's not necessarily the job, but how one performs in their job that matters. Bloom where you're planted.
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I'm pretty sure if people wanted to be a SWO, they would have went SWO. If the 1810 community wants to be SWOs then they should shut the community down and stop trying to pretend they are IW/Cryptologic officers and plus up the SWO ranks.
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