Charting our course

  • Published
  • By Maj. Alysia R. Harvey
  • 960th Cyberspace Operations Group Public Affairs
Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas --  U.S. Air Force Reserve Public Affairs professionals gathered in Marietta, Ga., Feb. 8-12, for the 2016 Air Force Reserve Command Public Affairs Leadership Symposium, the first of such an event for this career field in more than six years.

The more than 130 Citizen Airmen from across the U.S. came together to get a vector for telling the stories of reservists by learning from each other and industry partners.

"We are certainly at a critical point in our Air Force Reserve, where we need to tell the Citizen Airman story loud and proud," said Col. Bruce Bender, AFRC director of public affairs, in a welcome letter to the attendees. "As the Air Force looks at ways to be more innovative and efficient in the name of budget cuts, our Air Force Reserve will continue to be in high demand. I encourage you to use all the tools in your toolkit to amplify our message," he stated, adding that he and his staff are committed to helping those in the field further that message through information sharing.

His staff's commitment was evident throughout the week, as they worked tirelessly to ensure the attendees were equipped with the tools necessary to execute the mission. They hosted breakout sessions on topics, to include leveraging social media, public affairs writing, becoming accredited in the public relations field, and training on the Air Force Public Information System and Adobe Premier Pro software.

"We really wanted to emphasize the basics and customer service as we chart our course for the future," said Lt. Col. Chad Gibson, AFRC public affairs chief of operations and presenter for the break-out session on writing headlines that attract readers' attention. "We want to ensure our Reserve PAs have everything they need to be successful as we tell our Citizen Airmen stories, and that was our big focus when planning this event."

In addition to the presentations by Reservists on the service-unique aspects of the symposium, participants had the option to go on tours of the Defense Video & Imagery Distribution System (or DVIDS as it is more commonly called) and CNN Headquarters, and AFRC/PA leadership invited communications professionals from Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company, The Coca-Cola Company, Meltwater, Nikon and Sony to address the group.  

Much like these companies are known by their logos, one of the highlights of the symposium was the unveiling of the new Reserve public affairs logo, which can be localized for each unit.

"We encourage you to use this logo on your products, in your signature blocks, on business cards, whatever you'd like," said Bender. "We spent a lot of time on this design and each element was carefully selected, from the font type and size to the airwaves image. We wanted to keep it simple, but have something that uniquely identifies our products and unifies us as a career field."

Capt. Lisa Poppe, an individual mobilization augmentee Public Affairs Officer at U.S. Southern Command, said she was pleasantly surprised by the new logo and the advanced training presented by the Air Force Reserve Command Public Affairs team.

"The Public Affairs logo is classic, depicts smart innovation and proves that our current public affairs leadership is heading in the right direction," Poppe said. "In fact, due to the communications plan training and writing seminars, I was able to develop a strategic communications plan within a few days after returning from the symposium.  My next goal is to learn more about the Accredited in Public Relations plus Military Communication (APR+M) Certification."

Although it has been six years since the last gathering of this group of professionals, Bender says he hopes to have them more frequently and is working to get some of the trainers out to the different units if funding prevents the mass gatherings like this one.

"Coming together face-to-face to learn from each other, network and discuss new trends in our industry is so important, and I hope we are able to host an event like this at least every two years," Bender said. "However, in the meantime, thanks to the feedback we received during this one, we know there is a need for training.  I consider it a headquarters function to ensure our folks are trained and equipped to do the mission, so we are going to work hard to get some of our experts out to the various locations to meet provide training on a variety of topics."

Attendees were pleased to hear this news, as well as the fact that the career field has been approved for a "tech refresh" every year for five years.  In other words, the equipment used by public affairs practitioners will be replaced with new items.

"We live in a world where technological advances happen quite rapidly, and those changes sometimes make what we do in our line of work difficult if we have outdated equipment," said Chief Master Sgt. Bill Goben, AFRC public affairs functional manager. "So, you all will be pleased to know that we have been approved for a 20 percent tech refresh beginning in FY18. This tech refresh will allow AFRC to update its units' deployment kits within the five-year period; therefore, it is vitally important that your inventory lists are kept current."

And while that was fantastic news to the group of communicators, there was even more news as the command's annual communication excellence and media contest awards winners were announced on the last day of the symposium.

"I couldn't be more proud of the PA staff," said Lt. Col. James Bishop, 439th Air Reserve Base chief of PA, whose office the most awards of any AFRC PA shop. "This was particularly rewarding to see Westover earn the best PA shop in the command, with 10 other individual awards.  It was just amazing -my bag was six pounds overweight on my trip back home!"