Commanders and Their QA

By Lt Col Earl Bennett

A few years ago shortly after I took command of a munitions squadron, I received my first brief from my Quality Assurance chief who proceeded to tell me how well things were going in our unit as evidenced by our nearly 100% pass rate on QA evals and inspections.  I had already been in command for about a month when this occurred, and I had already been doing some “spot checks” of my own as I walked around the various shops and around the Munitions Storage Area.  I listened to my QA chief tell me how well our maintenance troops performed on their evaluations and then I said something like this: “well, that’s amazing we have such a high pass rate.  As the Chief and I have walked around the squadron, I’ve noticed we have some pretty poor housekeeping practices.  I’ve also noticed we don’t do a good job keeping equipment forms up to date.  So, you must not be looking at these things in your QA Plan?” 

After an uncomfortable silence, my QA team admitted that perhaps they could tailor their program to focus on these areas.  The Chief, I, and my QA sat down and we decided we could do more inspections in these areas as well as tighten up our overall program.  We also agreed that a 99% QA pass rate might not be the best indicator of the quality of our maintenance if we weren’t looking at everything or looking at things critically enough.  We agreed to revamp the QA Plan, and revisit on our next meeting.

Interestingly enough, QA found some of the same things the Chief and I had found in our walk-around.  They wrote them up, and briefed the chain of command.  It was amazing how fast the word spread throughout the squadron, and everyone tightened up their adherence to standards.  We still had failures, and we learned from them; both the technicians and leadership.

The story doesn’t end here; our objective is a continual journey to meet the exacting standards required in the munitions arena while supporting the mission.  The cost of failing to hold that standard is just too high, and we must never grow comfortable in reading the latest statistics from our QA or some other source to tell us all is well.  Leaders, at all levels need to know their business just as well as their technicians and their QA.  Nothing commands the respect of your people as much as a maintenance leader knowing and comprehending the intricate details of the munitions business.  A word of advice, this knowledge doesn’t come from sitting at your desk and answering emails; munitions officers need to be out with their people perfecting our trade.  That’s called leadership.