CHIEF  OF  INFORMATION  

                             SENIOR  ENLISTED  LEADER    1200  NAVY  PENTAGON  

                               ROOM  4B463                    WASHINGTON,  DC    20350-­‐1200  

   

 All, It's an exciting time to be in the Navy and an even more exciting time to be an MC in the Navy. Take the arrested landing of the X47B drone aboard USS George H.W. Bush (CVN 77) July 10. The still and video imagery of that historic event was incredible. Our MCs were everywhere. In addition to documenting the event extremely well, the ship superbly hosted military distinguished visitors - to include SECNAV and CNO - and international, national, local and trade press. The Media Department aboard Bush did an incredible job to ensure that historic story was told and shared. See some of that excellent work here: [http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=75298]. OCCUPATIONAL STANDARDS The updated MC Occupational Standards are out. These OCCSTNDS are the baseline tasks MCs are expected to perform. They're used to drive training requirements at DINFOS and in the MC Rate Training Manuals. They're also used to guide what your MC advancement exams will be based on. Since these OCCSTNDS were released in July, your advancement exams won't reflect these changes until 2014. You can download them here: [http://www.public.navy.mil/bupersnpc/reference/nec/NECOSVol1/Documents/MC_occs_CH-55, Jul13.pdf] ADVANCEMENT EXAMS A team of MC leaders spent a week at the Naval Education and Training Center (NETC) reviewing your MC Advancement Tests and updating them to the new Rate Training Manuals and OCCSTNDS. The goals of the Advancement Examination Readiness Review were to reduce the number of resources on the bibliography, add more questions from the updated Rate Training Manuals and remove outdated test questions. The updates will be seen in 2014 exam cycles. If you're taking the test this fall, study the current bibs for the September 2013 exam cycle. There's still more work to do on the MC advancement exam database, but starting next year, the tests will become more relevant and the bibs will become more manageable. OFFICIAL NAVY APP AND NAVY.MIL REFRESH An official Navy App has been designed and is being sent to the various App stores. We'll send out a Team PA when a simultaneous release date is set for the iOS,

   

Android and Windows apps. This first version of the Navy App presents news and information you'll find on www.navy.mil, All Hands Magazine [www.ah.mil] , the Navy's YouTube channel [http://www.youtube.com/user/usnavy ]and other Navy communication channels. The next iterations will allow users to bring in more local content and personalize the App to their command, region or other preferences. To do that, we have to rework the content management system for www.navy.mil to be able to provide the Navy App standard feeds for local content. One goal for the new www.navy.mil is to have local pages that are useful, relevant, easy to manage, and integrate into a unit's web and social presence. In addition to rethinking and reworking the local pages, a team from the Office of Information, Defense Media Activity and the Fleet has started working on other content management system and website requirements. The overall goal is to make www.navy.mil more relevant, more local, and easier to search and navigate. STORYTELLING Both the Navy App and www.navy.mil rework projects are part of an effort for us to enhance how we communicate with our publics. But both are only delivery methods and are meaningless without valuable content. This is why what you do is so important for the Navy. Your photos, stories, videos and graphics are the most important way we communicate with our publics. If you haven't read RDML Kirby's Team PAs that talked about storytelling please take a look at them here: [http://www.slideshare.net/NavyVisualNewsService/team-pa-content-is-king-17-jun2013] and here: [http://www.slideshare.net/NavyVisualNewsService/team-pa-share-first-8-jul2013]. A few takeaways from RDML Kirby's "Content is King" Team PA: - MCs want to tell better stories and want to write more features and should be given more freedom to do so - We need to communicate more "through story -- personal, visceral, compelling story" so we can "understand one another... gain perspective... explain ourselves..." - All communications are personal and we need to look at the human side of our Navy story more I know many of you are already doing incredible creative work. You're writing features, shooting photo stories and producing compelling videos. But we're not seeing a lot of that content making its way up to our Navy-wide channels like www.navy.mil, All Hands Magazine [www.ah.mil] , and the NavyLive Blog [http://navylive.dodlive.mil]. We want you to look for opportunities to practice and implement better storytelling. To share with us stories that show our people doing great things that teach us more about

   

life, being a Sailor and our Core Values in action. "We can write or produce great stories about stuff, and we do. Indeed, we should," wrote RDML Kirby in his 'Storytelling' Team PA. "The Navy needs 'stuff' to do our job -- ships, aircraft, weapons, drones. All that is interesting and all that is important. But if in telling the world about those things we forget the human element we miss an equally important opportunity to connect the Navy to the people we defend." We're asking each of you to share your work with DMA and CHINFO. Send us your feature stories. Send us more kabob-style stories. Read more on the kabob here: [http://usnavymedia.tumblr.com/post/56348241453/kabob-anyone]. Send us your photo feature stories. Send us your multimedia pieces. Send us your infographics. Send us your b-roll. Send us your video packages - even if they don't fit into the time specs for All Hands Updates. Overwhelm us with your compelling content. I look forward to hearing from you. As always, I have an open door, phone, and email policy. Please communicate with me your thoughts and ideas. Keep up the great work. Vr/ Master Chief MCCM(SW/AW/EXW) Jon McMillan Senior Enlisted Leader, Navy Chief of Information MC Community Master Chief jon.mcmillan@navy.mil Office: (703) 692-4704