Identification of supplementary metrics to sustain fleet readiness from a maintenance perspective

A wide variety of programs and schemes are in place (and many programs are in continuous development by organizations such as the Office of Naval Research) that address the sustainability of the Navy's Fleet. Newly developed technologies are allowing for the continued design and development of much more complex ships with a host of innovative concepts and requirements. The cost of construction of these next-generation ships, budgetary restraints, and other factors have also made it so necessary to maintain, adapt, and extend the life of the legacy fleet to meet operational requirements and maintain our maritime dominance. As we extend and adapt technology to become implemented across the wide variety of vessel platforms in existence in the legacy fleet, manning reductions are being implemented across the various ship-type classes. As more and more maintenance is being shifted from the sailors on the ships to various off-ship organizations, this brings into question the level of training necessary for ship's personnel in the maintenance area that is required when manning the ship from a tactical or operational perspective. Decision tools need to be developed for senior Navy management for use in evaluating and determining the optimal balance in manning ships from not only the operational perspective but also from the maintainability/survivability perspective. It is believed evaluation of the requirements, benchmarking, and the development of assessment metrics for determining the requirements of the Fleet for capable maintainers are of vital importance and will have far-reaching impact on the Sea Warrior, Sea Trial, and Sea Enterprise programs in support of the Sea Power 21 strategic concept of the Navy. This paper explores the necessity of benchmarking current ship's force capabilities, establishing manning requirement metrics, and evaluation of current maintenance policies.