Saving Millions

Pharaoh of Egypt - photo by JoAnn Sturman

by W.R. Priskna

“Lt. Priskna, I've an important job for you," said Captain Henry. "Being a pilot is not enough in this man's Air Force, so you're going to be the detachment's new beverage control officer (BCO).”

As an aeronautical engineer by training, I would be slightly overtrained for the job, but Captain Henry was a good guy and wouldn't steer me in the wrong direction.  I would just have to start small and work my way up.

He continued, “Make sure the refrigerator is always full of soft drinks and there's plenty of beer available for the weekly Friday afternoon horseshoe tournament.”

Extra duties were important for career advancement. They gave your commander something positive to say about on your semiannual Officer Efficiency Report (OER). Operations officer, training officer, and safety officer were positions which marked one for greatness. Other additional duties like BCO were reserved for very young officers or for those not destined for command.

After two years of serving as BCO, Captain Henry had been transferred and replaced by Lt. Colonel Michaels, a raging alcoholic and consummate "yesman."   I had done a respectable job of keeping the refrigerator full of soft drinks and beer, so it was time to move up to be the unit's Resource Conservation Officer (RCO).

“Priskna! RCO is a crucial responsibility. I know you can handle it. The Air Force wants to save money, and the RCO will be the key man in every unit to make it happen. Don't let me down.”

“Yes, sir.”

Funding for all Air Force operational flying units was based on flight time. If a unit did not fly every minute of their allocated flight time, then the time would be reduced the next quarter. This reflected poorly on the unit's commander, consequently extra flight time was NEVER returned to headquarters. Labor costs could not be reduced since all personnel received a set salary without overtime benefits. The only conceivable way to improve efficiency was time management, which allowed us more time to do paperwork.

Every three months the detachment received a savings goal from headquarters. How the sum was determined was a mystery, but it  amounted to thousands of dollars–no easy task for a small unit with 12 pilots and 88 enlisted personnel assigned to a modest facility.  This was the peacetime military, and our detachment was tucked far away in the Sonoran Desert, where there was little to do. 

A vivid imagination and a bit of cunning were needed to juggle the numbers and convince headquarters we were meeting their goals.  This had been a difficult task for past RCO's, but in a moment of clarity I realized a substantial amount of time could be saved if the desks in the office were rearranged closer to the latrine and coffee machine. If it took less time to walk from one's desk to the coffee machine, then one could drink more coffee during office hours.  Each bursting bladder would have to be relieved more often, but each round trip to the latrine would take less time.  The scheme was flawed but brilliant; exactly the type of program Michaels would endorse, especially if some multiplication and addition were used in the calculation.

The savings were calculated as such:

(Number of people in the unit) x (average salary) x (time saved for each trip to the coffee machine) x (number of trips to machine per day) x (work days per quarter) + (Number of people in the unit) x (average salary) x (time saved for each trip to latrine) x (number of trips to latrine per day) x (work days per quarter) = QUARTERLY COST SAVINGS

In reality the desks were never moved because there was nothing to save.  It was a sham, but on paper the savings amounted to thousands of dollars in excess of the quarterly goal. Every three months the desks were hypothetically moved a few feet closer to the coffee machine and latrine in order to save even more thousands!

After a few banner quarters Lt. Colonel Michaels summoned me to his office, “Priskna, I had my doubts about you, but you are doing a shit hot job as RCO. I think there may be a spot for you in my Air Force after all.”

All this success aside, my exploits paled in comparison to my friend Sean, an RCO assigned to another helicopter unit, who soon would be discharged and on his way to Harvard Business School. His background in economics allowed him to view cost savings in a global manner which would benefit the entire operational Air Force for generations to come. The idea was simple and involved redesigning the Air Force flight suit. The one piece suit zipped up the front, and when one needed to have a bowel movement a lot of valuable time was wasted unzipping and dropping the flight suit to the ankles then pulling the garment up over the shoulders and rezipping it.  Sean's innovation involved placing a Velcro flap over the seat of the suit. The time savings extrapolated throughout the entire Air Force was astronomical. Unfortunately for Sean, his commander saw through the ruse. 

There are many bright lights who serve in the military, but as long as the system does not reward commanders for innovations which translate into real savings, it will be business as usual.

 Hoi An, Vietnam - photo by JoAnn Sturman