The higher you ascend on the enlisted rating ladder, the more valuable you become to the Navy. This is understandable since you have more experience in your rating, have probably attended several Navy schools, and your attitudes are well-oriented to Navy life. In a sense, you are now in a position and better qualified to impart your knowledge and experience to the personnel serving under you. Your bearing, actions, and disposition will be under scrutiny not only by your seniors but also by your subordinates.

As a supervising EA1, your job is a many-sided task. It involves the procurement of necessary equipment, repair parts, and other materials; planning, scheduling, and directing work assignments; maintaining an adequate file of appropriate publications; interpreting and complying with current directives; collecting engineering data; making progress reports; carrying on a comprehensive and effective training program; interviewing subordinates, using the Personnel Readiness Capability Program (PRCP) guidelines; and drafting official correspondence. This chapter discusses many of the duties and responsibilities of the EA1 supervisor. These discussions center on those topics that, for the most part, are considered to be unique to the Engineering Aid rating; in other words, those administrative and supervisory topics related specifically to supervising the engineering division and assisting the management division of the operations department in a Naval Mobile Construction Battalion.

Obviously, there are many other subjects that relate to the Navy or the Seabees, in general, that you must also be thoroughly familiar with to be an effective supervisor. Those topics, such as leadership principles, principles of administration, correspondence procedures, and so forth, can be found in the Navys military requirements books that are required study for advancement in rating. General topics related to the Seabees as a whole, such as the PRCP program, are covered in the NCF/Seabee PO1 training manual (TRAMAN). Some other topics that you should become familiar with, such as facilities maintenance special project and military construction (MILCON) project submittal procedures, are also not discussed in this TRAMAN; however, a listing of reference sources concerning these and other topics is contained in appendix IV of this TRAMAN.

By now, you should be very familiar with the organization of a Seabee construction battalion and with the battalions operations department. Therefore, we will begin our discussion of your responsibilities by first discussing the management division and the ways in which you will be expected to assist the management division. Then we will discuss your duties and responsibilities as they relate to supervising the engineering division of the operations department.

LABOR DISTRIBUTION REPORTS AND TIMEKEEPING

 Labor reporting, such as that included in a Monthly Situation Report and a Deployment Completion Report (both of which are discussed below), is of great importance to the operation of Seabee units. It provides management with data that is necessary to determine labor expenditures on project work for calculation of statistical labor costs and to compare actual construction performance with estimating standards. It also serves to determine the effectiveness of labor utilization in performing administrative and support functions, both for internal unit management and for development of planning standards by higher command.

For labor reporting to be effective, an accurate labor accounting or timekeeping system is mandatory. This system must permit the day-by-day accumulation of labor utilization data insufficient detail and in a reamer that allows ready compilation of information required by the operations officer in the management of manpower resources and in the preparation of reports to higher authority. The timekeeping system used in Naval Construction Force units is described in COMSECOND/THIRDNCBINST 5312.1 series. For the purpose of our TRAMAN discussion, only the most important aspects of the system are covered. In the system, the basic unit for measuring labor is the man-hour which, as you know, is the amount of labor produced by one person working 1 hour of time. Man-days are computed on the basis of an 8-hour day regardless of the length of the scheduled workday. therefore, if an individual has worked a scheduled 9 hours in 1 day, he or she has expended 9 8 = 1.125 man-days of effort. Similarly, ten persons working 9 hours in a scheduled workday is equivalent to 11.25 man-days.

 All labor is considered as being either productive labor or overhead. Productive labor includes all labor that directly or indirectly contributes to the accomplishment of the mission, including military operations and readiness, disaster control operations, training, and, of course, construction operations. For the latter-construction operations-productive labor is further accounted for in two categories as follows:

1. Direct labor includes all labor expended directly on assigned construction tasks, either in the field or in the shop, and which contributes directly to the completion of the end product. For EAs, this includes, for example, surveying on a tasked construction project, travel time to and from project sites, and the preparation of as-built drawings.

2. Indirect labor comprises all labor required to support construction operations, but which does not produce an end product itself. This category is further subdivided under various codes listed in COMSECOND/THIRDNCBINST 5312.1 series. One of the codes, X02 - operations and engineering, lists such work as drafting (other than as-built preparation), surveying (for other than tasked projects), materials testing, and timekeeping as indirect labor.

Overhead labor is not considered to be productive labor in that it does not contribute directly or indirectly to the end product. It includes all labor that must be reported regardless of the assigned mission. Examples of overhead labor are the work performed by personnel assigned to the S-1 department, leave and liberty, and time spent getting haircuts and going to the exchange during working hours. It also includes time lost due to inclement weather and waiting for transportation