Just because they can’t be made redundant easily doesn’t mean their roles cant fundamentally change. From my view it looks like across the corps there seems to be a movement towards scrapping the small Wing Perm Staffs and taking the LASER route of regional perm staff teams that encompass the roles of WHQ perm staff for the whole region. One former WExO in charge of finance/approvals, one in charge of Pers Management etc.
I honestly don’t think the role of WExO as we currently know it will be around in a couple years time
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Most Sqn Ldrs don’t hold the same level of responsibility as Sqn Cdrs in my opinion.
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Fair point, hadn’t thought of it that way I guess it would be relatively (this is the MOD) easy to change responsibilities of individuals if all their doing in specialising in one of the areas they already work in but have them cover a wider area ie a Region. Would a LASER system work in the more geographically separated areas LASER is a lot more compact than Wales and West for example
That will vary depending on the position and the Wing as there are Wings where the Wing team are very active and push activities out on a frequent basis. Other Wings are very happy sitting back doing very little to naff all!
If your in an active Wing and have a very active Wing Shooting Officer, then I would say that this position holds a considerable amount of risk and pressure which many OCs wouldnt face.
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For most elements I’d imagine so. Especially with pers management, arranging virtual boards and transfer requests etc can all easily be done remotely. H&S audits are already a regional job iirc, the only bits that might be more difficult is for stuff like BPSS clinics and other in-person only functions that can’t easily be done from RHQ. You mention W&W being sparse, I raise you S&NI!
Yeah, it might take some adapting but it seems the natural way to go if we cannot replace WExO posts, as the “functional” system as opposed to the geographical one we have now seems to be saving a job role or two at laser. Not saying it’s a good thing, just seemed more and more likely to me in recent months with the way things are going
It’s a people-oriented organisation with a large amount of individual and geographical differences, challenges and specificity. This more bureaucratic, less personal, regionalised approach risks a lot of damage to interpersonal relationships and personnel management.
Certain processes may become more efficient, but are they more effective at achieving positive outcomes?
Considering the number of complaints about decisions and lack of logic, response, efficacy, or transparency from “ivory towers” or “powers that be”, it baffles me that the organisation would be looking at increasing the distance between the front line and decision makers.
If this happens, and I know SWR is looking at it, I will be incredibly sceptical and preparing for worse outcomes. UNLESS a very good, data and feedback-driven, impartial report out of LASER suggests otherwise and I might soften. However, this is SWR. Proof of concept in LASER is not enough to prove that it will work as well elsewhere, because personalities, egos, and competency are variables that cannot be controlled or assessed.
However, I don’t see this directly as a budget issue at least in the short term as I’m not aware that staffing is to be directly reduced through this move.
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Not necessarily endorsing it, just noting that it appears to be the direction of travel for SWR and at least one other region, on top of LASER. Agree with your points though, skepticism is warranted.
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Just popped up in the Telegraph.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/11/27/army-cadets-at-risk-after-budget-slashed-chiefs-warn/
Link for the poor people 
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Or, use Firefox. 
That’s a worrying cut to the Army cadets and a loss to young people. The Northampton University study showed the lifelong benefits of being a cadet, but that needs the initial funding.
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Welcome to life under Labour, another section of the population to affect in the long term!
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Because 14 years of the Tories has set up kids so well for the future.
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They’re talking about a 50pc ‘real terms’ cut, since 2020. Who’s been in power most of that time??
I’m also pretty sure this is the letter being referred to. Sent only a couple of months after the election…
Do you honestly think that this is a problem because of Labour?
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Controversial opinion - id rather cadets budget is cut 50% so we can have the money spent on making sure big Vlad isnt an idiot…
The bank isnt bottomless
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The cadet success is been by making use of the spare peace time capacity of the armed forces to develop young people.
This makes sense as it allows the retention of our that you wouldn’t need in peace but need very quickly in war.
Unfortunately with things ramping up with Putin, this is removing the spare capacity that cadets would make use of.
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But £26,000,000 does not buy you much in defence out of a Budget of £54.6Bn (£54,600,000,000)
For every £1 spent on the ACF over £1,400 is spent on defence.
The crucial fact that is being highlighted is the difference between cost and value. The cadet forces as a whole build better citizens for UK PLC, with the RAFAC out preforming both the ACF and CCF. Having ACF or ATC or SCC who can easier slot into our armed forces or just have a greater understanding of our armed forces, cyber threats and a knowledge of First Aid will benefit the UK if the new cold war warms up a bit.
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This is the never-ending problem with beancounters - it’s very easy to work out the black & white (red!) data on a budget sheet, but assessing the “value” of a project is too grey for them = doesn’t compute. They know the cost of everything, but the value of nothing!
It took ages for MOD to allow projects that would look at “spend to save,” rather than being outside an annual budget limit, e.g. replace all the decrepit metal framed windows in a building for modern, double-glazed units. I did this for the Officers’ Mess at Martham - huge savings on projected energy bills over 5 yrs + the annual savings on the proportion of windows that were painted annually. The “grey” savings were ignored - better living conditions for the occupants, reduced fire risk as everyone was using small electric fires / heaters (more energy too) & far less noise impact when night operations were in progress. However, I did manage to push the plan through. 
Forward thinking companies will always try to factor in a %% of the grey areas, even if they seem to be more subjective than objective. Cadet spending should be like this.
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This in spades
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I posted about it at the time.
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