AF CyberWorx Project Update: CWS Inform

Written by Lorren Stahl, Technical Writer
and Clara Cirks, Marketing Specialist

CWS Inform Project Background

In 2018, AF CyberWorx began a project to assess current readiness management systems for 621st Contingency Response Wing out of Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey. AF CyberWorx interviewed Graduate Training Integration Management System (GTIMS) users to understand user needs and assess the ability of the GTIMS. Our User Experience (UX) Designers solicited feedback on user pain points, user journeys, and needs of an ideal system.

Key Factors Discovered in GTIMS User Interviews

AF CyberWorx team members discovered three key factors during this series of interviews:

Readiness is a critical factor for squadron commanders.
Commanders rely on the readiness information they receive to be current and accurate.
Current systems do not collate information, making readiness assessment difficult because information needs to be verified through more reliable sources.

Additionally, data sets pulled from GTIMS were disparate and lacked actionable intelligence. As the stakeholder’s goal was to enable commander/staff readiness orchestration and expand capabilities of the system, further development of solutions was integral. Small business CyberWinter Studios was introduced to AF CyberWorx and project stakeholders through a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program to further develop solutions for the platform. The SBIR program enables small businesses to engage in federal research and development for technological potential.

Current Stages of Developed Solutions

Following the discovery phase, CyberWinter Studios designed and developed a minimum viable product (MVP) that consolidates relevant data into a single, intuitive format. This product and partnership are still active, and currently, CyberWinter Studios has a Phase II SBIR award. CyberWinter Studios’ current product, CWS Inform, has potential for enterprise automation, as the platform and code provide an interactive dashboard, automated workflows, and normalized back-end data. Code from this project has also been pushed to Github for common use by developers looking for a platform to understand and measure force readiness. Thank you to our partner with CyberWinter Studios, Mr. John Grigg, for continuing to push efforts to engage crucial technology with warfighters.

To learn more about AF CyberWorx initial efforts for this project, please visit the CWS Inform project webpage.

For more information on CyberWinter Studios, please visit the CyberWinter Studios website here.

Images courtesy of Mr. John Grigg, CyberWinter Studios