ROCK ISLAND ARSENAL, Ill. -- The way ahead for First Army in a time of transition was the focus of the First Army Commanders Conference held here April 27-30.
In opening remarks to the command teams of First Army's divisions and brigades, First Army Commanding General, Lt. Gen. Michael S. Tucker, recapped the changes in the unit's structure over the past decade and said more change is coming.
"It's not First Army's first rodeo. We've done this before and under a pretty heavy mobilization load," Tucker said. "So there's a lot of institutional memory here that has to do with how you go about doing this."
Communication is key to easing the transition, Tucker added.
"We need all of your feedback as we go through the rehearsal of concept drill this week," he said. "When we leave this conference, there must be a shared understanding of what the operational concept of Operation Bold Shift is and what our roles and responsibilities are. That's our number one training objective for this conference."
During Operation Bold Shift, First Army is restructuring its organization and streamlining the way it supports reserve-component forces for deployment. The unit also is shifting its training support focus to premobilization training, while maintaining its core mission of providing postmobilization reserve-component training support.
Jimmie S. Ring, First Army deputy chief of staff for Plans, Operations and Training, said the conference was intended to make sure the organization's leaders know how this restructure will happen.
"We had the Commanders Conference to bring all of the leadership from the brigades and divisions together to ensure that we had a shared understanding of what Operation Bold Shift will be…and how we're going to employ this new formation that we're creating," she said.
Tucker encouraged attendees to take advantage of being in the same room with so many First Army leaders at one time.
"After the fall Commanders Conference, when we went back home, requests for information started flowing in, and that's good," Tucker said. "But ask RFIs, if you can, while we're here, if you see someone face-to-face.
"Leaders manage change. They don't sit around and allow change to occur around them. This week is about us talking about that. We have some great people here to help us give the tools we need to execute the task."
At this critical juncture for First Army, information overload is OK, Tucker noted.
"The biggest crime is failure to communicate," he said. "If you have to hit 'all users' on your emails, I'm OK with that. I'm OK with getting emails that I probably don't need to get. This is all about situational awareness and having a common understanding. If we have that common understanding, then we will have the trust that's necessary to execute."
Ring called the conference a success. "The week went very well," she said. "The commanding general was very happy that we had the opportunity to have some frank dialogue about how the brigades and divisions saw the employment of the Operation Bold Shift structure and their roles in it. They had the opportunity to express some of their concerns and ideas about what would work."
The discussion will be continued during First Army's next Commanders Conference this fall, she added: "Going forward, we're going to bring those leaders back in and refine our concept so that we have buy-in from all levels of command."
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