Gen. Ann E. Dunwoody and Command Sgt. Maj. Jeffrey J. Mellinger included a visit to the 413th Contracting Support Brigade, Fort Shafter, Hawaii, during a recent tour of the Pacific.
Dunwoody is the commanding general of the Army Materiel Command and Mellinger is the organization's senior enlisted advisor. The two were in the Pacific to visit AMC assets and attend briefings and meetings with AMC supported organizations. The 413th is an Expeditionary Contracting Command unit.
According to Col. Mike Hoskin, 413th CSB commander, the 413th provided the AMC leadership with briefings on current the unit's operations and ideas.
"We discussed the focus on post award contract administration and the recent authorization of increased numbers of full time employees within AMC," Hoskin said. "Gen. Dunwoody agreed that this is an important issue and explained that this was not only authorized but was now part of the approved POM (Program Objective Memorandum)."
Hoskin said the general also liked the military integration program in place and thought using the contingency contracting team leaders as contracting division military deputies to senior civilian contracting directors was a clever way of ensuring full integration.
"We emphasized that this system assists in growing the next generation of senior executive service, sergeants major, and general officers in the Army," Hoskin said.
On the enlisted side of the house, Hoskin said the command sergeant major was happy with the unit's focus on training (warrior and contracting) the tactical units scheduled to deploy but did have one concern.
"Currently AMC doesn't have a way of tracking who has been trained and who has not after the unit redeploys back to home station. There is a possibility that TEDS (Training and Education Development System) will fix the ability to track numbers of personnel when it is up and running but the question of how perishable the skills are is still an open issue," Hoskin said.
Maj. Gen. Michael J. Terry, commander, 8th Theater Sustainment Command and Col. Cathy Cutler (special project officer' -SPO) pointed out to the AMC leadership how well the ECC/413th has teamed with 8th TSC to come up with alternative acquisition solutions to new and recurring challenges.
Dunwoody remarked that the 413th has come a long way in a little time and are already doing great things for its customers and the Army.
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