Consideration of enabling and enterprise functions within Defence force design

Abstract

Defence force design is the process for planning and designing the future Australian Defence Force (ADF) and its supporting organisation. Traditionally, force design has focussed on major equipment acquisitions such as ships or aircraft, not least because of the long lead time for delivery of such assets. However, there is a need for a coherent force design process that provides better long term planning for the enabling and supporting functions, in addition to the warfighting functions. This paper describes the novel application of a prioritisation method to assess investment options relating to supporting, enabling and business functions of Defence, which are collectively described as enterprise functions. These enterprise functions include, for example, capability acquisition, facility management, finance, military strategy, force design, science and technology, and the engagement functions with the rest of the Australian Government. The Australian Department of Defence operates a biannual cycle called the Defence Capability Assessment Program (DCAP), which is the analytical process that assesses strategic guidance and determines organisational design and investment priorities to achieve the Defence strategy. The various stages of the DCAP include collating gaps and opportunities, prioritising needs and developing force options, then assessing and prioritising these options. Selected options are included in the Integrated Investment Program (IIP) in order to maximise the overall benefit to Defence for a given budget across the next 20 years. DCAP has historically focussed on major equipment acquisitions, but the 2020 Force Structure Plan stated that Defence would return to government with a detailed proposal for workforce growth, which was then addressed within the DCAP 2020-21. This was the first DCAP with a primary focus on workforce. The DCAP is based on a Capability Based Planning (CBP) approach, which is best suited to assess the operational components of Defence that contribute directly to a warfighting scenario. However, it is conceptually difficult to apply the same approach to the enterprise force options. For example, is it possible to estimate the contribution of a pay clerk to the ADF defeating an adversary in battle? DCAP 2020-21 investigated innovative ways to assess 'enterprise' force options to improve these functions in parallel with the 'operational' force options, which were assessed through a CBP approach. The Best Worst Method was selected as the most robust, suitable prioritisation tool to assess the enterprise options. Representatives from every Group and Service of Defence were asked to generate a narrative of how each of their proposed force options mitigates risk to Defence objectives, including the targets set out in the Defence Corporate Plan. Each Group and Service then used these narratives to select their most-valuable (best) and least-valuable (worst) force options and to make a relative comparison of every other option against these best and worst. These pairwise comparisons were converted to a quantitative value score for each option. The individual lists were displayed in a visual 'stitching' tool that allowed linear scaling and translation of each list to adjust their position on a common scale. Facilitated discussion amongst the representatives generated an agreed list of the relative values of every option. These enterprise option scores were then stitched together with the operational scores for input to a portfolio optimisation tool and generate proposed portfolios of investment. This process demonstrated one approach to the treatment of supporting and enabling functions that complements the assessment of warfighting capabilities. When presented to senior decision makers, the enterprise scores were accepted as a fair representation of the relative value of the proposed options. The output of DCAP 2020-21 will underpin both the updated IIP and the Defence workforce growth options developed in response to the 2020 Force Structure Plan.