GAO produces 18 reports on F-35 between 2001-2018
The GAO says it produced 18 reports specifically on the F-35 between 2001 and 2018. Here’s an excerpt from the first: Although the Joint Strike Fighter […]
Management
Fahey plans reforms to the 5000 series
The Defense Department is undertaking a comprehensive rewrite of its main acquisition guidance and that revision work will have a heavy emphasis on software development, […]
Sustainment cost estimating update
The increased capability and complexity of weapon systems has been accompanied by a decline in reliability and availability and a corresponding increase in O&S [Operating […]
The myth of PERT: all the decisions have been made
Mr. Holifield…. If we can find some way of doing the preliminary work and clarifying the type of project that you are going to want… […]
DOD spent $413 million on the FY2018 audit
The DoD’s discretionary spending is almost half of the total U.S. Government’s discretionary funding. In addition, the DoD owns the majority of the U.S Government’s […]
Are certified managers associated with worse project outcomes?
The demand for professionally certified project managers has grown significantly since the mid-1980s and organizational policymakers today associate certification with project manager competence. Despite its […]
Intangible asset valuation sounds like weapons choice
Valuation of intellectual property (hereafter the broader term, intangible assets) is one of the most important and vexed issues in finance, investment and commercialisation today. […]
To End the Reform Pendulum, Fix the Budget
After a 2009 law increased centralization of defense acquisition decisions, reform began to swing in the other direction starting around 2015. The new emphasis is […]
A discussion on program office organization
Following up on the podcast, here’s a bonus Q&A with the gracious Victor Deal: Eric: During the podcast, you said: “There’s this sense that perhaps […]
Does the program manager matter?
If PMs indeed can have little influence over program outcomes, it is unreasonable to hold them fully accountable for those outcomes; however, this opposes NPM’s approach that has guided defense acquisition for more than two decades.
The role of the contracting officer
Thus, contracting authority is fragmented. The project officer is responsible for the success of the project, while the contract officer is the legal representative of […]
How Google Works: acquisition review (part 1)
The book How Google Works, by Eric Schmidt and Jonathan Rosenberg, offers many insights in a post-industrial (or post-corporate) world. I’ll discuss the book’s ideas […]
How to Invest in Randomness and Optionality
Think about that for a second. When there is a 90% that companies are bad, and a 90% accuracy rate being able to identify them, I still have a 50% hit rate of being right. So someone with 90% accuracy is no better than flipping a coin.
How does cost growth affect decision making?
I’m not sure how these results support the idea that “a solid and funded test plan often mitigates future cost growth.” It sounds like if you were 10% over budget to first flight — and that reliably means you’ll be that much or over for the program — then engineering and requirements problems were the culprit and not testing.
Do intangibles lead to a productivity divergence?
When intangibles hardly matter, then capital and labor ought to be about equally productive across all firms. When intangibles matter a lot, then productivity differences will widen. What does this mean for defense organization?