I know some people reading this will be inter linked with great sectors making up a strong Wing and have no need to change. On the flip side there will be some especially in the remote areas where your nearest Squadron is 10s of miles away (possibly more)
This is aimed at a circa radius of where your sector has 6 squadrons within say a 30 miles. Which will cover this middle ground. The reason for this thought process is looking into what the ACF do well and how we could replicate it. Their squadrons are Detachments under a Company which is there Sector usually they have 9 rather than 6 and the Company’s create the Battalion or Wing as in RAFAC case.
On a detachment they have a constant “Instructor Sergeant” and Acting Under Officer or anything up to Lieutenant (Acting Plt Off to Fl Off) they then have a set of permeant Company staff (Sector staff) with a different specialisms and skill sets. Along side a Company Commander (Sector Commander) and Company WO (Sector WO). They utilise the company resourcing to deliver training and inter detachment competitions.
This could work well within RAFAC and potentially free up some space on Squadron for the staff to be more hands on.
Sector Level - could have a Sector Commander and Warrant Officer (as of present)
Sector adjutant (taking away from the squadrons)
Sector training officer (taking away from the squadrons) - Could merge into Adj role
Sector DofE Officer (taking away from the squadrons)
Sector Shooting specialists
Sector AT specialists
Other specialisms - 1st Aid/Music/Cyber etc
Flying allocation to be given to sectors allowing for more staff to be able to transport
Sector camps - Smaller training camps to RAF Stations
Each Squadron within the Sector would have a permanent Officer Commanding at Flying Officer or below alongside a Sergeant and CI turning up to Squadron parade evenings and with Squadron when needed at Sector. Sector Staff can help delivery of training at different squadrons as required. Ultimately you would have less burden on Squadron staff with things coordinated at Sector level. If one Squadron had shooting facilities and another didn’t, it would help share this around to give more cadets opportunities without the Squadron/Postcode lottery. Although the “my Squadron” mentality would have to be dropped by many as to work it would need giving up control to some extent.
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The ACF Company model is indeed one we could look at. But it is not solely based on staffing. It has a number of physical and mechanical elements it relies on to work. So it would need investment.
The main ones are:
Coy HQ - physical location, not a Teams channel. As a minimum it needs a couple of offices, meeting room and training room/classroom. It needs IT to support it.
QM dept - QMs are at Coy level so though Dets have their stores a lot of kit is held by the Coy QM staff. This might or might not include armouries. You need equivalent QM staff to run it as well
MT - ACF get 1 minibus per Coy around here (others may have more). They also have access to a van and car, all MT vehicles.
CAA - full time RFCA employee at Coy level, does admin, stores, maintenance (many are also CFAV).
Worth noting that the ACF keep the Adj and Trg Off roles separate at Coy level (both CFAV roles and busy ones too)
ETA: QM, MT need space and CAA needs an office.
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We have this & tried to make it work but it’s failed every time so we no longer use sectors.
In short there isn’t the appetite or the number of staff available to make it work
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Sectors are still a trying project in our Wing. The problem we have is probably more the appetite than staffing numbers as RAFAC is very much xx Squadron rather than looking at the bigger picture. You could go to one squadron and have a completely different cadet experience to one next door because the OC’s are into different things. Looking at Sector level, if you brought together 6 Squadrons providing 12 staff combined (not unrealistic) that could provide a good sector team that deliver multi-Squadron events allowing Squadron nights to still go ahead. The training programme is delivered from a rotating HQ of Squadrons within the sector with Sector training Officer & Adj on hand to arrange RA’s etc
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I think the issue is that there isn’t the appetite amongst the volunteers.
What would probably be better is that the sector staff is doing as a secondary duty by Sqn staff.
So a lead OC for a Sector, lead Adj, Lead TO. So you’re not removing staff from Sqns or reinforcing a hierarchy but promoting inter-operability.
There’s already a number of posts above Sqn level that don’t fulfil much so you would need to grow into any sector structure rather than try & implant any,
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I’ve said this before, but the best way to achieve this (and address discrepancies between ATC terminology and the way both the parent service and ACF label things; i.e. the correct way) would be for the small units commanded by fg offs and flt lts to be called flights, and for these flts to be grouped into squadrons (rather than the made up sectors), commanded by sqn ldrs.
The big problem is that sector commanders don’t actually command anything, so they’re support staff.
The authority is the squadron (which for historical reasons is tough to change unless there’s a legitimate mechanism for the squadron’s identity and badge to switch from flight to squadron and back again without ruining it).
You could then have a lead squadron commanded by a sqn ldr (any size) and have the other units under the command, but again, massive cultural shift needed and that’d ultimately need to start with the actual authority moving.
Until then, it’s all good will and that won’t really work beyond simply being a mature working relationship based purely on the people.
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Ah….well back to drawing board then.
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But the point I’m really making is that won’t exist in many places — too many preferred ways of doing it.
Wouldn’t even need to be a “spat”, but just disagreement on where interest lies.
To really make it work, the authority would need to move.
IMO, that’s how it should be.
Sector staff should be supporting squadron staff. They should be using their volunteer management skills to encourage sharing of ideas, opportunities, and resources. They should be offering practical support to squadrons.
Sadly, the military mentality of “me sector commander, therefore I’m your boss” gets in the way of a lot of productive work.
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Or I suppose sqn OCs who don’t want any input messing with their trainer.
If you work on the principle that those with the most information be the ones most empowered to make the decisions then yes & that’s as it should be.
In an ideal world you would only have HQAC & sqns because everyone would naturally work well together 
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