U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Julie Weckerlein Col. Gary Mausolf and Janak Bhatt discuss coffee production during a tour of the company's production plant March 12 in Hyattsville, Md. A group of Air Force officers and senior NCOs from the Pentagon were at the company to gain insight as the company recently incorporated a program similar to Air Force Smart Operations for the 21st century into their work. Colonel Mausolf works on the Air Staff at the Pentagon, and Bhatt is an Eight O'Clock Coffee Company engineering manager.

Leaders of the Eight O'Clock Coffee Company met with the Airmen to share lessons learned since they implemented similar sets of tools to systematically improve their processes and production by eliminating elements that slow their work.

“We operate with the belief that with structure comes freedom,“ said Joe Navin, the director of manufacturing. “By sticking to this program, we've been able to improve our production time and service to our customers.“

Choosing a coffee company as a place to learn about AFSO 21 concepts was easy, said Lt. Col. Juan Carlos Gacharna, the chief of AFSO 21 Integration and Transformation for the Air Force Operations, Plans and Requirements Division at the Pentagon.

“The company is a little over a year into its improvement journey and it's struggled at times to keep momentum,“ he said. “It was beneficial to visit an operation that is in the early stages of its efforts; making significant gains yet has vast room for improvement.“

The tour included a briefing from Navin and other plant leaders, who shared the company's history, lessons learned and successes since they implemented their new processes. The Airmen, who were all from Air Force Operations, Plans and Requirements Division, were then led out onto the production floor, where they watched coffee beans being unloaded from the trucks, hauled through the roasters, sent to packaging and then stored away in a warehouse. All the while, leaders from the company were on hand to explain and answer questions.

“The overwhelming and unanimous response to the visit was positive,“ Colonel Gacharna said. “This group could easily see the value in touring a facility that managed the receipt, processing, roasting, packaging and warehousing of coffee products.“

The similarities between the Air Force and the coffee business were deep, especially when it came to team management and motivation.

“There were many parallels between the company efforts and the Air Force's to gain traction in implementing their initiatives,“ Colonel Gacharna said. “It's even more insightful to witness an operation running mid-stream – reaping those small successes while struggling to implement others, but all the while gaining momentum and slowly winning over 'receptive skeptics' to the company's efforts.“

This wasn't the first time Airmen stepped into a civilian business environment to learn about ways to improve operations. Airmen from around the globe have visited package delivery businesses, airlines and hospitals.

“AFSO 21 is not a temporary spur-of-the-moment idea,“ said Chief Master Sgt. of the Air Force Rodney J. McKinley during a past tour of United Airlines' administrative and maintenance offices in San Francisco. “It is going to help us see ways of doing things more efficiently, which helps the warfighter, saves money and makes the Air Force a better place to work.“