Navy Force Structure: Actions Needed to Ensure Proper Size and Composition of Ship Crews
Highlights
What GAO Found
Total ship operating and support costs—which include personnel and maintenance costs—and maintenance backlogs increased during the optimal manning period (2003–2012) and have continued to increase for most ship classes since the initiative ended. Since the implementation of optimal manning, the Navy reduced crew sizes, which decreased the associated personnel costs for most ship classes, even as crews were partially restored. However, increased maintenance costs offset the reductions in personnel costs, as shown below. Navy officials attributed maintenance cost increases to reduced crews, longer deployments, and other factors. GAO's analysis did not isolate the relative effects of reduced crews from these other factors. Maintenance backlogs also increased during the optimal manning period and have continued to grow.
Changes in Average Annual Personnel and Maintenance Costs from Start of Optimal Manning Period through Fiscal Year 2015
The Navy's process to determine manpower requirements—the number and skill mix of sailors needed for its ships—does not fully account for all ship workload. The Navy continues to use an outdated standard workweek that may overstate the amount of sailor time available for productive work. Although the Navy has updated some of its manpower factors, its instruction does not require reassessing factors to ensure they remain valid or require measuring workload while ships are in port. Current and analytically based manpower requirements are essential to ensuring that crews can maintain readiness and prevent overwork that can affect safety, morale, and retention. Until the Navy makes needed changes to its factors and instruction used in determining manpower requirements, its ships may not have the right number and skill mix of sailors to maintain readiness and prevent overworking its sailors.
Moving forward, the Navy will likely face manning challenges as it seeks to increase the size of its fleet. The fleet is projected to grow from its current 274 ships to as many as 355 ships, but the Navy has not determined how many personnel will need to be added to man those ships. In addition, as the Navy has gained experience operating its new ship classes, their crew sizes have grown and may continue to do so. Without updating its manpower factors and requirements and identifying the personnel cost implications of fleet size increases, the Navy cannot articulate its resource needs to decision makers.
Why GAO Did This Study
In 2001, the Navy began reducing crew sizes on surface ships through an initiative called optimal manning, which was intended to achieve workload efficiencies and reduce personnel costs. In 2010, the Navy concluded that this initiative had adversely affected ship readiness and began restoring crew sizes on its ships.
The conference report accompanying the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016 included a provision that GAO review the Navy's reduced manning initiatives in the surface fleet. This report examines (1) any trends in ship operating and support costs and maintenance backlogs, (2) the extent to which the Navy's manpower requirements process accounts for ship workload, and (3) any manning challenges and implications for the future.
GAO analyzed and reviewed data from fiscal years 2000 through 2015 (the most current available) on crew sizes, operating and support costs, material readiness, and the Navy's manpower requirements determination process. GAO also interviewed Department of Defense (DOD) officials and ship crews to discuss workload, manning levels, enablers of smaller crew size, and implications for the future.
Recommendations
GAO is making four recommendations that the Navy (1) reassess the standard workweek, (2) require examination of in-port workload, (3) require reassessment of the factors used to develop manpower requirements, and (4) identify the personnel costs needed to man a larger fleet. DOD concurred with each recommendation.
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Office of the Under Secretary for Personnel and Readiness |
Priority Rec.
To ensure that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness should direct the Secretary of the Navy to have the Navy conduct a comprehensive reassessment of the Navy standard workweek and make any necessary adjustments. |
Closed – Implemented
DOD concurred with our recommendation, citing its commitment to ensuring that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet. In November 2018, the Navy completed its Operational Afloat Workload Study Final Report, conducted by the Navy Manpower Analysis Center. The study comprehensively reassessed workload and time for productive work, training, service diversion activities, sleep, personal activities, messing, and other components of a 168-hour week across the fleet. The final report recommended changes to the afloat workweek. For example, it recommended a readjustment of the productive work factor, the creation of a new individual training component, and an increased allotment for service diversion activities in the workweek. All these changes better account for workload and how sailors spend their time when aboard their ships. In January 2019, the Navy codified these changes in a revision to Navy instruction (OPNAV 1000.16L), establishing a mandatory baseline to use in developing updated ship manpower requirements. . These changes will allow the Navy to more accurately calculate the size and composition of its ship crews, and allow crews to more safely and effectively execute their workload. The Navy has used these and other updated factors, to recalculate the manpower requirements for the DDG 51 destroyer class, leading to a required crew size increase of about 10 percent (an additional 32 crew members) and for the LPD 17 amphibious transport dock class, leading to a required crew size increases of about 6 percent, or 23 additional crew members.
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| Office of the Under Secretary for Personnel and Readiness |
Priority Rec.
To ensure that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness should direct the Secretary of the Navy to have the Navy update guidance to require examination of in-port workload and identify the manpower necessary to execute in-port workload for all surface ship classes. |
Closed – Implemented
DOD concurred with our recommendation, citing its commitment to ensuring that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet. In January 2019, the Navy revised its guidance (OPNAVINST 1000.16L) to require that in-port workload be a primary factor in developing manpower requirements for all surface ships. The Navy has completed in-port workload studies for two ship classes which led to increases in their crew size requirements, and is now mandated to consider in-port workload of other ship classes as it updates their manpower requirements.
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| Office of the Under Secretary for Personnel and Readiness |
Priority Rec.
To ensure that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness should direct the Secretary of the Navy to have the Navy develop criteria and update guidance for reassessing the factors used to calculate manpower requirements periodically or when conditions change. |
Closed – Implemented
DOD concurred with our recommendation, citing its commitment to ensuring that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet. In response, the Navy released guidance for updating these factors in a March 2018 memorandum. The Navy has been reassessing and updating these factors since the release of GAO-17-413. Additionally, the January 2019 revision of OPNAVINST 1000.16L codified the process by which these standards should be revised. The revised instruction further includes criteria and triggers that necessitate the updating of manpower requirements. These criteria are both condition- and time-based, and include compliance with current allowances and approved staffing standards. The Navy expects these changes to keep factors current and accurate, thereby leading to more accurate and properly sized ship crews.
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| Office of the Under Secretary for Personnel and Readiness |
Priority Rec.
To ensure that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet, the Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness should direct the Secretary of the Navy to have the Navy identify personnel needs and costs associated with the planned larger Navy fleet size, including consideration of the updated manpower factors and requirements. |
Closed – Implemented
DOD concurred with our recommendation, citing its commitment to ensuring that the Navy's manpower requirements are current and analytically based and will meet the needs of the existing and future surface fleet. The Navy used its Manpower Projection Tool to project its future manpower needs associated with the current 355-ship requirement and 30-year shipbuilding plan. The projection shows the need for annual increases of enlisted personnel through 2024, and sustained growth in end strength peaking in fiscal year 2033 as the number of ships in the fleet increases. The Navy also calculated manpower costs associated with the planned larger fleet size, and these projected costs also rise in proportion to the increasing numbers of sailors needed to man the larger fleet.
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