5 Reasons Your Official DA File Photo Matters
There’s been plenty of wailing and gnashing of teeth as the US Army downsizes, cutting over 100,000 Soldiers from its ranks over the next few years, including nearly two thousand captains and majors.
Indeed, the Army has the unenviable task of making difficult choices as to who stays and who goes. In some cases, talented officers were booted for having disciplinary infractions in their records from nearly a decade ago. Others because their career fields were over-strength.
But in some cases, what made the difference was an officer’s official file photo — whether outdated, in the wrong uniform, or simply missing from their file.
Judging a man’s quality from a photograph may seem a bit unfair, sure. But there are (at least) six good reasons an officer needs to take the official DA photograph seriously.
1.) Your photo is the first thing the board sees. Make it count. The promotion board process is intimidating and opaque. Board members — sworn to secrecy — are sequestered in a room for two weeks, scouring thousands of promotion board files. This means that they’ll spend about three minutes on every potential candidate — three minutes to encapsulate years’ worth of hard work and sacrifice.
Board members spend most of that three minutes concentrating on the cryptic — and often misleading — senior rater narrative, which separates the chaff (“one of the best”) from the wheat (“#1 of 10”). You’ll have little control over befuddling verbiage, or the subtle games senior raters as they dole out “above center mass” remarks on a seemingly haphazard basis (e.g., “managing their profile”).
But there is one thing you can control — your photograph. It’s your “handshake” to the board — the very first thing the board sees. It’ll set the tone for the rest of your file. Get it right.
2.) A poor DA Photo usually indicates a mediocre officer. Ah, here come the straw-man arguments: Officers with poor file photos are like Sam Damon, the virtuous, “muddy-boots” protagonist of Once An Eagle, presumably too busy to worry about getting his official photo updated because he’s just that busy volunteering for combat duty. As the argument goes, boards are more likely to select officers like Damon’s antagonist, Courtney Massengale — the sycophantic ladder-climber more likely to be seen in polished low-quarters than worn desert boots.
But framing the discussion with two of the most one-dimensional characters in modern literature belies the fact that those who didn’t care enough to buy the new uniform tended not care enough in other areas of their job. Doubly so considering that officers have been regularly told — for the past five years — about the importance of having their photo taken in the new uniform. If an officer can’t get something as simple as a photograph right, what can they get right?
3.) Your Enlisted Soldiers get their uniforms right. You should, too. Step out of the Corps HQ and spend some time around enlisted Soldiers: you’ll find that privates and specialists need to wear their uniform correctly when it comes time for their promotion board. Despite being increasingly reliant on food stamps, enlisted Soldiers still manage to find the cash for the new Army Service Uniform. Why shouldn’t we expect the same out of captains and majors?
4.) You should wear the uniform properly because we’re an Army at war, not despite it. We get it — you haven’t had time to buy the new uniform because you’re so busy fighting the war. But that’s even more reason to make sure you have the new uniform, and that you wear it properly. Sure, you’ll spend most of the war patrolling the Hindu Kush, clad in combat drab and body armor. But some of the most challenging wartime duties aren’t on the streets of Fallujah, they’re on the driveways of Fayetteville. Over the last decade, thousands of officers and non-commissioned officers, clad in service uniforms, have knocked on doors and performed the most solemn of duties — notifying families of the passing of a loved one. It’s a wartime duty, and it’s a damned important one. We owe it to Soldiers and their families to do it with dignity.
5.) Think the Army’s concerned with looks? The private sector can be worse. As we transition to a peacetime Army, the drivel of Army bureaucracy will undoubtedly drive many young officers to the private sector, where — presumably — you’ll be judged on talent, and not silly things like dress.
As if.
Just as a good file photo sets the tone for a promotion board, a good business suit can make or break a job interview. Even in the notoriously lax Silicon Valley, failing to dress for success can kill a talented interviewee’s job prospects. Just peruse a few pages on LinkedIn, and take note of how many potential applicants spent good money on professional portraits.
Hey, at least your official DA photo was free.
Major Crispin Burke is an active-duty Army officer stationed at Fort Bragg, who, miraculously, seems to have survived the Officer Separation Board. Or at least he hasn’t been told yet. Follow him on Twitter at @CrispinBurke. His views are his own and not those of the Department of Defense.
