AFSO21: A new way to put out fires

  • Published
  • By Ed Constantine
  • 354th Fighter Wing AFSO21 office
EIELSON AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska (AFNS) --  Many people tend to 'fight fires' in their professional and sometimes even in their personal life. Problems pop-up and seem to spread like wildfire and a lot of time and energy are spent trying to put out the 'fires.' Unfortunately, with manpower and funding shortages, it is easy to fall into the trap of seeing firefighting as a way of life.

Most firefighters/supervisors look at the 5W's -- who, what, when, why, and where -- when trying to address these issues. What most do not realize is that they often are addressing symptoms and not the root cause of the problem. The 5W's may help you make the symptom go away, but the problem is likely to resurface if the root cause isn't addressed. The inspector general of the Air Force is now requiring the AF-Approved Problem Solving Model to be used when answering any major command IG findings.

The AF-Approved Problem Solving Model comes from the playbook published by AFSO21 office. The playbook lays out the eight steps of the problem solving model. They are Clarify & Validate the Problem, Break Down the Problem / Identify Performance Gaps, Set Improvement Targets, Determine Root Causes, Develop Countermeasures, See Countermeasures Through, Confirm Results & Process, and Standardize Successful Processes. Key to the success of the 8-step model is the 4th step, determine root causes.

The easiest tool for determining root cause is the 5-Why's. It is the process of repeating the question Why? five times, more or less, until you have found the root cause. 

The Lincoln Memorial provides an excellent example. There was excessive wear on the Lincoln Memorial from all the cleaning it was getting because of bird droppings. The Park Service experimented with different cleaners and brushes to cut down on the wear. 

That didn't work so they looked at it differently and asked "Why are we cleaning it so much?"  Because of all the bird droppings.

They put up nets to keep the birds out and it worked some but not well enough and the tourists complained about them. They went one step further and asked "Why do we have so many birds coming to this monument?" 

After studying it they determined it was because of the insects that swarmed the monument in the evenings. They tried different types of insecticides but nothing seemed to work for long. So they asked "Why do we have so many insects swarming the monument?"

They determined the bright lights that illuminated the monument in the evenings were drawing the insects. They found out that by turning on the lights one hour later each evening they could eliminate more than ninety percent of the insects and the resulting bird droppings. The brushes and cleaners, nets and insecticides all addressed symptoms of the root cause. The root cause was the lighting and once it was addressed the problem went away.

As you can see, something as simple as replacing the 5W's with the 5 Why's can help you to stop fighting fires by addressing the root cause instead of the symptoms.

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