Marine manpower support for NMCI: A welding of cultures

by Harry P Ward, originally published August 2002

Providing Marine manpower support to the Navy Marine Corps Intranet project required a comprehensive analysis by Headquarters Marine Corps and contractors.

The Navy Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI) manpower plan began in the spring of 2000 and merits study for future endeavors that involve Marines working under civilian contractors. These efforts may become more commonplace as the Marine Corps looks for efficiencies in harnessing technology and outsourcing civilians in order to return Marines with these highly valued skill sets to the Operating Forces. One of the first steps of the command, control, communications, and computers (C4)-led military manpower working group (MMWG) was to complete a comprehensive data call of military network architecture specialists in the Supporting Establishment of the Marine Corps to determine the percentage of duties related to the network that would be replaced by the NMCI initiative. The basis of the data call was to group network specialists into bins to ultimately determine if they spent 75 percent or more of their time on network related tasks. If this was true, they were deemed to be the part of the population that would be replaced by the NMCI utility. For the Marines in those billets, the result would be reassignment in the normal permanent change of station (PCS) cycle with coincident structure movement to our highest priority requirements. The occupational fields that we felt would be most affected at the time were the 28XX (ground electronics maintenance) and the 40XX (data systems) occupational fields.

Upon completion of the data call it was discovered that 766 billets could potentially be moved from the Supporting Establishment to higher priority requirements in the C4 occupational field and other Operating Forces requirements. At this time, three courses of action were drawn up: we could fill all of these billets with Marines working under the NMCI contractor, we could fill some of the billets with Marines to maintain core competencies in network architecture, or we could fill none of these billets with Marines and completely rely on the contractor for our network infrastructure. After thorough analysis, the C4 position was that we would fill some of the billets with Marines to hone their skills in the Supporting Establishment network infrastructure and to augment the workforce that would provide the Marine Corps a critical service.

At this point the MMWG, chaired by C4, became the manpower working implementation team, chaired by Manpower and Reserve Affairs (M& RA) with representation from C4, Training and Education Command, Marine Corps Combat Development Command, Marine Corps Systems Command, Northrop Grumman, and Booz, Allen, and Hamilton. The number of Marines determined to adequately support the requirement for core competencies in the network architecture was 251. This number resulted in approximately 62 Marines required for assignment to network operating centers (NOCs) in Norfolk, VA; San Diego, CA; Oahu, HI; a northeast regional location (either Quantico, Philadelphia, PA; Mechanicsburg, PA; Cherry Point; or Albany, GA); and helpdesk facilities in Norfolk and San Diego. After several days of heated discussions, the military occupational specialty (MOS) and grades targeted were the 4066 MOS (small computer systems specialist) in the grades of sergeant to gunnery sergeant. The group decided that in peeling off the 4067 MOS (programmer, Ada (programming language), that had been targeted for deletion) and the 28XX occupational field due to the paucity of numbers involved that the number of billets being transferred due to the initiative was being pared down to below 500. Outside of the 251 billets that would be filled by Marines working under the contractor, 211 billets would return to the Operating Forces for critical fills. Additionally, it was decided that the grades of sergeant through gunnery sergeant best met the Marine Corps' requirements for working under a contractor. The group felt that Marine Corps ethos indoctrination was complete at the rank of sergeant or the end of the first enlistment. Additionally, the consensus was that participation above the rank of gunnery sergeant should be limited to leadership and administrative oversight positions due to the management layers that the contractor was providing. As the group's work progressed, it was further decided that at each of the NOCs/help-desk locations, a master sergeant of MOS 4066 would be required for leadership/administrative oversight while an 0602 (command and control systems officer) captain would serve as detachment officer in charge (OIC) to provide overall direction. Further, the 4066 Marines in ranks of sergeant through gunnery sergeant would incur a 5-year enlistment involving approximately 2 years working under the contractor followed by a 3-year payback with the Operating Forces. In terms of budget, we studied the impact on the reality of two PCSs within a 5-year enlistment and found that the cost would be palatable based on the numbers and grades involved in the initiative.

We had a workable plan manpower-wise; however, the group's concern turned to the core competency attainment issue. The Marine Corps culture would provide a workforce with high vitality to complete the tasks of network architecture service in a training environment that NMCI would deliver on, but the business culture of the contractor could have potentially focused more on the labor pool that the Marines would offer and downgrade the training concerns of the Marine Corps. The solution to this dilemma was deemed to be a contractual modification that is in the final stages of formulation. The contractual modification hammers out issues like core competency measurement, daily professional military education (PME) concerns, daily physical fitness attainment, leave and liberty guarantees, noncompete clauses, individual development program specifics, workspace requirements, guarantees for workplace advancement opportunity, shift assignment equity, funding for individual certifications, and a 42-week productive year that allows completion of annual Marine training to maintain Marine Corps culture and ethos. Additionally, an indepth execution plan was drawn up to present a cradle-to-grave process solution for the identification, assignment, and subsequent Operating Forces utilization of Marines that would be involved in this program. From beginning to end, an assessment of proficiency levels would ensure a quality service to the gaining Operating Forces commander while a continual feedback loop to the contractor and Headquarters Marine Corps would be established to determine relative efficiencies and areas of needed improvement.

In terms of core competency measurement, the Marine Corps is asking for a proficiency testing format for network architecture core competency measurement that would be given at the beginning, middle, and completion of 2 years under the contractor. This would serve as the Marine Corps' report card on core competency advancement of our Marines during the 2 years of training with the contractor. Weekly time for PME review and test completion, with the master sergeant providing oversight, and daily time for maintenance of Marine physical fitness standards are included in the proposed wording. Thirty days of leave per year and weekend liberty guarantees, at equitable levels to the civilian employees of the NOCs and help desks, are addressed to ensure indepth consideration. Detailed individual development plans will be coproduced by detachment OICs and NOC management to guide the development of Marines throughout the 2 years assigned under the contractor. Reasonable workspace for each Marine, while providing the opportunity and funding guarantees for individual certifications in Microsoft, Tivoli, Remedy Systems Professional, Dell help desk and advanced server, Veritas, and Unix are guaranteed.

All training will occur at the individual sites since contractor provided temporary additional duty funding is running into legal restrictions. Training will include classroom, computer-based, and e-learning training. Personnel status is currently one master sergeant assigned to San Diego and one assigned to Oahu. Detachment OICs and Marines receiving core competency training were to initially begin reporting in April 2002, but due to the present sliding timeline will report no earlier than January 2003.