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The Doffgrinder Is Damaging The Community & Here's Why
aestu
Member Posts: 0 Arc User
"The Doffgrinder". Such is the popular moniker for the dreaded Personnel Exchange Officers at Starfleet Command and KDF Academy. The final destination for the too-short careers of many Duty Officers. Heralded by many captains as a way of "balancing duty officer specializations", the impact of this institution upon the community is seldom considered.
There is a widespread perception that to be unscrupulous is a trait exclusive to duty officers. On the contrary, many captains have proven quite unscrupulous in filling out personnel requisitions as often as regulations allow, enrolling excessive numbers of personnel to build their private empires, then churning and burning all but a slim minority that meet a set of arbitrary requirements back through the Personnel Exchange Officers.
Often these "arbitrary requirements" are blatantly racist and discriminatory, or are based on stereotypical personality characteristics associated with certain professions, e.g., the belief that good engineers are necessarily stubborn, or that being honorable is somehow more important for a career as a security officer than a doctor. Duty officers who fail to meet these requirements are forever branded as "underperforming", regardless of their actual performance, or whether they have even been given a chance to perform at all.
Excessive enrollment of duty officers is exacerbated by PWE's pushing of Ferengi privateers and Gamma Quadrant irregulars into fleets, displacing actual Starfleet personnel. Those personnel, too, are often sent back to Starfleet Command, disappearing into the milieu of endlessly itinerant duty officers.
The result is that although enlistment of new duty officers has skyrocketed since the Personnel Exchange Officers were implemented, the level of opportunity for the average duty officer has plummeted. Studies indicate that it is only the very rare duty officer that ever sees actual service. The common duty officer is typically cycled through the system, never being sent on any actual assignment, before finally being posted to a starbase. For a duty officer, assignment to a starbase is a fate as bad as being thrown out the airlock. It precludes ever being posted aboard a starship, or seeing an actual field assignment, ever again.
There have been some efforts by PWE to correct the most glaring abuses in the system. For example, it is no longer permitted to enroll duty officers from a fleet starbase then reassign them back, thereby preventing captains from padding their supply of requisition credits.
Yet abuses of the system remain. The rate of construction of the new starbases along the Neutral Zone is generally believed to be excessively slow. Hundreds of duty officers are assigned to starbases lacking basic amenities such as uniforms, chefs, or holographic recreational facilities.
The subject of bathrooms is often considered to be a joke by starship captains, but for the hundreds of duty officers assigned to these sparse, improvised starbases, it is no laughing matter. Resources are poured into frivolous amenities such as novelty pets and neon lighting, but starbase planners are not even provided the option to build improved restroom facilities for their duty officers. So it is that the many hundreds of hapless duty officers assigned to the new starbases remain out of sight, below decks in their squalid quarters. Speculation runs rampant as to how the duty officers manage their elimination.
Predictably, PWE has remained sullenly unresponsive on this issue, refusing to even allow captains the option to build such an amenity. PWE's reasons are unfathomable but we know better than to expect an explanation. I have every faith that in a year, an option to build bathroom facilities for the starbase shall continue to be unavailable.
Proposals have been floated to allow duty officers to be promoted under certain conditions, or increasing the wait time between reassignment of "underperforming" officers to prevent churn-and-burn recruitment.
But I believe that the only way this serious issue can be corrected is to make the duty officers more visible in the world of captains, so that the common duty officer is no longer merely a set of statistics and trite quotes on a one-page dossier.
Captains must be permitted and encouraged to interact with their duty officers outside the planning of assignments from their ready room, observing them go about their business throughout the ship, or even play an active role in away missions. Only then will captains no longer be able to disregard the individual duty officer.
There is a widespread perception that to be unscrupulous is a trait exclusive to duty officers. On the contrary, many captains have proven quite unscrupulous in filling out personnel requisitions as often as regulations allow, enrolling excessive numbers of personnel to build their private empires, then churning and burning all but a slim minority that meet a set of arbitrary requirements back through the Personnel Exchange Officers.
Often these "arbitrary requirements" are blatantly racist and discriminatory, or are based on stereotypical personality characteristics associated with certain professions, e.g., the belief that good engineers are necessarily stubborn, or that being honorable is somehow more important for a career as a security officer than a doctor. Duty officers who fail to meet these requirements are forever branded as "underperforming", regardless of their actual performance, or whether they have even been given a chance to perform at all.
Excessive enrollment of duty officers is exacerbated by PWE's pushing of Ferengi privateers and Gamma Quadrant irregulars into fleets, displacing actual Starfleet personnel. Those personnel, too, are often sent back to Starfleet Command, disappearing into the milieu of endlessly itinerant duty officers.
The result is that although enlistment of new duty officers has skyrocketed since the Personnel Exchange Officers were implemented, the level of opportunity for the average duty officer has plummeted. Studies indicate that it is only the very rare duty officer that ever sees actual service. The common duty officer is typically cycled through the system, never being sent on any actual assignment, before finally being posted to a starbase. For a duty officer, assignment to a starbase is a fate as bad as being thrown out the airlock. It precludes ever being posted aboard a starship, or seeing an actual field assignment, ever again.
There have been some efforts by PWE to correct the most glaring abuses in the system. For example, it is no longer permitted to enroll duty officers from a fleet starbase then reassign them back, thereby preventing captains from padding their supply of requisition credits.
Yet abuses of the system remain. The rate of construction of the new starbases along the Neutral Zone is generally believed to be excessively slow. Hundreds of duty officers are assigned to starbases lacking basic amenities such as uniforms, chefs, or holographic recreational facilities.
The subject of bathrooms is often considered to be a joke by starship captains, but for the hundreds of duty officers assigned to these sparse, improvised starbases, it is no laughing matter. Resources are poured into frivolous amenities such as novelty pets and neon lighting, but starbase planners are not even provided the option to build improved restroom facilities for their duty officers. So it is that the many hundreds of hapless duty officers assigned to the new starbases remain out of sight, below decks in their squalid quarters. Speculation runs rampant as to how the duty officers manage their elimination.
Predictably, PWE has remained sullenly unresponsive on this issue, refusing to even allow captains the option to build such an amenity. PWE's reasons are unfathomable but we know better than to expect an explanation. I have every faith that in a year, an option to build bathroom facilities for the starbase shall continue to be unavailable.
Proposals have been floated to allow duty officers to be promoted under certain conditions, or increasing the wait time between reassignment of "underperforming" officers to prevent churn-and-burn recruitment.
But I believe that the only way this serious issue can be corrected is to make the duty officers more visible in the world of captains, so that the common duty officer is no longer merely a set of statistics and trite quotes on a one-page dossier.
Captains must be permitted and encouraged to interact with their duty officers outside the planning of assignments from their ready room, observing them go about their business throughout the ship, or even play an active role in away missions. Only then will captains no longer be able to disregard the individual duty officer.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Post edited by aestu on
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Comments
Did you smoke crack?
God, lvl 60 CW. 17k.
@DevolvedOne
lmao @ bathrooms.
but yeah..if you are unruly or aggressive, you have no long career on my ship.
in the spirit of the semi RP of this thread
Really? More visibility? Of DOffs? I am a Vice Admiral, concerned with the defense and establishment of a starbase, the operations of a small but loyal fleet of fellow officers, assisting in the defense of the quadrant from various threats, such as the Borg and Tholians, and attempting to oversee the operations of these officers, all in limited amounts of active time.
I have close to (on some toons, over) 2 dozen "command track" officers. Of these officers, I regularly only deal with 4, my standard away team. The rest typically get some initial attention as I deck them out in the ship's standard uniform, possibly check their training and maybe adjust that a bit, see their name once or twice as I post them to certain shipboard duties or department head positions, then promptly forget about them, since their only purpose from that point forward is to be "eye candy" whenever I visit my bridge. For those souls above the 10-12 I can do this with, their only remaining fates is a prompt dismissal from the wait of my candidate list or a "slavery" transaction through this ferengi operation we call the exchange.
My "main" toon currently operates a confiscated Tholian carrier. This ship has 2500 loyal crew, of which I can only influence up to 400 of through the aforementioned "ready room panel". What of the remaining 2100? Why do I not get to see them, or attempt to use them at this "grinder" position to ensure that I have the best possible staff for my ship? Meanwhile, I've had complaints issued to my escort captain that the crew is a bit cramped, holding 100, maybe 200 Crew/DOffs on a 50 crewperson escort for extended tours is uncomfortable, to say the least.
While it would be noble for me, when active, to interact with petty officer Jane or even recruit Fred, said interactions would usually be backseated, or even considered a nuisance, as I attempt to handle the plethora of duties/activities that are available to me during my limited operations time...
To rob a line: [quote: Mariemaia Kushrenada] Forum Posting is much like an endless waltz. The three beats of war, peace and revolution continue on forever. However, opinions will change upon the reading of my post.[/quote]