Letters

摘要

I enjoyed Adam Hebert's "Issue Brief" on AFSO 21 in the January 2008 edition of Air Force Magazine [p. 20]. When addressing the difficulty in clearly explaining AFSO 21, his following comment particularly caught my attention: "Part of the problem is that AFSO 21 and its descriptions are laden with jargon and buzzwords. Lean. Six Sigma. Theory of constraints. Business process re-engineering. Just-in-time inventory. Blah, blah, blah." The tools mentioned above precede AFSO 21.They were important elements of the Total Quality Management (TQM) movement that was popular back in the 1980s and 1990s. We had great senior leader support in the early stages of TQM, but much of the support waned as time passed. A lot of what was going on then is what I think I see going on now in the Air Force. The real challenge is yet to be faced: What are AFSO 21 and the Air Force going to look like in years to come?