Team Assessment for FLETC Assignment by Marty Deeks

Response Prepared for FLETC Assignment 10-B

Team Assessment and Evaluation Protocol – Part B

Assignment Brief: Write a formal evaluation of each member of your current team. Include team leadership if applicable. For non-Federal personnel use your primary work team or special unit assignment.

Student Name:

Martin Atticus Deeks                             Student Number 007194

Parent Agency: NCIS (Attached)

Team: Office of Special Projects (OSP)

Nature of the Unit: Counter-espionage and other assigned duties.

Opening Evaluator Comments: Wow. Just gotta say I didn’t expect to be evaluating my own NCIS team as part of FLETC. Me? Sure. But not them. Especially since OSP doesn’t seem to be a standard team. I think we’ve been poked, prodded, and generally raked over the coals in my time with them as LAPD Liaison more than the rest of NCIS combined. It’s a special unit composed of unique individuals I’ve worked with for years.

Grisha Callen: Let’s just start with the tough one. I think it’s fair to say Callen doesn’t really know who he is, so it’s pretty much impossible for anyone else to claim they know him. Except maybe Sam, but he’s a case all his own. Full disclosure: I’m letting Callen live rent-free above the bar I own back in LA. He doesn’t pay rent or say thanks, but neither of those things are Callen’s style.

I get the guy didn’t know much about his background, and maybe still doesn’t. It’s hard to say because he never talks about those things. In fact, I’d be hard-pressed to fill two pages of this blue book with what he does talk about. He’s supposed to be the agent in charge of the team, but most of the time he doesn’t seem comfortable with that role. I think sometimes he does it just to keep Hetty happy.

If you looked up “lone wolf” in the dictionary I’ll bet you’d find Callen’s picture next to it. Give him any whiff about his family and he’s off on his own. I think that explains some of his later bonding with Mosley…she could say it was about her son and he’d back her play without question because it was about family.

I can’t really say we’re close. But like I said, I don’t think anyone’s really close to Callen. Even Callen himself.

Sam Hanna: Sam is a SEAL. That’s almost all you need to know about him. He says he’s an honorable man, but sometimes his definition of honor confuses me. Where’s the honor in looking the other way when an assistant director is mistreating prisoners?

If it sounds like I have a bit of a grudge against Sam, I guess that would be true. I mean, it’s hard not to when your mouth is destroyed by a dentist’s drill and you keep the secret of his wife’s identity. With most people that would be enough to prove your honor and character. But not with Sam. It’s like you start over every day having to prove yourself again and again to him. And it’s not just me. I see him do that with other members of the team, too. When is it enough?

If I’m wound too loose for the team, Sam’s wound too tight. I mean, who sends both their kids to military school? Don’t get me wrong, he’s got great kids. It’s just that he’s making all those choices for them and I’ve seen how that ends down the line. Callen tried to tell him once, and Sam just shut him down. It’s Sam’s way or the highway, but what happens when Sam’s way is wrong?

Kensi Blye: She prefers this name at work. And yeah, she’s my wife. That’s the full disclosure part, along with the fact that I love her more than anything else on this earth.

Kensi’s complex. She’s devoted to her work, enough that she almost pushed me out of her life twice. So devoted she went to Mexico on Mosley’s say-so without batting an eye. If that’s not dedicated I don’t know what is, but it comes with a cost. I worry every day about that cost, and try to plan for a future without the job. But Kensi is so bound up in being perfect, being someone her father would be proud of, that she doesn’t stop to realize she already is that person and that he’s surely proud of her. Just like I’m proud of her. I just wish she’d take time to be proud of herself, too.

Nell Jones: She may work in Ops most of the time, but she’s a part of the team. Nell is very competent and compassionate, but she sometimes lacks faith in her own ability. She’s good in the field, but I worry she won’t be able to object to bad missions or bad orders. In the field she’s the Nellverine..tough and determined. Don’t let her size fool you…

Eric Beale: If there’s anyone on the team who reminds me of me, it’s Beale. Frequently a target of Sam’s criticism, no matter what he does, Beale is one of the most competent computer ninjas I’ve ever seen. He also stays cool in the field, and is capable of impressive courage if Nell is threatened in any way (who would have expected that?). But to his credit Beale is also willing to admit he doesn’t like being in the field that much. In a team full of alpha males that takes real courage. Now that he’s rich, he may be leaving NCIS, and that in my opinion is a huge loss. Beale is not replaceable.

Henrietta Lange: Who can actually say they know Hetty? If there’s anyone in OSP more shrouded in mystery than Callen, it’s Hetty, our Operations Officer. She picked me for NCIS, and later made sure I made it here, so I do owe her. But I also have to wonder…some of OSP’s biggest disasters occurred when we were being run by agents who were her proteges (Mosley and Hunter). She’s got ninja magic, no question. But maybe it’s starting to run out or only works for so long.

Hetty loves secrets. So much so that she holds things back in briefings…sometimes things we should have known going in. Sometimes it’s necessary, but you do wonder at other times. She’s like a weird ninja mother hen, but I don’t think this team would run long without her or someone like her.

Owen Granger: Yeah, I know: he’s dead. But Assistant Director Granger had a huge impact on me during my time with OSP. He was tough, but he was also fair. Unlike Sam, once you earned his respect that was it. I think one of my proudest memories was when I asked him what I should call him and he told me “My friends call me Granger.” That meant I’d earned the respect of one of the toughest men I’ve ever known. That’s actually given me the strength to push this far.

Granger also balanced out Hetty. His loss has been crucial to this team.

Martin Deeks: I’m the odd one out. The class clown always trying to fit in. At least that’s how they see me. How do I see myself? Now that’s a complicated question. I talk too much. I don’t take things seriously. I’m lazy…oh, what. That’s how others see me.

I know I came to the team with more undercover experience than any of them except maybe Callen. I know the law better than any of them do (thank you California bar exam), and I make a mean vodka martini. I also think I’m objective about things they wouldn’t be (never ask Sam to investigate a SEAL, by the way…it doesn’t work). I’m also willing to question authority when it’s wrong (see Mosley’s reports about that…if you can find them). There’s a line in what we do, a clear point between right and wrong. I’ve been across that line once and didn’t like it one bit. I’ve also seen what it does to people and the impact it has on their lives. I think this team needs that kind of perspective, even if they don’t realize it.

 

by Guest Contributor RobbieC