Ohio’s command chief warrant officer prepares to close chapter on storied 37-year career

Stuckman has served as the state command chief warrant officer since June 2012, and is only the fourth person to hold that position. The state command chief warrant officer serves as the senior ranking warrant officer and advises the assistant adjutant general for Army. He manages the military aspects of all full-time and traditional warrant officers to include readiness, training and education. There are currently about 250 warrant officers in the Ohio Army National Guard.

“My first encounter with a warrant officer was with the late Chief Warrant Officer 4 Robert ‘Ollie’ Cline. He had a profound impact on my desire to become a warrant officer,” Stuckman said. “Once I found out the OHARNG had helicopters and that you could become a warrant officer and fly one, there was nothing more I wanted to do than that.”

Another person who had an influence on his military career was his father, Pete Stuckman, who served 40 years as a full-time Guard member.

“As a full-timer, he not only had the responsibility to maintain unit readiness and Soldier care, but the community relied on him, other unit members and equipment in their time of need,” Stuckman said of his father’s service.

Stuckman’s service has included two deployments that made an impact, as he deployed to support Hurricane Katrina recovery efforts in 2005 and he went to Iraq with the 1st Battalion, 137th Aviation Regiment in 2009.

His leadership has also had an impact on others, including Chief Warrant Officer 4 Richard Kerwood, who has been selected to succeed Stuckman as the state’s top warrant officer.

“I think the biggest lesson I’ve learned from him is his inclusive leadership style,” Kerwood said. “He’s a calm, level-headed and deliberate leader who enables all to have a voice in the management of the team. Including all perspectives permits the best possible solution to challenges, while encouraging buy in from our members for the cohort’s direction.”

As he has seen many successes in his career, Stuckman credits the support he has received from his wife as the most critical in enabling those successes.

“I would like to thank my beautiful wife and best friend, Jenny, for all the love, support and sacrifices that she has made so I could focus on my career,” he praised. “While I was either off at a school, annual training or deployed, she was home, devoted to raising our two sons while taking care of a household and working full-time as a kindergarten teacher.”

After a 37-year military career that has included shaping the Ohio Army National Guard’s Warrant Officer Cohort path for nine years, Stuckman is now ready to close that chapter and prepare for the next in retirement.