The Leaders Book is not an administrative formality. An NCO who doesn't know each soldier's ETS, current profile status, and last PT score is not ready to give a readiness brief — and no one warns you when that brief gets called in 20 minutes.
What the System Actually Tracks
The structure separates data into distinct readiness categories, not by alphabetical order or rank hierarchy.
Service timeline fields anchor every soldier to their military lifecycle: BASD (Basic Active Service Date), DOR (Date of Rank), and ETS. ETS is the one that drives planning. A squad leader who knows three soldiers expire within the same 60-day window can surface retention concerns, request waivers, or plan cross-training before the shortage happens rather than after.
Readiness fields are the operational core. PT score and date establish whether the score is current or stale — a score from 14 months ago is not a readiness indicator. Weapons qualification tracks type (M4, M16, M9), qualification level (Expert, Marksman, Sharpshooter), and date. Medical profile start and end dates separate a temporary limitation from a permanent condition; the profile field holds the actual restriction text, which matters when making duty assignments.
Professional development captures military education tier (WLC, ALC, SLC) and schools attended. For a promotion board, these fields aren't background data — they're the primary eligibility criteria.
The Fields That Get Skipped
Blood type and NOK (Next of Kin) contact are the two fields most often missing from informal tracking systems. Both are irrelevant until they're critical. Blood type is a medical emergency field; NOK is a casualty notification field. Neither requires updating frequently, which is exactly why they go stale.
Height, weight, and body fat percentage support APFT and ABCP tracking. Combined with the PT date, these let a leader identify soldiers approaching the body composition threshold before a weigh-in makes it official.
Awards and decorations, tracked as structured multi-select rather than free text, make it possible to filter the entire squad by award type — useful when battalion needs a count of CIB holders or soldiers with ARCOM or above for a specific tasking.
Readiness at Squad Level
The value of this template compounds when the squad is viewed as a system rather than a roster. Sort by ETS to see retention risk. Filter by profile status to identify duty limitations for the week. Check qualification dates to flag who is overdue for a range cycle.
Cloud sync keeps the data current across devices — a field update after a range day reflects immediately, without waiting to reconcile a separate spreadsheet at the end of the week.