AFLCMC Leadership Log Podcast

In this episode we discuss opportunities in the upcoming Civilian Developmental Education,  or CDE, program  with AFLCMC"s chief of workforce development Linda Leichty and AFLCMC"s civilian developmental education program manager Mike Mathes. The once a year window to apply for the various programs in the CDE portfolio opens January 13, 2021 and closes March 13, 2021. Both of our experts...

This week we had a chance to chat with the Program Executive Officer for AFLCMC's Presidential and Executive Airlift Directorate Brig. Gen. Ryan Britton, about his organization's effort to bring supersonic airlift to the Air Force. When realized supersonic airlift will allow moving the nation's senior leaders and military teams to where they need to be twice as fast as is currently capable. Britto...

About 5 years ago, the Air Force embarked on a journey with Condition Based Maintenance Plus, also known as CBM+, to shift the sustainment enterprise from a “flying to failure” to a “flying to forecast” mindset. In this episode the CBM+ Program Office chief, Chris Damani, describes it as a new sustainment paradigm that is transforming the way the Air Force sustains its fleet. The central element i...

The KC-135 Stratotanker has been in service longer than most of us have been alive. Born out of the cold war need for nuclear deterrence the Air Force purchased 800 of the airframes from 1957 - 1965 in order to keep B-52 bombers airborne around the globe. We recently had the opportunity to chat with the senior materiel leader and Legacy Tanker Division chief Col. Mark Mocio about the challenges hi...

Resiliency can be defined as the ability to bounce back during adverse events in someone's life, and the Air Force considers it a key topic when discussing the wingman culture. This past year has certainly presented many challenges to everyone in the center. The approaching holiday season is a time of fellowship and joy for most, but for some it can be a particularly challenging time of year. The...

AFLCMC has a new 1st Sgt. In the Air Force an organization’s 1st Sgt, who can also be known as the 1st shirt or just the shirt, is a special duty rank and is a positional job. In our sister services the Army and Marine Corps first sergeant is an actual rank and not a special duty position. The position in the Air Force is held by a member of the senior NCO corps in the grades of E-7 through E-9. T...

When you think about the actual work being done across the Center, in house prototyping and manufacturing don't often come to mind. Contrary to that thinking there is a small, but very busy team working in AFLCMC’s Intelligence Surveillance Reconnaissance and Special Operations Forces Directorate, also known as ISR/SOF doing just that. Not too many folks know about the innovative work being done b...

Throughout his career Col. Cory Brown has worked on a variety of weapons systems including the U.S. Air Force's most tactical platforms when he was with the Predator Reaper program, and now he heads up the Air Force's most strategic platform as commander of AFLCMC’s B-2 system program office. We recently had a chance to talk with him about the vitally important role the B-2 plays in keeping our na...

After a nearly six month communication effort deep diving into all things AcqDemo, the two senior leaders who kicked off the AcqDemo information campaign AFLCMC’s executive director Kathy Watern and AFLCMC’s director of personnel Sherri Artuso got back together for a wrap up discussion about the effort. During the discussion Ms. Watern points out that they started the effort with a simple goal, wh...

Every year around this time we are reminded of how fortunate we are to be gainfully employed, and with great benefits. We are also reminded that there are many folks around us who aren’t so fortunate. This year has been an especially difficult one for many of our friends, family members and neighbors as the coronavirus pandemic disrupted life as we all knew it from earlier this year. One great way...

Lt. Gen. Shaun Morris took command of the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center on Sept. 04. He’s spent the last month getting up to speed on the latest activities in the center's vast portfolio. We had a chance to sit down with him for a few minutes to discuss how the first month has gone. We learned a little of his career history and we got a sense about some of his focus areas for the center a...

Welcome back for another episode of the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center’s Leadership Log podcast. This week we celebrate one of our own. James Tipton is the lead engineer for three B-1 ACAT III programs, and the software sustainment program at AFLCMC’s B-1 program office located at Tinker Air Force Base, Oklahoma. He was recently honored as a recipient of the 2020 Gears of Government Presid...

Do you know how Air Force uniforms are developed? Have you heard of the Berry Amendment, otherwise known as (10 U.S.C. 2533a), and do you know how it impacts Department of Defense procurement of certain goods and services? Have you heard of the Air Force Ideation Platform, and did you know that you can be an intricate part of improving existing uniforms, or developing future uniforms? Welcome back...

We identify feedback in the workplace as a communication process between managers and employees used to course correct and improve poor performance. It’ s also used to reinforce and encourage good performance. In this episode we talk with two seasoned leaders who over the course of their careers have spent countless hours both in giving and in getting feedback. AFLCMC's command chief Chief Master...

Operational security, or OPSEC, has had a renewed focus recently given the secretary of defense’s mandated OPSEC training for all Department of Defense employees. A few episodes ago, (E17) if you want to go check it out, we talked about the importance of protecting critical information, and the new DoD CUI standard for marking and safeguarding other than classified information. In this episode we...

This week we had a chance to sit down with our new vice commander Col. C.B. Cain for a discussion on his Air Force background and on his leadership philosophy and style.  For you history buffs, during our discussion we learned that he flew a C-17 into Wright-Patt and turned it over for display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force, so go check it out.  If you haven’t alre...

For information that hasn’t been classified, but is still in need of some level of protection we’ve long used the FOUO label (for official use only) to indicate that the information should be kept protected. The federal government has developed a new standard for information protection that all government agencies have to comply with, and part of that standard is replacing the FOUO classification...

This weeks's conversation centers around virtual training and war fighter readiness. Lt. Col. Ricardo Jaime, material leader and branch chief for the AFLCMC Simulators Division, Operational Training Infrastructure Branch, and Mike Burns from the SCARS program explain how the Simulator Common Architecture Requirements & Standards program, otherwise known as SCARS, provides a relevant integrated rea...

As our vice commander Col. Brady Hauboldt gets ready to retire we sat down with him to discuss his eclectic career. A recurring theme emerged during our discussion; an Airman’s plan for themselves and the Air Force’s plan for that Airman are often diametrically opposed…and that is not necessarily a bad thing. To put it in his words, “ that was my plan, but thankfully the Air Force had a different...

Did you know that within AFLCMC there is a group of dedicated professionals who focus on securing cyber resiliency for our warfighters? Do you know who your cyber focus team members are? And what does cyber resiliency and security even mean?ou know that within AFLCMC there is a group of dedicated professionals who focus on securing cyber resiliency for our warfighters? Do you know who your cyber f...

In this episode we talk with Stacy Betlej-Amodeo from AFLCMC's Rapid Sustainment Office. We discuss RSO's mission in general and how the organization embraces what then Secretary of Defense James Mattis charged the Defense Department to begin practicing: moving at the speed of relevance as he outlined in the 2,018 National Defense Strategy. We also discuss details about the upcoming Air Force Adva...

In this episode we discuss the upcoming changes in functional alignment across the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, especially at the senior materiel leader level. Our panel of senior leaders include: Maj. Gen. Mike Schmidt, program executive officer for the C3I & Networks Directorate; Thomas Robinson, director of Contracting; Kathy Sowers, director of Financial Management; and Brig. Gen. D...

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to work as an executive officer to a senior leader also known as the boss’ exec? If you have then this is the episode for you. Welcome back to the Air Force Life Cycle Management Center Leadership Log podcast. For this episode we were able to pin down four very busy execs from across the center for a candid discussion about how they got their positions, what t...

As we mentioned in an earlier episode, based on inputs from the "AFMC We Need Initiative," Air Force Materiel Command leadership made some significant changes to the Department of Defense Civilian Acquisition Workforce Personnel Demonstration Project, otherwise known as AcqDemo. One of the changes AFMC made to AcqDemo was removing the tiers. In this episode John Slye, who is the deputy program exe...

How do you continue to execute your mission when the work force is hampered by covid-19 lock down restrictions forcing 100 percent teleworking and their day-to-day effort relies on a legacy system that is only accessible while logged into the official network on the installation? With some agile out of the box thinking teams at both Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, and at Hanscom Air Force B...