SMA Daniel A. Dailey
Sergeant Major of the Army (Retired)
June 1989 – June 2019
SMA(R) Daniel A. Dailey who enlisted in the Army in 1989 and attended Basic Training and Advanced Individual Training as an 11B (Infantryman) at Fort Benning, Georgia.
He held numerous positions while serving in the United States Army. While serving as the TRADOC CSM he transformed the Warrior Leader Course making it slightly longer, adding more land navigation, more physical fitness, counseling and assessing subordinates.
He developed the NCO development timeline so that so that each NCO is proficient in the competencies necessary for the four NCO roles of leading, training, maintaining standards, and caring for Soldiers and equipment at the skill level they are entering, the leadership position they will hold and the organization they will lead. This timeline is a synchronized relationship between professional military education, promotions and assignments in a way that is deliberate, continuous, sequential and progressive. He focused on reducing backlog in NCOES courses and focused on improving instructors by developing the Instructor Development Program.
SMA Dailey was instrumental in bringing the Army Career Tracker Online. The Army Career Tracker enables Soldiers, NCOs, Officers, and Department of the Army civilians to understand and map out their individual career path and helps supervisors to assist subordinate’s self-development.
He made Improvements the Structured Self Development Program and focused on making the College of the American Soldier more beneficial to serving the Soldier’s educational self-development.
As the 15th Sergeant Major of the Army, December 2015-August 2019, his first challenge was to address the Tattoo Policy already in place. He got an immediate reversal and adjustment to the policy that eased Soldiers frustration and concerns with having and obtaining tattoos. He made significant changes to the uniform in gaining approval for a new service uniform, allowing Soldiers to wear black socks with the PT uniform and allowing them to wear headphones while working out inside. He made significant contributions in his leadership approaches dealing with sexual harassment, sexual assault and suicide in the ranks.
SMA Dailey introduced and championed “Not in My Squad” as a sound leadership approach to critical issues in the ranks such as Sexual Assault. He worked in concert with the TRADOC CSM in the implementation of the NCO 2020 Strategy; renaming the Warrior Leader Course to the Basic Leader Course at the same time redesigning the course. He created the Leader Core Competencies; creating the Master Leader Course and adding it to NCO PME; creating an NCO writing program; instituting the Select, Train, Educate, Promote (STEP) system; establishing the Distributed Leader Course as a prerequisite to attend resident PME; and the pursuit of a bachelor’s degree in the Sergeants Major Course.