Improving the Development and Utilization of Air Force Space and Missile Officers

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This electronic representation of RAND intellectual property is provided for non- commercial use only. Permission is required from RAND to reproduce, or reuse in another form, any of our research documents. This product is part of the RAND Corporation monograph series. RAND monographs present major research findings that address the challenges facing the public and private sectors. All RAND monographs undergo rigorous peer review to ensure high standards for research quality and objectivity. Improving the Development and Utilization of Air Force Space and Missile Officers Georges Vernez, Craig Moore, Steven Martino, Jeffrey Yuen Prepared for the United States Air Force Approved for public release; distribution unlimited The research described in this report was sponsored by the United States Air Force under Contract F49642-01-C-0003. Further information may be obtained from the Strategic Planning Division, Directorate of Plans, Hq USAF. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Improving the development and utilization of Air Force space and missile officers / Georges Vernez ... [et al.]. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references. “MG-382.” ISBN 0-8330-3818-4 (pbk.) 1. United States. Air Force—Officers—Training of. 2. Astronautics, Military. I. Vernez, Georges. UG793.I52 2005 358'.8'0973—dc22 2005018903 The RAND Corporation is a nonprofit research organization providing objective analysis and effective solutions that address the challenges facing the public and private sectors around the world. RAND’s publications do not necessarily reflect the opinions of its research clients and sponsors. R® is a registered trademark. © Copyright 2006 RAND Corporation All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from RAND. Published 2006 by the RAND Corporation 1776 Main Street, P.O. Box 2138, Santa Monica, CA 90407-2138 1200 South Hayes Street, Arlington, VA 22202-5050 201 North Craig Street, Suite 202, Pittsburgh, PA 15213-1516 RAND URL: http://www.rand.org/ To order RAND documents or to obtain additional information, contact Distribution Services: Telephone: (310) 451-7002; Fax: (310) 451-6915; Email: [email protected] Preface In 2001, the Vice Commander of the Air Force Space Command (AFSPC/CV) asked the RAND Corporation to review the assignment and utilization of space and missile officers (Air Force specialty 13S) and assess whether the career field is sustainable. About the same time, the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization issued a report calling for sig- nificant changes in the development and management of the space workforce, including officer, enlisted, and civilian personnel (Rums- feld Space Commission, 2001). Before and at the same time as our research, the so-called Developing Aerospace Leaders initiative was formulating ideas for altering professional development of Air Force officers within and across career fields. Seeking common ground between somewhat competing initia- tives (the Developing Aerospace Leaders initiative aimed to counter the tendency for officers to stay within narrow functional communities and instead broaden them into other areas to increase their future effectiveness as Air Force leaders, while the Rumsfeld Space Commis- sion mandated greater depth for space professionals), we concentrated first on identifying requirements: the backgrounds that 13S officers need to perform their jobs successfully—i.e., the demand. At the same time, we examined the backgrounds that officers had actually acquired by different stages in their careers—i.e., the supply. Then, we assessed the gaps in officers’ preparation and, finally, developed and used an optimization model to assess whether altered patterns of officer development and utilization could improve the match between iii iv Development and Utilization of Air Force Space and Missile Officers supply and demand and be sustained over time. As we illustrate, the model can address both current and future sets of requirements. This research, completed in early 2003, should be of interest to leaders in the space and missile community for what it says about the development and utilization of 13S officers, to leaders in other opera- tional and functional communities and to personnel planners for its potential methodological applicability to other career fields and even across career fields, and to personnel, education, and training special- ists for the kinds of data it uses and the new analytic capability it pre- sents. Subsequent to the completion of this research, the Air Force space and missile community established a Space Professional Devel- opment Program at AFSPC to oversee the development of officer, enlisted, and civilian space professionals Air Force–wide and published Space Professional Strategy, a strategic plan for developing and sustaining the officer, enlisted, and civilian space workforce (AFSPC, 2003). With assistance from its contractor, Scitor Corporation, the program (“Space Pro”) has developed more extensive databases that parallel those assembled and demonstrated in this preliminary research: one designates each position’s requirements, another identi- fies its contribution to an incumbent’s experience portfolio, and a third describes each member’s accumulated portfolio of experience— all three in terms of what are called space professional experience codes (see AFSPC, 2005). In parallel, the Chief of Staff, Gen John Jumper, and the Secretary of the Air Force, Robert Roche, began “operation- alizing” the Developing Aerospace Leaders initiative. They adopted a conceptual framework, chartered development teams to help shape plans for career fields and guide members’ deliberate development under the leadership of long-standing functional managers, established staffs at the Air Staff and the Air Force Personnel Center to support the effort, and appointed a Force Development Council of senior leaders to oversee the overall force development enterprise. This research was sponsored by the AFSPC/CV and was conducted in the Manpower, Personnel, and Training Program of RAND Project AIR FORCE. Coauthor (then–Lieutenant Colonel) Preface v Jeff Yuen, a 13S officer, spent the 2001–2002 academic year at RAND in his assignment for Senior Service School. Project AIR FORCE RAND Project AIR FORCE (PAF), a division of the RAND Corpo- ration, is the U.S. Air Force’s federally funded research and development center for studies and analyses. PAF provides the Air Force with independent analyses of policy alternatives affecting the development, employment, combat readiness, and support of current and future aerospace forces. Research is conducted in four programs: Aerospace Force Development; Manpower, Personnel, and Training; Resource Management; and Strategy and Doctrine. Additional information about PAF is available on our Web site at http://www.rand.org/paf. Contents Preface ...................................................................... iii Figures ...................................................................... xi Tables...................................................................... xiii Summary ................................................................. xvii Acknowledgments........................................................ xxix Abbreviations .......................................................... xxxiii CHAPTER ONE Introduction.................................................................1 The Space and Missile Career Field (13S) ...................................1 Concerns About the Evolution of the Career Field..........................4 Research Objectives and Approach ..........................................5 Scope and Limitations .......................................................7 Organization of This Report.................................................8 CHAPTER TWO Backgrounds Required for Space and Missile Jobs: Demand............9 Identifying 13S Jobs’ Required Backgrounds................................9 Focus on Education, Training, and On-the-Job Experience .............9 Experts Identified the Jobs’ Requirements.............................. 11 Reliability of the Experts’ Ratings of Required Backgrounds........... 14 Assessment of the Rating Process and Limitations ..................... 17 Backgrounds Required for 13S Jobs ....................................... 18 Backgrounds Demanded...............................................

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