As the CAC’s mission statement is a ppt poster and can be altered to suit. What things should be the priority in your view?
MTP and UBACs issued to all.
Suppression of Japanese Knotweed?
a brazzard that matches the Wedgwood Shirt?
the Cadets doing the opening ceremony of the Invictus Games did really well, but dear God that Brazzard looks bone on a light blue shirt…
“To smite your enemies. See them run before you. And hear the lamentations of their women.”
Remove any reference to Gliding in the ACO as we don’t.
[quote]MY MAIN EFFORT IS:
…the recruitment and retention of high calibre volunteers [/quote]
Anybody seen any of this???
The only alteration will be to delete it in toto.
Like every mission / vision statement a cacophony of empty rhetoric.
A strong cadre of high quality, trained and motivated volunteers? If this is what is wanted we need to have things for all subjects, at all levels and for all interests, put in place by our esteemed SLT for staff, that come into effect from the first moment they step through the door. I feel sorry for staff coming in now
… empowered command at all levels – does that mean squadron commanders will be able to do things / make decisions without seeking approval first?
A psychology of intelligent continuous improvement – management speak! Someone’s been on a course, because this sounds like a slide title/bullet point. I’ve not heard this one at work, but I doubt it will be too long before our personnel directotty hears it and starts putting up posters. She just loves a poster.
This probably looks good to senior management who get over excited about nonsense like this in public, but in private regard it as a something they have to do and is completely meaningless to the workforce.
The question is what effect will this have when we’re meeting on cold, damp, dark February evening.
I have never liked mission statements.
And ever since this one, we should be very wary of them.
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To give a bit of a counter-point despite being cynical of mission statements I have actually come round the necessity of them. With this statement we know: -
- What our top boss is trying & wanting to achieve
- What the rationale is for some of the decisions being made
- Allows people to challenge the crazy stuff by saying - “how does this help achieve our mission?”
- Gives us a way for the executive can be held to account.
The problem of mission statements is that they are often one of the tools of dilbert management, used to cover up the individuals’ own inadequacies & incompetence. This can be seen when one of the actions to a failure is to reissue a new mission statement to “revitalise” the team. I hasten to add I do not include the ACO or even the RAF in having dilbert management (although there are always a few numpties) - its very difficult to fight wars with poor leadership hence why the military is better than most organisations at weeding out the dilberts before they can do much damage.
Having worked in an organisation which often came up with ambitious projects, I was a little disturbed when I asked if we had a mission statement to be told “No not really, no-ones really sure” followed up by a “we don’t have one of those either” when I asked if we had a strategy document, 5 year plan or even a vision statement.
I will take the cacophony of empty rhetoric of vision plans over projects based on idea-farting any day of the week.
However lets take it back to basics.
We have had the situation with the studies & 2020 vision for the ACO.
We have just been provided the mission.
What we need to know now is the execution - how they want us to achieve this -otherwise this mission statement will become another empty word promise like so many corporate buzz words.
Don’t we already have the three aims?
Indeed we do. See my mission statement above. 
This is the bit where the ACO falls short and we are sold short.
Whatever happens in the real world when it comes to projects or “where we want to be” statements, if you are involved you invariably know what assistance / resources you have and are likely to be given and invariably a budget. It seems in the modern ATC there is nothing, apart from ill-concieved software. After that we are left pretty much to our own devices.
The fact that we have done so over the last few years well despite reduced support/resource has meant that the ivory towers feel they can present nonsense like this, knowing that we will do our best, knowing the pressure to provide support doesn’t exist. But then is this approach what they have got used to when they were in the RAF proper?
As a result of the decreased support and implimentation of things decided by others that we need, the pressure put on civ comms to buy / pay for things just to keep squadrons going has been ridiculous over the last decade and is here to stay. With the coming of what I imagine will involve increased scrutiny of CWCs will only seek to increase the pressure and potentially see people walk away. I’ve got a treasurer and 2 others who are leaving at the next AGM and no sign of willing replacements. There is a part of me that thinks our SLT regard issuing edicts/orders or adding admin etc is a form of support, to help us deliver.