Posted on Jan 23, 2018
The Next New Military Specialty Should Be Software Developers
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I disagree with the author on this one. Manpower: If a function can be performed from CONUS (a non-deployable billet), I don't need to waste limited active-duty slots against that function. Retention: In light of the AF's perennial difficulty retaining positions that have lucrative civilian counterparts (e.g., pilots), there is little chance we will be able to retain successful, certified coders. Training: Knowing the retention problem, the reality is, the AF would become a training pipeline dedicated to getting coders up to speed and certified and then losing them to the IT industry. The pipeline would be costly and never-ending. This is a job for experts, and the experts are at Cisco, Google, AWS, MS, IBM, Raytheon, etc. We just need to hire them as direct-support contractors.
The Next New Military Specialty Should Be Software Developers
Posted from warontherocks.com
Government Contracts
Software
Software Developer
Posted 7 y ago
Responses: 1
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I understand where you are coming from...but there is a problem with that. Just for background, I work at a DOD program office that has a partial R&D effort. Here's the problem; 1) most of the developers have no military background. Not a problem, in itself, but very difficult for them to understand end users. 2) The "experts" that are at Cisco, Google, etc...are at Cisco, Google, etc. We can't afford the best and brightest. We either get the very incompetent or the young guns (who leave for better paying positions once they get a little experience). DoD could do it, if we treated coders/developers like military doctors. We pay for training/education and they have to agree to multi-year obligation. (on top of typical enlistment or officer contract)
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Col Joseph Lenertz
I think we just disagree on the cost/benefit trades. We already have 10 year contracts with pilots (max allowed by law), and it still doesn't work. The training pipeline and manpower needed to support an active duty coder force is CRAZY expensive (in both dollars and manpower billets), and takes billets away from aircraft mechanics and bomb loaders, which the Air Force really needs and HAVE to be Blue-suiters. You are correct that getting the good coders from industry would be expensive. We need our contracting officers to understand that, and be prepared to pay $500K annual (wrapped) rate for them. We already pay $350K (wrapped) for MITRE support. And, we should have no expectation that after 6 months of tech school and 3 years of OJT, we'd have a Blue-suit coder that's anywhere NEAR what we'd be getting from the IT world.
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