Attention Drives Excellence In All That You Do

  • Published
  • By Col. Steve Arquiette
  • 60th Air Mobility Wing commander
TRAVIS AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. --  This upcoming week Team Travis welcomes our commander, Air Mobility Command Gen. Art Lichte and his command chief, Chief Joe Baron! During their stay, they will tour the base and most importantly meet with you, the Airmen and families who make Team Travis so unique and special, to see how well we do business and to thank you for your contributions. We'll have a chance to show off many of our Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st Century accomplishments as well as provide them feedback on the many successes and challenges we see.

Our exceptionally strong performances during the recent major inspections conducted by the AMC Inspector General's teams reflect the great pride and professionalism that make us stand out. Congratulations to Col. Tony Hinen's 615th Contingency Response Wing team for their "Outstanding" Logistics Standardization Evaluation Program inspection results!

While we in the 60th can all be very proud of earning very strong "Excellent" scores in our three inspections, it's the IG's comments and actions that tell the rest of the story. The Unit Compliance Inspection was the "best seen in two years" and we were presented 91 individual and team awards -- an IG "world-record" as the most ever given to a unit! The Emergency Management Exercise was "the best seen to date" and our LSEP inspection just missed being graded "Outstanding" by the ever-so-slim margin of .5 percent! One or two small attention to detail steps most likely made the difference in achieving the top score that everyone worked so hard to achieve.

That said, my thanks to all of you, for the great job is not diminished, but it does offer an opportunity to grow stronger by reflecting on an old yet very wise writing. It goes like this:

"For want of a nail, the shoe was lost; For want of the shoe, the horse was lost; For want of the horse, the rider was lost; For want of the rider, the battle was lost; For want of the battle, the kingdom was lost; And all for the want of a nail."

These lines are from Shakespeare's play "Richard III," describing how King Richard fell from his horse in battle because a blacksmith hammered one too few nails into the horse's hoof.

Regardless of where you work on Travis, your attention to detail played a key role in Team Travis achieving our overall "Excellent" ratings as well as achieving superb results in our global air mobility mission. Make no mistake about that!

The inspection gave each of us an opportunity to compare ourselves against the Air Force standard for our respective Air Force Instructions. Getting that edge may have been a challenge. Now that the inspectors have gone, keeping that edge becomes our new challenge. Like a professional athlete, you're in tip-top shape. That took months of disciplined effort to achieve. And as any athlete will tell you, it's much easier to stay in shape than to get in shape.

Yes, details matter. And not just here at home station either. Keep that attitude when you deploy. More than 700 members of Team Travis who are currently deployed around the world are doing just that. Whether attached to another unit or deployed with their own, their attention to detail, the same philosophy you demonstrated here last week, is making a difference in the Global War on Terrorism.

Never think for one moment that details are unimportant. If your goal is to provide extraordinary service, you must approach each step of the process as though it were extraordinary. Ignore the smallest detail and you ruin the outcome. If you ever doubt that, just remember King Richard's horse and count the nails. You and our Air Force will be better for it.