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Being free from binding procedures allows them to make stupid decisions as well!

The link below is to a slideshow (stay with me here) describing Netflix's corporate culture strategy. Whoever put this together has a great grasp on how inflexible bureaucracies are created. Slides 44-77 are relevant. https://www.slideshar...0&startSlide=44 There are a lot of points that parallel observations recently made about the USAF: Company starts out with focus and high performance High performance creates growth which leads to complexity and chaos Complexity is fought with procedures and regulations Too many procedures and regulations drive away talented people Everything still seems fine until the market (battlefield) changes The company is now filled with process followers that cannot adapt quickly enough to change And the best line: "Company generally grinds painfully into irrelevance" Their solution is to focus on what they're good at and continually hire better people. Better people don't need as many procedures to do their jobs well. Netflix doesn't get distracted by additional duties (my words) and they let mediocre people go. They analogize their model to that of a pro sports team constantly looking for new talent. I'm not saying the USAF should be run just like Netflix. It's a very laissez-faire company, to the extreme of not even having a vacation policy. You just leave whenever you feel like it. They've also made some pretty buffoonerous high-profile decisions lately that seem to show a lack of temperament at the top. Also, a few slides later they specifically state that their management culture is more suited to a creative company than organizations primarily concerned with preventing catastrophic error (such as crashing airplanes). We crashed a lot of jets in the past which begat today's voluminous rulebooks. That said, I think we sure as hell could at least a learn something from this kind of thinking. It seems to say that inflexible, ineffective bureaucracy is inevitable and the best way to fix it is by raising the Lowest Common Denominator. The AF may be trying to do this with the RIF but unfortunately the stratification seems to be based on who's the best at following the damn processes. Thoughts? Can we ever get out of this downward spiral of bureaucracy?

A huge portion of the shit we carry across the Pacific is people's household goods. We might as well be a moving truck. It's pretty ridiculous that sorties are generated to carry couches around. My solution to this and many other problems in the AF: stop PCSing officers every 2-3 years!

It's probably because somebody used check marks instead of Xs in the signature block. This is the kind of error that could bring down an entire flying squadron; they must want to do the whole thing over just to make sure everything is kosher. But seriously, the Vol 2s have it all, specifically Chapter 5. But I wouldn't worry about studying that stuff, it looks like you have a checkride coming up!

Is it true that initially the GAU-8 didn't have enough dispersion so they made the gun slightly less accurate? Maybe to overcome said Aiming Error, i.e. to get more of a shotgun effect? I can't remember who told me that. I ask because it's so hard to see what's going on 20K' below.

The original Fixing Broken Windows strategy was aimed at people who would otherwise be spraying graffiti and breaking windows. We don't fit into that mold.

Whoa whoa whoa, nobody said anything about shuttering the Class Six. Or the gas station for that matter. That shit saves me 5 bucks a month!

Get rid of all BXs stateside. Just pass a law that allows military and retirees to buy stuff sales tax-free.

2) How are you getting around the power issue (for those of us that do not have a power outlet)? Battery is supposed to last 10+ hrs under heavy use. Up to a month on standby. 3) How are you updating it without plugging it in to the AF Network? Same way we update ePubs. An approved, spinning hard drive for a go-between. 6) How can I find out how much it would save our squad/group/AF to stop getting paper products from NGA? Supposedly will save Travis something like $1.4 mil per year. 7) What other things are you using it for (flight planning, PUB Reader, joining the mile high club by yourself while your CO is asleep, etc)? Probably light flight planning and absolutely for a pub reader. The best thing is that people can learn to write their own programs.

Still waiting here at Travis. What they were spearheading 18 months ago seems to have gotten stuck in committee. Lesson learned for me: if I ever have a budget and an idea, just buy the stuff, THEN tell people about it.

True, but I would guess, based solely on the number of replies to the Gucci Girls thread, that Baseops readers would much rather bitch and complain about silly PR stories than applaud guys that are cooler than them! I will do both. I am none of the above but I'd love to be doing this. As a KC-10 pilot I have no chance of cross-training so I hope run across the opportunity to steal a helicopter someday. Preferably from a foreign country as part of a daring escape like in the movies. That would be more likely.

Dammit I already ran out of positive votes before I got to this post. +1

Damn airspace is more crowded up there than I thought. But seriously, I'll drink my 2 beers tonight for them and the rest.

All of us at Dhafra thank you for your appreciation!

Top rated comment on YouTube: "This must be the next aircraft of the Hellenic Air Force!With this aircraft we will ###### the turks!Greetings to our orthodox brothers in Russia!!!!!!!" No wonder the Greeks are out of money. Much too worried about new and expensive ways to ###### Turks.

More Global Hawk propaganda from the functional manager: “The president of the United States said, ‘I need information now,’ ” Thomas said. “This was the only asset to provide that broad view.” Global Hawk served new role in Japan aftermath

At least now they'll all have plenty of time to get bullshit bullets so the Sq/Gp/Wg execs don't get all of the good follow-on assignments! [ducks]

Hey man I totally agree. There are lots of heavy dudes out there doing great things. I was just noting that there are quite a few heavy guys out there who can't (or choose not to) see much outside their world.

What you guys call Admin is our entire world. Lots of mobility pilots don't realize that or won't admit it. I love my squadron, I love my jet, and I think I'm pretty good at flying it, but I'm not delusional. The guys in my UPT class who went to fighters are light-years beyond me now. I'm comfortable enough with my life to admit that. Some will get very pissy about this.

“No one person or service is better than the other. We mustn’t forget that.” “I would say every job, no matter how big or how small, is important,” Waite said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re rucking gear up a mountain, or if you’re pumping s--- out of an aircraft.” Not true. I wish people would quit spouting this bullshit. Some jobs are absolutely more difficult than others, thus the people that do them are more important. Virtually anyone in the military could learn this guy's job in about a week. "Without me, the bathrooms don’t get serviced, cargo doesn’t get shipped on time, and bullets run out ... and the enemy wins.” Well ok, he's right about this, our shit trucks were broken for three months in the desert and so we just cancelled all the sorties and played xbox the whole time. The enemy definitely won a little bit there.

I'm probably in the minority here but I think the A380 is a pretty amazing airplane. I don't care who built it, 1.3 million pounds at .85M is a pretty significant achievement. Currently, Airbus is the company that's pushing the envelope in regards to jumbo aircraft. It will cause other manufacturers to build bigger and better things, which is good for everyone. As far as it's wingspan, airports should adjust to it IMO. It's not like the early car manufacturers waited around for nice roads to be built. Technology drives its infrastructure, not the other way around. Also, though the A380 has had some high profile taxiing incidents, it probably still has a better record than AMC!

Travis will stay that way as long as AMC keeps rewarding it with money and recognition.

True, there will always be plenty of people that want to be military pilots, but we would rather not have the ones that would otherwise be working at BK. Better pay helps bring in better people, period. That's a pretty low-SA, douchebag thing to say, dude. I don't care who you may or may not be. Yes, he deserves it and so do the rest of us. We joined the military knowing the retirement pay was an option and some of us figure it as possibly part of our retirement planning.

According to the link, the turbine that drives the fuel and oxygen pumps is 55,000 horsepower! The entire engine produce 1.5 million pounds of thrust. And they did all of this 50 years ago. Unbelievable.

The seemingly slight increase from 21% to 33% oxygen content that nitrous gives is enough to produce a shit-ton of extra horsepower on a given motor, assuming the fuel system can keep up. If it can't, the engine will run seriously lean and burn holes in the pistons. Twice the flame, half the candle. Top Fuel dragsters use nitromethane as a fuel which provides even more oxygen content. They produce over 6000 horsepower from a 500 cubic inch engine. They also need rebuilt after six seconds of use. All that said, if the Air Force decides to shit-can a whole bunch of OBOGSes, I'd be pretty curious to see what would happen if somebody slapped one on their POV!