While being trained at my first command in the Navy, I noticed something unusual right away.
Appendix B of the Naval Aviation Maintenance Program (NAMP) contains a link to a form that provides the template for an equipment history record (EHR) card, which aviation maintenance administrators (AZs) frequently use to log maintenance. Section VI–Column B of the EHR card logs the status of technical directives (TDs) pertaining to the item. (A TD is akin to a recall that a car manufacturer might issue.) The form does not permit typing in this column; the TD status entries are chosen from a conveniently pre-entered drop-down menu (“INC” for an incorporated TD, “NA” for a non-applicable TD, etc.).
As the AZs were training me on filling out an EHR card, I noticed that they would print out the completed form and then bring the printed card over to the typewriter to type in the status “NA” in Column B. Apparently, the EHR card did not include “NA” in the pre-entered drop-down menu. I asked my fellow AZs if anyone had suggested adding the choice “NA” to the form, and everyone simply shrugged. I then went to our Airspeed office, which finds productivity gains in the work environment. The petty officer second class with whom I spoke agreed that this was an easy fix to an inefficient situation. But two days later, I was told, “My chief didn’t like it because it requires a change to the NAMP.”
Some months later, I returned to Airspeed to have another discussion regarding the missing “NA” on the EHR card, and it was suggested that I speak to someone in Quality Assurance. I went to QA and explained the situation to a petty officer first class, who responded, “You can route that yourself through your chain of command. But if it’s a NAMP change don’t even bother, because they are going to ignore you.”
Undeterred, I sent an email with my NAMP edit suggestion to my leading petty officer (LPO). One month later, my LPO told me my NAMP email had not been forgotten and would be sent along soon.
I realize full well that making a simple fix on an EHR card represents fractions of a penny in terms of gains in time and money that could be saved from streamlining other more expensive and time-consuming military processes. But it illustrates a glaring problem with military culture: the absence of honest and open discussion in the work environment about process improvement.
While following the unfortunate news regarding the recent preventable deaths relating to poor management at Veterans Affairs hospitals, I came across a quote that resonated with me: “In the military you are not taught to question; you are taught to obey. And that’s great on the battlefield, but health care is another beast,” Bill Benham, former first sergeant of the hospital at Fort Knox, Kentucky, told The New York Times.
I would argue that this same truth applies to office and maintenance work.
To better make use of enlisted professionals’ talents, work environments that are conducive to discussion should be created. Two fellow AZs each made a very sensible suggestion that would greatly improve the effectiveness and efficiency of our workload. Unfortunately, they made the suggestions laterally rather than up the chain of command, where they need to go in order to be implemented.
While I support the “Hatch,” a crowdsourcing platform for innovative ideas for the Navy, a discussion about the culture of silence in the military is noticeably absent.
As with any change in organizational culture, the push must come from leadership. It must be emphasized to subordinates, at every level of the chain of command, that speaking up about ineffective, inefficient, and unsafe practices is not only allowed and encouraged, but required.
The Navy, as with the other U.S. services, exists to preserve our free society—which is defined by an acceptance of open, transparent, and honest discussion. How much more powerful our Navy would be if the cumulative talents of enlisted professionals could be fully harnessed by a naval culture that was defined by those same three bedrocks.