The future role of operations research systems analysts in military comptrollership.

"ORSAs are trained to think with a disciplined mind. They cut to the essence of the question. They act as troubleshooters ... who provide independent analyses of a variety of issues."

--Walt Hollis, former Deputy Under Secretary of the Army (Operations Resarch)

The Department of Defense (DoD) faces a challenging future. The global war on terrorism, asymmetric warfare, lengthy deployments, transformation initiatives, the potential for a future constrained budget environment, ptivatization and outsourcing efforts, and shrinking personnel assets require a change in the way the military services conduct their business. Instead of being a cliche, "doing more with less" has become an unpleasant reality of life within the Department and its Components (that is, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, Joint Staff, military departments, and Defense agencies).

These challenges, however, translate to new opportunities. Operations within a potentially probabilistic, stern funding environment will require creative ideas and daring, out-of-the-box thinking to support the diverse needs of the DoD Components.

Operations Research Systems Analysis (ORSA) can greatly contribute to the military's success in the twenty-first century, This is especially true in the realms of comptrollership and resource management.

ORSA Overview

ORSA was born to overcome the operational difficulties that the United States and its allies experienced during World War II. The early, rapid advances made by the principal forces of the Axis Powers--Fascist Italy, National Socialist Germany, and Imperial Japan--denied the allies the luxury of time to conduct lengthy experimentation. Hence, creative solutions to extremely difficult, complex war-related problems had to be developed in a pinch. Fortunately, the ingenuity of the early operations research (OR) analysts resulted in innovative solutions to real life-or-death problems; this greatly facilitated the allied victory. The ORSA experience in World War II established the value proposition for applying the scientific method to military problem solving.

Of course, problem solving still remains a key role for ORSA in today's post-Cold War military establishment. In the future, however, I firmly believe that ORSA responsibilities will focus more on analyses that determine the validity, reliability, and accuracy of data collected rather than on solving operational problems.

Creating a Synergy of Sorts

OR analysts have been trained to apply sound scientific principles and theory creatively when collecting and analyzing data and when developing recommendations. ORSA analysts have the capability to package data and complex material into succinct, easily comprehensible formats that facilitate informed decision making. This essential skill lends itself well to the analysis of detailed information instead of the actual solving of problems. Basically, OR practitioners analyze the data, transform the raw data into meaningful information, and let the decision maker select a course of action. This growing OR role lends itself nicely to the comptroller/resource management functional arena.

The highly developed skills possessed by ORSA analysts (that is, analyzing complex [raw] data and transforming this data into meaningful information) could greatly benefit the DoD Components in using their resources more efficiently and effectively to meet future challenges. The various elements of the military environment require extensive and sound analysis to determine how best to accomplish the mission--and the comptroller/resource management discipline certainly is no exception.

It always has been a challenge to translate and interpret the national security strategy--as embodied in the annual DoD authorization and appropriation acts and the various funding guidance and operational directives from the National Command Authority (NCA)--into a field-ready combat capability.

In this regard ORSA can ease the burden by providing meaningful qualitative and quantitative analyses of the resource, readiness, operations, and quality of life issues and impacts. In fact, OR applications and techniques should be used to determine the optimal force structure needed to accomplish the missions of the Unified Combatant Commanders.

In short, ORSA is the analytical bridge that connects decisions of the Congress and the NCA through the Department's Harming, Programming and Budgeting Execution process to a specific command's resourcing position and force structure.

Toward More Efficient, Effective Solutions

The expanded role of the ORSA analyst includes conducting independent, robust analyses and complex studies to support the decision-making process. The potential for future resource constraints will increase the demand for this kind of ORSA service. In this scenario, the ORSA analyst will become more focused on ensuring that appropriate study methodologies are used to arrive at recommendations that streamline processes and procedures, create efficient and effective organizations, invigorate customer service, enhance productivity, enrich quality of life, and improve resource allocation without degrading mission capabilities.

As a case in point, prior to the current Transformation Installation Management efforts, the Commanding General, Eighth United States Army, chartered a group of Army resource managers to ascertain the feasibility of establishing a Director for Base Operations and Support (DBOS) on the staff of this major command (MACOM).

This study posed some rather intriguing problems and challenges. The group first had to consider those functions and tasks that should be incorporated into this new DBOS structure.

Second, assuming that the study team recommended the creation of a DBOS billet at the MACOM level, a decision would be needed whether and how those functions and the personnel currently performing them at the major subordinate command (the 19th Theater Support Command) could be transferred to the headquarters without increasing the Army Management Headquarters Account.

Third, the 19th Theater Support Command currently has armistice and wartime responsibilities that flow to the support groups and area support activities for accomplishment. Although two areas have distinct support groups to accomplish their wartime missions--and have area support activities to accomplish armistice operations--contingency and armistice operations remain consolidated at two support groups, the 34th Support Group at Seoul and the 20th Support Group at Taegu.

Assuming that the DBOS billet was created on the Eighth U.S. Army staff to accommodate base operations and installation management within an armistice environment, a decision would be needed whether and how the 34th and 20th Support Groups would be divested of their base operation and installation management support responsibilities. As a follow-on matter, might divestiture create the need to establish separate, distinct support activities at Seoul and Taegu.

These are but a few of the issues that result when considering transformational proposals. In this case, as a trained ORSA analyst, I participated in the study group. In addition to helping solve the aforementioned questions, which eventually resulted in the creation of the Korea Regional Office, I was charged to ensure that the team used analytical tools that were consistent with the study methodology to arrive at conclusions and recommendations that complied with the study's objectives. That included tracking our recommendations to ensure that they satisfied our decision criteria (which included command and control considerations, cost effectiveness, and the ability of the newly established DBOS organization to respond to changes in the current operational environment).

In this example, the Eighth U.S. Army didn't simply foster change for the sake of changing. This forward-deployed MACOM used its highly professional resource management personnel--including an erstwhile ORSA analyst--to realize efficiencies.

The Bottom Line

The prudent use and conservation of scarce public resources is the professional comptroller's/resource manager's most sacred obligation to the command, the Department, and the taxpayers. That obligation is supported and facilitated by the ORSA discipline, which has always managed and, in certain instances, maintained operational and performance databases. The task is somewhat more streamlined today than in former times.

For example, the wide application of local area networks throughout the DoD Components has helped to create centralized, command-unique resource management databases to capture Program Objective Memoranda, budget, execution, cost, installation status report, and manpower data. Select portions of the Training Resource Module can also be imported into the command-unique database. Overseas commands can capture host nation cost-sharing contributions and local economic indicators, such as currency fluctuations, that impact on foreign-currency-based budgets. Data concerning joint and combined resourcing could also be captured.

So what's the bottom line? A command-unique resource management database is simply a tool that ORSA can use to keep decision makers informed of resource management concerns and issues. Suffice to say, automated tools enable ORSA practitioners to analyze and interpret data, graphically depict significant trends, prepare forecasts, and make recommendations to the supported decision makers.

Fundamentally, the mission of ORSA professionals is to inform decision makers fully so that the later can make educated decisions. Analysts skilled in ORSA techniques will continue to perform the traditional roles of researching, developing, maintaining, and applying models and simulations; managing databases; testing equipment; and creating standard operational scenarios.

In the future, however, ORSA analysts will add value by their direct involvement in conducting analyses that support decision-making processes at the headquarters and MACOM levels. The likely shrinking of resources available to the DoD Components will create a greater demand for this type of ORSA service. In those lean times, the Components would do well to look toward their ORSA professionals to analyze complex resource management problems and arrive at alternatives, conclusions, and recommendations that help senior leaders and managers make informed decisions about resourcing postures.

In summary, the ORSA discipline facilitates the translation of congressional and NCA decisions into resources available for mission accomplishment at Component, MACOM, subordinate commands, installations, and combat unit echelons. In this regard, analysts skilled in ORSA techniques could use the data captured in command-unique resource management databases to point out significant recommendations to decision makers about the command's resourcing posture to support operations.

LTG John W. "Jack" Woodmansee, Jr., (USA-R), former Commander of the U.S. V Corps, captured the essence of this paper when he said: "I want ORSA officers working for me because they are smart, not because they can crunch numbers."

Why not let ORSA give you a helping hand in managing your resources?

John Di Genio is a management analyst with the Installation Management Agency Korea Regional Office, Yongsan Garrison, Seoul, Korea. A member of the Korea Chapter, he is a frequent contributor to Armed Forces Comptroller.