The Development Guidelines of Military Training System for High-Competent Officers of the Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters Following Israel Defense Forces’ Model

Abstract

The elite Israel Defense Forces’ training program “Talpiot” was studied and analyzed as the best practice model by qualitative research methodology, integrated with primary data from interviewing of 10 experts in education and personnel development fields. The systematic frameworks were adapted from the Thai military education and training system, system theories, which consists of 4 main parts; 1) Screening and Selecting as an ‘Input’ 2) Training and Learning as a ‘Process’, 3) Evaluating and Sorting in Organization as an ‘Output’, and 4) Feedback. Later, the efficiency development guidelines for the high-competent officer training system of the Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters were synthesized by using content analysis.

The results provided the understanding of the theories, the training systems of Israel Defense Forces, and the development guidelines for the high-competent officers of the Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters in 7 aspects of: 1) Screening and Selecting 2) Course Syllabus 3) Training and Learning Method 4) Training Management 5) Evaluating 6) Sorting in Organization and 7) Related Connection & Network. The critics on obstacles hindering the development were also included by the experts i.e. Organizational culture, seniority, personnel management system, and limitation of specialized instructors. Moreover, the research found that the development of high-competent personnel at Rank of Lieutenant Colonel (Lt.Col.)/Commander (Cdr.)/Wing Commander (Wg.Cdr.) (03 level) would be the most cost-effectiveness for the Royal Thai Armed Forces Headquarters at present. The key success is to develop a successor plan to identify the right personnel and to attain the right development course.