The great debate on how continuing resolutions affect DoD
DOD officials said continuing resolutions can delay their ability to pay for goods or services and can lead to repetitive administrative tasks or incremental planning. […]
Month: October 2021
Podcast: The next-generation of combat UAVs with Joseph Murray and Andrew Van Timmeren
I was pleased to have on the Acquisition Talk podcast Joseph Murray and Andrew Van Timmeren. Joe is the co-founder of Blue Force Technologies, a […]
Flyvbjerg forcefully explains why megaprojects should be more modular
I’ve researched and consulted on megaprojects for more than 30 years, and I’ve found that two factors play a critical role in determining whether an […]
Stanley McCrystal on risk taking and military leadership
Here’s one of the two factors that Stanley McCrystal finds important in a military leader: … the ability to make a decision with uncertainty. I’ve […]
Acquisition headlines (10/18 – 10/24/2021)
Algorithmic warfare: new navy task force focused on AI, robotics. (National Defense Magazine) ” The standing up of Task Force 59 will allow officials to […]
Senate appropriators support PPBE reform, provided some cautions
Several recent studies have examined the planning, programming, budgeting, and execution [PPBE] process of the Department of Defense, and have recommended various improvements. Chief among […]
Resolving the cognitive dissonance in naval planning
The U.S. Navy now faces contradictory demands. On the one hand, Congress and others are telling it to heed the lessons of recent catastrophes and […]
Busting up monolithic architectures, the problem of legacy systems, and a federated approach to JADC2
We use the term ‘mosaic’ in the context of what we call Mosaic Warfare. If you look at where the DOD has been heading, it’s […]
Why is defense innovation so slow?
If a clever engineer imagines a new weapon for the Air Force, and if the research-and-development office specializing in that class of weapons approves of […]
Acquisition headlines (10/11 – 10/17/2021)
Ex-Air Force tech boss eviscerates Pentagon for already losing the AI race against China. (The Drive) “Among various complaints leveled at the U.S. military’s approach […]
Reverse innovation, allied partners, and getting more bang for the buck
Consider an American company with a good-better-best product lineup with 80-90-100% performance at 80-90-100% pricing. When seeking to sell in an emerging economy, like India, […]
Does blackboard economics translate to defense decisions?
Here’s an indication of the kind of thinking that predominated the post-WWII world, as expressed by Alain Enthoven who was ASD Systems Analysis in 1966: […]
Risk mitigation and the question of Chinese anti-stealth radar
Here’s the excellent Chad Millette, the chief learning officer at Space System Command, on LinkedIn: Eric Lofgren, you suggest in reference to the story about […]
Podcast: A clean-sheet approach to Space Force acquisition with Cynthia Cook and William Shelton
RAND researchers Cynthia Cook and William Shelton joined me on the Acquisition Talk podcast to discuss their new paper that takes a fresh look at […]
Acquisition headlines (10/4 – 10/10/2021)
IT spend expected to trend up, acting DoD CIO says. (FCW) “The Defense Department’s IT spend has risen steadily in recent years, with an approximate 16% increase […]