SupportNET 22 - The cycle continues...

Some two years ago, having just attended the UK MOD's LOGNET 20 seminar, I wrote this brief article [https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/lognet-20-initial-thoughts-uk-defence-support-lee-fitzsimons] which finished with a deliberately positive tone. The noises being made were the right ones, and the people seemed energised. The optimistic tone of that piece was a conscious choice. Being a relative newcomer to the field and being surrounded by the older hats who have 'seen it all before' it is all too easy to adopt cynicism, rather than look for hope. I chose to look for hope.

Fast forward a couple of years to the recent SupportNET 22 and it is increasingly difficult to maintain the optimism. The presentations given by Defence Support seem to be re-runs of the ones delivered two years previously, albeit with some new buzzwords thrown in. Amongst the 'paradigm shifts' and 'step changes' now come the terms 'availability' and 'cost-cutting'.

In truth, I am squeamish when it comes to using the term ‘cost-cutting’. A focus on spending the right money, thereby reducing unnecessary cost is fair enough but 'cost-cutting' feels almost synonymous with corner-cutting - after all a reduction in capability, proportionate to the reduction in costs, is not likely to be acceptable.

I am not squeamish of the term 'availability' unless, of course, it is presented as though it is a new concept.

Within minutes of the presentations starting, in his welcoming speech, Lt Gen Richard Wardlaw - Chief of Defence Logistics and Support (CDLS) - said that we "should consider logistics during design". I want you to imagine, if you can, the silent noise that the collective eye-roll of almost 400 people makes, especially when accompanied by an inaudible - but tangible - slightly exasperated "well, yeah...".

In June, this year, the integrated logistic support concept will celebrate its 58th birthday, having been formalised by Department of Defence Directive 4100.35 in 1964. The 'integrated' [https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/changing-face-big-i-lee-fitzsimons] in the title refers to the integration of logistic support management into the technical management structure for a new weapon system, with a remit to, among other things, influence design from a logistic support perspective. Again, that was introduced 58 years ago and yet here we are, in 2022, being briefed that there's an intent to do it.

There's a tendency to talk about these things in terms of a cycle, or a wheel. As if, over time, ILS drifts away from being the focus before working its way back around and having another crack at it.

It's a simple enough analogy but, as with most things ILS, it isn't quite that simple.

I prefer to think of it as a snail (or drop) cam...

where the radius represents the level of focus or attention that ILS receives.

The shorter the radius, the more the focus and vice versa.

Initiatives like the introduction of ILS or acquisition reform or support transformation bring the focus on ILS closer to where it should be. As time moves on, the focus drifts away before another activity brings it back to where it should be (or near to it).

But, what's the point? What's the impact of that and what becomes so unbearable that it triggers another reform to sharpen the focus on ILS? To answer that, we need to stretch the analogy a little more...

What we need to do is to fix the spindles of the cam wheel and to add some axes. Axes that represent both the passage of time and the impact of losing focus on ILS

Here, we'll call the impact of losing focus on ILS 'Resistance to efficient availability'.

The impact, in extremes, will result in loss of availability but militaries - or more specifically military people - do not make a habit of being unavailable for their missions.

That means that generally speaking, availability tends to be scratched together but often in a hugely inefficient (expensive), tooth & nail kinda way.

So, what does that look like?..

Why does this happen?

Because a good number of the activities that comprise ILS, and its associated analysis discipline logistic support analysis (LSA) are, as Peter Stuttard explained in his article 'A Tale of Two Platforms...' [https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/tale-two-platforms-game-spot-difference-peter-stuttard], intangible. Invariably, ILS is only brought back into focus when there is a tangible effect i.e. cost is high or availability is low - or a combination of both.

When the resistance to efficient availability is high, and becomes untenable, it will trigger some sort of reform and, that reform will always include refocussing or redressing or reselling or rebranding ILS.

The difficult trick, so difficult that it hasn't yet been achieved, is to maintain that focus throughout and not just when the situation needs to be recovered.

What has any of that waffle to do with SupportNET?

There was a lot of talk and, as mentioned in the introduction to this article, a lot of the right buzzwords being thrown about and, superficially, all of that seems positive. It's not original though; it's all been heard before.

What I can't see is any evidence to suggest that this reform, this attempt at transformation, is different to any of the others.

The question remains, is this the start of another cycle of the cam or is it going to be a lasting change that will maintain a focus on the import of ILS and truly put it at the heart of dependable capabilities?