SALVOU.S. Army Watervl iet Arsenal

January 2017

Arsenal LandsLargest Contract in a Generation

Story on Page 3

Page 2 Salvo Jan. 31, 2017

The Arsenal Salvo is an authorized monthly publication for members of the Department of Defense. Contents of the Salvo are not necessar-ily the official views of, or an endorsement by the U.S. Government, the Department of Defense, the Department of the Army, or the Watervliet Arsenal. News may be submitted for publication by sending articles to Public Affairs Officer, 1 Buffington Street, Bldg. 10, Watervliet, NY 12189, or stop by office #102, Bldg. 10, Watervliet Arsenal. The editor may also be reached at (518) 266-5055 or by e-mail: john.b.snyder.civ@mail.mil. The editor reserves the right to edit all information submitted for pub-lication.

Commander, Col. Joseph R. MorrowPublic Affairs Officer, John B. SnyderEditor, John B. SnyderPhotographer: John B. Snyder Arsenal Facebook Page @https://www.facebook.com/WatervlietArsenal?ref=hlCover Photo: Wikipedia

Colonel Joseph R. Morrow

Commander’s Corner

The new year allows many of us to put the last year behind us and to restart our lives on a fresh course. A sense of renewal, if you will.

At the arsenal, earlier this month we announced the receipt of the largest, single contract in decades. This, too, will restart our operations and chart a new course for us.

The $47 million foreign military sales contract to provide 145 155mm howitzer cannons for the country of India is the best possible work that we could obtain. Don’t get me wrong, we should and do celebrate all contracts, regardless the size. But not all work is equal, as many of you may know.

Whereas a large mortar contract may exercise six to seven critical manufacturing skills, contracts for full-cannon systems, such as with this India order, exercise at least 11 critical manufacturing skills. As an example, mortar contracts do not require rotary forge, heat treatment, or rifling manufacturing operations. But the India order will.

These are critical skills that we must retain to ensure our continued placement as the nation’s Center of Industrial and Technical Excellence for manufacturing cannons and mortars. Our expertise

is so unique to large caliber manufacturing that if we allow our skills to erode, it may take years to gain it back. Additionally, as our baby-boomer workforce retire, they will take tens of thousands of hours of experience with them unless we have future work, work that will allow them to transfer their knowledge to a new generation of workers.

As some of you know, it took about eight years to get the India work, but the hard work is just beginning. I ask each of you to be careful as we move forward with this order. The India contract is so large, as well as important, that we

could easily focus too much on just this order while other requirements become neglected. We have to approach every contract with the same sense of pride, professionalism, and urgency so that nothing slips through the cracks.

Although I won’t be in command when we deliver our first cannon system to India, I look forward to working with you to ensure that we shape our operational environment for success with this order. And if we do this order right, I am hopeful that follow-on orders from India or from other allied military will be in our grasp, too.

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Story continues on page 4, “India”

By John B. Snyder

Arsenal lands largest contract in a generation

to ... India

The Watervliet Arsenal has received a $47 million contract from BAE Systems to manufacture 145 how-itzer cannon systems that will support a $737 million foreign military sales contract that BAE has with the Indian government. This award took about eight years to finalize and is the largest single contract the arsenal has received in decades. Under the contract, the arsenal will manufacture M776 155-mm tubes and associated parts for BAE that will become an integral part of the M777A2 light-weight howitzer system that India will purchase from BAE. The U.S. Department of Defense and the Indian Ministry of Defence signed a Letter of Offer and Ac-ceptance on November 30 making India the third U.S. ally to purchase the M777A2 howitzer system. The other two countries are Australia and Canada. The size and importance of this order cannot be overstated, by the arsenal or by the Army.

“By far, this is the largest foreign military sales of the 155-mm towed howitzer system that we have on record,” said David Wong, the Army’s program man-ager for foreign military sales of towed artillery sys-tems. “And, there may be an opportunity for follow-on orders.” Long-time arsenal budget analyst Joseph Bell took Wong’s statement a step further by saying, “In the more than 30 years that I have been at the arsenal, there has not been a contract for ‘any’ product line larger than this India order. This is huge.” Arsenal Deputy Commander Joseph Turcotte add-ed, “That in an era of declining defense budgets, this order comes at the right time for the arsenal as manu-facturing requirements have dramatically weakened since the withdrawal of combat troops out of Iraq in 2010.”

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India Cont.

Left: Marines with Battery K, 3rd Battalion, 11th Marine Regiment, fire an M777A2 Howitzer in the Quackenbush Training Area at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center, Twentynine Palms, Calif., Dec. 3, 2016, during the regiment’s “Top Gun” competition. Photo by: Cpl. Levi Schultz, USMC.

Page 3: Soldiers firing 155mm howitzer rounds from an M777A2 howitzer with Task Force Blackjack, Bravo battery, 4-25 Field Artillery on Forward Operating Base Shank, Afghanistan. Photo by Staff Sgt. Nelia Chappell was taken in 2014.

The arsenal has a new contract to manufacture 145 of these cannon systems with the first delivery in 2019 and the final delivery in 2020.

The decline in workload has unintended conse-quences that go beyond the most obvious, which is the reduction of the arsenal workforce to compensate for a reduced workload, Turcotte said. An order of this magnitude should allow the arsenal to justify the full retention of the workforce through 2020, as well as set the conditions for machining excellence for genera-tions to come. “For the arsenal to retain its worldwide status as a center of technical excellence for large caliber weap-ons manufacturing, we must maintain a highly trained workforce that can execute all critical manufacturing skill sets at any point in time,” Turcotte said. “In re-cent years, it has been very challenging trying to main-tain a state of excellence in all of our core capabili-ties and so, this is the best possible workload for the arsenal to maintain a high level of expertise in all core critical manufacturing skills.” Tom Pond, the arsenal’s director of operations, said he believes that the effects of this order will not only allow the retention of critical skills, but should also grow the skill base here. “Right now, a significant number of our machinists and machine tool operators have not had the benefit of working in more than a few critical skill areas during their careers because the contracts have not been very large or as challenging as this order,” Pond said. “This order will bring us at least 106,000 direct labor hours, which will exercise every critical cannon manufactur-

ing skill set at Watervliet. In addition to the direct labor hours, thousands of hours of indirect labor will also be supported.” Additionally, this order goes far beyond the manu-facturing of howitzer tubes. The order will require the arsenal to manufacture other parts to the howitzer sys-tem, such as breech blocks, muzzle brakes, and breech rings. Each of the sub-parts to the order will require extremely tight machining tolerances that will be mea-sured in thousandths of an inch. Nevertheless, as great as this order is for the ar-senal, it will not solve all the ills of an uncertain and declining defense budget, Turcotte said. “As large as this order is, it will only help us fill the gap in workload requirements to sustain our current workforce through 2020,” Turcotte said. “But many of us here are hopeful that this order will put us (arse-nal) on the world stage for military weapons manufac-turing, which may lead to other foreign military sales.” The arsenal will deliver 73 cannon systems in fiscal year 2019 and 72 systems in fiscal year 2020. The fis-cal year begins on October 1 of the previous year.

According to BAE, the M777 howitzer is highly por-table by land, sea and air, and the system features a minimal logistical footprint alongside maximum re-liability. The maximum range unassisted is 24.7 km and maximum assisted range is 30+ km.

After 203 years, the arsenal is

still hiring

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By John B. Snyder

Story continues on page 6, “Jobs”

A lot has changed at the Watervliet Arsenal since it began operations on that hot summer day in July 1813. But the one thing that hasn't changed is the demand to have a professional, dedicated, and a well-trained workforce to support our nation's

warfighters

The arsenal has survived the ebbs and flows of de-fense budgets for more than 203 years by continuously transforming its operations and so, it should not sur-prise anyone to see the arsenal transform itself once again in order to fill approximately 100 current or soon to be current vacancies.

For decades, Baby Boomers were the largest demo-graphic pool from which the arsenal could draw from. But as the generation of Baby Boomers now leave the arsenal workforce in significant numbers, a concern here is how to replace this talented group who have found that manufacturing jobs gave them the quality of life that allowed them to buy homes, put their kids through school, and to now, enjoy their golden years.

This now leaves the arsenal forced to focus much of its recruiting efforts at what is called the Millen-nial Generation, those born between 1981 and 1997, depending on which historical tool used. This seems to make sense given that the Pew Research Center last April claimed that Millennials now surpass Baby Boomers as the largest living generation.

The challenge, however, is that nearly 50 percent of

Millennials believe they will be working at some other place one year from now. According to a May 2016 article from the Gallup Business Journal titled, “Mil-lennials: The Job-Hopping generation,” the Millennial generation does not have the same job loyalty as pre-vious generations.

Given that some occupations at the arsenal, such as a machinist, may take a new hire up to four years of education and 8,000 hours of hands-on training before they are qualified, it is critical the arsenal recruits for the long-term.

Additionally, many Millennials do not visualize a career in manufacturing due to their perceptions that manufacturing jobs are dirty, low-tech, and not very challenging. Those perceptions, albeit wrong, have directed far too many Millennials away from a career in manufacturing and from the arsenal.

When one combines those Millennial challenges with the recent report from the New York State Department

Job Fair Part 1 of 2

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Jobs Cont.

of Labor stating that unemployment in the Capital District for November was 3.9 percent, the arsenal’s recruiting challenge is at least three-fold.

The arsenal must compete for high-quality workers in a local job market that has less than four-percent unemployment, target a demographic that does not have a high propensity to consider manufacturing as a career, and that prospective em-ployees may not be as motivated as Baby Boom-ers to stay for a career.

The arsenal leadership un-derstands those challenges and now believes that they must transform decades-old recruiting prac-tices of partici-pating in job fairs outside of the fence line, com-peting with other government agencies and local busi-nesses for top recruits.

For the first time in anyone’s memory here, the arsenal conducted a job fair on its installation on Friday, Jan. 20, in a grand effort to reach Millennials. And, be-cause the job fair was on post, the arsenal did not com-pete with other businesses or government agencies.

“I have been here for 31 years and I cannot recall a job fair being conducted here,” said William O’Brien, the arsenal’s director of Installation Management. “Mil-lennials now make up the largest group of working-age individuals in America and they are the future of the arsenal. With more than 80 different occupations here, there are plenty of growth opportunities that will challenge every generation of workers, especially the

Millennial generation.”

O’Brien added that through the on-post job fair, ar-senal recruiters were better able to talk about how the arsenal uses of science, technology, engineering, and math in each of its production lines, as well as in several other job fields not directly associated with machining.

“We had some of our best and brightest team members available at the job fair to help us tell our story and to explain our career fields to prospective Millennials,” O’Brien said.

Nevertheless, the arsenal did not turn away any high quality ap-plicant, regard-less of his or her generation, said Tina Pond, the director of hu-man resources at the arsenal.

“The variety of career positions and the arsenal’s culture creates opportunities for all generations to succeed here,” Pond said. “We

believe that every generation is important, as each of-fers unique strengths and qualities that will make a dif-ference to our troops and to our nation.”

After all, the motivators that drove Baby Boomers to stay for a career at the arsenal, such as health care, paid vacations, and a pension, are still available to new employees, Pond said.

The goal of the job fair was to offer tools, tips and advice to assist applicants with the job search process and to explain how to maneuver through the Federal and arsenal hiring process. Recruiters were available to discuss the current and future status of job openings that will be offered in nearly 36 different career fields. Prospective applicants will still need to apply through the USAJOBS website at https://www.usajobs.gov/.

The Watervliet Arsenal Human Resource team supports numerous job fairs conducted throughout the community at such places as an American Legion post to the VA Medical Cen-ter. One of the challenges, however, is when the arsenal participates in jobs fairs off post it then competes with other businesses and government agencies.

Photos by John B. Snyder

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As the youngest Baby Boomer here now turns 52, the arsenal must turn its attention to the generation that has taken over as the largest population demographic in the country — the Millennials — to build the workforce for the future. For nearly 50 years, Baby Boomers, who were born between 1946 and 1964, were the largest population group at the arsenal. This fact should not be a surprise given that Baby Boomers by 1964 numbered more than 76 million in America, which was about 40 percent of the population. But as Baby Boomers now leave the American work-force, as well as the arsenal, in significant numbers, there is a concern here, and to manufacturing centers across America, as to how to replace this talented group who have tens of thousands of hours of experience. Recent studies have shown that Baby Boomers are turning 65 at about 10,000 a day. That leaves the arsenal now redirecting a lot of its recruiting efforts at what is called the Millennial genera-tion, those born between 1981 and 1997. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Millennials now number more than 83 million and represent more than one quarter of the nation’s population. Given that American demographics have changed, the arsenal must change, too.

Job Fair Part 2 of 2

To reshape the arsenal workforce for the next genera-tion of defense requirements, the arsenal leadership is placing a lot of energy behind workforce development strategies, which range from succession planning to the transfer of knowledge to a new workforce. Whereas, succession planning has been ongoing for several years, earlier this month arsenal Commander Col. Joseph Morrow took action to provide for a seamless transfer of knowledge. He directed the arsenal to conduct a job fair. At first glance, the fact that the arsenal participated in a job fair is not news. But what was new is that this was the first job fair conducted on the arsenal in more than 35 years. Morrow said the importance of conducting a job fair here is that he wants to build the workforce of the future now, by leveraging the tremendous depth of skills that reside with those who will soon retire. He said that more than 30 percent of the arsenal’s workforce could retire in the next few years and he wants that retiring workforce to share their knowledge with a new generation of workers before they depart.

Departing Baby Boomers, rise of Millennials, force changes

Story continues on page 8, "Jobs 2”

By John B. Snyder

Photo by John B. Snyder

Page 8 Salvo Jan. 31, 2017

In the weeks building up to the job fair, the arsenal’s director of Human Resources, Tina Pond, said she was a little concerned that the job fair may not interest a large number of prospective applicants. After all, the arsenal did not have any one who had experience in an arsenal-hosted job fair. And so, there was no historical record to help anticipate potential interest. Nevertheless, Pond energized the arsenal leadership and staff to give their full sup-port and boy, did it work. On Jan. 20, the arsenal conducted a job fair and more than 900 prospective appli-cants were met by the commander; the di-rectors of Installation Management, Opera-tions, and Human Resources; as well as by 25 other subject matter experts. The arsenal has about 100 positions in 36 career fields that are currently open or will soon be open. This full-court press was a significant change in how the arsenal has built its workforce. The arsenal has participated in a large number of job fairs in the last few decades, but that participation was always off post and supported by a few human re-source personnel. Having senior leadership and subject matter experts, from machin-ists to security officers, engage prospective applicants, allowed the arsenal to achieve great success as hundreds walked out satis-fied with the information that they received. The goal of the job fair was to offer tools, tips and advice to assist applicants with the job search process and to explain how to maneuver through the Federal and arsenal hiring process. Human resource personnel were available to discuss the cur-rent and future status of job openings that will be offered in nearly 36 different career fields. Applicants would still need to apply through the USAJOBS website at https://www.usajobs.gov/. A few things the arsenal learned from this job fair; there is tremendous value in conducting a job fair on post because there is no competition with other businesses or government agencies for high-quality ap-plicants and; that after more than 200 years of operation the arsenal is still perceived as a great place to work.

Jobs 2 Cont.

Top: One hour after the arsenal opened the doors for the job fair, a long line of pro-spective applicants are still braving the cold to get information regarding job oppor-tunities here.

Center: Human Resource Specialist Jennifer Pusatere, second from left, provides last-minute instructions to subject matter experts who were working the job fair.

Bottom: Arsenal Director of Human Resources Tina Pond, left, Director of Installa-tion Management William O'Brien, and Management Assistant Letoshia Abell get-ting fired up just prior to the job fair starting Jan. 20, 2017. This job fair was also supported by arsenal Commander Col. Joseph Morrow; Director of Operations Tom Pond; and by 25 other subject matter experts and staff members.

Photos by John B. Snyder

By John B. Snyder

NYS Legion Commander finds commonality, importance here

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Story continues on page 10, "Legion”

When the New York American Legion commander met the Watervliet Arsenal commander Jan. 19, both quickly discovered that they have at least one thing in common. Both took command of their respective or-ganizations last July. Beyond that commonality, however, they also found that both organizations, the American Legion and the Army’s arsenal at Watervliet, have much more in common that transcends the arsenal’s fence line. The purpose of Legion Commander John Sampson and his staff’s visit here was to receive a command briefing and a tour of the arsenal’s manufacturing cen-

ter, to include a visit to the Army’s Benét Laborato-ries. Although this was Sampson’s first visit here, the arsenal has also hosted the last two New York Legion commanders, as well as the last two national com-manders of the American Legion. Arsenal Commander Col. Joseph Morrow started the visit by walking Sampson through more than 200 years of arsenal history during a command briefing. Morrow highlighted that the arsenal has supported every U.S. military conflict, from the Battle of New

Photo by John B. Snyder

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Legion Cont.

Orleans to the battles today in the mountains of Afghanistan. One highlight that stood out from the command briefing is that although the buildings and machinery have changed since the arsenal began operations in 1813, the one thing that has not changed is the workforce’s strong sense of duty to the American warfighter. With briefings complete, Sampson was led by arsenal Foreman Scott Huber through two production buildings where tubes were heated to nearly 2,000 degrees and then pounded into the near shape of a finished product to a mortar inspection area where Sampson was able to feel the difference between a legacy mortar tube and a new lightweight mortar tube. Sampson completed his visit by being escorted through Benét’s product display lab by Alice Crayon, Benét’s deputy director, and Raymond Brands, Benét’s chief of Direct Fire & Armaments. Here, Sampson was shown some of the Army’s weapon prototype developments and potential future weapon systems that are undergoing research, design, and field testing. Throughout the tour, Sampson said that he was surprised at the massive defense manufacturing capability that resides in New York at Watervliet. He added that he will take the arsenal’s story and tell it at the state and national level because he believes the arsenal is so very important to national security that it must be told. Morrow ended the visit by suggesting to Sampson that both organizations, the Legion and the Watervliet Arsenal, should improve their coordination of support to those who have served, who serve today, and to those who will serve tomorrow. Photos by John B. Snyder

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By Heather Durr

Get SHARP: What to do about cyberbullying?

According to the National Crime Prevention Council, online bullying, called cyberbullying, happens when teens use the internet, cell phones, or other devices to send or post text or images intended to hurt or embarrass another person. Cyberbullying is a problem that affects almost half of all American teens. Teens and parents of Teens can take steps to stop cyberbullying and stay cyber-safe.

Cyberbully tactics include:• Pretending they are other people online to trick others• Spreading lies and rumors about victims• Tricking people into revealing personal information• Sending or forward mean text messages• Posting pictures of victims without their consent

When asked why they think others cyberbully, 81 percent of teens said that cyberbullies think it’s funny and:• Don’t think it’s a big deal• Don’t think about the consequences• Are encouraged by friends• Think everybody cyberbullies• Think they won’t get caught

How Can I Prevent Cyberbullying? Some teens feel threatened because they may not know who is cyberbullying them. Although cyberbullies may think they are anonymous, they can be found. Talk to your child about cyberbullying. Advise them to: • Refuse to pass along cyberbullying messages• Delete cyberbullying. Don’t write it. Don’t forward it.• Tell friends to stop cyberbullying• Block communication with cyberbullies• Not say anything on line that he/she wouldn’t say it in person, • Never share your Internet passwords with anyone, except your parents.• Never meet anyone face-to-face whom you only know online.• Talk to your parents about what you do online

For More InformationCheck out the following resources to learn more about preventing cyberbullying:• Cyberbullying.us provides cyberbullying research, stories, cases, downloads, fact sheets, tips and

strategies, news headlines, a blog, and a number of other helpful resources on their comprehensive public service website.

• www.stopcyberbullying.org has a fun quiz to rate your online behavior, information about why some people cyberbully, and how to stop yourself from cyberbullying.

• www.wiredsafety.com provides information about what to do if you are cyberbullied.• www.stopbullyingnow.com has information about what you can do to stop bullying.

All statistics from the 2006 Harris Interactive Cyberbullying Research Report, commissioned by the National Crime Prevention Council.

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LEAN CornerFrederick Taylor's

"Scientific Management"By Mark Ripley

For a change of pace, the LEAN staff want to introduce you to some people from the long history of Continuous Improvement. Frederick Taylor, 1856-1915, was born into a wealthy Philadel-phia family. He could have gone into the lucrative mortgage busi-ness like his father but chose engineering instead. In fact, he was the first industrial engineer in history and that entire engi-neering discipline was based on Taylor’s work. Taylor started at Midvale Steel as an apprentice machinist. But he was soon promoted to time clerk, then journeyman machinist, gang boss, machine shop foreman, research di-rector and finally, chief engineer of the works. He went on to other positions but focused on consulting. When Taylor became a foreman at Midvale, he expected more output from his men. In order to determine how much work should properly be expected, he began to study and analyze the productivity of both the people and the machines (although the word “productivity” was yet to be coined and the applied science of productivity had not yet been developed). This began his life-long fo-cus on the human component of production. As the result of his studies, Taylor became the first efficiency expert — the original time and motion study specialist. He applied scientific methods to obtain maximum output and this ‘scientific management’ led to a tremendous surge of affluence that lifted the working masses in developed countries well above any level recorded before. Future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis coined the term ‘scientific management’ in the course of his argument for the Eastern Rate Case before the Interstate Commerce Commission in 1910. Brandeis argued that railroads, when governed according to Taylor’s principles, did not need to raise rates to increase wages. Taylor used Brandeis’ term in the title of his monograph, “The Principles of Scientific Management,” that was published in 1911. The Eastern Rate Case propelled Taylor’s ideas to the forefront of the manage-ment agenda. In his book, Taylor emphasized that the employer and the employee will both prosper through his system. A company can have both high employee wages and low manufacturing costs that will create an environment where maximum productivity begets maximum prosperity for all. Much of Taylor’s work still stands today. But, as with many pioneers, others have built upon his lessons. For example, “The Principles of Scientific Management” was required reading in Japan after WWII and was a strong early influence in the development of the Toyota production system.