Service Day - Air Force.

Mr. James R. "Ron" Speer, Acting Assistant Secretary of the Air Force (Financial Management and Comptroller)

(Mr. Speer focused his remarks on the high priority that Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld hasp/aced on financial management and the efforts within the Air Force to improve financial management.)

From the day of his confirmation hearing, Secretary Rumsfeld made improving Department of Defense (DoD) financial management a top priority. One of the first study groups that Mr. Rumsfeld chartered on assuming office was tasked to review the current state of financial management within the Department and to recommend actions for improvement. Furthermore, Dr. Dov Zakheim, the Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) (USD(C)), has made financial reform a top priority.

The Air Force also continues to make financial management a top priority. In fact, over the last several years, the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force (Financial Management and Comptroller) (SAF/FM) has restructured financial management to address financial issues better, initiated a major effort to improve financial and feeder systems, implemented numerous efficiency initiatives, and made a major effort to achieve CFO compliance.

All of these efforts were institutionalized in the newly updated SAF/FM Strategic Plan, which established the financial management mission and vision; outlined the financial management core competencies; and set specific, measurable goals to monitor our success.

The SAF/FM Strategic Plan clearly establishes the support of deployed operations as the top priority of financial management. Supporting the warfighter must always be our primary focus, and we are raking a number of actions to ensure that we maintain that focus.

We just recently reassessed our Top Dollar competition to ensure that this training and competition properly prepared financial managers and contracting personnel to function effectively in a deployed environment. We have also completed a new contingency training course that is a mandatory training requirement for personnel scheduled to deploy, and we assessed our career field to ensure that we are making available as many financial managers as possible to support contingency operations.

Finally, we will, for the first time in a decade, accomplish a manpower reengineering of the financial management function to ensure that we are properly sized and have the appropriate skills to perform our mission in peacetime and war.

The SAF/FM Strategic Plan reiterates the ability to formulate, justify, and execute budgets as a key core competency. To ensure that we remain a world-class budget operation, we have awarded the contract for the new Financial Information and Resources System that will be the backbone of future Air Force financial management. We are making improvements to the entire Air Force resource allocation process, and we are reengineering the way we estimate the future cost of flying hours that is so critical to our resource requirements.

Another key competency is delivering financial services, and we are using technology to provide more efficient and better services to our customers. For example, the ID DFAS Employee/Member Self Service system allows military and civilian members to update their payroll allotments and tax deductions from their desktop computers and also allows members to view their leave and earnings statements via the Internet.

We are also in the process of fielding a system that will completely automate leave processing for military members. This new system will eliminate a paper process that has not changed in 50 years. Other efficiencies include initiatives to make paperless the funding process when contracting for goods and services and fielding an automated travel system.

The demand for better cost, economic, and financial information has never been greater, and it is therefore a key competency of our Strategic Plan. To address this requirement, we are fielding several information systems to give commanders more accurate, timely, and relevant cost information.

For example, we now are deploying the Commanders Resource Information System, which will provide virtually real-rime information regarding the cost of flying aircraft. Also, the Depot Maintenance and Production System, scheduled to be deployed in the fall, will fully integrate labor and materials costs for depot maintenance into the accounting systems. Others systems giving better cost information to commanders include the Air Force Total Ownership Cost System and the Job Order Cost Accounting System.

The Strategic Plan also reiterates the unique responsibility we have as financial managers to exercise fiduciary responsibility as we spend taxpayer dollars. Key to this responsibility is ensuring that our personnel know and understand the "financial rules." To help maintain that knowledge base, the SAP/FM has instituted a professional development program that outlines the knowledge, skills, and abilities that will be expected of a professional financial manager within the Air Force.

A cornerstone of professional development is the ability to provide learning opportunities to all of our personnel. We have determined that the key to providing continuous learning opportunities to a workforce that is located throughout the world is computer-based distance learning. We have partnered with the Air University to offer that distance learning to all financial management personnel regardless of their location.

For example, an individual located anywhere in the world now can access the SAF/FM homepage from his or her desktop computer and obtain training on numerous subjects to include fiscal law, Anti-Deficiency Act requirements, and resource advisor training. Furthermore, there is more to come as we build the library of training for financial management.

Within the framework of our Strategic Plan, we also continue our aggressive efforts to achieve auditable financial statements. We will partner with the USD(C) and the other Service and Defense Agency senior financial managers to fix our financial and feeder systems. Fixing our systems is key to auditability; but, more importantly, better systems ultimately will give commanders more timely, accurate, and relevant financial information.

We also will continue to emphasize achieving a positive opinion on the Statement of Budgetary Resources. By doing so, we maintain the discipline to ensure that our disbursements are properly supported with contracts, receiving reports, and invoices; and we can be confident that the recorded obligations accurately reflect our requirements.

It is an exciting time to be an Air Force financial manager! With the support of the Secretary of Defense and our own Air Force leadership, we have the opportunity to make dramatic improvements to the efficiency of our operations and to the systems that provide managers with critical information for decision making. I look forward to working with each of you as we embark on this challenging journey.