U.S. Army Female Engagement Teams: Assessment & Selection

Helpdesk question: What are the lessons on what worked well with the use of military Female Engagement Teams (both U.K. and U.S.) and what were the main challenges? Key findings: Evaluations of Female Engagement Teams (FETs) used by the military to engage with women in Afghanistan that are available indicate that: •Female soldiers have had a deescalating effect as Afghan males generally accepted females being searched as long as it was done by other females. •FETs have had positive engagement with both women and men and were viewed as a kind of ‘third gender’. This gave them the advantages, rather than the disadvantages, of both genders: they are extended the respect shown to men, but are granted the access to home and family normally reserved to women. •The right training, support, and working conditions helped FET effectiveness. However, very little independent analysis has been carried out. Unclear functions and a desire to be useful meant FETs engaged in a wide variety of disparate activities and there was a great pressure to report the activities of FETs as successful. This resulted in a tendency to cite everything FETs carried out as an achievement, without really understanding cultural dynamics. The US Army Research Institute found that there is a lack of standardization of FET assessment, selection, training, integration, and employment procedures. FET soldiers and their officers identified a number of lessons from their experiences of deploying FETs. These include: •Assessment and selection: Rigorous assessment and selection procedures result in higher morale and greater mission success. •Training: Training in rapport building and influence, and language and cultural skills is useful. Physical fitness training helps FETs carry out their missions and integrate with other units. •Integration and employment: Emphasising the value and skills of FETs can help their integration. Units which recognised the value of FETs were more likely to include them in every mission. FETs who were used according to their training and had a clear purpose were motivated to deploy again.

The research presented in this report represents the analysis of a study of the Al-Muthanna Task Group (AMTG) who were deployed in Iraq during 2005-2006. The interview program took place in August 2007. Unlike the ADF’s early deployments in the MEAO in 2003-2005, later deployments to Southern Iraq were trained in pre-formed units prior to deployment. It was, therefore, necessary to determine whether this team training mitigated specific problems that had been identified in the earlier interviews with returnees from the MEAO. Although the topics that were covered during the AMTG interview program correspond to these covered in the early MEAO interviews, this report focuses on the issues relating to preparation for deployment and related teaming issues. The findings are compared with those analysed from the early MEAO interview program and the enduring human dimension themes and lessons from the MEAO are highlighted. There are some differences in the interview sample between the two d...

SSRN Electronic Journal

2006

Military medicine, 2016

The U.S. Army is undertaking fundamental changes to prepare to meet the missions of the 21st century. Through initiatives focusing on 25 or more years into the future, the Army is working hard to capture and integrate to fully advantage emerging technologies, organizational structures, and operating procedures. However, Army leadership recognizes first and foremost the importance of its people--soldiers--to force effectiveness. In this regard, the Army is seeking to insure readiness of soldiers for future operations and future job performance. when the focus is on future jobs and future missions, application of the "scientific" methodologies traditionally used for personnel and training decisions is complicated. Central to these methodologies is description of the performances involved in or needed for job or mission effectiveness. Such description cannot of course be made with certainty when focusing on the future. That is, when planning for the future, the focus is on pe...

The U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences (ARI) conducts research to support Army personnel and training goals. In recognition of the changes emerging with the Army's transformation, ARI developed a research program to identify, describe, and address future personnel requirements. This report describes an aspect of an ongoing ARI project concerned with future enlisted Soldiers. The objective of this project, known as Select2l, is to provide personnel tests for use in selecting and assigning entry-level Soldiers to future jobs. This report describes the initial phase of the project that consisted of a futuristic job analysis. The job analysis produced projections of a taxonomy of the jobs likely existing in the future, the performance demands of future jobs, and the knowledges, skills, and other personal attributes important to effective performance of the job requirements. These products were foundations for development of prototype personnel tests. These products were also the basis for design and development of an assessment of the likely usefulness of the prototype tests for selecting and assigning entry-level Soldiers to future Army positions. Project Select2l is being conducted with support from the Army G-1, Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel, and from the Army Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC). ARI has briefed these sponsors, as well as representatives of other offices to include the Army Accessions Command, Human Resources Command, and the Army G-3, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations. Research sponsors have provided the support and guidance needed for the success of the research.

2000

Abstract As part of a research program sponsored by the United States National Research Council (NRC), US Air Force recruits at Lackland Air Force Base were tested in their sixth (final) week of basic training. A battery of psychometric measures (The Millennium Tests©) was designed for, and administered by, computer using a Windows-platform mouse interface. The test battery embraced five different measurement domains1.

2015

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Military Psychology, 2013