The need for a mission command mindset in defense acquisition
The very nature of war makes certainty impossible; all actions in war will be based on incomplete, inaccurate, or even contradictory information… While past battlefields […]
Blog Posts
The thorniest problem facing program managers: long lead times
Two of the thorniest problems confronting PMs are: The length of time required to process procurement documents [and]… The length of time required to effect […]
Takeaways from the Navy’s revised (again) 30-year shipbuilding plan
The new Navy 30-year shipbuilding plan released April 18. Here’s an overview from Navy Times. Interestingly enough, the 30 year shipbuilding plan not only gets […]
Acquisition headlines (4/18 – 4/24/2022)
Navy plans to sink large undersea drone program. (Breaking Defense) “[The Navy] worked to “establish, resource and defend” the LDUUV program over a 14 year […]
Upcoming acquisition events to join!
A couple upcoming events to be aware of, hope to see you there! Acquisition Next: Artificial Intelligence Symposium May 5, 8:30pm – 2:30pm ET In […]
Can DoD help shore up, and speed up, the supply chain?
Here’s Chris Power, CEO of Hadrian, on the Venture Stories podcast. Hadrian is a software-defined factory that can quickly spin up new machine tools and […]
Trends in acquisition reform
I was playing around on Google NGram to see the relative importance of acquisition reform efforts over time. Interestingly enough, the term “Acquisition Reform” doesn’t […]
Noah Smith on defense spending and diversification
But the next question is, how do we prevent such debacles from happening? Simply slashing defense budgets seems unlikely to do the trick, for the […]
Acquisition headlines (4/11 – 4/17/2022)
Congress may reject Navy’s proposal to end LDP-17 flight II line, lawmakers say. (USNI News) “Last week, the Navy in its FY 2023 budget request […]
Report on China’s defense S&T key labs
Here’s a nice report from the China Aerospace Studies Institute on China’s Defense S&T Key Labs (DSTKLs). Lots of charts throughout. A fair number of […]
Rickover on the difference between administrators and engineers
Here’s Admiral Hyman Rickover in a 1971 Appropriations hearing*: There is an essential difference between the nontechnically trained or experienced administrator and the engineer. Administration […]
Will the FY23 defense budget get a $100B bump by Congress?
Here’s an interesting conversation about FY23 budget projections on Defense & Aerospace Report podcast. (I’ll forego the indent) Michael Herson: We’ve seen a lot of […]
GAO struggles to define oversight for the Adaptive Acquisition Framework
Here’s the General Accountability Office’s take on Middle Tier of Acquisition (MTA) in space systems from a recent report. Remember, MTA efforts must be rapidly […]
Acquisition headlines (4/4 – 4/10/2022)
DoD seeks $100M for valley of death bridge fund. (Defense News) ““The $100 million I am asking for is to help multiple small companies, especially […]
Congress needs introspection for PPBE Reform to work, for DoD to innovate at scale
There are several ways in which Congress is a major impediment to an improved defense investment process. First, congressional committees are loath to shed their ability […]