Know how many soldiers you are responsible for and ensure their readiness, both professionally and personally. This is the fundamental requirement given to leaders at all levels of the U.S. Army. Personnel systems reflect the unit a soldier is assigned to, without effectively considering the location they work at.

Yet, most Army services for health, welfare and morale are based at installations to serve the population working at or near that location. This presents a challenge for garrison and senior commanders who must take care of all soldiers within a particular geographic area, but do not have a way to quickly and accurately see information about all the personnel assigned to that area.

Adding an authoritative “Installation of Assignment” data point for every soldier and civilian within Army personnel databases would quickly and easily bridge this data gap of who is assigned to each installation and who is reliant on its services. Moreover, it would allow commanders and staffs in charge of installations and geographic regions to better understand the demographics, needs and challenges of their assigned soldiers, civilians and family members to prioritize resources and enhance readiness.

The Army is a hierarchy and assigns soldiers to a unit based on their job specialty. A soldier belongs to a squad, platoon, company, battalion, brigade, division and corps. There is a leader at each level of each unit responsible for the readiness and well-being of soldiers at all subordinate units. This linear relationship is referred to as the chain of command. When soldiers in a unit are physically located at the same installation, it simplifies accountability and readiness.

Supporting Separation

But many units and soldiers are geographically separated from their chain of  command due to operational or administrative needs. For example, a unit specializing in providing intelligence may have its headquarters at one installation but send its soldiers to different installations around the world to support missions. Regardless of the unit or command structure, every soldier is assigned to a physical installation somewhere in the world to perform their daily duties.

Soldiers need support in areas including health, legal and family services. The Army provides these resources at installations for soldiers assigned to the geographic area. A garrison commander ensures that each installation operates efficiently in prioritizing and providing services for all soldiers, regardless of the unit they belong to.

Each installation also has a senior commander, typically a general with the authority to handle legal and administrative issues. In some cases, this leader serves in the role for more than one installation. Yet, neither the garrison commander nor the senior commander is in the unit chain of command for all soldiers assigned to the installation.

For example, the commanding general of the 7th Army Training Command is senior commander for many installations throughout Germany. The general is responsible for personnel across three garrison headquarters, each with a garrison commander. While approximately 21,000 soldiers are at those installations, fewer than 1,000 are assigned directly to the 7th Army Training Command. To fulfill their duties, the general must know about all the soldiers they are responsible for, irrespective of unit.

Command Climate

In her 2022 Message to the Force, Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth charged leaders to “ensure the Army becomes more data-centric,” to “build positive command climates at scale across all Army formations” and to “reduce harmful behaviors in our Army.” Commanders not only have unprecedented access to data, they look for ways to make better decisions using available data.

Installation leaders manage resources designed to reduce harmful behaviors and build positive organizational climates. These include resilience centers, counseling programs, child care facilities and emergency services, to name a few. Effectively serving the population first requires understanding the population and its needs.

The first step in understanding the population is to identify who is included in that population. Leaders at all levels must know their soldiers and understand the challenges they face. This is a challenging task using today’s databases. Typically, human resources professionals must maintain a large list of units at an installation, then pull the information for each unit one by one. There is no easy way to rapidly gather this information on each individual soldier at an installation.

This lack of completeness means installation leaders must estimate the needs of the post using only a sample of the population. Certain groups may be unintentionally excluded from planning or, worse, the installation may underestimate the number of people it needs to service and thereby fall short on personnel and resources.

Moreover, Army systems are designed to protect the personal information of soldiers by ensuring that only the unit commander in the chain of command can see those details. These systems do not routinely extend permissions to or recognize installation leaders and their responsibilities to the soldier. 

To see data for all soldiers on an installation, these garrison and senior commanders would need to request data access for every individual unit of every individual soldier—a cumbersome and inefficient task.

Simple Solution

Personnel databases should add an “Installation of Assignment” data point for every soldier and civilian. Adding this simple data point would simplify the ability of human resources professionals and data analysts to quickly access information about all soldiers within an installation area of responsibility in near-real time. Systems then can assign viewing permission to garrison and senior commanders and their designated representatives based on installations for which they are responsible.

There are data fields that attempt to report this data in personnel systems, but they are inaccurate, especially for personnel located overseas or who are separated from their unit of assignment. As of this writing, a search of the Army Vantage system—which pulls together information from official Army databases—shows 7,000 soldiers assigned to U.S. Army Europe and Africa with an “Assigned Unit Installation” of simply “Army Post Office,” not a physical installation. It also is unclear if this data point reflects the soldier’s location or where their unit is located.

Our solution—adding the “Installation of Assignment” data point—more accurately reflects where day-to-day work occurs. Installation personnel can easily update this proposed data field for each soldier during arrival and in-processing. It is especially relevant for members of the U.S. Army Reserve and the Army National Guard who are called on for temporary active duty away from their home unit.

This data point also is a useful aid for Armywide personnel accountability, such as during a natural disaster or conflict scenario.

For installation leaders, this proposed solution provides a rapid way to understand and assess the needs of the personnel they are responsible for. Skilled data analysts can provide detailed insights into population trends, shifting demographics, utilization of services and methods to improve readiness and resilience, but only with appropriate data. The current system does not support accurate and comprehensive data analysis.

Garrison and senior commanders manage resources that soldiers, civilians and families depend on for readiness and resilience. These leaders are expected to know and anticipate population needs, yet Army systems do not provide a way for them to see and know their population.

Adding a simple piece of data to personnel records can address this challenge and improve the provision of installation services. Commanders deserve the ability to understand, visualize and describe their soldiers so they can direct the most effective means of ensuring their readiness.

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Maj. Jaison Desai, U.S. Army Reserve, is a senior solutions architect, SMX Technologies, supporting the U.S. Army Intelligence and Security Command, Fort Belvoir, Virginia. In the Reserve, he serves on the Science and Technology Task Force, Military Intelligence Readiness Command. Previously, he served on active duty and was chief data analytics officer for the 7th Army Training Command, Germany. He deployed twice to Iraq. He holds a doctorate in engineering and public policy from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh.

Maj. Jermaine Goodman is the assistant chief of staff for personnel for the 7th Army Training Command.

Linda Stewart is the Ready and Resilient Program analyst for the 7th Army Training Command.