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Big Sky Top 3 offer mentorship

By Master Sgt. Michael Rinck, Big Sky Top 3 President / Published July 28, 2014

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MALMSTROM AIR FORCE BASE, Mont. -- When I first learned that the Big Sky Top 3 was given an opportunity to submit an article, I thought of the awesome opportunity to increase organizational awareness. Most people have heard of the Top 3 in some way, shape or form, but perhaps not who we are as an organization and what we offer the base and community.

The purpose of the Top 3 Association is to establish and maintain a spirit of comradeship and esprit de corps, enhance the prestige and responsibility of all enlisted personnel, and encourage an attitude of unified purpose. This is achieved through multiple avenues such as our mentorship programs, Top 3 Outstanding Performer awards and our quarterly educational scholarship, to name a few.

I'd like to touch on two exciting mentorship programs that we have recently initiated that we hope will pay dividends. The first is the Company Grade Officer Mentorship Program which pairs a senior non-commissioned officer and a CGO to meet two times a month for a six month timeframe. This allows a relationship to be built and adequate time to cover many topics for discussion and for mentorship opportunities. We have a wide variety of suggested topics already prepared to help facilitate discussions or whatever happens to be the hot topic of the moment.

The other mentorship program we have recently ramped up is the Pathway to Promotion Program. This program will give staff sergeants, technical sergeants and master sergeants the opportunity to have their records reviewed and to receive priceless face-to-face feedback from chief master sergeants with whom some have sat on promotion boards themselves. There is also a senior master sergeant board briefing that is associated with this program that provides a question and answer session with chief master sergeants regarding promotion topics. We have also recently partnered with the 5/6 Alliance to provide mentorship opportunities on a monthly basis through separate seminars on various topics or during their meetings. We additionally offer monthly base-wide bullet writing seminars designed to help senior airmen through technical sergeant enhance their working knowledge of bullet writing and covers bullet statements, editing and feedback.

As I mentioned earlier, we also strive to be impactful in the community as well. We have an active Adopt a Highway program where we are responsible for the cleanliness of a two-mile stretch of highway. In addition, our organization takes pride in our Habitat for Humanity volunteer efforts in the local community.

There is much more to our organization than I can share here, so I encourage you to inquire further about who we are and what we bring to the fight. As senior NCOs, we are charged with the deliberate development and mentorship efforts of Airmen and we are fortunate to have many in this organization that have stepped up and made these efforts a success. I ask those that haven't joined yet to do so and start giving back. We all want to be part of something bigger than ourselves, so I challenge you, no matter what your rank, to join a prospective organization and start contributing. Together, we can continue to grow Wing one!
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