Engineering Conundrum
II-Structural Legacies
“Today’s problems come
from yesterday’s solutions.”
- "The Fifth Discipline” by Peter Senge
In 1971, the Air Force had gone through restructuring of
technical functions and regrouped technical officers into two streams instead
of four. Tech/Eng, Tech/Armt, Tech/Elect and Tech/Sigs were regrouped into two
streams of Mechanical and Electronics engineers. The branches were named AE (M)
and AE (L) for Aeronautical Engineers Mechanical and Electronics respectively.
There were several positives of the change. Air Force benefited
from the integration of all maintenance effort at flying as well as non-flying
bases. Engineer officers at senior levels could now move effectively across
sub-streams of specialisation providing for flexibility in personnel
management. However, when a majority of pre ’71 commissioned officers came up
for retirement in the 90s, some adverse effects began to show. The number of Armament
and Signals specialists dwindled significantly by the turn of the century.
In 2015, a seminar was conducted by 9 BRD to commemorate 1965
war efforts. One session was devoted to the role of Maintenance Command during
the war and the evolution of Maintenance Philosophy thereafter. In the chair,
was the illustrious Air Mshl SS Ramdas, who had seen it all. During Q&A, a
veteran asked him “Don’t you think we need to revert to the pre 1971 status of
four specialist Tech branches?”
Air Mshl Ramdas, thoughtful as always, acknowledged the
predicament while confessing that most veterans present, including him, had
retired from the Air Force too long ago to really place a finger on the pain
points. He did, however, have a mantra. “Let’s look ahead - going back is not
an answer” he said. The emerging discussions affirmed that, however startling they
might seem today, yesterday’s solutions were justifiable for the problems and
determining causes then perceived.
I wonder if we can think like the pioneers making a new Air
Force, unburdened by structural legacies present in the system. Only then grounded
in a vision for tomorrow can we hope to find unbiased answers to move from the
current reality to desired state. It is, however important to understand
legacies that usually tie us down.
Unwieldy Engineering Structures
Nowhere in the world
does an engineer’s canvas cover as much as that of an IAF engineer.
Every engineer has to go through the experience of the 1st/2nd
line field maintenance. Beyond 1st/2nd line, the depot
maintenance and developmental projects are the areas where the essential traits
of attention to details and depth of engineering knowledge are tested. A
significant number of engineers get involved in this type of work in their
career. Both, Mechanical and Electronics stream officers merge at senior
management levels at the Air Cmde rank.
Engineers work towards
maintenance/ logistics/ training of an extremely wide variety of technology -
purely mechanical to hi-tech electronics and software. They participate in
acquisition programmes, developmental projects. They operate and maintain Guided
Weapons, Networked, EW and IT systems. The widespread areas of deployment for
engineering branch officers include:-
·
Aircraft
(Fighters, transport, helicopters).
·
UAVs (Remotely
Piloted Vehicles).
·
Guided
Weapons.
·
Weapons/armament.
·
Airfield and
Navigational aids.
·
Radars
·
Communication
systems.
·
Communication
Networks.
·
Software/ IT
Applications.
·
Electronic
Warfare
·
Space
Applications.
·
Cyber
Security.
Even as a few brilliant and hardworking officers undertake these
varied assignments with aplomb, the engineering leadership in general suffers.
The options card runs into pages from which the personnel staff
can pick up an AE officer for posting. The more proficient an officer is, the
greater the challenges and variety of assignments come his way. The canvas
becomes so big that however sincerely the personnel staff may try we get
situations where apex level engineers get into uncomfortable situations. It is
now common to find AOM or DG (Aircraft) who have never been with aircraft
maintenance and DG (Systems) without any electronic systems background. The
leadership suffers in both domains although compared to the aircraft
maintenance we often underrate the challenges of managing ‘systems’.
‘Communications & IT’, known as ICT in civil parlance is a
massive field, which requires a separate cadre of its own, independent of the
existing Maintenance (AE) structures. That would enable Maintenance and operationally
flavoured ICT to be more effective as professionally independent cadres. The Maintenance
stream officers would look after the whole range of maintenance for aircraft,
but only the depot maintenance for ICT systems. The ICT stream officers, while
looking after only field maintenance, would also work towards all ICT
acquisitions, developmental projects and operations. As AOC-in-C MC, I had
proposed this change in phases, first only to stream out and eventually to
consider an independent branch of ICT engineers. My proposal was handed over to
a team led by one AVM for study and recommendations – and forgotten in due
course.
Disparate Logistics
“Structure Influences
Behaviour"
- “The Fifth Discipline” by Peter Senge
On Day One, the Indian Air Force started with five pilots and
one Eqpt officer. More non-technical Eqpt officers followed, who managed
stores. The Eqpt cadre had begun a decade before Harjinder Singh got
commissioned as the first engineer. The mechanics’ job was simply known as ‘squadron
maintenance’. Therefore, on commissioning, the role of Tech officers would come
to be known as ‘maintenance’. Meanwhile, Eqpt officers reached senior levels while
engineers dirtied overalls under the aircraft, in bomb dumps and workshops. The
Maintenance org structure had loosely taken shape where Eqpt officers and Tech
officers participated as separate entities. It is not difficult to imagine why
the new command in 1955 was named ‘Maintenance Command’ when the Air Force
decided to integrate all Maintenance and Supply Chain units. Bizarre, but true
- after Harjinder Singh, Fliers and even Eqpt officers headed maintenance
organisations for a long time without ever wielding a spanner.
In due course global trends recognised the scope of military
logistics to include design, development, acquisition, maintenance,
modification, upgrade, storage, distribution and disposal. Militaries all over
the world began using terms like ‘Material’ and ‘Logistics’ for what we called
‘Maintenance’. But, meanwhile the name of the Eqpt branch was changed to Lgs
(for Logistics) while continuing to perform the same support function of stores
management and assistance in provisioning and procurement. As a result we remained
permanently locked with the term ‘Maintenance’ as all-encompassing function
with logistics as its support function – a terminology misaligned with the usage
in the rest of the world.
One may say “So be it. We are unique. Let us continue with our
semantics” - Little do we realise that continuing with the ‘Maintenance’
semantic leads to many twists.
· Material
management within the Air Force is inappropriately considered as Lgs officers’
domain.
· Since we don’t
conform to the universally followed terminology, we are inappropriately
understood and represented in international exchange programmes.
· Inter services
Defence Logistics issues of the Air Force are misunderstood as independent
concerns of Lgs branch.
· Rising rank
structures of the Lgs branch create command/control/coordination issues - the purchase/
stores manager wearing a logistician’s hat wishes to turn away from his support
character in search of an independent role.
· The divide
constrains brilliant Lgs officers from performing a larger role.
We have regularly experimented with field maintenance org
structure. The
IO (reporting officer) for the SLO has been changed frequently to and fro
between the Station Commander and CEO. The reason for not going by the fundamental principle of
management - responsibility with authority - remains a mystery.
Renaming the functions
and a review of ranks/ reporting structures or merger of the two branches are
possible solutions.
A few former AOC-in-Cs MC and AOMs have unsuccessfully suggested merging of
the two branches. I would wish to call the merged single branch as Air Lgs with
the two streams as Air Lgs (M) and Air Lgs (L). A win-win for all concerned officers
including career prospects commensurate with the present status can certainly
be ensured during the period of transition.
Can engineers be trusted with vision?
Ineffective ICT Management
Info and Communication
Technology is the Max Leverage Area
If Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, college dropouts could rule the
software world, why do we need Computer Science/ Engineering graduates for
managing software systems in IAF? This delusion has resulted in Software/ IT/
Info Systems/ ICT management never getting institutionalised.
Communication/ Comp Sc/ IT engineers largely make the workforce.
However, there are two issues of concern.
- First: There is a
compulsive divide between airborne and ground systems management. Whereas technically
qualified engineers manage ground systems design/ development, pilots with little
software/ Communication systems acumen head airborne C4ISR systems development
and management.
- Second: ICT systems are managed part time. The
workforce rotates back to their primary branch role and the senior managers (of
avionics software, command & control systems, IT and Communication networks)
usually get just one such tenure before again getting isolated from the world
of ICT.
The result is that ICT finds itself in no-man’s land with the
management responsibility described best by the story about Everybody,
Somebody, Anybody and Nobody.
There was an
important job to be done and
Everybody was
sure that Somebody would do it.
Anybody could
have done it, but Nobody did it.
Somebody got
angry about that because it was Everybody's job.
Everybody
thought that Anybody could do it,
But Nobody
realized that Everybody wouldn't do it.
It ended up
that Everybody blamed Somebody
When Nobody
did what Anybody could have done
The leadership is unable to appreciate the ICT management need for
defining data formats, interface protocols and process to process communication
standards. Significant efforts with the necessary acumen are required either
to define our own or to adopt international standards to ensure seamless info grid
covering the whole spectrum of operations through ground, air and space.
However, with distributed responsibility within isolated pockets we fall short
of envisioning the big picture and consequent achievement of a reasonable
degree of Network Centric Operations capability.
Finally, Cyber Security and Space Applications need
knowledgeable leadership besides highly specialised work force. The technology
vision comes from the related acumen, which needs practice. Technology
management will continue to suffer if controlled by those occupied
predominantly in accumulating combat flying hrs.
Other Legacies
The operations men started the Air Force as General Duty
officers with a view to also look after the administration requirements.
However, over the years we have created longer support structures, which we
find difficult to manage especially as we aim to provide high career prospects
for everyone. Some branches have lost their relevance in the current
circumstances. The legacy structures have to be reviewed if we wish to improve
and move ahead.
…….To be continued
