In the operations of an army in a foreign land, a huge diversity of culture, attitudes, skills, policies and administrative procedures are experienced. In my experience working as a trainer in Afghanistan with the United States Forward Operating Base (FOB) under the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Training Mission - Afghanistan ( NTM-A ), I have learnt that these attributes have a direct effect on the operation of the candidates deployed in this region. However, minimal knowledge is availed to them on how to specifically deal with the diversities to foster good performance or outcome of their interaction with the communities around. As a result, I focus on creating a comparison of the various missions, operations and military training programs conducted in foreign environments and figure out how the cultural diversity affected the teams. In the end, I propose to create a solution that will assist in reducing the challenges created by this element and boost its positive impact to current and future militia teams operating in the same capacity.
Factors to Consider in the Training Program
The main focus is on the factors that vary in each foreign environment that the military groups operate in such as location, hours of operation, purpose of operation, responsibilities and safety points. All these factors have a phenomenal contribution in the attitude of the personnel because it influences their sense of security (Department of Defense, 2005). Therefore, the research should evaluate the performance of the various groups to be assessed and look at how each of these elements affected the operation of the troop.
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On the other hand, the groups that were interacted with or the environment’s attributes such as policies, procedures, beliefs, attitudes and skills should also be well evaluated. An environment that supports multiculturalism reduces resistance and fosters good communication and cooperation between the army troops and the people living there. However, vice versa is also true, in that lack of recognition and acceptance of multiculturalism and diversity of these attributes only makes success hard to achieve(Christopher, 2004). Therefore, the troops should be well trained to accommodate the diversity of the people and environments that they work in with patience to facilitate the achievement of their main purpose and responsibility in an operation or mission (McPhatter, 1997). Moreover, the same people should act as role models by accepting the culture of the environment they work in to facilitate support and cooperation from the communities.
Training Procedures
After the recognition of the challenges in the various operations in the past and the current missions and operations, a strategy of educating the teams should be identified. Some of the possible methods include seminars, talks, sharing of books and video and audio tracks with the members. Equipping people with the relevant knowledge should be enhanced by ensuring that all the candidates learn the effect of these factors to their operations and their safety (Pope-Davis, Donald & Hardin, 1997). As a result, the candidates will be more focused and willing to learn and apply the knowledge attained in the training.
The purpose of this vision and training is to improve the cooperation of teams and indulgence in multiculturalism and diversity that they face in their operations in foreign environments. A proper approach of these attributes will result to future success and solution to the challenges that come with diversity in a foreign environment. As a result, the operations of most of the candidates and members of the US army deployed in various regions across the world will have a chance to attain more support from the natives (Stewart, 2006) . Therefore, this training program is a fundamental tool for training and should be applied in every training in the army.
References
Cross, Terry L., KarlW. Dennis, and Mareasa R. Isaacs (1989). Toward a Culturally Competent
System of Care. Volume 1. Washington: National Technical Assistance Center for Children’s Mental Health, Georgetown University Child Development Center.
Department of Defense (2005). Defense Language Transformation Roadmap. Washington:
Department of Defense. — 2006a DOD Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms. Washington: Department of Defense. — 2006b Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Cultural Impact on Tactical Operations. Washington: Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force.
McPhatter, Anna R. (1997) Cultural Competence in Child Welfare: What is it? How do we
achieve it? What happens without it? Child Welfare 76(1):255-278. McSweeney, Brendan 2002 Hofstede's Model of National Cultural Differences
Christopher H. (2004).2006 Brochure: Center for Advanced Operational Culture Learning
(CAOCL). Quantico: Marine Corps Training and Education Command. Varhola, The US Militar
Pope-Davis, Donald B., and Hardin L. K. Coleman (1997) Multicultural Counseling
Competencies: assessment, education and training, and supervision. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.
Stewart, Andrew W. (2006). Friction in U.S. Foreign Policy: cultural difficulties with the world.
Carlisle Barracks: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College.
