Report Procedures

[JadziaKathryn]

When two officers go on an away mission (voluntarily or not), would both of them have to write a report, or just the ranking officer? A potential one-shot is brewing in my head, but I need to know how this report-writing business would work.

[Navigator]

Just one report. The way it usually works is the junior writes it; the senior will edit, approve and sign it (and claim credit )

[Asso]

Just so!

[JadziaKathryn]

The junior officer writes it? Hmmm. Must work around that somehow.

Thank you!

[CX]

That seems a bit odd to me too. I guess I ended up writing the after action reports for most everything I was involved in no matter what, whether it was because I was the flight adjutant or as the Special Projects Officer that had actually planned the events. Seems to me that either the senior of the two or both of them should write reports, but I don't have any experiance with how this kind of stuff is done in the active duty military.

[Alelou]

I think you can make up the rules however you want; it's your fanfic. In the future, we can certainly HOPE that only one person has to write a report unless there's something untoward to investigate, and that the senior officer would be responsible for doing that (even if he or she delegates it).

[Lady Rainbow]

I was under the impression that the ranking officer would write the after-action report, but depending on the away team, others might have their own additions to it.

Example: Let's say there's an Away team consisting of T'Pol (senior officer), Trip, Hoshi and Malcolm. During the adventure, they stumble over new scientific, technological and linguistic discoveries. T'Pol would write the general "Here's what happened on the planet" report, and probably a second one focusing on the scientific part of it. Trip and Malcolm might add their own impressions (about the technology) and Hoshi about the new language and culture.

And if something embarrassing happened, they could either keep it "off the record" or make the barest mention of it. (Granted, though, they'd have to make sure the various reports agreed.)

And Archer would end up reading the whole thing. No wonder starship captains are always behind on their paperwork!

[JadziaKathryn]

I think you can make up the rules however you want; it's your fanfic.

Oh, I can work with that.

[Linda]

In the Coast Guard Auxiliary (civilian volunteers trained to do the same search and rescue work as the regulars), the boat coxswain writes the patrol report. The crew members do not write the report though they may keep a personal radio log of the regular coms "ops and position" calls they personally make. These calls usually are every half hour unless the situation demands they be more frequent. Then, these may be added to the boat radio log later.

I guess you could make up your own rules that Starfleet would follow. I think canon has been silent on this detail. To my way of thinking, why not do it the Coast Guard way? That is the best way! Semper Paratus!

LOL, I am not biased or anything am I?