200th Blog Posting
Shipmates,
This is our 200th blog posting, coming just over six months since we launched this site. We have really enjoyed the dialogue and appreciate all of the apparent interest and growing readership (though we could always use more comments). As you hopefully know, iCommandant is just the tip of the iceberg for the Coast Guard's effort to leverage social media for the benefit of our mission execution and support, including our external communication and internal coordination. Since we initiated this effort, Team Coast Guard has stepped out aggressively to meet my intent. With social media really being about building networks, I thought I'd mark this milestone blog by sharing those sites that I read, both officially and unofficially. (This is not all inclusive, but a pretty good representation of some of the stuff I follow and/or find interesting).
The (ever expanding) Coast Guard Official Blogroll:
Coast Guard All Hands -- The voice of Master Chief Charles W. Bowen, Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard, and the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard Reserve Force, Jeff Smith.
USCG TRACEN Cape May - The blog of the Coast Guard?s Bootcamp.
iFORCECOM - The website of the United States Coast Guard Force Readiness Command, which is part of the Modernization Effort. The Force Readiness Command (FORCECOM) will become the Coast Guard's first command solely responsible for preparing forces to perform missions and execute them properly. FORCECOM will be charged with the current and future readiness of the Coast Guard's workforce -- Active Duty, Reserve, Auxiliary, Civilian and Contractor -- to ensure they will be ready when called to execute their missions.
Your Great Lakes Coast Guard -- a forum for the Ninth District Commander and members of his staff to share information about the U.S. Coast Guard's efforts as "Guardians of the Great Lakes."
Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach -- an official forum to share information about the U.S. Coast Guard's efforts as Guardians from Morro Bay, California south to Dana Point, California. Sector Los Angeles ? Long Beach is responsible for Coast Guard operations, missions, functions, and responsibilities that include providing search and rescue, marine safety, security, and environmental protection throughout the harbors and waters of California.
USCG Pay and Personnel Center -- Military Pay, Personnel and Travel procedural updates for Coast Guard Servicing Personnel Offices and unit administrative staffs.
USCG Pacific Northwest - D13 - The official blog of the 13th Coast Guard District
USCGAlaska - D17 - The official blog of the 17th Coast Guard District
AMVER -- The official blog of the Coast Guard?s Automated Mutual Assistance Vessel Rescue System
Coast Guard Auxiliary in the Pacific Northwest
Coast Guard Auxiliary Flotilla 76
Some of my other reads (some official, some not, listed in alphabetical order. We do not endorse everything found on these sites):
An Unofficial CG Blog
BitterEnd
Bryant?s Maritime Blog
Casco Bay Boaters Blog
Christiaan Conover
Coast Guard News
Danger Room
DHS Leadership Journal
Dipnote
DOD Live
Eagle Speak
gCaptain
Hell of a Day at Sea
Information Dissemination
Kennebec Captain
Mad Mariner
Maritime Licensing Blog
Masters of Towing Vessesls Association Forum
The Monitor
National Journal Experts
Navagear
Ocean Lines
Waiting for Ships to Come In
Panbo
Puget Sound Maritime
Sea Fever
Security Debrief
Social Government
TSA
USNI Blog
Weekly Leader
The next couple of months will be pretty interesting on the social media front. We are gradually phasing in the social media-friendly new CG Portal and in May we intend to launch he official Coast Guard Service blog and completely 2.0 enabled online CG Magazine. Keep reading, and better yet, commenting!!
This is our 200th blog posting, coming just over six months since we launched this site. We have really enjoyed the dialogue and appreciate all of the apparent interest and growing readership (though we could always use more comments). As you hopefully know, iCommandant is just the tip of the iceberg for the Coast Guard's effort to leverage social media for the benefit of our mission execution and support, including our external communication and internal coordination. Since we initiated this effort, Team Coast Guard has stepped out aggressively to meet my intent. With social media really being about building networks, I thought I'd mark this milestone blog by sharing those sites that I read, both officially and unofficially. (This is not all inclusive, but a pretty good representation of some of the stuff I follow and/or find interesting).
The (ever expanding) Coast Guard Official Blogroll:
Coast Guard All Hands -- The voice of Master Chief Charles W. Bowen, Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard, and the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Coast Guard Reserve Force, Jeff Smith.
USCG TRACEN Cape May - The blog of the Coast Guard?s Bootcamp.
iFORCECOM - The website of the United States Coast Guard Force Readiness Command, which is part of the Modernization Effort. The Force Readiness Command (FORCECOM) will become the Coast Guard's first command solely responsible for preparing forces to perform missions and execute them properly. FORCECOM will be charged with the current and future readiness of the Coast Guard's workforce -- Active Duty, Reserve, Auxiliary, Civilian and Contractor -- to ensure they will be ready when called to execute their missions.
Your Great Lakes Coast Guard -- a forum for the Ninth District Commander and members of his staff to share information about the U.S. Coast Guard's efforts as "Guardians of the Great Lakes."
Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach -- an official forum to share information about the U.S. Coast Guard's efforts as Guardians from Morro Bay, California south to Dana Point, California. Sector Los Angeles ? Long Beach is responsible for Coast Guard operations, missions, functions, and responsibilities that include providing search and rescue, marine safety, security, and environmental protection throughout the harbors and waters of California.
USCG Pay and Personnel Center -- Military Pay, Personnel and Travel procedural updates for Coast Guard Servicing Personnel Offices and unit administrative staffs.
USCG Pacific Northwest - D13 - The official blog of the 13th Coast Guard District
USCGAlaska - D17 - The official blog of the 17th Coast Guard District
AMVER -- The official blog of the Coast Guard?s Automated Mutual Assistance Vessel Rescue System
Coast Guard Auxiliary in the Pacific Northwest
Coast Guard Auxiliary Flotilla 76
Some of my other reads (some official, some not, listed in alphabetical order. We do not endorse everything found on these sites):
An Unofficial CG Blog
BitterEnd
Bryant?s Maritime Blog
Casco Bay Boaters Blog
Christiaan Conover
Coast Guard News
Danger Room
DHS Leadership Journal
Dipnote
DOD Live
Eagle Speak
gCaptain
Hell of a Day at Sea
Information Dissemination
Kennebec Captain
Mad Mariner
Maritime Licensing Blog
Masters of Towing Vessesls Association Forum
The Monitor
National Journal Experts
Navagear
Ocean Lines
Waiting for Ships to Come In
Panbo
Puget Sound Maritime
Sea Fever
Security Debrief
Social Government
TSA
USNI Blog
Weekly Leader
The next couple of months will be pretty interesting on the social media front. We are gradually phasing in the social media-friendly new CG Portal and in May we intend to launch he official Coast Guard Service blog and completely 2.0 enabled online CG Magazine. Keep reading, and better yet, commenting!!
ADM A
Posted at
7:13 PM
13 Comments:
Admiral Allen;
It was an honor and thrill to see my Sea-Fever blog and Weekly Leader make a list of other really terrific maritime blogs that you frequent.
It's great to see an organizational leader understand the value of and embrace social media as you have. Over the past few years technology has had an incredible impact in how we communicate, build relationships and exercise leadership. Your experiments with social media are extremely important, thanks for leading the way.
Congratulations on iCommandant's 200th post. I look forward to reading many more by you in the future here and wherever the next phase of your career may take you.
Thanks.
Fair Winds,
Peter A. Mello
Sea-Fever Consulting
http://sea-fever.org
http://weeklyleader.net
@petermello
Admiral Allen,
Congratulations on the 200th... they only get easier- well, no, not really. None the less, congrats.
And as Peter Mello noted I would also like to thank for reading our little slice of the internet at CGBlog.org :: An Unofficial Coast Guard Blog. We try to keep it interesting.
~LTJG Ryan Erickson
It is an honor to be listed on this blog as an occasional read of the Commandant, and in the company of so many great blogs on the internet.
Odd that you would use the disclaimer about not endorsing everything on these Blogs and then leave off the one Blog that has had the greatest impact on Coast Guard Civil Rights off the list.
Like it or not, agree with it or not, Congress and Booz Allen support that Coast Guard Report didn't really break any new ground. They just reported what had been reported in previous reviews going back a decade.
Leaving Coast Guard Report off your list sends a very different message than you think.
I've got to echo the comments made by others. Thanks, Admiral, for the vote of confidence.
Congratulations on this milestone! As the social media "experiment" continues, the accessiblity of major social networks such as Twitter on CG Work Station III's should be scrutinized again. The benefits of using Twitter as a tool to rapidly disseminate information to our share holders are unquestioned and can't be ignored much longer.
Admiral,
It is an honor for me to blog for two blogs that have made your list, cgblog.org and USNI blog. v/r Jim
I don't want this to get off topic, but with regard to the comment by Wonder I have to agree.
By all accounts Coast Guard leadership has ostracized the Blog Coast Guard Report for providing the very transparency the Commandant has stated brings self correcting behavior.
The reality based on the Booz Allen report and the video of the hearing is that Coast Guard Report forced the issue into the spotlight and caused a self correcting behavior that is now being played out in congress.
Admiral maybe it's time we stop listening to your handlers and listen to the people that asked for help with this nearly two years ago.
I fully believe we are on the path to recovery, but your expectations and that of congress and the American people may not be fully realized if this renewal process is carried out in a vacuum.
You Sir have placed the Social Media squarely in our services spotlight and the cross hairs of your employees.
Pretty much my entire unit reads Coast Guard Report daily (if not regularly), and many of us make it to your Blog by way of the Report.
Good news can be found anywhere, real thought provoking news that brings transparency to the issues must be sought out. Many of us find it at the Report.
What a great list of blogs, thank you for sharing it.
Though I do have to say I think it is interesting that there is someone making comments that some blog was left off, then that same person talks about how the blog in question isn't really breaking any new ground. Seems a contradiction! (And cocky to claim that any blog has had so much impact. Maybe next the CG Report can take on world hunger?) It just sounds like someone has their feelings hurt for not making it on the blog roll.
I didn't see anywhere on this list where it said this is all the blogs in the whole world wide web that talk about the Coast Guard, just a list that the Commandant reads. It is totally impossible to share all the blogs that write about the Coast Guard. So don't worry wonder the CG Report was probably not the only princess left off the parade float.
The blogs that the Commandant put as his reads do not all agree with the CG if you read through, and they tackle some really tough content...but they do it without making personal attacks, and in a manner that seems to encourage engagement and conversation not name calling and poo flinging. That might be a lesson for the CG Report to learn from.
So, big deal, the CG Report didn't make the cut this time. That doesn't mean they can't work on improving the CG Report and making it more readable and less angry and unprofessional in its personalize attacks on people (not, not saying they have to kiss stern or only report the happy stories, just improve their manners), so that it might make the cut next time.
Good afternoon Admiral Allen,
Congratulations on your 200th blog! I found the topics brought up by yourself, your guest posts, and the comments attached to be both interesting and enlightening.
I would like to take this opportunity to invite you to visit the National Strike Force blog at www.uscgnationalstrikeforce.blogspot.com.
Our blog has posts that address various NSF training and outreach efforts, including a post on the F/V MarGun lightering activities in Alaska. In trying to take advantage of the ever-growing social media venues, we are making a concerted effort to get more stories out featuring NSF members in action.
In our recently published 2008 Year in Review, I spoke of one of my mentors, Command Sergeant Major USArmy (retired) Donald Simmons, who inspired me through his dedication to his North Carolina Vietnam Veterans group. Just recently he was in Beckley WV at a veterans' group meeting when he encountered Coast Guard members in uniform. He mentioned that he was featured in a recent Coast Guard magazine and asked them if they knew of me. As it turned out, the Coast Guard members were actually National Strike Force members who were conducting hazardous material response training at the Tunnel complex, which the Atlantic Strike Team was completing and the Gulf Strike Team is presently going through. CSM Simmons and his veteran counterparts shared stories and fellowship with our members for several hours, as well as took many photos. CSM Simmons has contacted all of his friends and relatives in North Carolina, Connecticut and Texas and told them how the Coast Guard members made him and his veterans group feel special.
That story will be posted on an upcoming NSF blog.
I am hopeful that you will enjoy our blog, make it part of your regular blog visits and even add it to your list of blog favorites.
Thanks again for your proactive and inspirational leadership.
Semper NSF!
Semper DOG!!
Semper Paratus!!!
Very Respectfully,
Roderick E. Walker
Captain, US Coast Guard
Commander, National Strike Force
Admiral:
I am taking your advice and trying to do blogs: we will see how this comes out.
I do wish to thank you for taking so much of your valuable time to help me in my AMIO project. It was a real pleasure to listen to your views.
In a related comment, I mentioned that the Arctic happens to be an interest of mine, my second book that takes place in the Far North will soon be out--I hope.
As you know USRCS officer John Cantwell led two expeditions up the Kobuk River in Alaska. One of the main reasons for the expedition was to see if this could be an escape route for whalers trapped along the north coast of Alaska. The Bowhead Whaling had by this time started to work eastward along the north shore. Healy knew the Arctic and worried about the fate of those pushing eastward. I may be wrong, but I believe one can say this was the first instance of the USRCS/USCG's stragetic planning for operations in the Arctic.
Even more interesting is the story of Wrangel Island, above Siberia, which I will leave for another time.
Thank you the time and help you have given me on my project.
Dr. Dennis L. Noble
MSTCS, USCG (Ret.)
Wow, What an honor. I am ex-coastie (QM, Cutters Gallatin and Confidence.) Thank you.
Wow, that's one heck of a blogroll you've posted, there! Lots of great folks to keep up with. Thanks so much and congratulations with the 200th post!!!!
-Windows 8
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