#IAMIMSC: Maj. Mike Schumacher
Duty title and unit: Air and Ground Transportation branch chief, AFIMSC Installation Support Directorate, Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, Texas
Primary duty responsibilities: I oversee a six-person team that provides intermediate-level oversight of all air and ground transportation operations for 16,000 vehicle operations and air transportation Airmen. My team focuses primarily on standardization, innovation and communication across the enterprise and looks for opportunities to improve operations across the Total Force.
What’s the best part of your job?
I never have the same day twice. One day I’m working on the AFIMSC Installation and Mission Support Weapons and Tactics Conference and putting together a world-class event for senior logisticians, and the next day I’m in conversations about ground transportation challenges at data masked units or how to develop training courses for parachute riggers. My job is never mundane and always presents new challenges that need solved.
Why are you and your job important to the Air Force and AFMC?
We have a hand in all operations across the Air Force with air and ground transportation oversight. If it moves by ground or air (or is dropped out of the air), we have a key role in it.
What’s a recent project that gave you a great sense of accomplishment?
I work on an AFIMSC strategic goal dealing with installation resiliency. The goal has objectives that include improving access control points, maximizing the speed of priority shipments, executing energy projects and finding efficiencies in category management. The goal has seen significant progress over the past year as we continually move the needle, which in turn makes our installations more resilient in the face of future disruptions.
Which AFIMSC priority do you most identify with – or see yourself and your job fitting into – and why?
Effective logistics is a precursor to lethality and readiness; they are essentially the outputs of sound logistics. If we can move it by ground or air to the right place at the right time, in-garrison and expeditionary operations will be successful. If logistics fail, the mission fails.