Christopher Lowman, assistant secretary of defense for sustainment, suggested focusing on materiel availability and operational availability metrics to build a proactive approach to measuring military readiness and sustainment.
“My hypothesis is that an increased focus on materiel availability, operational availability and other sustainment health measures offers a proactive approach that integrates the expected engineered performance with the realities of the sustainment phase to better understand fleet performance over time,” Lowman wrote in an opinion article DefenseNews published Wednesday.
He noted that shifting toward a more data-centric, proactive framework requires metrics that enable the sustainment community to anticipate challenges rather than react to conditions.
This approach will allow sustainers to access “a rich data set” from which they can draw fleet-level conclusions, prioritize resources and streamline supply chain performance and maintenance schedules.
“By pivoting to these sustainment health measures, we can transition from a solely reactive readiness-based approach to one that emphasizes fleet health, supply chain performance, cost and return on investment in the form of availability,” Lowman said.
Lowman will speak at the Potomac Officers Club’s Achieving Transformative Cooperation for National Defense Forum on March 14. Click here to register and join the discussion on the future of Combined Joint All-Domain Command and Control and its impact on international security.
