Career Filled With Experience Comes To End For 33-Year Retiree

By Ms. Kari Hawkins (AMCOM)July 20, 2015

HAPPY FAMILY ON RETIREMENT DAY
Retirement is a happy day for Michael McGee, back row at left, who celebrated his last days at work for the Aviation and Missile Command with his family. With McGee are, front row from left, his parents Earnest and Gwen McGee, grandson Cooper Murphy,... (Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

REDSTONE ARSENAL, Ala. -- There's a lot of things Michael McGee will miss about working as a government civilian for the Aviation and Missile Command -- the great team of employees, the challenging mission, the opportunity to support Soldiers, among others.

But, more than anything, he will miss the chance to mentor young professionals on their career development and options.

"It was always rewarding for me to have the ability to give back to future leaders and workers here at AMCOM and Redstone Arsenal," he said. "I enjoyed assisting them with mapping out their careers; showing them how they could improve their resumes with training and academic opportunities; and advising them on pursuing experiences to broaden their skill sets."

Mentoring, encouraging and guiding other professionals comes naturally to McGee. They are skills that have often come into play during conversations with co-workers at AMCOM's Logistics Center and the Program Executive Office for Missiles and Space, to which he was matrixed during 27 of the 33 years he worked for AMCOM. He retired at the end of June as a deputy project director at the Missile Defense and Space Systems Project Office, PEO-Missiles and Space.

"I'm a family guy who's tried to equitably balance my professional and personal life," the 56-year-old said. "It's one thing to support your country and our great Soldiers. But if you neglect your family at the expense of your job, what have you really accomplished? For me, after 33 years of working for the Army, it's time for me to focus more time on my family, especially spending time with the three grandkids."

McGee began his career at the Missile Command (AMCOM's predecessor) as a Pershing II maintenance engineer right after graduating from the University of Alabama. He followed in the footsteps of his father, who worked with the Army Ballistic Missile Agency, the forerunner of NASA, the Missile Command and, later, AMCOM.

McGee's entry level job has led to 15 different job titles in 33 years. He's twice served as a director in the AMCOM Logistics Center. On the PEO side, he's served as the assistant PEO for Logistics, the G-4 (Logistics) under PEO Tactical Missiles, and as the logistics director or division chief in five different project management offices. His career also included an assignment with NATO on the MEADS (Medium Extended Air Defense System) Program, which involved international travel to defense contractors and military installations in Germany and Italy.

"In my career path, I actually practiced what was preached by my mentors. It's the same message that I tell young professionals. To achieve your career goals of being a senior leader, you have to diversify your skill set with different disciplines, different programs, different commodities and different phases of the life cycle," he said.

"So, in my judgment, in order to be a senior leader, you need to change jobs an average of about every three years. The progression should be very similar to the military officer template. You need to learn to leave your comfort zone, and learn entirely new disciplines and processes. Often, a horizontal move in the same grade but different series is the best strategic career move."

During his years at Redstone, McGee witnessed much change in the way the Army logistically supports the Soldier, both culturally and organizationally. He has worked to help transform logistics into a modern-day project management-centric support network with project managers working as the life-cycle managers.

"In my three-decade career, I have seen logisticians moving from the 'Rodney Dangerfields' of the Army acquisition corps to becoming statutorily empowered product support managers. Because logisticians now have a pivotal role in operations and sustainment, they have been elevated in prominence, stature and respect within a typical project office, particularly in terms of decisions and resource authority," McGee said. "Logistics now has a huge voice at the table when critical programmatic decisions are made."

Similar changes have occurred in the area of logistics engineering, he said, where "maintainability engineers have strategically influenced the very design of weapon systems" to minimize and even eliminate logistical problems for Soldiers.

"In my first job in the 1980s, a 32-foot-long Pershing II missile was dis-assembled on top of a launcher at unit-level maintenance. Soldiers replaced individual circuit card assemblies in a dis-assembled missile guidance section, all in a muddy field in a Bavarian forest. I'm exiting government service when missiles are now maintenance-free for 10 to 15 years," McGee said. "That's a radical change in a relatively short timeframe."

McGee has also been part of the local Team Redstone enterprise for Soldier Focused Life Cycle Management. In 1999, he received a Superior Civilian Service Award for leading the Team Redstone Integrated Product Team that established the initial framework for SFL at Redstone.

"The multi-disciplined elements of logistics -- maintenance, supply, technical manuals, training, for example -- are now consolidated as a single integrated product team collocated with a project manager," he said. "When I entered government service, the PMs had to coordinate with 10 different functionally specialized logisticians in 10 different offices under the old Missile Logistics Center. Now, all product-specific logisticians are collocated with the PM under the operational control of a single logistics director."

But he considers his best accomplishment to be assimilating the ideas of several mentors into a Career Development Model for AMCOM Logistics Center logisticians.

"I see myself as a product of active mentorship," he said. "I listened when mentors told me what I needed to do to build my career and the changes I needed to make to be a better employee. I feel honored to be able to document those lessons and advice into a simple roadmap for future logisticians to follow."

Fortunately, that's been easy to do at Redstone, where the addition of new organizations and new missions over the years has made it possible for employees to find ways to grow their career without making a physical move.

At Redstone, people have a unique opportunity to diversify their careers without ever leaving the Huntsville area. For example, in addition to AMCOM, a logistician can work at the Army Materiel Command headquarters, MDA, SMDC or NATO over the course of their career," he said.

McGee remembers a pivotal point in his early career when his supervisor, Ken Brooks, asked him to "volunteer" for a "black program" during Operation Desert Shield. The special project placed him on a team of 12 senior then-MICOM leaders traveling to Israel (then a pre-war zone). The nine-month overseas assignment was intimidating for McGee, who was the junior member of the team. It also gave him exposure to MICOM leadership, which later lead to a major promotion for the then-30-year-old.

"I believe the trust factor in career counseling is critical to planning your future career progression," McGee said. "You've got to both listen and react to advice that often completely contradicts your own personal assessment of the next step to take. Saying 'yes' at that particular crossroad completely changed the path of my career. I became a PM-guy who enjoyed the dynamic project management culture of controlled chaos."

Move around, take challenges, trust in leadership -- all are part of the advice McGee has given to young professionals. But there's one more workplace aspect that he likes to emphasize with those in management positions -- the personal touch.

"Leaders and managers should find out what's important to their employees. Usually, it's the personal stuff like family, faith and kids that really matter," McGee said. "We need to really genuinely care about people and help them to create a healthy balance between their professional and personal lives."

McGee is following his own advice these days as he leaves civil service to pursue another follow-on career as a defense contractor. Re-entering the workforce as a defense contractor will take McGee out of his own comfort zone.

"I'm transitioning, not retiring. I trust that I still have unique skills to offer in our nation's defense needs," he said. "I remind myself how much the defense world has changed during my own career. I entered working with nuclear weapons in the Cold War with the Soviet Union. I'm exiting when we're confronting bandit terrorists semi-controlled by weird ISIS organizations. The degree of change is mind boggling."

First, though, he will enjoy some down time with his family, work on the "Honey Do" list at home and practice his golf swing.

And as he enters the contractor workforce, chances are McGee will find new young professionals to mentor. Among those will be his own family members -- his two daughters, their husbands and a niece -- who all work on Redstone Arsenal as does his brother.

"Be proactive," he said. "And be open to opportunities, even if you are uncomfortable doing so.

"It seems uncanny to me how often I was asked to do something by someone that's turned into bigger and better things for me in the long run. Maybe destiny is more common than chance. Regardless, I leave federal service feeling blessed and fortunate. I cherish the friendships I've made. I'm thankful to have been a small part of the Redstone team."