Mandatory new form key to guiding officers’ careers

  • Published
  • By Maj. John J. Thomas
  • Air Force Personnel Center Public Affairs
RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFPN) --  Force development becomes more tangible for all officers, lieutenant colonel and below, who face assignments next year as they must complete an online Officer Development Plan, which is replacing the old preference worksheet.

A "transitional" version of the form will be available on the Air Force Personnel Center Web site this week, officials said.

Under the plan, those up for permanent changes of station in calendar 2004 will have to fill out the form by logging on to the personnel center’s assignment management system.

It marks the launch of the revamped online assignment preference portion of the new force development concept. Filling out the form starts the force development review for each officer.

“It’s their way into the process,” said Col. Kathleen Grabowski, chief of assignments programs and procedures here.

An officer's plan is then reviewed by the appropriate people in the chain of command and in that officer’s career field, the colonel said.

“Ultimately, it’s what the development teams will use to validate career goals and recommend the best next type of assignment for each officer,” Grabowski said.

That recommendation will then be used by assignment teams at the personnel center to best match Air Force requirements with each officer’s expressed career goals.

“The bottom line is still Air Force needs,” Grabowski said. “That hasn’t changed.”

Filling out the form is similar to accomplishing the old ‘preference worksheet,’ officials said. But there are different blanks to fill in and some new questions to answer that will give career field leaders more of the information they need to put the right person in the right job at the right time.

Officers will be asked questions about career plans, goals and duty preferences. There is also room for airmen to enter comments they think are important for reviewers to know.

Reviewers will also have an area where they can record additional recommendations to the development teams. Officers will be able to update the form as often as they and their reviewer think is needed, officials said.

“The more information we can get up front on the ODP about an officer’s plans and the needs of his or her career field, the better the development team can guide an officer’s career,” said Col. Christopher Miller, director of assignments here.

Unlike with the preference worksheet, officers will get feedback -- or a ‘development team vector’ -- recorded on the form itself once their development team reviews it, officials said.

“The development team will evaluate an officer’s preferences and reviewer recommendations, and then (they will) give feedback to the individual and the reviewer about a reasonable development path,” Miller said. “We also hope to realize an overall time savings for both officers and their commanders by bringing the factors that affect these decisions into finer focus right off the bat.”

“These are big changes everyone should take note of because this form will be very important to their careers,” Grabowski said. “Development teams need to know as much about an officer as possible to guide careers, and the ODP will be the repository for a lot of that information,” she said.

“We’re using this ‘transitional’ form because force development is moving ahead and we’re not going to slow the process to wait for the 100-percent solution on this form," Miller said. "The transitional ODP will do the job for us until the full-fledged (version) is ready to go.”

The format of the development plan’s online form will be honed further when it drops its ‘transitional’ label and a final version of the ODP is fielded sometime next year, officials said. (Courtesy of AFPC News Service)