Training Engineers with Industry

Doctrine requires the Army to conduct full spectrum operations, giving equal consideration to stability operations and Defense Support of Civil Authority (DSCA) with the traditional missions of offense and defense. This shift in doctrine, among other things, requires the Army to review its training and development to meet the new demands. U.S. Army Engineers have a major role in stability operations. The new doctrine requires engineers to conduct numerous technical tasks in support of stability operations. While these technical skills are not necessarily new to the Regiment, they have not been emphasized in the recent past. The education, training, and development of technical skills were second to the tactical engineering skills required of the Regiment. The Engineer Regiment recognizes it lacks the competency to meet the challenges of the new doctrine and is developing a Building Great Engineers (BGE) campaign plan to address those challenges. This monograph examines some of the impacts of modifying doctrine to include stability operations and the capability gaps created by this change. Likewise, the Engineer Regiment has stability operations tasks that they are unable to fully support and must develop the capacity to meet those requirements. Industry also plays a critical role in stability operations and that role must be leveraged for the Army, the Engineer Regiment, and the interagency to succeed. Training with industry (TWI) is an existing program the Army uses to expose its officers to technical and upper level managerial experience in fields that are not available in the military. TWI assigns officers to civilian industries to gain this experience and upon their return to the Army, they implement those skills. The U.S. Army Engineer Regiment should leverage the existing TWI program to assist in developing the select technical skills of its field grade officers in certain stability operations tasks. While the overall impact of the program will be small in sc