You can submit your questions to Dr. Drill via e-mail to : DrDrill@CadetStuff.org.

This month, Dr. Drill provides a "two-fer" on drill team:

We have a competetive drill team at our NJROTC program, but it is having a problem keeping its members and gaining new ones. Any ideas on how to help us?

Slightly Annoyed

and

I have found myself in a fix. I have just been made first sergeant and I need to organize a drill team. What are the steps I need to take from ground zero to national champions?

Mr. Confused

Boy, you folks sure are "Annoyed and Confused" (wasn't that supposed to be the sequel to "Dazed and Confused"?). Ah ha.. uh, ha... Hmmmm, that wasn't as funny as I expected.

As far as retaining & recruting competitors: Make sure your people know what the benefits and advantages of being on a competition team are. You have benefits, right? 2 weeks vacation, and all the orthotic inserts you can wear? Seriously, though, like anything else, Drill Team has to be competitive, both on and off the Grinder. That means the team appears to have reasonable chance of competing and winning at whatever kind of competitions you have.

Membership on a drill team shouldn't be automatic just 'cuz you showed up for the practice. This right here is a real morale killer for your members and will affect your retention: You must recognize the hard work they have already put into the team when you bring on new members. If Cadet Seaman Apprentice Two LeftFeet shambles his way onto the team just because he's available every Tuesday and Thursday for practice, yet the guy can't drill his way out of a gasoline-soaked paper bag with a cigarette lighter, your other team members are going to feel marginalized.

Your team members have probably put in a lot of work to make the team competitive and relevant. so you need to make sure their contributions are recognized and acknowledged as part of the overall investment in the drill team. Think of it like this: Every time one of your members comes to practice, commits to a competition, etc, they're casting some of their "drill team pennies" into a big piggy bank. They have a reasonable expectation that their group contributions will have dividends later on, so don't break their piggy bank. Else they'll just throw up their hands and split, and you'll be left with Mr. LeftFeet and his directionally challeged cronies.

As far as taking a team of zeros and making them into heros, well, to quote Han Solo talking about avoiding any "Imperial entanglement": "See, that's the trick, isn't it?"

And just like Han Solo says, its gonna cost you.

I wish there was some magic fairy dust you could sprinkle on a collection of twenty drill team groupies and *poof* they'd become super-competitive über marchers. Believe me, it would make my life as the "Lord of the Drill" a whole lot better (and, hopefully, I'd be surrounded by as many hot chicks as the Michale Flatley guy!). But, alas, its unfortunately a LOT harder than that.

The bottom line is, a good competitive drill team rises from consistency, practice, scheduling, practice, dedication, practice, teamwork, practice, attention to detail, practice, hard work, practice and, uh, what was that other thing? Let me check the Drill PDR.. Oh, yeah PRACTICE.

Seriously, though: practice is what will build experinence in your team. If you have a bunch of airmen you take to wing competition, and nobody on the team has ever been to a wing competition, then the only thing you have to rely on is your own mad skillz which have been honed thru practice, practice, practice. You surely don't have any experience there to fall back on. If your team is both inexperienced AND un-practiced, I wouldn't waste the $3.25 a gallon to take the unit van all the way to the doggone competition. You're cooked already. So you must do what you can (practice) to prepare yourself (practice) for every situation (practice). You have to have your drill down cold (practice), uniforms so squared away that Gunny Hartmann would cry with joy (practice) and you have to be able to demonstrate it (practice). Ol' Mr. Subliminal would be proud!

Don't forget, too, that you have to do what works for your situation. An NJROTC unit, based around an academic setting with a regional drill meet during the school year is considerably different than a CAP unit that meets year round once a week at the local armory and has a regional competition in May.

And for now, that's all I have to say about that.