I was watching Gomer Pyle USMC and Gomer is caught in a situation.
Carol Burnett plays a sargent, and because it’s the 60s the most pressing problem is she has to put on a variety show
Well Sargent Carter is all for it until he finds out that she wants to star Gomer and not him in the show.
So Sargent Carter says Gomer can’t be in it. Now Carol Burnett (I forget who she’s playing), orders Gomer to rehersal, saying “Pyle I’m pulling rank on you.”
Carter finds out and orders Pyle to dig a hole. Carol Burnett sees him and orders him back to rehersal and this goes back and forth with perdictable hilarious results
Now I was just wondering, what happens in real life when a subordinate gets a set of conflicting orders from two different people of equal rank?
Or is that the kind of thing that happens on TV but not in real life?
I believe whichever person that is in Pyle’s “chain of command” would have the final say.
When Pyle is orderd to do something counter to what someone else ordered, he should bring that fact up, and let the two Sgt’s work it out. But if they can’t, Sgt. Carter is (by being Pyle’s direct NCO) the default one to follow.
Right. But then, why is Sgt. Carter in the picture at all, then?
I am guessing it’s not because Pyle was on some kind of official detached duty (“TAD”), but that Carter was ordered to accomodate Burnett in her duties, and done in a vague enough way for comedy to ensue.
Oh, it happens in real life - not quite in this way, but it happens.
What a smart private will do is tell Burnett that she needs to take this up with Carter - and if that doesn’t work, Carter’s superior, Lieutenant Such-and-such. No private should be put into a position where they don’t know what their job or chain of command is, and the Burnetts and Carters in real life know this.
Usually these conflicts are just minor misunderstandings that resolve themselves - if they don’t, the chain of command should intervene. But a private isn’t set up to resolve these conflicts on their own and chains of command generally recognize this.
Well Pyle does say to Burnett “Can you and Sgt Carter get together and decide what I should be doing?” And she says “Pyle I’m pulling rank on you, now get over to the hall and rehearse.”
So he goes and Sgt Carter finds him there and orders him out. He comes down on him hard and makes him dig a hole.
For comedy effect this goes back and forth most of the show.
Burnett says to Sgt Carter “I was sent here by the Colonel to put on a show and he expects EVERYONE to co-operate.” This is to imply as “Mlees” says that she had authority to do whatever is needed to get the show put on.
And again Sgt Carter was all for the show till he found out Pyle was the star and not him.
In case you want to know they put Sgt Carter in charge of pulling the curtin up and down, which satisfied him, then Pyle and Burnett did a duet of medleys
Yeah, well, that’s nice and all, but as Pvt. Pyle, I would follow my NCO’s directives (unless someone senior to Sgt. Carter orders otherwise in my presence, so that I have a clear understanding of my orders, and a clear understanding of Burnett’s authority). She may think she has authority that the Colonel may not have intended for her to have, but it’s possible that she may be … mistaken.
If I had only Burnett’s assurances that she can order me about (and countermanding my normal chain of commands orders), I would carry out her orders as long as they don’t conflict with my regular chain of commands orders. When they do conflict, I stick with my own NCO (or Company Commander, etc).
Whoever is in Gomer’s chain of command takes precedence. My sister’s in the Navy and once got into a dick waving contest with an NCO who wasn’t in her chain of command who ordered her to do something that would have interfered in a task her superior NCO in her chain of command had ordered her to finish. Hilarity ensued, threats of courts martial and captain’s mast were made, but at the end of the day the NCO got smacked down by the CPO.
I never thought I’d use the phrase “my sister” and “dick waving contest” in the same sentence. I need to scrub that mental image out of my head.
Odesio
Chain of command rules. If it’s not quickly made clear, it’s only to allow for more Gomer-between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place gags.
I’ve told this story before on the Dope… Dean, a friend of mine, was a private in the Ohio Natl. Guard 20-some years ago and was deployed on a training mission to some Central American country (Honduras, I think it was). He was given guard duty with his M-16 one night and was told by his sergeant that no one should let through the gate after a certain hour. Well after that time, a brigadier general (!), apparently tipsy, came up to the gate with a local lady of easy virtue, and demanded to be let through. Dean had never seen the general before, didn’t know for sure who he was, but knew he wasn’t in Dean’s chain of command. Dean refused to let the general in, and despite the general’s blustering, stood his ground. His C.O. backed him up in the morning, and he suffered no consequences.
