United States Army Third Infantry Division Directorate of Morale, Welfare, and Recreation

By Michael D. Hughes

The objective in this work was to analyze the structure and organization in the operations of a military
organization that supports one of the greatest Divisions of the United States Army, the 3rd Infantry
Division. The history of Morale, Welfare and Recreation Division as it relates to civilians employees,
soldiers, family members and the Ft Stewart, Hunter Army Airfield Community. Morale, Welfare, and
Recreation history started on the battlefields of World War 1 were Salvation Army sisters and Red Cross
volunteers ministered to the needs of soldiers. The focus of this work provided administrative aspects of
public administration and its effects on military success. On October 18th, 2007 Chief of Staff of the Army
General George W. Casey Jr, and Secretary of the Army Pete Green signed and unveiled the Army Family
Covenant pledging to support its soldiers and families, and active guard and reserve organizations with
funding programs to deliver a quality of life commensurate with their service and sacrifices to the
nation. It is this commitment that propelled and motivates this organization. The Army Morale, Welfare
and Recreation exists because the United States Army states it is committed to the wellbeing of the
community of people who serve and stand ready to defend the nation and enhance the lives of soldiers,
their families, civilian employees and military retirees. In all organizations there will be transition,
changes and improvements within their environments I hope with this work I have opened the minds
and hearts of those brave men and women who love the military and the United States of America. With
god on our side who can defeat us.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 22, 2014
• ISBN: 9781503515673

Michael D. Hughes

Michael David Hughes is a former United States Army officer. He is currently the sports director of Hunter Army Airfield Third Infantry Division Directorate of Moral, Welfare and Recreation. He has held this position for the past twenty-four years. Hughes served as the chief of Sports, Athletics and Intramural Programs for a community of fifteen thousand–plus individuals consisting of troops, officers, dependents, and retired personnel. As the professional sports authority on the installation, he serves as the principal advisor to the installation commander on sports. He also provides advice and technical assistance to unit commanders in conducting their unit-level sports programs. As a leader and manager, Hughes has demonstrated in-depth knowledge and skill in handling administrative functions and conducting, training, and counseling individuals on professional development and problem solving. From 2004 to 2006, he served at the United States Army Garrison Kaiserslautern, Germany, as the sports programmer for the 415th BSB Klaber Kersern. From 2001 to 2003, Hughes served as the assistant MWR officer, DIS ARCENT-KUWAIT, in Camp Doha, and assisted in the management of programs for an international community of United States multiservice personnel in excess of 3,500 military, civilians, and contractor personnel. In addition to this, he supported several annual rotations of Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) deployments and other contingency training unit deployments. Hughes’s background reflects experience in supervision, administration, business management, sports, and athletic programs. He is a self-motivated achiever with a high regard for honesty, reliability, and commitment, believing these qualities to be what a person needs to accomplish a goal. Michael Hughes is a graduate of the Savannah State University master’s program in public administration, an experience that prepared him for the challenge of accomplishing the mission of writing this book. He is also a graduate of the University of Tennessee with a BA in political science.

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Michael D. Hughes.

Library of Congress Control Number:               2014920475

ISBN:                  Hardcover                                   978-1-5035-1565-9

                             Softcover                                     978-1-5035-1566-6

                            eBook                                           978-1-5035-1567-3

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 11/25/2014

Xlibris

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

695339

CONTENTS

Introduction

Conclusion

Appendix A

Appendix B

Appendix 1

Appendix 2

Appendix 3

Appendix 4

References

Introduction

T he objective of this book is to analyze the Directorate of Morale, Welfare, and Recreation of the Third Infantry Division using gap analysis and subfield standards according to the field of study in public administration. Directorate of Morale, Welfare and Recreation Division hereafter referred to as MWR. MWR relates to civilian employees, soldiers, and family members of the Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield communities. This history of the Army MWR division will demonstrate how the subfields of organizational theory, human resources, budgeting, leadership, and ethics play an important role in the support of the Third Infantry Division’s mission. The focus of this document will be the administrative aspects of public administration and its effects on mission suc cess.

As of October 2014, the FAQs page on the NAF Management Trainee Program provided the following information:

MWR’s history started on the battlefields of World War 1, where behind the lines, Salvation Army sisters and Red Cross volunteers ministered to the needs of soldiers. They were the forerunners of today’s morale, welfare, and recreation specialists. After the war was over, funding stopped and morale programs were mothballed. It was not until July 1940 that the Morale Division, later named Special Services, was established within the Adjutant General’s Office.

Between 1946 and 1955, the core recreation programs were established and staffed by a combination of active-duty military and civilians. Until the mid-1980s, active-duty enlisted soldiers and officers held military occupational specialties in Special Services, and when the use of active-duty soldiers was discontinued, civilians began operating the MWR organization and programs with military oversight. Special Services underwent significant reorganization and had many names before coming to its present configuration.

In November 1984, the U.S. Army Community and Family Support Center was established as the headquarters for MWR operations, providing this entity oversight and policy support while also administering certain specialty programs such as contracting, financial management, and other services. It also provided operating management of the Armed Forces Recreation Centers and other special projects.

The Family and Morale, Welfare, and Recreation Command was established by the Department of the Army October 24, 2006, and has evolved from these early beginnings.

The Family and Morale, Welfare and Recreation Command Fiscal Year 2009 Annual Report describes the United States Army’s Family and MWR Programs as a military organization whose primary mission is to provide the United States Army with programs that fulfill and support the Army Family Covenant.

On October 18, 2007 the chief of staff of the Army, General George W. Casey Jr., and the secretary of the Army, Pete Green, signed and unveiled the Army Family Covenant, pledging to support its soldiers and their families, and Active Guard and Reserve organizations with funding programs to deliver a quality of life commensurate with their service and sacrifice to the nation.

The Army Family Covenant commits the U.S. Army to enhance soldier and family readiness by standardizing family programs and services, increasing accessibility to health care, and improving soldier and family housing, and child, youth, and school services. Education, careers, libraries, recreation, travel, and the BOSS (Better Opportunities for Single Soldiers) program where also added to enhance Army communities and the marketplace.

On June 3, 2011, the Family and MWR Command was deactivated in a ceremony at Fort Sam Houston. Army Family and Morale, Welfare, and Recreation services became the G9 section within the Installation Management Command. Through all the name changes, the mission of MWR has remained constant. Army MWR exists because the U.S. Army states it is committed to the well-being of the community of people who serve and stand ready to defend the nation, to enhance the lives of soldiers, their families, civilian employees, and military retirees. The mission is to serve the needs, interests, and responsibilities of each individual in the Army community for as long as they are associated with the Army, no matter where they are. Family and MWR, through the Army Family Covenant, seeks to bridge the gap between the garrison and local community and contribute to the Army’s strength and readiness by offering services that reduce stress, build skills and self-confidence for soldiers and their families.

As of October 2014, the U.S. Army MWR official homepage offers the following introduction:

The Directorate of Morale, Welfare, and Recreation (DMWR) includes a wide range of activities and facilities for Fort Stewart and Hunter Army Airfield. Our mission is to increase the effectiveness of the Army by assisting commanders and maintaining the morale, the mental and physical fitness, and promoting the social well-being of military personnel, their families, and other authorized users by providing a wide range of social, recreational, and entertainment programs. This is accomplished by promoting maximum participation in planned and diversified activities. MWR organization uses program managers and activity managers in planning, developing, and implementing all supervised MWR activities including Sports, Outdoor Recreation, Arts and Crafts, Auto Crafts, Entertainment, Clubs, Bowling Centers, and Golf Courses.

Soldiers are also employees, volunteers, parents, spouses, retirees, neighbors, and friends. MWR aims to be there with programs and services to enhance the quality of soldiers’ lives.

I

Organization Theory

A n organization, by its basic definition, is an assembly of people working through a division of labor. An organization provides a means of using individuals more than can be accomplished by the aggregate efforts of group members working individu ally.

In Modern Organizations, Amitai Etzioni (1964) defines organizations as social units … deliberately constructed and reconstructed to seek specific goals.

Corporations, armies, schools, hospitals, churches, and prisons are included; tribes, classes, ethnic groups, friendship groups, and families are excluded. Organizations are characterized by labor, power, and communication responsibilities, divisions which are not random or traditionally patterned, but deliberately planned to enhance the realization of specific goals. The presence of one or more power centers which control the concerted efforts of the organization and direct them toward its goals; these power centers also must review continuously the organization’s performance and repattern its structure where necessary to increase its efficiency.

Jeffrey Pfeffer (1997, p. 7) summarizes in New Directions for Organization Theory that organizational theory studies provide an interdisciplinary focus on the following:

A. The effect of social organizations on the behavior and attitudes of individuals within them.

B. The effects of an individual’s characteristics and action on organizations.

C. The performance, success, and survival of organizations.

D. The mutual effects of environments, including resources, tasks, political, and cultural environments on organizations and vice versa.

E. Concerns with both the epistemology and methodology that undergird research on each of these topics.

In the Encyclopedia of Business Terms on Inc.com, the entry on organization theory reads thus:

Of the various organizational theories that have been studied in this realm, the open-system theory has emerged as perhaps the most widely known, but others have their proponents as well. Indeed, some researchers into organizational theory propound a blending of various theories, arguing that an enterprise will embrace different organizational strategies in reaction to change in its competitive circumstances, structural design, and experiences.

Modern organization theory is rooted in concepts developed during the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s and early 1900s. It was also during that period when a research was conducted by German sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920).

Weber believed that bureaucracies, staffed by bureaucrats, represented the ideal organization form. Weber based his model bureaucracy on legal and absolute authority, logic, and order. In Weber’s idealized organizational structure, responsibilities for workers are clearly defined, and behavior is tightly controlled by rules, polices, and procedures.

Weber’s theories of organization, like others of the period, reflected an impersonal attitude toward the people in the organization. Indeed, the workforce, with its personal frailties and imperfection, was regarded as a potential detriment to the efficiency of any system. Although his theories are now considered mechanistic and outdated, Weber’s views on bureaucracy provided important insight into the era’s conceptions of process efficiency, division of labor, and authority.

Another important contributor to organization theory in early 1900s was Henri Fayol. He is credited with identifying strategic planning, staff recruitment, employee motivation, and employee guidance (via policies and procedures) as important management functions in creating and nourishing a successful organization.

Weber’s and Fayol’s theories found broad application in the early and mid-1900s, in part because of the influence of Frederick W. Taylor (1856–1915). In a 1911 book entitled Principles of Scientific Management, Taylor outlined his theories and eventually implemented them on American factory floors. He is credited with helping to define the role of training, wage incentives, employee selection, and work standards in organizational performance.

Researchers began to adopt a less mechanical view of organizations and to pay more attention to human influences in the 1930s. This development was motivated by several studies that shed light on the function of human fulfillment in organizations. The best known of these was probably the so-called Hawthorn studies. These studies, conducted primarily under the direction of Harvard University researcher Elton Mayo, were conducted in the mid-1920s and 1930s at a Western Electric Company plant known as the Hawthorn Works. The company wanted to determine the degree to which working conditions affected output … The studies failed to show any significant positive correlations between workplace conditions and productivity …

The legacy of the Hawthorn studies and other organizational research efforts of that period was an emphasis on the importance of individual and group interaction, humanistic management skills, and social relationships in the workplace.

The focus on human influences in organizations was reflected most noticeably by the integration of Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs into organization theory. Maslow’s theories introduced two important implications into organization theory. The first was that people have different needs, and therefore need to be motivated by different incentives to achieve organizational objectives. The second of Maslow’s theories held that people’s needs change overtime, meaning that as the needs of people lower in the hierarchy are met, new needs arise. These assumptions led to the recognition, for example, that assembly-line workers could be more productive if more of their personal needs were met, whereas past theories suggested that monetary rewards were the sole, or primary, motivators.

Douglas McGregor contrasted the organization theory that emerged during the mid-1900s to previous differences. Theory X encompassed the old view of workers, which held that employees preferred to be directed, wanted to avoid responsibility, and cherished financial security above all else.

McGregor believed that organizations that embraced Theory Y were generally more productive. This theory held that humans can learn to accept and seek responsibility; most people possess a high degree of imaginative and problem-solving ability; employees are capable of effective self-direction; and that self-actualization is among the most important rewards that organizations can provide its workers.

In his book The Human Side of Enterprise, Douglas McGregor, talked about how the conditions by conventional organization theory and by the approach of scientific management for the past half century have tied man to limited jobs that do not utilize their capabilities and have eliminated meaning from work. Man’s habits, attitudes, expectations have been conditioned by his experience under these circumstances. Change in the direction of theory Y will be slow, and it will require extensive modification of the attitudes of management and workers alike. People today are accustomed to being directed, manipulated, and controlled in industrial organizations and to finding satisfaction for their social, egoistic, and self-fulfillment needs away from their jobs. This is true of much of management as well as workers.

The Encyclopedia of Business Terms on Inc.com says further of organization theory,

Traditional theories regarded organizations as closed systems that were autonomous and isolated from the outside world. In the 1960s, more holistic and humanistic ideologies emerged. Recognizing that traditional theory had failed to take into account many environmental influences that impacted the efficiency of organizations, most theorists and researchers embraced an open-system view of organizations.

The term open systems reflected the newfound belief that all organizations are unique, in part because of the unique environment in which they operate—and that they should be structured to accommodate unique problems and opportunities. For example, research during the 1960s indicated that traditional bureaucratic organizations generally failed to succeed in environments where technologies or markets were rapidly changing. They also failed to realize the importance of regional cultural influences in motivating workers.

Environmental influences that affect open systems can be described as either specific or general. The specific environment refers to the network of suppliers, distributors, government agencies, and competitors with which a business enterprise interacts. The general environment encompasses four influences that emanate from the geographic area in which the organization operates:

• Cultural values, which shape views about ethics and determine the relative importance of various issues.

• Economic conditions, which include economic upswings, recessions, regional unemployment, and many other regional factors that affect a company’s ability to grow and prosper. Economic influences may also partially dictate an organization’s role in the economy.

• Legal/political environment, which effectively helps to allocate power within a society and to enforce laws. The legal and political systems in which an open system operates can play a key role in determining the long-term stability and security of the organization’s future. These systems are responsible for creating a fertile environment for a business community, but they are also responsible for ensuring via regulations pertaining to operation and taxation that the needs of the larger community are addressed.

• Quality of education, which is an important factor in high technology and other industries that require an educated workforce. Businesses will be better able to fill such positions if they operate in geographic regions that feature a strong education system.

The open-system theory also assumes that all large organizations are comprised of multiple subsystems, each of which receives