General calls on contractors to partner on savings, technology Published Sept. 4, 2014 By John Parker Tinker Public Affairs TINKER AIR FORCE BASE, Okla -- The commander of the Air Force Sustainment Center recently addressed businesses large and small to encourage their partnership to boost the center's success through cost-cutting initiatives and innovation in technology in a time of smaller budgets and heightened world conflicts. Lt. Gen. Bruce Litchfield spoke Aug. 20 at the ninth annual Tinker and the Primes National Requirements Symposium at the Reed Conference Center. "We've got challenges out there," General Litchfield said. "But we're not going to hide from those challenges, and we're going to do everything we can as Airmen to make our Air Force better tomorrow than it is today. "If we can marry up the innovation in industry with the innovation we have in the government and what we're trying to do within our sustainment center, I think we've got a pretty good future," he added. "We've got great opportunities." The symposium drew hundreds of aerospace and defense companies and contracting officials interested in partnering with the Air Force to sustain its warfighting capabilities. General Litchfield said the Air Force Sustainment Center has been meeting its challenges by adopting a management model that strives for transparency from the "chief's door to the shop floor." The same principles are being applied across the AFSC, including Hill Air Force Base, Utah, and Robins AFB, Ga. "We're going deep and we're going wide, and when I walk around Robins Air Force Base I expect to see the same thing I do at Tinker, and when I go to Hill I expect to see the same ways there," the general said. General Litchfield has led the charge for "Road to a Billion," an initiative to attack cost drivers and historical business practices using a scientific, data-driven approach to save money across the organization. Eighteen months after the program began AFSC has reached a cost-savings/cost avoidance of more than $1.085 billion, changing the program's name to "Road to a Billion and Beyond." The AFSC Way, including the new AFSC 3.0 initiative, has returned approximately $500 million to the Air Force in cost savings and cost avoidance. According to the general, those resources can now be used elsewhere to modernize Air Force weapon systems and sustain readiness. "This is the basic premise," General Litchfield said. "The cost of readiness, the cost of what it takes to sustain our force, will determine the size of the force that we can afford. The size of our force will determine how we fly, fight and win the next war. "We're in a time of unprecedented conflict with a budget coming down, and we have to apply cost effectiveness discipline in our operations," the general said. "And why those two words together? 'Cost' because we have to be cost conscious and 'effective' because we still have to maintain the best Air Force in the world." Other Tinker leaders echoed the general's comments on increasing efficiency and reducing costs for the organization. Kevin O'Connor, vice director of the Oklahoma City Air Logistics Complex and guest speaker at the conference, described the complex as a "production machine" with the goal of increasing output while lowering costs and production time. He re-iterated the general's emphasis on innovation, "any service, any product that you can provide us to increase our throughput and increase our speed and make us more effective, we're interested in it." Tinker leaders hope their participation in the conference will increase partnerships with contractors to leverage cost reductions and efficiencies across the enterprise.