The Naval Air Systems Command Diminishing Manufacturing Sources and Material Shortages Team (AIR 6.7.1.6) was named the 2007 DoD DMSMS Government Team of the Year at the annual DMSMS Conference Oct. 30 in Orlando, Fla.

“DMSMS mitigation is absolutely critical to weapons systems readiness and to life cycle sustainment cost. The issues that the folks here are addressing help us mitigate the risk from our supply base,” said Jim Hall, Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Logistics Plans and Studies. “I think the NAVAIR DMSMS Team is a great example of how to move forward in actionable ways to take an important concept such as DMSMS mitigation and turn it into the real day to day work that needs to be done to continue to support our platforms.”

The awards given at the conference by Hall, on behalf of the Defense Department, recognized government and industry teams and individuals demonstrating outstanding achievement in providing the nation’s military with increased operational readiness with reduced costs through the proactive management of DMSMS.

“It’s nice to see the team recognized for what we’ve accomplished over the last several years,” said Ric Loeslein, NAVAIR DMSMS Team Lead. “The NAVAIR DMSMS Team is a dynamic group that began its legacy by forming a local DMSMS working group. It’s nice to see that they’re recognized now, not only within the Navy, but within the DoD, as well. Navy is looked at in DoD as leading the way with some of the DMSMS programs, and NAVAIR is certainly at the forefront.”

The NAVAIR DMSMS Team consists of six people including three civil service personnel and three contractors -- Loeslein; Myrl Leach; Vinh Phan; Robin Brown; Rick Cahn; and Howard Pinnell.

During the award period 2006 and 2007, the NAVAIR DMSMS Team performed almost 400 DMSMS tasks, facilitated 3,600 man-hours of DMSMS training, recommended resolutions for 359 DMSMS cases with a combined cost avoidance of over $30,000,000. The NAVAIR DMSMS Team has directly supported 90 percent of all NAVAIR program offices by providing system support, plan building support and/or training.

The NAVAIR DMSMS Team originated as a part of the AIR 4.1D Aging Aircraft Integrated Product Team and has since transitioned to the AIR 6.7.1 Design Interface/Maintenance Planning Division. While the DMSMS Team is enjoying their award, they also realize there are still challenges ahead. One is being able to access a program’s bill of materials (BOM). Loeslein said that the DMSMS community is working on locating all the weapon system BOMs into a common DMSMS tool so that all NAVAIR platform specific programs can access them.

“The Weapons System Program Offices need to be in lock step with their industry partners to effectively manage and mitigate DMSMS proactively,” said Alex Melnikow, DoD DMSMS Working Group Chairman.

With that in place, NAVAIR programs, working with the DMSMS Team, will be able to perform proactive obsolescence mitigation to address DMSMS issues before higher cost solutions are required. Program offices will be able to review case solutions on common components to assist in their decision processes for deriving solutions that are specific to their platform, thereby greatly reducing duplication of effort.

The NAVAIR DMSMS Team engineer, Vinh Phan, said that this award marked a major milestone in his career and analyst Robin Brown said it raised the bar for even more efficient DMSMS management to ensure operational availability to the war fighter.

“We are not stopping here,” said Howard Pinnell, logistics analyst. “We will be identifying common solutions across platforms in NAVAIR and DoD to further assist in the reduction of cost and improved readiness.”

DMSMS Team logistics analyst Rick Cahn indicated that his work in mitigating DMSMS issues is a true reminder for who everyone at NAVAIR truly works for – the Sailors and Marines.

“Now we need to take it a step further and continue to improve upon the support we are currently providing,” said Myrl Leach, NAVAIR DMSMS Logistics Analyst. “We need to expand our work with the programs and develop more synergy.”

In addition to the NAVAIR DMSMS team award, Lt. Col. Bill Hidle, V-22 Deputy Assistant Program Manager for Logistics, earned the government individual award.

“It really means a lot,” Hidle said. “There’s no individual solely responsible. My team has done a fantastic job. I think the reason that I was flattered and got the award was because we really are where the rubber meets the road. We actually did what we said we were going to do and produced the results. I’m very honored.”

In addition to the awards garnered by NAVAIR organizations and personnel, the efforts of one of NAVAIR’s close industry partners were also acknowledged. The V-22 Bell-Boeing/Manufacturing Technology contractor team earned the industry team award by reducing their program’s DMSMS processing time from 150 days to 50 days, thereby clearing a backlog of 400 cases.