Officer Fitness Report Evaluation Study

Abstract : The purposes of this task were to evaluate the effectiveness of the current process used to appraise the performance of Navy officers and to recommend a method for providing data that would aid in assigning officers to non-operational billets. Interviews were conducted with commanding officers, members of statutory and nonstatutory selection boards, detailers, and others to determine how the performance data were developed and used as well as to identify problems. The other military services and industry also provide information on their procedures. The interviews clearly showed that the current Navy officer performance appraisal data are designed to indicate who should be promoted and selected for key billets such as commanding officer. However, the Navy uses the information in many inappropriate ways such as non-operational assignments and selection for educational programs. The other services provided additional techniques for establishing scores for promotability but none for making differential assignments. Recommendations included improving the instructions for describing jobs, completing the narrative, ranking lieutenants, establishing a procedure for controlling manipulation, developing methods for training commanding officers, counseling officers, and identifying unique abilities of officers.