How to Act on Insubordination in Team

[m0311]

Good Evening,

Hope you all are doing well.  I am looking for some guidance on how to handle a situation that happened yesterday. I am a new Lieutenant in the Army, and am responsible for a small team of under 10 guys.  I had a situation occur within my team where, according to my senior enlisted counterpart, a junior soldier cussed at, and attempted to instigate a fight with him (he tried to achieve this by trying to get the senior NCO to swing at him first). Ultimately my senior NCO kept his cool, and removed himself from the situation with no physical altercation happening. I only learned about this after inquiring about some unusual team meeting he had after work.  It seemed like my chief  intended to keep the incident within the enlisted lane, and under my radar.  

My chief is one of the most respected NCO's in my unit- and I want to have his back.  He said he was going to talk to the senior enlisted leadership in the unit, and that he intended to handle it this way.  I asked what his opinion is on what I should do to address the situation- and he said he would bring it up the enlisted chain of command and that I didn't need to do anything.  He is clearly and visibly upset by the incident.  I feel like I need to do something.

I feel like me taking a back seat on this is not demonstrating much leadership, and that I should do something. So far I have not talked about this to anyone in my team but my chief. But I think me getting involved would automatically make it an administrative/UCMJ matter- as opposed to handling it within the enlisted lane without ruining a career. 

The thing to do seems simple- sit down with the junior soldier, tell him that his behavior will not be accepted in my team, and than no one will behave in such a insubordinate and disrespectful manner to one of my NCOs. But my concern is that then as a consequence, im not sure what I can do except pursue a UCMJ action.  UCMJ action will tie my unit and myself up in administrative work for some time, and ruin the soldiers career (any maybe I should).  This incident came out of left field from  my point of view.  The junior soldier is a bright, and capable soldier who had been doing a good job.  But even so, this behavior cannot be accepted at all.


 How should I handle this?

[mynewunit]

Your responsibility is the Chief and the Private, not the incident. If there is a real problem, there will be another incident. Your goal is to act, not react.  AKA Prepare. Plan you action based upon a few situations you could see occurring and adjust as needed.

Step #1: Know your men. Someone trying to create a physical altercation fits in one of a few categories. Where does the Private come from? Does he have any siblings? What kind of relationship does he have with his dad?  What does he do/plan to do outside the service? Does he have a girl friend, wife, kids?
Also learn all these things about your Chief.

Step #2: Have your Chief teach you how to handle this type of situation.  He will have to double think every action. Listen inventively. Ask good questions.  Also let him know what you will have to do "per the rule book" if it happens again (this means you would have to go look it up). Give him some discrete limits and what you foresee as an acceptable outcome.  They are going to have to work together.

Think hard about the settings of these conversations. Specifically how you "look".  Have personal conversations in T shirts over a meal or doing some PT.  Have the conversations with the chief about the Army answer, in an office, with some level of formality. Maybe even an outlook meeting request.

Secondary resources: Talk to the other Privates.  Find out about them and the Private in question. Then talk to the other NCO's.  Not about the Chief, but about tension in the squad / Chain of command. Then talk to your superior (AKA Captain) about Tension in the Platoon.

Wild Cards: You are in the Army.  There is a "theater" where the 2 of them could get in a pile of rubber chips and beat the heck out of each other.  Obviously there are rules and supervision for this. I wouldn't put any build up into this, but I might create the opportunity.  If your chief is humble, tell him to loose at least once. Then you can show the Private he finished his mission but did he get what he wanted.  

What not to do: Administrate. No written anything is going to change them.  I am not saying don't write this down. I am saying that Paper praise or Paper punishment is going to help this thing. You need a personal relationship with both Parties. 

Little side note. Prepare for the worst case outcome, whatever that might be. That way when it happens, you can just say Good, and get back to work.  All of this stuff is hard. The best way to get these voices out of your head is to fill your head with the voices of the wise people around you.  The best outcomes come from knowing the most about the people you are dealing with.