Implementing an outcomes-based training and education (OBT&E) program is not for those who would be popular. It requires hard work and the willingness to break established patterns. However, even before it is fully implemented rapid improvements in creativity, energy, and enthusiasm result, and when properly executed, it clearly produces better training outcomes.
I have used the techniques at three schools, each with very different types of students: the Captains' Career Course at Fort Benning, Georgia, which trains newly promoted captains mainly in planning and coordinating tactical operations; the 198th Infantry Brigade, also at Fort Benning (the unit that trains all the Army's newly enlisted infantrymen); and now with cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. These were not solo efforts. Each has required the hard labor and persistence of many talented subordinates and the assistance of like-minded experts willing to help educate leaders.
Getting started required the strong support and encouragement of commanding generals who saw the need for a better way and were willing to take the risk of trying something different. I have seen only two patterns: support and encouragement from a commanding general but reluctance and foot dragging from his staff, or opposition from a general reinforced by vigorous staff efforts to suppress OBT&E. (This case kills it, of course.) I have not yet seen a staff working to provide active support and assist the change, although there are always a few brave individuals who offer furtive help.
This experience makes sense when one considers how disruptive OBT&E is despite its fundamental basis as a simple idea: results matter more than processes. Measure outcomes, not inputs or processes.
The impetus for this stemmed from several observations. First, the level of individual skills in units was often too low to allow them to easily change the way they did things, even in combat. Soldiers often knew only one course of action, and generally had little understanding of why they did it that way. Second, our training seemed to increase rigidity rather than the desired adaptability. A pronounced predilection for "the approved solution" blinded people to opportunities and made it difficult for them to see the existence of other possibilities.
Third, because our training considered each task in isolation, it not only worked against the way people learn, but caused us to miss that advances in one area (marksmanship, say) often came at the expense of other areas (confidence, problem solving, initiative, accountability).
Finally, it became apparent that tests provided a better measure of how well we executed a training plan rather than how well those plans worked. This was not a conscious deception, merely a collective failure to consider the bigger picture. The more efficient we became, the more rigid the controls and we were less adaptive. We assumed it all worked. The institution seized on much information that confirmed the assumption, and filtered out or distorted contrary information. It is doing so still.
Enter OBT&E. Putting this into practice requires four broad changes. Leaders must first define precisely what they are trying to accomplish (outcomes) and what will be seen when it is done right (observable measures of effectiveness). This is difficult, requiring much hard thought and group buy-in, and is also uncomfortable in an institution that centralizes planning. These outcomes and their associated measures of effectiveness become the basis for all training and assessment.
Second, the commander must set conditions. This includes finding and changing rules that prevent deviation and neutralizing outside vetoes (range-control procedures, ammo distribution processes, quality-control inspectors, etc.). It also means changing systems. The Army's current task-based training system has co-evolved with numerous scheduling and support systems, all of which prevent meaningful change. The commander must first break these systems, but then develop and implement new ones that perform the beneficial functions of the originals without doing the harm. This is slogging, unglamorous work, which if omitted, will virtually guarantee that OBT&E will not outlast the commander who implemented it.
Third, it requires developing leaders. OBT&E replaces scripts and set-piece instruction with trainers who know the material, are empowered to experiment, and held accountable for their results. They have to be able to perform the skills and explain why things are done that way.
Leaders operate under two main constraints: lack of resources and a rule that they may not make progress toward one outcome at the expense of another. In the previous example, progress in shooting cannot come at the expense of confidence or understanding. If so, the leader must find another method. Perhaps surprisingly, the most difficult part of developing leaders is convincing them that they have the power to try new approaches. Most are reluctant at first, some even deeply suspicious. OBT&E's embrace of leaders doing different things in different ways also causes staff angst as it makes the old centralized scheduling systems impossible to use.
Fourth and last, OBT&E requires a new method of assessment. Leaders at all levels have to measure progress against all outcomes. The basic technique involves randomly selecting individuals and giving them problems
different from any they have previously encountered which they must use their newly developed skills to solve. These ongoing assessments provide insight not just to the level of skills, but into character and problem-solving traits. They provide feedback on needed program changes and are also the means by which leaders are held accountable for their results. Soldiers, like all people, train to the test. Therefore, designing the right test is crucial as it will drive the entire training program. Building tests that leaders cannot game means they have to train their Soldiers to think as well as to apply their skills.OBT&E works. In fact, the results can be spectacular. Soldiers not only learn skills better but also become much more comfortable making decisions, exercising initiative, and accepting responsibility for their actions. Leaders almost always end up working harder but report much more job satisfaction because they have a good deal of control over their destinies. It can appear to be a magical transformation within a unit if one is not aware of all the work that went into it. However, OBT&E will disrupt many supporting processes and is almost guaranteed to create resistance from outside the unit. Overcoming that requires the commanding general's support and a great deal of persistence. But the payoff is worth it: leaders and Soldiers who are much better prepared for combat.