Professional Development - The Stick

Sign in Subscribe

Professional Development

The world of work and professional growth, including success and failure.

An aircraft carrier and a destroyer steaming side by side.

Course Corrections

A story of growing pains, accountability, delegation, and sleep deprivation. Sometimes things go wrong.

Lieutenant Cain

Lieutenant Cain

A story of getting out by going through, by Ian. They say Navy Surface Warfare Officers eat their young. I can attest this is not true, but it happens often enough that it feels true. As a young, lost junior officer on his first ship, I longed for good examples

Faking It, Part 3

Faking It, Part 3

A story of failure, by Ian, continued from Faking It, Part 2. This story was originally published on June 28, 2025. OPS caught me right after breakfast on Friday morning. “Well, sir, last night we were able to complete the flight deck events that we had planned for this morning,

A ship on the horizon steaming toward the sunset.

Faking It, Part 2

A story of our own expectations, by Ian, continued from Faking It, Part I. This story was originally published on June 22, 2025. That night a piercing ring shocked me from the depths of sleep. I slap grabbed the phone and managed, “…Captain….” “Sir, this is the Officer of the

Ships moored in San Diego at sunrise.

Faking It, Part 1

A story of others’ expectations, by Ian. This story was originally published on June 8, 2025. I closed my eyes and drew in that cool, dry morning air from the bridge wing, high above the pier. Sunlight stretched up from behind the eastern mountains into an open sky, now glowing