New position descriptions developed at Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) are bringing the depot in line with commercial industry hiring practices and allowing for increased flexibility in employee professional development, all with an eye on improving efficiency and utilization.

FRCE worked hand-in-hand with local human resources professionals and higher-echelon personnel agencies including the Navy’s Office of Civilian Human Resources and the federal Office of Personnel Management, along with union representatives and training experts, to become the first Defense Department depot to develop mixed trade aircraft mechanic positions. These new mixed trade positions allows aircraft maintainers at FRCE to gain qualification in multiple areas of expertise, where previous job descriptions locked them into just one. Employees working under the new mixed trade initiative will develop a broad skill set that can encompass airframes, sheet metal, electrical and composites.

“It only makes sense to move FRC East in a direction that has been the industry standard for many years now,” said Tina Rowe, head of the Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul Production Department (MRO-P) at FRCE. “To remain competitive in this industry, as part of the defense organic industrial base, we must continue seeking change and finding better ways to do businesses. In this case, that means moving away from trade-based position descriptions and giving our workforce the opportunity to use all of their talents to benefit our nation’s military aviators, instead of pigeonholing them into just one area.”

Andrew Rock, who currently serves as head of the depot’s Engine Branch and was instrumental in the switch, said the end goal of the new position description is increased efficiency and utilization by decreasing downtime.

“In the end, it can’t help but boost efficiency and utilization because now one aircraft maintenance professional will be able to do all facets of a task instead of waiting on another trade,” Rock explained. “Reducing the number of interruptions to the maintenance process can’t help but improve our turnaround times and get the aircraft back to the mission even faster than before.”

Getting the aircraft maintainers qualified in multiple trades requires a significant amount of on-the-job training, Rock said,  Even with robust training plans and intensive learning, not every mixed trade artisan is going to be qualified in every trade – and that’s to be expected, Rock said.

“Now we get to figure out what our new hires are good at, because they’re in a training program that basically encompasses all of the aircraft trades, and they will shine in the areas where they should shine,” he said. “We don’t expect anybody to come in and be stellar at all the trades – that could happen because we do have people with the drive and aptitude to do that, but it wouldn’t be the norm. The important part is that they will be have the opportunity to qualify in all of the trades, and will be qualified in the areas in which they have demonstrated proficiency.”

The mixed trade initiative at FRCE began its rollout on the V-22 aircraft line. Rock, the former head of the V-22 Branch, said the new position description is a natural extension of the “beginning-to-end” concept the line instituted on the V-22 line a few years back, where one cross-disciplinary team of artisans worked an aircraft from its induction at the depot through to its return to the Fleet.

“With that ‘beginning-to-end’ concept, we put a work leader who was an air framer with a strong sheet metal mechanic and a strong electrician and they run that plane from start to finish,” he explained. “It doesn’t matter what phase the aircraft is in or what work they are doing with it, the entire team worked on the aircraft and it was a true team effort to get it across the finish line. When we first started working this way, it was a new concept.

“This new mixed trade position description on the aircraft lines will allow us to continue doing this same thing,” Rock continued. “Eventually, this way of doing business won’t be new, but will be second nature to the entire workforce.”

Don McLean, an overhaul and repair supervisor on the V-22 line, said the change has been generally well-received within the workforce.

“There are a lot of folks here who are excited about the opportunity to get their hands dirty in another part of the process,” he said. “We have a lot of smart people who now have the opportunity to grow in their jobs, and we have the flexibility to find the place in which they really excel. Your job now isn’t to learn just one trade, but you need to be proficient at multiple things.”

McLean said he’s already had two former sheet metal workers express an interest in composite work, with one of the artisans already qualifying to perform general basic composite repairs.

“That artisan has already been picking up a lot of the work, and we’re working to introduce him to some other trade skills, as well,” McLean said. “The intent is to get all of our workforce qualified in multiple trades.

“I know that, as a sheet metal mechanic, when I got promoted to supervisor I had to work with electricians and air framers and all those other trades, and I really had to lean on coworkers to help me understand where exactly the whole maintenance process was going,” McLean continued. “With these new artisans, once they start moving up in the ranks, they’re already going to know what each step entails from each trade and it’s going to benefit everyone in the long run.”

In addition to increasing efficiency on the production environment, the wider knowledge base and broader skill set will benefit the depot in other ways as the mixed trade initiative matures, said Allen Williamson, V-22 branch head.

“It extends beyond the floor,” he said. “We’re really good at promoting from within, so when you have an artisan leave the production line to go work as an in-service repair planner, an industrial engineering technician or in the business office, they’re going to have a holistic understanding of aviation maintenance. That will benefit the customer, as well.”

Other industrial facilities across the Defense Department have taken notice and begun reaching out to see how they can make the change to mixed trade positions, Rock noted.

“I was recently on a phone call with an Air Force facility that wanted to gather some of our lessons learned and to pick our brains and see how we cracked the code on this,” he said. “They’re excited that we’ve done it, and now they hope to benefit from it, too.”

Rowe said the team will continue working to develop the mixed trade concept and expand it to additional positions beyond the aircraft lines, within MRO-P.

Watching FRCE make big changes to the way the depot does businesses has been exciting, Williamson noted.

“We have become a facility where we institute a change, we monitor that change, and then we make adjustments based on that feedback,” he said. “It’s a great time to work here at the depot, with all the changes that we’re making in order to bring ourselves up to speed with commercial industry.”

FRCE is North Carolina's largest maintenance, repair, overhaul and technical services provider, with more than 4,000 civilian, military and contract workers. Its annual revenue exceeds $1 billion. The depot provides service to the fleet while functioning as an integral part of the greater U.S. Navy; Naval Air Systems Command; and Commander, Fleet Readiness Centers.