Operational Readiness Inspection on the Horizon Published March 2, 2009 By Lt. Col. Trevor Noel Mission Support Group Commander March 2009 -- If you are not aware of it our next ORI is on the horizon and scheduled for July 29 - Aug 4, 2010. To put it in more urgent terms, counting this drill the 180th FW has 36 drill days left before the ORI. With this timeline in mind, February drill is our "Kick off to the ORI" and several key steps have been taken to help the Wing establish the right focus and attitude towards our preparation for the ORI. Earlier this week our Wing Commander, Col. Mark Bartman, asked me to head up "Team ORI." I'm sure most are familiar with the name "Team ORI" but we have a lot of new members, me included, who are not familiar with this team and its purpose. My focus is to provide a detailed overview of "Team ORI" and its purpose, function and most importantly, its mission. Team ORI's purpose is to bring together key functional experts from throughout the Wing who are also key decision makers so we can crystallize our ORI focus and direction. We will have a SINGLE ORI plan, a plan established and managed by Team ORI. One of the major factors that negatively impacts how well a wing does on an ORI is "stove pipe" planning. This type of planning results in each organization doing "their own thing" making it impossible for the Wing to execute the ORI as one, which is exactly what we will be tasked to do. Each Group is represented on Team ORI with the respective members serving as functional leads for the process they own. As the functional expert they will be responsible for leading and directing those things their organizations are responsible for in preparing the Wing for the ORI. Team ORI will have a different look and mode of operation, with the most significant change being the size of the team. Team ORI will be limited to 12 - 15 members who are either senior members or the functional expert for a key ORI requirement. Below is the list of members already selected to serve as Team ORI: MSG Col. Trevor Noel Lt. Col. Gregg Biddle Lt. Col. Mike Masiker Lt. Col. Bill Giezie Senior Master Sgt. Rita Franklin Master Sgt. Ed Wagner Master Sgt. Amy Rodriguez Fighter Wing Lt. Col. Rob Michalak OPSG Chief Master Sgt. Michael Haas Lt. Col. Christopher Belli Lt. Col. Timothy S Moses Maj. Jim Spanbauer MXG Lt. Col. Lindsey Whitehead Chief Master Sgt. James Duty MDG Lt. Col. Amy Whitehead Please get to know the members representing your functional area and provide your input to them. Our mode of operation will primarily be one of planning, coordinating and decision making and most importantly leading all ORI preparation. Another difference is that under Team ORI each Group will establish its own ORI planning team which will include their function from Team ORI. The group specific ORI planning team will be responsible for handling all of their functional ORI requirements that contribute to the overall Wing ORI plan. Bottom line, this is where most of the work preparing the Wing for the ORI will take place. Finally and most importantly, Team ORI will lead the Wing on our ORI mission to achieve an OUTSTANDING on our 2010 ORI. I will be providing more details along our ORI journey but I would like to end by saying that it takes EVERY member in this Wing to get us that OUTSTANDING.