Air University

Allen G. Peck, Lt Gen, Commander

Air War College

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Daniel Baltrusaitis, Col, PhD, Dean of Research

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Air Force Research Institute

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AIR UNIVERSITY

AIR WAR COLLEGE

Red Is Good

Transformational Changes for US

Air Force Aircraft Maintenance

Paul J. McAneny

Colonel, USAF

Air War College

Maxwell Paper No. 46

Air University Press

Maxwell Air Force Base, Alabama

August 2009

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ii

Disclaimer

Opinions, conclusions, and recommendations expressed or implied within are 

solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of Air University, the United States Air Force, the Department of Defense, or any other US 

government agency. Cleared for public release: distribution unlimited.

This Maxwell Paper and others in the series are available electronically at the Air University Research Web 

site http://research.au.af.mil and the AU Press Web 

site http://aupress.au.af.mil.

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iii

Foreword

Over the last two decades, the Air Force’s fleet of aircraft 

has shrunk 40 percent, while the average inventory age has 

increased from eight years in 1973 to a projected 26.5 years 

by 2012. Concurrently, this smaller, older fleet has been 

tasked with 2.3 million flight hours per year since the end 

of Operation Desert Storm. In an environment of flat budgets, limited manpower, and an aging, shrinking fleet, the 

Air Force seeks cultural transformations to remain the 

world’s premier air, space, and cyberspace force. The transformation initiative Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st 

Century (AFSO21) was designed to increase productivity, 

responsiveness, and efficiency, thus improving equipment 

readiness, reliability, and availability.

Given the mixed results of past transformation efforts, 

has AFSO21 achieved the desired effects? Col Paul “P. J.” 

McAneny offers an analysis focused on aircraft maintenance but applicable to the entire force and recommends 

cultural changes to support lasting transformation. He examines the impact of metrics on transformation and evaluates the USAF aircraft maintenance culture. He asks several questions: Can focused metrics precede cultural 

change? Does the aircraft maintenance community support 

a Red Is Good culture, in which metrics are used to illuminate problems rather than measure success or failure? If 

so, is the community a true learning organization that can 

maximize its impact through continuous process-improvement 

initiatives? The answers lead Colonel McAneny to recommend several Air Force–level changes to meet long-term 

aircraft readiness and reliability targets.

As with all Maxwell Papers, the Air War College publishes 

this study in the spirit of academic freedom and open debate. 

We encourage your engagement on the issues the paper raises 

and solicit your responses.

MAURICE H. FORSYTH

Major General, USAF

Commandant, Air War College

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About the Author

Colonel Paul J. (P. J.) McAneny is a faculty member at 

the Air War College, Spaatz Center for Officer Education, 

Air University, Maxwell AFB, Alabama. The Air War College 

is the Air Force’s senior professional military education 

institution providing post-graduate senior leader development programs based on joint, multinational, multiagency, 

war-fighting, and international security operations; air and 

space force strategy development; and national security 

planning. A 250-member student body representing all military services, other federal agencies, and 45 allied nations 

is enrolled annually in a fully accredited program awarding 

a master of strategic studies degree and joint professional 

military education II credit. 

Colonel McAneny received his commission from the Reserve 

Officer Training Corps in 1987. He is a 2009 graduate of the 

Air War College. Prior to his assignment at Maxwell AFB, 

Colonel McAneny was the deputy commander of the 437th 

Maintenance Group, 437th Airlift Wing, Charleston AFB, 

South Carolina.

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vii

Acknowledgements

I would like to express a brief thank you to several individuals 

who influenced the course of this effort. First, I would like 

to express my gratitude to Lt Col Michael “Batt” Masterson, 

USAF, PhD, whose editorial comments and professionalism 

assisted immensely in maintaining the focus and quality of 

this effort.

I would also like to thank all the individuals I interviewed 

personally or corresponded with. While the views were quite 

diverse, the end goal remained the same: to serve the Total 

Force more effectively in an era of declining resources. Those 

individuals who deserve special mention include Col Robert 

Hamm, Headquarters Air Education and Training Command 

(HQ AETC/A4/A7D); and Dr. Ronald Ritter, Secretary of the 

Air Force’s Smart Operations Office (SAF/SO).

Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Rebecca, and my 

three daughters, Campbell, Madeleine, and Erin, whose unconditional love and patience for their oft-absent husband 

and father were instrumental in seeing this endeavor 

through to completion.

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Red Is Good

Transformational Changes for

US Air Force Aircraft Maintenance

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. True but . . . if you don’t 

know it’s broke, it don’t get fixed.

—Gen Bill Creech

 The Five Pillars of TQM

Introduction

Over the last 20 years, the US Air Force has seen a 40 

percent reduction in the size of its air fleet, while the average 

age of that inventory has gone from eight years in 1973 to 

24 years in 2008. The negative trend is expected to continue to a projected average age of 26.5 years by 2012.1 On 

any given day, 14 percent of the remaining fleet (about 800 

aircraft) is either grounded or operating with age-related 

flight restrictions.2 Since the end of Operation Desert Storm, 

the Air Force has maintained an average rate of 2.3 million 

flight hours per year with a fleet that is much smaller and 

older than the one fielded during the first Gulf War.3 Operations Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and Enduring Freedom (OEF) 

have put further stress on the fleet; thus, aircraft will reach 

their projected service life much sooner than planned or 

budgeted for. 

Within this challenging environment of flat or decreasing 

budgets, limited manpower, and a rapidly aging air fleet, 

the Air Force sought a way to transform its culture not only 

to survive but to remain the world’s premier force in the 

domains of air, space, and cyberspace. The Air Force transformation initiative, called Air Force Smart Operations for 

the 21st Century (AFSO21), was begun after considering 

only the effects desired, not the organizational-level changes 

required to successfully implement the transformation. The 

desired effects of AFSO21 are 

1. increasing Airman productivity, 

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2. improving readiness and availability of critical equipment, 

3. increasing responsiveness and agility, 

4. sustaining and improving operational safety and reliability, and 

5. increasing energy efficiency.4

This paper focuses on the cultural changes required to 

achieve the desired effects of AFSO21, based on the relentless pursuit of continuous process improvement. However, 

successful, valid, reliable, and continuous process improvement 

is only possible in an environment that tolerates, encourages, 

and promotes the public airing of dirty laundry. Others 

have labeled this a Red Is Good mentality, from the wellknown construct of PowerPoint metrics briefings using red, 

yellow, and green stoplight charts to depict established target status.5 In a Red Is Good culture, problems are viewed 

as great opportunities to improve rather than failures or 

threats. Toyota Corporation is recognized globally as a 

benchmark for fostering a Red Is Good culture, demonstrated by Toyota president Katsuaki Watanabe’s visit to 

one of his US manufacturing plants. When shown that the 

plant met the metric targets (all green) for its most recent 

reporting period, Watanabe observed, to the dismay of his 

US managers, “Ah, no problems, must need no managers.”6

Watanabe curtly and elegantly conveyed that metrics and 

goals were useless if leaders weren’t using them as tools to 

find process problems and waste that could be eliminated. 

Unfortunately, many current USAF leaders look at metrics 

from the exact opposite point of view—as an opportunity to 

show others that they are on top of their game and meeting 

or exceeding all expectations.7 In other words, they have a 

Green Is Good mentality. 

This investigation will be framed by three research questions (RQ): 

RQ1: Can focused metrics precede cultural change? 

RQ2: Does the Air Force, specifically the aircraft maintenance community, currently support a Red Is Good culture? 

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RQ3: If so, is the aircraft maintenance community a bona 

fide learning organization that can achieve the greatest impact 

possible from continuous process-improvement initiatives? 

This analysis will examine metrics and their impact on 

transformational culture change and evaluate USAF aircraft maintenance community initiatives. Answers to these 

questions will generate several recommended changes at 

the Air Force enterprise level if the service hopes to achieve 

simultaneous efficiency and effectiveness targets for aircraft readiness and reliability—the desired effects of 

AFSO21.

Culture Change and Transformation

Most transformation programs start on the wrong 

foot. And because they often follow in the wake of 

failed restructuring efforts that have left indelible 

scars on the workforce, they are seen as just 

another attempt at cost reduction.

—Tony Hope and Jeremy Hope

 Transforming the Bottom Line

What is organizational culture? How should the Air Force 

be categorized as an organization? What are the common 

characteristics of successful cultural change agents in large 

organizations? Where does the current AFSO21 (Lean) transformation fit into this discussion? Edgar Schein defines culture as “a pattern of shared basic assumptions learned by a 

group as it solved its problems . . . [and] taught to new members as the correct way to think and feel in relation to those 

problems.”8 By Schein’s characterizations, today’s Air Force 

is a mature organization where culture defines leadership 

rather than leadership defining culture. Mature organizations can function successfully for many years, so long as 

their cultural assumptions remain relevant to the external 

environment. However, if the environment changes and the 

organization can’t adapt, that inflexibility leads to a period of 

rapid decline.9 Furthermore, if mature organizations have a 

long history of success grounded in certain core assumptions 

about themselves and the environment, they are unlikely to 

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challenge or reexamine those assumptions because they 

remain a significant source of pride and self-esteem. This 

reluctance can act as a filter (or blinder) and prevent key 

leaders from recognizing alternative, but necessary, means 

of survival.10

Successful cultural transformation starts with a wellconstructed vision instilling a forward-looking mind-set 

that positions the organization to move confidently and 

aggressively toward bold objectives.11 Further, the vision of 

transformational leaders must consistently and clearly 

communicate organization priorities, goals, and assumptions throughout the workforce. This is known as organizational alignment. If ignored, workers become preoccupied 

with their individual task stovepipes and procedural details.12

But when a company has synergistic and mutually supportive metrics, goals, and objectives at all organizational 

levels, a complete organizational alignment—true change 

and transformation—is possible. Aligned organizations 

have clear objectives, a common language, and a trustbased, open information system.13 Once these conditions 

for success have been set, a culture of excellence where 

great ideas flourish from the bottom up is truly possible. 

The trick, and the problem, is successfully converting these 

ideas from concepts to actions. Transformational leaders 

can break through corporate cultural inertia by seeking, 

promoting, and celebrating progressive thinking.14 Jim Collins, author of Good to Great, says, on the other hand, that 

it is just as important to avoid demotivating people by failing to deliver results on their progressive thinking. Instead, 

change agent champions “point to tangible accomplishments—however incremental at first—and show how these 

steps fit into an overall concept that will work. When leaders 

do this in such a way that people see and feel the buildup 

of momentum, they will line up with enthusiasm.”15

Organizational culture analysis demonstrates that it takes 

anywhere from three to 10 years to successfully change the 

fundamental culture of a large organization.16 Unfortunately, 

the AFSO21 Lean transformation efforts were flawed from 

the start, following the very pattern criticized by Hope and 

Hope in Transforming the Bottom Line. The service programmed major budget cuts (primarily personnel accounts) 

between 2007 and 2011 to save 21 billion dollars while 

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assuming risk until transformational capabilities were identified.

17 Instead, successfully transforming organizations must 

first reduce the workload, not the work force.18 The Air Force 

did the exact opposite. It cut manpower budgets while assuming that workload reductions and speed and quality improvements would follow. Air Force leaders must reevaluate their 

basic assumptions about service transformation to attain the 

effects desired with AFSO21. Only then will the Air Force be 

capable of the bold policy and organizational changes 

necessary to facilitate transformation.

Metrics, Goal Setting, and Cultural Connections

Goals without metrics are more of a hallucination 

than a vision.

—Alex Miller, Chuck Parke, and Harry Gregory

 Leading for Results course

 University of Tennessee

What gets planned, gets measured. What gets 

measured, gets done.

 —Wayne Turk

 “Is Your Project on Track?”

Metrics can and do influence corporate culture, whether 

by intention or not. To be effective, metrics must flow from 

a clearly defined strategy. An organization that fails to measure itself correctly will not know how or where it falls 

short.19 Metrics, when properly developed and utilized, provide leaders with valuable tools to measure progress and 

lead change across all organizational levels. The most effective metrics are customer focused and capture the entire 

value stream. However, a misapplied focus on metrics can 

be a powerfully counterproductive force in corporate culture and actually hinder organizational progress. 

First and foremost, metrics should always reflect the 

value of the organization’s product to the customer, ensuring delivery at the right place, time, quantity, quality, and 

price.20 In developing metrics, the core questions should 

be, “Where are we going?” and “How do we get there?”21

Value-stream visible metrics have the following attributes: 

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• accurate (reliably expresses the phenomenon being 

measured), 

• objective (not subject to dispute), 

• comprehensible, 

• timely, and 

• robust (resistant to being gamed and hard to manipulate).22

Another important point for leaders to consider in metrics development is unity of focus for the best return on 

investment. Leaders should personally champion no more 

than five of the highest-level critical end-product metrics 

and cascade responsibility for supporting metrics downward through the organization. Goal setting is also a critically important leadership task and is linked directly to 

encouraging team members to achieve higher levels of performance than they might have thought possible. Incremental and realistic increases in goal difficulty raise the 

level of effort required to achieve goals while simultaneously 

expanding the performance envelope of the entire enterprise stream.23 Metrics are worthless unless the results are 

critically reviewed on a regular basis, with the target being 

complete process improvement. Good metrics should allow 

target setting, identify issues and problems, and provide 

feedback on process efficiency and effectiveness.24 Metrics 

displayed in simple and visible scoreboards let all personnel 

know how they are doing—as the simple stoplight chart 

does, using red (significant problems that could impact 

success), yellow (correctable problems), and green (everything is on time, on budget, etc.) indicators.25

Good customer-focused metrics encompass the entire 

value stream. Rather than using traditional metrics just because they are “what’s always been tracked,” an organization should consider eliminating metrics that don’t create 

value as perceived by the customer. Once set and focused 

on key high-return processes, value-stream ownership 

should be assigned to a specific individual or small group. That 

person or persons are empowered with total responsibility 

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and authority to improve performance within the value 

stream.26 This is much more effective than isolated attempts 

to maximize “stovepipe” performance, because ultimately 

final output is constrained by the lowest level of support, or 

bottleneck, in any component of the value stream.27 To 

summarize, there are four guiding principles of metrics for 

value-stream teams: 

1. Targets should be aligned with strategy.

2. Teams play a role in choosing targets.

3. Focus on the customer including possible development of new metrics.

4. Measures should influence behavior.28

Assigning team empowerment to value streams is the 

most powerful tool at any leader’s disposal. While leaders 

are solely responsible for setting strategy—owning the 

process—teams should be the primary unit of execution 

and do all the real value-creating work.29 Teams at Toyota 

Corporation take ownership of the entire value stream and 

use the plan-do-check-analyze (PDCA) cycle to achieve process improvement where it can be most effective.30 The 

PDCA cycle is a systematic method that codifies the “continuous” in continuous process improvement. Planning involves analyzing the value stream, finding the areas with 

the most waste, and deciding what adjustments to make in 

order to remove that waste from the process. The do step 

involves carrying out the corresponding plans of action. 

Checking means judging results of actions (feedback) taken 

against predetermined targets in the do step—in other 

words, comparing what should have happened with what 

actually happened in order to make further refinements. 

Good checking requires an atmosphere friendly to peerand self-criticism. Otherwise, if personnel sense that failed 

attempts at process improvement are perceived negatively 

by leadership, honest feedback will be lost. Progress is impossible without an atmosphere where mistakes can be 

freely reported. Finally, the analyze step is as simple as it 

sounds: reflect on the results of the check step. If the 

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results from the check step meet the target, then standardize. If not, find the root cause and restart the PDCA cycle.31

Two critical questions are:

1. Does the organization have a culture that supports 

and encourages systematic problem solving?

2. What really happens when people report problems?32

Creating a culture where the bearer of bad news is lionized 

rather than ostracized is one of the most difficult things for 

any leader to achieve. The 2008 resignations of the secretary 

of the Air Force and the chief of staff are illustrative. While 

the secretary of defense’s official statement said that these 

resignations were specifically related to recent Air Force 

missteps involving custody of nuclear weapons and components, many in and outside the Air Force believe otherwise. 

Michael Dunn, Air Force Association president, recently 

summed it up by stating, “Secretary Wynne and General 

Moseley have been outspoken in pointing out the Air Force 

needs to recapitalize and modernize the fleet. . . . It is apparent 

to us that the Department of Defense did not appreciate the 

military advice nor the warnings they were getting.”33 This 

effectively signaled to the entire Air Force that our organization maintains a Red Is Bad culture. In a Red Is Good culture, problems are viewed as opportunities for systematic 

problem solving. 

A Red Is Bad culture is not unique to the Air Force. There 

are numerous instances of many working in service and 

maintenance type industries where the only experience 

with metrics and data is negative. In some production 

environments, metrics are used to punish low performers, 

justify cutbacks, and support dubious arguments that foster 

an environment of distrust and wariness.34 This leads to 

inaccurate or inflated job completion estimates to create a 

buffer in order to minimize reprimands for not meeting the 

schedule. On the other hand, reporting realistic estimates 

and system problems would allow leaders to have full and 

accurate process visibility to better manage uncertainty 

and risk in the daily schedule.35

Rather than being a pass/fail indicator, metrics should 

instead be used to judge process efficiency and effectiveness 

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as well as identify trends.36 Furthermore, metrics should be 

constantly refined to ensure that leaders and process 

owners can get to, and remain focused on, the heart of the 

issue.37 No leader wants to be in a situation where process 

owners are reluctant to provide data that reflects negatively 

on the process. This human tendency must be overcome, or 

else it creates a false reading of current project status.38 It 

is important to remember what should be the true purpose 

of all good metric rating systems: to help tell a story and 

gain a shared understanding of what’s important. Effective 

rating systems should lead to problem discovery and result 

in solutions.39

This discussion of metrics leads to the cultural connection 

question, Can metrics influence culture? W. Bruce Chew, a 

Harvard expert on factory productivity in America, believes 

metrics do influence behavior if they are properly created. 

Chew states, “When the primary goal is to influence behavior, 

the simpler the better must be the rule. If the people who use 

an index can’t understand it at a gut-level, it probably will 

not affect their decisions and priorities.”40

In fact, measurement systems drive behavior at all levels, 

and the choice of measures is critical to the behavior to be 

influenced.41 Therefore, it is critical that managers consider 

who and what will be influenced by the metrics they choose 

to track.42 Enterprise metrics, those specifically designed 

with the intention of aligning incentives and behavior across 

the entire organizational value stream, ensure that both individual and corporate goals are synchronized.43 Truly 

transformational metrics discourage personnel from focusing only on their individual production stovepipes and instead encourage them to think about the value, quality, 

quantity, and timeliness of the final output product.44

Simultaneously, keeping internal process metrics in 

perspective is important to prevent an overemphasis 

from suboptimizing real customer value.45 Ultimately, behavior guided by consistent application of metrics and goals 

over time leads to a real and permanent culture change 

that successfully considers the entire value-stream process. 

When a leader has accomplished that, the corporate culture 

has taken a major step towards successful, long-term, continuous process improvement.

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10

Current Air Force Aircraft Maintenance Metrics

Choosing metrics for metrics’ sake is a bad thing and 

really proves nothing. A good maintenance manager 

will not strive to improve a metric but will use it to 

improve the performance of the organization.

—Brig Gen Terry L. Gabreski, USAF

 Foreword to Air Force Maintenance Metrics

The US Air Force flies 430 sorties per day in support of 

OIF and OEF. In fact, the Air Force airlift fleet averages a 

takeoff every 90 seconds, every day, 365 days a year.46

Reams of data on operational tempo, flight hours, and so 

forth are collected by Air Force maintenance data analysts. 

These measurements enable predictive estimates of structural fatigue, system performance, and airframe service 

life. Research shows cost per flying hour increases significantly during the first 12 years of aircraft service life, so it 

is important to collect and track these metrics for predictive 

analysis.47 The most recent version of the Air Force Maintenance Metrics handbook lists 34 primary maintenance 

metrics to track.48 These are used not only for predictive 

analysis, but also for trend analysis and progress checks. 

Recent independent research studies by the Air Force Logistics Management Agency (AFLMA) and the Office of Aerospace 

Studies (OAS) highlighted problems with aircraft maintenance data validity as well as the absence of a systematic 

method for goal setting at higher headquarters. Likewise, 

other studies have shown how nonaligned metrics suboptimize, 

or undermine, the desired enterprise-level performance for 

some weapon systems. Finally, a Green Is Good/Red Is Bad 

culture still permeates the aircraft maintenance community.

The metrics used to reflect fleet health at both wing and 

enterprise level for the aircraft maintenance community are 

mission capable (MC) rate, aircraft (sometimes called fleet) 

availability, home-station logistics departure reliability rate 

(HSLDR) for mobility air forces, and utilization rate (UTE) 

for combat air forces. MC rates are simply determined by 

the number of aircraft that can fly at least one assigned 

mission divided by the number of aircraft possessed by the 

entire wing. Aircraft availability is the metric for determining 

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11

“health of the inventory” and is dependent on the MC rate as 

well as the number of aircraft across the entire enterprise 

(possessed, backup, depot, etc.).49 This measure is useful 

for determining if the total logistics enterprise is capable of 

providing sufficient aircraft to accomplish mission requirements. A certain percentage of the fleet must always be 

available on any given day in order to execute the Air Force’s 

flying program.50 HSLDR metrics judge operational effectiveness based on customer needs in the mobility air forces 

and are determined by comparing on-time takeoffs to deviations from the flying schedule.51 For the combat air forces, 

UTEs are the local measure of effectiveness, counting the 

number of flying hours an aircraft is utilized during a given 

month, quarter, or year.52

Traditionally, MC rates have been a common benchmark. 

A typical unit would compare its MC rate against established 

major command (MAJCOM) standards or against the rates of 

similar units. Units that were lower in comparison to these 

benchmarks would then try to identify the influencing factor 

(process, policy, or resource) and seek remedies.53 More 

recently, enterprise leaders have preferred to focus on aircraft availability because it best articulates systemic fleet 

stress levels and overall combat capability. Aircraft availability provides a direct answer to the question, How many aircraft are ready right now?54 Aircraft availability is impacted 

by MC, not mission capable for maintenance (NMCM), and 

not mission capable for supply (NMCS) rates as well as factors such as aircraft in depot or undergoing modifications.

The Air Force has been collecting maintenance data for 

decades but suffers from three data-collection problems 

common to service environments:

1. There is so much data that it is difficult to separate 

the wheat from the chaff. 

2. For various reasons, some collected data is no 

longer available. 

3. The data often does not measure what it purports 

to measure.55

These problems violate the guiding principles for metrics of value-stream teams. Recently, the AFLMA and OAS 

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12

collaborated on a study of C-5 maintenance data. They discovered that much of the data on past C-5 modifications 

was lost when C-5 depot responsibilities transferred from 

Kelly AFB, Texas, to Warner Robins AFB, Georgia.56 The 

AFLMA also found that aircraft maintenance metrics were 

inaccurate and vulnerable to both intentional and unintentional manipulation. Researchers uncovered delays in recording aircraft status changes to “not mission capable,” after 

aircraft status had already changed.57 AFLMA also discovered 

systemic problems involving maintenance metrics. Procedural 

methods for reporting broken aircraft systems obfuscated the 

actual cause. Ultimately, lack of input control and discipline in following electronic data-reporting procedures injected doubt into the entire maintenance data-collection 

process.58 On top of doubts about the actual data, AFLMA 

also found no formal methodology or analysis involved in 

determining the metric goals for C-5 MC, NMCM, or NMCS 

rates.59 Likewise, a separate Government Accountability 

Office (GAO) study found that Air Combat Command has no 

historical record of any process establishing most of the metric goals for its primary aircraft maintenance metrics.60 GAO 

investigators suggest “the lack of documentation in setting the 

goals ultimately obscures basic perceptions of readiness and 

operational effectiveness” while wasting the time of wing aircraft maintainers who attempt to meet standards having no 

basis in actual organizational performance.61

Air Force maintenance metrics also have alignment issues. 

Proper organizational alignment is present where, with all 

other variables held constant, improvement in lower-level 

metrics leads to improvement in the higher-level metrics.62

While it is common to see different metrics at different organizational levels, this split focus can be problematic when local 

goals are not aligned with the overall enterprise strategy.63

This results in suboptimization or an overemphasis on a 

particular metric that ignores the actual root cause of the core 

problem and may in fact exacerbate the problem.64 An AFLMA 

study revealed misalignment between the primary winglevel leadership C-5 metric, HSLDR, and the Air Mobility 

Command’s primary metric of aircraft availability. The 

study demonstrated that these metrics were not aligned, 

with the result that wing-level maintainers were focused on 

maximizing local operational effectiveness while the MAJCOM 

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13

was concentrating on improvements in overall strategic 

readiness.65

Furthermore, the Air Force still lacks the ability for constructive self-criticism, an essential ingredient of continuous 

process improvement. Metrics must be looked at as tools for 

fixing problems affecting the process; otherwise their value 

is questionable. In fact, metrics that “show the pain” best 

have the greatest value.66 The Air Force has an Only Green 

Is Good mentality whereby leadership, often due to a strong 

self-preservation instinct, has no tolerance for items marked 

red for noncompliance.67 An environment where constant 

deficiency identification is the norm must be the goal. While 

the Air Force aircraft maintenance community has the obsessive desire to measure just about everything, the wrong things 

are often measured, and a negative stigma exists against taking the time to study a process closely enough to actually 

improve it.68 Only when this paradigm is changed can the Air 

Force expect sustained operational improvements.69

When Air Force maintenance organizations combine effective metrics with a Red Is Good mentality, true long-term improvements will be realized. A dynamic relationship between 

analysts and maintenance leaders must exist in which the 

analysts are fully integrated partners with the leader’s agenda 

of long-term process improvement.70 Good analysis remedies 

the tendency to focus on final results rather than the critical 

factors that drive those results. Lean organizations find ways 

to measure the independent variables, such as resources, 

funding, manpower, or programming data, that have the 

greatest effect on fleet readiness.71 Many units are discovering there are better measures than MC rates to assess how a 

wing meets sortie production and long-term fleet health 

requirements. A more effective approach may be increased 

emphasis on the scheduling process to maintain a balance 

between daily sortie production for the near term and future 

fleet health for the long term.72 Significant transformational process improvement will begin only when winglevel maintenance organizations focus on using metrics 

for true root-cause analysis to achieve enterprise-level 

aligned, requirement-driven goals.

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14

The Toyota Production System and Air Force

Aircraft Maintenance

You can’t tell the winners without a scorecard, 

or tell the losers either. And without a scorecard, 

neither winners nor losers will know which they 

are. No one will know how to get better, either.

—Gen Bill Creech

 The Five Pillars of TQM

The success of the Toyota production system and its 

foundational culture is well known. Facing restricted budgets, limited personnel, and dwindling financial resources, 

the aircraft maintenance community needs to fundamentally change its culture to improve mission effectiveness. 

Real cultural change can only be achieved if the Air Force 

learns and applies the right lessons from observing the 

Toyota production system and other successful Lean organizations in implementing transformational continuous process improvement. 

The Toyota cultural model of a learning organization is 

the construct many organizations strive to emulate. The 

core of the Toyota production system is an attitude of selfreflection and self-criticism together with a burning desire 

to improve. Toyota leaders at all levels are encouraged to 

openly address things that don’t go right and then take 

responsibility and propose countermeasures to prevent 

these things from recurring.73 The difference between 

Toyota and many other companies is Toyota’s fanatical process orientation. Less successful companies have resultsoriented leaders or a Green Is Good mentality. Process-oriented 

leaders are more patient, believing that investments in the 

people and the process lead to the desired results, while Green 

Is Good managers want to immediately measure the bottomline performance of any attempted continuous improvement programs.74 Many companies and leaders are unable 

to accept the paradox that by continually surfacing problems and stopping to fix them as they occur, waste is eliminated and productivity soars. Instead, assembly lines are 

run continuously and problems accumulate, eventually 

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causing lower quality and increased delays.75 Toyota also 

ensures that all leaders clearly understand the company’s 

core value stream. Likewise, all internal service operations 

view their role as supporting the core value stream. The 

leaner the core value stream, the leaner the supporting 

operations can be.76 Toyota leaders are commonly described 

as focused on the long term, dedicated to the company’s 

core values, and possessed with detailed hands-on valuestream knowledge. At Toyota, problems are seen as opportunities to train and coach other employees.77 Unfortunately, 

for many organizations the essence of building in quality 

has been lost in bureaucratic and technical details. This is 

why Toyota incorporates their PDCA cycle into four easy-tounderstand steps:

1. Go and see.

2. Analyze the situation. 

3. Use one-piece flow and visual signals to surface problems. 

4. Ask Why? five times.78

The most important metrics to Toyota leaders are those 

driving problem solving and supporting process orientation. 

These value-stream measures test everything from lead time 

to first-pass quality to cost. Aggressive goals begin at the 

executive level, and each lower level develops measurable 

annual objectives designed to support those leadership goals. 

These metrics are updated daily and become more specific 

lower down in the process hierarchy.79 Of note, metrics having 

no influence on improving core value-stream operational excellence or those enabling suboptimization are eliminated.80

How can the Air Force maintenance community emulate 

Toyota’s effective continuous process-improvement culture? Achieving the Toyota level of transformation requires 

both patience and perseverance—organizational culture is 

both the creation and product of a learning organization. It 

has taken Toyota well over a decade to build a North American 

organization that resembles the learning enterprise it built 

over the course of several decades in Japan.81 The challenge 

is in creating an aligned organization of employees who 

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share the organization’s core beliefs and continually learn 

together.82 To learn means to have the capacity to build on 

the past and incrementally move forward, rather than starting over and reinventing the wheel with each new leadership change. This is the fulcrum point of the Air Force’s 

challenge. To build a learning organization, it is necessary 

to have stability of personnel, slow promotion, and carefully 

planned succession systems to protect organizational 

knowledge bases.83 Successfully transforming culture takes 

years of applying consistent approaches and principles. To 

its credit, the Air Force has made attempts to become a 

learning organization but has fallen far short of the Toyota 

model. As commander, Tactical Air Command, General Creech 

instituted senior-officer immersion programs. General Creech 

rightly believed that “it’s when leaders do not understand the 

challenges—and the real problems and issues—that they give 

direction that adds to the problem rather than to the solution.”84 In General Creech’s program, wing senior officers 

(normally colonels and above) were required to spend two 

weeks working side by side with Airmen as they went about 

their daily routine. The purpose was for wing senior leaders 

to gain a deeper understanding of the environment, challenges, and demands faced by Airmen on a daily basis. At 

the end of the two weeks, these leaders were required to 

provide a written report to General Creech with insights 

and recommendations. Since General Creech’s retirement 

over 20 years ago, less ambitious incarnations of this program continued sporadically. While the benefits of the 

Creech immersion program are intuitively obvious, they 

pale in comparison to the learning organization model at 

Toyota, where value-stream managers understand virtually 

every facet of the process they lead. This problem is particularly acute in aircraft maintenance, where officers and senior 

noncommissioned officers (NCO) are frequently rotated and 

often have little or no experience with the weapon system 

they are charged with supporting. 

A transformed learning organization would enable the 

Air Force to empower a new breed of wing-level leaders: a 

chief process officer who takes ownership of understanding, tracking, measuring, and optimizing crucial end-to-end 

aircraft maintenance business practices. These leaders 

must establish the right maintenance process metrics, 

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measure performance, devise improvements—or reengineer 

a process that is clearly broken—and establish a continuous 

program of process optimization, as Toyota’s four keep-itsimple steps force managers to do.85

The chief process officer must have a firm grasp on enterprise thinking. This “grasp” is defined as a discipline for seeing the whole, recognizing patterns and interrelationships, 

and learning how to structure these interrelationships in 

more effective, efficient ways.86 Toyota has achieved a culture of stopping or slowing down to fix problems to get quality right the first time. While this may sound simplistic, 

countless organizations have tried to emulate Toyota and 

failed. The company philosophy of getting quality right first 

enhances long-term productivity. Toyota developed visual 

systems to alert teams or project leaders when a machine 

or process needs assistance.87 Metric data are used to learn 

and monitor process performance, not as a method for 

punishing or rewarding people. Dr. W. Edwards Deming, 

the famous American engineer who led the quality movement in Japan and later in America, stated that 96 percent 

of quality problems were built into the work system while 

only 4 percent were due to individual employee performance.88 The great majority of experts agree that process 

rather than people offers the greatest opportunities for continuous improvement.89 For a variety of reasons, service 

processes such as aircraft maintenance are full of waste. 

Service processes:

1. are by their nature slow processes which drive up 

expense,

2. tend to have far too much work in progress, often as 

the result of extreme complexity in the service itself, 

and 

3. are flush with non-value-added (to the customer) work 

typically comprising 50 percent of the total service 

cost.90

This represents a huge potential for enterprise thinkers 

to achieve significant improvements in speed, quality, and 

cost. According to Lou Giuliano, CEO of ITT Industries, in 

an organization full of leaders who are enterprise thinkers, 

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“everybody’s number one task becomes improving the processes for which they have the responsibility.”91

The Toyota production system also teaches valuable lessons about the potential pitfalls from the introduction of 

new technology. Jim Collins theorized in Good to Great that 

fantastically successful companies use technology as an 

accelerator of momentum, not a creator of it. Great companies become pioneers in the application of technology in 

their business model.92 The Toyota philosophy towards 

technology introduction is to not readily compromise its 

principles and goals for something that is merely faster and 

cheaper. For instance, using information technology as a 

cost-cutting measure may have many unintended consequences radically damaging to corporate culture.93 Instead, 

Toyota only incorporates thoroughly reliable and tested 

technology that serves its people and processes. It is not 

uncommon for mature organizations like the Air Force to 

attempt to change cultural assumptions by incorporating new 

technology. New technology causes employees to reexamine 

their present assumptions and possibly adopt new values, 

beliefs, and assumptions.94 While this may indeed be beneficial to the organization, technological seduction is often accompanied by unintended, harmful side effects.

For instance, new technology is often introduced to enable better communication throughout an organization, 

but instead senior leaders may use the information they 

gather for control purposes and unwittingly expand hierarchical control.95 The Air Force is about to begin the rollout of its newest technology effort in support of logistics 

processes. The Expeditionary Combat Support System 

(ECSS) is designed to enhance war-fighter support by enabling “improved availability of mission critical weapon systems.”96 ECSS has been designed to transition Air Force 

logistics processes to a planning-based, cross-functional, 

integrated (full visibility at all levels), high-performance 

(new metrics) operation.97 Overall transformation goals for 

fiscal year 2011 are a 20 percent increase in equipment 

availability and a reduction in annual operating costs by 10 

percent or 2.75 billion dollars.98 Transformational changes 

from ECSS are expected through integration of the entire 

supply-chain business process and associated personnel 

roles across the entire value stream. One of the tenets of 

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the system is increased Air Force–wide asset visibility to 

improve planning and develop new metrics on weapons 

system availability, on-time delivery of maintenance events, 

cycle times, and other data.99 ECSS will be the primary enabling technology for the new Air Force Global Logistics 

Support Center (AFGLSC). The AFGLSC is empowered to 

control the entire Air Force supply chain network.100 As 

such, it has the authority to “redirect the source, direction, 

or speed of re-supply” as well as “change the priority of 

maintenance actions to meet changing warfighter requirements.”101 The AFGLSC mission brief states that it will provide “tactical, enterprise-level” management of the supply 

chain.102 This oxymoron should signal caution among Air 

Force maintenance leaders. The Air Force must be cognizant of the unintended abuse of what are referred to as 

ECSS “Make/Repair” activities. These activities are described as enabling centralized oversight of service, maintenance, repair, and overhaul activities for aircraft, components, facilities, and equipment.103 Unfortunately, the 

military has well-documented struggles with information 

technology systems originally designed for reachback and 

information sharing but ultimately used to facilitate highly 

centralized operational execution.104 A move to centrally 

control base-level repair priorities is in direct contrast with 

the decentralized concepts that have served the aircraft 

maintenance community well since they were instituted by 

General Creech in the 1980s. His positive organizational 

changes demonstrated how highly centralized systems 

robbed wing-level maintenance teams of process ownership 

and empowerment.105 As ECSS comes online and the AFGLSC 

becomes fully operational, Air Force aircraft maintenance 

leadership must consider mitigation strategies to avoid the 

loss of wing-level process ownership and empowerment inexorably linked to centralized control of maintenance repair. 

Today, the Air Force remains stuck in the nascent stages 

of its cultural transformation. The initial attempt to transform the Air Force in the early 1990s using Total Quality 

Management (TQM) principles popularized by Deming was 

generally recognized as unsuccessful and aborted by service leadership within the decade. More recently, the Air 

Force made a spirited attempt to embrace quality with its 

AFSO21 program, vowing not to repeat the mistakes of past 

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programs. While some high-profile successes have been 

achieved, most notably at the air logistics centers (ALC), the 

contention that the Air Force has embraced “partial quality” 

holds true for others. This partial quality is characterized 

by a lack of mission focus with the emphasis on efficiency 

overshadowing effectiveness, leaving many Airmen with the 

impression that customer service­–oriented functions like 

finance and personnel have been degraded. If AFSO21 initiatives don’t ultimately lead to improved operational effectiveness, then Airmen have every reason to question their 

overall utility. Partial quality also drives the impression that 

AFSO21 is overly focused on management versus leadership, with NCOs viewing it as just another level of micromanagement.106 Becoming a learning organization and creating empowered chief process officers while eschewing the 

allure of information technology–enabled, centralized execution are significant steps towards a permanent, long-term 

cultural transformation.

Transforming the Culture in Aircraft

Maintenance at the Enterprise Level

If you don’t know what you are doing, you keep 

making the wrong mistakes.

—Yogi Berra

 Quoted in Gen Bill Creech

 The Five Pillars of TQM

In the 1990s, the failure of Air Force TQM programs to 

approach the lofty goals promised by their most vocal advocates resulted in waning support from military leaders and 

professional educators. Airmen who saw the quality movement as a way to increase our military edge and improve 

efficiency were eventually outnumbered by those who saw 

it as just another square to fill.107 The Air Force is now several 

years into its second attempt at transformational culture 

change. While there have been several well-publicized 

AFSO21 success stories, a true Air Force transformational 

culture change remains an unsettled issue. The aircraft 

maintenance community has served as a test bed for many 

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successful AFSO21 initiatives. To lock in these initial successes and support continued growth, changes in leadership methodology, management, and service policies are 

required—not just in Air Force aircraft maintenance, but at 

the Air Force enterprise level. These changes include instilling a Red Is Good culture and ensuring that Airmen leading 

steady process improvement are rewarded and promoted 

ahead of their peers. At the MAJCOM and Air Force levels, 

trends toward centralization of base-level maintenance 

functions must be approached with caution. Finally, the 

human resource management system for aircraft maintenance leadership should be completely overhauled to grow 

true learning organizations.

Changing the culture of any mature organization the size 

of the Air Force is a daunting challenge. Organizational 

change management is a disciplined process—guiding an 

organization and its stakeholders through significant organizational change, addressing the people issues of transformation, and mobilizing individuals and groups at all levels of 

the organization to support the transformation.108 In today’s 

Air Force, an appropriate response to ongoing skepticism at 

all ranks, due to the failures of previous TQM and other 

transformation initiatives, should be constantly considered. 

Air Force leaders must understand legitimate skepticism 

and accept personal responsibility to positively work 

through it. Successful leaders deeply understand AFSO21

issues and opportunities and forcefully present the case for 

change.109 Overcoming cultural norms is a bigger challenge 

than just mitigating AFSO21 skepticism. The Air Force 

made rational appeals to Airmen on the importance of a 

continuous process-improvement culture, declaring that 

money and manpower pools are drying up. The problem is 

that Airmen at the local operating level don’t perceive they 

are affected. Therefore, saving programmed Air Force dollars 

is not an attractive selling point. The question What is in it 

for me and why should I care? is never really answered.110

In aircraft maintenance this could be as simple as asking a 

technician, “When was the last time someone asked you 

how the job should be done?”111 In the past, when operational requirements or problems somewhere else in the 

value stream caused a workload spike, the traditional solution was 12-hour shifts and/or work through the weekend. 

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Instead, a new Lean Air Force paradigm needs to be mutually 

beneficial at all levels. Enlightened self-interest is very good as 

a motivating force. As Col Robert Hamm, the Headquarters 

Air Education and Training Command deputy director for 

logistics, states, “Let’s use our heads and these new Lean 

tools to fix our processes because, in my opinion, we won’t 

see the major increases in manpower or money necessary 

to repair our aging aircraft. . . it’s just not realistic. Everybody can get behind ‘Let’s not work overtime through the 

weekend to fix this.’ ”112

Ultimately, any successful cultural transformation is going 

to be leadership driven. Executive-level leaders are the principle source for the generation and reinfusion of an organization’s ideology, articulation of core values, and specification of 

norms.113 These leaders, or change-agent champions, are the 

ones whose ideas and initiatives must be rewarded through 

performance reports, compliments, and formal recognition.114

In the earliest stages, process-improvement groups will be led 

from the top down because the pressing need is to change the 

way employees think by direct demonstration of a better way. 

By the second stage, however, the process-improvement group 

will focus more on making leaders into teachers, and Airmen 

become not just technicians but process engineers. This is 

critical mass for Lean transformation—a point where leaders 

become coaches rather than dictators and Airmen become 

proactive learners. This transition is the key to a self-sustaining 

Lean learning organization.115 The vast majority of Air Force 

units have yet to attain this critical transition point.

Air Force maintenance leaders can begin to make the 

transition by managing for bottom-line results in the organization’s value stream. The ultimate goal for any flying wing is 

increased combat capability. Leaders need to determine the 

local measurements, goals, and objectives reflected in combat capability and define the end-to-end core value streams 

impacting those measurements. When value streams or processes that improve combat capability are identified, maintenance leaders must align goals strategically across the entire 

enterprise and assign specific value-stream managers. The 

challenge for senior maintenance leadership becomes finding 

objective metrics to put the true bottom-line output products 

in clear focus. When performance is measured correctly, it 

improves. When performance is correctly measured and 

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compared to goals, historical trends, and like units, it improves more. When significant improvement is recognized 

and rewarded, productivity soars.116

Well-constructed value-stream metrics are used by leaders 

to manage processes and drive culture change. Leaders 

must approach metrics as a tool to fix processes rather 

than a way to assign blame.117 This is the essence of the 

Red Is Good culture. In the past the Air Force set out to 

change culture when instead it should have let culture 

change come naturally through adherence to metrics and 

standards. The point is to create a cultural climate where 

the truth is heard and where red metrics drive questions, 

dialogue, and debate, not answers. In such a climate, real 

and intense debate is desired, as opposed to translucent 

dialogue that lets Airmen “have their say” so we can all get 

“buy in” to some predetermined decision. Finally, red metrics 

must create a climate where bad news can’t be ignored because it illustrates the very core problems of the valuestream output.118 There are two possible interpretations of 

a red metric: a signal of failure to reach targeted valuestream performance or a request for help. In a Red Is Good 

climate, the focus must be on the requests for help. It is 

crucial that senior maintenance leaders ensure their entire 

organization understands that red, yellow, and green stoplights are signals and not grades.119 A major step the Air 

Force needs to take to create a Red Is Good culture is a reevaluation of its entire inspection culture. To ensure fidelity 

and execution following a major inspector general visit, a 

“fix phase” should be incorporated to allow inspectors and 

units to interact and correct discrepancies before the inspection team departs the base.120

The aircraft maintenance community must remain wary 

of centralization purported to improve communication, process visibility, and efficiency. General Creech had it right 

when he stated that a centralized system subordinates 

ownership and empowerment. He led the original effort to 

reorganize both flight-line and back-shop maintenance 

units so they were specifically responsible for their aircraft 

or end-item spare parts. Team leaders, who had the same 

skill sets as the Airmen they led, were given responsibility 

for their entire value stream. These leaders then had total 

process visibility and a direct impact on flight-line shortages. 

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Poor performance was easy to track and remedy. Individuals 

and teams who deserved recognition for stellar process 

improvement were easy to single out. The Air Force–wide 

centralized environment that existed prior to General 

Creech’s transformation had no specific output measurements of the various maintenance organizations and, most 

important, no visible linkage with the larger flying mission 

of the wing.121 As the Air Force incorporates the ECSS into 

the entire logistics enterprise, it must consciously work to 

avoid unintended consequences by specifically codifying 

business rules to prevent the natural drift towards centralized repair, which unwittingly removes repair-process 

ownership from wing-level and lower organizations. 

The Air Force Materiel Command (AFMC) ALCs are good 

models to emulate for wing-level flying organizations. The 

ALC turn-around over the last decade has been well documented. From fiscal year 1999 to 2002, the AFMC’s programmed depot maintenance (PDM) on-time delivery rate, 

one of the organization’s primary value-stream measures, 

was no better than 81 percent. In other words, the war 

fighter could count on at least one in five aircraft being 

returned late from PDM. After AFMC’s Lean initiatives, the 

on-time delivery rate showed dramatic improvement. By 

fiscal year 2004 it was 92 percent, and in 2005 it reached 99 

percent, with one ALC achieving 100 percent. In the A-10 

aircraft PDM line, the 120-day total cycle time was reduced 

60 percent to just 51 days.122 So what differentiates ALC 

maintainers from those in a flying wing maintenance organization? Many note that ALC depot maintenance work 

does resemble a commercial production process and therefore is more conducive to waste reduction through Lean 

principle application. While that may be correct, the biggest 

difference between the ALCs and flying wing maintenance 

is that ALCs most closely approximate what Toyota labels a 

learning organization. The ALCs have civil servants in senior 

production-management positions with many years of experience and genuine hands-on knowledge of all the processes in the value streams they manage and lead. This is 

not the case in a flying wing, where maintenance leaders at 

both the officer and senior NCO levels often find themselves 

managing systems about which they have inadequate handson experience. If the Air Force truly hopes to transform wing02-Text.indd 24 9/9/09 8:50:46 
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level aircraft maintenance into a Lean organization, major 

changes in the current personnel system must be addressed. 

A survey on change management published by the American 

Management Association and Deloitte & Touche had the following conclusion: “It seems that many organizations have 

to change in order to change. Their present structures and 

cultures tend to disallow the successful implementation of 

change initiatives” (emphasis added).123 The Air Force personnel system is one of those “present structures” and must 

change as it currently exists to support maintenance leadership if the Air Force has any hope for true transformational 

breakthroughs in its flying wings. The basic personnel 

system in use today is essentially the same system that 

was adopted from the Army in 1947, when the Air Force 

became a separate service. That Army system was originally developed in 1890 by the secretary of war, Elihu 

Root.124 The core tenets of our personnel system—top-down 

evaluations in a hierarchical bureaucracy and frequent 

moves for career development—are nearly 120 years old!125

So today we have a century-old system that prepares Airmen to function in a vertical, hierarchical bureaucracy that 

stifles innovation and actually works against the creation of 

learning organizations. 

The first personnel issue that must be addressed is performance evaluation. While the Air Force has tinkered 

through the years with minor changes, such as required 

evaluation comments, rating categories, and endorsement 

levels, the system is essentially unchanged. Performance reports are based purely on an evaluation by an Airman’s rater 

and the rater’s rater.126 The Air Force needs risk-taking, outof-the-box thinkers to succeed in a Lean AFSO21 transformation, but our actual performance evaluation system supports a hierarchical, risk-averse bureaucracy. In this system, 

red continues to be bad. A single evaluation report that uses 

moderate praise rather than enthusiastic endorsement will 

kill an officer’s or senior NCO’s career. An innovative, out-ofthe-box-thinking officer need have only one risk-averse, 

control-oriented boss, and his or her career is essentially 

finished.127 The Air Force needs to move forward in the 21st 

century by considering performance evaluation alternatives 

that support a transformed Lean organization. The answer 

may be a 360-degree system or some other method of 

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rewarding risk-takers rather than leaders who are naturally 

driven to become risk-averse careerists. There are many large 

organizations using similar successful systems to benchmark. 

The time is right for Air Force senior leadership to tackle this 

contradictory, outmoded evaluation system.

The second personnel policy requiring reform is the assignment policy for maintenance officers and senior NCOs. In 

the current Air Force model, frequent moves and a wide 

variety of duties are required in the name of career development. The goal is to grow leaders with a wide variety of 

skills to function at the top of the hierarchical pyramid. 

This has created a host of officers and senior NCOs who are 

aircraft maintenance generalists rather than experts. A 

typical officer’s career includes maintenance management 

on a variety of aircraft, from heavy lift transportation to 

high-demand, low-density reconnaissance aircraft to small 

fighters, alternating between staff assignments at the fieldgrade level. The same happens, though not as frequently, to 

NCOs once they reach the grade of master sergeant and 

join the senior NCO corps. While the basic maintenance 

organization, procedures, and policies are the same for all 

these kinds of aircraft, the aircraft-specific processes are 

considerably different. Most maintenance officers and many 

senior NCOs are, in effect, amateurs by profession. They 

never get the chance to spend enough time on one aircraft 

or in one job to become true experts.128 This is no way to 

create a learning organization where value-stream leaders 

are expert level at every process they control. 

Again, the Air Force needs to redesign “present structures” 

in order to change. Aircraft maintenance officers and senior 

NCOs should be closely tied to the aircraft they maintain. 

While this is currently done very loosely with special experience 

identifiers, there is no governing policy that states, for example, 

once assigned as a career C-5 maintenance officer, an Airman will remain a C-5 maintenance officer. Ideally, a typical 

active-duty maintenance officer would rotate among C-5 

bases in the continental United States as well as overseas 

enroute locations primarily supporting C-5s. If assigned to 

a MAJCOM or Air Force staff, his or her focus would be the 

C-5 if at all possible. Staff tours would be followed by a rotation back to a C-5 field unit. Permanent change-of-station 

assignments to primarily maintain other aircraft for career 

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broadening would be the exception rather than the rule. 

This may sound like a radical change, but in reality it mirrors 

how personnel are currently managed in the rated community. 

The Air Force would never consider taking a pilot with three 

years of experience flying the U-2, send him for one year to 

fly F-16s in Korea, and then rotate him back to the United 

States to fly KC-135s in North Dakota. Perversely, this is 

routine for Air Force maintenance officers and senior NCOs. 

More often than not, the resulting outcome at wing level is 

field-grade aircraft operators with vastly superior system 

knowledge compared to their aircraft maintenance counterparts on the other side of the table. Toyota and other mature 

Lean firms get brilliant results by giving expertly trained 

value-stream managers complete responsibility for endproduct success.129 If the Air Force hopes to break through 

and do the same, it needs leadership at the highest levels to 

consider bold changes to our outdated personnel system 

and create learning organizations in wing-level aircraft 

maintenance.

Summary and Recommendations

By 2012 the average USAF aircraft is projected to be more 

than 26 years old. Simultaneously, as this indefinite trend 

continues, support funding and manpower are expected to 

stagnate. The Air Force has no choice but to mitigate the 

aging air fleet’s impact on readiness by transforming its 

culture to one where continuous process improvement is 

the accepted way of doing business. Already there have 

been noteworthy process-improvement successes at the 

ALC depots as well as some flying wings. However, the Air 

Force enterprise has yet to truly transform so that all Airmen actively seek to improve their value-stream processes. 

In the aircraft maintenance community, service-wide 

changes must be incorporated to enable a metrics-driven 

culture change supporting continuous process improvement. These changes include establishing organizational 

policies and business rules to ensure that new information 

technology systems do not result in a drift away from the 

current, highly successful decentralized repair process of 

aircraft and spare parts. Furthermore, significant changes 

in the personnel evaluation system, assignment process, 

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and rotation policy for all officer and NCO maintenance 

leaders are in order.

The answer to RQ1 is yes—metrics do drive culture and 

influence behavior. The best metrics are those developed with 

an eye towards worker involvement that tie value directly to 

an organization’s customer by ensuring end products are delivered on time with the right quantity, quality, and price.130

The ultimate goal is to create a Red Is Good culture, where 

problems are viewed as opportunities and the bearer of bad 

news is lionized rather than ostracized. In this cultural 

transformation, metrics are not pass/fail indicators but instead measure process efficiency and effectiveness and 

identify trends.131

For the Air Force maintenance community to successfully attain a Red Is Good transformation, as addressed in 

RQ2, current enterprise-level metric deficiencies must first 

be addressed. Recent AFLMA and GAO research studies 

raise questions about the validity of aircraft maintenance 

data as well as the associated goals set by higher headquarters. Studies also demonstrate how nonaligned metrics 

suboptimized enterprise-level performance in the Air 

Force. Finally, in too many organizations constant deficiency identification through metrics remains the exception 

rather than the norm. Instead, a Green Only mentality permeates wing leadership, who, often due to its own selfpreservation instinct, has a low tolerance for items marked 

red for noncompliance.132

Only by becoming a true learning organization can the 

Air Force maintenance community hope to advance its 

transformation towards a permanent, Red Is Good, continuous process-improvement culture. The Air Force needs 

to create an environment that breeds chief process officer 

leaders as RQ3 proposes. These leaders must be capable of 

establishing the right process-performance metrics, devising improvements—or if a process is clearly broken, reengineering it—and establishing a continuous program 

of process optimization.133 Air Force–level policies must 

be changed in order to grow chief process officers and enable 

a service-wide continuous process-improvement environment. These changes include establishing new business 

rules to ensure the new ECSS does not evolve towards centralized repair of end-item spare parts. Additionally, the 

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century-old Air Force personnel management system must 

be overhauled to support a culture of learning among aircraft maintenance leaders. First, a personnel evaluation 

system supportive of risk-taking, outside-the-box thinkers 

needs to be introduced. A method of rewarding these learning leaders with advancement and responsibility should 

replace the current system, which rewards leaders naturally 

driven to become risk-averse careerists. Second, the Air 

Force needs to move away from an assignment process that 

overwhelmingly results in maintenance leaders becoming 

airplane generalists. Rather, maintenance officers and senior 

NCOs should be permanently tied to specific aircraft models 

in order to become expert-level value-stream leaders.

Significant enterprise-level changes are required by the 

Air Force for a true process improvement culture to take 

hold. To continue effective maintenance of the total force in 

this era of declining resources, there is no choice but to 

seek out and implement the changes required to enable 

lasting and significant transformation.

Notes

(All notes appear in shortened form. For full details, see the appropriate 

entry in the bibliography.)

1. Dudney, “The Post-June 5 Air Force.”

2. Ibid.

3. Meserve, “USAF Maintenance Metrics,” slide 5.

4. Ritter, “AFSO21 Views You Can Use.”

5. Rhea, “Lean Metrics: Red is Good, Green is Worthless.”

6. Ibid.

7. Morgan, “The Tyranny of Metrics.”

8. Linnean, “AFSO21: Identifying Potential Failure Points.”

9. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 255.

10. Ibid., 321–22.

11. Powell, “Lines of Excellence.”

12. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 237.

13. Hope and Hope, Transforming the Bottom Line, 193.

14. Powell, “Lines of Excellence.”

15. Collins, Good to Great, 174–77.

16. Kotter, Leading Change, 13.

17. Livingood, “Using Logistics Data to Influence Change.”

18. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 187.

19. Hamm, “Thinking and Fighting as an Enterprise: Building the Culture of Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century,” 18.

20. Ibid., 20.

21. Dennis, Getting the Right Things Done, 70.

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22. Pendley et al., “Establishing C-5 TNMCM [Total not Mission Capable 

for Maintenance] Standards,” 47.

23. Frisco, “Leader Behaviors and Role of Leaders,” para. 2.0.

24. Turk, “Is Your Project on Track?” 35.

25. Ibid., 37.

26. Frisco, “Leader Behaviors and Role of Leaders,” para. 3.0.

27. Miller, Park, and Gregory, “Leading for Results,” slides 22–23.

28. Hope and Hope, Transforming the Bottom Line, 106–9.

29. Ibid.

30. Liker, The Toyota Way, 272.

31. Dennis, Getting the Right Things Done, 71–72.

32. Ibid., 176.

33. Dudney, “The Post-June 5 Air Force.”

34. George, Lean Six Sigma for Service, 288. 

35. Nicol, “Design and Analysis of an Enterprise Metrics System,” 18. 

36. Pendley et al., “Aligning Maintenance Metrics,” 12.

37. Powell, “Lines of Excellence,” 5. 

38. Turk, “Is Your Project on Track?” 37.

39. Dennis, Getting the Right Things Done, 54. 

40. Creech, The Five Pillars of TQM, 318–19. 

41. Hope and Hope, Transforming the Bottom Line, 91–93.

42. Ibid., 95. 

43. Nicol, “Design and Analysis of an Enterprise Metrics System,” 2. 

44. Ibid., 35. 

45. Miller, Park, and Gregory, “Leading for Results,” notes section, 

slide 11.

46. Pendley, “C-5 TNMCM Study II,” 80. 

47. Dixon, The Maintenance Costs of Aging Aircraft, 41–42. 

48. AFLMA, Air Force Maintenance Metrics, 30.

49. Meserve, “USAF Maintenance Metrics,” slide 7. 

50. AFLMA, Air Force Maintenance Metrics, 14–15.

51. Pendley et al., “Aligning Maintenance Metrics,” 15. 

52. Livingood, “Using Logistics Data to Influence Change.”

53. Pettingill and von Hoffman, “Air Force Mission Capable Rate and 

Aircraft Availability Model Study,” 23. 

54. Meserve, “USAF Maintenance Metrics,” slide 8.

55. George, Lean Six Sigma for Service, 281. 

56. Pendley, “C-5 TNMCM Study II,” 85. 

57. Pendley et al., “Establishing C-5 TNMCM Standards,” 47–48.

58. Bell and Hardemon, Total not Mission Capable for Maintenance 

Study, iv–v.

59. Pendley et al., “Establishing C-5 TNMCM Standards,” 45–46.

60. Ibid. 

61. Ibid., 46. 

62. Ibid., 15.

63. Ibid., 5. 

64. AFLMA, Air Force Maintenance Metrics, 6. 

65. Pendley et al., “Establishing C-5 TNMCM Standards,” 14. 

66. AFLMA, Air Force Maintenance Metrics, 8. 

02-Text.indd 30 9/9/09 8:50:48 
31

67. Dailey, “On the SECDEF’s Argument that the Air Force Lacks a 

‘Culture of Self-Criticism.’ ” 

68. Rinehart, “How the Air Force Embraced ‘Partial Quality.’ ” 

69. Ibid.

70. AFLMA, Air Force Maintenance Metrics, 58–59. 

71. Pettingill and von Hoffman, “Air Force Mission Capable Rate and 

Aircraft Availability Model Study,” 6. 

72. Lynch et al., The Air Force Chief of Staff Logistics Review, 48. 

73. Liker, The Toyota Way, 252. 

74. Ibid., 261. 

75. Ibid., 130. 

76. Ibid., 287. 

77. Ibid., 182. 

78. Ibid., 135. 

79. Ibid., 261–63.

80. Ibid., 305. 

81. Ibid., 263. 

82. Ibid., 290. 

83. Ibid., 252. 

84. Creech, The Five Pillars of TQM, 383–84. 

85. Hammer, “The Chief Process Officer?” 

86. Linnean, “AFSO21: Identifying Potential Failure Points.”

87. Liker, The Toyota Way, 38. 

88. George, What Is Lean Six Sigma? 18. 

89. Ibid., 42–43. 

90. Ibid., 3. 

91. Ibid., 252. 

92. Collins, Good to Great, 162.

93. Liker, The Toyota Way, 158.

94. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 318. 

95. Ibid., 320. 

96. US Air Force, “Think ECSS.” 

97. US Air Force, The Playbook: Leading the ECSS Transformation, 5.

98. Livingood, “Using Logistics Data to Influence Change.” 

99. US Air Force, Designing the Future of Air Force Logistics, 5. 

100. AFGLSC, “Concept of Operations,” 3.

101. Ibid.

102. AFGLSC, “Mission Brief,” slides 38–39.

103. US Air Force, Designing the Future of Air Force Logistics, 5. 

104. Lambeth, Air Power against Terror, 295. 

105. Creech, The Five Pillars of TQM, 129–30.

106. Rinehart, “How the Air Force Embraced ‘Partial Quality.’” 

107. Ibid.

108. US Air Force, The Playbook: Leading the ECSS Transformation, 15. 

109. US Air Force, AFSO21 Senior Leader Training, slide 17. 

110. Linnean, “AFSO21: Identifying Potential Failure Points.”

111. Hamm, interview by the author, 19 December 2008. 

112. Ibid.

113. US Air Force, The Playbook: Leading the ECSS Transformation, 13. 

02-Text.indd 31 9/9/09 8:50:48 
32

114. Hamm, “Thinking and Fighting as an Enterprise: Building the 

Culture of Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century,” 19. 

115. Womack and Jones, Lean Thinking, 268–69. 

116. Creech, “Organization and Leadership Principles for Senior Leaders.”

117. Hamm, “Thinking and Fighting as an Enterprise: Building the 

Culture of Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century,” 17.

118. Collins, Good to Great, 73–80. 

119. US Air Force, AFSO21 Senior Leader Training, slide 26.

120. Dailey, “On the SECDEF’s Argument that the USAF Lacks a ‘Culture of Self-Criticism.’ ”

121. Creech, The Five Pillars of TQM, 129–31, 237–39. 

122. Carlson, “Air Force Materiel Command,” 3–4. 

123. Quoted in Creech, The Five Pillars of TQM, introduction. 

124. Hammes, The Sling and the Stone, 233. 

125. Ibid., 233–35. 

126. Ibid., 234. 

127. Ibid. 

128. Ibid., 235. 

129. Womack and Jones, Lean Thinking, 321.

130. Hamm, “Thinking and Fighting as an Enterprise: Building the 

Culture of Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century,” 20. 

131. Pendley et al., “Aligning Maintenance Metrics,” 12.

132. Dailey, “On the SECDEF’s Argument that the Air Force Lacks a 

‘Culture of Self-Criticism.’ ”

133. Hammer, “The Chief Process Officer?”

02-Text.indd 32 9/9/09 8:50:48 
33

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