# Exercise planners helping DLA create effective training scenarios

/ Published Oct. 4, 2023
BATTLE CREEK, Mich., 
The Defense Logistics Agency, like so many Defense Department agencies, relies on exercises to hone skills and develop experience for its workforce. Exercises are useful training tools and are used to practice virtually every aspect of operations from safety procedures to battlefield movements.                Defense Logistics Agency exercise planner John Snead oversees the scenario created by his team for the Agency Contingency Readiness Exercise in July 2023.                            Exercise Planning                            Defense Logistics Agency exercise planner John Snead oversees the scenario created by his team for the Agency Contingency Readiness Exercise in July 2023.            SHARE IMAGE:Download ImageImage DetailsPhoto By: DLA Disposition ServicesVIRIN: 230726-D-AU600-1024

“The main purpose for doing an exercise is to practice procedures and processes that an organization has in place,” exercise planner John Snead said. “That’s the main reason for training and you do an exercise to train on those processes and procedures.”

Before any exercise training takes place, it first must be developed into a teachable scenario. That is the role of Snead and other exercise planners. Making an exercise requires planning and development from the ground up – beginning with basic goals to achieve. Through multiple planning conferences with the program managers, Snead is able to determine the most effective methods for executing the exercise.

Snead and his counterparts are there to ensure the exercise goes according to plan while also presenting an opportunity to measure objectives for the event. This includes placing ‘injects’ into the exercise – problems that are presented to the training audience – that participants must overcome to successfully navigate the scenario.

“I come up with exercise objectives in coordination with the training audience,” Snead said. “Once we come up with the exercise objectives then we design the exercise around that. My job is not to come up with exercise objectives but to execute your exercise correctly.”

Creating an effective exercise requires more than just developing objectives and problems for participants to solve. There are a host of logistics involved that planners must take into account that are vital to the success including what buildings the players will use, who provides food and water and event dates to name a few.                Participants perform simulated expeditionary operations during the Defense Logistics Agency Contingency Readiness Exercise in Battle Creek, Michigan during July 2023 operations.                            Exercise Planning                            Participants perform simulated expeditionary operations during the Defense Logistics Agency Contingency Readiness Exercise in Battle Creek, Michigan during July 2023 operations.            SHARE IMAGE:Download ImageImage DetailsPhoto By: DLA Disposition ServicesVIRIN: 230726-D-AU600-1016

The exercise planners monitor and oversee the event from beginning to the moment they give the ‘End Ex’ signal. But once complete, Snead and his team are not the ones who determine if the event was a success. In the end, it’s the originating organization that determines if the objectives were met to a satisfactory level.

“As the exercise planner as long as it goes off and we can look at the exercise objectives and measure them it’s considered successful,” Snead said. “For the training audience if they successfully met their exercise objectives it’s successful.”

DLA Disposition Services routinely partners with other DLA and DOD entities as part of annual exercises.  Most recently, Disposition Services joined together with DLA Distribution and DLA Logistics Operations for the Agency Contingency Readiness Exercise which concluded in July.