Staff Duty Analysis

Reference CAPP 60-32 Staff Duty Analysis Guide. This page applies to Cadet Officers Only.

Overview

The purpose of the cadet staff duty analysis program (SDA) is to improve cadets’ critical thinking and communication skills through the practical application of leadership in a staff / organizational environment.

Objectives: By participating in the SDA program, each cadet will:

1. Develop critical thinking skills relating to project management and leadership challenges that cadet officers are likely to encounter during staff service; and

2. Become proficient in communication skills used in organizational settings by

1. developing skills in writing technical / managerial documents, and
2. developing skills in preparing and delivering oral presentations.

Further, the SDA curriculum serves the Cadet Program as a whole by promoting more sophisticated practices in the management of cadet activities, as cadet officers become familiar with staff products (i.e.: operating plans, after action reviews, etc.), thereby increasing the activities’ overall effectiveness.

SDA's consist of three sections you are required to complete in order to promote:

SDA Staff Service
SDA Technical Writting Assignment
SDA Oral Presentation

SDA Staff Service

The cadet serves for at least 8 weeks (56 days), or 4 weeks (28 days) if using ROTC/JROTC accelerated promotion, in any support staff position available to cadets, as approved by the unit commander. Serving in a line staff position, such as Flight Commander or Cadet Commander, do not satisfy the requirements for this promotion. The following is a list of positions that satisfy the requirements of the SDA Staff Service:

Cadet Activities Officer
Cadet Administrative Officer
Cadet Aerospace Education Officer
Cadet Communicatons Officer
Cadet Drug Demand Reduction Officer
Cadet Emergency Services Officer
Cadet Historian Officer
Cadet IT Officer

Cadet Leadership Officer
Cadet Logistics Officer
Cadet Operations Officer
Cadet Public Affairs Officer
Cadet Recruiting Officer
Cadet Safety Officer
Cadet Supply Officer

If you are not currently serving in a Support Staff role, please submit a cover letter, in the CAP Business Letter format (found in the Templates page), and resume to C/Maj Pelissero and TFO Henrie Emerson. jacob.pelissero@cawgcap.org henrie.emerson@cawgcap.org

SDA Technical Writting Assignment

The cadet drafts a technical document that is relevant to leadership and managerial challenges they encounter as leaders in their organization. Along the way they develop competencies in critical thinking and written communications. Technical writting assignments can be submitted at any time within the Achievement and must meet standards before an oral presentation can be given.

Selecting a Technical Writting Format

One of the main products of your SDA is a technical document. Table 2.1 of CAPP 60-32 shows which document types correspond best to various cadet support staff positions. There are 8 Achievements between Mitchell and Spaatz, so you have 8 SDAs to complete, and 8 document types from which to choose, in any order. You may not repeat a technical document.

The technical document must be your own original work, but it is permissible to reach back to something you created previously – perhaps the resume you wrote for encampment cadre last summer – and submit that for SDA credit.

Submitting a Technical Writting Document

All technical documents have a unique grading rubric, found in Appendix 1, CAPP 60-32. Please review and grade your SDA yourself before submitting to make sure it meets standards. Technical Writting Documents will be graded strictly for format, grammar, syntax, and spelling. Documents not meeting standards as outlined in the rubrics will be labeled "Requires Revision," and returned to the cadet with feedback. Please submit technical documents to TFO Henrie Emerson henrie.emerson@cawgcap.org, for grading.

SDA Oral Presentation

Cadets convert their service learning experience and technical document into an oral presentation, and make themselves available for questions and answers before an audience designated by the senior mentor.

You’ve written a technical document. Now, it’s time to develop a presentation or briefing that you’ll deliver orally.

In an organizational setting, it’s common to pair a written technical document with an oral briefing. The technical document is a “read ahead,” as in the presenter distributes it before the meeting and the audience reads it ahead of time. With the document providing raw facts, analysis, or recommendations, as the case may be, meeting time can be spent more profitably in a discussion about the key points.

Your briefing needs to be extemporaneous. That means you’ll plan your remarks carefully in advance, creating a general road map for what you’ll say, in what order you’ll say it, and how you’ll say it. An extemporaneous talk is different from an impromptu talk, which is where you speak with little to no preparation. At the other end of the spectrum, extemporaneous talks differ from formal speeches, where the speaker reads verbatim from a painstakingly honed text.

1. To prepare your extemporaneous briefing, use the same process writing principles that you used for the written document. Brainstorm, organize and outline, draft, edit, and get a friend’s feedback. A great outline for a draft is the USAF Talking paper.

2. Add one new step to this process: practice delivering your talk. Literally stand up and speak to yourself in a mirror, or ask friends to be your audience. Are you speaking loudly enough? Clearly enough? Does your content “flow” as naturally as you thought it would? Do the main ideas come across? Which words are hard to pronounce? Time spent working on delivery is time invested wisely.

3. Prepare for Q&A. Ask yourself, What’s the most challenging question someone in my audience could ask? What’s the biggest, most compelling objection they could raise? By thinking about those tough questions or objections, you’ll naturally build a better briefing. Further, practice how you’ll respond to those tough questions or objections. Also, while preparing for your audience interaction (Q&A), think about how someone might be easily confused by your topic. Might they ask a question that seems on point to them, but in fact is a tangential issue? As you did when preparing for the “tough” question, be ready for the tangential question.

4. Check your timing. For SDA purposes, the oral presentation should be of 10 to 15 minutes’ duration, plus about 5 minutes for Q&A.

Once you are ready to deliver your oral presentation, please utilize the Test and LFF Request page.

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