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Article Excerpt
The U.S. Air Force's Air Mobility Command has been investigating the efficiency of its cargo movements for decades. In response to worldwide deployments, the movement of hazardous materials (HAZMAT)--a category of material that ranges from simple cleaning solutions to the most dangerous munitions--has increased. HAZMAT cargo provided by commercial firms and destined for overseas military installations often arrives at Aerial Ports of Embarkation (APOE) in the U.S., where they are accepted for shipment through the Defense Transportation System (DTS), or become "frustrated." Frustrated items include those shipments arriving at APOEs with missing documentation, incorrect labels, damage, or incorrect packaging (Ellison 2004; Christensen 2006). These frustrated items are delayed until the commercial firm responsible for the shipment can fix the frustration causes. Since almost every function within the military relies on HAZMAT to complete its mission, an increase in frustration levels at APOEs hinders the effectiveness of deployed troops overseas. In recent years, as the military has increasingly relied on commercial sourcing and shippers, its role in APOE frustration levels has become even more of an issue for the Air Force. This study takes a direct look at the training and procedures used by commercial shipping companies as they ship HAZMAT to the Air Force's aerial ports.
U.S. federal regulations and international guidelines that govern HAZMAT shipments--both through the DTS and via commercial shippets--are available to the public and are constantly updated and published by the U.S. Department of Transportation (CFR 49 2006, Labelmaster 2006). In accordance with these regulations, HAZMAT shipments entered into the DTS require a trained and certified shipper, proper packaging, and proper documentation upon arrival at the APOE. In 2003, new military policy established a set of business rules for suppliers shipping cargo through the DTS (Wynne 2003). The policy's intent was to reduce frustration levels at APOEs and ensure on-time delivery of cargo. Unfortunately, frustration levels have not decreased in the few years since the policy was established, suggesting that further changes in either procedure or policy may be needed. The purpose of this research was to help address this problem by examining whether shipper training procedures might be impacting frustration levels at APOEs.
PREVIOUS RESEARCH
The literature related to HAZMAT transportation is primarily limited to safety (Mejza et al. 2003, Sweet 2006), optimal routing studies (Revelle et al. 1991, Erkhut and Verter 1995, Zhang et al. 2000), and, more recently, studies on security and supply chain disruptions (Sheffi 2001, Russell and Saldanha 2003, Kleindorfer and Saad 2005). Also, rail transportation has specifically been an area of research interest for chemical and HAZMAT transportation (Young et al. 2002, Closs et al. 2003). However, only one study could be found on the hazardous materials training differences by shippers (Rothwell et al. 2002) and no known work has looked at the occurrence and causes of frustrated HAZMAT shipments in the Defense Transportation System. Therefore, with funding from the Air Force Institute of Technology, a line of research was begun in 2004 to investigate frustrated HAZMAT shipments in the DTS. In the initial study, Ellison tracked the impact of the Government Purchase Card program on frustration levels, identifying a lack of communication between the military members ordering the items and the civilian shipper about DTS transportation requirements (Ellison 2004). Next, Christensen sought to identify the main reasons for frustration at Charleston and Dover Air Force Bases and to compare cargo frustration procedures at the two locations (Christensen 2006). He noted that the respective military customer services sections had different management styles for handling frustrated hazardous cargo. One would fully require the shipper to fix all problems, while the other would actually make minor corrections after speaking to the shipper to expedite the process (Christensen 2006). Additionally, Christiansen's research noted that both military and commercial shippers were the source of frustrated HAZMAT at the aerial ports; however, the reasons for frustration varied, with the military shippers' causes being mostly "Missing Documentation" and "Incorrect Regulation References," and civilian shippers' reasons being mostly "Incorrect Certifications" and lacking the shipment "Transportation Control Number" (TCN). These findings seem in contrast to the findings of Rothwell et al. (2002), who found no significant difference in the knowledge of military verses civilian HAZMAT shippers.
Though limited research previously investigated the effects of a shipper's training program on its customers, there is significant research on training effectiveness. Kirkpatrick's 1959 four-level model evaluated Reaction, Learning, Behavior, and Results components to assess the effectiveness of training or teaching programs (Kirkpatrick 1996). Additionally, a recent study has shown that unless a company' s training program is aligned with its departments' goals, the training is a waste of employee time and company money (Clark and Kwinn 2005). Researchers developed seven routes through which companies can ensure effective training programs, each of which highlights the importance of direct contact between the training manager and the company's upper and departmental management. Understanding a company's needs ensures that employees acquire the necessary training to meet the company's goals (Clark and Kwinn 2005).
In addition to choosing appropriate training programs, it is important to ensure the provided information is retained. In 1992, Ford and his colleagues investigated how students retained information, and found that retention was affected by the number of opportunities a student had to perform the learned activity and the activity's level of difficulty (Ford et al. 1992). They also concluded that task performance requires both knowledge and a level of self-efficacy (Ford et al. 1992). Thus, while a training program may be adequate, resulting performance may not be (Ford et al. 1992).
METHODOLOGY
This research investigated how commercial shippers train their employees to ship HAZMAT through the military and commercial airlift systems, with the goal of determining whether training practices at commercial hazardous material shippers affect frustration levels at APOEs. There are numerous hazardous material shippers within the United States; therefore, a multiple case study method was used to develop logic replication and provide more meaningful findings (Yin 2003). The first step in the case study methodology (Creswell 1994; Yin 2003) was to develop a list of questions and standards of comparison that would be used to draw the individual cases into a cohesive framework. We formulated two research questions to address this first stage of the case study process, and addressed them by researching commercial and military regulations, including international guidelines from the Department of Transportation, Department of Defense, United Nations, and other international organizations. These two research questions are as follows:
1. What significant differences exist in the way military and commercial shipper personnel are trained on how to ship hazardous cargo?
2. What...
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