At Parris Island, new recruits take their initial strength test after they've completed their initial processing, which includes things like filling out paperwork, receiving immunizations, or getting their new uniforms. It's the last step in the administrative week before drill instructors pick up the recruits to begin training.
When I got to Parris Island, I was saddened to see how poorly the female recruits performed. The average run time did not meet the requirement. Slow run times and a general lack of awareness of what to expect in training meant that these women were disadvantaged mentally and physically in every way possible. They were more at risk for injuries; they slowed up everybody else; and they were less confident than their peers. That low confidence seeped into other areas of training.
I knew Colonel Haas had seen how poorly our women performed. The only time I ever saw him at my battalion was during the initial strength test and the next day when the drill instructors gave their pick-up speeches to the new recruits. He was well aware that the female recruits had an IST failure rate that was eight times that of the male recruits. And he had seen countless female recruits quit running during the mile and a half run around the track because they were too tired or out of breath to continue.
At the unit level, we want the recruiters to be successful; we want the recruits to be successful; we want the drill instructors to be successful. But the latter two can't happen until the first does.
I was lucky because I had prior experience as a recruiting-station operations and executive officer before I was selected to be a recruiting-station commander a few years later. I knew how to do data analysis to identify trends and implement corrective-action measures. But most of the recruiting-station commanders had never been exposed to this part of the Marine Corps. They wanted to succeed but were often overwhelmed by how different recruiting duty is from any other type of assignment in the Corps. They often just didn't know where to begin. In my view, we needed to team up if we were going to ensure that all Marines were tougher, faster, and stronger, regardless of gender.
Recruiters are supposed to hold the poolees accountable—to make sure they're training before they arrive at boot camp so they can be mentally and physically strong enough to succeed at boot camp. This is key first for the recruit's individual success, but also because if the recruit doesn't make it, the recruiter has to recruit someone else to fill her spot (as I've mentioned earlier).
That spot between being recruited and shipping off would be a fabulous time to download a couch-potato-to-5K running program on a smartphone, or to set up alerts to do push-ups throughout the day.
When I was on recruiting duty, I had my recruiters hold my female applicants to the same standards as my male applicants when it came to physical preparation and progress and learning their basic knowledge. As a result, we achieved the lowest IST failure and boot-camp attrition rates for men and women in the history of the Marine Corps. I knew change was possible.
Based on my experience, I did what felt obvious to me: I started reaching out to the recruiting-station commanders. I said, “Hey, I know what it's like. I've been in your shoes. But there are things you can do that will make your recruits successful and stronger and faster and tougher.”
Many of the recruiting-station commanders welcomed the feedback about their recruits. But one of them did not. He went to his district commander, and his district commander complained to my boss three months after I arrived at Parris Island.
This is when things soured like a recruit uniform that hasn't dried properly.
So, my boss found out that I was communicating directly with the commanding officers at recruiting because one of them complained to his boss. Had my boss had my back—or the Marine Corps’ back—this still would not have been a problem. When he received the complaint, Colonel Haas could have responded with, “Yeah, that's been a problem. Want to talk to your recruiters?”
He could also have said, “Was there an issue with the tone of the email from Lt. Col. Germano? If there was, I'm happy to talk with her about her approach.”
He could have said, “Huh. I didn't know about that. Let me talk to her and find out what's up.”
He didn't say any of those things. Instead, he assumed I must have been in the wrong, and he decided to reprimand me.
I can't tell you how frustrated I was. I didn't go to the recruiters and say, “Hey! I know everything there is to know, and you need to fix this!” I said, “Hey, Recruit So-and-So is being dropped today for this reason. In looking at her history and looking at her stats, here's what I found. Here are the trends. Here's what my sergeant major and I can do to help ensure your kids are successful, if you help us do x, y and z.”
I'm not stupid, and I had been in the Marine Corps for almost two decades by this point. I was never a know-it-all—especially as a woman. Otherwise, I would have never made it that far. If I had said, “I was a highly successful recruiting-station commander and I know what I'm talking about,” they would automatically think I was an asshole. There was no, “The recruits are failing and it's your fault” aspect to my calls, mainly because I was painfully aware of the tightrope I
