Measurement of team performance in air combat–have we been underperforming?

In air combat, a traditional way of evaluating team’s taskwork performance is to measure its performance output. However, it provides a narrow view about the team’s performance and potentially misses the complexity of air combat and the team’s taskwork when tactical operating procedures, teams’ competencies and applicability of aircraft systems are evaluated in live-, virtual- and live-virtual-constructive- simulations. This paper introduces a model of an air combat system, which explains the dynamically interacting elements relevant to the measurement of team performance in air combat. Shared situation awareness, mental workload, task performance and normative performance are proposed as supplementary measures for the performance output. Recommendations for the selection of measurement techniques are provided. The multidimensional measurement approach presented in this paper can prevent potential misunderstanding of team performance. The principles of the system model and the associated measuring techniques can be applied to the analysis of any military system where the objective is to achieve a holistic measure of team performance.