It is unfortunate that Mr. Smy neglected to research his facts thoroughly before posting his message. As the person who was so discourteously assailed in his post, I will endeavour to provide the facts in order for the readers here to develop a fair and balanced opinion.
“If the site is reflective of the work being done by LFRR PMO, then I would suggest that no one hold their breath expecting results in any improvements to the Reserve Army.” I will comment on this statement at the end of my post.
‘The Home Page was updated with a telephone number last April…” Yes it was. And the reason that it hasn’t been updated since is because the Army has been without a Webmaster since April. An Army Webmaster has recently been hired and his priority right now is the redesign of the Army site. This redesign includes the Army Reserve and LFRR pages. “The media page is two years out of date.” Yes it is. Because, quite frankly, there has been nothing in the past year and a half (the time that I’ve been employed at LFRR) that has been worthwhile posting there. “The Sitreps are out of date.” No they are not. The Sitreps are a historical collection of what has happened to LFRR since the government announcement on LFRR. How can history be out of date? “The documents page is out of date.” In what way? There are some key documents listed on that page.
“The SO Coms posted a CANLANDGEN on 17 Jul 02 on Army Reserve Employment Opportunities. When readers began asking specific questions, the reply was "I don‘t know...I‘m just relaying the information." Still no answers on 26 Aug” Actually, to put the ENTIRE quote into perspective, I was asked if there was any plan to put the Reserve Employment Opportunities on the Internet. My ENTIRE reply was “I don‘t know and I don‘t even know if there are plans to do so. I‘m just relaying the information here. This is not an LFRR initiative. In fact, we didn‘t even know about it until we fell on the CANLANDGEN yesterday.” All these requests for “Subject Matter Experts” and answers from other Directorates were coming during the summer leave and posting season. I, too, took some summer leave. I decided “on 26 Aug 02” to give people a few weeks after the summer to get back into their routine and/or settle into their new jobs before requesting their “voluntary” participation on the LFRR open forum. It was at this time, however, that I had to have surgery and was off for a while on sick leave. I am, after all, only human.
“The SO Coms posted an article by Jack Aubrey of Southam News which discussed Reserve recruiting and the Groupaction ad agency. The post was titled "Look Who Designed Our Recruiting Campaign" and it produced a lot of comment and questions, but no definite answers by the DND staff.” To be absolutely correct, this article discussed CF recruiting, not Reserve recruiting, and the work done by Groupaction. If you go back to the post, sir, you will see that Captain Grant, who is the head of operations for the advertising group in DND, replied with two lengthy posts about recruiting and he also posted in another discussion thread to which he referred people. So to say that there were no definite answers by the DND staff is not correct and is very misleading.
“I emailed PMO LFRR and still have received no answer to the complaints I made of the site and the timeliness of the information.” I would be quite interested to know who you emailed in this office. I certainly did not receive an email from you and if any of the other staff here had received it, it would have eventually come across my desk. And quite frankly, sir, my email address as well as the 1-800 number are posted in every one of my posts on that board. And you’ve certainly seen my posts to be able to quote from them. Had I been in your shoes, I would have at least attempted to make a phone call on the toll free line before publicly maligning the work done by the LFRR staff.
“As far as I am concerned, the site is a waste of money. It is a sop to the Army Reserve, but does not give any up-to-date info on the work of the LFRR PMO. And the General Forum site could better be done by Mike Bobbitt.” Am I completely satisfied with the LFRR site? Most definitely not. It is something that I inherited and design-wise, it is horrible, and up-to-date? No. Not entirely. But better than it was when I took over, and there will be a 100% improvement, hopefully by mid-November, when the new site gets uploaded. So spending an inordinate amount of time and energy on the site at this moment would, then, yes, be a waste of money. And, you are correct; the Open Forum discussion board could better be done by Mike Bobbitt. In fact, I would have welcomed it. I tried in June to organize the forum into useful topics myself and ended up deleting the entire General Discussion bulletin board. I am not an IT wizard. I admit that and have done so many times on that forum. But again, the redesign of the site will also redesign the forum into something a lot more aesthetically pleasing and easier to use.
“I wish I could figure out how to send this email to the PMO.” There is no need now is there. But I will reiterate, my email address and 1-800 number are no secret on that forum. You could have very easily contacted me or any of the staff here, through me, at any time.
“Has anyone looked at the Land Forces Reserve Restructure web site. If the site is reflective of the work being done by LFRR PMO, then I would suggest that no one hold their breath expecting results in any improvements to the Reserve Army.” I take great exception to the fact that you would base your opinion of the work done by PMO LFRR on a web site. If you want to criticize me and my work, that is fine. I can accept that. But do not broad brush the entire staff here, who work hard and are doing their damnedest to do everything that YOU, the reserve community, has asked for. I also find it interesting that you would come to this bulletin board to be critical of another. I have on many occasions on that forum told the participants that the discussion board is for them and to let me know what they would like or not like to see. I don’t recall at any time seeing a post or message or any sort of contribution from you. It’s too bad. Had you brought this subject up there, we could have had an open and frank discussion about it with all the active participants there.
I would like to make one last point before ending this post. I think I need to remind you that PMO LFRR is a project that is trying to develop and Army Reserve of the future. Issues of today are dealt with by the Director of Land Reserve Management. I would have to say that the majority of topics that are being discussed on that forum are issues of today and not LFRR issues, but, as moderator, I let them continue in order that factual information is passed to reservists in the quickest method possible. You may see this as a gossip column…but tell that to the five recruits that I personally know of whose processing problems were solved as a result of that discussion board and as well from the private who publicly resigned on the bulletin board due to training frustrations but has since had a change of heart. Are those six reservists a “waste of money” to you , sir? They are not to me.
