Preserving capacity, General Tom Lawson, Chief of the Defence Staff, Keys to Canadian SAR
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appealed for help in crafting the specifi ca- tions for training, an aspect that is not as well honed as the army's ability to write specs for vehicles or other capability. "In a resource constrained environment, it's caused us to look at our HR model, how we develop people, the education and training," he said in an interview. "I would argue that the model we have used – train the trainer, here are some materials, set up a classroom – that isn't serving us. That doesn't institutionalize the capability." Rather than schoolhouses for C4ISR, he wondered if industry might have online solutions, perhaps resources that could be delivered to a soldier in a vehicle. "[The army and industry] can both be creative about how we do this. I think there is an opportunity for industry to take some of the fantastic technology they are building and be creative in how we could institu- tionalize the education and training for these systems." C C4ISR A sk Colonel Stephen Hall what he most needs from the de- fence industry and the answer might surprise you. Hall leads the Canadian Army's C4ISR development program and, while solutions to fuse data from myriad sources into a comprehensive picture that can be securely shared across the Canadian Armed Forces and with allies are always welcome, what he most needs is help with education and training. "It's a little odd," he acknowledges. "Eyebrows go up: 'Training? How do I build training? That's not a box I can run on an assembly line and make money on.'" Take a second look, though, and it's not hard to understand why. Over the past two decades, the army has invested heavily – as much as $3 billion – in systems and process- es to improve its command, control, com- puters, communications and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities. Hall worries that many of those gains have not been institutionalized, and as a result what should be a high-performance system is not performing to expectations. "The biggest challenge is the institution- al part. It's not the engineering and it's not the technology. We have done a good job," he explains. "During the Afghan war there was certainly a lot of procurement, and some of it was quick to make sure equipment was getting overseas. But one could make the point that some of these are not complete capabilities yet in terms of all the training and education." Without soldiers trained on the full ca- pability of a system, or even a system of systems, the army is not capitalizing on its considerable investment, making future introductions problematic. Unlike a new vehicle fl eet that rolls out every decade, C4ISR is constantly evolving and requires highly trained users. During a brief presentation to industry at the recent Army Outlook in April, Hall by Chris thatcher 26 APRIL/MAY 2014 www.vanguardcanada.com THE ARMY'S C4ISR CHALLENGE MAXIMIZING CAPABILITY: