MOODY AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. -- Moody AFB officials recently welcomed a delegation of Air Combat Command facilitators for a five-day Rapid Improvement Event to assist the base with its Air Force Smart Operations 21 initiatives.
The visit was designed to assist maintenance leadership on procedures that can save the Air Force time and money, said Maj. Nate Hancock, 23rd Maintenance Operations Squadron commander.
AFSO 21 is a program designed to help increase Air Force efficiency by observing and improving each task and weeding out unnecessary steps. The RIE examined the repair and enhancement process, which involves implementing more effective techniques to order and replace aircraft parts.
"One way of improving aircraft availability is to look at the different processes; including the repair and enhancement process," the major said. "If we shorten the time of replacing a broken part, then the aircraft can get back in the air quicker. That was the grand scheme of this event."
Though the ACC delegation wasn't familiar with aircraft ordering and repair procedures, the visit was intended to see how wing members could research and implement AFSO 21 into daily workings.
While the visit focused specifically on maintenance operations, AFSO 21 is intended for implementation throughout all Air Force career fields.
To prepare for the event, a group of Moody AFB maintainers and logistics members convened to develop various ideas on updating current ordering practices, said 1st Lt. Jonathan Chandler, 23rd Logistics Readiness Squadron and RIE team leader.
"We identified (aircraft parts ordering) issues to address to become more (in-line) with AFSO 21," said Lieutenant Chandler. "The group had two weeks of preparations to analyze these current processes and seek areas where we could improve."
The visit also helped maintenance leaders understand the basics of smart operations and showed the wing staff will readily volunteer for opportunities that can help them do business "smarter not harder," said Major Hancock.
"Last March, we requested assistance from Air Force Special Operations Command to help ensure we were following the (Air Force secretary's) idea for AFSO 21," he said. "So once Moody switched to ACC, they had already seen we asked for help and that was transferred (to the new command).
"They were extremely appreciative that we reached out for help," the major added. "We had a team of experts working on this, so there was no room for failure. By doing this, it gave us a big step forward among the other wings in the command."
"To continue successfully completing the mission to the standards we're accustomed, Team Moody needs to constantly find innovations that make our operations more efficient and effective," said Col. Kenn Todorov, 23rd Wing vice commander. "The visit proved Moody is willing to tackle the challenges this new culture of performing operations provides, but it also could serve as a pre-cursor for future events surrounding AFSO 21 reviews in other work areas."