The Air Force is rolling out the most dramatic retooling of how it evaluates and promotes enlisted airmen in decades — and those airmen want to know more about how it's going to work.
"Our airmen are hungry for information," said Rob Frank, CEO of the Air Force Sergeants Association. "This promotion system is the biggest change in 45 years. Because we want all the info now, and don't have it, it's tough. Every audience I talk to, we talk about this."
After years of preparation, the Air Force started unveiling parts of the new system in 2014, beginning with the new feedback form called the Airman Comprehensive Assessment.
Related: Timeline of new enlisted promotion system
While many airmen might want to know everything now, the Air Force is keeping some of its cards close to its vest. In a Dec. 2 interview, Brig. Gen. Brian Kelly, the Air Force's director of military force management policy, said the Air Force is doling out information in a specific fashion, to ensure airmen understand each piece as it is put into place.
"We've purposely tried not to let them look ahead," Kelly said. "We've really wanted our airmen to focus on the task at hand. We don't want them, right now, to be too focused on the future pieces."
One such piece of information that is not yet being released, for example, is the percentages that will be used for the forced distribution, or quotas, of airmen most highly recommended for promotion under the new system. Those percentages will be unveiled this summer, Kelly said, and will first be put into place in November, for the closeout date for technical sergeants hoping to make master sergeant.
But a good amount of information is already known.
Quotas
One of the biggest changes is the elimination of the five-point numerical rating system that previously made up enlisted performance report scores. Over time, EPR scores inflated until most airmen received a so-called "firewall 5" out of five possible points, rendering the score effectively useless at differentiating between levels of performance.
Instead, beginning this year, supervisors will assess airmen's performance by choosing from a series of prewritten responses on the revised EPR form, which best describe an airman's duty performance. At promotion time, commanders will take eligible airmen's EPRs and slot them into one of at least four categories, the top of which will be for airmen who are most highly recommended for promotion.
The top two categories will have quotas so only a certain percentage of eligible airmen will end up with recommendations. Those quotas are intended to limit the number of top promotion recommendations, and prevent the firewall 5 effect.
But one tech sergeant in Military Times' online forums raised this issue:
"As a TSgt in a small AFSC [Air Force specialty code] but large squadron … Will I be in the same 'pool' as all TSgts in my unit?" commenter Zxc wrote in November. "My section? My AFSC? My AFSC within my unit/base? My base/wing? There's so many ways it could be split up, and depending on how they do it could dramatically alter the number [of] '5s' and '4s' they have to give out."
"Forced distribution will be across AFSCs, not by AFSC," Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force James Cody said in a Jan. 6 email to Air Force Times. "When a commander applies forced distribution, he or she will use the performance assessment along with input from supervisors at all levels to determine which airmen have the greatest potential for promotion, and therefore should receive the highest promotion recommendation."
But the Air Force has not yet decided at which level forced distribution will be applied.
Reader Jared Schlenker also said in a comment on Air Force Times' Facebook page, "Quotas confuse the hell out of me."
"So each squadron boss has to determine his top performers, OK," Schlenker said. "You've got a squadron like the Thunderbird squadron, comprised of the best of the Air Force. But only so many can be top performers. Then you have an operational squadron, same quota. So some of those Thunderbird maintainers are going to be rated lower than folks in other squadrons, simply by virtue of a percentage, even though they are supposed to be the best around."
In his email, Cody said the Air Force has no plan to adjust forced distribution for certain units.
"We certainly have great airmen across our Air Force, and we deliberately put high-performing airmen in certain positions," Cody said. "Our developmental special duties are one example. But that doesn't necessarily mean those airmen are the best or most knowledgeable in our Air Force. We have phenomenal airmen performing at a very high level around the world. Commanders will determine, based on their airmen's performance in that position, which of their promotion eligible airmen have the greatest potential for promotion and therefore should receive the highest promotion recommendation."
Minimum scores
Another significant change is that, for the first time, specialty knowledge tests and promotion fitness examinations will have minimum test scores required to be eligible for promotion.
Airmen must score at least 40 out of 100 for each test, and the combined scores must be at least 90. That means, for example, an airman who scores the minimum 40 on the SKT must score at least a 50 on the PFE to be promotion-eligible.
Airmen who are only taking the PFE, including those who have recently gone through retraining, will have their PFE score doubled to take the place of the missing SKT. Those airmen must score at least 45 on the PFE to meet the minimum combined score of 90. And senior noncommissioned officers taking the Air Force Supervisory Examination must score at least 45 to be considered for promotion.
Airmen who do not meet those minimum scores will be considered non-selects.
"How's it going to work if the number of people the AF needs to promote that year don't meet the minimum scores?" commenter Steve-OK wrote in the Military Times forum.
Cody doesn't think that will be a problem.
"As we looked at the minimum score requirement, we were very purposeful about making sure the score was high enough that our airmen would still need to apply themselves, but not so high that it would be unrealistic and we'd risk not having enough airmen meet the requirement every year," Cody said. "We went back and looked at more than 10 years of promotion records, and we have always had enough airmen score above the minimum requirement, so we're very confident enough airmen will meet that requirement in the future."
For example, airmen most recently selected for promotion to staff sergeant had an average SKT score of 66.03, and an average PFE score of 62.80 — well above the minimum requirements.
Favoritism in promotions?
Some airmen are convinced that the new system will lead to favoritism.
"The new system SCREAMS of the good ole boy club," commenter fufu wrote in Military Times' forum. "It will only make the GOB worse than it already is. Don't attend the [squadron] Xmas party? [Squadron] picnic? ... [Not] go to every [squadron] function? Not getting promoted."
Kelly said the new system won't lead to supervisors steering promotions to their favorite airmen and disregarding who is genuinely the best performer.
The new feedback form process will provide transparency that prevents that kind of favoritism, he said. Each year, an airman and his supervisor will have a detailed conversation about what the airman's goals and expectations will be for the coming year. When the time comes for evaluations, Kelly said, "there shouldn't be a lot of surprise for the airmen in terms of what they get."
And the feedback form is visible up the supervisor's chain of command. "There should be a very auditable trail for the entire chain of command to see and look at what's going on for this particular airman's performance, and there shouldn't be a surprise that, I suddenly picked my favorite out of the hat over here," Kelly said. "It should be linked to, how they're doing performance-wise. And it should be clear up through the whole chain. So there's some checks and balances, if you will, for the higher-level folks to see what's going on, and making sure that everybody's visible, and that somebody's not just moving certain people to the top of the stack."
Conversely, Kelly said, the feedback form should show through documentation when an airman doesn't do well in the evaluation process because he didn't meet his requirements — not because he isn't the supervisor's golden boy.
"I would expect on the other person's report, it would have to say, we're asking you to build 10 widgets a day and you're only building five widgets a day," Kelly said. "So there should be some documented performance beyond just personal values of 'I like this airman' [or] 'I don't like that airman.' There's a true discussion of performance, and a true discussion of the value of performance."
Does volunteering still matter?
Commenter Ripcord made a prediction in Military Times' forums:
"The days of the volunteer of the year or the PhD student getting a top rating without being awesome in their primary duties are over," Ripcord wrote.
It looks like Ripcord is right. Cody said that while self-development and off-duty activities such as volunteering will remain an important part of being a well-rounded airman under the new system, "performance comes first and is the primary factor."
"If an airman is not meeting job performance standards, then the off-duty involvement is not important," Cody said. "In fact, on the new EPRs, if an airman does not meet job performance standards, their supervisor will not be able to include comments about self-development or off-duty activities."
But an airman who does meet performance standards will see a benefit from his or her volunteer activities, Cody said.
"If an airman does meet or exceed job performance standards, then the other activities are absolutely important," Cody said. "We aren't completely discounting the importance of volunteer activities; we're making adjustments to ensure they don't outweigh performance, as that must be the primary factor we use to discern amongst our airmen."
Other changes
And there are other changes:
- Starting this year, airmen being considered for promotion up to technical sergeant will have only up to their three most recent EPRs considered. Only the EPRs produced on the static closeout date after an airman becomes eligible for promotion will be considered, meaning in the first year an airman is promotion-eligible, only his first EPR will be considered. This is intended to emphasize airmen's most recent duty performance. Previously, the Air Force considered the last five years of EPRs.
- The Air Force is increasing weighted EPR points to a maximum of 250 points, from the current 135-point maximum.
- The Air Force will begin phasing out promotion points for time-in-grade and time-in-service this year. That process will take three years.
- The Air Force is closing out EPRs for the same ranks at the same time throughout the year — at the promotion eligibility cutoff date — instead of staggering EPRs throughout the year. Under the old system, airmen were being evaluated in different time periods.
Stephen Losey is the air warfare reporter for Defense News. He previously covered leadership and personnel issues at Air Force Times, and the Pentagon, special operations and air warfare at Military.com. He has traveled to the Middle East to cover U.S. Air Force operations.
