The First Shirt trusts the CO, or things just don’t work.
I saw too many instances in company commands where either the CO was a martinet, or the NCOIC was a douche.
Besides, everyone knows you when you want something done, you talk the the E-4 who actually does the job.
You made me laugh! Thank you.
When I was a 1LT, I referred to my E-4 clerk as my SPIC. Got a few interesting responses until I told them it meant "specialist in charge."
I had a Towed Vulcan platoon (late 70s) that had three "Acting Jack" squad leaders (Spec 4's). My other SL was an E-5. We were the only platoon in the battery to pass our ARTEP (Tac Eval).
The day before it started, I got them together and told them why, to a man, they were better than the other platoons. By then, I'd been through multiple evaluations as a Platoon Leader, and knew what the evaluators focused on. Piece of cake...