III. Sailors, Marines, and Civilians:
The Cornerstone of Success

America’s naval forces are combat-ready largely due to the dedication and motivation of individual Sailors, Marines, and civilians. Developing and retaining quality people is vital to our continued success and is among the Department’s biggest challenges. Meeting these challenges is essential to long-term effectiveness. But, with continued fiscal austerity and constrained funding, any increased investment in personnel programs will likely come at the expense of future modernization. However, as it is so often said, our people are our most valuable resource. It is with this in mind that we must continue to put a premium on recruiting, retaining, and training the best people our country has to offer.

Core Values: Honor, Courage, and Commitment

The Department of the Navy’s core values of honor, courage, and commitment are the very fabric of our naval character. It is the ethos of who we are and how we conduct ourselves on a daily basis. From these principles we uphold the traditions of the naval profession and shape the service’s standards for moral conduct. As warfighters, we wield destructive power and must often act independently on the battlefield to judge situations and show the highest caliber of moral leadership. Therefore, it is essential that core values be an integral part of Sailors’ or Marines’ leadership training and professional development throughout their careers.

Sailors, Marines and civilians possess a strong personal commitment to these core values and are relied upon to uphold the highest standards of professional and personal conduct. Thus, ethical awareness and adherence to core values is at the forefront of every decision, Department-wide.

Recruiting America’s Best and Brightest

At the end of FY 98, the Navy’s end strength was 381,502 active duty and 94,294 reserve. Active duty and Reserve Marines numbered 173,142 and 40,842, respectively. Department-wide civilian staffing stood at 207,782. The downsizing of the early/mid-1990s is nearly complete, and the Department of the Navy is working to ensure that the nation’s youth are aware of the diverse and rewarding career possibilities that naval service offers to America’s best and brightest. Naval service stimulates and challenges young people while providing a solid foundation of “high-tech” training, life skills, and leadership experience at a relatively early age. Although the Navy and Marine Corps both met officer and enlisted recruiting goals for their respective Reserve forces, recruiting remains a challenge for the active duty Navy forces. Increasing college attendance, historically low unemployment, and prolonged economic growth all combine to compete with naval recruiters for the limited pool of qualified enlistees.

The Navy experienced a recruiting shortfall of 6,892 Sailors in FY 98. Unfortunately, FY 99 is equally challenging with the same competitive factors. In response, we developed a strategy to address this environment and help avoid an accession shortfall in FY 99. First, we boosted the number of recruiters by 25 percent, from 3600 in 1998, to over 4500 by March 1999. Next, our advertising campaign emphasizes that the Navy represents a great career opportunity. We have further empowered our recruiters by increasing recruiting incentives, including Enlistment Bonuses, Navy College Funds, and a series of specific bonuses and contracts targeted to attract general detail (GENDET) Sailors. Shorter enlistment contracts may also help young people unsure whether the Navy is the right choice for them. Likewise, we included a legislative request to increase the maximum enlistment bonus from $12,000 to $20,000, which should help attract enlistees.

Additionally, the Navy increased the maximum allowable enlistment percentage of non- High School diploma graduates (NHSDGs) from five percent to the DoD limit of 10 percent earlier this year. Although a high school diploma is an important validation of ability to succeed, it is not the “be-all” or “end-all” of a potential recruit’s measure of worth. This initiative authorizes the recruitment of up to an additional 2600 boot camp entrants when their work experience and above average test scores identify them as “Proven Performers” and justifies their admission. Additionally, we will provide highly effective training through our Personal Academic Capacity Enhancement Program for personnel at boot camp requiring remedial instruction. We recognize that recruits without high school diplomas have historically failed to complete recruit training at a rate of about 10% greater than those with diplomas. However, this metric is more than offset by the fact that non-diploma graduates who complete boot camp have higher retention rates and perform as well or better than their peers in the fleet.

Despite the impact of a strong civilian economy, the Marine Corps met all of its recruiting goals in FY 98, extending an unbroken string of recruiting success — both in quantity and quality — to 41 consecutive months. To continue to recruit quality men and women, the Marine Corps maintains an effective and award-winning advertising program. As young Americans grow less inclined toward military service, new approaches and more resources must be applied to recruiting. To generate awareness and quality recruiting leads, and to make the Marine Corps more attractive, the Marine Corps expanded the use of high-profile marketing opportunities. The Marine Corps is also developing an Internet-based system to bolster both initial and follow-up recruiting effectiveness. Likewise, a CD-ROM product is under development that gives comprehensive Military Occupational Speciality information to help recruits make informed career decisions before departing for boot camp.

Retention

Individual Sailors and Marines are the foundation of the total force. Caring for them and their families is central to personnel retention and the overall readiness of the Navy-Marine Corps team. Decreasing quality of life, family separation, pay disparities with the civilian community, lower advancement opportunity, erosion of other benefits, and a strong civilian economy adversely affect retention of Navy and Marine Corps personnel.

Enlisted Retention: Overall, enlisted first-term retention during 1998 was approximately 32% for the Navy, which is about 6% below the retention level to support a steady-state Navy force level. Overall enlisted first-term retention for the Marine Corps was 21.8%, which is the minimum rate to sustain the Marine Corps force structure. A combination of initiatives, such as increasing the Selective Reenlistment Bonus (SRB) from $45,000 to $60,000, will focus on boosting retention figures. The Navy’s ongoing commitment to fund the personnel account adequately addresses lingering concerns about timely permanent change-of-station moves, bonus payments, and advancement opportunities. In addition, the Chief of Naval Operations’ initiative to reduce the inter-deployment personnel tempo will give Sailors more time at home. Despite these efforts, an across-the-board increase of military compensation is needed to stem the tide of declining accessions and insufficient retention.

Other initiatives to enhance personnel compensation were included in the FY 98 National Defense Authorization Act. Housing allowance reform, to be phased in over six years, will first stabilize and then reduce the percentage of housing costs absorbed by individual Sailors and Marines. Subsistence allowance reform will correct pay inequities among enlisted people and will tie increases in this allowance to a credible food-cost index. The Department enhanced family separation pay, hazardous duty pay, and overseas tour extension bonuses to alleviate hardship situations. In order to offer our quality people a competitive standard of living, the Department needs strong and continuing support from the Congress for significant increases in military compensation.

To complement these financial initiatives, the Department of the Navy is placing a greater emphasis on the way we work. For example, the Department is developing a new Smart Work program to provide our Sailors and Marines with the best tools and equipment possible, which will help to reduce the number of hours our enlisted personnel work while increasing the quality of their work. Some examples include:


Officer Retention: During the past few years, reduced force levels partially offset the adverse impact of Navy officer community shortages, which, nonetheless, were exacerbated by high-tempo worldwide operations. While the Marine Corps is meeting its end strength requirements and will for the foreseeable future, retention in aviation specialties is a concern. Unfortunately, our Armed Forces are nearing their lower end- strength goals at a time when the robust civilian market offers strong employment alternatives to our personnel. Inadequate retention only increases the personal sacrifices demanded of our remaining people as sea tours are lengthened due to operational requirements and commitments. Positive changes are needed immediately to help stem the loss of highly skilled and motivated people before current readiness is more adversely affected. Retention also must be improved to meet officer manning requirements particularly in Navy and Marine Corps aviation, nuclear power, surface warfare, and special warfare.

• Aviation: Navy pilot retention decreased to 39% in FY 97 and further declined to 32% in FY 98. This trend is expected to continue for the foreseeable future, and pilot retention already falls short of the 35% aggregate level required to fill critical department head and flight leader positions. Naval Flight Officer retention is also declining, with aggregate retention in early 1999 at the minimally acceptable level of 38%. While continuation of these mid-level officers represents our greatest retention challenge, there has also been an increase in resignations of more senior aviators, particularly due to intense competition from private industry. The Marine Corps is also experiencing aviation retention challenges, especially for fixed-wing aviators. The Navy is developing compensation proposals to address Service-specific retention shortfalls and regain the high ground in the retention battle. Relief from current Title 37 legislative constraints will enable us to continue developing new compensation programs and more efficiently apply limited resources where and when they are needed. Aviation Career Continuation Pay (ACCP) is one such initiative that would mark a departure from the unsuccessful retention programs of the past. Tied directly to force structure, ACCP would meet the retention challenge at every critical point throughout an aviation career by rewarding aviators for superior performance and increased responsibility.

• Nuclear Power: The success of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion program is a direct result of quality people, rigorous selection and training, and high standards. FY 98 retention for submarine officers was 27% and 21% for nuclear-trained surface warfare officers, which is currently adequate because of our post-Cold War downsizing. However, nuclear officer accessions and retention remain below the required level to sustain the future force structure. Retention rates must improve to 38% for submarine officers and 24% for nuclear-trained surface warfare officers by FY 01 to meet steady-state manning requirements. In its present form, the Nuclear Officer Incentive Pay program remains the surest and most cost-effective means of meeting current and future manning requirements. The authorization requested to extend the program and increase pay limitations will provide the Department of the Navy with sufficient program flexibility to address current and future retention challenges.

• Surface Warfare: Despite a large reduction in the number of ships since the Cold War “high-water mark” in the mid-1980s, the Surface Warfare Officer (SWO) community is experiencing difficulty retaining enough senior lieutenants and junior lieutenant commanders to meet department head requirements. Current retention in SWO community is 25% against a manning retention requirement of 38%. To reverse the SWO retention trend, Navy leadership is addressing waterfront quality-of-life concerns and has proposed Surface Warfare Officer Continuation Pay (SWOCP). This initiative would pay surface warfare-qualified officers up to $50,000 to remain in the community through their tenth year of commissioned service.

• Special Warfare: Historically, officer retention in Naval Special Warfare (NSW, commonly referred to as SEALs — for Sea, Air, Land forces) was among the highest in the Navy. Since 1996, however, the annual number of resignations has risen dramatically. The SEAL retention rate at the critical seven-year point has fallen to 58.2% from historical levels of greater than 80%. The Navy is attempting to address SEAL junior officer retention problems in several ways including proposed increased incentives. These incentives include a proposal for NSW officer continuation pay — targeting officers with 6-14 years of service — and proposed legislative relief from the restriction on drawing more than one Hazardous Duty Incentive Pay. Additionally, the Naval Special Warfare community leadership is conducting a thorough evaluation of its organization in an effort to reduce personnel tempo, improve job satisfaction, develop a mentoring program, and expand postgraduate education opportunities.

A Comprehensive, Competitive Military Compensation Strategy

Navy leadership is fully cognizant that we need a multi-faceted approach to be successful in improving personnel readiness. While there is no one remedy to this complex problem, a boost to military compensation is fundamental to a long-range solution.

Therefore, we strongly endorse the DoD compensation triad (basic pay increase of 4.4 percent in FY 00 and 3.9 percent each year through FY 05, pay table reform to recognize and reward performance, and repeal of the Military Retirement Reform Act of 1986 (Redux) as an excellent step toward addressing pay gap and compensation concerns.

While the compensation triad will begin to address our recruiting and retention concerns, it will not ensure adequate retention in many of our undermanned, highly skilled, warfare specialties. Historically, targeted bonuses have proven highly effective and very cost efficient in attacking these retention problem areas. This year, we plan to make greater use of this proven strategy. As discussed in the section on Recruiting and Retention, our FY 00 Authorization Act request seeks congressional support for several special and pay incentives and bonuses to deal with key personnel problem areas.

Long-term savings and financial security for our Sailors and Marines can help improve recruiting and retention. Therefore, in addition to the DoD compensation triad, we believe that a 401K-type payroll savings plan would pay significant dividends in providing our Sailors and Marines an uncomplicated, low initial investment means of establishing financial security. An important program that supports these goals is the Uniformed Services Payroll Savings Plan (USPSP), a tax-deferred long- term savings program that would authorize service members to contribute up to 5% of basic pay, with no government matching funds. It would be managed by the Federal Thrift Investment Board (FTIB), which already oversees the Civil Service Thrift Savings Plan, and would be charged with professional oversight and participant education for the Navy and Marine Corps.

Strongly supported by the Department of the Navy, the establishment of a USPSP would be a significant step in addressing continuing congressional concerns that young men and women joining the Services have inadequate knowledge and understanding of skills required for personal financial management and fiscal responsibility. While the Department has implemented personal financial management programs that provide excellent access to information for managing a Sailor’s or Marine’s financial future, these programs are only a first step and should be complemented by a Defense Department- sponsored savings plan.

Equal Opportunity/Diversity: The Department of the Navy remains committed to development of Navy and Marine Corps forces that reflect the demographics of American society. Both Services traditionally emphasize accessions to diversify the military population. Last year some modest gains were made in minority recruitment. The Services also have increased efforts to retain minorities. Mentoring programs are also being developed for the benefit of all Sailors and Marines. In addition, a cadre of naval leaders is being assigned to a Standing Committee for Minority Affairs to provide experience and guidance on issues of diversity and equal opportunity.

Quality of Life: The availability of effective Quality of Life (QoL) programs and services offer Sailors and Marines peace of mind no matter where they are stationed or deployed, and contribute greatly to retention and readiness. The four major goals for QoL include adequate and fair compensation, appropriate bachelor and family housing, access to high-quality health care, and effective programs for community and family support.

The Department of the Navy has established QoL Master Plans to provide standards for QoL programs and services. Through this effort, the Department provides an array of QoL programs that are an essential component of the career benefits package. Many of these programs cultivate and reinforce Department of Navy core values, while others provide vital community support services. Of special note is a $77 million increase in the Voluntary Education (VOLED) program throughout the FY 00 FYDP. Recent studies show a strong relationship between the use of VOLED and increased retention. Additionally, LIFELines, a revolutionary, web-based approach to QoL support services education and delivery, will be inaugurated in early 1999 to provide more effective access to these services.

In the execution of its QoL Master Plan, the Marine Corps has revolutionized its approach to the delivery of critical QoL programs by merging Morale, Welfare and Recreation (MWR) and Human Resources (HR) programs into the Personal and Family Readiness Division. The Personal and Family Readiness model creates a strong advocacy voice for quality of life and establishes a proactive, prevention-based focus. The “One Corps, One Standard” goal is accomplished by a variety of initiatives that address the family, youth activities, and physical fitness. A premier example of a prevention-oriented program is Semper Fit, which promotes the personal readiness of Marines and healthy lifestyles in families by providing a team of fitness, medical, and education counselors.

Housing: Ensuring that America’s Sailors, Marines, and their families are adequately housed in the local community or in military housing is a top QoL issue. New initiatives are underway in housing allowance reform, family housing, and bachelor housing. The newly implemented Basic Allowance for Housing (BAH) system, which is to be phased in over a six-year time frame, will provide allowances that more closely match the actual housing costs of the service member.

In addition, the Department will use Public Private Venture (PPV) initiatives to meet its future housing needs. The Navy is implementing plans to privatize housing at 16 different locations that target more than 29,000 family housing units. In a similar fashion, the Marine Corps is pursuing privatization at nine locations that include more than 8,000 family housing units.

PPVs have become the first choice to accomplish whole-house revitalization or replacement of existing homes. Effective use of PPVs allows the Department to increase the number and improve the quality of housing. In areas where analysis of economic, quality, and market factors demonstrate that a PPV is not feasible, more traditional means of meeting our requirements will be employed. Privatization allows the Services to enter business agreements with the private sector to revitalize or replace existing housing, build new units to meet the additional needs of the Service, and maintain the inventory.

The Department is similarly committed to improving the Quality of Life for our single Sailors and Marines through the elimination of inadequate barracks and the achievement of a higher standard of living. As currently programmed, the Navy will eliminate all community restrooms by FY 08 and attain a seven-year replacement cycle for all barracks furnishings by FY 03. The Marine Corps will completely replace inadequate barracks by FY 05, eliminate all barracks maintenance and repair backlogs by FY 04 and reach a seven-year replacement cycle for barracks furnishings by FY 02.

Safety

Protecting the lives of Sailors and Marines and preserving valuable material assets are critical benchmarks in ensuring that America’s naval forces remain operationally ready to meet their daunting global commitments.

One of the major innovations developed and adopted by the Navy and Marine Corps is the Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS). Recognizing that human error continues to be the leading cause of accidents, this analytical process provides the first step in the Operational Risk Management (ORM) process — hazard identification. This new process of analysis better focuses intervention strategies at the root causes, and is designed to help Sailors and Marines identify and eliminate or reduce these risks.

The Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Marine Corps continue to move forward with ORM at all levels. The Naval Safety Center has conducted eight organizational level “Train the Trainer” courses and developed a new ORM training course for fleet staffs. The Navy has also incorporated ORM into the Leadership Training Continuum. ORM is used by the Fleet to throughout the Inter-Deployment Training Cycle (IDTC) identify and quantify risk and create more dedicated unit-training time. Continued emphasis by leaders at all levels throughout the Navy and Marine Corps has made safety awareness part of the Department’s culture.

Another significant risk-management tool entered the Fleet Marine Forces in April 1998, when the computer-based Squadron Assistance/Risk Assessment (SARA) software program was fielded for every Marine Corps squadron. SARA is a unit-level risk management and flight-scheduling tool, designed to assist military aviation organizations in conducting daily activities. SARA facilitates daily scheduling, accumulates unit data, and analyzes aircrew risk factors based on aircrew qualifications. In July 1998, the Joint Service Safety Chiefs endorsed SARA and recommended funding for continued development, product support, and possible use of SARA by all U.S. Armed Services.

Medical

Navy Medicine is committed to delivering world-class health care to the Navy-Marine Corps team, its retirees, and their families. Operational medical units, such as hospital ships and fleet hospitals, are capable of providing state-of-the-art health services throughout the world. On a smaller scale, a lighter and more flexible rapid response capability is being developed. Lastly, preventive medicine — health education, reducing injuries, encouraging healthy lifestyles — has been given priority because it is key to sustaining a fit and healthy fighting force.

TRICARE: The foundation of our health care system is TRICARE — Department of Defense’s triple option managed health care program. In regions where TRICARE was established early and is now mature, it has improved access and uniformity of benefits while ensuring a high level of medical readiness. In regions where TRICARE has only recently started up, there have been some growing pains. Because TRICARE introduced some fundamental changes in how beneficiaries receive care, the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Services continue to address problem areas in implementing the program. The Department of the Navy is committed to making TRICARE work and will ensure that its beneficiaries continue to receive the finest health care possible.

Retiree Medical Care: Another important focus for the Department is improving access to medical care for Medicare-eligible beneficiaries. The TRICARE Senior Prime demonstration project now being implemented at the San Diego Naval Medical Center, offers some encouraging opportunities for improved health care for retirees. Other promising methods to mitigate the loss of medical benefits for retired members and their families at age 65 are under evaluation.

Medical Innovation: Navy clinicians and researchers are leveraging technology advances and developing processes to improve medical care. In addition, telemedicine is now being used to provide better access to specialized treatments for both patients and providers. The use of telemedicine provides operational and remote units a medical force-multiplier by keeping Sailors and Marines on station, while maintaining direct contact with designated specialists. The Navy is also streamlining medical operations by working closely with the other Services and the Department of Veterans Affairs to integrate health care services better and avoid duplication.

The Department is working with the Department of Defense to establish the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP) to provide medical care for up to 66,000 retired Service members and their dependents. The demonstration program will be offered at naval hospitals in Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico, and Camp Pendleton, California, starting January 1, 2000. DoD is planning two additional demonstration programs, the TRICARE Senior Supplement program and an expanded pharmacy benefits program for Medicare-eligible persons over age 65 (mail order pharmacy benefit), as mandated by the FY 99 DoD Authorization Act.

Moreover, the Navy’s research programs are internationally recognized as being at the forefront of DNA vaccine technology, immunobiology, and hearing conservation. The Navy will continue its medical research initiatives for the benefit of our personnel, and make results of our research available to citizens everywhere.

Revolution in Training: Educating Today’s Force
for Tomorrow

The Department needs a potent Navy-Marine Corps team capable of responding to increasingly diverse and sophisticated operating environments. Tomorrow’s force must adapt to decentralized operations, smaller crews, increasingly sophisticated and lethal weapon systems, expectations of precise execution, proliferation of asymmetric threats, and unpredictable environments. Satisfying these needs demands a highly trained, broadly educated, and exceedingly proficient core of individuals molded into cohesive teams to perform a wide variety of missions. Intensive training and education are central to the continuing success of our naval forces into the 21st Century.

The Naval Services are committed to training that emulates the operational environment and instills the warrior’s ethos of sacrifice, endurance, teamwork, and dedication. In this regard, the Department of the Navy is instituting fundamental changes to the way we train by focusing on the following objectives: reducing the infrastructure cost of training and education; increasing personnel readiness; improving quality of life by increasing time in homeport; and making training an ongoing priority for every Sailor and Marine. The current training infrastructure is being modernized and made more efficient to take advantage of a host of new technologies. Investments in training technologies, focused curricula, modeling and simulation, and a shift toward increased training in an operational setting will better support the preparation of today’s Sailor and Marine. The net results will be an enhanced ability to teach a broad foundation of knowledge, an increased speed of learning, improved realism of training scenarios, access to special situational knowledge, and a focused remediation in order to minimize attrition.

The Department also recognizes that the demands of the 21st Century will challenge their training continuum. Accordingly, the Service has embarked on a new Training Modernization Initiative that will provide our operating forces with trained Marines in a shorter period of time than the current training pipeline. The primary focus of the Training Modernization Initiative is to identify core competencies that contribute to mission accomplishment for each rating and Military Occupational Speciality (MOS). We will then infuse technology into institutional training for core competencies and provide the proper mix of distance and resident learning for core plus competencies. Our plan is to reduce the length of formal institutional training, teach more courses per year, and provide training to Sailors and Marines when and where required. Constrained resources require leveraging live training opportunities, while remaining within operational and personnel tempo constraints. Limited range and training areas, reduced steaming days and flight hours, environmental restrictions, and constrained budgets increasingly restrict operational training opportunities. The importance of “Train Hard, Train Fast, Train Often, Train First” cannot be overemphasized, especially as the Navy-Marine Corps team will continue to be the “force-of-choice” for forward presence, peacetime engagement, crisis response, and many of the conflicts that are sure to come in the future.

Critical to overcoming some of these constraints are some simulation initiatives. Although not a complete solution, simulation offers a way to overcome many of these obstacles and use technological advances to present more realistic training. Combining simulation with live training opportunities overcomes range and target limitations, enhances the realism of the training scenario, improves after-action review and objective evaluation, and supports tactical decision making and mission rehearsal/planning. The Navy and Marine Corps will continue to develop modeling and simulation capabilities to enhance operational training at home and on deployment.

Basic Training: Initial training for officer and enlisted personnel must prepare them to handle increasingly diverse operational environments — from Arctic and desert wastes to urban “canyons” and labyrinths. Decentralized operations, increasing weapons lethality, asymmetric threats, and complex and varied environments require innovative and resourceful individuals capable of making timely, effective decisions under pressure. The focus on building strong foundations in character, integrity, and leadership during recruit training and initial officer training lies at the heart of a career-long continuum of education. The updated Battle Stations in Navy recruit training and the Crucible in Marine Corps recruit training are dedicated to instilling a common set of core values, overcoming mental and physical challenges, and fostering unit cohesion and teamwork. Battle Stations and the Crucible were specifically designed to provide a defining moment in the transformation of young men and women into Sailors and Marines.

The Navy and Marine Corps design basic training to best meet the needs of their respective operational environments and missions. The Navy conducts basic training in a gender-integrated manner, while the Marine Corps is gender-segregated. The Department of the Navy believes strongly that each Service should retain the flexibility to structure its training to satisfy the specific and sometimes unique needs of that Service.

Advanced Military Education: Integration of Professional Military Education (PME) and leadership training with tactical and strategic warfare education throughout a naval officer’s career is essential in meeting the Department of the Navy’s mission. Providing advanced education opportunities for Navy and Marine Corps officers is critically important as the Services transition to more complex network centric warfare and operational maneuver doctrines and supporting tactics, techniques, and procedures. Education in strategic, operational, and tactical levels of warfare is being strengthened to prepare officers to integrate their understanding of the wide range of 21st Century naval warfare. Expansion of off-campus professional military education opportunities, development of distributive learning options for graduate education, and modernization of advanced education labs and libraries increase flexibility in critical education areas for tomorrow’s leaders. Implementation of the new Operational Planner course at the Naval War College highlights the Navy’s commitment to producing astute tacticians and leaders.

Furthermore, the Navy has implemented its Foreign Area Officer (FAO) program, which combines formal education with overseas assignments in an effort to develop a cadre of regional experts. These area specialists are essential to furthering the nation’s engagement strategy.

The Marine Corps Total Force Distance Learning program is forging a worldwide network of satellite campuses to make continuing education accessible for everyone. The Marine Corps University (MCU) improved its approach to PME through distance learning by establishing the College of Continuing Education (CCE) in 1997. Employing the higher education resources of the MCU, the CCE improves traditional correspondence-based distance education programs in conjunction with the Marine Corps Institute, while leveraging multimedia technology, such as the Marine Corps Satellite Education Network, to improve course delivery. In addition, the Marine Corps makes extensive use of programs like the MAGTF Staff Planning Program (MSTP). MSTP is an instructor and evaluation cell that travels to respective Division- equivalent and above commands to train and educate commanders and their staffs in operational planning and execution.

Managing our Civilian Workforce

Civilians make up about one-third of the Department’s people and are essential members of the Navy-Marine Corps team. Recent efforts to train and maintain a pool of well- qualified employees include better training opportunities for junior employees and new civilian performance appraisals that emphasize incentive awards. The Department also has hosted a series of successful civilian recruitment programs throughout the country, which brought Navy and Marine Corps activities together with civilian college students. In addition, the Department sponsored special engineering and science residential programs, to expose outstanding high school and college students to Navy and Marine Corps technical missions and functions.

There is growing concern about the impact that such issues as Base Operating Support regionalization, claimant consolidation, and outsourcing will have on the civilian workforce. A generally shrinking workforce does not generate enough new people to replace the Department’s aging scientists, engineers, and senior managers. Without careful management of retirements and hirings, significant gaps in experience can occur. Accordingly, we have sharpened our focus on succession planning to ensure that the necessary civilian expertise is available for continuity, consistency, and strategic support.

Civilian Leadership Development Program: The Department of the Navy’s Civilian Leadership Development Initiative provides opportunities for employees to enhance their competitiveness for higher level positions. Several civilian leadership and management programs including the Defense Leadership and Management Program, the Senior Executive Fellows Program (SEF) at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and the Department of the Navy’s Brookings Institute course, provide significant opportunities for development. The curriculum in each of these programs include rigorous graduate-level coursework, rotational assignments, and Professional Military Education (PME). The long-term goal is to sharpen civilian leadership skills, increase experience levels, and enhance understanding of the missions of the Departments of Defense and Navy.

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