Vanguard Magazine

INTERVIEW or the involvement of the L1s in this space. Is the user community engaged enough in the important work you three are doing? If not, what are you doing to improve that? MGen Dawe: The short answer is yes. I am heartened by what I'm hearing from the service chiefs in terms of all things dig- ital. They get it, and they've got very com- pelling use cases in each of their services. The Canadian Army is deploying a Multi- National Brigade HQ to Latvia, which will need to be interoperable with an Al- lied Higher HQ. The Navy is sailing ships with our allies in the Indo-Pacific Theater routinely. And certainly, the Air Force has a lot on its plate with the onboarding of tremendous new capabilities and with NORAD modernization. So, the CAF senior leaders certainly don't need much convincing as it relates to the importance of the work that needs to be done in the face of these real and pressing challenges. I would further add that these challenges provide us with a great opportunity for some seismic adjustments to how we com- mand and control in the contemporary operating environment. Raj Thuppal: Fortunately, I have both Peter and Ross, because they are the ones who are going to proxy most of the L1s, at least for the big capabilities that we need to deliver. I'll give an example. For NORAD modernization, the RCAF commander is fully on, so I work very closely with him on all the communication systems-related projects. It's great to see that level of com- mitment and I'm sure that we see the same for different sectors. Ross and I work with the DM, ADMs, the CFO, and many others. So, there's quite a bit of enthusiasm within the de- partment. I think our challenge is to keep that enthusiasm by delivering quickly. If we take too long, then we lose momen- tum. Ross Ermel: I concur with what Peter and Raj said. The bottom line is that the L1s are very invested in where we need to go. In fact, they see a clear and present need for us to move towards digital, to be nim- bler, and to move up the digital learning curve. As I came on board, I saw my role was to bring coherence and to represent the user, but that doesn't mean that we're doing it once serially by initiative. It's to make sure that I set the conditions working with Pe- ter and Raj so that L1s see their potential future in terms of capabilities, readiness and business processes. So, do we have L1 engagement? Absolutely. Michael Rouleau: Q I'd like to just drill down on the issue of ongoing initiatives versus the coher- ence that you're talking about. There are pockets of progress that are being made across the organization, and those are to be celebrated, but with some of those initiatives come challenges. I'd like to explore that. Ross Ermel: And Mike, that's the core of the digital transformation operating model. We've partnered with an industry strategic partner on a series of workshops across L1s to start getting input as to what attributes need to be part of an overall model. To answer the questions: What are those digital initiatives that we can move on and how do we start to think about pri- 20 DECEMBER 2023/JANUARY 2024 www.vanguardcanada.com jective and then work our way backwards rather than the opposite? MGen Dawe: Before coming into this job, I would've looked at readiness through an entirely different lens, but in keeping with my previous comments about the central- ity of C2 interoperability, I would argue that it's even more pressing in this context. When we talk about C2 interoperability, it absolutely demands readiness. In fact, we refer routinely to day zero- or first-day read- iness and all that implies. When you think about it, without data tagging and catalog- ing, identity credential and access manage- ment or ICAM, data-centric security and zero trust, plus secret cloud environment, you can't join the club. What keeps me fo- cused, energized and motivated is getting to that. Michael Rouleau: Q I'd like to transition to the next ques- tion, which is about business ownership Canadian Army members of NATO enhanced Forward Presence Battle Group Latvia become familiar with new ISS Generation 2 communications equipment during Operation REASSURANCE, Latvia on 16 August, 2023. Photo: Canadian Armed Forces When you think about it, without data tagging and cataloging, identity credential and access management or ICAM, data-centric security and zero trust, plus secret cloud environment, you can't join the club. What keeps me focused, energized and motivated is getting to that. — MGen Dawe

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