APPD helps maintain balance in force structure

By Lori NewmanSeptember 2, 2010

FORT SAM HOUSTON, Texas -- One of the key components of the "Center" in the Army Medical Department Center & School is the Army Personnel Proponent Directorate.

"APPD looks at what's going on in the generating force and the operating force," explained Col. Kaylene Curtis, director, APPD.

"We don't create the force structure but we keep abreast of structure changes going on in the world around us and personnel policy changes that will affect the life cycle of someone's development from the time they enter military or civilian service as an Army Medical Department employee until the time they depart service. We develop recommendations for force structure spaces that will turn into faces."

APPD has four divisions: Officer, Enlisted, Civilian, and Force Structure.

"We work very closely with all the Army commands and within the schoolhouse; we work with the Medical Capabilities Integration Center and the Dean [of the Academy of Health Sciences]," Curtis said.

"We do analysis and make recommendations for the commander of the AMEDDC&S, The Surgeon General, and the corps chiefs of the eight AMEDD Corps [Medical, Dental, Veterinary, Medical Specialty, Nurse, Medical Service, Enlisted, and Civilian]," Curtis said.

"The Force Structure Division is a centralized point of contact for data within APPD on Army medical personnel," Debbie Keipp, chief, Force Structure Division, said. "We are the number crunchers."

APPD and Office of the Surgeon General Program Analysis and Evaluation host the Command Grade Allocation Conference each year in October.

"Manpower representatives from all major commands come to Fort Sam Houston for the conference and they tell us what changes they intend to make in their force structure," Curtis said.

The first day of the CGA conference, each command representative has the opportunity to provide an overview briefing on any exceptional increases or decreases in the AMEDD force structure.

Once the briefs are completed, an allocation process is conducted. Representatives present their AMEDD force structure requirements by corps, Area of Concentration and Military Occupational Specialty, and grade level of detail. Tradeoffs between commands and corps are made, as necessary, to keep the final AMEDD total within the DA-mandated strength and grade parameters.

Once the distribution of authorizations is complete, APPD builds objective force models to insure the AMEDD retains the ability to grow and maintain viable specialties.

"One of the biggest things we do on the officer side of the house is objective force modeling," Curtis said.

Each year congress meets and establishes the Budgeted End Strength for the Department of Defense. The DoD then passes the information to the Pentagon and they determine the BES for each branch of service. Once the Army has its portion, the Department of the Army allocates the BES for the AMEDD.

The Office of the Surgeon General, Director of Human Resources, provides APPD with the BES for the six officer corps within the AMEDD; Medical, Dental, Veterinary, Nurses, Medical Specialist, and Medical Services Corps. The APPD is responsible for developing an Objective Force Model for each AOC within each corps.

"We look at grade structure to make sure, within the officer and enlisted sides of the house, that we have the appropriate balance of grades that will allow people the opportunity to progress all the way through to the very highest position possible throughout their career," Curtis said.

"For example, the Medical Corps may be given budgeted end strength of 4,000. The Officer Personnel Proponent Division will than take the 4,000 and break it out into the 41 specialties within the Medical Corps based on the needs of the Army," said Nancy Jones, chief of the Officer Personnel Proponent Division.

"A lot of people don't think about civilian development and about our Civilian Division when they think AMEDD Personnel Proponent," Curtis said.

"We look command-wide at all civilians, medical civilians in particular," said Josie Poirier, chief of the Civilian Personnel Proponent Division. "We envision and design the AMEDD civilian workforce of tomorrow."

Civilian Personnel Proponent Division has developed ACTEDS [Army Civilian Training, Education & Development System] training plans for civilians in a variety of medical specialties. ACTEDS plans list different training and competencies an Army civilian may need.

"An ACTEDS plan is like a road map that gives you an idea of how to progress in your career," Poirier said.

The plans help prepare employees to become more competitive to fill higher-level and/or leadership positions and help the AMEDD retain our workforce.

The Civilian Personnel Proponent Division also assisted in setting up the Civilian Life Long Learning Program at the AMEDDC&S. It is a central portal for all civilian training information. The portal was launched last October, and has been a resounding success.

The Enlisted Division monitors the life cycle management of 17 AMEDD Military Occupational Specialties that comprise Career Management Field 68 for all three components.

"We ensure that Soldiers within the AMEDD are properly managed from initial enlistment to ETS [estimated time of separation] or retirement, and have the opportunity to progress from private to sergeant major, regardless of the specialty they hold," said Martin Caldwell, acting chief, Enlisted Personnel Proponent Division.

In addition, the Enlisted Division ensures that the enlisted force structure of the AMEDD complies with mandated Department of the Army grade structure requirements, as well as ensure that all policy changes are properly synchronized and integrated within the AMEDD. EPPD works with DA in establishing bonus programs for understrengthed MOSs, and spearheads initiatives involving enlisted personnel changes requested by AMEDD leadership for submission to the Army G1.