Set high standards

Junior Non-Commissioned Officers (JNCOs) with the Barbados Defence Force (BDF) have been advised to set and maintain high standards regardless of pressures to do otherwise.

 

Highlighting the BDF’s values of honesty, integrity, commitment to duty, selfless service, loyalty, self-discipline and mutual respect, Chief-of-Staff Colonel Alvin Quintyne told those gathered at the Paragon base for the closing ceremony of the Junior Command Course 1/2016 to embrace each of these going forward.

 

Congratulating the 28 successful individuals, he called their graduation yet another chance for them to make a positive difference in shaping the Force of the future.

 

Quintyne advised them that as JNCOs they have an inescapable responsibility for the maintenance of good order, military discipline, morale and esprit de corps among the private soldiers. 

 

“This is as true today as it was yesterday on the battlefields of WWI and WWII or in the ranks of the West India Regiment out of which this force had its genesis,” he stated.

 

Their leader also reminded them of their role to showcase the epitome of excellence in performance, professional conduct, dress and deportment both in and out of barracks and in their work ethic.

 

“The force is not a place for idle NCOs who fail to give of their best in whatever they are called upon to do whether in barracks or on operations on the high seas or on land. The eyes of every private soldier and ordinary seaman will be on you and they will be taking their cues from you. Therefore you have no choice as a professional JNCO other than to set the right examples consistently. Set yourselves some high standards and let no one pressure you into lowering your standards to their level. If you lack the moral courage and willpower to maintain your high standards in the face of criticism and ridicule, then you do not merit the badge of rank you wear,” he insisted. (JMB)