The 3 R's of Training and Exercises

 It's been a couple of weeks since I shared a post from the Field Grade Leader entitled “How Does Failure Enable Learning” (https://fieldgradeleader.themilitaryleader.com/failure-wasilewski/). I wanted to return to this topic and further examine how to apply the pressure in training and exercises. I’ve always believed that training and exercises are inextricably linked, and I am willing to bet that some of you would agree that exercises are nothing more than a training event that represents the culmination and integration of previous training iterations in multiple areas. To borrow from the original article, I pose the following: Are we providing participants “the gift of their worst day.” in our training and exercise programs.

I have served in training and education roles probably more than any other in my career. I believe in the value of good training and I also believe that it must be iterative and progressive. Good training should also follow the three “Rs”. It must be relevant, realistic, and rigorous. Good training ties the audience to a topic or event that is within the realm of the possible. Relevance gives the training context and connects the trainees to the training. Realistic training puts the audience in the situations and environments in which they will perform in an actual event. While some aspects of training lend themselves to the classroom, it’s hard to conduct sampling, or search and rescue, or firefighting, or active shooter response operations without putting trainees in a training environment that replicates the real world. Rigorous training represents the pressures experienced during an actual event, designed to increase proportional to task proficiency, and pushes the audience to the brink of failure - and sometimes past that. It’s important, though, to establish a “growth culture” early in the training – set the expectation of falling short; that it’s by design; and that it’s o.k.

As stated previously, exercises should represent the culmination of various training events. Like training, exercises can (and should) also be iterative and progressive. The Homeland Security Exercise Evaluation Program (HSEEP) Manual describes this in great detail. Exercises are a critical part of my current organization (and within FEMA as a whole) and are an important tool to assess emergency response and recovery capabilities. However, applying the context of giving participants their “worst day” denotes developing the scenario to cause the response to begin to fail to determine those gaps that will spur growth and improved capabilities. I think we sometimes overlook the opportunities that failure creates in these instances.

As with training, exercises should also follow three “Rs” that are related but different. They should be robust, reflective, and repetitive. Designing and delivering robust exercises allow participants to bring all their capabilities to bear on the situation and it helps to identify capability limitations – not necessarily gaps – that could fail should system stress reach the tipping point. Exercises that put pressure on those systems can lead to deliberate effort to bolster the capability rather than lead the exercise participants into a false sense of security. Ensure there is adequate post-exercise time devoted to analysis and reflection. This should go beyond the “what went wrong” but more importantly “why did it go wrong” and "what can we do about it". It’s important not to assign blame, acknowledge the extra pressure the exercise applied, and allow participants time to discuss possible solutions. I encourage you to check out this TEDx talk that stresses the importance of reflection after planning and execution: https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=TEDx+how+to+be+the+best+fighter+pilot&docid=607990565478993350&mid=5F7D42C8723D32C7518B5F7D42C8723D32C7518B&view=detail&FORM=VIREHT

Lastly, and probably most importantly, the exercise design should include time to “reboot” the exercise at least once and within a very short time of the first iteration. When I taught chemistry at West Point, one of my mentors had a saying, “Repetition is the blunt force trauma of learning.” (Thank you, Colonel Dooley) This aspect is at the heart of the article referenced in the beginning and is very likely something that most of us don’t incorporate in our exercise design and schedule. Yes – this may cost more. Yes – it requires more time from participants, evaluators, and controllers. But YES – it allows participants to address and quickly correct those shortcomings and start building the long-term “muscle memory” so that those gaps don’t reappear in an actual emergency. The reality is that depending on scale, some exercises lend themselves easily to repetition and some don’t. However, I am confident that some aspects of all exercises (whether table top, functional, or full scale) lend themselves to repeating aspects of the performance that need additional attention to develop muscle memory. 

If you’ve read this far, I commend you. I’d like to leave you with a final thought. It’s time that more organizations move from a culture where failure is stigmatized to one where it is embraced and underwritten provided it produces growth. Allow your organizations to step outside their comfort zones, to push the boundaries of their capabilities, and to truly embrace the notion that not meeting the bar is o.k. and real growth comes from what you do from that point forward. Get in the reps to build strength; reflect to build perspective; include rigor and realism to build relevance; and make those activities robust enough to fall short and spur growth.

#training #exercises #preparedness #FEMA