Commanders should put down their BlackBerry devices and get involved in the training of their soldiers, according to a forum of junior leaders.After four days of meetings at the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command-hosted "Army Profession Junior Leader Forum" at Fort Sill, Okla., about 90 junior Army leaders – including noncommissioned officers, warrant officers and junior officers – delivered to senior Army officers, Nov. 18, their opinions on issues such as trust relationships, standards and discipline, Army professional certification, leader development, and Army culture.Staff Sgt. Jeremy Adams, a member of a work group that discussed "standards and discipline," said commanders need to be more engaged in the training of soldiers – engaged in a way they get their uniform dirty."Standards need to get reinforced through active presence," Adams said.Adding, "Active presence means you are there – not there standing on the wall with a BlackBerry in your hand connected to your email from your desk, but there, actually involved, conducting training ... the 'be, know, do' concept – let's get back to that."Staff Sgt. Joshua Freeland, of the "certifying Army professionals" work group agreed."Leaders at all levels have to be engaged on a personal level, not through email and text messages," Freeland said. "It's already been documented that soldiers hate electronic leadership."Capt. Patrick Merriss, with the "standards and discipline" work group told the leadership his group was concerned with developing soldiers' ability to conduct counseling."We're not taught how to deliver an effective counseling to our subordinates," he said.He told the leadership that as a young lieutenant he said he knew the difference between formal and informal counseling or written and oral counseling, but didn't know how and when to use them or their impact on soldiers.Merriss also said there needs to be more "peer-to-peer" leadership among the ranks."Something we don't do enough in the Army anymore is peer-to-peer leadership," he said. "It's tough to look your brother in the eye and tell him when he's messing up and how he's messing up."Chief Warrant Officer 2 Darrin Helton, on behalf of his group, advocated "consequences for failure," in regard to professional military education (PME).In PME, he said, the standard is one test, and if soldiers fail, they get a retest – after that, they get recycled or relieved from the course."Often, it is at the discretion of whoever the commander or the commandant is," Helton said. "What we see through our discussion is, often this is utilized as a third-time retest. What we want to see is consequences for failure."Helton also advocated new, non-traditional methods to disseminate information to Soldiers, like social media and smart phone apps. But he also said leadership must continue to use, or strengthen their use of traditional systems of relaying information to soldiers as well, such as unit formations."Some units have three formations a day, some have two, some have none," he said. "We're advocating getting back to the roots and utilize some of these methods to get that dissemination of information out there."Capt. Robert Graves, who participated in the work group tasked with discussing "certification of Army professionals" said his group sensed an "impending crisis" of individuals – junior leaders especially –who have been promoted in theater due totheir performance there, but who had not experienced formal schooling to go along with the new rank and responsibility."That experience is not being balanced with the institutional knowledge we feel is required to take those broad skills that we hope to impart in PME to balance with the experience of combat on the ground down in theater," he said.He told the leadership at the out briefing that increased funding and increased class sizes could help solve the problem. "We need to get them back into the schools," Graves said.Out of the "leader development" work group, Staff Sgt. Mathew Olodun said there is inflation in the enlisted evaluation system that could be solved in part with input from senior Army leadership."[There] is inflation in the evaluation system, especially on the NCO side of the house ... the one and one has become the standard, has become the floor," Olodun said.The two numbers, from a soldier's senior rater, reflect their overall performance and potential for promotion."As an NCO, if you are not meeting that one and one standard, you look like you're lacking next to your peers," Olodun said.The sergeant his working group recommends the Army redefine the NCO evaluation culture – which could start with input from the top."We recommend a memo from the chief of staff of the Army or sergeant major of the Army-level to re-establish the baseline of the NCOER; that getting that three and three is OK," Olodun said.Recognizing performance outside of regular Army channels – like official Army awards – is important for soldier development, said Chief Warrant Officer 3 Brendon Ramroth of the "Army culture" work group.Ramroth relayed that his work group discussed ideas like extending compensation days for soldiers "that give 110 percent" or providing exceptions from duty rosters, or that soldiers who exceed fitness standards should be allowed to do PT as an individual. He also said commanders, if they use social media websites, can recognize outstanding performers there as well.Additionally, the "Army culture" work group recommended the Army should bolster its sponsorship program for soldiers moving from one unit to another, standardize an Army-wide reception and integration standard operating procedure, and should develop a professional "reception cadre" that is responsible for receiving Soldiers as they move from one installation to another – or from advanced individual training to their first duty station.That time period is something Ramoth said his group identified as a "potential gap in character development" for soldiers.Input from the Army Profession Junior Leader Forum, gathered as part of the Army's "Profession of Arms Campaign" will be used to develop recommendations for incorporation into the 1st Profession of Arms Annual Report and Four Star Summit.