STAVANGER, Norway – NATO Joint Warfare Centre’s (JWC) annual Vision 2025 workshop started on February 16, 2021, with an overview of the theme “Collective Training” – one of the four interrelated project lines that the Centre has identified to best prepare and adapt the organization for future missions.
The workshop brought together staff throughout the JWC to review, share perspectives, and identify priority areas relevant to the Centre’s important mission to train and prepare NATO Command and Force Structure Headquarters at the operational and strategic levels, and to support the Alliance's Warfare Development Agenda informed by the NATO Warfighting Capstone Concept.
Vision 2025 provides a roadmap for the JWC, allowing the staff to develop short and long-term goals and timelines based on the Centre’s four project lines under the following themes: Collective Training, Warfare Development, Organization, and Professional Development.
The vision project initially started in October 2019, followed by the inaugural workshop which took place in February 2020.
The biggest benefit of the workshop is the teamwork across the JWC, according to Rear Admiral Jan C. Kaack, Commander JWC.
“This annual event provides staff at all levels within the JWC the opportunity to elaborate and discuss our future strategies, structure, resources, exercise delivery models, processes, and human capital to meet the training needs of the NATO Alliance, now and as we look to 2025.”
Rear Admiral Kaack added: “We are a relatively small organization with a powerful mission to prepare NATO Forces to be ready to fight in a complex battlespace that spans air, land, sea, cyberspace and space. We must adapt in a coherent way to be able to provide the best training that our training audiences rightfully demand. Vision 2025 is our consistent endeavour to make NATO better.”
A full day of activities was dedicated for each project line split into in various syndicates during the workshop. The participants discussed current issues and progress, and shared insights into how to adapt to future requirements. A read-back session was held by each syndicate at the end of each day, which will be included in the action plan brief to the JWC Commander in March.
JWC’s Programme Director 1 and Vision 2025 Core Team Leader, Colonel Adam Lackey, explained that the Vision 2025 programme is a continuous process to institutionalize change culture within the command. Systemic change is critical to the JWC’s ability to deliver collective training and warfare development for the Alliance, today and for years to come.
Colonel Lackey noted that the JWC's people were the linchpin in this process: "By involving everyone in both deliberate planning and action for improvement, we are making ourselves better. This helps us to make NATO better."
The workshop is not an end, but a beginning to an annual cycle, Colonel Lackey explained.
"We are excited to begin the implementation of these many great ideas. Building on the first year’s success, we anticipate another productive year of improvements."
At the end of the workshop, which concluded on February 22, Rear Admiral Kaack underscored that the JWC, “is a flexible, creative, resilient organization with a ‘can do’ attitude.”
The Commander said: “Our vision helps create a culture of professionalism, innovation, curiosity, and cooperation. It highlights strengths of the JWC as One Team. I am very pleased with the overall enthusiasm and collaboration from everybody who took part, as well as the core team who organized it.”
