Fires CoE website on FKN 1 June.

The Fires Knowledge Network (FKN), accessed through the Army Knowledge Online (AKO), will premiere its Fires Center of Excellence (CoE) website on 1 June in conjunction with the virtual standup of the Fires CoE by the Chiefs of Field Artillery (FA) and Air Defense Artillery (ADA). FKN is consolidating the two centers under the Fires CoE concept before the ADA physically closes on Fort Sill.

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Since 2003, FKN has been a robust online knowledge management resource for Field Artilleryman stationed worldwide, and now those same capabilities are expanding to serve Air Defenders. FKN is a collection of technological tools that currently enables the FA Center to connect with Soldiers and units in the field to provide information, solve problems and share lessons learned. The objective is to enable the creation, capture and sharing of knowledge to help our warfighters accomplish their missions.

FKN currently has more than 49,000 unique members and is visited by an average of more than 3,800 members daily.

Fort Sill's Knowledge Management Team already has begun incorporating ADA Center information onto FKN in preparation for the virtual standup of the Fires CoE website. Users will be able to tap into the website from any computer that has internet access at any time from any where in the world.

The first of its kind on AKO, FKN is part of the Combined Arms Center's (CAC's) Battle Command Knowledge System (BCKS), Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. BCKS was formed to lead the Army in developing policy and procedures to fully exploit the power of knowledge management in the 21st century. FKN won the 2005 Army-wide award for best knowledge management tool.

FKN Capabilities. Currently, FKN provides Field Artillery Soldiers a single access point to search for information from the FA school, communicate with peers through professional forums and stay abreast of current and future changes, events and initiatives. As of 1 June, Air Defenders will be able to tap into these capabilities as well as others as a partner on the Fires CoE website. The ADA capabilities will be as robust as those of the FA shortly thereafter.

FKN provides a method for Soldiers and leaders to ask FA School subject matter experts (SMEs) and organizations questions or start threaded discussions open to everyone. It allows the user access to all the directorates/departments in the FA School, the FA Proponency Office, Master Gunner, Field Artillery magazine with editions back to 1959 searchable by Google-Mini and more than 100 professional forums. FKN maintains an official data repository for FA publications, instructional materials and other documents that pertain to the FA and fire support mission. The repository is linked to professional forum sites within FKN that provide quick access to information for specific military occupational specialty (MOS) and functional areas without having to search the entire database.

Currently there are more than 12,000 FA-related documents, photos and video media in the knowledge repository. To date more than 1.2 million documents have been downloaded by users.

FKN serves as the entrance portal to FA professional forums. A professional forum is a group of users who share common interests, such as all in the same MOS, rank or group of ranks, unit (i.e., 4th Fires Brigade, Stryker, light), job (i.e., company fire support officers, fire supporters in all ranks and jobs), etc.

FKN also gives leaders the ability to reach the FA community via email groups consisting of all FA members, just one MOS, unit of assignment, ranks and many other attributes. This allows the right message to reach the right group without having to "spam" uninterested audiences.

A leader can upload a document on FKN and send an AKO email to specific audiences. It is not unusual for a command group document to be downloaded in excess of 2,000 times within 24 hours of its posting and email notification.

Setting Up a Forum. Each professional forum is populated and administered by a professional forum administrator. Most administrators can set up their forums after an eight-hour training session. Forum administrators can update their sites from any computer anywhere as long as they can access AKO through the Internet. They do not have to depend on "webmasters" to post information. If a forum administrator has a problem or question, the Fort Sill Knowledge Management Team is only a phone call away.

Administrators and leaders also can track the number of documents downloaded by users or the number of times their forum has been entered and provide that information to the command.

ADA Coming Online in FKN. The Fort Sill Knowledge Management Team will provide the ADA Center briefings and background materials on FKN capabilities and the new Fires CoE website as well as train forum administrators. The team will be able to share its many lessons learned while helping to create more than 100 professional forums using the FKN template.

If readers have questions or want to schedule FKN briefings or discuss training opportunities, they can contact a POC. At the ADA School, the POC is Angel Quezada, Digital Training Access Center, at DSN 978-6775; commercial [phone]; or email [e-mail]. At the FA Center, the POC is Mike Gradoz, Chief Information Operations (CIO)/G6, at DSN 639-8322/8353; commercial [phone]/8353; or email [e-mail].

FKN will not change for Field Artillerymen--rather it will become a more robust and multifunctional knowledge management tool as it welcomes the Air Defense Artillery into its database as part of the Fires Center of Excellence website.

SFC(R) J. Michael Gradoz

FKN Sr. Community Administrator

CIO/G6, FA Center

Fort Sill, OK