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Managing the transition

  • Published
  • By Lt. Col. Michael Shea
  • 380th Expeditionary Aircraft Maintenance Squadron commander
SOUTHWEST ASIA --  As we start the next air and space expeditionary force rotation, are you and your organization ready?

We make it look easy at times, but it takes a lot of preparation to keep up the pace of operations we have set. Each cycle we demand maximum effort from everyone for a limited period of time. It reminds me of a relay race: a team of people going at top speed who work together to reach the finish line first.

We are in a long, tough race. Our goal in the race is to win the war. We can do that by flying the air tasking order every day. We make it manageable by breaking it down into segments: our AEF rotations. Just like a relay race, each segment is critical to winning the race.

As individuals, we are the runners in the race. We strive to become the best, most disciplined individuals with our unique sets of talents, ready to join the fight. We accomplish this through disciplined training.

The relay race is broken into two distinct parts; the sprint and the exchange of the baton. The sprint is what we do for the majority of our time deployed. That is the part that we train so hard for every day in order to be able to go full speed. The key to the successful race, though, is a flawless baton handoff. Like a race, the most critical juncture for us is the transition between AEFs.

The change between AEF rotations is critical to continuing the support of the air tasking order uninterrupted. It is a tightly orchestrated set of actions between the two AEFs, with the ultimate goal to not adversely affect the overall operation.

When you have a flawless handoff in a race between two highly skilled and trained athletes, the pace of the race is unabated and they win. However, if they can't make that handoff smoothly, then the race is lost. Just like the athlete, we've received our training, it is now up to us to execute the transition in order to continue to fly the air tasking order every day and win the war.