• Strategic Customer Relationship Management. This activity is the heartland of the CoM role and touches all the activities they perform. In this role they are interacting continuously at the highest levels in the unified customer to sustain a current picture of FLC needs and challenges and to provide the FLC with a current picture of our constraints and challenges. To this end they are 'accountable' for our delivery performance. With their position on their respective Service and FLC boards, this is a powerful role that we should exploit to the full particularly when considering cross-cutting DG issues.
• Planning Round. I have the responsibility for ensuring that cluster/IPT input to the PR is tautly and realistically costed and programmed against the stated user requirement. The CoMs provide the strategic brokerage with the unified customer and will therefore be seeking my assurance that the costings/programme are taut and realistic. We have collective responsibility to work on potential equipment and support solutions to the financial/capability challenges we face. We will be co-chairing the forthcoming PR 3* screenings.
• Joint Business Agreements. The role of the CoMs is to provide the strategic brokerage of the JBAs with the FLC and provide a domain view. My role is to ensure that we are not making commitments beyond our resource allocation, but at the same time are accepting a reasonable degree of efficiency challenge and prudence in risk provisioning.
• Industry Sector Strategies. There are a number of industry sector strategies in various states of maturity at the moment. Principally, these sector strategies are the responsibility of DCD167 (overarching MoD industry/commercial strategy) and myself (delivery of most of the benefits, and harmonisation with project delivery strategy) and he and I will cooperate extremely closely on their evolution with the relevant 2*s. However, it is very clear that none of these sector strategies can succeed without the blessing, and in most cases, active participation of the FLC. I see the CoMs playing a key role in brokering issues with the FLC at strategic level - some of which require the FLC to make quite radical changes. As such the CoMs and I will both sit on the top governance fora of these sector strategies.
• Safety. The CoMs role is to provide assurance that the critical DE&S-FLC safety interface is managed in a manner that ensures this link does not contribute to a breakdown in end to end safety.
• Specific Operational Roles. As you are aware, each of the CoMs has an operational role in managing a substantial part of DE&S business for which they are directly responsible to CDM for ensurance of delivery. My interaction with the CoMs in these areas would be via IBAs where relevant.
• Main Board Role. At Main Board level each of the 3*s 'owns' a Strategic Risk and this will require direct interaction with DGs and their teams.
• CDM deputising. From time to time and for specific pre agreed areas of DE&S responsibility (e.g., CoM Air's role as the OCCAR BoS member), CDM will direct the CoMs to deputise for him on specific issues which time constraints and priorities require him to delegate (as he would potentially to any Board member). Equally, there are times when the external face of DE&S is best represented by a senior Serviceman and in these instances the CoM will need to be fully engaged in the business under debate. It will be clear when CoMs are engaged on such a delegated activity.
• Support to Operations. A key task the CoMs are engaged in is providing the interface with the FLC in support of current operations.
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167 Has since been re-titled as DGD Commercial