CPT Williams commanded a company and was notoriously late in submitting reports, attending meetings, and completing tasks. He was practically a laughingstock from the battalion commander to the lowest company private. If someone made a mistake within the unit, it was referred to as "you Williams'd it."
While CPT Williams wasn't completely incompetent, he had no idea that his company had no faith in him to accomplish a mission. His battalion commander didn't have much faith in him either because he'd never selected CPT Williams to be the main effort company.
This affected the morale of CPT Williams' Soldiers because they never had the opportunity to shine as the main effort company that conducted the "heavy lifting." They didn't see why they should be punished for having a lackluster commander.
CPT Williams learned a lot about himself when the battalion commander encouraged his company commanders to conduct a 360 assessment of themselves. He participated in the MSAF program and received his Individual Feedback Report, or IFR.
The feedback in the comments for CPT Williams seemed stunningly mean-spirited and, while there were plenty of weaknesses called out, there were almost no strengths. Some of the comments were that he was absent-minded, withdrawn, disorganized, helpless, and ignorant. The only strengths identified were friendly and hard-worker.
CPT Williams realized that there must be some validity to receiving such a scathing report and scheduled a meeting with his battalion commander to solicit advice. He was ready to take action because he no longer wanted to be perceived this way, which he knew must be affecting the morale of his Soldiers.
