VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. – The Commanding Officer of Combat Direction Systems Activity (CDSA) Dam Neck has awarded three on-the-spot awards for contributions to High Velocity Learning (HVL) this quarter.
High-Velocity Learning (HVL) is one of the four “Lines of Effort” (LOE) that Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) ADM John Richardson made last year to help achieve the Mission Priorities laid out in the Navy’s “Design for Maintaining Maritime Superiority” initiative. HVL is also one of Naval Sea Systems Command’s lines of effort to “Expand the Advantage” in the NAVSEA Campaign Plan.
"We use HVL at Dam Neck to give every employee a voice in their work place - empower them to speak up. We have be able to address issues here at the command that may not have previously been socialized and it give us an opportunity improve something, whether it be one of facilities, process improvements, cost savings or anything else," said CDSA Dam Neck Commanding Officer, Cmdr. Andrew J. Hoffman. "We've had eighteen inputs so far this year and have made some important changes due to HVL."
CDSA developed an HVL Tracking Tool on Sharepoint that enables employees to upload any issue they see that needs collaboration and attention. Once it is populated in the “See” phase, a Swarm Lead is assigned to swarm and solve the issue. It is then open for input from anyone in the command during the “Share” phase and once the initiator feels the issue is solved, it is moved to the “Sustain” phase and re-evaluated.
Amanda Cochren, from the Combat Systems Support Branch, was submission judged to be the first winner of a cash award in CDSA’s High Velocity Learning Tracker. Her recommendation for a quicker Ship Self Defense System (SSDS) Engineering Change Proposal (ECP) Implementation Process will speed up how actions are tracked and completed and will ensure the ECPs can be implemented in the necessary timeframes. She swarmed the idea with a team that will result in more upfront recording of actions and scheduling of timelines for action completion as well as a standing status meeting to follow-up on actions from approved ECPs.
Joe Kelly, from the Surface Ship ASW Systems Branch, recommended a better way to document where branch priorities should be focused while engaging the branch in process improvement and implementation. This should lead to better sharing of information among the workforce, new employees and leadership.
Roger Messer of CDSA’s Information Management branch, promoted the use of the Defense Switch Network phone – also known as the DSN line – to make calls to other military installations, which will dramatically reduce the command’s long distance charges. He created a DSN page on CDSA’s Sharepoint site, with links to common DSN prefixes and dialing instructions, as well as All Hands emails and other messages to further communicate how this simplistic habit can save the command money.
"Once we educated the command on the use of HVL, we found many useful ways to use it to solidify and better our ways of doing business" said Hoffman.