Who Is Joint?

An analysis of joint officer management from the demand side to assist in a response to a congressional directive to review joint billets and joint duty assignments. The goal of the demand-side research was to recommend a procedure for identifying the joint content of positions and to examine the implications of applying the procedure to generate a new Joint Duty Assignment List. The researchers found from analysis of survey data that joint content can be adequately measured by using a combination of Joint Time and Joint Function and an algorithm was developed to rank-order the positions. The size of a list can then be cut to the desired number of positions the services can support. The authors recommend changing policy to allow O-3 positions to qualify for joint credit. They further suggest changes to the Goldwater-Nichols legislation to allow in-service billets for grades O-4 to O-6 and to use a specific methodology to identify critical billets. A companion report will describe the results and recommendations of the supply-side analysis.