Multiobjective Value Analysis of Army Basic Training

Basic combat training is the first course in initial entry training for U.S. Army enlisted soldiers. The training may be considered a portfolio of training tasks. A small number of tasks were suspected to be of lesser quality. Multiobjective decision analysis was employed to evaluate the tasks using stakeholder groups from various organizational levels. The results identified areas for improvement and also provided insight about how personnel at various levels of the training organization viewed the tasks and their training value differently. The decision maker adopted a number of recommendations and the valuation exercise provided a useful process for eliciting informal feedback from organization members. Several lessons learned from the study should be useful to others, including the benefit of examining stakeholders vertically in an organization and techniques that were helpful in gaining acceptance of decision analysis as the approach of choice.