Being Ancient, I lived before there was METL
and life was good... :D
Seriously, I am not a METL fan (heavy or otherwise...). The intent was to design a training process that was not subjective (BWahahahahahahahaaaa) and the eliminated the 'valleys' in the training cycle (equally hilarious; most of the valleys are personnel system or major training event induced). The process did eliminate some valleys -- it also eliminated most all the peaks, like any process designed to eliminate highs and lows, it simply bred mediocrity.
Having said that, I agree with both of you on the problem but do think that training distractors make it difficult and if one adds in a DMETL to the METL, it can easily get in the too hard box.
You'd think all those civilians and iron Majors developing MTOE could quickly adapt to -- and the Personnel system would support -- modifying the TOEs to provide QRFs and PSDs since everyone in both theaters has had them for what, six years now? Guess that's in the too hard box also...
My suspicion is that about a third of the public doesn't know but is pretty well convinced the Armed Forces can do nothing right; another third believe they do nothing wrong and the middle third makes up its mind slowly on what is reported in the media. Most of those media folks are totally clueless but they do eventually get a lot of it right so it generally works out okay.
Back to the METL -- consider the fact that units do not do tasks; they perform missions and those missions can require the completion of hundreds, even thousands of disparate tasks by a lot people and organic and other units. The METL process was an attempt to simplify the training effort. It overdid that simplification bit and developed a rote, by the book mentality, it dumbed us down...
It needs to go and to be replaced by outcome based training.
Yep. Condition is the big problem.
To simplify training and make it easy on the training cadre / instructors too many 'conditions' are cookie cutter, easy approaches to the problem at hand. Problem in the real world is that conditions can vary so widely as to make much training meaningless. Clearing a roadblock at Hood and clearing one in Afghanistan will differ in multiple ways.
Simple example is climatology based. Performing a task on a pleasant and balmy June day at Bragg and the same task in January at Carson -- much less further north or up -- is a different thing entirely. A task tested at night with a full moon is likely to result differently if the same unit were tested on a night with no moon.
Another simple example is use of the Map *. Last time I looked, there were 21 map 'tasks.' Those aren't tasks, they're enabling skills and there are other skills the system doesn't recognize. There are really only two map tasks -- Using a map, (1) Plot or locate own, friendly, enemy and other locations; (2) Conduct a map reconnaissance to select masks, clearances, routes and positions. Yet, we waste time teaching some or all those 21 'tasks' over and over at every level from BCT to the OACs...
* GPS is great. Love it. Use it -- but if it goes out I won't be in trouble or lost. Not sure everyone can say that -- but they should be able to, even Joe. Especially Joe...
Training is not easy, it's difficult and it needs to be done well and it must be integrated and aimed at producing the desired performance that is most likely to offer success regardless of conditions.
For the good of the cause ...
Just wanted to offer a few notes from an Army National Guard (ARNG) perspective. My state-directorate-level (think "division-level"?) lessons-learned integration (L2I) cell works alongside our state's Pre-mobilization Training Assistance Element (PTAE).
As of TY2007, each state and territory has a PTAE, which is a five-soldier command-and-control cell tasked with coordinating the efforts of unit Training Assistors (TA). Training Assistors are M-day soldiers brought onto federal active-duty in a unit's year three or four of the ARFORGEN model, or upon alert. They "assist the commander to plan, resource, execute, document, and assess training." They're funded at a ratio of 1 TA per 60 authorized soldiers; funding state-by-state obviously varies considerably year-to-year.
Training Assistors are analogous to Unit Mobilization Assistors (UMA), the active-duty First U.S. Army representatives who shepherd a mobilizing national guard unit through a mobiliziation station. The stated Army objective is to have a mobilizing company spend only 30 days at mobilization station; 45 days for a battalion; 60 days for a brigade.
Every state has their own take and flavor on how to best use/organize/locate Training Assistors (TA). In my state, they're currently located at the unit level, and serve as a readiness and/or training NCO augmentee. They're also qualified as instructors and observer-controllers/trainers, so that they can be surged to support a given unit's pre-mobilization Home Station Activity Plans (HSAP).
Individual Warrior Tasks and weapons qualifications are now tested and validated prior to Mobilization-Day (M-day), the day on which a unit is placed on federal active duty. Because of this, Uncle Sam has thrown additional money toward more Unit Training Assemblies (UTA) in year three and four of the ARFORGEN. That means citizen-soldiers who are ramping up to ARFORGEN year five are definitely drilling more than one weekend a month, two weeks a year.
In my opinion, the additional drills are something of a blessing and curse. On the plus side, citizen-soldiers are being paid and resourced for more training; and they don't have to unnecessarily "train, test and validate" for up to six months at mobiliziation station. On the other hand, there are lots of training requirements that are being pushed to the state- rather than the federal-duty side of the equation, just so Uncle Sam can meet the objective of "only 12 months on federal active-duty."
Finally, some commanders lament the constant focus on individual-task training in this pre-mobilization philosophy. When does the collective-task METL-training occur, they ask, so that--for example--your wrenches know how to fix Good-Guy stuff, in addition to how to shoot Bad-Guy stuff?
I hope this helps clarify the situation originally described by Uboat509, as it pertains to the Army National Guard; or, at least, that it doesn't add its own clutter. Please apply all usual caveats on the ARNG being (organizationally? philosophically?) different than USAR, as well as Big Army; and each of the colonies has it's own way of doing things, too. Remember the ARNG Golden Rule: Don't tread on us, or each other.
Thanks for your attention. Have an Army day!
Inputs To Metl Development
There are two primary inputs to METL development: war plans and external directives.
War Plans. The most critical inputs to METL development are the organization's wartime operations and contingency plans. The missions and related information provided in these plans are key to determining essential training tasks.
External Directives. External directives are additional sources of training tasks that relate to an organization's wartime mission.
I don't believe a unit's METL drives how they train, but what they are to be currently trained to do. If my memory serves me correctly a unit's METL is approved at the next higher echolon. (Co approved by BN, BN approved by BDe, etc...) IMO this was designed to give commanders a focus base for what they needed their units to be proficient in. Additionally if I remember correctly a unit's METL should be ever changing to a degree but their are some never changing core tasks as well.
I brought this up in another thread in reference to the status of artillery and ADA units today. When one looks at the fact that a unit's METL is to based off of their wartime mission then I can see where some of their tasks will have changed, but cannot see the employment of their gun systems completely being off their METL. Talking today about this specific subject I do not see how they are failing at this. I understand many of these units are currently conducting more of an infantry type role (FOB security, convoys, patrols, etc...) but don't they already do this as a unit. Do they not secure their own perimeter? Provide their own escorts? I hope I am wrong and misreading/understanding the problem, but a lot of it seems simply IMO a knee jerk reaction vs not having the opportunity to stay proficient.
Units change their METL to reflect
current mission, it's not totally static. Plus, they also have a DMETL, a Deployment METL with theater and gaining command directed specific to the theater tasks.
Having said that, I'm not a METL fan, it's probably going to leave the system soon and be replaced by an outcome based effort.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Sargent
...To reiterate, my point is that I don't buy the knee-jerk "We're not training to METLs and this is a tragedy" line that doesn't acknowledge the realities of the current operational situation. If the pre-existing METLs need to be the priority, then the current operational requirements must be changed. If they are not, then we must simply be prepared to let them go and retrain to them when things change. To argue that we can do both simultaneously is not supported by reality.
Cheers,
Jill
I totally agree and most of the Army seems to as well. We probably should not tell Gian... :D