WATERVLIET ARSENAL, N.Y. (July 7, 2015) - Four months ago, the Secretary of the Army testified before Congress regarding the Army's posture and in his closing statement said, "With your assistance, we will continue to resource the best-trained, best-equipped and best-led fighting force in the world: the U.S. Army."
It is a fact that the Arsenal, via its manufacturing, directly supports the Hon. John M. McHugh's statement about having the best equipped fighting force in the world. After all, the Arsenal has been equipping the Army since the War of 1812.
But how does the Arsenal support the other two proclamations ̶ having the best-trained and the best-led fighting force in the world?
If one believes that the Secretary's proclamations transcend beyond Soldiers to include the Civilian workforce, then the Secretary's comments do apply to the Arsenal. By the way, the Arsenal leadership believes it does.
That is where the challenge lies.
Col. Lee H. Schiller Jr., the Arsenal commander, recently said at a town hall meeting that a command climate survey administered in 2014 revealed a few remarkable findings. One, that the workforce perceived that there was no formal leader development program. Secondly, there was no formal training program.
Given that the Arsenal is an Army-owned and -operated manufacturing center, how can that be true?
But it was. The workforce had pointed out what should have been a blinding glimpse of the obvious.
The commander called in his senior leaders, many of whom had been at the Arsenal for 25 years or more, to determine what happened to the Arsenal's training and leader development programs. Certainly, these two hallmarks of the Army institution did not just come of age recently and the Arsenal had yet to catch up.
Lots of fingers pointed, theories posited, but much blame for the absence of leader development and a formal training program fell on the "Peace Dividend" of the 1990s.
For those who remember the first Gulf War, the United States and its allies pummeled the Iraqi military into submission in less than 30 days. This great military success created an environment for political and military leaders to come to the conclusion, or at least have a discussion, that America may no longer need such a large standing military.
After the major withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq beginning in 1991, the Army's force structure was significantly reduced by hundreds of thousands of Soldiers within just a matter of a few years.
Why? Because many believed that there would never be another large-scale conflict, such as what was just fought. Given that direction of thought, why should America maintain a large military force structure? And so, it didn't.
Sound familiar? Isn't that what was said after World War I, World War II, Vietnam…
Nevertheless, in tandem with the Army reductions, the Arsenal reduced, too.
From the time of the end of the first Gulf War to the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the Arsenal workforce suffered nine reductions in force that reduced its workforce from about 2,500 to less than 500 workers. As part of this reduction, the Arsenal leadership restructured the organization, thereby, significantly reducing the number of staff divisions and offices. One of the offices cut was the training office, which also focused on leader development.
So, here the Arsenal is many years later and there finally is great movement at the Arsenal toward reestablishing training and leader development programs. A game of catch up, if you will.
Last April, Bill O'Brien, the Installation Management Director, and Arsenal Chief of Staff Barbara Hill put together a team that focused on the 18 sub-program areas of workforce development through a Lean Six Sigma process. The team consisted of a good cross-section of leaders and workers who spent a week defining the problem and then mapping out solutions that will address the needs of the workforce.
"After several years of reduction in force and organizational restructuring in the late 1990s, several critical employee programs, such as training management and leader development, got lost in the transition," O'Brien said. "What these surveys (command climate) have shown is that our workforce today not only desires, but also demands a wholesale change to the way we currently address their professional development."
About the same time as O'Brien's A3 effort, another Lean effort was underway being led by the Operations Directorate's Darryl Borton, Terry Van Vranken and George Pusins. The intent of this Lean effort was to address the loss of skills that the Operations Directorate had recently experienced due to the retirement of many skilled artisans.
As a result of both of those efforts, last month the Arsenal sent machinists Robert Day, Brant Wert, Thomas Heaney, and Kenneth Chirpka to Army instructor training at Fort Lee, Va.
The rationale of the Arsenal leadership was to have a small cohort of top-notch employees to become fluent in Army training and then to bring that education back to the Arsenal to stand up a training program. By the way, all the folks the Arsenal sent are Veterans, as well as have many years yet to serve at the Arsenal before they become retirement eligible.
"We believe the team that went to Fort Lee well represents most major manufacturing operations, from minors to majors to tubes to the tool room," said Day. "What this will give us as we start building a training program is instant credibility as we try to change the Arsenal's culture."
According to Wert, the team plans to start small by initially focusing on machine tool operators, machinists, and machinist apprentices before it expands its training program to other sections and directorates.
Although the training team has a tough mission ahead of them, it is not as if they are starting with nothing.
"Even though the Arsenal does not have a training office, it has been conducted training through the years," Day said. "What we hope to have is a stake in the future development of the workforce by making training more focused, professional, and enjoyable."
The training team is currently in the analysis and design phases of program development. From there, they will move to developing training plans and schedules, implementing the training, and then assessing the training. Formalized training should begin in the next few months.
The Secretary also said before Congress, "Today and into the future, the Army must provide well-led and highly trained Soldiers organized into tailorable and scalable organizations that provide our Nation's leaders an array of options, both lethal and nonlethal, across the entire range of missions."
The Arsenal has only one recommended modification to the Secretary's verbiage.
"Today and into the future, the Army must provide well-led and highly trained Soldiers and 'Civilians' into tailorable and scalable organizations that provide our Nation's leaders an array of options..."
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The Watervliet Arsenal is an Army-owned-and-operated manufacturing facility and is the oldest, continuously operating arsenal in the United States, having begun operations during the War of 1812. It celebrated its 200th anniversary in July 2013.
Today's Arsenal is relied upon by U.S. and foreign militaries to produce the most advanced, high-tech, high-powered weaponry for cannon, howitzer, and mortar systems. This National Historic Registered Landmark has an annual economic benefit to the local community in excess of $90 million, and its 2014 revenue was about $117 million.
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