Survey helps turn things around

  • Published
  • By Jeanne Grimes
  • Oklahoma City Air Logistics Center Public Affairs
TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. (AFPN) --  Great deeds can be built on small gestures. And with a good plan, it is possible to turn a unit around on a dime.

When Vicki Preacher came here in July 2001 to fill the top post in the environmental management directorate, she found problems with morale spilled onto the mission.

“There was considerable room for improvement,” Preacher said.

She knew there were problems, a feeling reinforced first by a chief of staff of the Air Force climate survey and later by a separate survey Preacher conducted in-house.

The results of both, she explained, “let me see the areas we needed to focus on.”

Topping that list was the conception among employees that their work was unappreciated by their supervisors, the base leaders and the Air Force.

With her staff, Preacher chartered an employee work group to “fix” those areas identified as problems by the surveys.

“I started doing director’s calls once a quarter and recognizing all award winners,” Preacher said. “Employees enjoyed the public recognition, but what they really wanted was the day-to-day pat on the back. They wanted someone to say ‘You did a good job on that.’”

Soon, deserving workers were earning kudos for their efforts on the job. Some of the recognition was informal -- candy in a box bearing the message “You’re Appreciated” -- and some were more traditional. Preacher created a director’s award, and directorate officials also initiated a peer award. In time, quarterly award winners vied for employee-of-the-year honors.

In July, the directorate drafted a strategic plan which Preacher briefed to all employees. The plan identified the directorate’s values, focus areas, measures of success and vision.

The surveys also pointed to problems in the area of communications.

“The employees felt they didn’t know what was going on in the organization,” Preacher said.

A quarterly online newsletter was the solution to keep the directorate’s 75 workers in the know.

At the same time, directorate officials began conducting annual program reviews. Those provided a forum for all the program managers to brief Preacher and other supervisors. And employees now file weekly activity reports.

“I meet one-on-one with each staff member annually,” Preacher said.

Preacher admits she is a hands-on director.

“I get out, and I wander around,” she said, “and the employees really do like that.”

The directorate recently won recognition as the best environmental office in the Department of Defense.

Given Tinker had not received a major environmental award since 1996, Preacher said she takes the laurels as proof the changes she has affected in the directorate are more than cosmetic, although there is some of that, too.

“(Ours) is the oldest building on base,” she said, “and nothing has been done to this building for a really long time.”

That is changing now, with directorate people contributing sweat equity in efforts to renovate office space and modernize common areas.

“The people here have so much potential. They just needed someone to push them in the right direction,” Preacher said, explaining that the surveys pointed out that direction. “I’m agreeable to most anything if it’s good for the workplace.”

Air Force active-duty, Reserve, Guard and civilian employees can give feedback in the 2003 Air Force Climate Survey through Nov. 23 online at http://afclimatesurvey.af.mil.