Building a high performance team

The C-130J Transition Unit (JTU) Commanding Officer said he would have been honoured and proud to be tapped on the shoulder as commanding officer of any unit, let alone one that had the responsibility of bringing a new aircraft in.

“There is a fair amount of trust there.” he said.

“I’m fairly well prepared for it having been involved in the Pilot Training Capability project that saw the T-6C Texan II introduced into service, and before that the C-130H Life Extension Programme, when we upgraded our legacy C-130H aircraft.”

His career experience has given WGCDR Russell an insight on what was involved in starting the unit from scratch.

“Standing up the new unit really motivated me because the question wasn’t, how do you feel about being a commanding officer, it’s how do you feel about  being a part of shaping and leading a high-performance team and how do we work together to get the best out of ourselves and each other .”

It helped that WGCDR Russell’s team was highly motivated to make the project succeed.

“The C-130 is such an important platform for New Zealand and has been involved in every major operation, mission and deployment since the 1960s. Everyone understands introducing a new capability has it challenges, but being part of the next evolution and delivering this key capability for New Zealand is pretty amazing.”

“JTU will deliver the C130J capability to No. 40 Squadron as effectively and efficiently as possible to ensure they are resilient and ready to respond to any situation in our challenging geo-strategic environment.”JTU was established to ensure a seamless capability integration of the C130J while No. 40 Squadron could maintains uninterrupted output in the service of New Zealand’s interests.

To achieve this JTU and No. 40 Squadron have had to carefully manage specialist personnel across both units to ensure continued fixed-wing tactical airlift capability whilst also meeting project milestones.

Once sufficient progress has been made by JTU in terms of the test programme, No. 40 Squadron will become the enduring home of the new C-130J capability.

Until that happens, it does mean that personnel joining WGCDR Russell’s team has left a gap in No. 40 Squadron, which has been a challenge. He equated it to the introduction of the P-8A Poseidon, which replaced No. 5 Squadron’s P-3K2 Orion fleet.

However, unlike the P-3K2 and the P-8A there will be no capability gap between aircraft types and so the sharing of resources must be closely managed, WGCDR Russell said.

“I don’t see any difference between JTU and No. 40 Squadron. The squadron’s Commanding Officer Wing Commander Brad Scott’s team and JTU are working very closely together because we understand that to achieve a successful integration we need to share resources and build a cohesive team to ensure that all outputs are met.”

The people in JTU were “absolutely phenomenal”, WGCDR Russell said.

“I sometime pinch myself at the quality of people that I have the privilege to work with every day. I don’t know why I’m still surprised because this is the organisation we work in."

“We’ve had a very small team to date, essentially Flight Commanders and a Warrant Officer. They have had to balance not having any staff, therefore being the planner and the producer, keeping all the oversight and doing everything themselves.”

However, now that trained personnel are returning from the United States, the executive staff are “seamlessly” transferring that into a more leadership-focussed role, he said.

“It’s been really impressive to observe the integration of two teams initially separated by the Pacific Ocean into one back home in NZ.”

Working with the larger team arriving home from the United States was a key milestone for the unit, he said.

“The aircraft are cool and the simulator is cool, but the people and the team are the greatest assets of the whole project from my perspective.

“We’re finally, going to be in one place and can truly build that sense of whānau and integrate into the wider base and NZDF community."