On Staffwork — Tales of a Staff Officer
It has been three years since I have left the police force, but now more than ever my police training as a staff officer has become extremely relevant. As KCL Blockchain grows as a student enterprise, more companies and organisations are reaching out to work with us. A common problem that I have identified in this process is that our members refer unnecessarily long messages for me to follow-up, without informing me what needs to be done. It is difficult to act when there is no context to follow up on. To address this issue and to ensure we grow in a sustainable manner, there is a need to develop my fellow team mates as staff officers and spread the workload.
It is important to remember that, we are not just an ordinary society of fun and games. We are society united around a common interest in blockchain. We are also a society about personal growth. We aspire to pierce through the veil of averageness.
Through my sharing, I hope that it provides a guide on good staff work and it facilitates your personal growth. For this article, I have referred heavily from Major General Ng Chee Khern’s papers — ‘On Staff Work’ and ‘On Command’.
What is a staff officer?
According to the Singapore Armed Forces Dictionary — ‘a staff officer plays four roles. (1) They analyse the situation. (2) They recommend plans based on their analysis. (3) They translate their supervisor’s decisions. (4) They supervise the execution to ensure success.’ The work that they engage in is called staff work.
Everyone in our society is a staff officer. A person is a staff officer so long as they are accountable to a higher authority. Anyone who hustles need to report to the team. No one can execute a plan on their own. Cognizant of the definition, we can observe that a team member is a staff officer to their director. A director is a staff officer to the President. Likewise as president, I am staff officer to the leadership team. Our internal consensus mechanism makes us accountable. It is because we are accountable to each other that generates a duty for self-improvement.
Distinguishing between first and second orders of thinking
To lead is to know how to think, to conceptualize nothingness into something. Before we begin any work, it is important to know how to think. There are two ways. First order thinking refers to — ‘why do I want to do something?’. It refers to the true driving force of our action. It is difficult to engage with because there are no boundaries. It requires imagination and inspiration. However, it is important because without purpose, we would be wasting our time and energy on meaningless tasks. It is inefficient. Second order thinking refers to — ‘How do I do it?’. It is usually easier to conduct this form of thinking because the parameters are defined. We just need to solve the problem. University does a good job of teaching us second order thinking, but it does little to train us in first order thinking. Having a training in philosophy can help, but often I find that it is lacking in many and myself.
It is important that our KCL blockchain members consider both types of thinking when initiating and executing projects. Without the Why, there can be no How. All would be meaningless.
How do we translate thinking models into staff work?
Before we commit any plan to action, we should always study the situation. We should ask — what is required of me?
For example, when a KCLblockchain member attends a networking event, they should be asking these questions to their new contacts:
- What do they do?
- What are they interested in?
- How can we facilitate or collaborate?
These three guiding questions are all that is required. The first is to appreciate who our potential partners are and qualify them as legitimate actors. The second question is to understand their motivations and needs. By understanding their needs, we can engage in first order thinking and ask why we should collaborate with them. What is the ends we can both reach together? If we cannot work together, how can I help this new friend expand their network to achieve their ends? Can we refer them to someone? These questions are helpful to ask. Networking is not for networking’s sake. We should always aim to be facilitative and helpful to all our friends.
Once we have decided on the ends, we can then think of the third question using second order thinking -how can we translate our partnership into actionable outcomes. At first meetings, we do not have to make any commitments. What we must do is to follow up by recording our agreement and for the responsible member to report their hustle to their director, the president, or the team. The staff officer should be ambitious, in a sense that they are convinced that their proposal will work. They complete a successful hustle by persuading the team with their logic that their plan is feasible. This is how hustle should be conducted.
While, this might not be the best framework, it is better than nothing. Far too often, many people talk about networking, but for what reason are they doing it they are unsure. I hope this procedural thought process clarifies things for our team.
Side point — Why is (networking) cultivating relations important?
Everyone should always try to cultivate relations with others in the blockchain space and everywhere. Ultimately, while these new relations might not lead to anything, it is always good to speak to people. Nothing asked, nothing gained. Reach out your hand, and you make a new friend. We can only develop opportunities by making new relations.
When making new friends and partners, we should always aim to bring value to the people we work with. By doing so, they recognise our expertise and share theirs. Cultivating these relations is difficult and it will take time, effort, thoughtfulness and sensitivity. However, this is important because opportunities help to develop us and our fellow team mates into better competent people.
Personally, there is a greater sense of purpose when we build for each other and commit to a bigger team than just working for ourselves. Building for more is most rewarding.
On Analysis
A staff officer needs to understand two things — depth of analysis and priority. Depth refers to explaining the difference between what the current situation is and the difference that is brought. By identifying the change in the present state, it allows us to identify value, gaps and opportunities. For example, we could ask, ‘can we have an event on a particular date?’ A barely satisfactory answer would be ‘yes, we can because the date is empty’. A better response that sheds greater light into the issue would be to say that ‘Looking at the calendar, it is possible to have the event on that date. However, it is ill advised to do so because we have another event the next day, this might create attendee fatigue and see a diminished crowd.’
On priority, refers to arranging issues of importance in a hierarchy. This is important because it helps us to define what our best outcome is and help us conduct better cost-benefit-analysis when we engage in our reasoning process. Every action has trade-offs and we live in a world with limited resources. Prioritization helps us be more effective in our resource allocation.
Therefore, prior to engaging in any negotiation or analyzing a decision, we should ask ourselves — what issues do we prioritize first, second and so on. By doing so, we would know what we are ‘fighting’ for and what can we afford to give up. If we do not know what we are fighting for, there is no coherence in our thoughts, we can be taken advantaged like fools and we would miss out on important opportunities.
A good rule of thumb to test if your analysis is good or bad, is to ask, at the end of my argument would my audience ask- ‘ok so?’. If they ask, ‘ok so?’. It means that they do not understand the logic of your argument. You are getting nowhere.
This was taught to me by my Literature teacher, Mr Aloysius Lim. Back then, I found it hard to understand what he meant. It is only now that I receive too many messages from my team that I find myself ‘haunted’ by his guidance.
Concluding remarks
Every member of KCL Blockchain should aspire towards becoming an outstanding staff officer. To be a good hustler is to be a good staff officer. Mistakes are inevitable but if there’s any time to fail in life and experiment — it is during our university days. It is with KCL Blockchain.
Outsiders might ask, why am I writing these articles? The reason is simple. It is always more fun to build bigger things than smaller things. But to do that, one must find incredible people. If that can’t be found, then one must develop them. At KCL Blockchain, it is important that we develop our members to not just be competent domain experts in our respective fields but also competent people with the necessary soft skills. Over this period of time, I have observed how I and many of our fellow members have developed. It is a fascinating process.
As a leader, I hope to develop all my team mates to the best of my ability. I may be lacking in many ways, but my constant fear of stagnation pushes me to become better for the team. I hope my team mates who have read this recognise the importance of staff work and my hope is that you develop into better people.
I shall continue to work hard for you and the team.
Afternote:
Reading about the papers, on staff work and command, after all this time has made me recall the fun times I had with the Operations department, SPF PHQ. The time I spent as a staff officer- understanding plans and receiving guidance from my superiors helped me understand the operations of a large enterprise. I always enjoyed observing how my DC(Ops) Lau, AD Mdm Koh, and my OOs & AOOs made decisions, especially under stressful situations. Translating our plans into action was the most rewarding part of our work. I had a fun time, and I would not be the person I am without their guidance and nurture. Can’t wait to return home and do more for my unit through national service.
To my friends currently in NS, put your best foot out there, do some staff work. Work hard!
Credits as well to my Literature teacher — Mr Aloysius Lim, for his tireless work ethic to improve my arguments. It must have been so frustrating to read my poorly written scripts! Ha!
Additionally — many thanks to the silent partners and my flatmates for their constant support. Without them, I would have struggled more during this difficult time.
References:
MG Ng Chee Khern. On Command. (2009). Journal of the Singapore Armed Forces. Available at: https://www.mindef.gov.sg/oms/content/imindef/publications/pointer/supplements/oncommand/_jcr_content/imindefPars/0013/file.res/ON%20COMMAND%20(L).pdf
MG Ng Chee Khern. On Staff Work. (2009). Journal of Singapore Armed Forces. Available At: https://www.mindef.gov.sg/oms/content/imindef/publications/pointer/supplements/onstaffwork/_jcr_content/imindefPars/0013/file.res/ON%20STAFF%20WORK(L)_280809.pdf
