WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE — Lt. Gen. Robert McMurry, commander of the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, held two commander’s calls at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base Jan. 18 and 19 to outline his priorities and recognize outstanding accomplishments of employees throughout the center.
During the commander’s calls, McMurry highlighted AFLCMC’s role in supporting Air Force and Department of Defense priorities. He also spoke about his vision for AFLCMC to be the best acquisition and product support center in the DOD and be able to prove it.
“We have to be the organization that other organizations benchmark,” McMurry said. Adding that he wanted other organizations to say that AFLCMC does acquisition better than anyone else.
One of the questions the general posed to the audience was ‘how do we become a better center?’
He went on to highlight five areas or lines of efforts as well as activities aligned with each area that will improve AFLCMC’s efficiency and help the center meet his vision.
The five focus areas are responsive human capital, recognized expertise, innovative execution, adaptive base and infrastructure and purposeful engagement.
Speaking about responsive human capital, the general said the center has to be able to hire people rapidly, and fill positions quickly, develop people and retain them.
Some of the activities the center will engage in include taking steps to improve the hiring timeline, and enhancing development opportunities for employees.
Under recognized expertise, the goal of the center is to be known for strong technical competency, extraordinary team and multi-domain expertise. Some of the activities AFLCMC is leading in order to meet that goal include developing and rewarding a collaborative culture and promoting cross domain thinking and solutions.
With innovative execution, AFLCMC’s goal is to be known for delivering superb systems via innovative, efficient and effective approaches. Some of the steps the center is taking include improving the speed of delivery, increasing partnerships with the labs and growing an innovative culture.
When McMurry spoke about adaptive bases and infrastructure, he talked about the need to modernize.
“When we go to our bases what we recognize is a couple of things,” said McMurry. “Our communications infrastructure is antiquated, and our facilities are aging and under maintained and we are not upgrading our infrastructure at the rate we probably should. There are reasons for that.”
The general added that the center would take a number of steps to improve the network and infrastructure.
With purposeful engagement, McMurry spoke about the importance of engaging various audiences and talking about the great things that AFLCMC does in support of the Air Force and nation.
“We have to build advocates from every branch and within our own service,” McMurry said. “And we have to tell the good stories and celebrate our successes.” He added that for every bad story there are thousands of good stories the center can tell.
McMurry concluded by thanking attendees for their service.
“From cyber to presidential aircraft recapitalization, to the next tanker to clearing the roads on base, what you do matters,” McMurry said. “The reason I’m still here is because every day I get to work with people like you.”
