AFMC team picked to ‘spread-the-word’

Published Nov. 21, 2005
By Ron Scharven
Air Force Materiel Command Public Affairs

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio (AFMCNS) -- In less than 1 year, almost 2,000 young officers in many career fields will be told to hang up their blue suit and be involuntarily separated from the Air Force in order to balance the officer overages.

This action will be conducted using a Force Shaping board. To ensure each officer is told of the board’s concept and action, each MAJCOM was asked to create a “Spread the Word” team. The AFMC team, selected by Gen. Bruce Carlson, AFMC commander, is Brig. Gen. Kathie Close, AFMC/A7 and Lt. Col. Cheryl Malone, AFMC/A1.

“The decision was made to turn off the enlisted accession pipeline in 2005 and the Air Force was able to meet the FY05 end strength,” General Close explained, “but that created an imbalance between the enlisted and officer force mainly in company grade officers in the 2001 through 2004 year groups.”

She said the Air Force was able to pay for these overages with supplemental monies. But the imbalance has, in essence, caused the enlisted force to pay for the officer overages.

There were several volunteer programs and initiatives instituted, such as waiving active duty service commitments but the programs didn’t quite reach the desired goals. Several other options were looked at but the Air Force decided to conduct a force shaping board that impacts ’02 and ’03 year groups.

To prepare the MAJCOM Spread the Word teams, the Air Force Personnel Center at Randolph AFB, Texas, conducted a force shaping training session. The training covered a myriad of topics as to why we have the challenges we face today, who was going to be impacted, what year groups, the Air Force Specialty Codes affected and how the Force Shaping board is going to be conducted. It also covered the volunteer programs such as Palace Chase, the Blue to Green programs, civil service opportunities and limited active duty waivers.

Two briefings were created; one for the base leadership and the other was for the officers affected. “I give the executive briefing to the leadership and Colonel Malone conducts the mass briefings,” General Close explained. “The mass briefing is about a 45 minutes long scripted briefing and with the questions and answers the session runs about 2 hours. This ensures that everyone in the Air Force gets the same word at the same time,” she continued.

“Because of the dates of the board, we will have briefed everyone affected in AFMC by Nov. 18 since it will be determined on 1 March 06 who will have to be force shaped,” General Close said. “The board will meet in April of next year, the results will be released 1 June and those officers selected to be involuntarily separated from the Air Force will have an established separation date of 29 September 2006. We are trying to give them as much information possible to help them make that crucial decision and transition as easily as possible,” the General said.

General Close said that we need to do everything from a leadership perspective to provide these officers every opportunity and resource to transition them from the military to the civilian world, civil service, the enlisted ranks, the Guard or Reserves or to another service.

“I truly believe that these officers have the skills the civilian community wants: they are disciplined, trained, they have leadership experience their peers on the outside don’t possess, they have the training to successfully run large programs and these are very marketable skills in the civilian community,” General Close said.

According to Colonel Malone, there are only two AFSCs that the officers in the 2002 and 2003 year groups can cross-train into; navigator and developmental engineers. Of course, they would have to meet the academic and physical requirements.

“If the officer was prior enlisted, a boarded officer will have the opportunity to return to their old AFSC, based on the needs of the Air Force, and at the enlisted rank they held upon entering Officer Training School, Colonel Malone explained.

“This is a new generation, General Close said, “they really have a sense of patriotism and commitment – a warrior-type attitude, it’s not just a job to them.”

“This is a wingman issue. These officers have to make a crucial decision, and in many cases, a family decision, and it is up to us to give them all the help possible to make that decision,” General Close said.

Spreading the word