with acquisition and sustainment and research and engineering leadership in the Office of the Secretary of Defense and in the military services “to ensure risk is understood and that the acquisi- tion workforce is encouraged to manage risk effectively.”
Asked where responsibility would fall for ensuring that acquisition programs deliver promised capabilities to the end user on time and on budget, Austin responded that he would rely on a collaborative rela- tionship of the secretary of defense, the undersecretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, the service acquisi- tion executives and the undersecretary of defense for research and engineering and would himself bear ultimate responsibility.
“Problems with acquisition can arise from many factors, including overly ambitious requirements, immature technologies, and poor planning and/or execution by government or contractor teams. ... When there are failures, we should learn from them, identify root causes, and move on from the program if a better alternative can be identified.”
On the issue of unrealistic, unfeasible, unstable and unaffordable requirements, Austin was asked what best practices the department can employ to generate realis- tic and feasible requirements, particularly
“This transition team
was really focused on having people in place on day one that didn’t require confirmation.
”
HICKS SWORN IN
Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III, right, swears in Dr. Kathleen H. Hicks as deputy secretary of defense on Feb. 9 at the Pentagon. (Photo by Staff Sgt. Jack Sanders, U.S. Air Force)
in sophisticated, rapidly evolving technical areas, and given that software increasingly defines the capability.
“Dynamic approaches to requirements generation in a mission engineering context, as well as insights from proto- types, experiments and pilots aligned with the department’s modernization priori- ties and the National Defense Strategy, should continuously shape requirements and designs,” Austin stated. He singled out “these approaches that actively engage users, and allow rapid iterative insertion of emerging technologies.”
CONCLUSION While some think of the presidential transition period as the first 100 days or so, it’s really just the beginning, said Loren Dejonge Schulman, vice president of research at the Partnership for Public Service, in a discussion with Terry Gerton, president and CEO of
Academy of Public Administration, on “Government Matters.”
“Realistically, transition will go on for the rest of the year,” Schulman said. Histori- cally, it has taken at least this long to get all the appointees in place.
MARGARET C. ROTH is an editor of Army AL&T magazine. She has more than a decade of experience in writing about the Army and more
than three
decades' experience in journalism and public relations. Roth is a MG Keith L. Ware Public Affairs Award winner and a co-author of the book "Operation Just Cause: Te Storming of Panama." She holds a B.A. in Russian language and linguistics from the University of Virginia.
the National
https://asc.ar my.mil
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