Welcome to the next volume of the Staff Sync. Today I wanted to shed light on being an Executive Officer (XO) in a IBCT. After 14 months as a Platoon Leader, and 13 months in the 3 shop, I had the opportunity to become an XO in a line company for 7 months until I PCS'd to start my SOFCCC. Although my XO time was at the beginning of COVID, I was still able to learn and hopefully able to help prepare you for your time as an XO.
As an XO, you are your Company Commander's right hand person. You are also the link between the Commander and Platoon Leaders in the Company, as well as the link between your Commander and the Battalion XO. You primary responsibilities are maintenance and resourcing training.
Property accountability is one of the most important and mundane things in the Army. It can ruin a career and also make you broke if you do it wrong! As an XO, you will not necessarily be signing for any equipment, but you will be there facilitating change of command inventories, cyclic inventories, and SI inventories for the Commander. Along with helping keep accountability of said items, comes maintenance. Your supply SGT will be your best friend and the maintainers in the Motorpool will be aswell. It will be mostly on you to ensure you are getting items in your Company properly serviced as the right time, maintaining that paperwork, and reporting it to your Company Commander and BN XO.
With all this maintenance, it would be useless if you did not train. That is your second primary responsibility. Resourcing ammo, land, and any other items needed for training will fall on you as an XO. It is a thankless job, but when you are organized and on-top of your game, it will make the Company look good as an organization.
It is very easy to be overwhelmed as an XO. Keep in mind that you will have supply NCOs, CBRN NCOs, armorers, and your Platoon Leaders to help share the load as you delegate some of the responsibilities. Overall, you are there to make your Company Commander have the freedom to make decisions and plan, while you make sure everything for that plan is ready-to-be-used and resourced.
-Staff
