On the Army News page, this change in policy was posted on October 8:
This fall, the Canadian Army (CA) will implement an innovative program whereby Combat Arms promotions from Corporal to Master Corporal will be managed at the unit – instead of the national – level. This change, a positive outcome of the CA Renewal effort, is expected to save time and money and help the CA accelerate the progression of its “shining stars.”
The drive to work smarter and be more efficient can lead to a fresh examination of why things are done in a certain way. Such a review process may end up standing the status quo on its head, as was the case with Corporal-to-Master Corporal appointments in the Canadian Army (CA) Combat Arms trades.
The CA has four Combat Arms trades: infantry, armoured, artillery, and combat engineers. The majority of the personnel in these trades are privates or corporals located in field units where they perform their baseline jobs.
On the basis that no one knows their soldiers’ strengths and leadership qualities better than their own unit, authority to determine which corporals will be promoted to the appointment of Master Corporal is now given to the unit Commanding Officer (CO). The COs will now also be the ones to select soldiers with leadership potential for Primary Leadership Qualification (PLQ) training, which is a pre-cursor to promotion to Master Corporal.
This was achieved by eliminating the requirement to hold National-level promotion boards for Corporals in the Combat Arms. As a result, the CA will save time, reduce paperwork, simplify the selection process, cut back on costly postings and – most importantly – enhance the process of ensuring the right soldier is in the right place at the right time and with the right qualifications.
I can’t think of a more ridiculous way of managing the promotion process than managing it directly from the national level. The army sets standards for promotion to each rank nationally, and that makes sense, as soldiers can be detached from their parent unit for particular operations or short-term local requirements, so you want to see a certain level of standardization in training and education to make those detachments work as well as possible. But there’s a huge difference between setting standards and actually directly managing the promotions. You could make a case for it with senior NCOs and officers, but for junior ranks that seems an over-abundance of centralization.
