Total Force Fitness: a challenge for leaders

  • Published
  • By Lt. Col. Michael Higgins
  • 48th Surgical Operations Squadron commander
ROYAL AIR FORCE LAKENHEATH, England --  You'd have to be living under a rock these days to not notice how important the term "fitness" has become in our Air Force. Just driving onto the base in the morning, one sees scores of Airmen in physical training gear. Listening to conversations at lunch tables, between meetings and out in the work centers, Airmen of all ranks discuss and, at times, emotionally debate our new physical fitness test and standards. While so many of our Airmen successfully negotiate the hurdle of the test in fine fashion, more than 20 percent of our team are earning unsatisfactory scores and unfortunately the consequences of those scores.

Have no doubt, this important issue is of great concern to our leadership. At the same time, we remain in a fiscally constrained environment, engaged at a high operational tempo of sustained conflict, continually deploying Airmen around the globe; and leaving organizations and families in constant states of multi-tasking, recovery and crisis management. We expect individuals and our community as a whole to be flexible, resilient and always ready. The very nature of our way of life requires continuous performance, resilience and recovery of whole individuals, whole families, whole organizations and whole communities. The integration of mind, body and spirit into our traditional concepts of fitness and readiness is a paradigm shift. Leaders, we have an incredible challenge before us.

In December 2009, Adm. Michael Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, directed all the services to rethink our concepts of fitness, health, and readiness. Specifically, he charged the services to apply leadership and science and think holistically to provide 21st century definitions of fitness, health and resilience. Coined "Total Force Fitness," the model embraces eight different facets of mind and body domains: physical, environmental, medical, spiritual, nutritional, psychological, behavioral and social. The August 2010 supplement of the journal Military Medicine compiles much of the initial expert opinion of these areas. It is the infusion and assessment of these areas across an individual, family, organization and community that can give a picture of Total Force Fitness and true readiness. The growing body of both medical and non-medical evidence illustrates that each of these facets can and do have profound effects on another. Therefore, a holistic approach of integrating health and function is required for achieving total force fitness.

But how do we get there from here? I opine that we start from what simplistically we know works when applied: leadership. While from a procedural standpoint, moving physical fitness testing to an independent cell may have seemed appropriate, it fundamentally removed an incredibly important function from commanders. In a holistic model which requires the infusion and integration of thought, direction, resources and processes to measure outcomes, a commander's involvement, authority and leadership cannot be replaced. Our base has in place structures and processes which are capable of facilitating and directing these concepts through the Integrated Delivery System and the Community Action Information Board. This structure, initially designed as a holistic body with commander influence, became less effective as an integrating body as programs were implemented and evaluated often along functional lines creating a "stove pipe" effect.

In order to achieve the types of cross-functional effects on our wing along areas of physical fitness, alcohol use, resiliency, family support, etc., the participation and influence of commanders and other leaders at the IDS and CAIB is required. In addition, commanders will remain with difficult decisions to make regarding how business is done. We've all suffered the "just do more" and the "work smarter not harder" concepts. What then must we choose not to do? In considering Total Force Fitness as an indicator of readiness, are we measuring the right things? What courage is required to make such decisions? What environment must we create to allow our people and processes to flourish?

However, this leadership influence cannot occur in a vacuum. Holistic models require participation and integration of all levels of people across the community. To achieve the vision of Total Force Fitness will require considerable collaboration and more direct collegial interaction between agencies and leadership so as to allocate resources for processes that achieve measurable, effective outcomes. The power of disruptive ideas and innovation, concepts that change our patterns of business, cannot be taken lightly and will likely come not from those people in leadership but from those doing the daily grind of the wing's work or from the families supporting them. Challenging the "sacred cows" (flying schedules, service hours, administrative processes, etc.) of the organization will become important to validate our ways ahead. Utilizing organizations and individual skill sets that transcend boundaries will remain key (chaplains, flight doctors, key spouses, etc.). Keeping a legitimate connection to measuring what our Airmen and their families know and feel as important will be needed. Integrating communication processes throughout our operations to channel feedback and allow as much "transparency" as possible will be crucial to sustaining positive trends.

We are tasked and challenged with rethinking our view of what "fitness," "health" and "readiness" mean to us. The evidence before us suggests that we do need to rethink through it as they are intertwined and not mutually exclusive. The temptations are there for busy people to reduce issues to simple parts and then focus on those parts hoping for progress. Unfortunately, with interdependent systems, this approach often fails the overall goal. Despite the scores of wonderfully important programs, services, support and experiences we provide our Airmen, we remain stressed. There is tension regarding the topics of PT tests, alcohol use, poor decision making, administrative processes, operations tempo, "do more with less," etc. The issues are much deeper: issues of control, self-image, security, respect, self-worth, entitlement and power.

We're fond of saying that the mission is job number one. The common thread of the mission, organization, family and community is that of our people. The whole person, whole organization, whole community challenge is gaining momentum in the Total Force Fitness model. Leaders wanted. Leaders needed. Fight's on!