I’ve been completely disengaged and disinterested in Astra since day 1, it simply doesn’t mean anything. There’s no compelling reason to be involved, there’s no tangible ‘thing’ that can be pointed to.
It’s a vanity exercise that means precisely nothing to the frontline.
I understand that they are accepting so-called story boards from the wider CFAV population, but I’m not entirely sure what that entails and I’m yet to find clarity on how a determination is made as to the suitability of a particular idea.
Ideally, it would be assessed not only for cost, ROI and impact on customers, but also against other change ideas within the organisation to identify if there are any areas of dependency or any conflicting projects/ideas. Whilst I know they have a nominal PMO, I’m yet to see their TORs to see whether they’re acting in such a way or if they’re there in name only. Let alone how that PMO would then interact with a Programme or Portfolio Board.
I take it you Wing has engaged with the ASTRA team and had a brief then.
We had one at our conference by a WO. Came across very well and answered all questions as a CFAV, not a HQAC crony.
Future editions of this quarterly newsletter
This in the June 2023 newsletter, number of newsletter’s released since then 0.
Once again we’ve shot ourselves in the foot by over promising, I suspect because this is volunteer driven and life gets in the way, it’s either that or all the time being spent on FoIs!!
What they delivered was mission command intent.
They intended to produce the newsletter quarterly.
Just in the same way many of us have promised the other half that we intend to re-tile the bathroom……
Well, thread dredge but this didn’t happen did it.
I refer to my earlier post…..
I mean, it’s got worse, if anything. When ACTO 10 first came out, we could self approve stuff the day of an event for a lot of things. We’ve been told locally even if it can be approved, it still needs to be done with 2 weeks notice to allow for any audits etc. Which sort of makes the whole thing redundant.
Yep. We have gone further backwards than we were before, and that’s saying something.
I think I’ve said this before, but SMS contains all of the information required for Copilot to draft AO/JIs, using approved templates, rather than burdening volunteers with this task.
Yep, it should do. And I think the question goes further and should be asked why we need to create AOs, JIs and more for some of the things we do. Like a radio course on my unit on a Saturday, I’d have to create all of those. I wouldn’t if I ran the exact same course on a parade night (even over a few evenings). Exact same event, exact same details just different time of delivery and one needs an application on SMS, AO/JI/RA attached, signed up some time in advance. The other I could decide 15 minutes before I need to and make it work.
Bane of my life - having to file an AO for regular shooting events (air rifle) on our sqn - I do make it “multi-date” to minimise the faff - but why? It’s on SMS, it’s held at our own sqn, all the safety points are covered in the RSD.
And another thing, let’s make RSDs cover a set period (3 - 6 months?) for air rifle (same location, same equipment, same personnel). Nothing changes on the RSD but for some dates (event + range recce / reading range orders → range orders + range recce conditions haven’t changed!).
Agree it has got worse
The last AO I wrote came to 8-9 pages and several MB of disk space. Looking back over older paperwork (same activity) it was 2 sides of A4 max.
It won’t do emergency arrangements though. Which we apparently need even if we’re at our squadron…
Why on earth? Normal sqn protocols surely?
Yeah, but still gotta be in your AO.
Add a box for them in SMS, then populate the template from the information in that box. If we had a Parent Portal, they should appear there too.
That stop requires you to provide that information for every event, even those where it’s covered by standing orders or by someone else.
Have a tickbox for when you want to deviate from standing orders, and the text field only appears when the box is ticked. If you don’t tick the box and generate an AO/JIs, it populates that section with words to the effect of ‘refer to standing orders’.