A recent visit to Europe and a conference in the Middle East by the Indianapolis site director and deputy provided an opportunity to gain an understanding of customer's issues in their own environment.
The visit by Greg Schmalfeldt, director, and Paul Gass, deputy director, focused around the Army Central Command Theater Financial and Comptroller Forum in Qatar but yielded opportunities to meet customers in stops prior to and after the conference.
On the way to the conference, the duo, along with German Rendon, DFAS Expeditionary Support Organization director, stopped in Stuttgart, Germany, to visit with representatives from United States Africa Command and United States European Command Resource Managers (G8s).
"Our visits to AFRICOM provided us the opportunity to meet face-to-face with the customer on their turf," Schmalfeldt said. "It allowed us to put together a complete picture of what is happening in the continent of Africa and how this mission is supported by the Army."
During the visit to EUCOM, Schmalfeldt and Gass conducted a town hall meeting to listen to concerns and communicate the mission of Indianapolis to the group.
"It seems simple, but our ability to visit major Combatant and Army Commands throughout Europe and Southwest Asia provides significant value to both our customers and DFAS," Gass said. "Our customers mentioned time and again just how much they appreciate us taking the time to come see them and listen to their specific and unique concerns and needs."
Following the quick stopover in Europe, the group headed to Qatar for the FM Forum in Doha led by U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Brad Deyer, ARCENT commanding general. Highlighting this year's forum was a visit from the Honorable John Whitley, Assistant Secretary of the Army (Financial Management and Comptroller). Whitley delivered opening remarks at the three-day conferences.
"It's good for us to get the 'on the ground' picture of what is happening in ARCENT," Schmalfeldt said, "and build the relationships with the different leaders across the Army and Special Operations Command who are actually executing the ARCENT mission.
"ARCENT is a $12 billion a year operation with seven physical locations that are very spread out in the region and supporting 20 different countries. This conference helped us understand how that translates into priorities for us."
Schmalfeldt related that the area runs under 13 different funding authorities so "it gets to be a very complicated financial picture and we need dedicated people here that actually understand that picture."
For first-time attendee Gass, the FM conference provided an opportunity to gain insight into the top priorities for the Middle East area.
"Qatar is a very important gathering of finance subject matter experts and leaders directly supporting the warfighters in the Southwest Asia theater of operation," Gass stated. "I gained a great appreciation that DFAS is involved in every financial and accounting aspect of supporting these Warfighters. Our invitation to this forum makes complete sense as DFAS is consulted continuously to support 24-hour operations."
During the conference, Schmalfeldt presented a one-hour session on "DFAS Support to Deployed Operations." The group was also able to meet with and listen to what was going on in theater from the represented commands at the conference.
"This was our chance to talk to the different commands that he's (Dreyer) supporting," Schmalfeldt said. "When you're looking at the theater of operations there, you get the full briefs on what's happening and where the priorities are, along with a good understanding of how the theater works."
The theater FM Forum is designed to be a venue to not only coordinate efforts among community professionals, but also to reinforce pathways to open communications as well as strengthen relationships among leaders in financial management across all levels of Defense operations.
Among the other attendees was U.S. Army Maj. Gen. David Coburn, U.S. Army Financial Management Command commanding general, also headquartered at Indianapolis.
The group concluded their visit with a stop in Vicenza, Italy, to visit the AFRICOM G8 and the Financial Management Support Unit headquartered there.
| Date Taken: |
01.04.2019 |
| Date Posted: |
12.31.2019 14:21 |
| Story ID: |
357947 |
| Location: |
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA, US |
| Web Views: |
39 |
| Downloads: |
0 |
PUBLIC DOMAIN
This work, Indy Ops leaders visit Europe, Middle East, by Steven Lawson, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
Subscribe
