LANGLEY AIR FORCE BASE, Virginia –
A team of personnel experts came to train Langley personnelists Feb. 14 and 15 on the changes that will affect the way Air Force does personnel business.
The new initiative, called Personnel Services Delivery (PSD) Transformation, will use technology to place the capability for conducting routine personnel transactions into the hands of Airmen via Web-based services and contact centers.
“This training is the first step in changing the way we all think, even as personnelists, about the way we accomplish personnel transactions,” said Col. Michael Maloney, director of personnel services at the Air Force Personnel Center. “We’re training our personnel specialists first and giving them the opportunity to inform their customers.”
“We’re converting from a face-to-face environment to a web-based environment,” said Maj. Nolan Corpuz, 1st Fighter Wing MPF commander. “It’s time-saving, saves manpower and allows personnelists to be in the commander support staff where they’re most needed.”
While PSD will transform personnel services across the total force spectrum, the visiting teams train personnelists on some changes that affect active duty Airmen and are scheduled to take affect March 31.
Several processes like retraining and retirements, currently worked through base level military personnel flights, will be self-initiated via the Web and centrally managed and processed at the Air Force Contact Center at Randolph AFB, Texas.
The changes will take effect in six “spirals” over the course of two years, said Capt. Sheila Grady, 1st MPF.
“The capabilities scheduled for release during Spiral One are current day-to-day base-level processes that have been redesigned,” she said. “Most of these capabilities were redesigned to remove work from the MPF as we transition towards more web-based transactions.”
As of March 31, accessions, Board of Correction to Military Records and Evaluation Appeals, duty history and duty status updates, retirement processing, retraining applications and classification actions will no longer require MPF support.
By the end of June, Career Job Reservations, DD 214s, Assignment Preference Worksheets, enlisted promotion orders and the Selective Reenlistment Program will follow.
“By summer 2007, the MPF will be much smaller and a good portion of the workload will be executed by the Air Force Contact Center via web based tools,” Captain Grady explained. “We will improve timeliness of actions by providing Air Force members an expanded ‘round-the-clock access to personnel support. That support will be provided by the Air Force Contact Center that will answer calls, emails, mail or conduct live chat sessions to assist the troops.”
With convenient and secure access from any Internet-ready computer or telephone around the globe, Airmen will avoid waiting in lines, save time and fit their personnel business into their own schedule.
Major Corpuz said the new system uses some corporate models that millions of people are already using. He cites USAA Bank as an example.
“Maybe 90 percent of USAA customers have never walked into a USAA building,” he said. “It’s cutting out the middle-man and how a lot of people do their business today.”
“PSD will provide our Airmen the same convenient 24/7 on-demand access to information much like they have come to expect from on-line banking and internet commerce,” said Colonel Maloney.