DLA director talks transformation, telework, technology at Aviation Town Hall

Richmond, Va. -

The director of Defense Logistics Agency touched on several topics and answered questions from the DLA Aviation workforce during a town hall Tuesday on Defense Supply Center Richmond in Virginia.

DLA Director Army Lt. Gen. Mark Simerly recognized the accomplishments of four DLA Aviation employees, discussed core values and new training opportunities and reviewed the importance of the DLA Strategic Plan with a packed house of DLA Aviation employees.

The five-year plan charts how the agency can remain responsive to warfighters' needs in a contested logistics environment.

"Our warfighters are going to be operating differently," Simerly said. "That means we have to operate differently. We have to think differently about the challenges of the warfighter; we have to act in ways that generate better readiness and resilience. We have to operate at the speed of war and be able to achieve decision advantage over our adversaries."

Simerly also discussed new training opportunities available to the workforce, including a training program designed to help employees develop their data acumen.

Readiness

A panel that included Simerly, Air Force Chief Master Sgt. Alvin Dyer, DLA senior enlisted leader, Air Force Brig. Gen. Chad Ellsworth DLA Aviation commander, and Cathy Contreras, DLA Aviation acting deputy commander, spent the second half of the town hall answering questions from the workforce.

Simerly responded to the first question about whether the agency should start prioritizing some weapons systems over others so the agency will have the parts in place in one to two years.

"The short answer is yes, it is advisable," Simerly said. "We're really in an era where we know we have some constraints on resources. I don't see any large increase in physical resources to our mission set in the near term, so that means we have to think better, and we have to ruthlessly prioritize our mission sets. We have to adjust our priorities to match the service priorities, not only from a weapon systems management standpoint but also talk to our leaders in the combatant commands about the way the weapon systems are going to be employed in that fight."

Artificial Intelligence

Simerly's earlier comments on data acumen and the agency's need for better data applications led to a further discussion on artificial intelligence and when DLA Aviation will have access to those tools, given its rise in the commercial sector.

Simerly said that within the coming months, DLA should have an AI generative tool available that will allow employees to do a search in their browsers.

"You're going to see quite a few things emerge in the near term that will be available for you to use," Simerly said. "I can say DLA is moving out very aggressively with artificial intelligence, and we understand the commercial applications being used and certainly see the benefit for us of using those tools."

Telework

Simerly also responded to a question about the telework policy and why it is uniform across the DLA enterprise when forward sites have different customers and circumstances.

"We really did that so we could standardize across the enterprise so (that) we wouldn't have 'have and have nots,' or, you know, some sense of comparative advantage from others if we weren't applying it in a uniform way," Simerly said. "We know that there might be some cost to that in terms of opportunities to engage with partners … I would remind you that in the policy right now, there is flexibility in there, so there are some opportunities to do things on an acceptable basis that don't align with the Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday policy."

Retention and Training

In a discussion about what DLA Aviation can do to make itself competitive and retain employees that are thinking about leaving or being recruited by other federal agencies, the DLA director said that the agency wants to do more to retain people and is looking at developmental opportunities and ways to invest in people.

Ellsworth and Contreras, asked for employees to talk to their supervisor or leadership to give them a chance to change things before leaving the agency.

"Pull one of us aside," Ellsworth said. "We don't have the answers to everything, I promise you, but I know that some of the answers are out there with you. So, if you communicate with us, we can learn from you about where we're missing the mark in some cases and where we can make it better for you, to make it a place you want to work."

Commitment to Mission

Toward the end of the town hall, Simerly responded to a question about what an individual can do at the working level to support the agency as it prepares for a contested environment.

"On the thinking side, we all have the responsibility of trying to think clearly about the challenges of supporting the warfighter and what that means from a warfighter perspective at the end of the day," Simerly said. "And everything in between us and them in terms of supporting that mission, factoring in what's changing from the battlefield, factoring in what's changing in terms of supply chain disruptions, and then looking at our past practices or current practices and determining whether or not they're relevant, whether they're suitable to those conditions and also helping others think about that."

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