WORKFORCE
Back-to-Basics will create a modern continuous learning environment and empower employees to craft their careers.
“A lot of that scrap learning has become credentials, where you would take it if you need it,” he said.
Back-to-Basics will give employees the power to choose the credentials they need to fit their jobs, Greene said, and it is the responsibility of the employee—and their supervisor—to keep up with the required courses for the employee’s functional area, as well as any extra credentials. “Tis is a big paradigm shift,” he said. “It’s going to be a challenge but also a benefit. Te work- force—supervisors and employees—have been used to very prescriptive [training].”
According to Aaron Hutson, strategy and policy branch chief, currently the culture for acquisition training is to complete all certifications as soon as possible—sometimes even up to Level III certifications—but the DACM and DAU have learned through student feedback that the training was too front-loaded in this model. Te Back-to-Basics program is moving toward a “train, apply, train, apply” model, where the learner is given more flexi- bility. “It empowers the learner to work with their supervisor … to determine the specialty training credentials that are needed,” he said.
“Tis framework will give some time back to the organization and the employee,” Hutson said. “Tere’s a reduction in prescriptive training across all functional areas and levels, some more than others, but that’s required training that’s been given back to the employee, local organization and supervisor.” Tat extra time can be used for on-the-job training and credentialing. While work- force members have always been able to cross-train over different functional areas, this “time back” will enable them to do it more readily than in the past, Greene explained.
DAU is complementing the Back-to-Basics goal of streamlining training by changing its curriculum, Hutson said. According to DAU, its transformation will include high-quality content that is more relevant to the learners’ needs, shorter courses, more variety in course offerings, more online courses, more learning resources available at the moment of need and, of course, credentialing.
And in an interesting twist, COVID-19 restrictions have helped get this new training culture started. “COVID allowed DAU, I think somewhat unintentionally, but DAU capitalized on it to refine and improve their online learning platform,” Greene said.
“Tey are positioned very well to have a reduction in … in-person training. Tey are still going to have some of that, but bottom line, we’re going to see a lot more of what they are calling VILT— virtual instructor-led training,” he added.
Of course, the implementation of Back-to-Basics is not going to be a “one and done” situation, Richardson cautioned. It will be rolled out in phases so adjustments can be made to the program as necessary, to better serve the workforce.
Ultimately, individuals will have the freedom and responsibility to keep up with their required trainings and any additional train- ing they want to have—something that is completely within the spirit of a continuous learning environment, Greene said.
“At the end of the day, this will be a much better process, much less time away from the job doing unproductive training,” Richardson said. “[It will] provide more opportunities that are productive, like going to [Naval Postgraduate School] or leverag- ing some of the DACM programs to improve your capabilities.”
“Change is hard,” he added. “Pack your patience. Expect some growing pains. We will get through it.”
For more information on Back-to-Basics, go to:
https://go.usa.gov/ xeaVp. Burning questions? Check out the frequently asked questions at:
https://asc.army.mil/web/topics/btb/.
JACQUELINE M. HAMES is an editor with Army AL&T magazine. She holds a B.A. in creative writing from Christopher Newport University. She has more than 10 years of experience writing and editing news and feature articles for publication.
https://asc.ar my.mil
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