Rear Adm. Dave Antanitus, USN

How do you know what you

know? The Director, Installations

& Logistics (SPAWAR), explains

how program managers obtain

objective quality evidence—

metrics—to substantiate their program successes and strategies.

A L SO IN THIS ISSUE: SO IN THIS ISSUE:

SECURITY SUPPORT TO

ACQUISITION OF WEAPONS

SYSTEMS

POWER ELECTRONICS

BUILDING BLOCKS PROGRAM

MODERN ACQUISITION MYTHS

The Business of Metrics—

Measuring the Product of the Plan 

P ROGRAM M ANAGER

LAST CHANCE TO REGISTER FOR DAU ALUMNI

ASSOCIATION ANNUAL ACQUISITION SYMPOSIUM

USD(AT&L) Announces Retirement

DoD Biometrics Program—Search for a Prime Security

Enabler that Cannot be Lost, Forgotten, Forged, or Stolen

MARCH-APRIL 2003
2

Strengthening DoD’s Identity Assurance

Through an Enterprise-Wide Biometrics

Solution

Dr. Linda Dean • Maj. Stephen Ferrell, USA •

Lydia Kaizer

Biometrics—a prime security enabler that

cannot be lost, forgotten, forged, or stolen.

42

Can’t Get to Performing Without

Storming

Maj. Norman Patnode, USAF

Working as a team through the stages of

forming, storming, norming, and finally,

performing.

10

The Business of Metrics—Measuring the

Product of the Plan

Rear Adm. Dave Antanitus, USN

How do you know what you know?

18

Acquisition Programs/Total Information

Awareness—Secretary Aldridge’s Feb. 7

Pentagon Briefing to Media

E.C. “Pete” Aldridge Jr.

Total Information Awareness (TIA) is a

project to demonstrate information technologies that can be used as tools to prevent future terrorist acts anywhere in the

world. 

46

Power Electronics Building Blocks

(PEBB) Program

Joseph C. Piff

PEBB is bringing a whole new perspective to power control and distribution.

60

Security Support to Acquisition of

Weapons Systems

Arion Pattakos

Security and Critical Program Information (CPI) are vital to success on the battlefield.

Vol X X XII, No.2, DAU 173

A B I M O N T H LY M AGAZINE OF THE D EFENSE

The Defense Acquisition University is accredited by The Commission of the Council

on Occupational Education (COE), a national

institute of accreditation recognized by the

U.S. Department of Education.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 1

30

Modern Acquisition Myths

Capt. Dan Ward, USAF

One size does not fit all.

36

The Reliability Analysis Center

Ned Criscimagna

A Program Manager’s Resource

A CQUISITION U NIVERSITY

ALSO

Defense Acquisition University Awarded National Accreditation........................................................7

DoD Transformation Still on Track.........................................................................................................................8

DAU South Region Signs MOA with U.S. Army Space & Missile Defense Command

& Acquisition Support Center, Southern & Western Regions....................................................14

Distance Learning Technology Brings Instructors to Students..........................................................15

DoD Recognizes Top Info Technology Performers ..................................................................................16

Five New Business Initiatives Approved..........................................................................................................29

Pentagon Plans Heavy Investment in UAV Development...................................................................34

DAU South Region Gains New Strategic Partners...................................................................................39

Advanced Technologies Program is on the Battlefield..........................................................................40

DFARS Transformation.............................................................................................................................................45

DAU Award Presented to Outstanding Student........................................................................................54

DAU South Region Hosts First Annual Acquisition, Technology, and Education Expo......55

Director, Defense Procurement & Acquisition Policy Publishes New Managers’ Guide...59

Edward C. “Pete” Aldridge to Retire .................................................................................................................64

DAU Alumni Association Celebrates 20th Anniversary.........................................................................69

Pentagon Officials Tell Congress Missile Defense System “Moving Forward”...........................72

DAU Alumni Association Celebrates Anniversary.....................................................................................74

Aldridge Appoints Domain Owners..................................................................................................................79

Honoring 12 Exceptional Mentor-Protege Teams...................................................................................80

DoD Announces Plans to Stimulate Undergraduate Research.......................................................84

Universities Selected for Research Funding................................................................................................84

Become a DAUAA Corporate Sponsor..........................................................................................................85

Surfing the Net .............................................................................................................................................................87

PM Writer’s Guidelines............................................................................................................Inside Back Cover

Published for the

DEFENSE

ACQUISITION

UNIVERSITY

President

Frank J. Anderson Jr.

Commandant

Col. Ronald C. Flom, USA

Director, Operations Group

Col. Ronald J. Hayne, USA

Director, Visual Arts and Press

Greg Caruth

PROGRAM MANAGER

Managing Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Collie Johnson

Chief, Layout and Design . . . . . . . . . Paula Croisetiere

Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sylwia Gasiorek-Nelson

Letters to the Editor and other correspondence are

welcome and may be mailed to the address shown

below or sent by e-mail to collie.johnson@dau.mil. Article preparation/submission guidelines are located on the

inside back cover of this issue or may be downloaded

from our Web site at http://www.dau.mil/pubs/pm/articles.

asp. Inquiries concerning proposed articles can also be

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Some photos appearing in this publication may be digitally enhanced.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Dean is Director of the DoD Biometrics Management Office (BMO), located in Arlington, Va. Her

full bio appears on p. 5 of this article. Ferrell is Director, Biometrics Fusion Center, BMO; and Kaizer

is with Booz, Allen & Hamilton, providing policy

contract support to the BMO.

DOD BIOMETRICS PROGRAM

Strengthening DoD’s Identity

Assurance Through an EnterpriseWide Biometrics Solution

Biometrics—A Prime Security Enabler that

Cannot be Lost, Forgotten, Forged, or Stolen

D R . L I N DA D E A N • M A J. ST E P H E N F E R R E L L , U S A • LY D I A KA I Z E R

2

I

magine what it might be like for

DoD employees, even when transferring from one area to another, to

be able to easily access their computers and workplaces with the

touch of a finger to a platen device, or

by glancing into an iris scanner. Imagine, more importantly, what it might be

like for the DoD to know that users are

able to access only the facilities and information to which they have been

granted authority.

Traditional Forms of

Identification Fall Short

The challenge to achieving such an endstate is easily stated: how does the DoD

guarantee—at any given time, in any

given location—that a person claiming

authority to access valuable internal assets is actually the person to whom such

authority has been granted? Recent

events have made it clear that something

in addition to the traditional forms of

identification—photo IDs, Personal

Identification Numbers (PINs) and passwords—might be necessary to meet this

challenge. A tool is needed that cannot

be lost or forgotten, forged or stolen;

that can guarantee the identity, or verify the claimed identity, of an individual; that can ensure that the right person with the right privileges has timely

access to secure systems and facilities
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 3

across the DoD enterprise; and that can

positively link an individual with certain activities or events.

To achieve these levels of identity assurance, the DoD is turning to measurable, individual-specific characteristics

that can positively associate a person

with the benefits—including facility and

network access—to which he or she is

entitled. These characteristics are referred to as biometrics. They include

certain physical patterns and geometries

that are unique to each human being: a

fingerprint, the shape of a hand, the configuration of an iris, the arrangement of

nerves in the retina, the topology of the

face, the inflections and modulation of

a voice.

Each of these and other individual-specific identifiers can be captured, measured, converted to a mathematical algorithm, and recorded for future use.

Moreover, because they represent who

you are, instead of what you know (a

PIN or password) or what you possess

(a token or key), each has the potential

to allow for guaranteed identity assurance. That, in turn, translates to guaranteed security of the DoD’s physical

and information assets.

The DoD is no stranger to biometric

technologies; the Department has been

using these technologies to manage access to chemical demilitarization projects for many years. More recently, the

Department has begun using iris scan

and fingerprint technologies to manage

physical access to restricted properties

and logical access to critical computers

and networks.

Looking to the future, the DoD is investing heavily in the research, development, and evaluation of emerging

biometric technologies, including facial

recognition, hand geometry, signature

verification, and voice recognition, to

determine their operational viability. A

list of qualified devices, however, is only

half the equation. The question remains:

how do you make each device functional

within an enterprise as massive, multifaceted and geographically dispersed as

the DoD?

The DoD Biometrics

Management Office

In 2000, the United States Congress directed the Secretary of the Army to act

as Executive Agent in leading, consolidating, and coordinating all biometrics

information assurance programs for the

DoD. To accomplish this mission, the

Army created a DoD Biometrics Management Office (BMO). The mission of

the BMO is to ensure that biometrics

technologies are integrated effectively

into information assurance programs,

physical access control systems, and best

business practices across the DoD. This

mission entails two clearly defined objectives: 1) to test and evaluate currently

available biometrics products for DoD

applications; and 2) to develop an enterprise solution to facilitate the use of

biometrics across the DoD.

Device Testing

The BMO maintains two criteria for selecting the biometric devices that it evaluates.

COTS Product

First, the device must be a CommercialOff-the-Shelf (COTS) product. Through

close working relationships with research and development organizations

such as the Defense Advanced Research

Projects Agency (DARPA), the BMO

keeps informed of cutting-edge technology developments in the biometrics

arena. Its mandate, however, is to build

a solution that will satisfy current DoD

requirements.

Interoperability

Second, the BMO considers only those

devices that have the potential to integrate into a large, enterprise-wide solution. Interoperability is critical. Once

these prerequisites are satisfied, the Biometrics Fusion Center (BFC), located in

West Virginia, steps in to perform comprehensive testing.

There are three phases to the BFC’s product testing process.

Product Assessment Phase

All devices claim certain levels of technical performance. The BFC’s Product

Assessment phase determines to what

degree those claims are valid, and

whether or not they meet certain DoDdetermined minimum performance

standards.

Controlled Environment Testing

The second phase of the evaluation

process, Controlled Environment Testing, introduces each device to a set of

conditions intended to determine if an

item—in addition to being technically

viable—can remain technically viable

in various DoD operational environments. Devices are subjected to extremes

DoD is turning to

measurable,

individual-specific

characteristics that

can positively

associate a person

with the benefits to

which he or she is

entitled, such as a

fingerprint, the shape

of a hand, the

configuration of an

iris, the arrangement

of nerves in the retina,

the topology of the

face, the inflections

and modulation 

of a voice.
4 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

of illumination, temperature, humidity,

physical stress, operational repetition,

particulate contamination, and electronic and magnetic interference. The

data collected from these evaluations

allow the BFC to match device capabilities with specific DoD operational

requirements.

Field Testing

Those devices that meet one or more

DoD operational requirements are graduated to the final phase of the evaluation process. Field Testing involves physical deployment of selected devices to

the operational environments in which

they will have to function. Their performance during this phase will establish the military applications for which

they will be appropriate, and the level

of security that they will be able to provide within each application.

The result of these testing activities will

be a DoD Biometrics Product List. This

is the list from which DoD executives

and commanders will select biometric

devices that meet their specific identity

assurance requirements.

Enterprise Solution Development

The BMO plans to reach Full Operational Capability (FOC) of its biometrics enterprise solution by the second

quarter of fiscal 2005. The devices, systems, network architecture, and business processes that comprise this solution will allow for worldwide deployment of biometric identification devices

to safeguard access to DoD facilities and

information.

The goal of this development initiative

is summarized in a phrase coined early

on by the BMO: one enrollment, multiple

uses. The idea is to provide the DoD with

the ability to: 1) rapidly, accurately, and

securely authenticate personal identity

based upon one or more of an individual’s biometric characteristics; and 2) to

exchange that individual’s biometric credentials between authorized entities in

a secure and trustworthy fashion.

Once fully operational, the DoD’s biometrics solution may be used as a standalone access security tool or—especially

dards or common commercial practices

for biometrics. This maximizes interoperability between biometrics applications, helping the biometrics industry meet DoD technology requirements

in an efficient manner. By reducing the

adoption of technologies that cannot interact with other systems of similar purpose but different architectures, this interaction between industry and

government is a benefit to taxpayers as

well.

Building the Component Pieces

The BMO has identified four stages in

the life of a biometric:

• Collection

• Storage

• Access and Retrieval

• Use

Each of these stages, or functional areas,

poses a unique set of requirements that

must be satisfied individually, but must

also work within the larger context of

an integrated solution. For each functional area, there are five phases to the

development process:

• Design

• Build

• Test

• Field

• Integrate

The final phase, integration, involves

the incorporation of the solutions developed within each functional area

(Collection, Storage, Access and Retrieval, and Use) into a unified architectural whole. To create best-of-breed

solution sets for each area, the BMO has

created four Enterprise Working Groups

(EWGs) to identify requirements and

design and implement Technology

Demonstrations (TDs).

The Collection Enterprise

Working Group

This EWG is responsible for researching and recommending the best biometrics collection system configurations

to become part of the enterprise solution’s operational, systems, and standards architectures. To ensure scalability, this group will focus primarily on

in those instances when the facility or

network in question is of particular importance—it may become part of a layered solution, serving in concert with

other, more traditional forms of identification.

The DoD Biometrics Senior

Coordinating Group

To ensure that the security requirements

of the various Agencies, Departments,

and Services within the DoD are adequately represented as the BMO proceeds with evaluating biometric devices

and with building a biometrics enterprise solution, the Army, acting as executive agent, also has formed a DoD

Biometrics Senior Coordinating Group

(BSCG). Similar in function to a board

of directors, this group is composed of

senior military and civilian executives

across the DoD.

Its mission is to provide strategic guidance to the DoD BMO on the development, evaluation, and implementation

of biometrics enterprise solutions; and

to serve as the DoD-wide coordinating

group for biometrics issues. This mission entails, among other things, the development and implementation of policy, and the promotion of selected

technical and business process standards.

Policy

In order for the DoD to successfully deploy a biometrics enterprise solution,

policy must be created and implemented

to allow for and manage the use of this

solution. The BSCG endorses and provides advocacy for policy governing the

collection, storage, retrieval, and use of

biometric data within DoD. This provides the needed horsepower to implement those plans, and provides the DoD

biometrics end-users with the guidance

they need to best employ these new

technologies for security or business

process improvement.

Standards

As information and resource sharing becomes an ever-increasing priority across

all government departments, the BSCG

recommends and promotes the use of

federal, national, and international stan-
5 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 5

the most widely used biometrics technologies, such as fingerprint and iris

scan, to serve as a program baseline. Dependence on other biometric technologies, such as voice and facial recognition, will grow as those systems become

more mature and are able to satisfy user

requirements. The intent is to identify

biometric collection devices that will

meet user requirements regardless of location or environment, including devices used for both physical and information access.

One solution currently under review by

the Collection EWG is to leverage all or

portions of the DoD’s existing personnel information collection infrastructure. These include:

• All 65 United States Military Entrance

Processing Command Stations.

• All fixed Real-time Automated Personnel Identification System locations

(RAPIDS).

• All portable RAPIDS workstations that

issue Common Access Cards (CACs)

within the DoD.

In any event, candidate collection solutions are scheduled for testing during

the TD phase in the fourth quarter of

fiscal 2003.

The Repository Enterprise

Working Group

This EWG is tasked with identifying the

most relevant biometric storage solutions to enhance DoD business and tactical functions. To achieve this goal, the

group is focused on researching and recommending optimal biometric repository configurations for local, regional,

and central repositories. Candidate

repository solutions for local and regional repositories are scheduled for testing in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2003.

Access and Retrieval

Enterprise Working Group

The next step in the process is to identify the communications architecture

that will best support secure access, retrieval, and management of biometrics

data. Working closely with the Defense

Manpower Data Center (DMDC), the

Access and Retrieval Enterprise WorkDR. LINDA S. DEAN

DOD BIOMETRICS MANAGEMENT OFFICE

Office of the Secretary of the Army

Corporate Information Office/G6

Dr. Linda S. Dean became the Director,

DoD Biometrics Management Office on Aug. 1,

2002. As the Director, Dean

is currently overseeing the

development of DoD biometric policies and enterprise solutions for physical and logical

access uses crossing all functional areas including finance,

logistics, personnel, acquisition, information management, and medical. 

Prior to assignment in this position, from October 1999 to August 2002, Dean served as

the Army's Corporate Information Office's

(CIO) C4 Enabling Technologies Director

where she directed the implementation of

the Army's Common Access Card and Public

Key Infrastructure programs, which provide a

standardized DoD smart card technology solution for personal identification, digital signatures, and email encryption. 

From October 1997 to August 1999 she

served in the Army's Office of the Director of

Information Systems for Command, Control,

Communications, and Computers (DISC4) as

the Director, Electronic Commerce (October

1990 through September 1997) and Director, C4 Policy (October 1997 through September 1999), respectively. While in those

policy positions, she managed the development of Army-wide policy direction contained in over 200 regulations, pamphlets,

and Army policy letters, for the Army's five

information mission area disciplines, which

included: automation; telecommunications;

printing and publishing; visual information;

and records management.

Before joining the ODISC4 staff, from 1987-

1990, she served as a senior program analyst in the Army's Program Executive Office,

Standard Army Management Information

Systems (PEO STAMIS). As a senior analyst,

she was responsible for oversight of program

management activities for several high-dollar

(greater than $100 million in life cycle costs)

Army Information Systems, including the

Army's Computer Aided Logistics System

(ACALS), the Corps of Engineers Automation

Program (CEAP), and the

Army's Super Computer Program.

Dean served as Chief of the

Resource Management

Division, Software Development Center, Fort Lee, Va., and

as Chief of the Program and

Budget Division, Headquarters,

Information Systems Engineering Command, Fort Belvoir, Va.

(1984-1987). In both positions she centrally managed Army-wide annual operating budgets amounting to $60

million and $756 million respectively.

While serving as a comptroller careerist, she

held journeyman program analyst positions in

both the Army's Training and Doctrine Command and the Information Systems Command (1981-1984). She entered the Army's

Comptroller career field as an Army Materiel

Command Intern at Corpus Christi Army

Depot in August 1979. Prior to the internship,

she spent six years (1973-1978) working in

both supervisory and non-supervisory positions in Army finance and accounting offices

at Fort Monroe, Va.; Fort Jackson, S.C.; and

the Army Corps of Engineers Middle East Division (Rear) in Berryville, Va.

Dean earned her Doctorate in Public Administration from the University of Southern California, Washington Public Affairs Center,

Washington, D.C. She holds a Masters of

Public Administration from the University of

Southern California, Washington Public Affairs

Center, Washington, D.C., and a Bachelor of

Arts (with honors) in Human Resource Management from Saint Leo's College, Fla.

Dean's executive training includes the Professional Military Comptrollership Program at the

Air University, Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala., in

1983 (her team received the academic

achievement award); the U.S. Army Mid-Career Executives Program in Public Administration during 1986 through 1987; and, the

Federal Executive Institute Program for Leadership in a Democratic Society in 1995.
6 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

ing Group is tasked with guiding the

design and development of this optimal

architecture.

As with the processes previously described, candidate solutions identified

by the Access and Retrieval EWG will

be tested in the fourth quarter of fiscal

2003.

Use Enterprise Working Group

The Use Enterprise Working Group is

responsible for carefully considering

DoD end-user requirements in designing an enterprise solution. This group

is working closely with the RAND Corporation, which has been tasked with

surveying multiple DoD organizations

to identify user requirements. Consolidated user feedback is expected during

the second quarter of fiscal 2003, in time

for candidate solution testing in the

fourth quarter of fiscal 2003. 

In addition to the four EWGs that constitute the core of the BMO’s enterprise

solutions development program, five

specialized working groups are charged

with addressing program-wide enterprise architecture, requirements, policy,

legal, and economic issues.

• The Enterprise Architecture working

group is tasked with determining the

optimal architectural configuration

between DoD users and the central

repository.

• The Requirements working group is

responsible for identifying functional

requirements from the Uniformed Services, DoD civilian political leadership, the Joint Staff, and other DoD

agencies to establish future regulations.

• The Policy working group is charged

with developing a prescriptive, incremental DoD policy framework that

mandates policies and procedures for

how biometrics will be acquired,

stored, and used.

• The Legal working group is tasked

with establishing regulatory authority and guidelines for proper collection and disposal of biometrics from

active and reserve military personnel,

civilians, contractors, family members, and foreign personnel hired by

the DoD.

• Finally, the Functional Economic

Analysis working group is responsible for defining alternatives to support the Program Objective Memorandum (POM) process, and for

delivering a cost-benefit model to validate the implementation of the enterprise solution.

Putting the Pieces Together

Once the TDs are complete, the BMO

will integrate these functional solutions

into a comprehensive Enterprise Architecture. Parallel to this effort, the BMO

will develop a policy framework to establish procedures for the collection,

storage, and use of biometrics within

DoD. Leveraging both the technology

solutions and the policy framework, the

BMO plans to reach Initial Operational

Capability (IOC) by the second quarter

of fiscal 2004 and FOC by the second

quarter of fiscal 2005. Figure 1 to the

left illustrates this process.

During the IOC phase, the BMO will introduce its integrated enterprise solution on a smaller scale to various test

populations. This important phase will

allow the BMO to identify user concerns

regarding technology and operational

components of the solution. This information will provide the BMO with a

clear picture of which best-of-breed biometric technologies are best suited

within each environment, and will allow

for fine-tuning and adjusting of the solution as a whole. Collected over the 12-

month duration of the IOC phase, this

information will drive the Biometrics

Management Office’s migration plans,

as well as its acquisition and deployment plans, for scaling and implementing the solution to FOC across the

DoD.

FIGURE 1. DoD Biometrics Management Office Enterprise 

Solution Development

FIGURE 2. DoD Biometrics Management Office Enterprise 

Solution Management
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 7

Enterprise Solution Management

Once the enterprise solution has

achieved FOC, the focus of the DoD’s

biometrics program turns to maintaining and securing DoD biometric data

and managing the network over which

those data are exchanged. However, the

rapidly evolving nature of biometric

technologies will continue to present

challenges and opportunities for improvement. In fact, as illustrated in Figure 2 on the preceding page, the development of a biometrics enterprise

solution is itself an ongoing, iterative

process.

This approach follows a “build as you

grow” concept, dividing the system into

several useful, supportable, and operational increments. In growing biometrics capability, demonstrated technology and operational concepts are

incorporated into sequential Capability

Increments (CIs). As each CI completes

the build phase, it becomes the baseline

for the next increment. This ongoing

process will ensure that the BMO continues to meet its mission within the

DoD, and will ensure that the DoD possesses the identity assurance system that

it needs to meet its mission to the people of the United States.

Biometrics—A Prime

Security Enabler

As the DoD moves further into the digital age, biometrics serve as a prime security enabler by ensuring positive identification of those accessing critical

systems and facilities. This technology

offers countless uses for military applications in future systems, including information assurance, force protection,

and access control. However, mature

technology adoption takes a deliberate,

conservative approach in order to

achieve optimal effectiveness. The DoD’s

initiative with the BMO’s biometric Enterprise Solution assumes this course of

action to ensure that the resulting system architecture is interoperable, scalable, and able to meet the growing demands of our transforming military.

Editor’s Note: The authors welcome

questions or comments on this article.

Contact ssadlon@brtrc.com.

F

ORT BELVOIR, Va. (Feb. 4, 2003)—The Commission of the Council

on Occupational Education (COE) has granted accreditation to the

Defense Acquisition University, located at Fort Belvoir, Va. Announcement of the action was made by Harry L. Bowman, Executive Director, Commission of the Council on Occupational Education (COE),

following the Commission’s meeting held in Atlanta, Ga., Feb. 2-4, 2003. 

The award of accreditation status is based on an evaluation to demonstrate

that the institution meets not only the standards of quality of the Commission, but also the needs of students, the community, and employers.

The Commission’s evaluation process includes an extensive self-study by

the institution and an intensive review by a visiting team of professional

educators representing the Commission’s member institutions from other

states.

The Defense Acquisition University began its self study in July 2000 and

underwent a team visit in November 2002. The visiting team chairperson

was James Conely.

The COE, based in Atlanta, Ga., offers quality assurance services to postsecondary workforce education providers across the nation. Organized as

a non-profit corporation, the mission of the Council is to assure quality

and integrity in career and workforce development. Services offered include institutional accreditation (recognized by the U.S. Department of

Education), program quality reviews for states and workforce education

providers, and informational services. Most of the Council’s work is carried out by qualified professional volunteers who are experts in workforce

education.

Institutional membership in the Council is voluntary, but can be achieved

only by becoming accredited. The Council’s current membership makes

it unique. Members include postsecondary public technical institutes, specialized military and national defense schools, Job Corps Centers, private

career schools, non-profit workforce education providers, corporate and

industry education units, and federal agency institutions. No other agency

accredits and serves the diversity of organizations served by the Council.

There are approximately 410 institutional members at the present time.

The Defense Acquisition University, with headquarters at Fort Belvoir, Va.,

has regional campuses in Patuxent River, Md.; Dayton, Ohio; Huntsville,

Ala.; and San Diego, Calif. For its primary mission,

DAU provides training and education to approximately 129,000 practitioners in the Department of Defense Acquisition, Technology

and Logistics Workforce (DoD AT&L).

Editor’s Note: To view the DAU 2003

Course Catalog, visit http://www.dau.mil

and click on “DAU Courses.” 

Defense Acquisition University Awarded

National Accreditation
DoD Transformation Still on Track

GERRY J. GILMORE

WASHINGTON, March 6, 2003—The

Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks on the

United States underscored DoD’s

need to transform to meet the challenges of

the 21st century, Defense Secretary Donald

H. Rumsfeld said here today. 

In his opening remarks to military and civilians gathered at the fifth Pentagon town hall

meeting, Rumsfeld recalled that he’d spoken to Pentagon employees about transformation issues at a similar gathering the day

before the attacks. 

At that time nobody knew terrorists were

about to launch their attacks against America the next day, Rumsfeld pointed out. Immediately after the attacks, some people, he

said, thought transformation should be put

on hold, in order to better prosecute the

war on global terrorism. 

“The opposite was true,” the Secretary emphasized. “Indeed, the attacks of Sept. 11

make transforming the Department even

more urgent, because they have awakened

us to a fundamental truth.” 

America has entered a new security environment, where, Rumsfeld remarked, “the

nexus between terror and terrorist states

and weapons of mass destruction means

that attacks in this 21st century will be more

likely—(and) very likely more deadly—than

at any time in modern history.” 

RELEASED March 6, 2003

An Air Force sergeant asks Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld a question during a “town hall”

meeting at the Pentagon, March 6, 2003. Photo by Robert D. Ward
Although the United States and its allies

have routed terrorists in Afghanistan and

elsewhere in the world early in the war, the

Defense Department is “still not yet arranged

to deal successfully with this new security

environment,” he stated. 

DoD entered the 21st century configured “to

fight big armies, big navies, and big air

forces,” Rumsfeld said. It isn’t arranged, he

added, “to fight the shadowy terrorists and

terrorist networks that operate with the support and assistance of terrorist states.” 

To win the global war on terror, America’s

armed forces have to become more flexible

and agile “so our forces can respond more

quickly,” Rumsfeld pointed out. “Today, we

still do not yet have that agility.” 

The Defense Department “is still bogged

down to too great an extent in the micromanagement and bureaucratic processes of

an earlier era,” he said. For example, he said,

DoD wants to be like a private-sector corporation and be able to transfer money from

department to department rapidly, as

needed, rather than haltered by myriad outdated rules. 

Today, he added, more than 300,000 servicemembers are performing essentially nonmilitary jobs, “and yet, we’re calling up reserves to help deal with the global war on

terror.” 

Hundreds of thousands of manhours are

consumed preparing reports that are likely

not read and are “of marginal value,” he

noted. 

And the time to produce a weapon system

at DoD has doubled since 1975, Rumsfeld

remarked, “in an era when new technologies are arriving in years and months, not

decades.” 

Today’s DoD was set up to meet the challenges of the mid-20th century, not the 21st,

he declared. However, steps to eliminate

waste and duplication have taken place on

his watch, the Secretary said. 

For example, headquarters staffs across DoD

have been reduced by about 11 percent, he

said. The acquisition process has been

streamlined “by getting rid of hundreds of

pages of rules and regulations and allowing

program managers—we hope—to be more

innovative, flexible and creative,” he added. 

A new financial management system is slated

to debut this spring, he said, that will help

DoD to greatly reduce the 1,800 different

information systems it currently uses. 

Rumsfeld said he wants to revamp DoD’s

civilian personnel system, making it more

flexible and responsive “so we can attract

and retain and improve the performance of

our 700,000-plus civilian workforce.” 

Opening the floor to questions, he fielded

inquiries about Iraq, transformation, and

other topics. A female Air Force civilian employee asked if there was a way to streamline the paperwork and bureaucracy required for hiring new people. 

Rumsfeld gestured toward David Chu, the

Pentagon’s top personnel manager, and said:

“David Chu, fix it.” 

The auditorium erupted in laughter. Chu

told the Air Force employee that civilian

personnel management is one of the things

DoD has marked to revamp as part of its

transformation. 

“That’s exactly what we want to try to

change,” he said. 

Editor's Note: This information is in the

public domain at http://www.defenselink.

mil/news.
10 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Your first impression of the title

of this article may be that it is

written primarily for acquisition professionals (APs) or for

“budget weenies.” You are right.

However, I would submit that for any

of us who control money, whether that

be an ACAT I program manager developing the latest weapons system or a division officer managing a portion of

ship’s OPTAR (Operating

Target), we are all at least

part AP, and if we are not

all “budget weenies,” we

probably should be (that

is, unless, you have an

unlimited budget!).

Developing Metrics

This article addresses the

process of developing

metrics, the objective sets

of data we use to measure

how we are doing relative

to goals, and how we are

improving, declining, and

the reasons for both. If

you control any amount

of money, are part of or

own a process, have people working for you, or

work for somebody who

imposes goals and standards, this article is for

you. I guarantee you that

you are not measuring

everything you should.

Why Develop

Metrics at All?

The first question to ask

is, “Why develop metrics

at all?” The answer is simply to improve your performance. You think you know how you

are doing, but how do you really know

unless you have the objective quality

evidence to prove it? Put another way,

“how do you know what you know?”

In the case of Space & Naval Warfare

Systems Command (SPAWAR), as we

started fielding IT-21 (Information Technology for the 21st Century)—the U.S.

Navy’s IT program to improve shipboard

communications and computing capability—our customers voiced significant

dissatisfaction in our ability to field systems that worked, were cost effective,

and could be delivered on schedule.

We “knew” we were not as bad as our

customer was telling us. We were good

people, working hard to deliver the best

products and services we could to the

MANAGEMENT & MEASUREMENT

The Business of Metrics—

Measuring the Product of the Plan

How Do You Know What You Know?

REAR ADM. DAVE ANTANITUS, USN
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 11

Fleet. Yet, our reputation was in the toilet. We had no substantive data, no metrics, to document where our money was

spent, why it was spent the way it was,

and why some systems were troubled.

We wanted to be the premier provider

of IT systems for Navy, but the truth was

our processes really were broken, and

we were not measuring anything to develop the knowledge to make our

processes better. 

You develop metrics, then, to measure

your processes. Your analysis of your

metrics then provides knowledge, which

is fed directly back into your processes.

The result should be improvement in

your processes, which will be borne out

by your subsequent metrics. Much like

a systems engineering approach, this is

a recursive and iterative process for improvement in your processes, and ultimately in your performance. 

In SPAWAR, we had plenty of incentive

to embark on process improvement, and

today’s metrics show where performance

has substantially improved as well as areas

that still need the work. The difference

between now and three years ago is that

we now understand our processes, we

know what drives them, and we are measuring them. How do we know this? Our

customers have told us. 

Where Do We Start?

We all have things we should be measuring, but for whatever reason, we do

not. Given this situation, and the knowledge that we do need to improve our

performance and do need to develop

metrics, where do we start? Well, we

could just start measuring anything and

everything and see what falls out. We

could hire an outside contractor to come

into our organization and do this work

for us. There are several very professional contractors out there willing to

do this work for us, but if

we a looking to “buy a miracle” from a contractor,

what will we have learned

in the long run?

A better approach is to do

the work ourselves. Think

about this for a while. If you

hire a contractor, don’t they

come in and learn what it

is you do for the first few

weeks? The point may very

well be that you do not understand what it is that you

do or do not understand

about the processes you use

to do your job. If this is an

honest assessment of your

starting point, why would

you hire someone else to

figure it out for you? 

A good way to start on your

metrics development journey is to map out your core

competencies (what it is

that you do) by organization, department, division,

and so on down to the desired level. When you have

defined and agreed upon

your core competencies, the

next step is to map the processes you

use to execute your mission to the core

competencies. This again, is not easy. In

SPAWAR, it took us several meetings before we reached consensus on these first

two steps, and we are still refining these

areas as missions and tasks change or

evolve. The last step is to identify metrics (things you would like to measure)

to assess how well you execute your

processes. Yes, a contractor could do

this for you, but I contend the best product is generated internally. 

What Makes a Good Metric?

First and foremost, a good metric is measurable. Examples include cost, performance, reliability, schedule, or anything

else that has numbers readily associated

with it. (Be careful here—just because

you can measure something does not

mean it is a useful metric!) Secondly, a

good metric is one that maps directly to

a strategic goal or has a tactical focus. A

strategic goal may take the form of the

CNO (Chief of Naval Operations) objectives, Type Commander strategic

goals, or even the goals of a Battle Group

for a given deployment. Metrics with a

tactical focus would be a level or more

below the organizational or corporate

level, but would be similar in content

and would map to higher-level goals or

objectives.

Measure the Right Things

The metrics you develop and track need

to be part of your everyday job. If you

are tracking metrics just to maintain

data, you are measuring the wrong

things. Do not hesitate to discard metrics that you find you are not using on

a day-to-day basis. You need to focus

your attention on things that make a difference. If you are measuring the right

things, your metrics provide knowledge

to improve your processes, are important to your boss, are important to your

customer, and in a sense, “tell your story”

for you.

Share your data and your conclusions

with your customers frequently. They

will tell you if you are measuring the

right things. Have open books, build

trust with your customers and stakeholders, and keep feeding the metrics

Why develop

metrics at all? The

answer is simply to

improve your

performance.You

think you know

how you are doing,

but how do you

really know unless

you have the

objective quality

evidence to prove

it? Put another

way,“how do you

know what you

know?”
12 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

back into your processes to improve

your performance. This approach 

really does work, and once you get it

going, it is just part of your daily routine.

Fleet Modernization and the

D-30 Process

To illustrate how metrics really do make

a difference in becoming more efficient,

let’s look at how we do Fleet modernization. Again, this is a SPAWAR point

of view, but the processes involved and

metrics measured could be used by any

organization.

The chart on p. 13 shows the timeline

for the D-30 process, which is mandated

by the Fleet for modernization. Taking

a look at the first 6 months of the timeline, you can see that Battlegroup (BG)

composition should be identified at D30, the first planning conference held

at D-28, a final planning conference at

D-25, and the final baseline for the BG

established at D-24.

At SPAWAR, we keep track of, or measure the dates of these meetings and conferences. While the exact dates for these

milestones may not be critical, planning

meetings and conferences that take place

on schedule provide good “leading” or

predictive metrics for how successful

we will be in providing cost-effective

modernization for the BG. Specifically,

the final baseline must be established

on or before D-24 (or 1 month prior to

BG deployment). This allows the planning yards to ship check individual ships

for the new systems they will receive in

their post-deployment CNO availability before they get underway for their

near-term deployment. This then allows

the planning yards to develop integrated

System Installation Drawings (SIDs)

while the ships are deployed.

Similarly, with completed SIDs, funding put in place, Government Furnished

Equipment (GFE) received, and installation contracts let prior to return from

deployment, the installation contractor

has ample time to plan for modernization before the ship returns and hit the

ground sprinting once the CNO availability starts.

In SPAWAR, we have found that with

everything working perfectly, you can get

a contract awarded up to 100 days...In

many cases, early contract award has

resulted in installation cost savings of up

to 30 percent, and the metrics show 

how and why.

DAVID J. ANTANITUS

REAR ADMIRAL (LOWER), USN

Director, Installations & Logistics (SPAWAR 04)

Space & Naval Warfare Systems Command

Rear Admiral David

Joseph “Dave” Antanitus is a native

of La Salle, Ill. He graduated from the United

States Naval Academy

in 1974 with a Bachelor of Science degree in

Mathematics.

A member of the acquisition professional

community, Antanitus is currently

serving as the Director for Installations and Logistics in the Space and

Naval Warfare Systems Command.

His previous acquisition assignments

include serving as a major program

manager in the Naval Sea Systems

Command’s Deep Submergence Program (NAVSEA PMS-395) and Major

Program Manager in SPAWAR’s Fixed

Undersea Surveillance Program

(PMW-181).

Antanitus entered the Submarine Service upon graduation from the Naval

Academy, and his initial sea tour was

aboard the nuclear-powered attack

submarine USS Parche(SSN 683). He

went on to serve as Engineer Officer of the fleet ballistic missile submarine

USS Ulysses S. Grant (SSBN

631) and Executive Officer of USS Boston (SSN

703).

His shore tours included

duty on the staff of Submarine Squadron 14 in

Holy Loch, Scotland, and

Weapons Systems Analyst for the

Chief of Naval Operations Office for

Naval Warfare (CNO OP-07).

Antanitus assumed command of the

pre-commissioning unit for the Los

Angeles class attack submarine Hampton (SSN 767) Aug. 12, 1991. He took

the ship through commissioning, initial sea trials and fitting out, and commissioned it USS Hampton Nov. 6,

1993.

Antanitus’ personal awards include

the Legion of Merit with gold star, the

Meritorious Service Medal, and the

Navy Commendation with four gold

stars.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 13

The planning phase of modernization

discussed here is a process with numerous metrics mapped back to it. In

addition to dates, other metrics include

ship check completion, SID completion,

ShipAlt Record (SAR) approval, installation funding, GFE delivery, and Integrated Logistics Support (ILS) certification and many, many more. All of these

metrics roll up into contract award for

a consolidated installation package. In

SPAWAR, we have found that with

everything working perfectly, you can

get a contract awarded up to 100 days

prior to the start of a CNO availability.

In many cases, early contract award has

resulted in installation cost savings of

up to 30 percent, and the metrics show

how and why.

As with most things in life, however, the

planning and execution of modernization rarely goes perfectly. Poor ship checks

spawn errors, SIDs are inaccurate or incomplete, or GFE is not properly kitted

for an optimum installation. So, once

your high-level metrics have identified

areas of concern, you have to develop

and analyze lower-level metrics to really

get at the root cause of your problem. In

the case of drawing errors, we found that

we were spending millions of dollars

every year in rework due to inaccurate

SIDs. Armed with this data (or metrics),

we were able to go back to the individual planning yards and discuss process

improvements they needed to implement

to provide us, the customer, with a more

cost-effective product.

Interestingly, most of the yards kept no

metrics on their performance with respect to drawings. They just assumed

they were doing fine, not knowing how

well they really could do. Once they

started tracking the right metrics and

started feeding them back into their

processes, we saw error rates drop by as

much as 50 percent! This is one of many

examples where our metrics were used

to make a process more efficient. Put

another way, metrics modify behavior.

For every step in planning and execution of modernization, we found many

things we could measure and many

areas we could improve. We continue

to work on these areas for every ship we

modernize. We also found that when

measuring our cost effectiveness in delivering the end product, there were

events that we could not control, and

some of these were real cost drivers. 

Baselining (that is, establishing a modernization installations package) a BG

two years before deployment is somewhat of a crystal ball exercise. We all do

the best we can in predicting composition and requirements for individual

units, but over the course of two years,

“stuff happens.” Ships’ schedules change,

units in BGs are swapped for operational

and maintenance reasons, and world

events can alter dramatically. All of these

reasons lead to changes in BG composition and ship requirements after the

D-24 baseline is set. 

Consider the scenario where at D-20 on

the nominal timeline, Cruiser A is

swapped out for Cruiser B for the subsequent deployment. The immediate effect is that the money spent to ship

check and complete SIDs for Cruiser A

is lost, and new funds have to be identified to ship check and complete drawings for Cruiser B. Additionally, if Cruiser

B is deployed, we may have to expend

additional travel and Per Diem expenses

to ship check at sea, and we may have

to pay the planning yard additional

funds to expedite drawing development

to support a CNO availability on an earlier timeline than planned.

There is no free lunch here, and operational failure is not an option, but responsiveness has a price tag attached.

We always get the job done, but the later

in the cycle an installation is turned on

or a change is made, the more it costs.

It is important to measure this cost of

responsiveness and share it with the customer. They need to understand how

they are driving costs so they can make

sound business decisions as well as operational ones. The metrics in this case

help both the provider and customer

optimize their processes.

Execution—Where the Rubber

Meets the Road

While the planning metrics provide all

the leading indicators for success, the

D-30 Process (Deployment – 30 Months)

If you control any amount of money, are

part of or own a process, have people

working for you, or work for somebody

who imposes goals and standards...I

guarantee you that you are not

measuring everything you should.
14 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

rubber meets the road in execution. The

final cost, schedule, and performance

measure the total product of the plan. 

• For cost performance, there is no approach better than the Earned Value

Management (EVM) system. (EVM is

a system that uses work completed

vs. funds expended to develop cost

and schedule performance indexes.

It develops a Cost Performance Index

[CPI] and Schedule Performance

Index [SPI] to assess work efficiency

as it is being performed. Courses in

EVM are taught by the Defense Acquisition University [DAU] and are

also offered online.) 

• Schedule is measured directly in time

to accomplish work.

• Performance is measured in a variety

of methods, from CASREP (Casualty

Report) free time to performance vs.

advertised standards. Again, metrics

shared between the provider and the

customer provide a common reference for the success of the modernization performed.

Good Metrics Evolve

The modernization example demonstrates how we started by identifying a

core competency, mapped our processes

to it, and developed metrics to measure

the process. Actually, the example given

discussed only a small fraction of the

metrics we measure on a daily basis.

There are many more at several different levels required to fully understand

what is driving our cost, schedule, and

performance and ultimately to provide

the objective evidence to let us “know

what we know.” Good metrics also

evolve, and by continually measuring

the same things, you may be missing

new opportunities to improve.

Set Goals

When you start measuring your

processes, set goals. When you achieve

your goals, raise the bar and keep measuring. Push your metrics to your customers and show your customers how

they can contribute to process efficiency.

You really are what you measure, and

measuring the product of the plan needs

to be part of doing business every single day.

Think you are doing fine?——Show me

the metrics!

Editor’s Note: The author welcomes

questions or comments on this article.

Contact him at david.antanitus@navy.

mil.

DAU SOUTH REGION SIGNS MOA WITH U.S. ARMY SPACE & 

MISSILE DEFENSE COMMAND & ACQUISITION SUPPORT CENTER, 

SOUTHERN & WESTERN REGIONS

On Feb. 5, 2003, the Defense Acquisition University

South Region (DAU South), located in Huntsville,

Ala., and representatives from the U.S. Army Space

and Missile Defense Command (SMDC) and the Acquisition Support Center (ASC), Southern and Western Regions, signed a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) establishing and entering into an educational and strategic

partnership. Their partnership will seek to leverage mutual learning opportunities.

Signatories of the MOA were from left: Maxine Maples

Kilgore, Director, ASC Southern and Western Regions;

Mark Lumer, Principal Assistant Responsible for Contracting, U.S. Army SMDC; and Jim McCullough, Dean,

DAU South Region.

For more information on DAU Strategic Partnerships,

contact Wayne Glass at wayne.glass@dau.mil. Photo by Debra Valine
Distance Learning Technology

Brings Instructors to Students

GERRY J. GILMORE

WASHINGTON, March 13, 2003—The Air

National Guard's distance-learning programs

are recognized as some of the most advanced

within the Department of Defense. 

About a decade ago, DoD asked the Services to step

up research and implementation of distance-learning

methods as a means of training servicemembers, said

Master Sgt. John Kayko, superintendent for the Air

Guard distributed learning program.

“E-learning,” “distance learning,” or “distributed

learning” is any method of instruction where the instructor isn't physically present,” Kayko explained.

Classes may be conducted via satellite broadcast, on

CD-ROM, over the Internet—even by teleconference. 

For years the Air National Guard has adopted many

cutting-edge training and education techniques—especially e-learning methods, he noted. 

“We follow private industry and try to get the very

latest e-learning technology they're using and adapt

it to our DoD-related methods,” Kayko explained. 

In 1995, the Air Guard put in a satellite-based learning system called the “Warrior Network” and concurrently created its distance learning policy branch,

he explained. The Air National Guard and Army National Guard mutually share the Warrior Network and

many other e-learning resources, he noted. 

Kayko said the Air Force's version of the Warrior

Network is the Air Training Network, or ATN. Many

other federal agencies, he noted, share ATN's satellite

system. 

E-learning technology saves money “because you're

not sending people from the home unit to another

state to take these courses,” said Maj. Dean DeJong,

chief of the Air Guard advanced distributed learning

section. This type of training is especially beneficial

for guardsmen who may live far away from their units,

he pointed out. 

“We can deliver an education or training course

pretty much anywhere in the world, even if servicemembers are on deployment,” noted Master Sgt.

William Quarles, Air Guard advanced distributed learning program manager. 

In a joint project called “Project Alert,” the University of Nebraska is working with the Air Guard and

Army Guard to develop common courses suitable for

e-learning, Kayko said. One example is a hazardous

material-handler training course that's available to servicemembers on CD-ROM and on the Web. 

“Such training is applicable, of course, to all the

Services, and many other federal agencies,” Kayko

pointed out. 

He said the Air Guard's Warrior Network is mostly

televised by satellite with three uplink sites and 202

downlink sites or classrooms. 

The classrooms feature high-definition television

monitors and open speaker systems, so the students

can communicate with the instructor, Quarles explained. Students can see the instructor, ask questions

and get a response back, he added. 

Multiple hookups can be used to connect several

classrooms of students, Quarles pointed out. One such

course using this networking technique is the Satellite NCO Academy, he remarked. The program consists of 13 weeks of satellite-broadcast lessons and two

weeks of resident instruction. 

The active Air Force provides the majority of formal resident training to Air National Guard members

and Air Force reservists, Kayko explained. The Air

Force plans to convert some classroom instruction to

e-learning format. In fact, Kayko added, the Air Guard

will assist in converting some of the active Air Force's

resident training instruction into distance-learning

form.

He noted that several active Air Force courses are

now being converted to e-learning format via Project

Alert. 

DoD's advanced distance-learning Sharable Content Object Reference Model courseware is currently

being used by the Services in providing standardized

Internet-based instruction, Kayko pointed out. 

“Multiple agencies can use the same tool, thereby

saving money and sharing the courseware,” he concluded. 

Editor's Note: This information is in the public domain at http://www.defenselink.mil/news.

RELEASED March 13, 2003
DoD Recognizes Top Info

Technology Performers 

GERRY J. GILMORE

WASHINGTON, Jan. 22, 2003—Top performers across the Defense Department's information technology realm recently took

home DoD Chief Information Officer (CIO) Award

honors. 

The CIO Awards program, now in its second year,

recognizes outstanding achievement in at least one

of seven key areas of information technology outlined in the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996: acquisition;

architecture and interoperability; information assurance; management and standards; applications

(technology or process); capital planning and investment; and information management/information technology workforce. 

Recognized achievements provide better service,

cost- savings, and significantly impact DoD's information technology mission. 

Section 5123 of Clinger-Cohen (co-named after thenU.S. Sen. and former Defense Secretary William

Cohen) requires DoD to leverage information technology and adopt related goals toward improving

efficiency and effectiveness across the department. 

DoD CIO Awardees for 2002 include:

Team Award Winner: U.S. Air Forces in Europe

(USAFE) Network Operations and Security Center,

Ramstein Air Base, Germany, developed information

technology solutions to improve information assurance for more than 40,000 customers across 10 European and Asian countries. Also developed a more

efficient, computerized "one-stop" personnel-processing system that greatly enhances quality of life

for USAFE service members, family members, and

DoD civilian employees. 

Second Place Team Winner: The Navy Supply Information Systems Activity, Commercial Asset Visibility II System Team, Mechanicsburg, Pa., developed a computerized logistics system that tracks and

monitors supply assets in the repair cycle, providing 99.55 percent accurate accountability of stock

in transit for repair. The system is credited saving

(with) more than $300 million in inventory management and $1 million in direct labor costs. 

Third Place Team Winner: The Headquarters, U.S.

Army Knowledge Online team's Web site,

https://www.us.army.mil/portal/portal_home.jhtml,

is recognized by CIO Magazine as one of the top 50

across business and government. InfoWorld also

ranked the Army as No. 10 out of 100 organizations

for its innovative use of information technology. 

Team Award Finalist: Information Support Activity,

U.S. Army Accessions Command, Fort Monroe, Va.,

used information technology to improve recruiting

operations, including a special Web portal that monitors quality of service and performance. 

Team Award Finalist: The efforts of the U.S. Marine

Corps Legacy Applications Team at Quantico, Va.,

were cited for significantly improved computerized

systems used to support the warfighters, while ensuring that legacy computer databases have been

identified, tested, and certified before being transitioned into the improved and interoperable NavyMarine Corps Intranet system. 

Individual Award Winner: Army Maj. Mitchel Hudson, Director of the Information Support Activity at

the U.S. Army Enlisted Records and Evaluation Center, Indianapolis, is credited with developing an onRELEASED Jan. 22, 2003
line site for official military personnel files. He integrated the personnel electronic management systems

networks of the Total Army Personnel Command,

the Enlisted Records and Evaluation Center, the National Guard Bureau, and the U.S. Army Reserve Personnel Command. Savings are expected to exceed

$1.1 million. 

Second Place Individual Winner: Col. John M.

Maluda of Headquarters, U.S. Air Forces in Europe,

Ramstein Air Base, was cited for a computer security initiative that realized a 68-person staff reduction and established a common standard for computer security operations. 

Third Place Individual Winner: Thomas J. Sheehan,

Deputy Director for Information Technology Management in the Pentagon's Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and

Logistics, worked to accomplish successful testing

of a secure, remote, dial-up communications system

for senior DoD leaders to use in the event of additional terrorist-precipitated actions. As part of another pilot project, he also worked to marry wireless technology with the OSD Enterprise E-mail system. 

Individual Award Finalist: Marine Corps Lt. Col. Hal

M. Gobin, U.S. Marine Forces Atlantic at Norfolk,

Va., was recognized for his role in helping to establish DoD's Public Key Infrastructure program within

Marine operations along the Atlantic coast of the

United States. 

Individual Award Finalist: Naval Reserve Cmdr.

David M. Wojda, Naval Reserve Forces Command,

New Orleans, worked to ensure legacy Naval Reserve computer databases and systems were inspected

and compliant for transition to the Navy-Marine

Corps Intranet. 

Editor’s Note: This information is in the public domain at http://www.defenselink.mil/news.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Aldridge is the Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology & Logistics), The Pentagon, Washington, D.C.

DOD BRIEFING

Acquisition Programs/Total Information

Awareness—Aldridge Briefs Media

18

I

have a few opening comments this

afternoon, and then we’ll open it up

for any questions you may have. I

will first address some actions we’ve

taken to modify our operation of

the Total Information Awareness [TIA]

project being undertaken by DARPA

[Defense Advanced Research Projects

Agency].

Total Information Awareness

As you know, TIA is a project to demonstrate information technologies that can

be used as tools to prevent future terrorist acts anywhere in the world. There

have been some concerns expressed regarding the protection of the privacy of

individuals, and to address those concerns, we’re establishing two oversight

functions. 

INTERNAL TIA OVERSIGHT BOARD

The first is an internal TIA oversight

board, which I will chair. This board

will establish policies and procedures

for the use within the Department of

Defense of those technologies and will

establish the protocols for transferring

those technologies to entities outside of

the Department of Defense. Other than

myself, the internal board will consist

of the Under Secretaries of Policy and

Personnel and Readiness; the Assistant

Secretary of Defense for Command,

Control, Communications and Intelligence; the Assistant Secretary of Defense

for Legislative Affairs; the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs; the General

Counsel; and the Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Oversight. The first meeting of this board will

be held at the end of this month. 

EXTERNAL TIA FEDERAL

ADVISORY COMMITTEE

We’re also establishing an external federal advisory committee that would advise the Secretary of Defense on the

range of policy and legal issues that are

raised by the development and potential applications of TIA technologies.

The charter of this committee and [a list

of] its members are included in a statement that I believe was released just earlier today [p. 10], which will give you

the names and what the purpose of that

external board will be. 

Acquisition Programs

I would now like to turn to management and improvement issues and to

some of the weapon systems decisions

that we’ve made as part of the president’s

FY ’04 budget request. Dov Zakheim

briefly covered some of these at his

budget briefing on Monday, but I’ll give

you the opportunity to ask questions

if you need more detail. 

DOD 5000 SERIES

The DoD 5000 series, the documentation that establishes the DoD

weapons acquisition system, is ready for

the Deputy Secretary of Defense’s signature. We expect that momentarily. The

DoD 5000.1 directive is now three

pages, with a five-page attachment. DoD

5000.1 tells us what we want to accomplish with our acquisition system:

flexibility, responsiveness, innovation,

discipline, and streamlined and effective management.

The DoD 5000.2 instruction is now 12

pages, with a 24-page attachment, telling

us the management framework and the

elements that must be incorporated in

our acquisition plans, such as evolutionary development, milestone decision points, technology plans, and criteria for entering the various stages of

the programs. Those are some of the

things that they cover.

On Feb. 7, Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology &

Logistics) Edward C. “Pete” Aldridge

Jr., held a Pentagon briefing followed

by Q&A on Acquisition Programs

and the Total Information Awareness

(TIA) program. Also participating

was Michael Wynne, Principal

Deputy Under Secretary of Defense

(Acquisition, Technology & Logistics).

RAH-66 Comanche aircraft.

Photo courtesy The Boeing Company
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 19

You can actually read this document and

know what to do. The old documentation—the directive, instruction, and regulation—was a total of 250 pages, and

I will assert was never read. Hopefully,

this one will be.

SPIRAL DEVELOPMENT/

PROGRAM STABILITY

In accordance with my goals, most of

our major weapon systems now have

an acquisition strategy that includes evolutionary spiral development, and to the

best of our knowledge, are properly

priced to meet the schedule and performance objectives. We have budgeted

these programs, for the most part, based

upon independent cost estimates that

tend to be more accurate than those provided by the military departments. I believe these two elements—spiral development and properly pricing

programs—are essential if we are to deliver the weapon systems to the

warfighter on schedule and within the

performance that we have promised. 

FUTURE COMBAT SYSTEM

Regarding major acquisition activities,

we’ve added funding—about $1.3 billion—for the Army’s Future Combat

System. The Army has made a conscious decision to defer modernization of some of its legacy equipment

in favor of investing in the future of

the Army. A major decision is planned

for May of 2003 to enter into system

development and demonstration Milestone B. We’re having monthly reviews

with the Army as we lead up to this

decision point.

COMANCHE

We’ve restructured the Comanche program. It’s now reconfigured for reconnaissance and light attack, and we’ve reduced the numbers to about 650—that’s

roughly half—pending the outcome of

the review of the Future Combat System of the Army. The program was having some difficulty in achieving its performance objectives for the full attack

capability, and we decided to limit its

capabilities for now. 

MISSILE DEFENSE

The president has directed we provide

a limited capability for defense against

long-range ballistic missiles by upgrading the missile defense test bed with interceptors, a sea-based component, improved land-based radars, and a plan to

evolve this capability through evolutionary spiral development in the future. 

The first missile defense component

ready for deployment—the PAC-3 —is

being transferred to the Army in accordance with our management plan for

missile defense. You may recall that our

management plan calls for the military

department to assume the deployment

operations after the capability has been

developed by the Missile Defense

Agency. 

SHIPBUILDING

We’ve increased the shipbuilding rate

from five ships to seven in FY ’04, and

plan to gradually increase this rate

through the FYDP [Future Years Defense

Plan] period. We’re continuing with the

conversion of the four Trident submarines to very capable, conventionally

weapon-armed SSGNs [Nuclear Powered Cruise Missile Submarines]. 

The DDX (destroyer) program continues with its focus toward technologies

applicable to a family of ships—cruisers, destroyers, and littoral combat

ships—consistent with last year’s restructuring. 

The CVNX (aircraft carrier, nuclear, experimental) program has been restructured to place as much technology as

possible on the lead ship, now called

the CVN-21. New propulsion plant,

electric catapult, reduced manning, improved survivability, and more efficient

flight operations are the keys to this new

carrier, planned to be available in the

2011 period. And plans for a second

ship to begin construction in 2011 will

further enhance carrier effectiveness. 

F/A-22

We’ve had some delays in the flight test

program that have resulted in a transThe DoD 5000

series...is ready

for the Deputy

Secretary of

Defense’s

signature. We

expect that

momentarily...

it’s prescribing

what we want

you [program

managers] to do,

but not the

recipe of how to

do it. 

Image courtesy Northrop Grumman 

DD(X) artist’s rendition
20 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

fer of some funding

from procurement to

R&D [Research & Development]. Recent results have shown that the flighttest program is recovering, but we’ve

had to slow the production somewhat

in the near term. This has not increased

the cost of the program since we have

a “buy to budget” plan for the F-22. 

F/A-18

We’re continuing production of the F/A18E/F at a rate of 42 per year. We will

introduce the production of the F/A18G, which is the electronic warfare version, in FY ’06, and the combination of

the Es, the Fs, and the Gs will total 42

aircraft a year throughout the FYDP period. 

V-22 OSPREY

The flight test program for the V-22 is

going well, with over 250 hours of testing since its return to flight. They’re

doing high rate of descent and shipboard

compatibility testing now—the more

difficult and challenging testing period.

I will travel to Patuxent River next week

to review the results and the future plans

for the flight test program. 

JOINT STRIKE FIGHTER

The Joint Strike Fighter development is

progressing well. There will be a major

engine test this year, and we’re a little

over 2-1/2 years away from first flight

of the development aircraft. Our eight

international partners are heavily involved in the development, and their

local companies are winning contracts

for various components. As you know,

the United Kingdom picked the STOVL

[Short Takeoff from Vertical Landing]

version of the Joint Strike Fighter, as the

aircraft that will go on their new carrier,

the winner of which we just announced

last week. 

We’re finalizing agreements with Israel

and Singapore for potential purchase of

the JSF through a security cooperation

and participation arrangement. This is

much like a Foreign Military Sales activity.

We’ve accepted the results of the NavyMarine Corps Tactical Air Integration

Study. Better integration of the elements

of the Navy and Marine Corps missions

and the integration of a more reliable,

available, and improved capability Joint

Strike Fighter have permitted the Navy

and the Marine Corps to reduce the

number of aircraft required to accomplish their mission. There should be no

effect of this decision in the near term,

and we expect international sales to

more than offset the reduction in the

Navy’s Joint Strike Fighter numbers.

OTHER TRANSFORMATIONAL

PROGRAMS

Other transformational programs are

continuing. The Transformational

Communication System, TCS,

which is the equivalent of

putting fiber optics in space;

the acceleration of the UAVs

[Unmanned Aerial Vehicles)

and UCAVs, [Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles]; and a serious start on a spaced-based

radar are in the budget. We’ve

accelerated our efforts on hypersonic technology and have

allocated about $1.3 billion in

our science and technology

budget for high-speed hypersonics and space technology. 

2004 Budget Request

Let me close by commenting

briefly and in general on the

president’s budget requests.

We’ve done a lot of good things in this

budget to address deficiencies and problems. We’ve balanced our needs for our

people, our readiness, our modernization, and transformation; we’ve balanced

the near-term risk versus the far-term

risk; and we feel comfortable that this

balance is right. 

However, there are some things we did

not do. We would have liked to eliminate sub-standard family housing units

faster; we would have liked to have recapitalized our infrastructure at a faster

rate; we would have liked to have

bought more tactical aircraft at a faster

pace to reduce the average age of our

tactical Air Force; we would have liked

to have gotten our shipbuilding rate up

to 10 ships a year versus 7 to sustain the

size of the Navy; and we would have

liked to have gotten our science and

technology budget up to our goal of 3

percent versus the 2.7 percent that’s in

there now. Again, balance is the key, and

we believe overall, it’s about right. 

Q

Mind if I ask you a couple of questions about

the Comanche program? You mentioned

that the numbers were halved, and you attribute that, it seems, largely to the fact that

the role is limited to recon and light attack.

But I’m hoping you can elaborate upon this.

My understanding is that before the DAB

[Defense Acquisition Board] in the fall, the

program really was in serious jeopardy. And

Joint Strike Fighter

Photo courtesy Lockheed Martin 
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 21

there was a lot of analysis, there was a lot

of reworking, restructuring the program

that was done, basically, as I understand,

that gave you and your staff a comfort level

with the program. Can you elaborate upon

what sort of restructuring, what sort of

analysis gave you a comfort level? And why

these numbers, as opposed to the 1,200? 

A

The original Comanche program was

over 1,200 aircraft, including variants

that included light attack plus attack

versions. And as we looked at the weight

required to hang more and more capability on the Comanche, it was very clear

that the risk was extremely high as we

got further and further into heavier and

heavier requirements. And that was

causing the program to slip; it was causing them to spend a lot of money on capabilities that we weren’t sure we really

needed.

So we looked at that program to try to

reduce the risk. There was an independent look done by IDA [Institute for Defense Analyses], General Larry Welch,

who felt that there was too much risk

in these high-end requirements. And we

decided to slow down the program—

focus it on what we could achieve with

high confidence, which was the light attack plus reconnaissance—and then

look at the structure of what the Army

needed for their Future Combat System

[FCS]. All of these are related decisions. 

The decision coming up in May on the

Army’s FCS is really going to be a major

decision relative to the future composition and size and components of the

Army. We felt that [by looking at] the

Comanche program, with its 650 aircraft, and the FCS, then we can make a

decision on how all those fit together at

that particular time. But risk was the key

thing behind it. 

Q

Can I just follow up on that? One thing in

particular, the UAV component of it—you

know, a lot of people wonder why can’t the

armed recon mission be done by a UAV?.

And there’s a big push at the DoD level in

the Army to pursue the UAV. There was

some analysis done, as I understand it, that

basically addressed that question. Can you

talk about that? 

A

Well, that was one of the other factors

that went into the question of what is

the size of the Comanche we should be

planning for now. Given [the fact that]

we don’t know how all that fits together,

we can define a structure of the Army

that could use roughly 650 Comanches,

and then let these other issues—Future

Combat System, the role of UAVs—play

out before we made a final decision as

to the direction of the Army. 

Q

The Senate passed an amendment [WydenFeinstein Amendment, Jan. 23, 2003] designed to severely curb both research and

deployment of the Total Information Awareness system. Do you think that the advisory committees, which you have announced

today, should lead the conference committee to drop that amendment? Or what do

you think about it? 

A

We’re working with the Congress on

their amendment. We’ve actually briefed

Senator Wyden on that concept, and we

think we can probably come to a compromise that is acceptable to all.

Q

But do you think these elements address

some of their concerns?

A

Yes. 

Q

Can you say a word or two about the Boeing tanker lease proposal and how far along

you are? You’ve had a series of meetings. It

looks like you’re getting close to a decision.

A

It’s hard. You’re right, we have had a series of meetings within the [Pentagon].

We’ve had Boeing in to talk to them

some more. It is a major investment required by the Department of Defense.

It’s something new—anything new leads

people to ask questions about whether

or not it’s doable. But we are working it

now. In fact, we’re having meetings this

week, and we’ll try to wrap up some direction, hopefully next week, on this

whole idea.

We’re looking at the military value; we’re

looking at how we do a lease that would

protect the taxpayers’ interest; what are

the other alternatives, lease versus buy?

Those kind of things are all being assessed at this point. No decision has

been made as of yet, but we’re trying to

work those out and come to a decision

soon. 

Q

I just want to follow up on that. You say

that you’re going to come to a decision soon;

We’ve done a lot of good things in

this [2004] budget to address

deficiencies and problems. We’ve

balanced our needs for our

people, our readiness, our

modernization, and

transformation; we’ve balanced

the near-term risk versus the

far-term risk; and we feel

comfortable that 

this balance is right.
22 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

you want to try to make a decision next

week. Did I understand that correctly? 

A

We would like to. Whether or not we

can depends on whether people can

focus their attention on those things. 

Q

Can you talk about the funding for that program and how that is reflected in the budget that you sent up to the Hill? 

A

There’s no funding at this point in the

budget that’s gone before the Hill. The

Air Force had a plan to purchase the aircraft in their Program Objective Memorandum. That is reflected in the out

years. But as of right now, there is no

funding identified in the FY ’04 budget.

If we decided to proceed, we would have

to go in with a reprogramming request

and work with the congressional committees to find the funds. 

Q

Did DoD actively solicit participation from

the privacy groups to be members of the external oversight board, specifically those

groups that had expressed serious reservations about the concept of TIA? 

A

No. What we’ve done is form the external group we have—which has the

expertise to go look into these issues.

How they proceed and how they may

hold their hearings—and maybe they

would solicit the groups to come and

give them their view—that would be

something that would be worked out

by the external oversight board. 

Q

The UAV/UCAV road map—isn’t the latest version of that about due now? 

A

I saw it as of yesterday—the draft version. 

Q

Can you talk about it? How might it affect

what you do and how much money may be

involved?

A

As you know, we’ve put a lot of money

for UAVs and UCAVs into our budget,

both in Predators and Global Hawks.

We are working on a joint program between the Navy and the Air Force for a

follow-on UCAV.

All those are still a little bit in the out

years. The road map really does lay out

what we want to accomplish, shows the

programs that we have currently underway, and tries to rationalize a way

ahead that avoids duplication. It is really good, but it still needs some coordination work to be done.

Q

So Northrop Grumman hasn’t captured the

Navy UCAV with X-47—are you going to

reopen the competition in that?

A

We are examining what a joint program

might look like and what the competition element of that joint program

should be.

Q

So you may compete the X-45, X-47?

A

We are still working that. We haven’t

made the final decision on it yet. But we

will have a joint program. 

Q

Do you have any other details on the UCAV

Joint Program Office?

A

No. It’s being discussed now, and we

haven’t [decided] who’s going to lead

it—I would speculate and project it will

be run much like we’re running the Joint

Strike Fighter Program Office, where

there is a lead Service program manager,

and the other Services have the acquisition, and then those Services switch.

Wynne: We had a session on that very

thing. And what we want to do, I think,

is let DARPA combine the programs, because they’re both DARPA programs,

and then move toward a first flight or

some objective event before we begin

to assign it to an Executive Agent or Service. The Joint Strike Fighter—what

used to be called the JAST (Joint Advanced Strike Technology), and even a

[different] name before that—started

out as a DARPA program. And so it

is very much similar to that. But we’re

going to let it mature under the

DARPA umbrella, even if it has interService program managers. 

Q

Yes, sir. Secretary Rumsfeld told the

House Armed Services Committee the

other day that if the V-22 [Osprey] doesn’t perform satisfactorily during its flight

test, it could be cancelled. What’s your

own assessment of how that program’s

working? Are you still as skeptical as

you’ve always been?

A

I’m always skeptical until I’m proven

otherwise. Their flight test program is

laid out very well. They are not skimping on doing hard tests early. They’re

We’ve added funding—about $1.3

billion—for the Army’s Future

Combat System. The Army has

made a conscious decision to defer

modernization of some of its

legacy equipment in favor of

investing in the future 

of the Army. 
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 23

testing in that high rate of descent, where

the vortex ring state problems exist.

They’re doing shipboard compatibility

testing right now, [which is] another

problem where you get different flow

fields across the ships and integration

with other helicopters. They’re working

on that.

My trip next week is to go down and

assess where they are, how well they

have done, what’s the plan for the future, and what the reliability looks like

in the airplane so far, because they’ve

done a lot of work on that. So my trip

next week should give me a little better

indication of how they are progressing.

I haven’t heard any real problems yet,

but we’ll see after my trip. 

Q

Can you talk about the downsizing plans

that you have for the AT&L office? And are

you transferring functions to the Services,

for example?

A

As you may recall, I had a re-engineering plan for AT&L, which includes a reduction in staff by about 15 percent.

We’re on track to make that happen.

Also we’re trying to move some elements

of AT&L from the management of certain projects back to the Services. I had

a listing of those—about $700 million

worth of activities that were joint programs that could be given to the Services for management.

Congress, in their authorization and appropriations bill, has instructed me not

to do that.

Q

So you’re not transferring that [$700 million worth of activities]? 

A

They have told us that they do not want

us to do it, even though they did this

before I even asked. It was going to be

part of the FY ’04 budget. We’re going

to continue to address that and work

with the Congress.

Q

Why are they opposed? 

A

They’re concerned that if these joint programs—many of which they provided—

moved to a military department, they

will be raided to the detriment of the

Department and other Services to pay

for Service-unique [programs]. And so

the result is these [joint] programs will

go away in some way or form. They’re

afraid of that. I think we could fix that,

but that’s their call. 

Q

Under the ’04 budget, in the projections,

what’s the total number of F/A-22s envisioned for the Air Force? And do you think

that will ultimately be the number? 

A

As I’ve mentioned before, we have a plan

called “buy to budget.” As you may recall, last year when we agreed to proceed with the F-22, there was a big debate between the Air Force estimate of

F-22 costs and the independent CAIG

[Cost Analysis Improvement Group] estimate of about $7 billion. 

We established a program by which we

would use the Air Force estimate of cost,

but we would only buy the number of

airplanes the CAIG says you could buy

at that cost, and that was the “buy to

budget.” That number was roughly 295,

but it permitted the Air Force, if they

could in fact achieve cost savings, to buy

more, up to the 339 that they would

have liked to have had. As this flight test

program has proceeded, and the cost of

the flight test activities have gone up,

we have deliberately moved money from

the procurement account to R&D to pay

for that. Therefore, the number of aircraft has to drop.

So the number now projected at the estimate of the procurement cost is about

276. But the incentive is still there for

the Air Force, as they go out into the future, to invest in cost-savings measures,

and we will permit them to buy more

aircraft within those cost limitations, if

they can do that. But right now, it’s

around 276, which is affordable—and

again, I’m projecting out to the year

2010 now, which is not easy to do, but

that’s roughly the number. 

Q

Assuming the V-22 [Osprey] is able to pass

its flight test program, when would the program be returned to a full production status? And is [full production] budgeted for in

the out years? 

Petty Officer 3rd Class Jerry Lowe, a Navy aviation boatswain’s mate, directs an MV-22 Osprey landing on the flight deck of the USS Essex (LHD 2). The Osprey, with its unique tilt

rotor design, is again undergoing operational testing designed to evaluate the operational

effectiveness and stability of the Osprey for service with the Marine Corps and Air Force. DoD

Photo by Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Jason A. Pylarinos 
24 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

A

There is an increase in the procurement

account for the V-22 in the out years,

under the assumption that the flight test

program is successful. We will have to

make the decision on whether or not to

continue that production profile probably this summer through the fall, for the

FY ’05 budget submission that will go

next year. So I am very much on top of

the flight test program to make sure that

so long as it’s proceeding in a successful

direction, we will continue to do that. If

we start seeing some problems occur, we

may have to readdress where we go. 

Q

Sir, a study called the ISAT 2002 [Information, Science and Technology] study, “Security With Privacy,” said, among other

things, that DARPA currently has a number of programs in its, quote, “information

offices”—meaning Information Processing

Technology Office, Information Awareness

Office, and Information Exploitation Office—which involve the potential use of information derived from distributed systems,

government, and private databases. Aside

from the TIA project, which has been widely

discussed, what other projects in those three

information-related offices raise these type

of privacy concerns? 

A

I don’t think any of them do. A lot of

the information technology deals with

protection of information from outsiders

and computer protection for increasing

the bandwidth available to communicate, which has always been a restriction. There’s lots of these information

technology activities. I am only aware of

the one TIA activity that has raised concerns regarding privacy, but TIA is the

only program of its kind that I’m aware

of. 

Q

The Joint Staff has discussed naming an executive agent for the Blue Force Tracking

program. [The Blue Force Tracking Program will provide both friendly force tracking and communications and situational

awareness to the dismounted soldier or platform.] Is this something that’s on your radar

screen yet? And what would you think about

it? And how would the Services get the

money? Because my understanding is that

the ’04 budget doesn’t account for that. 

A

I’m not familiar with the Joint Staff proposal. I am quite familiar with Blue Force

Tracking. I think it’s an excellent idea.

We don’t have enough of it. It has a lot

of implications for our ability to have a

more effective force and certainly to

avoid collateral effects.

Q

Is interoperability a current problem—what

are each of the individual Services doing? 

A

Absolutely. And I think that’s why the

Joint Staff is proposing a joint office where

we can solve those kind of problems. 

Q

The Navy is estimating the cost of CVN21, the first ship, at $11.7 billion, including Research and Development. Has that

number been reviewed by the CAIG? Is that

a CAIG number? And are you comfortable

that that ship is going to deliver more than

two times the value of a Nimitz class carrier? 

A

I haven’t seen the numbers. I don’t know

what fiscal year dollars that [estimate]

is for—if it’s in year 2018 dollars, it

makes a big difference versus the dollars today. I have not seen it. We are

going through the process now.

The CVN-21 will come to a DAB for review, and the CAIG, as far as I know,

has not reviewed those cost estimates.

In fact, we’re not even sure exactly all

the details of what’s going to be in the

carrier—the first unit carrier versus the

second.

We are very much involved with spiral

development of carriers, as well. We

don’t want to overload the first carrier

such that we increase the risk so much

that we have to increase its cost even

more so. So, the capabilities of what I’ve

seen look very attractive, including not

only reducing the manpower, which

saved us some money, but also the survivability and effectiveness. 

Q

If I might follow up on that question about

the ISAT 2002 study, I think this is a study

by the DARPA and it does say a number of

programs raise these concerns about private databases. Would you have any objection if I were to talk to the heads of these

three offices just to sort of go through this?

Because I know there’s a lot of issues here. 

A

I think I would talk to Tony Tether [Director, DARPA] first. I don’t object, but

Tony Tether—he’s the one who puts this

all together. I’m not familiar with the

study, so I can’t comment on the validity of what the study is or is not. 

Q

On TIA, is [retired] Admiral [John]

Poindexter still a part of TIA? 

A

Yes. 

Q

And do the reforms you mention mean a

reduction in size and scope of what TIA

could do? 

A

No. What we’re talking about is to give

myself and the Department of Defense

one more degree of confidence that

we’re doing the right thing with the

project. And there are protocols, that

if the project technology is successful—

a fact yet to be proven—and an agency

outside the Department of Defense

wants to use it, we’ve got the right protocols to transfer that [technology]—

with all the necessary provisions of privacy, supplemented by the external

board, which will also review this—to

give us additional confidence that we’re

doing the right thing. 

Q

If Congress gives you the go-ahead, when

do you plan to have TIA operational? 

A

I don’t know when it will be operational.

It’s a technology project. The FY ’04 budget has $20 million for the TIA project,

and I believe in FY ’03 we had 10 million. If things proceed in Congress, we’ll
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 25

be spending the money and determining the feasibility. That has yet to be determined—it’s still a technology project. 

Q

We face a possible war with Iraq. Now can

you talk about some of the resident technologies that are in the field today, that

might have some impact on the tactics, techniques, and procedures the U.S. would use

to fight a fast and furious war, as the president said? What’s out there today? 

A

Well, I think what you’re asking is, what

do we have that is transformational

today, as opposed to transformational

into the future. The transformational

communications system, space-based

radar—those are transformational for

the future. I would say what’s transformational today is how we’re using the

equipment we’ve got.

Clearly, the Special Forces guy on horseback calling in a B-52 with precisionguided munitions is a transformational

way of using forces we currently have.

Stealth was transformational before. It’s

[still around]—we’re [still] using it.

Bandwidth is increasing the communications system. The integration of these

things together, through the COAC

[Combined Air Operations Center] that’s

[located] in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and

Prince Sultan Air Base—those are transformational. 

So the things that we see in the field,

like precision munitions, UAVs, stealth

technology, long-range strike aircraft, B52s, even though not transformational,

are certainly being used in transformational ways.

The integration of all this stuff—to be

able to pull a lot of different systems and

lots of information together and go after

a target using not only satellites, but

JSTARS [Joint Surveillance Target Attack Radar System] and AWACS [Airborne Warning ad Control System], P3s and AC-130 gunships, and

Predators—all of that information being

consolidated, and then watching the

young kids on the chat box in their computers talking—that’s transformational. 

Q

One of the worst problems in the Gulf War

was fratricide. And that’s the neutral way

of saying killing your own forces accidentally. What progress has been made since

the Gulf War on that issue, in the technologies or procedures? There was a BCIS

[Battlefield Combat Identification System]

that was cancelled a couple years ago that

was supposed to solve all that. You indicated some concern about interoperability

problems. 

A

Well, I’m afraid we haven’t solved all of

it. We saw the problems with some unfortunate deaths of Canadian soldiers

quite recently. And we need to work on

it. We are making progress. I’m not sure

I can tell you exactly how far we’ve gone,

but we do have some Blue Force Tracking capabilities. We’d like to get more

of it. I think combat ID and combat

identification is a very good thing for us

to do. Progress is slow—we need to

make more progress, I would say. 

Q

Can you talk a little bit about changes to

the B-1? It was built to penetrate, and that

seems to not be the case anymore. What

does that mean for the bomber fleet?

A

Well, as you know, we had roughly 97

B-1s. We took 33 of them out and used

the money to modernize the other ones

that were remaining. So we’ve put improved equipment on them. And as the

B-1 ages and our precision weapons systems get developed, we try to adapt the

airplane, which has basically now become a truck, to deliver the munition.

It’s not the airplane that’s important—

it’s delivering the munition on the target that’s important. And the B-1 is quite

capable of doing that, but we need to

make sure we continue to improve its

defensive capabilities against more aggressive threats and to give it survivability by giving it a longer-range munition and things like that. 

Q

I’m just wondering if you could tell me

whether [retired] Admiral [John] Poindexter will remain in charge of the Total Information Awareness project for the indefinite future; and if so, will his role change

in some way by having a board overseeing

his activities? And I also wondered if the

outside board will have any binding nature

to its recommendations?

A

I don’t want to get into personalities.

And I really don’t want to debate the

merits of TIA. Let me talk about the

board. The board—the internal board—

certainly as I will chair it, is focused

upon what we in the Department of Defense are doing to make sure that we

feel comfortable with this project. It offers one more checkpoint that things are

going right and that we have all the restrictions in place, and if we ever do

transition that project to another agency,

it’s done in a proper manner. 

The external board, which will be set

up under the law—the Federal Advisory Committee Act [FACA]—will be

run just like a federal advisory board.

In accordance with that, there will be

meetings which will be established and

public in some cases, unless they get

into classified information. There will

be opportunities for people to come

Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

DoD Photo
26 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

and talk to the board, to provide their

advice.

It will be run just like any other advisory committee, under the chairmanship of Newt Minow, and other people

who are named in the press release. All

have credentials and expertise in this

area. And I think that gives us one other

dimension of [checks and balances]. It’s

external and it will be reporting to the

Secretary of Defense—it’s advisory to

him. I’m sure there are lots of issues regarding privacy and other things that

go beyond just what the TIA does; there’s

issues of how you handle detainees and

things of that nature that this board can

in fact advise the Secretary of Defense

about. 

Q

So he [Poindexter] is still in charge? You

weren’t suggesting anything other than that? 

A

He is still there. No, I’m not suggesting

any changes. 

Q

I just wanted to follow up on the 5000-series streamlined acquisition rules. Beyond

sort of incorporating or putting more of an

emphasis on spiral development and properly funding [programs], is it your intention with these simpler DoD 5000-series

rules to make it easier for non-traditional

companies to get into contracting?

A

Yes, exactly right. What we’re trying

to do here is that we’re trying to tell

the program manager in the acquisition community: This is what we want

you to do; we want you to be flexible

and innovative and responsive, and

we want you to streamline the process,

but I don’t want to tell you how to do

that. When you do it, I’m interested

in interoperability, I’m interested in

safety, I’m interested in properly pricing programs, I’m interested in a

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE NEWS RELEASE

Total Information Awareness (TIA) Update

Washington D.C. (Feb. 7, 2003). The Department of Defense will establish two boards to provide oversight ofthe Total Information Awareness Project, the program

designed to develop tools to track terrorists. The two boards,

an internal oversight board and an outside advisory committee, will work with the Defense Advanced Research Projects

Agency (DARPA), as it continues its research. These boards will

help ensure that TIA develops and disseminates its products to

track terrorists in a manner consistent with U.S. constitutional

law, U.S. statutory law, and American values related to privacy. 

The TIA internal oversight board will oversee and monitor the

manner in which terrorist tracking tools are transitioned for realworld use. This board will establish policies and procedures for

use within DoD of the TIA-developed tools and will establish

protocols for transferring these capabilities to entities outside

DoD. A primary focus of the board will be to ensure that the

TIA-developed tools to track terrorists will be used only in accordance with existing privacy protection laws and policies. The

board, which is expected to hold its first meeting by the end of

February 2003, will be composed of senior DoD officials. 

The outside advisory board will be convened as a federal advisory committee and will comply with all the legal and regulatory requirements for such bodies. The committee will advise

the Secretary of Defense on the range of policy and legal issues that are raised by the development and potential application of advanced technology to help identify terrorists before

they act. 

Members of the outside advisory board are Newton Minow

(Chairman), director of the Annenberg Washington Program

and Annenberg Professor of Communications Law and Policy

at Northwestern University; Floyd Abrams, renowned civil rights

attorney; Zöe Baird, president Markle Foundation; Griffin Bell,

former U.S. Attorney General and Court of Appeals judge; Gerhard Casper, president emeritus for Stanford University and

Professor of Law; William T. Coleman, Jr., former Secretary of

Transportation; and Lloyd Cutler, former White House Counsel. 

DARPA is continuing its research into whether advanced technologies can be used to help identify terrorist planning activities. This technology development program was established

under the name Total Information Awareness (TIA) and is designed to catch terrorists before they strike. Under the rubric

of TIA, DARPA is attempting to develop three categories of

tools—language translation, data search and pattern recognition, and advanced collaborative and decision support tools.

The research conducted under TIA will provide the tools for obtaining information pertaining to activities of terrorists, and if

connected together, this information could alert authorities before terrorists' plans are carried out. While the research to date

is promising, TIA is still only a concept. 

Development of these anti-terrorism tracking tools would allow

the agencies to better execute their missions. TIA does not plan

to create a gigantic database. Further, TIA has not ever collected or gathered and is not now collecting or gathering any

intelligence information. This is and will continue to be the responsibility of the U.S. foreign intelligence/counterintelligence

agencies, which operate under various legal and policy restrictions with congressional oversight. This technology development program in no way alters the authority or responsibility of

the intelligence community. Furthermore, TIA has never collected, and has no plan or intent to collect privately held consumer data on U.S. citizens. It is a research program designed

to catch terrorists before they strike. 

Editor’s Note: This information is in the public domain at

http://www.defenselink.mil/news.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 27

whole series of things—and you’ll

have copies of this when it’s signed—

of all the things that we want you to

incorporate in your processes that are

important to us. 

And we lay out in the instruction: Here

is a series of milestones. We want you

to do Milestone A, Milestone B, Milestone C, and here are some criteria to

how you should enter these various

milestones. And we’re interested in spiral development, and we’re interested,

again, in proper pricing, we’re interested

in reducing risk, we’re interested in the

technology plan. 

So it’s prescribing what we want you to

do, but not the recipe of how to do it.

And that’s what was happening in the

old series—the 250 pages. We were giving them gory details about how to do

something, and nobody was reading it.

I read something the other day, an article that said, “Well, the new series really doesn’t do anything different.” And

I said, “Well, how do you know? Nobody’s ever read it.” You have to compare the two to understand the difference.

Q

In the proposed numbers for the fiscal

year ’04 and ’05 budgets, I notice there

is a decrease for DISA procurement by

several hundred million dollars, and there

is an increase by ’05 for something like

600 (million) or $700 million in procurement funds for the OSD. What correlation is there between this shift in numbers? It’s almost an equal number.

A

I don’t know whether DISA [Defense

Information Systems Agency] had

bought something in ’03, [decided] they

weren’t buying it in ’04, and therefore

the numbers went down. Is it for procurement? I just don’t know. 

Q

It’s specific to procurement. And just to follow up on that, an analyst from the Center for Strategic and International Studies

surmised that possibly this is related to efforts over the years to centralize buying

power in DoD.

A

No. In fact, it’s just the opposite. My proposal is to decentralize buying out of

the OSD. Our job in OSD is to provide

policy and guidance and not to manage

programs. And what was happening

was, everything that was a joint [program] and they didn’t’ want to give it to

the Service, they were giving it to my

office, and I was having to manage almost $2 billion worth of effort a year.

We are the wrong people to manage

things like that. It needs to get back to

people who have the management skills. 

Q

As it’s currently worded, the Wyden Amendment, if that were adopted, how would that

impact the development of TIA? 

A

Again, I’m trying to avoid getting into

this big debate.

Wynne: We’ve seen so many versions

of it. But what it would do is simply require more reporting to Congress over

the activities that are in place now. And

I think while we want to share as much

as we can with the Congress, especially

on this sensitive issue, we really don’t

think it merits that kind of day-to-day

oversight. So what we are trying to do

is work with the Congress, in fact, to

point out to them that with this kind of

resolution, with the inside board and

the outside board, we are instituting the

kind of oversight that in fact they wanted

us to.

Q

You talk about the Navy family of ships.

The Navy is trying to push the littoral combat ship, and get it fast as they can. And

Ronald O’Rourke and some of the outside

analysts have said the Navy has not done

the analysis to determine whether this is

the proper ship to be doing the kind of missions it’s being sent to do. You seem to have

signed off on this as a program, and you’re

normally a little more calculating about requiring analysis on how these things proceed. 

A

No. Let me clarify. I don’t know what

the littoral combat ship looks like either, and neither does the Navy. But the

concept of a smaller combat ship that

you can afford more of, and one better

designed to handle the littoral areas—

that is a direction which we’ve all signed

up to in the Defense Planning Guidance

and the Quadrennial Defense Review as

something that’s necessary. We don’t

want this ship to be so big that we can’t

buy very many of them. We want them

to have a lot of capability. And what it

looks like is yet to be determined. That

process is ongoing in the Navy, and

when we get to the point where we have

to enter into Milestone A and Milestone

B, we will have all those answers. Otherwise, we can’t go into those milestones. 

Q

Yes, but if they want to buy the first ship in

’05, from a standing start of just months

ago, and have the first ones in the fleet in

’07—I know you guys are trying to speed

things up, but can you do it that fast? 

A

I will be a skeptic, again, on this one. It

has to be proven to me that we can do

it that fast. 

Q

The F-22 question: you said very cryptically that if the test program appears to be

recovering —[Dov] Zakheim [the DoD

Comptroller] alluded to this the other day—

what are some of the benchmarks of recovery? 

A

What was happening was we didn’t have

spare parts, and we didn’t have airplanes.

The test points—we have a drawdown,

a number of test points—and you can

[drawdown] to where you get to the

point where you enter into OT&E (Operational Test and Evaluation). We

weren’t going down that slope as fast as

we would like.They’ve reenergized it,

and now we’re coming down that slope

faster than we were before. It looks like

we can meet the schedule, provided

those test points can be flown as rapidly

as they say. And it looks like they can. 

The other part of it was the avionics

package, and that was a question of two

things. One is reliability. When you turn
28 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

it on, what’s the probability it’s going to

work? And then once they turn it on

and it’s working, how long does it stay

working? Those two are called reliability and basically sustainability or stability. We were having some problems

there—the reliability coming on was

down, and it didn’t run very long before they had to reboot it. And that was

causing us some problems in the software package.

Reliability and the stability numbers now

seem to be on the rise, which gives us

some confidence that the thing will

work. 

Q

How many more months do you want to

see the trend rise before you declare a success? 

A

Well, I think the key to that is to have

a certain number of points done, and

the avionics package stability at a point

where we can start operational test and

evaluation. That is in the summer period—I’m going to say July/August period. They have to have so many down

to where they can enter into it with a

production representative airplane to

start OT&E. 

Q

A question about the Marine Corps in the

upcoming ’04 budget cycle. There’s a big

study underway now about expeditionary

warfare and forcible entry. The Navy looks

like it’s made some decisions to delete some

research and development funding out of

the AAAV [Advanced Amphibious Assault

Vehicle] program. And you yourself have

considerable questions left from the V-22

[Osprey] episode. Does all of this add up to

essentially a major review getting underway now of the whole Marine Corps modernization process and where they’re

headed?

A

Yes, the study is a review of forcible

entry, and that is a question of what do

you mean by forcible entry? Does that

mean going across the beach? Going

over the beach? What does it mean

about the equipment carried [by] the

Marine Corps and the Navy to the

beach? All of that is under review, and

it could, in fact, have an impact upon

modernization and the direction we take

for the future, very definitely. That’s why

we have it underway. 

Q

I wanted to ask you a question about Joint

Strike Fighter costs. One of the benefits of

having international partners in the program is that U.S. buys are reduced; foreign

buys could offset the price difference that

usually comes along with that. The international partners in the program so far

have expressed interest in the Air Force

STOVL version of the plane, not the Navy’s

carrier version—the version that’s being

cut by the Navy at this point. What’s the

cost effect of that going to be? And does that

affect just the Navy or all the Services?

A

First of all, I have no idea how many

airplanes we’re going to buy in Joint

Strike Fighter in the year 2020, which

is when all of this occurs. But the unit

cost numbers, in spite of the reduction,

are holding the goal we set for ourselves;

roughly for the conventional airplane,

$37 million a copy in FY ’02 dollars.

The carrier version is a little more expensive because it has to carry more

weight and some leading-edge flaps and

things like a bigger wing to make sure

it can operate with the right attitude.

And that number’s around $47 million.

And the STOVL version, strangely

enough, is actually less—it’s only $46

million in current estimates.

Those [numbers] are holding. And it

is very important that we keep that affordability number. And if we can get

any additional international sales in our

purchase beyond the roughly 2,600

that we plan for the U.S. and U.K., then

those costs will come down even further. 

Q

I’m not trying to draw you into a debate,

but I’d like to ask the question, can you tell

us how much money has been spent, of

whatever funds may be available, on this

[Total Information Awareness] research and

its components so far today? 

A

I can tell you what’s in the budget. I can’t

tell you precisely how much today we’ve

spent. We had $10 million for this project in FY ’03. The project for the president’s budget is $20 million in FY ’04. 

Q

And the contracts have not been let, or have

they been let? 

A

There are some contracts that have been

let for people to work on this. I don’t

know which ones they are. 

Thank you all for coming today.

F-22 Raptor

Photo courtesy The Boeing Company
Five New Business 

Initiatives Approved

T

he Department of Defense announced

today the DoD Business Initiative Council (BIC) approved five initiatives that

will improve business practices and

processes across the Department. 

The approved initiatives focus on various

requirements and processes and will positively affect business applications within the

DoD. They include:

• Initiate discussions with the Office of

Management and Budget and the Congress on revisions to scoring rules on capital leases (e.g., lease to own), so that budget authority and outlays are scored in

ways more similar to commercial accounting practices.

• Study successful Share-in-Savings projects and use this research to develop legislative proposals to expand this proven

technique.

• Review the joint travel regulations to obtain more parity between civilian and military travel practices and leverage best

business practices to obtain volume discounts on commercial lodging.

• Work with the DoD Policy Board on Federal Aviation to improve personnel aspects of the military air traffic control

process.

• Propose legislation that permits the full

cost of travel to be charged to the appropriation current when the travel begins. 

The benefits from the BIC-approved initiatives include streamlined business processes

that will enable DoD military and civilian

personnel to make better use of their time,

the opportunity to avoid unnecessary costs

in several functional areas, and the possible return of some Service personnel to deploying units. Several of the proposals require legislation prior to implementation

and realization of any efficiencies. 

The BIC was launched in July 2001 to implement bureaucracy-reducing and/or

money-saving opportunities in the business

practices of the Department of Defense,

which is core to Secretary Rumsfeld's

broader “Battle on Bureaucracy” campaign.

The council is presided over by Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Edward C. “Pete” Aldridge

and is composed of high-level military and

civilian personnel. 

In approving the latest round of BIC initiatives, Aldridge noted, “the BIC will continue

to bring good ideas forward for consideration. For the Department's business

processes to improve, leadership must use

teamwork and gain continued support and

participation from the entire workforce.” 

Editor’s Note: This information is in the

public domain at http://www.defenselink.

mil/news.

IMMEDIATE RELEASE Jan. 29, 2003
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Ward is stationed at the National Imagery and

Mapping Agency, Reston, Va. He is the Contracting

Officer’s Technical Representative for a tactical imagery dissemination system called BRITE. He is

Level I-certified in Test and Evaluation and in Program Management, and Level III-certified in Systems Planning, Research, Development and Engineering.

PROGRAM MANAGEMENT

Modern Acquisition Myths

One Size Does Not Fit All

CAPT. DAN WARD, USAF

30

You have probably heard the ancient story of Icarus and

Daedalus—how they built

wings with feathers and wax to

escape the Labyrinth and how

Icarus ignored his father’s warning about

flying too high. Everyone knows that

story is a myth.

You have probably heard the following

six stories too. The difference is, some

people believe these stories are true—

and that can lead to serious trouble. Like

the feathers in Icarus’ wings, the Acquisition Myths described here will ultimately fail to support you as you fly

toward your goal.

1

THE MYTH OF THE METHOD:

“ONE SIZE FITS ALL.”

First there was Scientific Management.

Later, we had Management by Objectives (MBO), Total Quality Management

(TQM), Management By Walking

Around (MBWA), The Revolution In

Military Affairs, Acquisition Reform, and

a host of others. Each method had its

particular strengths, and each was rejected, or even vilified, when a new

school of thought entered the arena.

Today the hot topics include Spiral Acquisition and Agile Acquisition. Tomorrow is sure to bring something new.

For some strange reason, some people

tend to get on the TQM/MBO/MBWA/

Spiral/etc., bandwagon and become con-
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 31

vinced that it will work in every situation, despite the fact that none of our previous methods were foolproof or flawless.

We humans are hardwired to look for

patterns, so why we continue to miss

this pattern is a mystery. 

The truth is no particular method is appropriate for every conceivable situation, program, or enterprise. To put it

plainly, one size does not fit all. These

management methods can be useful and

effective tools when applied to the situation they were designed to address,

but they quickly become useless or

counterproductive when misapplied—

and it’s not hard to misapply them.

When we believe we’ve got the perfect

method, it becomes a box instead of a

guide, and we start doing things because

“we’re following the method” as opposed

to “because it helps us reach our goals.”

This also transfers responsibility for failure away from the individual and onto

the method. If I’m doing it by the book

and something goes wrong, it must be

the book’s fault!

That is not to say methods are a waste of

time. Some of them are quite good. But

none of them are perfectly suited for

every situation—and none ever will be.

A hammer is a wonderful tool, unless

you need to cut wood. For that, you’ll

want a saw.

How to proceed? Keep in mind that any

method, formula, or process has its

strengths and weaknesses. Avoid taking

a broad-brush approach to your development efforts, and don’t be too quick

to latch onto the latest management fad.

2

THE MYTH OF THE 

INTERIM SOLUTION:

“THIS SYSTEM WON’T LAST LONG.”

Belief in the Myth of the Interim Solution can be dangerous and needlessly

expensive in the long run. It can lead a

Program Manager to take shortcuts and

make decisions that negatively impact

the user, because “it is only an interim

solution. We’ll do the heavy lifting later.”

The reality is, if something works, it

tends to stick around.

I once worked on a program that actually had the word “interim” in its name.

That was several years ago, and as far as

I know it is still in use. The problem was,

the darned thing worked! It met the

user’s need, inexpensively and simply—

so developing the real solution was put

off and its funding was diverted elsewhere. Fortunately, we did it right the

first time, and our stop-gap capability

became a real asset. The truth is, it

wasn’t a problem at all—other than the

fact that we were still calling it an interim solution.

How to proceed? Gold-plating every system is not the answer. Some systems are

truly temporary and disposable—just

not very many of them. Program Managers and designers need to keep in

Whether or not

Icarus actually

plunged into the

Mediterranean

Sea one sunny day,

his story has an

important lesson

for today’s

acquisition

community. His

death is a

metaphor for the

danger of pride—

he trusted his

own judgment

and flew too

close to the sun. 

It wasn’t

exuberance or

carelessness that

brought Icarus

down. It was

arrogance.
32 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

mind that a system’s lifespan will most

likely exceed our expectations. We need

to be cautious about cutting corners and

taking a “we’ll fix it later” attitude. In a

“pay me now or pay me later” scenario,

the upfront payment is often significantly smaller than the bill you’ll receive

down the road. In other words, it’s usually better and cheaper to do it right the

first time than to do it over.

The point is, systems sometimes remain

operational longer than the developers

expect. Just look at the 40-year-old

B-52, which is projected to remain in

operation until 2037 (or longer?). I wonder how its development might have

been different (and how much money

could have been saved) if we’d suspected

how long it would last.

3

THE MYTH OF 

REQUIREMENTS CREEP:

“REQUIREMENTS CREEP IS

BAD AND AVOIDABLE.”

Some acquisition programs manage to

avoid any significant requirements creep

through a variety of approaches. Not

that they should, but some do.

Here is why a little “creep” is a good

thing. As a development program

evolves, technology advances—often in

unexpected ways. The more time developers spend with users, the better we

understand their needs, wants, and expectations. That combination—increased understanding and improved

technology—often leads to the conclusion that the system’s requirements need

to be changed or expanded. That is not

a bad thing, and it shouldn’t come as a

surprise. 

This type of requirements creep is therefore largely unavoidable and highly appropriate. If both technology and our

understanding of users needs improve

over time, it makes sense to count on

and plan for the inevitable expansion of

system requirements. Problems arise

when users recognize the need to expand or change the requirements, while

the developer remains focused on the

original baseline. Another problem surfaces when new requirements are added

without a corresponding increase in

funding. These problems are largely selfinflicted and essentially avoidable. 

The Spiral Acquisition model is well

suited to solve these problems, and it

does so admirably. Users receive new

capabilities sooner than in a traditional

approach, and as technology develops,

they receive incremental improvements

to the capabilities. Ideas that once would

have been labeled requirements creep

now can be folded into future spirals.

How to proceed? Rather than fighting

requirements creep or seeing it as a necessary evil, PMs should smile and include it in their original plans, budgets,

and schedules. The Spiral Acquisition

model, while not suited for all situations

(see Myth No.1), gives planners, developers, and managers a flexible road map

for such planning. Remember, it is only

requirements creep if we didn’t see it

coming, and there is no good reason to

be caught off guard.

4

THE MYTH OF THE CONOPS:

“WE KNOW HOW THE SYSTEM

WILL BE USED.”

While painting my living room walls recently, I used a flathead screwdriver to

pry the lid off the paint can. When I was

done, I used the butt end of the screwdriver to pound the lid back on. Prying

and pounding are outside the scope of

a traditional screwdriver CONOPS [concept of operations], and those are not

the activities I had in mind when I

bought the screwdriver. Still, it got the

job done quite nicely, and I don’t think

I’m the only screwdriver operator who

uses it that way.

Warfighters are famous for taking a similar approach to their tools. No matter

how experienced, educated, or intuitive

a PM might be, we can seldom foresee

all the ways our systems will be used

and changed after they are deployed.

New situations arise unforeseen, and innovative people play with the equipment and make it do new things. Before

long, the original CONOPS becomes at

best incomplete and at worst obsolete.

For example, the American fighter jets

still fly, but these days they spend a lot

more time doing air-to-ground missions

than engaging in actual dogfights with

enemy fighter jets. I’m not sure that was

the original plan, but there’s nothing

wrong with that. It is better to have an

obsolete CONOPS and a new capability than a solid, unchangeable CONOPS

and no innovation.

How to proceed? Aim to produce systems that are adaptable, flexible, scalable, reusable, modular, and interoperable. Keep in mind that users are

creative. We don’t always know everything about how they use today’s systems, let alone how they might use tomorrow’s. When you’re defining the

specs and requirements for the next genMYTH vs. REALITY

1. One size fits all. 1. Different situations require

different tools.

2. This system won’t last long. 2.If it works, it stays.

3. Requirements creep is bad. 3.Requirements creep is 

inevitable and good. Plan 

for it.

4. We Know the Concept of 4.Users are creative and 

Operations. innovative.

5. Development is for the 5.Hobby shops can provide

pro’s. excellent systems.

6. We can learn from 6.We seldom see the longexperience. term results of our actions.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 33

eration screwdriver, try to ensure it won’t

accidentally lose any “non-spec” capabilities (like opening paint cans). Ever

try prying open a can with a Phillips

head screwdriver? Sometimes losing a

capability like that can be an acceptable

trade-off. Nevertheless, it should be an

intentional trade-off, made with the full

knowledge (and preferably the buy-in)

of the users.

5

THE MYTH OF HOBBY SHOPS:

“ONLY ‘PROFESSIONALS’

SHOULD DEVELOP SYSTEMS.”

At a recent gathering of military acquisition professionals, someone bemoaned

the fact that “hobby shops” are “[providing] near-term solutions with no integration, and the folks who own those

‘hobby shops’ are reluctant to yield any

control [over the system]... because they

work.” It is interesting that anyone

would complain about small groups of

people providing systems that work. It

is even more interesting that the proposed solution is to hand control over

to a second party, who probably has less

knowledge about the mission need, the

system, and the CONOPS than the original hobby shoppers. 

The truth is users and other amateur developers are sometimes able to create

systems that work quite nicely thank

you very much, and they often do it

faster and cheaper than anyone else.

They may not know their EVM [Earned

Value Management] from a hole in the

ground, but they know what their operational requirements are. The problem is their solutions might be too tailored to their own situation, so the rest

of us miss out on sharing their accomplishment. Their lack of development

experience might cause them to make

mistakes that a Level III acquisition professional wouldn’t. This is exactly where

the professionals should come in. Rather

than trying to wrest control away from

successful amateurs, we should come

alongside them and share our professional expertise. There is a word for that

type of behavior—teamwork.

How to proceed? As Chief of Staff of the

Air Force Gen. John Jumper recently

pointed out, “there needs to be oversight and standards, not standardization.” In other words, standards are

tremendously useful and important, but

standardization misses the point. Integration is often a vital requirement, except when it isn’t. What we often lack

is not external control over hobby shops,

but clearly defined and well-understood

standards. The professional acquisition

community should let the hobby shoppers keep doing their thing—dreaming

up and developing systems that work.

Our job should be to join their teams

and help them understand that wax

melts if they fly too close to the sun, and

feathers get heavy if they fly too close

to the sea. Maybe they could try using

aluminum. 

6

THE MYTH OF LEARNING 

FROM EXPERIENCE: 

“WE DIRECTLY EXPERIENCE 

OR OBSERVE THE 

CONSEQUENCES OF OUR ACTIONS.”

Experience is an excellent teacher—perhaps the best teacher around. That doesn’t mean we always learn the right things

under its guidance. In today’s defense

acquisition environment, we often have

five-year development programs managed by people on two-year assignments, spending one-year money. Military personnel like myself, often can’t

stick around long enough to observe

firsthand the long-term outcomes of our

decisions. Experience is an excellent

teacher, but it is hard to learn from experience if you’re not there. 

Peter Senge made this same point in his

book The Fifth Discipline. As he explains

what he calls “the delusion of learning

from experience,” he points out that we

do not directly experience the long-term

consequences of many of our most important decisions. Cause and effect are

not closely related in time and space,

making it nearly impossible to draw

proper conclusions and learn proper

lessons. He also points out that many

of today’s problems come from yesterday’s “solutions.” Why? Those solutions

are often based on things we think we

learned from experience. We are learning from experience all right, but sometimes we’re learning the wrong lessons

because our experiences are not always

what we think they are. 

How to proceed? We can learn from

other people’s experiences, we can study

history, and we can seek out the decisions and actions of past years, watching for causal relationships with today’s

lessons and challenges. We should also

recognize the role that intuition, insight,

introspection, and innovational urges

can play. Remember, it is very difficult

to directly observe all the implications

of our own actions. For that reason, it

is important to cast a jaded eye on the

short-term conclusions we are tempted

to draw. Keep in mind that the final

chapter has yet to be written.

Acknowledging Our Limitations

Whether or not Icarus actually plunged

into the Mediterranean Sea one sunny

day, his story has an important lesson

for today’s acquisition community. His

death is a metaphor for the danger of

pride—he trusted his own judgment instead of listening to his father’s wise

counsel. He flew too close to the sun. It

wasn’t exuberance or carelessness that

brought Icarus down. It was arrogance.

And arrogance lies at the core of these

six myths as well. 

If we want to avoid sharing Icarus’ fate,

we need to steer clear of his flight path.

In contrast to the myths described here,

the truth is we have not discovered the

perfect management or acquisition

method, and we never will. We do not

know everything about how our systems will be used or how long they will

last. We have not defined all our requirements perfectly up-front, and we

do not directly experience the consequences of some of our most important

decisions. We may be highly educated

and highly experienced, but we are also

highly human. If we’re not humble

enough to acknowledge our limitations

and smart enough to act accordingly, we

will probably end up all wet, just like

Icarus.

Editor’s Note: The author welcomes

questions or comments on this article.

Contact Ward at WardD@nima.mil. 
Pentagon Plans Heavy

Investment in UAV Development

SGT. 1ST CL ASS DOUG SAMPLE, USA

WASHINGTON, March 18, 2003—

The Defense Department today

unveiled a billion dollar roadmap

for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

(UAVs) during the next 25 years. Plans call

for developing joint interoperable UAVs that

are capable of everything from surveillance

to air strike. 

“The roadmap provides those high-priority

investments necessary to move UAV capability to the mainstream,” said Dyke Weatherington, Deputy of the UAV Planning Task

Force in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, at a DoD press briefing today. “The

potential value UAVs offer ranges across virtually every mission area and capability of

interest to DoD. The roadmap identifies

those key technology areas that we think

are right for investment.” 

The Pentagon has made UAV weapon systems a priority. Defense Secretary Donald

Rumsfeld, who strongly supports the UAV

program, has pushed UAVs as one way to

transform the military. 

Today, about 90 UAVs support military operations around the world, and the Department has them standing by for potential use over Iraq. 

By 2010, according to the roadmap report,

DoD hopes to increase its UAV inventory

to about 350. And the Department plans to

increase that to more than a thousand in

the outyears, according to Weatherington. 

RELEASED March 18, 2003

Deputy for the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Planning Task

Force, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Dyke Weatherington briefs reporters on the UAV Roadmap report

during a Pentagon press conference on March 18,

2003. The UAV Roadmap outlines development of unmanned aircraft for the next 25 years. 

DoD photo by Helene C. Stikkel
From 1991 to 1999 the Pentagon invested

about $3 billion in UAV projects. That is

projected to rise to $10 billion from today

through 2010, according to the latest DoD

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Roadmap 2002-

2027 report. 

The Air Force's Predator UAV proved its

military capability flying reconnaissance

missions in Bosnia, and was credited with

taking out one of Al Qaeda's top lieutenants

in Afghanistan with a Hellfire missile. 

Besides Predator, the military services are

developing other UAV platforms. For example, the Air Force has another UAV called

Global Hawk. The system is completely

computer-operated and can be used for

long-term surveillance. The high-flying

Global Hawk currently carries photo reconnaissance equipment, but production

versions of the system will carry electronic

intelligence gathering materials. The Global

Hawk can stay airborne for 32 hours.

The Army has developed the Shadow 200

tactical UAV. The Army also has the Hunter

UAV, and both are primary surveillance

UAVs and relay video in real time. 

Meanwhile, the Marine Corps has developed Dragon Eye, a small, hand-launched

UAV that can give leaders a snapshot of the

battlefield, and it plans to make improvements to the Pioneer UAV developed by the

Navy. The Pioneer was used in the 1991

Gulf War. 

The Navy is developing Neptune, which

can drop small payloads and the X-46/X47, a large autonomous unmanned combat

aerial vehicle that has a 34-foot wingspan.

The system will be initially built for tactical surveillance, but the Navy envisions it

one day becoming a strike system. 

Weatherington said that UAVs offer a unique

advantage for military leaders because they

can conduct dangerous missions without

the risk of human life. UAVs will soon have

the capability for reconnaissance in areas

possibly contaminated with biological or

chemical agents or suppress enemy air defenses, or provide deep strike interdiction,

he said. 

Editor's Note: This information is in the

public domain at http://www.defenselink.

mil/news.

Predator Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

DoD Photo
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Criscimagna is a Science Advisor with Alion Science & Technology in Rome, N.Y., and Deputy Director of the Reliability Analysis Center. He holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and an M.S. in Systems Engineering from the Air Force Institute of Technology. 

BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES

The Reliability Analysis Center 

A Program Manager's Resource

NED CRISCIMAGNA

36

T

he Reliability Analysis Center

(RAC) provides reliability, maintainability, quality, and supportability (RMQS) resources

and services to program managers, the Department of Defense, the

military services, other government

agencies, and industry. The RAC is one

of 13 Information Analysis Centers

(IAC) sponsored by the Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC). The

RAC, and indeed the IAC program as

a whole, can help program and project

managers:

• Cope when short-staffed.

• Analyze large quantities of available

information in a particular subject

area.

• Ensure that any previous research is

considered in their system design.

• Find information from analogous systems for their new systems.

• Search for applicable, and establish

contact with, leading researchers and

scientists in a particular field.

The RAC facilitates the cost-effective implementation of RMQS throughout all

phases of a product's or system's life

cycle. 

Support for Program Managers

and Military Acquisition

RAC provides support to the defense

acquisition community in general, and

program managers specifically. Since its

creation in 1968, the RAC has worked

for a wide range of organizations in the

public and private sectors. Our work

for acquisition programs includes 

developing reliability programs, conducting selective reliability analyses, developing traditional reliability and accelerated life tests, witnessing testing on

behalf of the government, developing

requests for proposals, and assisting in

source selection.

For fielded systems, the RAC focuses on

improving the availability of fielded systems. These projects include working

with the Navy Depots to improve their

overhaul process; with the U.S. Army

Power Reliability Program to increase

the availability of Command, Control,

Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 37

facilities; and with the U.S. Air Force

Warner Robbins Air Logistics Center to

improve the readiness of electronic

countermeasure pods.

By working for a wide range of customers, the RAC is able to transfer

lessons learned and best practices from

one industry to another, and between

the commercial and government sectors.

How does the RAC support program offices? Here are just a few examples.

• A Navy program office program analyst needs information on environmental stress screening for a cost-benefit analysis. She calls the RAC. Within

a few hours, she has the necessary information—and at no cost. 

• A logistics engineer in an Army program office is looking for commonly

used and new methods for predicting basic system reliability. He sends

an e-mail to the RAC and receives a

reply with the information by the end

of the day. 

• A logistics analyst with an Air Force

Program Office is trying to find a standard factor by which to reduce a contractor's failure rate predictions that

will be used to determine how many

initial spares should be purchased. He

faxes his inquiry to the RAC and is

called the next morning by the RAC

engineer who gives him the answer

to his question.

• A program office needs support to

evaluate a reliability growth test proposed by the prime contractor and to

monitor the management of the

growth process. Lacking the experienced staff to do these long-term tasks,

the program office quickly gets the

RAC to work without going through

the competitive contract process.

The Reliability Analysis 

Center is an IAC

The RAC is an Information Analysis

Center (IAC). The IACs are government

organizations regulated by DoD Directive 3200.12; DoD Scientific Technical

Information (STI) Program, dated

Feb.11, 1998; and DoD Instruction

3200.14, Principles and Operational Parameters of the DoD Scientific and Technical Information Program, dated May

23, 1997. The Office of the Secretary of

Defense, Director of Defense Research

and Engineering provides policy oversight of the IACs. Administrative and

operational management is provided

through the Defense Information Systems Agency by the Defense Technical

Information Center (ATTN: DTIC-AI),

8725 John J. Kingman Road, Ste. 0944,

Fort Belvoir, VA 22060-6218. Appointed

Contracting Officer Technical Representatives (COTRs) from technical host

organizations provide technical management for the IACs.

A primary customer of the RAC and all

the IACs is the military acquisition program manager. IACs have scientists, engineers, and information specialists experienced in specific technical areas to

help program offices locate, analyze, and

use STI. The IAC staffs establish and

maintain comprehensive knowledge

bases, including historical, technical,

scientific, and other information collected throughout the world and pertinent to their respective technical communities. They also collect, maintain,

and develop analytical tools and techniques, including databases, models,

and simulations. Program and project

managers can capitalize on the specific

skills of their staff and maximize their

tight budgets by calling on the unique

and specialized skills of the IACs. The

IACs can provide managers with affordable short- and long-term technical

services. 

The RAC provides technical expertise

and information in the engineering disciplines of RMQS and facilitates their

cost-effective implementation throughout all phases of the product or system

life cycle. Reliability is an aspect of system performance that affects mission

success, system availability and readiness, support costs, mobility, and system effectiveness. Designing for maintainability ensures that systems can be

safely, economically, and efficiently kept

in operating condition. 

Quality is and has long been an important aspect of manufacturing, installation, and other processes. Supportability considers the overall infrastructure,

resources, and investment needed to

support a system over its operational

life. 

The RAC is operated by Alion Science

& Technology and is located in Rome,

N.Y. Patrick Hetherington is the RAC

Director. The COTR for the RAC is

Richard Hyle, who is with the Air Force

Research Laboratory, Information Directorate in Rome, N.Y.

A Steering Committee with voting members from the military services and from

DoD provides guidance to the RAC.

George Desiderio, Deputy Director, Systems Engineering, Office of the Under

Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology and Logistics/Interoperability) is

the Chair of the Steering Committee.

The RAC Supports the Program

Manager in Many Ways

At the beginning of this article, we listed

ways in which the RAC supports Program Offices and Program Managers.

The examples given generally fall into

two categories: technical support and

consulting services. 

Technical Support

Program managers have free access to

eight hours of technical support. Technical solutions may be only a telephone

call or e-mail message away. To provide

quick, accurate answers we call on our

staff or extended expert network, conduct bibliographic searches of our more

than 70,000 references in the Reliability Analysis Center library, and draw

upon our experience and other technical sources. 

Consulting Services

For more extensive technical needs that

go beyond our free technical support,

program managers can quickly, without

the need for a competitive award, get

the RAC working as a member of the

program office team. When a more detailed answer than can be provided using

the RAC's Inquiry Services is needed,

RAC can supply both short- and longterm consulting help (on-site when necessary) to satisfy your needs. 
38 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

In addition to technical support and

consulting services, the RAC provides

three other key services.

Training Services

RAC presents training courses in virtually all aspects of reliability, maintainability, and quality in both open registration and on-site formats. Courses can

be tailored to meet specific user requirements. Courses stress proven approaches and techniques for the designer, analyst, and manager. The RAC

teaches about 1,000 public and private

sector students each year. 

Publications and Tools

RAC offers more than 50 authoritative

publications on reliability, maintainability, quality, and supportability as well

as software tools to help you design,

build, and support effective systems and

products. The RAC develops a wide variety of publications in the following categories:

• Analysis and Application Guides

• Commercial Practices

• Data Books

• Quality Improvement

• Reliable Application of Components

• Software Products.

The RAC develops these products leveraging the experience and knowledge

that its staff gains in conducting a wide

range of projects for our government

and industry clients. 

Current Awareness

The RAC can help the technical staff of

a program office to stay abreast of the

latest news, advances in reliability, and

the other assurance disciplines.

RAC JOURNAL

The RAC publishes a free quarterly technical journal containing articles covering engineering advances, policy and

standards activities, technology applications, and upcoming events. The focus

is on practical knowledge that can be

applied to improve RMQS.

START Fact Sheet

The RAC publishes a series of Fact

Sheets, available at no charge, entitled

Selected Topics in Assurance Related Technologies (START) intended to “start” the

reader's knowledge in a specific technical subject area. 

World Wide Web Access

Users can obtain information on related

Web sites (including training, software

tools, standards, etc.), conduct online

searches of the RAC library, download

free copies of the RAC Journal and START

Fact Sheets, check the Calendar of

Events, access useful tools free of charge,

and order products.

Program Managers Have

Access to RAC Resources

The RAC has more than 60 engineers

and technical staff members to support

its clients. In addition to our strong technical staff, we have access to more than

1,700 other technical staff members. 

Subject Matter Experts

The RAC has a network of subject matter experts (SMEs) to supplement its

own staff. In nearly all cases, subject

matter experts provide a response gratis.

Our SMEs include individuals from

academia (e.g., Penn State and Rutgers),

industry (e.g., ReliaSoft and JBF), and

consulting (e.g., Wayne Nelson for accelerated life testing).

Data

RAC is a worldwide renowned source

of reliability data. It maintains extensive

quantitative and qualitative databases

on components, assemblies and, most

recently, systems, and makes the data

available through several data products.

Data is collected from numerous industry and government test and field

sources and is updated on a continual

basis. 

The RAC created and manages the Data

Sharing Consortium (DSC). The DSC

compiles and disseminates data on parts

and systems, and is open to all commercial, U.S. Government, and foreign

organizations. By sharing data, DSC

members save costs from the reduction

and elimination of redundant testing,

and have access to a larger base of data

with which to evaluate the quality and

reliability of parts and systems. Types of

data contained in the DSC include

screening, qualification, failure analysis, and field performance of components and systems.

Library

The RAC maintains a complete library

that includes articles, books, journals,

reports, and other technical documents

dealing with RMQS topics. Many of

these documents are in electronic format making searches and information

retrieval quick and accurate. Our librarian ensures that an abstract, complete with key words, is entered into our

library database for each document entered in the library.

An online feature allows visitors to the

RAC Web site to search the library using
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 39

a concept or key word. The Reliability

Analysis Center will only distribute

copies of documents for which we hold

the copyright, in accordance with copyright laws. In general, search results for

RAC publications will indicate RAC as

the “performing/publishing agency” or

the “source.” These RAC products can

be ordered from the RAC. 

Putting the RAC to Work for You

For government clients, the process of

putting the RAC to work is a straightforward and quick process. First, customers write a task white paper with

RAC assistance. Then, the statement of

work is sent to our COTR, who ensures

that the work is within the scope of the

RAC charter, and prepares a Work Plan

and Statement of Work (SOW). After

the Work Plan and SOW have been finalized and approved, the RAC sends a

technical and cost proposal to the customer. When all parties are satisfied with

the SOW and technical and cost proposal, the customer issues a Military Interagency Purchase Request and the

RAC starts work. 

34 Years of Success

The RAC serves the RMQS communities with a wide range of products and

services backed by 34 years of experience and successful work. Like all the

IACs, the RAC was established first and

foremost to serve the needs of Department of Defense and military organizations. Program managers can especially

benefit from the RAC because we are attuned to defense acquisition issues and

concerns, can be placed on contract

quickly and efficiently, and have worked

on improving the reliability, availability,

and readiness of many weapon systems.

Editor's Note: The author welcomes

comments on this article. Contact him

at NCriscimagna@alionscience.com.

For more information on the RAC, go

to http://rac.alionscience.com.

DAU SOUTH REGION GAINS NEW STRATEGIC PARTNERS

T

to extend its educational strategic partnerships and leverage increased learning opportunities, the Defense Acquisition University

(DAU) South Region signed Memorandums of

Understanding with Drake State Technical College and Oakwood College; and Letters of Intent

with Grambling State University, Tuskegee University, and Bethune-Cookman College. The signing ceremony was held at the DAU South campus, located in Huntsville, Ala., on Jan. 28, 2003. 

For more information on DAU South Region

Strategic Partnerships, contact Dr. Jerry Davis,

Associate Dean, Outreach and Performance Support, DAU South Region, at jerry.davis@dau.mil.

For more information on the DAU South Region,

visit the DAU Web site at http://www.dau.mil.

Standing from left: Dr. Legand Burge, Dean, College of Engineering Technology and Computer Sciences, Tuskegee University; Dr. Aubrey Long, Chairman, Division of Business Administration, Bethune-Cookman College; James McCullough,

Dean, DAU South Region; Dr. Helen McAlpine, President,

Drake State Technical College; Hank Valentine, CEO, Historically Black Colleges & Universities and Minority Institutions;

Dr. Delbert Baker, President, Oakwood College; Dr. Obadiah

Simmons, Dean, Continuing Education and Special Programs,

Grambling State University; and Army Col. Ronald Flom, DAU

Commandant.

Photo by Donald Clark
Advanced Technologies Program

Is on the Battlefield

JIM GARAMONE

WASHINGTON, March 18, 2003—U.S. military planners cannot allow chemical or biological attacks to stop operations. 

Two Advanced Concept Technology Demonstrations

(ACTDs) are helping combatant commanders continue their missions in the face of chemical and biological threats. 

The Restoration of Operations (RESTOP) ACTD and

the contamination avoidance at seaports of debarkation ACTD are projects that find technologies

to help keep airports and seaports open. 

“If a base gets ‘slimed,’ operations still must continue,” said Cindy Maclellan Wilson, the ACTD oversight executive for the two projects. 

If an enemy uses chemical or biological weapons in

a combat environment against a maneuver force,

units can avoid or go around the contaminated area.

That isn't possible with an airport or seaport. They

are fixed and the facilities to unload planes and ships

cannot be quickly duplicated elsewhere. 

The ACTDs look at ways to alleviate the problem,

better ways to quickly decontaminate areas, new procedures and concepts of operations, and new equipment to allow servicemembers to continue operations. 

The RESTOPS project started in 2000. The idea was

to restore operations on airfields quickly. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency and U.S. Pacific Command sponsored the effort.

“Chemical-biological situations are one of the hardest problems we try to handle,” Wilson said. “We

took a look at what concepts of operations and tactics, techniques, and procedures were being used

and what was still needed.” 

The group conducted a technology call and received

more than 170 technologies. The sponsors held field

trials at the Army's Dugway Proving Ground, Utah,

and selected 14 technologies and five concepts of

operations they wanted to test. 

“Before the ACTDs started, if you were subjected to

a chemical or biological attack, that was the end

game—the mission degradation was significant,”

Wilson said. “If we can keep moving at all, that's an

improvement.” 

She said that unlike large acquisition programs,

ACTDs often don't have hard numerical measures

of effectiveness. “Commanders know, however, if

something improves their effectiveness,” she said.

With RESTOPS, one of the measures was sortie generation. “If your air base is contaminated, how do

you keep your aircraft moving personnel and moving equipment?” she asked. “You know what your

standard operating tempo is, so we said, ‘let's minimize degradation as much as possible.’” 

The ACTD included equipment, warning technologies, decontamination technologies, medical equipment, and personnel protection. Portions of the

ACTD are being rushed to the Persian Gulf. 

“One that appears to be extremely successful is the

SAFE kit—Small Area Filtration Equipment,” Wilson said. “These help you get fresh, clean air into a

room that would otherwise be contaminated.”

“It's a popular problem right now since everyone is

going out and buying their duct tape and plastic

sheeting,” she said. “That's actually the militarily approved way to seal a room. If you've got a room that

you need personnel working in, we cover up the

vents, cover up the windows, then in the doorway

RELEASED March 18, 2003
we put in a SAFE kit. This is a filtration system that

seals into the doorway. It lets you get fresh, filtered

air rather than getting carbon dioxide poisoning or

being contaminated by chemical or biological agents.” 

Another technology that has proved useful is the mobile chemical agent detector. This is a vehiclemounted detection system that can detect agent vapors moving through an area. It can triangulate to

identify chemical agent location and type. 

Another useful tool is the RESTOPS information

management system. “Basically it's a plug-and-play

in your command-and-control system for use in a

biological or chemical situation,” Wilson said. “It

helps show which areas of the base are contaminated,

and commanders can move troops and resources as

needed to protect or decontaminate them.” 

Prior to this system, she said, commanders relied

upon grease pencils, maps, and word of mouth to

allow them to identify contaminated from uncontaminated areas of the base and advise their troops. 

Some things don't make the cut, which allows defense officials to redirect acquisition efforts and resources to more promising areas.

Officials tested RESTOPS technologies and procedures at Osan Air Base, South Korea, in February

2003. Some preliminary results have already been

shared with the combatant commanders. 

The time spent on RESTOPS gave the ACTD focused

on seaports a leg up, Wilson said. The Contamination Avoidance at Seaports of Debarkation [CASPOD] ACTD had a 2002 start and is sponsored by

U.S. Central Command. 

“RESTOPS conducted a data survey its first year and

looked at existing studies,” she said. That work was

easily transferred to CASPOD. “Because of the

groundwork, CASPOD was able to hit the ground

running.” 

Officials did a quick tabletop exercise in 2002 and

were able to put together commercial off-the-shelf

technologies quickly. Wilson received a Central

Command memo saying that the flyaway capability

CASPOD demonstrated had “significant military utility.” The command asked for additional money for

the capabilities now and recommended the program

for the other combatant commanders, she said. 

Wilson said DoD sent the command the extra money

so they could immediately purchase the theater chemical/biological response package. “It will be sent to

the field shortly,” she noted. The package is protection suits, test kits, personnel safety equipment, detection strips, and special types of waste pumps to

handle contamination. 

The two projects also put thought into cross-contamination. 

“What do you do if an airport is slimed and an aircraft is landing with equipment you need now?” she

asked. “Can you land it? Once it's landed, who's

going to touch the aircraft to off-load it? How do you

ensure the equipment inside the aircraft hasn't been

contaminated? Is your runway now contaminated

because you have this dirty aircraft on it?” 

Seaports have to deal with similar problems and then

some. Usually, DoD hires local stevedores to offload

ships. “What's their protection [from chemical and

biological attacks]?” she said. “The problem isn't just

around your port; the chain link fence doesn't stop

it. What do you do?” 

So the ACTDs not only deal with equipment and

procedures for U.S. personnel, but also with the political realities that operations place DoD into.

Wilson said the best defense is to not get “slimed.”

But assuming it happens, the answer is to be able to

continue to operate. “These two ACTDs are among

the first to seriously look at this problem,” she said. 

Editor's Note: This information is in the public domain at http://www.defenselink.mil/news.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Patnode is a Professor of Program

Management and Leadership at the

Defense Acquisition University, Fort

Belvoir, Va.

TEAM DEVELOPMENT MODEL

Can't Get To Performing 

Without Storming

Working as a Team

NORMAN H. PATNODE

42

Why do some teams seem to

speed shift straight to overdrive, produce amazing results, and have a blast

doing it, while other teams

just seem to stay permanently stuck in

park, producing nothing and going

nowhere?

As a professor teaching Program Management and Leadership in the Defense

Acquisition University's former Level III

Certification Course in Program Management—the 14-week Advanced Program Management Course—I've

pondered this question often as

I've watched over 50 teams go

through the process of forming,

storming, norming, and perYou know, I

always thought I

knew something

about leadership,

but despite my best

efforts, this pole is

acting just like my

program costs—no

matter what I do,

it keeps going up.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 43

forming. Not all of them made it to performing. But many did.

So what separates the “overdrive” teams

from those “stuck in park?” The ability

to successfully storm. If you want to

reach the pot of gold, you have to follow the rainbow. But the rainbow doesn't appear until after the storm.

Team Building 

One of the most dramatic examples of

this I've seen occurred one sunny morning out on a grassy parade field. I was

facilitating a group of 12 students

through some team building exercises.

We had worked our way through awareness and trust, and were taking a short

break after debriefing a challenging

problem-solving exercise the group

had just completed.

Toward the end of the break, as we

sat in the grass sharing stories and

waiting for the others to return, I

asked the six students who were

there if they'd like to try a little

“extra” exercise. Having nothing better to do, they agreed.

Now this exercise, on the surface,

appears quite simple. I asked the six

of them to stand shoulder to shoulder in two lines of three, with the

two lines facing each other. I then

asked them to bend both their arms

at the elbow, and with their forearms horizontal, to point at the

line of folks opposite them with

their index fingers. After repositioning a few folks slightly to put

all their index fingers in a straight

line, I placed a long, slender, lightweight rigid pole (a thin green

tomato stake) so that it sat on top

of their fingers. After explaining

that they had to keep their index

fingers in contact with the bottom of the pole at all times

(“grabbing” the pole in anyway

was against the rules—they had to

simply let it rest on their fingers),

I told them their task was to “simply” lower the pole to the ground.

I asked the group if they understood

the task, and then released my hand

from the center of the pole. The pole

immediately began to move—slowly

and steadily upward. The group was not

overly concerned by this, and indeed,

judging from their giggling and laughter, appeared to find this unexpected

turn of events amusing. Despite their

numerous conversations and best efforts, the pole had soon moved from

waist level to eye level. Since this is not

a very comfortable position, I asked

them if they'd like me to reset them so

they could try again. They quickly

agreed, and with a few quick words of

encouragement from me they were off

again. Their discussions remained quiet,

calm, and extremely polite, and by now

the other six students had returned and

were watching with interest. As I explained that we had decided to do an

“extra” exercise for fun, we all watched

the pole slowly rise again to eyeball level.

At this point the participants declared

the task undoable, and asked if they

could quit and do a “real” exercise. Noting to myself that this group got

nowhere near the storming phase, I

cheerfully agreed.

The full group of 12 then worked their

way through three more problem-solving exercises, each significantly more

challenging than the last. The group did

well, and really began to pull together

as a team. They had come to see each

new exercise as a “challenge,” and they

were now sharing their ideas and criticizing each other's ideas fast and furiously as they raced the clock to complete each new challenge.

I was delighted with their progress, and

although we were nearly out of time, I

decided to return to the “lower the pole”

exercise. Since we hadn't debriefed the

earlier “failure,” I wanted to try and

squeeze some learning out of that experience.

I asked the group if they were ready for

their final challenge of the morning.

“Bring it on!!” they all chorused. They

were a bit surprised, and a little concerned when I announced we'd be doing

the “lower the pole” exercise again —

after all, they'd all “seen” with their own

eyes that it couldn't be done.

Recognizing the need for encouragement, I assured them that it could indeed be done, and asked the six students who had not previously done the

exercise to please line up. I asked the

others to step up close and watch. After

placing the pole on their fingers and removing my hand, the pole began to, you

guessed it, rise.

But it was different this time. Based on

what was said, and how it was said, it

was obvious this group was very concerned about the pole moving in the

wrong direction. Without any real discussion, John and Tom both took over

and began giving instructions. When

they didn't get the results they wanted,

they began shouting directions, louder

and louder, but the pole continued to

rise.

And then it happened—the accusations.

Tom was yelling at Gary that it was all

his fault, and that he was the one making the pole go up. Amazingly, save for

a few murmurs of protest, Gary remained silent. But then John and Susan

began to yell at Gary too. “Get your act

together, or we're all going to fail because of YOU!” This was more than Gary

could stand. He exploded! Yelling at no

one in particular, but everyone at once,

he pulled his fingers down a foot below

the bar and exclaimed that it couldn't

be his *%?!* fault because he wasn't

even touching the !<*?# pole!

The best way I know to describe the intensity of this moment is to tell you that

the six students who were observing

each unconsciously took two or three

steps backward. The looks on their faces

said it all.

There was a moment of stunned silence

among the participants. Trent was the

first to speak, “I think I know why the

pole's going up.”

“Let's hear it,” said Susan.

“Well, we've been told we have to keep

our fingers in contact with the bottom

of the pole, but the pole is so light that

by the time we feel the pole on the top

of our fingers, we've already moved it
44 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

up—up off the fingers of the people next

to us. And then they do the same thing,

over and over. The pole keeps going up

and up.”

“Man, is this a cruel party joke, or what?”

interjected John, which brought a much

needed laugh to the team. (The observers were beginning to feel comfortable enough to step back up to the

group.) It was at this point that Tom

said, “I guess we owe Gary an apology.”

Susan and John were quick to apologize

for their earlier hasty judgments, and

Gary was graciously accepting these

apologies while confessing that only moments before he was SURE that the real

problem had been Susan, so he was just

as guilty as they were.

Then out of the blue, Cheryl made an

insightful observation. “Our fingers are

like the people on a team, only they're

not working together . . . they all know

the goal . . . but they're not working together.”

Trent piped in, “OK, so now we know

the problem—it's not to lower the

pole—it's to get our team member fingers to work together.”

“How do we do THAT?” asked Susan.

It was Gary, the previously declared

“cause” of the problem, who offered the

key—communication. “We have to get

our fingers to talk to each other.”

Susan instantly shot back, “But we already tried that. We talked, and yelled,

and even cursed at each other, but the

pole still went up! I don't think talking

will work, and I really don't want to go

there again.”

“Think ‘communicate,’ not ‘talk,’” said

Trent, and with that Gary slid his fingers together, capturing Susan's. Trent's

eyes lit up and he did the same, capturing one of John's fingers. Gary instructed everyone to slide their fingers

into groups. “Look, now we have three

players on the team instead of 12—communication has to be easier.” 

Tom suggested they shift to two groups

of fingers, one at each end of the pole.

Then, with quiet confidence, the group

slowly and easily lowered the pole to

the ground, their fingers “talking”

through their shared sense of touch.

There was a long moment of quiet,

hushed amazement as everyone realized

what just happened—then the whole

group erupted in loud, victorious cheers.

“Well, how many of you still think this

exercise is unsolvable?” I asked as we

stood in a circle preparing to debrief the

experience we'd just shared.

"Ah-Ha!"

“What led to success? What prevented

success in the earlier attempt? How are

these two experiences different?” We

discussed these questions at length, and

squeezed a good deal of learning out of

the experiences, but it was days later before I had the “ah-ha” that led to this article. I had witnessed the formation and

growth, along a very compressed timeline, of two six-person teams. When I

Although each team is as unique as

its members, teams develop and

grow along a predictable path.

The most commonly accepted model

of team development was published in

1965 by Bruce Tuckman, and consists

of four distinct phases—Forming,

Storming, Norming, and Performing. 

Forming

This stage begins with introductions

and is typically characterized by questioning. Why are we here? What are we

supposed to do? How are we going to

get it done? It usually involves a fair

amount of apprehension. The team

members are cautiously exploring the

boundaries of acceptable group behavior. Individual roles and responsibilities are unclear and processes have

not yet been defined. During this stage,

the team typically makes little, if any,

progress toward achieving its goal.

Storming

Conflict emerges as team members

struggle to enact their personal agendas and react against the efforts of

others to control them. The authority

and/or competence of individuals are

often challenged. Discussions can become heated and quite emotional.

Team members try to rely solely on

their personal and professional experience and resist collaborating with most

of the other members of the team. Impatient about the lack of progress,

team members often argue about

what actions should be taken next and

opinions can become quite polarized.

This is usually the most difficult phase

for a team, but it's a natural and necessary step. 

Norming

The team begins to experience group

cohesion for the first time. Norms

emerge as the team works through the

conflicts, and a sense of mutual respect and support develops between

the team members. They begin to see

themselves not as individuals, but as

members of the team. They accept the

ground rules and their roles in the

team. The team discusses and develops its processes. Enthusiasm is

high, and the team is tempted to go

beyond the original scope of its tasking.

The team may engage in fun and

social activities. 

Performing

Having gotten to know one another,

the team members understand each

other's strengths and weaknesses.

They make full use of their strengths as

they begin using their team processes

to troubleshoot, solve problems, and

make decisions. The team has a shared

vision and begins to get a lot of work

done. Disagreements still occur, but are

now resolved positively, with team

members readily making any necessary changes to team processes or organizational structure. In addition to

processes and structure, the team also

spends time attending to relationships,

and team members look out for one

another. Working together as a team is

fun.

PATH TO PERFORMANCE
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 45

fit this experience into the framework

of the forming, storming, norming, and

performing model of team development,

it's clear that the first team never grew

past the politeness of the forming stage,

while the second team clearly charged

into and through the storming phase. 

Examining the Storm

The “storm” starts in different ways for

different teams. Just as teams differ in

many ways, “storming” can begin within

a team in many different ways. It may

be as subtle as someone sitting in a different chair, or as unmistakable as an

explosive outburst of anger. Storming,

like the meteorological phenomenon it's

named after, comes in many forms. But

in every case, storming doesn't end until

the team addresses the needs and desires of each of the team members.

When people come together to form a

team, they do so to accomplish some

common goal they can't achieve by

themselves. However, while the team

members may agree in broad terms on

the goal and what needs to be done to

get there, they each bring their own individual needs and desires with them.

At the outset the individual needs and

desires of each member remain largely

unknown to the other members of the

team. It's not until these needs and desires are shared and addressed that a

team begins to coalesce and “perform.”

So why is it so hard for people to share

their needs and desires with the other

members of their team? Well for starters,

they're often strangers, so there's the real

concern of embarrassment, ridicule, or

even retribution, especially if the desires

are self-centered or not politically correct. Thus, for most people there's a significant level of “discomfort” involved

in sharing their needs and desires. In

addition, because needs and desires, like

assumptions, are often subconscious,

team members sometimes aren't even

aware of their needs and desires, so they

don't get openly shared.

As long as the discomfort or fear remains, most people will avoid openly

sharing their needs and desires. This

leads to the polite, reserved behaviors

typically seen within teams in their early

“forming” stage. But even at this stage,

“norms” are inadvertently being set

within the team. Team members begin

to sit in the same chair—“their” chair.

A few of the members begin to make

decisions and to speak for the whole

team, deciding what's to be done next

and setting deadlines. Because these

“norms” are not set explicitly—they usually happen without anyone talking

about them—they often clash with the

needs or desires of one of the team members. When this happens, it can open

the door for the team to begin storming. But only if that team member feels

safe enough to put his or her concerns

on the table. If a team member believes

that speaking up is more painful than

living with the consequences of a proposed action or decision, and chooses

to remain silent, then the team will miss

the benefits of storming.

When something does get thrown on

the table that is in direct conflict with

someone else's need—something too

painful to ignore—and the team member speaking up still feels a bit unsure

of his or her safety, then the resulting

challenge may be a bit clumsy and emotional. This can be painful (not meaning blood is spilled or punches are

thrown), but until all team members

have put all their needs on the table,

and they've all been addressed by the

group, the team won't get to performing. It's necessary for a team to go

through the awkward, uncomfortable

discussions we've labeled as “storming.”

So don't be afraid of it. Encourage it. 

It’s About Trust

Storming is saying what you honestly

think, despite the risks involved. This

takes a tremendous amount of trust,

which highlights why it's so important

to spend time up-front in team development addressing things such as

ground rules, common values, and roles

and responsibilities.

When the members of a team develop

trust in each other, they're willing to present ideas and defend them because they

know that everyone will listen to their

ideas, think about them, and give them

honest criticism. That's the benefit. The

process of storming improves and polishes ideas by identifying and challenging assumptions, obstacles, and expected

outcomes. Better ideas result in better

solutions, and better solutions equate

to higher team performance. By “storming” ideas before implementing them,

teams can create their rainbow and follow it to the pot of gold.

Editor's Note: The author welcomes

questions or comments on this article.

Contact Patnode at Norman.patnode

@dau.mil.

DFARS Transformation

T

he Department of Defense is kicking off a major transformation initiative to identify dramatic improvements and reductions to procurement policies, procedures,

and processes in the Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement (DFARS).

A task force, under the direction of Deidre Lee, Director, Defense Procurement

and Acquisition Policy, will consider bold changes and make proposal recommendations. The task force will also develop legislative proposals for consideration by

the Congress for future changes to the DFARS.

The public is encouraged to participate in generating ideas for improvements. To

submit your proposals, go to the following Web site:

http://www.acq.osd.mil/dp/dars/transf.htm

DPAP will consider and post all ideas, but its aggressive schedule precludes

responding on an individual basis.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Piff is Manager, Technical Programs Department, Anteon Corp., in Arlington, Va. He holds an M.E. in Engineering Administration from The George Washington

University and a B.S. in Engineering Physics from Cornell University. He has 30 years’ experience as a defense contractor in planning, managing, coordinating, and

executing R&D projects. Currently, he is working for ONR in several program offices. The author gratefully acknowledges the many Anteon staff members who furnished their expertise to the efforts described in this article, as well as Terry Ericsen, ONR, who directed the program and developed the graphics. 

BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES

Power Electronics Building

Blocks (PEBB) Program

PEBB Bringing a Whole New Perspective to

Power Control and Distribution

JOSEPH C. PIFF

46

T

he Power Electronics Building

Blocks (PEBB) program was a

government-sponsored research

and development program with

the vision of changing the paradigm for designing and manufacturing

electrical high-power conversion and

control products. Since the U.S. Government does not manufacture products, success of this program would be

measured by the acceptance of the new

concept by the power electronics manufacturing industry and by the various

commercial and military users of these

products. A change in the design and

manufacturing paradigm would effect

a change of emphasis from pure operational efficiency to a combination of operational and design and manufacturing cost efficiency.

New Power Electronics Program

Generated, Funded by ONR

The Office of Naval Research (ONR) exists to invest taxpayer dollars in programs that define basic knowledge and

exploit that knowledge to develop technology options that provide affordable

capabilities to the Navy and Marine

Corps. ONR pursues an integrated Science and Technology (S&T) program

from basic research through manufacturing technologies. All programs are to

consider the affordability of the final

product. Research areas include oceanography; advanced materials; sensors;

electronics; surveillance; mine counterPhoto by David McLaughlin, Anteon Corp.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 47

measures; weapons; and surface ship,

submarine, and aircraft technologies.

The Power Electronics Building Blocks

(PEBB) program, conceived in the ONR

Ship Hull, Mechanical and Electrical

Systems Science and Technology Division, and initiated in late 1994, included

Research and Development (R&D) of

electronics, materials, and manufacturing techniques. ONR funded the program at Anteon Corp., where the company performed program management

assistance; PEBB design, fabrication, and

testing; PEBB trade show; and PEBB

communication system design and implementation work.

The primary responsibility of the ONR

Program Management Officer, after conceiving the idea for the product and

achieving an indication of interest from

the user community, was to assemble a

team of R&D organizations that could

move from concept to reality in a relatively short period of time. At the same

time, he had to incorporate evolving

DoD and ONR procedures into his program plan to ensure program acceptability by ONR senior management personnel, who ultimately have funding

authorization authority over specific

agency research programs.

The PEBB concept requires a whole new

way of thinking about power control

and distribution. Navy procurement personnel and ship design and procurement personnel at organizations that design and build our nation’s ships (i.e.,

shipyards) must be prepared to consider

these new ideas as they are readied for

implementation. Major procurement

and life cycle cost savings, and space

and weight savings were predicted after

the success of the PEBB program.

Assembling a Team

To most quickly achieve this new way

of thinking, we began educating the appropriate personnel as soon as practical. We also began preparing the PEBB

program products for Fleet implementation by developing prototype demonstrations of predicted shipboard equipment as quickly as possible.

A relatively large team was assembled

that included academia, a Navy laboratory, Federal Government laboratories, industrial manufacturers, and system integrators for commercial and

military customers (Figure 1). Together,

they tackled the management challenges of implementing PEBB using

several available techniques, including

electronic communication and collaboration, definition of an open architecture, public demonstration of interim product, and technology review

workshops.

Additionally, the policies and procedures

of ONR dictated schedule challenges

that had to be addressed. The PEBB program was the first Concurrent Engineering S&T program undertaken at

ONR, as well as the first S&T program

to initiate Integrated Product and Process

Development (IPPD) procedures under

the then new Department of Defense

Directives issued by the Secretary of Defense in 1995.

The Power

Electronics

Building Blocks

(PEBB) program

fabricated a

special, lowerpower

demonstration unit

that could be

demonstrated at

trade shows.

Employing the

latest technology,

the demonstration

unit could operate

on single-phase,

220V input power.

At each show, we

continued to

demonstrate

increasingly varied

and sophisticated

types of electrical

loads powering

practical operating

systems.
48 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Terry Ericsen, ONR PEBB Program Management Officer, has stated that undertaking the management of a program

implementing these new directives in a

pervasive, highly aggressive technology

program has been the greatest challenge

of his career.

This article will address the management issues encountered during prosecution of the PEBB program.

Market Information

Commercial and military organizations

have been moving toward using electrical energy as the universal medium

for transport of energy for several years.

The concept of energy transport using

electrical wires rather than by mass

transport using steam, air, or other fluids in factories and in air, land, and sea

vehicles offers many advantages, including reduced piece parts, ease of control, and minimized wear. The end result is the potential for a substantial

increase in performance and a reduction in ownership cost of the end product. 

The Navy has performed many studies

of the benefits of employing more electric systems on ships, and concluded

that both fabrication and operational

benefits accrue. Additional cost benefits accrue if products have both a commercial and military application.

A primary enabling technology for the

entire range of “more electric” applications is the rapid evolution in the field

of power electronics (Figure 2, p. 49).

A family of power electronics devices

allows the production of power management modules that can handle all of

the electric power control and conversion functions required to move power

from the generating and storage sources

to the ultimate loads. Consumers purchase the added value of electrification

of our world in products such as automobiles that now, more often than not,

incorporate electric windows and door

locks. The PEBB program was initiated

in recognition of the opportunities for

cost reduction in power electronics by

exploiting and improving emerging device technology (especially solid-state

power devices), packaging concepts,

and circuit topologies.

The mission of the PEBB program was

to design, develop, and demonstrate

Power Electronics Building Blocks for

commercial and military applications.

The PEBB concept was to convert from

complete system designs for each application—the clean sheet of paper approach—to a system design achieved

by selecting from a small set of standard modules, i.e., a modular design

approach. A PEBB was defined as a universal power processor that changes

any electrical power input into any desired form of voltage, current, and frequency output (Figure 3, p. 50). Considering the wide range of power

handling requirements, a family of devices was expected.

ONR was the developer and primary

sponsor of all PEBB and PEBB-related

R&D. Commercial applications include

electric automobiles, utility distribution

systems, motor controllers, and alternative (e.g., solar, fuel cell) power systems. Military applications include highpower propulsion, auxiliary, and weapon

systems for ships, submarines, aircraft,

and land vehicles that use intelligent

control to manage electric power systems efficiently and provide reliable, uninterruptible power. The Navy needs

standardized, intelligent, solid-state

power control devices, capable of managing a few Watts to mega-Watts to prevent proliferation of high-cost, single

application devices.

The Navy developed, fabricated, and

demonstrated a family of universal,

scaleable power control devices that deliver high-quality, digitally synthesized

electric power for multiple applications.

The PEBB, coupled with recently developed, power-dense MOS (MetalOxide Semiconductor)-Controlled

Thyristor (MCT) switches, offers the opportunity to reduce size, weight, and

cost of commercial and military power

electronics systems by factors of 10 or

more. A programmable multipurpose

device, the PEBB is replacing many

unique, high-cost power-conditioning

elements used in previous system designs.

Engineering Approach

Product Description—Open Architecture. The PEBB is a complex device with

electrical and mechanical boundaries

that were purposefully set fuzzy at the

beginning of the program to encourage

broad, innovative, “out-of-the-box”

thinking. A team of research and customer (or user) personnel was assembled to discuss the operational and physical requirements to be expected of the

products and to place some structure

and priority on the design concept. Team

members were asked to develop a list

of prioritized requirements for their application(s). Then, the team was assembled to discuss, weight, and score

FIGURE 1. Collaboration Triad
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 49

the requirements to develop an indication of those features that were most important to the largest number of potential users.

In an effort to gain the greatest amount

of customer satisfaction, the team used

the “House of Quality” process to choose

the best design characteristics for the

Navy’s investment. We expected that

some requirements would be contradictory, at least according to the laws of

physics as we understood them, and

would have to be negotiated to achieve

something practical. To gain a consensus opinion of what a PEBB is or should

be, a categorized and prioritized list of

requirements was developed that was

then used to set a relative level of need

by each participant.

In late 1998, ONR came up with the descriptive nomenclature of “Plug and

Play,” a concept very similar to that used

in the personal computer industry. (Interestingly, the acronym for Plug and

Play (P-n-P) plays off the solid-state device description of the interface: p-n or

n-p.) Starting with a finite number of

standard frames that are built to accommodate open, industry-standard

electrical and mechanical interfaces, a

manufacturer (or an individual) can purchase off-the-shelf components and assemble a functioning personal computer

almost as easily as a child can assemble

a structure from a set of blocks.

Because of the power levels involved,

and to minimize the losses introduced

by inefficient electrical design, the power

electronics industry has been faced with

the need to design specific solutions to

each power conversion situation. The

purpose of the PEBB program was to

eliminate the need for most, if not all,

of that unique design requirement in

favor of a set of designated building

blocks for assembly—much like a child’s

set of blocks. However, for this concept

to work, both the supplier and customer

needed to benefit. Therefore, the program needed to develop boundaries.

On one side of the boundary, the “plug”

side, the interface specifications needed

to be well known so that every manufacturer could produce a product that

would work with every other manufacturer’s product. On the other side of the

boundary, the “play” side, there was

room for unique engineering and, therefore, competition among suppliers, i.e.,

niche marketing. With this structure,

PEBB manufacturers would have an incentive for entering the market with

building blocks of their own.

Just as you can purchase a modem for

your personal computer from any number of manufacturers, each with its own

unique characteristics, the PEBB program developed an architecture that allows unique characteristic competition.

For example, if a chip manufacturer

wanted to sell complete inverters, that

manufacturer would manufacture the

chips, but would purchase all other

components (e.g., filters, cabinets) from

other manufacturers and assemble the

complete system for sale. Likewise, that

manufacturer may consistently buy

components from the same set of suppliers or may have an in-house line of

products, with a corresponding set of

costs, which are assembled from components from multiple manufacturers.

We wanted to encourage collaboration

on the setting of standards for the interfaces between components. For plug

and play to work, the system must be

smart enough to recognize each comFIGURE 2. Trends in Power Semiconductor Devices

A PEBB is defined

as a universal

power processor

that changes any

electrical power

input into any

desired form of

voltage, current,

and frequency

output.

Considering the

wide range of

power handling

requirements, a

family of devices

was expected.
50 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

ponent and adjust its operations to

achieve the desired output with both

the available input and grouping of components. However, the standards-setting process does not begin until a group

of manufacturers in the hierarchical industry decide that standards are to their

mutual financial advantage, so this part

of the process is still ongoing.

Dual-Use Development. When commercial products are purchased and applied in military systems with little or

no modification, the expectation is that,

because of the competitiveness of the

commercial market, the products are

less expensive than products designed

specifically for military application. The

Navy desires: 1) to build systems based

on pre-engineered, pre-tested, commercially applied building blocks instead of one-of-a-kind system developments; and 2) to buy hundreds of units

from production lines that produce millions of units. Therefore, the PEBB concept was to initiate the development of

a commercial product with pre-planned

applicability to military systems. A market evaluation revealed that power electronics products were being engineered

into commercial products and that this

was a growing trend.

As conceived, the PEBB is software-reconfigurable; multi-purpose; smart; and

is a universal device, replacing several

specialized devices like circuit breakers,

motor controllers, power conditioners,

or inverters. The PEBB combines powerdense semiconductor developments

with improved fabrication and packaging processes to reduce the size, weight,

and cost of electric power conversion

systems by a factor of 10 or more; and

increases the efficiency in some areas by

a factor of 100 (Figure 4 below).

Since it is a single, standardized unit of

manufacture, production of this device

in large quantities reduces its cost. And

since its controller incorporates a microprocessor, it provides an interface for

device-level feedback and system-level

control. A PEBB, jointly developed with

industry, meets both commercial and

Navy specifications. Thus, commercial

use of PEBB technology contributes to

even further cost reductions. Potential

savings for the military are enormous if

it draws upon the civilian sector to

jointly develop a PEBB and its market

The architectural similarity between

Navy zonal electrical distribution and

the proposed drive train for the Department of Energy (DOE) hybrid car

is shown in Figure 5 (p. 52). The conceptual Naval zonal system shows zones

for electrical propulsion equipment,

power generation and conversion equipment, and “user” or “auxiliary” equipment. The conceptual electric/hybrid

vehicle shows a power source (fuel cell,

turbine, etc.), bi-directional inverters,

an energy management and control system, energy storage, and an electric drive

motor. In some applications, the power

levels are similar, while the large loads

onboard ships are significantly larger

than those necessary in an automobile.

Concurrent Engineering. Concurrent

Engineering was an early name for the

currently implemented (and expanded)

IPPD initiative within DoD. The DoD

definition of IPPD is “a management

technique that simultaneously integrates

all essential acquisition activities through

the use of multidisciplinary teams to optimize the design, manufacturing, and

FIGURE 3. PEBB Systems—A Simple Set of Blocks for Power

Electronics

FIGURE 4. PEBB Program Achievements vs. Goals
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 51

supportability processes. IPPD facilitates

meeting cost and performance objectives from product concept through production, including field support.”

One of the key IPPD tenets is multidisciplinary teamwork through Integrated

Product Teams (IPTs). These IPTs are

staffed with experts in the various technical fields (e.g., design engineering,

manufacturing, quality control, logistics, product support) required to bring

the product to fruition. When studied,

many of the tenets of IPPD can be related to the concepts implemented in

the International Standards Organization (ISO) 9000 Quality Standards. IPPD

was implemented in DoD by direction

of the Secretary of Defense on May 10,

1995, several months after the PEBB

program had begun operations.

Ericsen, the ONR PEBB Program Management Officer, had already been working for several years prior to program

initiation to establish realistic but aggressive goals for the program. He had

been meeting with power electronics industry principals to determine the feasibility of the concept, to identify technical and manufacturing shortfalls, and

to establish the alliances necessary for

success. His IPT consisted of principals

in the power electronics device design

and manufacturing industry and those

organizations that purchase those devices to assemble functioning power

conversion units, along with Navy

power electronics R&D personnel.

This team met frequently in the early

years of the program and used the team

communication system described on p.

52 to reduce the need for expensive faceto-face meetings. Its members possessed

the correct mix of expertise to ensure

that the design being developed could

be produced using standard manufacturing equipment, would satisfy commercial/industrial and military requirements, and would have reasonable

reliability and life cycle expectancy when

deployed in practical applications.

The PEBB IPT, working with the PEBB

Program Management Officer, established a series of intermediate milestones

for operating hardware. This new technology was a radical departure from current practice in the industry. As such,

incremental demonstration of the developing capability was expected to be

necessary for continuing acceptance of

the feasibility of the concept. Therefore,

ONR established three incremental

demonstration milestones using standard Navy terminology for replacement

equipment: function; form and function; and form, fit and function (Figure

6, p. 53).

• The first generation of PEBB devices

used first-generation advanced power

electronics solid-state technology to

demonstrate in working models the

functionality of the concept.

• The second generation of devices

demonstrated multi-functionality by

integrating the controlling microprocessor with the high-density power

semiconductors to eliminate separate,

unique devices for each required

power electronics function.

• Finally, the third generation of devices

demonstrated all of the foregoing in

a compact, power-dense package suitable for both commercial and military applications. 

Each step along this path to ultimate

success was defined in a manner that

would yield solid information for the

next design step. If any technological

difficulties were encountered, they

would be addressed long before the

point of no return. Additionally, ONR

encouraged the Naval Sea Systems Command to become familiar with the technology by participating on the IPT and

by developing and testing units manufactured by their traditional commercial/industrial suppliers.

Communication Management

Program Reviews. Early in the PEBB

program, the primary method of communication among program participants was the quarterly Program Review. The largest contractor in the

program was the silicon chip designer/manufacturer, and that contractor usually organized and conducted the reviews at its site. 

The first day was usually set aside for

proprietary information exchange between this contractor and the government concerning new chip design

progress. Then, one or two days of open

presentations from various program participants allowed for discussion of the

meaning of the PEBB concept and further refinement of the architecture of

the device. These reviews included

“breakout” sessions wherein the audience was broken into smaller parts by

choosing specific topic areas for detailed

discussion.

As the program progressed and the team

communication system described on p.

52 was implemented and improved,

these program reviews were scheduled

less often and were held at the locations

of other program participants, including universities, Navy laboratories, and

other government agency sites. These

The PEBB

program was

initiated in

recognition of the

opportunities for

cost reduction in

power electronics

by exploiting and

improving

emerging device

technology

(especially solidstate power

devices),

packaging

concepts, and

circuit topologies.
52 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

face-to-face meetings were highly successful at getting program participants

into one-on-one discussions (especially

during breaks in the presentations).

These discussions were often the catalysts to major agreements for partnerships or for technological progress.

Team Communication. From the beginning of the PEBB program, it was obvious that an advanced communication

system was going to be necessary to coordinate the operation of the program

and to encourage program participants

to collaborate during device development. The PEBB team of government

laboratories, public and private universities, and commercial/industrial organizations was described as a “virtual

company.” The virtual company was defined to mean that all participating organizations would be considered to be

“units” of a company structure and,

therefore, communication among these

units should be as seamless as it would

be within a well-functioning single organization.

The team was formed, but the method

of communication needed to be developed. Lotus NotesTM, a commercially

available product, was chosen because

it provides e-mail, Internet browsing,

Internet or Intranet site development

and display, and database development

and implementation for almost any conceivable purpose: project scheduling

and tracking, collaborative document

development, document routing, document and information sharing, and

more.

Further, Lotus Notes includes a collaboration environment allowing for multiple program participants to comment

on or edit a document. This allowed

PEBB program participants to state their

opinion about a topic, add more information about the topic, or ask questions

about what someone else said. This capability is especially useful, for example, for the process of developing product interface specifications. One of the

purposes of the ONR-sponsored program reviews was to allow interested

participants to get to know each other

and open a dialogue that would continue between reviews.

To encourage this interaction, we established “forums” within Lotus Notes

that included databases containing the

design thinking to date, and areas where

individuals could share and “discuss”

ideas. The forums established included

Modeling and Simulation; Applications/Systems; Commercialization; Processing; Passive Components and Materials; Packaging; PEBB Demonstration;

Electromagnetic Compatibility/Electromagnetic Interference (EMC/EMI); and

Form, Fit, and Function (3F), also

known as Plug and Play.

Public Demonstrations. For a large

commercial market to develop, the

PEBB vision needed to be shared with

organizations that were not participating in the PEBB design and development program. As R&D projects

yielded operating products, those devices were incorporated into practical

operating systems that could be

demonstrated at trade shows. For this

purpose the PEBB program fabricated

a special, lower-power demonstration

unit that employed the latest technology, but that would operate on singlephase, 220V input power.

At each show, we demonstrated increasingly varied and sophisticated types

of electrical loads. For example, we

demonstrated an electrical motor operating a pump with a manual control

valve to achieve a “needed” flow rate

and compared that with operating the

motor with PEBB control to achieve the

same flow rate without the control valve

and using less power, i.e., we could

throttle the power rather than the flow.

The design of the PEBB supports control of electro-mechanical devices from

a common base, thereby easing the

FIGURE 5. Architectural Similarity of Ships and Hybrid Vehicles
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 53

manufacturer’s requirements for developing specific control hardware and

reducing the cost of delivery of final,

operational product. For example, a

linear motor manufacturer loaned a

motor to be displayed as a load on the

PEBB demonstrator. We eliminated the

manufacturer’s controller card and operated the motor with the latest version of the PEBB to demonstrate the

ability to precisely control the acceleration rate of a projectile.

Workshops. In addition to the Forums

implemented in Lotus Notes, specific

topic-area workshops involving technology-specific experts were organized

and conducted. We held an Applications Workshop and a Soft Switching

and Resonant Converters Workshop.

Elements Contributing to

Success of Program

The five-year, ONR-sponsored PEBB

program was a highly aggressive technical program that developed new technology for application by commercial

and military organizations. Commercial

and military supply organizations have

taken the concept and are proceeding

with final engineering development. So,

what were the elements that contributed

to the success of this program?

First, a highly competent, highly dedicated program champion, Terry Ericsen

of ONR, was consistently involved in all

aspects of the program, from the intricate technical details to dealing with

Congressional and Secretarial review

and funding issues. His exceptional efforts to develop and hold together a large

team of highly diverse personnel were

perhaps the greatest contributor to the

success of the PEBB Program.

Secondly, the communication system,

both face-to-face and electronic, worked

effectively to keep everyone informed

as to the current state of development

of the product and the plans for the future. However, the portion of this system designed to encourage the sharing

of development ideas did not work as

FIGURE 6. PEBB Development Schedule
54 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

well as desired. We believe that lack of

training and, possibly, the competitive

nature of the government contracting

business was the greatest impediment

to this effort. People were either unwilling or unable to find the time to learn

the collaborative software functions.

Moreover, the possibility of a lack of

trust among participants negated the

positive factors evident in the software

implementation. For this type of effort

to succeed in a “virtual company,” a lot

of effort to establish mutual trust will

need to be expended.

Finally, the timing was just right. Our

experiences in talking to people in attendance at trade shows was that both

the commercial and military markets

were ready for less costly, more compact

design of power electronics systems. The

technology, especially in silicon-based

chips, was at the point where practical

devices could be designed to achieve

new levels of performance. Another

measure of success of a technology development program is the number of

new patents issued—over 70 patents

were issued to PEBB program participants. 

This development approach demonstrated the limitless possibilities for product development from concept to reality when government, academia, and

industry cooperate in the drive toward

the major new technologies that will affect our lives in the 21st century.

A New Paradigm

ONR succeeded at instituting a new paradigm into the thinking of the designers of power electronics equipment.

How does the Navy benefit? What are

the next steps?

Several developments need to be continued in parallel. First, the heart of the

PEBB is the switch as implemented in

silicon. Further development of this

technology to get the switching speed

up from the current level of between 10

and 20 KHz to 70 KHz needs to be pursued. Several concepts are in process.

At the same time, researchers in this

technology area are considering material changes that could increase the high

end of the temperature envelope, allowing a greater number of applications

in harsh environments.

Secondly, continuing efforts to get industry to work together to establish interfaces between components and then

effective minimum interface specifications are being pursued by ONR. Real

plug and play cannot be achieved until

this step is completed.

Finally, systems engineering needs to be

pursued. The ONR PEBB Program Management Officer’s next program responsibility is called the Advanced Electrical Power System (AEPS). The AEPS

program will take Ericsen’s success one

step further and begin speculating about

the many alternative system designs for

future systems using low-cost, flexible,

modular, smart electrical high-power

control and conversion devices. One of

the many applications of this technology in the Navy is to use linear motors

to launch and retrieve aircraft from the

decks of aircraft carriers. 

The ingenuity of our ship system design

engineers will be tasked to employ this

new technology in a manner that improves the operability, maintainability,

and survivability of our Fleet assets and

reduces the overall cost of these systems.

Editor’s Note: The author welcomes

questions or comments on this article.

Contact him at JPiff@Anteon.com. For

more information on topics discussed

in, or related to this article, visit the

AEPS/PEBB and ONR Web sites at

http://aeps.onr.navy.mil and http://www.

onr.navy.mil.

DAU AWARD PRESENTED TO OUTSTANDING STUDENT

T

he Defense Acquisition University (DAU), in partnership with the Bryant Adult Alternative High

School, presented Bryant student Marlene Luchi

with DAU’s Outstanding Student of the Year Award.

The presentation took place during a Bryant Honors ceremony at the school in Alexandria, Va., on

Feb. 7.

Selected by the counseling staff at Bryant, Luchi has

attended the school since 2000 and participates in

many activities. She is currently President of the

Bryant National Honor Society and also serves on

the Leadership Committee. Luchi holds two jobs,

one of which is at DAU as an assistant in the Office

of the President. As a Partner in Education with Bryant

School, DAU presents this award twice a year to recognize students who exemplify leadership, learning,

and service. This is the first time the awardee has

also been an employee at DAU.

From left: Air Force Col. William McNally, Air Force Chair, DAU

Executive Institute; Marlene Luchi, recipient of the Outstanding

Student of the Year Award; Army Staff Sgt. Duane Adens, DAU;

and Navy Senior Chief, James Pratt, DAU Enlisted Advisor.

Photo by Barbara Zenker.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 55

DAU SOUTH REGION HOSTS FIRST ANNUAL

ACQUISITION, TECHNOLOGY, AND EDUCATION EXPO

Over 200 participants took part in the First Annual Acquisition, Technology, and Education

Exposition, hosted by the DAU South Region,

on Jan. 28, in Huntsville, Ala. Forty-five individual exhibitors from military, government, industry, and academia staffed over 30 exhibits. The day’s

events also included seminar sessions on the following topics:

• Overview of Defense Acquisition University

• DoD 5000 Series Changes

• Sustainment Systems Technical Support

• Cost Risk Analysis Tool

• Aviation Technology Assessment and Transition

Process. 

Due to its success, the Expo event is planned to be

an even larger event next year. 

For more information on the Annual Acquisition,

Technology, and Education Exposition, contact

Dr. Jerry Davis, Associate Dean, Outreach and Performance Support, DAU South Region, at

jerry.davis@dau.mil. For more information on the

DAU South Region, visit the DAU Web site at

http://www.dau.mil.

Bruno Wengrowski, Professor of Contracting,

DAU, delivers a presentation on “Sustainment

Systems Technical Support.”

Photos by Don Clark

Exhibitors’ booths.
56 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

JOIN DAUAA

Defense Acquisition University

Graduates, Faculty, and Staff!

Take advantage now of the great

benefits of DAUAA Alumni membership —

• Addition of DAUAA membership to

your resumé.

• Continuing involvement in defense

acquisition activities and links to

other professional organizations.

• Networking with other members of

the defense acquisition community

through the Association Web site.

• Timely updates on evolving

defense acquisition policies in Association Newsletters.

• Forum on defense acquisition

through newsletters and

symposium papers.

• Continuing Learning Points (CLPs)

for DAUAA Annual Symposium

participation — up to 16 CLPs —

toward meeting DoD continuing

education requirements.

Call (703) 960-6802 to join DAUAA

or complete one of the forms (opposite page). To learn more about

DAUAA or register online using a

credit card, visit the DAUAA Web site

at http://www.dauaa.org or e-mail at

dauaa@erols.com

JOIN DAUAA

Defense Acquisition University

Graduates, Faculty, and Staff!

Take advantage now of the great

benefits of DAUAA Alumni membership —

• Addition of DAUAA membership to

your resumé.

• Continuing involvement in defense

acquisition activities and links to

other professional organizations.

• Networking with other members of

the defense acquisition community

through the Association Web site.

• Timely updates on evolving

defense acquisition policies in Association Newsletters.

• Forum on defense acquisition

through newsletters and

symposium papers.

• Continuing Learning Points (CLPs)

for DAUAA Annual Symposium

participation — up to 16 CLPs —

toward meeting DoD continuing

education requirements.

Call (703) 960-6802 to join DAUAA

or complete one of the forms (opposite page). To learn more about

DAUAA or register online using a

credit card, visit the DAUAA Web site

at http://www.dauaa.org or e-mail at

dauaa@erols.com
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 57

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

DAU Alumni Association News!

All DAU Course Graduates

Gain Full Membership Status!

Industry & Government Employees 

Who Are Not DAU-DSMC Graduates

Are Eligible for Associate Membership!

GIVE A COPY OF THIS OFFER TO AN ASSOCIATE

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

DAU Alumni Association News!

All DAU Course Graduates

Gain Full Membership Status!

Industry & Government Employees 

Who Are Not DAU-DSMC Graduates

Are Eligible for Associate Membership!

GIVE A COPY OF THIS OFFER TO AN ASSOCIATE

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

DAU Alumni Association News!

All DAU Course Graduates

Gain Full Membership Status!

Industry & Government Employees 

Who Are Not DAU-DSMC Graduates

Are Eligible for Associate Membership!

GIVE A COPY OF THIS OFFER TO AN ASSOCIATE
58 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

You have a new chance to join the DAU Alumni Association!

All course graduates gain full membership status!

The benefits of DAUAA membership have increased. Graduates of all DAU courses are now eligible

for full membership status. Industry and government employees who are not DAU-DSMC graduates

are eligible for associate membership. Take advantage of this opportunity to join DAUAA today!

❑1 yr $2500 ❑3 yr $6000

Fill out this card and mail with a check payable

to DAUAA. Mail to:

DAU ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

2550 HUNTINGTON AVE STE 202

ALEXANDRIA VA 22307

Register Online at: http://www.dauaa.org

Name ........................................................................

Address .....................................................................

..................................................................................

Rank/Title/Service ......................................................

Company/Agency ......................................................

Phone (H)..................................................................

(W)..............................Fax .............................

For information call (703) 960-6802 • (800) 755-8805 • Fax: (703) 960-6807 • E-mail dauaa@erols.com

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

You have a new chance to join the DAU Alumni Association!

All course graduates gain full membership status!

The benefits of DAUAA membership have increased. Graduates of all DAU courses are now eligible

for full membership status. Industry and government employees who are not DAU-DSMC graduates

are eligible for associate membership. Take advantage of this opportunity to join DAUAA today!

❑1 yr $2500 ❑3 yr $6000

Fill out this card and mail with a check payable

to DAUAA. Mail to:

DAU ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

2550 HUNTINGTON AVE STE 202

ALEXANDRIA VA 22307

Register Online at: http://www.dauaa.org

Name ........................................................................

Address .....................................................................

..................................................................................

Rank/Title/Service ......................................................

Company/Agency ......................................................

Phone (H)..................................................................

(W)..............................Fax .............................

For information call (703) 960-6802 • (800) 755-8805 • Fax: (703) 960-6807 • E-mail dauaa@erols.com

THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

You have a new chance to join the DAU Alumni Association!

All course graduates gain full membership status!

The benefits of DAUAA membership have increased. Graduates of all DAU courses are now eligible

for full membership status. Industry and government employees who are not DAU-DSMC graduates

are eligible for associate membership. Take advantage of this opportunity to join DAUAA today!

❑1 yr $2500 ❑3 yr $6000

Fill out this card and mail with a check payable

to DAUAA. Mail to:

DAU ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

2550 HUNTINGTON AVE STE 202

ALEXANDRIA VA 22307

Register Online at: http://www.dauaa.org

Name ........................................................................

Address .....................................................................

..................................................................................

Rank/Title/Service ......................................................

Company/Agency ......................................................

Phone (H)..................................................................

(W)..............................Fax .............................

For information call (703) 960-6802 • (800) 755-8805 • Fax: (703) 960-6807 • E-mail dauaa@erols.com
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 59

Director, Defense Procurement &

Acquisition Policy Publishes New

Manager’s Guide

Now online at:

http://www.acq.osd.mil/dpap
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Pattakos is the Senior Advisor to the President/CEO of Beta Analytics International, Inc. He is a Certified Protection Professional (CPP) and an Operations Security

Professional (OCP).

SECURITY & CRITICAL PROGRAM INFORMATION

Security Support to Acquisition of

Weapons Systems

Vital to Success on the Battlefield

ARION N. “PAT” PAT TAKOS

60

T

he word security is not

synonymous to a bad

four-letter word. For

some it may seem so if

it adds further requirements, or seems to impede

progress during research and

development activities or the

formal weapons systems acquisition process. The fact is

that security, intelligence, and

counterintelligence support

to the acquisition of weapons

systems is necessary for

achieving success on the battlefield. 

People in the protection business are not there to impede

progress and yes, they are sensitive to the imperatives placed

on program personnel dictated

by cost, schedule, and performance. They are driven by the

mandate to help field systems

that have not been compromised, but nevertheless are

open to exploitation by those

not so friendly to our nation's

interests. If you tend to equate

security with a bad four-letter

word, make it a good one such

as help—a way to help field successful systems. 

Program Protection Plan

DoD has now rescinded the outdated

DoD 5000-series documents, and issued interim guidance pending the development and coordination of policies

that are flexible and designed to more

rapidly respond to warfighter needs.

Such concepts as evolutionary acquisition and spiral development are now

important acquisition strategies, but the

essentials of the various phases associated with the Milestone (MS) A through

C decision points are the same in the

interim guidance. 

Concept and Technology Development

are based on user needs and technology

opportunities. When an affordable, militarily useful capability has been identified and demonstrated in a relevant

environment (and can be developed for

production in normally less than five
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 61

years), the System Development and

Demonstration Phase is entered with a

Milestone B decision. Milestone B is the

point at which an acquisition program

is initiated. Prior to this decision, the

guidance states, is when the identification and protection of Critical Program

Information (CPI) must be ensured. It

is at Milestone B that a Program Protection Plan (PPP) is required once the

CPI is identified (Figure 1). 

Protecting CPI

When determining CPI, the term “crown

jewels”should come to mind. CPI literally means that information, technology, or systems would cause significant

harm if exploited by an entity inimical

to our nation's interests. Among the criteria for determining such harm to a

weapons system are our adversaries’ ability to kill it, to counter it, to copy it, to

shorten its expected combat life, or to

cause a significant redesign of the system and hence expenditure of more research and development dollars.

If adversaries can do one or more of

these damaging actions, an acquisition

program must take steps to protect the

identified CPI. In the case where programs do not have CPI, program managers must so certify in writing to the

Milestone Decision Authority (MDA). If CPI

does not exist, a PPP is

not required.

Scientists, engineers, and

other program personnel

are schooled in applying

various analytical processes to determine and

achieve goals. Increasingly, so are Security and

Counterintelligence

(S/CI) personnel. This

community of professionals recognizes that no

longer is it acceptable to

impose security requirements based strictly on

book specifications or

regulations. Rather, it is

more effective to examine

security needs in their

specific environments.

Just as program personnel are familiar with Risk

Management techniques,

so too are S/CI professionals. 

The analytical process for

protecting CPI is embodied in the requirement

that program managers or

their representatives prepare a PPP (as stated in

Attachment 2 to DoD's 5000-series interim guidance). The PPP is required by

MS B (if CPI exists) and thus logically

must be prepared during the phases associated with pre-systems acquisition

following the Milestone A decision. S/CI

personnel counsel that developing the

PPP as early as possible during MS A

phases will avoid future security problems that might impact those projectsensitive areas of cost, schedule, and

performance. The goal: our fielding of

an effective system that is protected and

secure from exploitation by the bad guys

during combat. 

PPP uses a Risk Management approach

to identify, recommend, and implement

security countermeasures designed to

reduce risk to an acceptable level at an

acceptable cost. When we use the term

acceptable, we mean the person responsible for the system—the one who

makes the resource decisions—usually

the project manager or, in some cases,

the MDA. A PPP describes what must

be protected and why, against whom,

what vulnerabilities might be exploited,

and the necessary countermeasures for

protecting the identified CPI.

A key step of the PPP process is the identification of what needs protection—the

CPI—and why it needs protection. The

“why” question is answered by establishing the adverse impact if an individual CPI is exploited based on the criteria cited (kill, counter, clone, etc). If

more than one CPI is identified, metrics can be developed that establish the

relative order of CPI importance. Such

metrics give a clearer picture of the security risk when viewed in relationship

to threat and vulnerability.

You Get What You Ask For

With CPI identification, it logically follows that we then must answer the question: “From whom do we need to protect CPI?” The counterintelligence community is charged with identifying the

adversary collection threat to a system.

Based on an Intelligence Production Request (IPR), written by the program

managers or their representatives, a

Multi-Disciplined Counterintelligence

Threat Assessment (MDCITA) is prepared

by Service counterintelligence analysts

in coordination with members of the intelligence community. The notion “you

get what you ask for”comes to mind

here. Specifically, the preparation of the

IPR is not a trivial exercise if you want

an MDCITA that is a significant input

to a well-prepared PPP. A program manager cannot just say, “gimmie threat”and

People in the protection

business are driven by

the mandate to help

field weapons systems

that have not been

compromised, but

nevertheless are open

to exploitation by those

who would kill the

system, counter it, copy

it, shorten its expected

combat life, or cause a

significant redesign of

the system and hence

expenditure of more

research and

development dollars.
62 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

expect a helpful response. Supporting

S/CI personnel can be of significant help

in preparing an effective IPR. 

Among other things, a successful IPR

requires: 

• A clear description of the system and

its operational role.

• Details of the CPI and the rationale

for its importance. 

• The physical location of the CPI and

how it exists (its form or format). 

• CPI distinguishing traits/emissions

and any sight or sensor sensitivities.

• System testing information. 

• CPI relationship to key technologies

such as those listed in the Militarily

Critical Technologies List. 

• Any anticipated foreign involvement. 

A useful MDCITA provides details of adversaries' intent and capability to collect CPI using their human, signals, imagery, and their measurement and

signature intelligence capabilities. Essentially, what is sought during this step

is an estimate of the likelihood adversaries will target our system and how

they might do it. Again, metrics can be

developed to describe that likelihood. 

An understanding of the threat supports

an analysis of how our CPI might be collected by adversaries. This step provides

characteristics of weaknesses or potential weaknesses that might be exploited

by adversaries. What we seek to understand are those poorly protected

pathways that adversaries might use to

gain knowledge of our CPI. An exploitable weakness in the protection of

CPI is the vulnerability. Some examples

of typical vulnerabilities are: 

• Lack of need-to-know enforcement 

• Failing to use secure communications 

• Poor classification management

• Poor computer security/information

assurance 

• Inadequate visitor controls 

• Poor trash management 

• Web sites that disclose too much 

• Weak security training and awareness. 

Metrics can be used to describe the degree of vulnerability. 

Risk Reduction

The threat-vulnerability relationship provides an estimate of the likelihood of

adversaries’ success in accomplishing

their target objectives (i.e., collecting

our CPI). The product of the adverse

impact to our system (exploitation of

CPI), and the threat-vulnerability relationship provides us with an estimate

of the potential for loss (the risk) and

provides the basis for a risk assessment.

A risk assessment is not a mandated element for inclusion as part of a PPP, but

is recommended to rank risks in relative order of severity. A risk assessment

is the basis for establishing priorities for

the effective application of security resources. It also provides a benchmark

for determining the benefits of security

countermeasures—the reduction of risk

(Figure 2). 

Security countermeasures are selected

to reduce the risk of adversaries collecting and thus potentially exploiting

CPI. One definition of the word countermeasure simply is anything that

negates adversaries' ability to collect.

Countermeasures may include personnel security measures, physical security,

procedural measures, and technical security measures. Typical countermeasures include: implementing need-toknow policies; security clearances;

implementing security classification

guidance; encryption of communications; sound operations security practices; and many, many others. 

The principal sections of a PPP include

the elements previously described. However, more elements must be considered. These include attaching a time/

event-phased security classification

guide; a system security engineering

management plan; an anti-tamper plan;

and if foreign involvement or sales are

contemplated, then a technology assessment and control plan is necessary. 

While not mandated, developing an Operations Security (OPSEC) Plan is recommended. OPSEC deals with the generally unclassified evidence of sensitive

activities or operations. In a message

dated Jan. 14, 2003, the Secretary of

Defense reminded all that the DoD has

more than 700 gigabytes of Web-based

data subject to adversary exploitation,

and that by using the OPSEC process

we could eliminate potential vulnerabilities from that source. Given the

FIGURE 1. Program Protection Planning
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 63

amount of easily available information,

determining the information (indicators) that may reveal CPI is critical. 

The Counterintelligence community is

dedicated to providing the support

needed by the research, technology, and

acquisition communities. To that end,

DoD has designated 450 CI positions

(150 per Service) specifically for such

support. A Department of Defense

Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA)

has been established that has elements

and organizations that support research,

technology, and weapons system development. The Joint Counterintelligence

Training Academy (part of CIFA) provides a two-week research and technology protection course with such related subjects as Risk Management and

PPP.

Policy requires that a Counterintelligence Support Plan (CISP) should be

prepared for each Research, Development, Test and Evaluation facility, for

those acquisition programs with CPI,

and may be extended to those contractor or academic institutions with CPI.

The CISP is viewed as a contract between a CI supporting element and the

organization supported. The CI representative, the supported element security manager, and the commander/program manager signs the CISP at the local

level. Headquarters-level approvals are

also necessary. The CISP outlines how

36 support activities, from threat briefings and debriefings to CI support to

defensive information operations, will

be conducted. The CI commitment to

support program managers, commanders, and the entire research and technology community clearly is there.

Tug of War

A subject that has received much attention is when to classify and hence

protect technology. S/CI professionals

would like to see critical technologies

(potential CPI) identified as early as possible during the MS A to MS B phases.

Pre-milestone A would be great, some

opine. However, the tug of war between

enabling basic research and protecting

the technologies that will be (or are) key

to our systems is understood. 

National Security Decision Directive 189

and Executive Order 12958 mandate

that basic scientific research not clearly

related to the national security may not

be classified. Our technical know-how

is advanced with the open development

and acquisition of knowledge inherent

in basic research. But, it appears reasonable to accept the notion that protection is required when the “how”of

applying that knowledge to a weapons

system is determined. In DoD funding

terms, this point lies somewhere between 6.1 (Basic Research) and 6.3 (Applied Research). 

Security—A Profit Center

Security should be viewed as a profit

center or at least as value added. We

profit by fielding systems that support

the warfighter if the systems are available when and where needed. Our adversaries' ability to kill, to counter, to

clone a system, or to shorten its useful

effective combat life does decrease a system's value and the way we profit. Such

adverse impacts, in fact, expend resources in terms of lives and money. S/CI

personnel, in coordination and cooperation with program personnel, are dedicated to making security work by taking appropriate security and counterintelligence actions at the right time.

The crest of the 902d Military Intelligence Group states: Strength Through Vigilance. It does indeed make good common sense.

FIGURE 2. Risk Formula

The Security and

Counterintelligence

(S/CI) community of

professionals

recognizes that no

longer is it acceptable

to impose security

requirements based

strictly on book

specifications or

regulations. Rather, it

is more effective to

examine security

needs in their specific

environments. 

Editor's Note: The author welcomes

questions or comments on this article.

Contact Pattakos at Pattakos@betaan

alytics.com.
64 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Edward C. “Pete” Aldridge to Retire

T

he Department of Defense announced today [March 31,

2003] that Under Secretary of

Defense for Acquisition, Technology

and Logistics (AT&L) Edward C.

“Pete” Aldridge, Jr., will retire from

government effective May 23, 2003.

Principal Deputy Under Secretary

(AT&L) Michael W. Wynne will

serve as Acting Under Secretary of

Defense (AT&L) effective that date. 

The Secretary of Defense remarked:

“Pete Aldridge is a leader who has

brought vision and results to a critically important position. His record

of accomplishment in nearly two

decades of service in the Department of Defense will be

felt for many years to come. I am grateful for his willingness to serve and help us [in] defining priorities that

are transforming this Department. He will be missed

and he will leave with our best wishes and full intention to turn to him frequently for counsel and advice.” 

Reflecting on his career, Aldridge said, “Every job I have

had has been exciting, demanding, satisfying, and worthwhile and has contributed in a variety of ways to our

national security.” He continued, “Now it is time, for

personal reasons, to move on to a more relaxed period

of my career. I will continue to support the national security interests of this country, albeit in a less direct way.” 

Aldridge was sworn in to his current position on May

11, 2001. His 42-year career includes 18 years of service in the Pentagon—first as an operations research analyst, as the Director of Planning and Evaluation under

Rumsfeld during his first tour as Secretary of Defense,

as Under Secretary and then Secretary of the Air Force

under President Reagan, and currently as the Under Secretary of Defense (AT&L). 

The other non-government periods of Aldridge's career

have been spent in the defense industry, working on

weapons and space systems vital to our warfighters. Immediately prior to his current position, he served as the

President of The Aerospace Corp., a non-profit organization dedicated to solving critical national problems

through science and technology. Prior to that, he served

as the President of McDonnell Douglas Electronic Systems. 

Aldridge has received awards from

numerous societies, including Rotary National Award for Space

Achievement in 1994. He is affiliated with numerous associations and

societies, including the American

Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, where he served as the President from 1997-98. 

In the 1980's Aldridge was at one

time an astronaut-in-training in

preparation for his participation as

a payload specialist on the first

planned mission from Vandenberg

Air Force Base, Calif., which was

canceled because of the Challenger

accident. 

Aldridge was born in Houston in 1938 and spent his

youth in Shreveport, La. He earned his bachelor's degree in Aeronautical Engineering from Texas A&M University in 1960 and a master's degree in Aeronautical

Engineering from Georgia Tech in 1962. 

In his resignation letter to the President, Aldridge discussed the theme of “Acquisition Excellence” that he

formulated during his nomination and confirmation,

and the five goals he sought to accomplish during his

tenure at the Department of Defense: 

“First, I wanted to improve the credibility and effectiveness of the acquisition and logistics support process.

Second, I wanted to improve the morale and quality of

the acquisition workforce. Third, I wanted to improve

the health of the defense industrial base. Fourth, I needed

to support the decision process rationalizing our weapon

systems and defense infrastructure with our new defense strategy. And fifth, I wanted to initiate those highleverage technologies that would provide the war-winning capabilities of the future.” 

Aldridge summarized, “All in all I think we have made

significant progress on accomplishing these five goals

and setting in place the acquisition, technology and logistics support activities that you and Secretary Rumsfeld want to have for DoD.” 

Editor's Note: This information is in the public domain

at http://www.defenselink.mil/news. 

DoD photo
These rewards are now

being enjoyed by some 

of our authors. You too

may: 

• Earn continuous learning points. 

• Get promoted or

rewarded. 

• Become part of a focus

group sharing similar

interests. 

• Become a nationally

recognized expert in

your field or specialty. 

• Be asked to speak at a

conference or

symposium.

If you are interested, please contact the

PM Managing Editor (collie.johnson@

dau.mil) or the ARQ Managing Editor

(norene.fagan-blanch@dau.mil) or visit

the guidelines for authors at http://www.

dau.mil/pubs/pm/articles.asp or

http://www.dau.mil/pubs/arq/arqart.asp.

Enjoy the Benefits!

If you are an expert on one or more topics and are willing to referee articles for the ARQ, email norene.fagan-blanch@dau.mil.

Many of DAU's Acquisition Review

Quarterly journal and Program Manager magazine authors have enjoyed

the benefits of publishing articles. Even if

your agency does not require you to publish, consider these career-enhancing possibilities: 

• Share your opinions with your peers. 

• Change the way DoD does business. 

• Help others avoid pitfalls with “lessons

learned” from your project or program. 

• Teach others with a step-by-step tutorial on a process or approach. 

• Investigate a hot acquisition topic

through research or surveys. 

• Interview a prominent person within

the DoD AT&L community.

• Condense your graduate project into

something useful to the acquisition

community.
66 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

DAU Course Application— Get the Latest Facts

WHO MAY ATTEND DAU COURSES?

• Military Service members must apply under their

Military Service, regardless of their assignment.

• Federal civilians apply under their affiliated Military

Service, DoD, or non-DoD Federal Service category.

• Defense industry employees working on DoD contracts apply under their own category.

• Foreign personnel registering under a Foreign Military Sales process apply under a special category.

Email Art McCormick at arthur.mccormick@dau.mil

if you have questions.

HOW CAN I APPLY FOR A COURSE?

Go to www.dau.mil and click on Enroll Here. Apply for

all courses at this site, including distance learning and

hybrid courses.

HOW DOES THE APPLICATION PROCESS WORK? 

Each DoD Military Service, e.g., Army, Navy, etc., is assigned quotas in DAU classes. Each agency, including

non-DoD, has a specific training office that acts on applications. Each agency, including DoD non-military

departments, funds training costs, such as TDY, assists

with TDY orders, places its students in a wait or reservation status, or may disapprove an application. Students should contact their agency’s POC if they have

questions about the status of their application, why

they are on a wait list, or how they should prepare their

TDY orders. The POC list can be found at

www.dau.mil/registrar/apply.asp at the bottom of the

page.

HOW MUCH DO COURSES COST?

At this time, DAU does not charge tuition for its courses,

except for foreign students who register under a Foreign Military Sales process. This category of foreign student, Department of Transportation-related agencies,

industry, and non-DoD federal employees fund their

own students’ travel and per diem costs. For military

and civilian DoD employees, there are no travel or per

diem costs to the student or the student’s agency to attend DAU courses as long as the proper procedures are

followed. The Director, Acquisition Career Management Office (DACM) associated with each DoD agency

will cover these costs, and students need to follow their

processes.

WHAT ARE CLASS MODES?

Web-enabled courses are strictly computer-based training. The course schedule shows classes running from

Oct. 1 to Sept. 30 since enrollment is constant throughout the fiscal year. Once approved for the course, students have 60 days to complete it, 28 days for BCF102, 90 days for CON-101. After applying, students

will receive various messages from “the system,” including log on and password information. Students

won’t be able to log on until they receive a message saying they have a confirmed registration. Students will

receive a message telling them whom to contact in case

of technical difficulties or questions for an instructor.

These messages should be saved for future reference.

Hybrid courses are composed of a Web-enabled phase,

lasting about 45 days, followed a couple weeks later

by a classroom phase lasting 5 days, except for PMT352 which lasts 6 weeks. Students must apply for the

B phase of a hybrid. They will automatically be enrolled

in phase A when they receive a reservation in phase B.

Students won’t be able to start phase A until about 60

days before phase B starts (45 days for phase A plus15

days after the Web-enabled phase ends and the classroom phase begins). This is done because the instructor wants the knowledge students acquired in phase A

to be fresh in mind when they arrive to class. Students

will receive a message telling them whom to contact in

case of technical difficulties or questions for an instructor. These messages should be saved for future reference.

On-site or Residential Courses are traditional classroom

courses. On-site courses are conducted at sites outside

of the DAU campus network. Residential classes are

held at a DAU regional campus.

HOW TO CONTACT THE DAU REGISTRAR?

DAU Registrar

dau.registrar@dau.mil

Phone:

703-805-3003 (DSN 655-3003) or 1-888-284-4906

Industry and Non-DoD Students

industry.registrar@dau.mil

Phone

703-805-4498
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 67
68

Fifteenth Annual International

Acquisition/Procurement Seminar —

Atlantic (IAPS-A)

June 23-27, 2003

Sponsored by the International Defense

Educational Arrangement (IDEA)

to be held at the

Defense Acquisition University/

Defense Systems Management College

(DAU/DSMC)

THEME

Interoperability in the

International Environment

Registration Fee: $125.00

For further information, contact any member

of the DAU-DSMC IDEA Team: (703) 805-5196

or

Visit our Web site:

http://www.dau.mil/international/international.htm

T

he Fifteenth Annual Acquisition/Procurement Seminar—

Atlantic (IAPS-A) will include

industry and government presentations and case-based learning, to allow a robust, positive exchange

of information and feedback. The theme

of the seminar will be “Interoperability

in the International Environment.”

The seminar is sponsored by the International Defense Educational Arrangement (IDEA), which consists of defense

acquisition educational institutions in

the United States, the United Kingdom,

Germany, France, and Spain.

Those eligible to attend are Defense Department/Ministry and defense industry employees from the four sponsoring nations who are actively engaged in

international defense acquisition programs. Other nations may participate

by invitation.

This year’s seminar will be held June 23-

27, 2003, at DAU/DSMC, Fort Belvoir,

Va. The last day of the seminar, June 27,

will be dedicated to the educational aspects of international acquisition.

Participants will be responsible for their

own travel and hotel arrangements and

expenses. There will be a registration

fee of $125.00 (cash or U.S. check only)

for attending the seminar. This will be

collected on the first day of registration.

While the seminar is unclassified, international participants must obtain a

visit clearance through their embassy.

Invitations, confirmations, and administrative instructions will be issued after

May 1, 2003.

To register for the seminar, please go to

the DAU Web site at http://www.dau.

mil/international/international_15.htm.

Contact an IDEA Team member for additional seminar information:

Comm (U.S.):

(703) 805-5196

E-Mail: internationalseminars@dau.mil

PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 69

A T T E N T I O N

MARK YOUR CALENDARS NOW FOR THE

DEFENSE ACQUISITION UNIVERSITY ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

20TH ANNUAL ACQUISITION SYMPOSIUM 

JUNE 17-18, 2003

DEFENSE ACQUISITION

UNIVERSITY

SCOTT HALL, FORT BELVOIR, VA.

DELIVERING WARFIGHTING

CAPABILITIES TODAY AND 

TOMORROW 

THROUGH EVOLUTIONARY

ACQUISITION

LIKE TO GOLF?

If you do, don't forget to check out the 

pre-symposium golf tournament on 

Monday, June 16, 2003, at the

Fort Belvoir Golf Course.

Join senior Defense leaders and acquisition professionals to discuss

some of the most timely and pervasive topics in defense policy.

Gain up to 12 Continuous Learning Points and have your questions

answered by senior acquisition

leaders through a series of keynote

presentations, panels, and workshops designed to explore all aspects of Evolutionary Acquisition

and what it means for you.

For more information on topics,

speakers, and registration, visit the

DAUAA Web Page at www.dauaa.

org. If you don't have Internet access, contact the Association by

telephone at 703-960-6802/1-800-

755-8805, or by fax at 703-960-

6807.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 70

A COMPARISON OF THE DEFENSE ACQUISITION

SYSTEMS OF AUSTRALIA, JAPAN, SOUTH

KOREA, SINGAPORE, AND THE UNITED STATES

Author: Stefan Markowski Editor: Tony Kausal

T

his guidebook describes the

national armament systems

of Australia, Japan, South

Korea, Singapore, and the

United States. Beginning with

an introduction to the political

environment, the acquisition organizations, systems, and

processes involved, Kausal and

Markowski describe the effects

of differences in national culture

and traditions, time zones, currencies, fiscal year schedules,

and language barriers. Tying these differences to each nation’s national armament system, the authors make the case

that international armaments cooperation is a difficult but

rewarding challenge.

Online

http://www.dau.mil/pubs/misc/acq-comp-pac00.asp

Printed Copy

To request a printed copy of A Comparison of the Defense Acquisition Systems of Australia, Japan, South Korea, Singapore,

and the United States, choose one of three options: 1) Fax a

written request to the DAU Publications Distribution Center at (703) 805-3726; 2) mail your request to Defense Acquisition University, Attn: OP-CI, 9820 Belvoir Road, Suite

3, Fort Belvoir VA 22060-5565; or 3) e-mail jeff.turner@

dau.mil.

ACQUISITION GUIDE FOR INTERACTIVE

ELECTRONIC TECHNICAL MANUALS

T

his guidebook is designed as the

primary desk reference for acquisition personnel who must acquire,

develop, deliver, and manage Interactive Electronic Technical Manuals

(IETMs). It incorporates the status of

existing/planned DoD and Serviceunique policy guidance, discusses current and projected technologies related

to the production of IETMs, analyzes

the relationships between IETMs and

training, and addresses delivery vehicles, including the World Wide Web. 

Online

http://http://www.dau.mil/pubs/misc/ietm.asp

Printed Copy

To request a printed copy of Acquisition Guide for Interactive

Electronic Technical Manuals (September 1999), choose one

of three options: 1) Fax a written request to the DAU Publications Distribution Center at (703) 805-3726; 2) mail

your request to Defense Acquisition University, Attn: OPCI, 9820 Belvoir Road, Suite 3, Fort Belvoir VA 22060-

5565; or 3) e-mail jeff.turner@dau.mil.

INCENTIVE STRATEGIES FOR

DEFENSE ACQUISITIONS GUIDE

Printed on behalf of the Office of the Deputy Under Secretary

of Defense for Acquisition Initiatives by the Defense Acquisition

University Press

I

ncentives should exist in every business arrangement because they maximize value for all parties. DoD

needs to adopt strategies that attract,

motivate, and reward contractors to

encourage successful performance.

Using commercial practices will enhance DoD's ability to attract nontraditional contractors. This guide amplifies existing policy regarding use of

incentives in defense acquisitions. It

explores cost-based and noncost-based

incentive strategies. It clearly defines

use of performance objectives or product functionality vs.

detailed requirements to seek best value acquisitions. It answers these questions:

• Why are we concerned with contractual incentives?

• What elements contribute to an effective incentive strategy?

• How can we build and maintain an effective environment

for a successful business relationship? 

• How can we build the acquisition business case?

• How can we build an incentive strategy that maximizes

value? 

Online

http://www.dau.mil/pubs/misc/incentive.asp

Printed Copy

To request a printed copy of Incentive Strategies for Defense

Acquisitions (April 2001), choose one of three options: 1)

Fax a written request to the DAU Publications Distribution

Center at (703) 805-3726; 2) mail your request to Defense

Acquisition University, Attn: OP-CI, 9820 Belvoir Road,

Suite 3, Fort Belvoir VA 22060-5565; or 3) e-mail

jeff.turner@dau.mil.

DAU Guidebooks Available

At No Cost to Government Employees
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 71

PERFORMANCE-BASED

SERVICE ACQUISITION IN THE

DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

Printed on behalf of the Office of the

Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for

Acquisition Reform by the Defense Acquisition University Press, March 2001

T

he Department of Defense has the

responsibility to acquire services

with the most efficient practices

and processes. Performance-Based Service Acquisition (PBSA) strategies strive

to adopt best commercial practices. They provide the means

to reach world-class commercial suppliers, gain greater access to technological innovations, maximize competition,

and obtain the best value to achieve greater savings and efficiencies.

This handbook highlights key elements of PBSA, investigates the use of market research, introduces the performance-based work statement, and establishes measurable

performance standards. It covers incentives and remedies,

using assessment and quality control plans, and it enumerates evaluation factors of source selection. Finally it discusses contract administration, particularly in regard to

post-award orientation and documentation of contractor

performance. 

Online

http://www.dau.mil/pubs/misc/pbsa.asp

Printed Copy

To request a printed copy of Performance-Based Service Acquisition in the Department of Defense, choose one of three

options: 1) Fax a written request to the DAU Publications

Distribution Center at (703) 805-3726; 2) mail your request to Defense Acquisition University, Attn: OP-CI, 9820

Belvoir Road, Suite 3, Fort Belvoir VA 22060-5565; or 3)

e-mail jeff.turner@dau.mil.

TEST AND EVALUATION

MANAGEMENT GUIDE

4th Ed., November 2001

T

he objective of a well-managed

T&E program is to provide timely

and accurate information. This

guide has been developed to assist the

acquisition community in obtaining a

better understanding of whom the decision makers are and determining

how and when to plan test and evaluation events. The guide is written for

current and potential acquisition management personnel

who are familiar with basic terms and definitions employed

in program offices. 

Online

http://http://www.dau.mil/pubs/gdbks/test_evalu_guide.asp

Printed Copy

To request a printed copy of the Test and Evaluation Management Guide, choose one of three options: 1) Fax a written request to the DAU Publications Distribution Center at

(703) 805-3726; 2) mail your request to Defense Acquisition University, Attn: OP-CI, 9820 Belvoir Road, Suite 3,

Fort Belvoir VA 22060-5565; or 3) e-mail jeff.turner

@dau.mil.

DAU Guidebooks Available

At No Cost to Government Employees

Summer PEO Forum

23-24 July 2003

J.T. Daugherty Conference Center, Lexington Park, MD

Sponsored by the Navy PEO for Strike Weapons and Unmanned Aviation

Theme: Precision Engagement Operations in the Context of 

Network-Centric Warfare

Plans include an optional tour of the Patuxent River Naval Air Facility followed by sessions at the Conference Center to include lunch, reception

and dinner. Day 2 will be CLASSIFIED and held at the Patuxent River Naval

Air Station Base Theater.

Visit www.precisionstrike.org for event details.
Pentagon Officials Tell Congress

Missile Defense System “Moving

Forward”

ARMY SGT. 1ST CL ASS DOUG SAMPLE 

WASHINGTON, March 21,

2003—Faced with the

threat by North Korea of a

nuclear warhead reaching the

United States, senior Pentagon officials told the House Armed Services Committee March 20 they

are moving forward with a billiondollar missile defense system. 

“We have achieved a number of

successes in the missile defense test

program, which have added momentum to the development effort

and bolstered our confidence that

we will be able to meet the challenges that lie ahead,” Edward C.

“Pete” Aldridge Jr., Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition,

Technology and Logistics, told the

committee.

Aldridge, joined on Capitol Hill by

Thomas Christie, DoD Director for

Operational Test and Evaluation,

and J.D. Crouch II, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International

Security Policy, testified on the

progress of a missile defense testing facility in Alaska

and on U.S. missile defense policy. 

Last year, President Bush ordered the Pentagon to

field a “hit to kill” missile defense capability by the

year 2004. The United States currently has no defense against long-range missiles and limited defense

against shorter-range missiles. 

Aldridge said the Pentagon's confidence in the program lies in tests done by the Missile Defense Agency

(MDA), which has oversight of the program. Those

tests, although criticized as being highly controlled,

show promising results despite several misses. 

In September, an Aegis sea-based theater defense

radar aboard the cruiser USS Lake Erie was able to

track all stages of a Minuteman III ICBM launched

from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. In October,

the Navy destroyer USS John Paul Jones used its Aegis

radar system in a test to track long-range target ballistic missile.

RELEASED March 21, 2003

A PAC-3 missile circa 1999 at White Sands, N.M. The PAC-3 missile greatly

increases the effectiveness of the Patriot Air Defense System in negating tactical ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and air-breathing threats. 

Photo courtesy Lockheed Martin
Overall, MDA has recorded four successful tests out

of five for the long-range ground-based intercepts,

and was three-for-three for the short- to mediumrange sea-based intercepts. The agency was five out

of seven for short-range ground- based intercepts,

Crouch said. 

“When tests have failed, we understand what went

wrong and have taken measures to correct the problem,” Crouch said. “Some test failures are to be expected with advanced technology development programs.” 

But the Pentagon cannot afford to fail in this program. North Korea has had an active ballistic missile program for years, Crouch testified. 

“North Korea caught us by surprise when it launched

its three-stage Taepo-Dong I space-launch vehicle/ballistic missile in August 1998,” he said. Now,

he said, the Taepo Dong II long-range missile is capable of delivering a nuclear weapon-sized payload

to parts of the United States and “could be flighttested at any time,” he noted. 

Crouch said that, according to the National Air Intelligence Center, the Taepo Dong II missile might

be exported to other countries in the future. Iran

and other countries also are working on space-launch

vehicles and intercontinental-range ballistic missiles

that could be ready for testing in the next few years,

he said. 

“We knew North Korea was developing longer-range

missiles, but we were surprised at the presence of a

third stage on the missile,” Crouch explained. “We

have been surprised many times in the past by foreign ballistic missile developments. We likely will

be surprised again in the future,” he added. 

The problem for the Pentagon is that some in Congress believe the military is moving forward too fast

on a costly, unproven missile defense system. 

Christie said that he “understands and shares concerns raised by members of Congress” regarding the

precedent of field operational systems without adequate testing. But he told the committee the MDA

must move forward with completion of the test bed

to further missile defense development. 

“If we don't develop an operational concept and an

attack comes, then we will have failed in a most serious way,” he told the committee. 

The MDA says it will cost $7.7 billion and $8.7 billion over the next two fiscal years and about $8 billion a year thereafter to run the program. The Pentagon began building a missile defense test site in

Alaska last summer. It is scheduled for completion

next year. 

The Pentagon missile defense plan calls for 20

ground-based interceptors to protect against an intercontinental-range ballistic missile threat. Those

missiles will be stored in silos at Fort Greeley, Alaska,

and at Vandenberg. 

Crouch said the United States has asked the United

Kingdom and Denmark for permission to upgrade

early warning radars in their countries to track ballistic missile threats from the Middle East. 

“The U.K. has granted permission, and we look forward to hearing from Denmark later this year,” he

said. 

To address the medium-range threat, Crouch said

three Navy Aegis-class ships will be equipped with

up to 20 SM-3 Standard missiles. 

“This will provide a highly mobile missile defense

capability to help protect U.S. forces and allies and

provide some limited protection for the U.S. homeland against shorter-range missiles launched from

ships off our coasts,” Crouch said. 

For short-range threats, Crouch said that Army would

continue to field additional air-transportable and

mobile Patriot Advanced Capability-3 missile units

with up to 346 PAC-3 missiles and 42 PAC-3 radars.

The PAC-3 missile is the first upgrade of the Patriot

system to feature a “hit to kill” missile that can help

defeat chemical and biological threats. 

Editor's Note: This information is in the public domain at http://www.defenselink.mil/news. 
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Gasiorek-Nelson is a full-time editor for PM Magazine, DAU Press, Fort Belvoir, Va.

ACQUISITION CREDENTIALS

DAU Alumni Association Celebrates

Anniversary

Twenty Years of Value and Service to the

Acquisition Community

SYLWIA GASIOREK-NELSON

74

F

or 20 years, the DAU Alumni Association (DAUAA)—a worldclass association of acquisition

professionals—has been actively

working to provide value and service for its members. This year DAUAA

will be celebrating its 20th anniversary

during the Annual Symposium, to be

held June 17-19 at DAU Headquarters,

Capital and Northeast Regional campus,

Fort Belvoir, Va. This year's theme—Delivering Warfighting Capabilities Today

and Tomorrow through Evolutionary

Acquisition—will serve as a review of

the acquisition initiatives of today and

tomorrow now foremost in the minds

of the acquisition community. 

Describing the value of the symposium,

Frank Varacalli, DAUAA President said,

“We'll use the symposium to bring life

to the policies and emerging practices

of Evolutionary Acquisition by exposing the attendees to DoD and Congressional leadership and to successful

practitioners. As we have in the past,

we'll present a series of workshops to

complement the distinguished speakers.”

2003 Symposium

This year's symposium will bring together a large diversified group of professionals from government and the defense industry, representing many career

fields: program management, contracting, logistics, engineering, manufacturing, software, and test and evaluation.

Also participating will be financial professionals, information technologists,

and senior defense and government executives as well as many distinguished

speakers and panelists.

These include Heather Wilson, Congressional Representative, N.M.; Michael

Wynne, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics; Deidre A. Lee, Director, Defense Procurement and

Acquisition Policy; Army Gen. Paul

Kern, Commanding General, Army Materiel Command; Claude Bolton Jr., Assistant Secretary of the Army for Acquisition, Logistics and Technology;

John Young, Assistant Secretary of the

Navy, Research, Development and Acquisition; Dr. Marvin Sambur, Assistant

Secretary of the Air Force for Acquisition; Dr. Ronald M. Sega, Director, Defense Research and Engineering; Louis

A. Kratz, Assistant Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Logistics Plans and

Programs; Frank Anderson, DAU President; Army Col. Ronald Flom, DAU

Commandant; and many others.

The two-day event will provide a wide

variety of workshops, seminars, and

panels on several relevant topics:

Photos by Richard Mattox

Senior acquisition executives attending the 2002 DAUAA Acquisition Symposium. From left:

Michael Wynne, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition, Technology and

Logistics); Frank Anderson Jr., DAU President; and John Phillips, Vice President for After

Market Growth, Honeywell.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 75

• Contracting for Evolutionary Acquisition

• Congressional View on Evolutionary

Acquisition

• Performance Based Logistics

• Research and Development and Evolutionary Acquisition

• Interoperability

for the Future

Combat System

• DoD Initiatives

for Software Productivity

• The Defensewide Information

Assurance Initiative.

According to

DAU Professor

Wayne Glass,

who is the current

DAUAA Vice

President for Operations, the symposium is a great

opportunity to

network, to share

and promote

ideas, and to stay current with acquisition policies. “It's all about evolutionary acquisition and spiral development,” Glass said. “These concepts

are crucial to preserve the ability of systems to adapt to the changing needs of

today's acquisition environment. It's all

about capability—how to improve and

how to sustain.”

Other highlights of the annual event will

include a special presentation to DAUAA

Corporate Sponsors; the Acker Award

presentation; a 20th Anniversary cakecutting ceremony; and a Golf Tournament on June 16, which is a voluntary

kick-off event, traditionally held in the

afternoon on the day before the symposium.

About the DAUAA

Today, with the membership now over

1,250, the association is headed by Varacalli, an ardent supporter and friend of

the Defense Acquisition University.

Working closely with Glass, Varacalli

runs the association with advice and

counsel from elected officers, a board of

Suzanne D. Patrick, Deputy Under Secretary of Defense

(Industrial Policy) at the 2002 DAUAA Acquisition Symposium.

The DAUAA Annual

Symposium is a great

opportunity to

network, to share

and promote ideas,

and to stay current

with acquisition

policies. 

Mark Salesky (right), 2001 DAUAA President, presents the David Acker Award for

Skill in Communication to Wynne at the 2002 DAUAA Acquisition Symposium. 
76 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

directors, board of advisers, Service representatives, and a DAU Liaison.

DAUAA Goals

The main goal of the association is to

focus on providing value and service to

its members, on establishing and maintaining interpersonal networks, and on

growing as the primary association of

Defense Acquisition Professionals. “The

goals for the future depend largely on

what our membership tells us is important to them,” said Varacalli. “I hope

to maintain a continuing dialogue

through improvements in our Web site

and by working with the DAU regional

centers and local chapters.” 

Of course, within those broad goals, the

association has two primary objectives:

• To provide a means for continuing

professional growth within the defense acquisition community.

• To promote DAU's reputation as a

world-class acquisition learning center.

Corporate Sponsors

One of the greatest successes to date has

been getting the Corporate Sponsor program off the ground. This initiative provides the broadest possible outreach in

strengthening the partnership between

the defense acquisition workforce and

the defense industry.

“By becoming a sponsor,” Varacalli explained, “companies can help us advance reciprocal learning opportunities,

and can participate in developing the

government and industry acquisition

workforce to meet the accelerating needs

of Evolutionary Acquisition.” To date,

the association has four Corporate Sponsors: Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Northrop Grumman. Several

more companies have indicated intent

to become Corporate Sponsors.

Why Join?

DAUAA ANNUAL SYMPOSIUM

As one of the most significant events organized by DAUAA, and held annually

at the DAU Headquarters, Fort Belvoir,

Va., the symposium provides opportunities for DAUAA members to learn and

grow professionally. It also emphasizes

the importance of networking, sharing

knowledge, and learning from other's

experiences in meeting the needs of the

Continuous Learning workforce.

MONTHLY BROWN-BAG SEMINAR

The Capital Area Chapter (CAC) also

sponsors monthly brown-bag seminars

with leaders in defense acquisition. The

association is also exploring the possibility of sponsoring smaller symposia in

conjunction with the DAU regional centers.

“We are working with the DAU regional

centers and campuses,” said Varacalli,

“to organize and support local chapters

to enhance the Distributed Learning experience.” This could also occur, he

added, “at our new local chapters as they

are established, as a means of strengthening our acquisition community.” 

THE ASSOCIATION HOME PAGE

The official DAUAA Web site at http://

www.dauaa.org provides a source of information for its members and an opportunity to network with other members in the defense acquisition

community. “Today, a wealth of information is available from the Internet

through extremely powerful search engines,” Varacalli noted. “Our mission

is to try and focus some of that information for our members and to promote an exchange of ideas. We're far

from that goal, and we're seeking input

on how we might best succeed.” 

One of the new items on the DAUAA

site is the Employment Opportunities

link, which posts selected job opportunities available only to association

members. The association is also exploring the possibility of a resume or

job search feature. 

ACCESS TO DAU'S ACKER LIBRARY

The DAU Acker Library supports the

curriculum of the DAU and its research

in defense acquisition. The library

maintains an extensive collection of

books, newspapers, and journals in the

field of management, with special emphasis on defense systems acquisition

management. Full borrowing privileges

DAU Alumni

Association—

In The Beginning

On Oct. 20, 1983, graduates of

many Defense Systems Management College courses met at

the College to establish a DSMC

Alumni Association. Army Brig. Gen.

Benjamin J. Pellegrini, then DSMC

Commandant, enthusiastically endorsed the idea and expressed the

support of DSMC management. The

60 graduates at the initial meeting

received endorsements from many

graduates unable to attend.

A draft of the constitution was presented by the organizers for review

and comment by attendees. Based on

comments received, the constitution

was completed and approved by the

first Board of Directors of the DSMC

Alumni Association on Dec. 9, 1983.

Professor Joanne L. Barreca, a graduate of PMC 83-1 and member of the

DSMC Policy and Organization Department faculty, was named the first

president. Retired Air Force Lt. Col.

Frederick W. Wynn, a graduate of

PMC 71-1 (the first class), and later

a DSMC faculty member, was the first

vice president.

The Alumni Association planned to

conduct a symposium annually, normally in June, to discuss changes to

the acquisition process and its management as well as DSMC matters. A

yearly business meeting of the association would be held in conjunction

with the symposium.

By the end of 1985, the membership

was approaching 1,000. Today it

numbers over 1,250 members.

In 2001, the DSMC Alumni Association (DSMCAA) officially changed

its name to the Defense Acquisition

University Alumni Association

(DAUAA).
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 77

are restricted to current faculty, staff,

and students; however, alumni may

register for weekend borrowing—a

privilege extended to few others. 

The library is also available online at

http://library.dau.mil and is an open

Web site, which offers a complete selection in the catalog. Additionally, the

site offers helpful library-type services

such as help desk, links to the most

common databases, learning resource

center, and many other library links.

NEWSLETTER

This monthly online publication keeps

the association membership informed

of current happenings in the acquisition community, current events at the

Defense Acquisition University and its

Regions, and other activities of interest to members of the organization. Emphasizing the importance of the

newsletter, Glass said, “We've started

an electronic news update and our

focus there is to give our members a

‘heads-up’ on important events and activities within the acquisition community, as well as provide news from DAU

Headquarters and regional campuses.”

Along these lines, the association is also

facilitating the subscription process for

Program Manager and Acquisition Review Quarterly. The DAUAA Web site

provides a link to the DAU Web site,

where postage-free subscription forms

are available at http://www.dau.

mil/forms/subscribe_form.pdf.

DAUAA AWARDS PROGRAM

The awards program established by the

association is linked to its objectives

and recognizes success and initiative

in promoting and advancing the acquisition profession. The awards program recognizes three constituencies:

the members of the association, the directors who manage its daily affairs,

and the broader acquisition community from which the association draws

support and to whom it provides support. 

The David Acker Award is the most

prestigious of the association awards,

and is presented annually to the individual who, in the opinion of the 16

elected directors, has most influenced

the course of acquisition innovation and

excellence by his or her skill in communication.

The award consists of a bronze full-face

relief of David Acker, encircled by a

ring bearing the name of the award and

the association's name. Recent recipients include: Michael W. Wynne, Principal Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and

Logistics (2002); Dr. George R.

Schneiter, Director, Strategic and Tactical Systems, Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics (2001); and

Chuck Cochrane, Department Chair,

Acquisition Policy Department, DSMC

(2000). 

DAUAA MEMBERSHIP

The Regular membership category is

open to graduates of all DAU courses

(and respective faculties of DAU). The

Associate membership category is for

those in government and industry who

are currently serving, or who have previously served, in defense acquisition

program management positions, but

who do not qualify for Regular membership. More information on becoming a member is available at http//www.

dauaa.org.

We Invite You to Join

From the Alumni Association's rich beginnings, it has worked hard to provide

services that reflect the needs and concerns of acquisition professionals. As

described in this article, the DAUAA Annual Symposium is just one of the resources and benefits made available to

association members.

You are invited to become a part of this

fine organization, and DAUAA is looking forward to seeing all of you at the

symposium. In an appeal to current and

potential members, Varacalli said, “We

need ideas and the energy that new

members bring. We're always searching

for ways to make the symposia relevant

and for committee volunteers to make

it happen.” 

Frank Varacalli (second from right), current DAUAA President, accepts a $2,500 sponsorship check on behalf of DAUAA from Raytheon, DAUAA’s first corporate sponsor. The presentation was made during a Defense Industry Training Roundtable, held at DAU Headquarters, Fort Belvoir, Va., on Nov. 20, 2002. Presenting the check is Raytheon representative

Curt Newell (second from left). Also participating in the presentation are Frank Swofford

(left), DAU Industry Chair; and DAU Professor Bill Bahnmaier (right), who serves as the current Vice President for Membership, DAUAA. 
78 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

The acquisition ladder is a tough climb

without the right education...DAU.

When was the last time you or one of your associates attended one of the 85 different acquisitioncourses offered by the Defense Acquisition University at one of its 12 locations around the country?

Did you know industry personnel may also attend?

Are you current on the DoD 5000-series cancellations and

revisions? Do you know the latest acronyms and terms?

When was the last time you or your associates took an introductory, intermediate, or advanced course in acquisition,

technology and logistics?

Did you know that DAU now offers 18 certification courses

that are taught entirely or in part using distance learning? Or

check out one of the 41 self-paced learning modules now on

our Continuous Learning Center Web site (http://clc.dau.mil/).

We also offer fee-for-service consulting and research programs. And take advantage of our competitively priced conference facilities.

Maybe it's time to talk to your training officer about some

additional training opportunities. Or call the DAU Registrar at

1-888-284-4906 to see how we can structure an educational

program just for you.

Visit the DAU Web site for the DAU 2003 Catalog and other

publications at http://www.dau.mil. To apply

for all DAU classes in the catalog, including Distance Learning classes, go

to http://www.dau.mil and visit the

DAU Course Schedule. To apply for

a course, click on the “Enroll Here”

link found in the DAU Home Page

banner.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 79

Aldridge Appoints Domain Owners

MEMORANDUM FOR UNDER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE (COMPTROLLER)

SUBJECT: Appointment of Domain Owners to Support Implementation of

Financial Management Enterprise Architecture (FMEA)

In support of the FMEA governance structure, I hereby appoint the following executives

as Domain Owners:

• Logistics — Honorable Diane K. Morales, DUSD(L&MR)

• Installations and Environment — Mr. Raymond F. DuBois, DUSD(I&E)

• Acquisition/Procurement — Ms. Deidre A. Lee, DIR(DPAP)

The AT&L Domain Owners will be responsible for implementing the Financial

Management Enterprise Architecture within their respective domains. I look forward to

hearing their progress on this important Departmental effort.

E.C. Aldridge, Jr.

THE UNDER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE

3010 DEFENSE PENTAGON

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20301-3010

ACQUISITION, 

TECHNOLOGY AND

LOGISTICS

Editor’s Note: This information is in

the public domain at the Director,

Defense Procurement and Acquisition

Policy Web site:

http://www.acq.osd.mil/dpap/.
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Gasiorek-Nelson is a full-time contract editor for PM Magazine, DAU Press, Fort Belvoir, Va.

SMALL BUSINESS UTILIZATION

Fresh Ideas, Shared Experiences,

New Partnerships

Honoring 12 Exceptional Mentor-Protégé Teams

SYLWIA GASIOREK-NELSON

80

T

eams of Department of Defense

prime contractors and their protégés from Small, Disadvantaged

Businesses (SDB) were honored

with the Nunn-Perry Award during the annual DoD Mentor-Protégé

Conference, held March 17-19 in Crystal City, Va.

Presenting the awards this year were

Frank Ramos, Director, Office of Small

and Disadvantaged Business Utilization;

H. C. “Barney” Barnum Jr., Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Reserve

Affairs); George T. Schultz, DoD Mentor-Protégé Program Manager; and retired Korean War Veteran, Army Cpl.

Rodolfo “Rudy” P. Hernandez.

Emphasizing the importance of DoD's

Mentor-Protégé Program, Schultz said,

“We are here to celebrate the success of

a proven program, recognize mentors

and protégés, and witness the growth

of significant partnerships—all made

possible by the DoD Mentor-Protégé

Program. The success of the program

continues to accrue through the energies of good people building strong mentors and protégés under the auspices of

the Department of Defense. I take this

opportunity to salute all of you.”

In his keynote speech, Barnum recognized the significance of teamwork.

“Those in corporate America are helping so the job will be done. And only

together as teams—not as superstars,

but as teams—we're all being successful,” he said.

Keynote speaker, H.C. “Barney” Barnum Jr., Deputy Assistant

Secretary of the Navy (Reserve Affairs). 

Frank Ramos, Director, Office of

Small & Disadvantaged Business Utilization, delivers closing remarks.

Photos by Richard Mattox
of Defense William Perry in recognition

of his implementation of the program.

This award recognizes mentor-protégé

teams that have excelled in technical developments, cost efficiencies, and increased business opportunities for SDBs.

The DoD's Mentor-Protégé Program,

which began in 1991, is a national initiative to encourage large defense contractors to develop the technical capabilities of SDBs. It also qualifies

organizations employing the severely

disabled to compete more effectively for

defense-related work.

Editor's Note: To learn more about the

Mentor-Protégé program, visit the DoD

Mentor-Protégé Program Web site at

http://www.acq.osd.mil/sadbu/programs/

index.htm.

PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 81

Comparing corporate leadership to the

Marine Corps, Barnum said that it's like

taking care of the troops, guiding the

men and women to realize mission accomplishment, bringing out the best in

them, assisting them in setting their

goals—goals important for the whole

team.

The results of leadership and mentoring, he added, are equal. “That's what

this Mentor-Protégé program is all

about—helping people to prepare for

the many responsibilities they'll assume

as they progress in their careers.” 

Commending this year's award winners,

Barnum said, “I congratulate all those

who are being recognized this morning

for their drive, determination, and enthusiasm, which has resulted in realizing mission accomplishment. The partnership between the mentors and

protégés,” he emphasized, “has truly

produced powerful, beneficial, and rewarding results.”

Concluding the ceremony Ramos said,

“I'm pleased to report that our MentorProtégé program has become the flagship small business program within the

Federal Government and that our award

winners today have become the flagship

award winners of the year.” 

Expressing gratitude to all who supported the program, Ramos emphasized

that the challenge today is to develop

stronger and more versatile protégés in

order to meet the needs of the Department of Defense. “Thank you for your

program support, which we will need

on a continuing basis. Congratulations

to all of the winning teams,” he said.

And the Award Goes to ...

The recipients of the Nunn-Perry Award

were selected based on each mentorprotégé team's success in achieving costefficiencies, enhancing each protégé's

technical capabilities, and increasing

prime contracting and subcontracting

awards to SDBs. This year's winners:

• Government Solutions, Inc.

Terradigm, Inc.

• Earth Tech, Inc.—Bhate Environmental Associates, Inc.

• Electronic Data Systems—

Force 3, Inc.

• HydroGeoLogic, Inc.—MicroPact Engineering, Inc.

• Manufacturing Technology,

Inc.—General Precision Manufacturing Inc.

• Q.E.D. System, Inc.—LPI

Technical Services

• Raytheon Missile Systems—

The ENSER Corporation

• Science Applications International Corporation—Command Technologies, Inc.

• Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure—Advent Environmental, Inc.

•Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure, Inc.—EM Federal

Corporation

•Hamilton Sundstrand Corporation—Aimco Precision, Inc.

• Northrop Grumman Space Technology—Upper Mohawk, Inc.

Nunn-Perry Award 

The Nunn-Perry Award is named in

honor of both former Senator Sam

Nunn, who sponsored legislation to create the Defense Department's MentorProtégé Program, and former Secretary

George Schultz, DoD Mentor-Protégé Program

Manager, delivers welcoming remarks.

The Nunn-Perry

Award is named

in honor of both

former Senator

Sam Nunn, who

sponsored the

Mentor-Protégé

Program

legislation, and

former Secretary

of Defense

William Perry in

recognition of his

implementation

of the program.
82 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

Mentor: Government Solutions, Inc., Vienna, Va. Protégé: Terradigm,

Inc., Albuquerque, N.M.

Mentor: HydroGeoLogic, Inc., Herndon, Va. Protégé: MicroPact

Engineering, Inc., Herndon, Va.

Mentor: Electronic Data Systems, Herndon, Va. Protégé: Force 3, Inc.,

Crafton, Md.

Mentor: Earth Tech, Inc., Long Beach, Calif. Protégé: Bhate

Environmental Associates, Inc., Birmingham, Ala.

Mentor: Manufacturing Technology, Inc., Fort Walton Beach, Fla. Protégé: General Precision Manufacturing, Inc., Pensacola, Fla. 

Mentor: Q.E.D. System, Inc., Virginia Beach, Va. Protégé: LPI Technical

Services, Chesapeake, Va.

Manufacturing Technology, Inc.—General Precision

Manufacturing Inc. Q.E.D. System, Inc.—LPI Technical Services

Electronic Data Systems—Force 3, Inc. HydroGeoLogic, Inc.—MicroPact Engineering, Inc.

Government Solutions, Inc.—Terradigm, Inc. Earth Tech, Inc.—Bhate Environmental Associates, Inc.

2003 NUNN-P
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 83

Mentor: Raytheon Missile Systems, Tucson, Ariz. Protégé: The ENSER

Corporation, Pinellas Park, Fla.

Mentor: Science Applications International Corporation, McLean, Va.

Protégé: Command Technologies, Inc., Warrenton, Va.

Mentor: Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure, Inc., Baton Rouge, La.

Protégé: Advent Environmental, Inc., Mt. Pleasant, S.C.

Mentor: Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure, Inc., Baton Rouge, La.

Protégé: EM Federal Corporation, Centreville, Va.

Mentor: Hamilton Sundstrand Corporation, Rockford, Ill. Protégé:

Aimco Precision, Inc., Phoenix, Ariz.

Mentor: Northrop Grumman Space Technology, Redondo Beach, Calif.

Protégé: Upper Mohawk, Inc., Beavercreek, Ohio.

Raytheon Missile Systems—The ENSER Corporation

Science Applications International Corporation—

Command Technologies, Inc.

Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure—

Advent Environmental, Inc.

Shaw Environmental & Infrastructure, Inc.—

EM Federal Corporation

Hamilton Sundstrand Corporation—Aimco Precision, Inc. Northrop Grumman Space Technology—Upper Mohawk, Inc.

ERRY AWARDS
84 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003

DoD Announces Plans to Stimulate

Undergraduate Research

WASHINGTON (March 14, 2003)—The Department of Defense (DoD) today announced plans to

award 19 grants, totaling $4.7 million, that will

support approximately 650 undergraduate students, in

its first annual Awards to Stimulate and Support Undergraduate Research Experiences (ASSURE) program. The

ASSURE program will be executed collaboratively with

the National Science Foundation (NSF) through its Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) Sites Program. All awards are subject to the successful completion

of negotiations between DoD, NSF, and the grantee institutions. 

Undergraduate programs are critical to DoD’s overall education investment strategy. The ASSURE program supports undergraduate research in DoD-relevant disciplines

and is designed to increase the number of high-quality

undergraduate science and engineering majors. ASSURE

serves as a complementary program to the DoD National

Defense Science and Engineering Graduate (NDSEG) Fellowship Program for graduate students in science and engineering. 

ASSURE aims to provide valuable research opportunities

for undergraduates, typically through an eight- to10-week

summer research program, located at the grantee’s institution. The program often draws students from institutions where access to research opportunities is limited.

The program also emphasizes the recruitment of women

and under-represented minorities. 

Today’s announcement is the result of a merit competition conducted by NSF in partnership with DoD. ASSURE

grants will be used mainly for three-year sites, although

a few sites will have a five-year duration. 

Editor’s Note: This DoD News Release is in the public domain at http://www.defenselink.mil/news.

UNIVERSITIES SELECTED FOR RESEARCH FUNDING

WASHINGTON (March 12, 2003)—The Department of Defense (DoD) today announced plans to award 17 grants to Universities selected for research funding. The grants

total approximately $8.5 million in fiscal year 2003

and up to $17 million per year starting in fiscal

year 2004. Sixteen academic institutions will receive the grants to conduct multidisciplinary research in 12 topic areas of basic science and engineering. These grants will be made under the DoD

Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative

(MURI) program. All awards are subject to the successful completion of negotiations between DoD

research offices and the academic institutions. 

MURI is a program designed to address large multidisciplinary topic areas representing exceptional

opportunities for future DoD applications and technology options. The awards will provide long-term

support for research, graduate students, and laboratory instrumentation development that supports

specific science and engineering research themes

vital to national defense. 

The average award will be $1 million per year over

a three-year period. Two additional years of funding will be possible as options to bring the total

award to five years. Out-year funding is subject to

satisfactory progress in the research and the availability of funding appropriations. 

Today’s announcement is the result of a rigorous

merit competition over many months under the

DoD MURI program. In response to the MURI

broad agency announcement solicitation, many letters of intent to submit proposals were received

leading to 83 full proposals requesting $497 million for multidisciplinary research. After a thorough evaluation by DoD technical expert teams,

17 of these proposals were found to be suitable for

funding.

Editor’s Note: The list of projects selected for fiscal year 2003 funding may be found on the Web

at http://www.defenselink.mil/news . 
PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 85

A T T E N T I O N

I

n the past, defense industry organizations and personnel have needed, but not always received, the

same acquisition training and education opportunities that are currently offered by the Defense Acquisition University (DAU) to government employees. The DAU Alumni Association (DAUAA) has

recently begun a Corporate Sponsorship program to

help DAU fill that gap. This program envisions a more

balanced approach to education and training that will

be mutually beneficial to both industry and the government.

Raytheon, Lockheed-Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, and Rockwell-Collins have already become DAUAA

Corporate Sponsors. We hope to add you as a sponsor

in 2003. 

Corporate Sponsorship of the DAUAA is open to any

defense industry firm that practices business according

to federal and state laws that prohibit discriminatory

practices. Sponsors cannot be companies with whom

U.S. law prohibits conducting DoD business. Foreign

governments or their agents cannot participate in DAUAA

sponsorship.

For a nominal consideration/fee, your company receives

these benefits:

• Up to 20 annual memberships are allocated for each

Corporate Sponsor. Employees chosen by the sponsor will receive an annual DAUAA Associate Membership at no extra cost.

• Preferential formal and social opportunities at DAUAA’s

Annual Acquisition Symposium at the Capital and

Northeast Region campus, Fort Belvoir, Va. 

• Employees of a sponsor may attend the symposium

at the discounted member rates. 

• Sponsors will receive a reserved exhibit space at no

cost. 

• Program participation opportunities for both individual speakers and panel participation is offered preferentially to sponsors, although the DAUAA reserves

the right to select program speakers based on the overall structure of the symposium. 

• Sponsoring companies may have their name and logo

in the annual symposium program and/or handouts. 

• Sponsor executives will be offered seating in proximity to invited DoD officials at plenary sessions and

meals.

• Your company is featured on the DAUAA Web site

(http://www.dauaa.org), with a one-page description

of your company, its products and services. (Note:

DAUAA is prohibited by IRS rules from advertising

or endorsing specific products or services, so it reserve the right to withhold all or part of the description not compliant with IRS rules.)

Sponsorship status becomes effective the date of receipt

of your application, along with the nominal consideration/fee. DAUAA is a non-profit organization, and sponsorship contributions are tax deductible. DAUAA reserves the right to change or expand benefits at any time

when approved by the governing DAUAA Board of Directors.

Although this sponsorship program is still in its early

stages, companies are already inputting ideas and suggestions into planning for the June 2003 DAUAA Symposium. 

MARK YOUR CALENDARS NOW FOR THE

DEFENSE ACQUISITION UNIVERSITY ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

20TH ANNUAL ACQUISITION SYMPOSIUM

JUNE 17-18, 2003, SCOTT HALL, FORT BELVOIR, VA.

BECOME A DEFENSE ACQUISITION UNIVERSITY

ALUMNI ASSOCIATION

CORPORATE SPONSOR 
86 PM : MARCH-APRIL 2003 Precision Strike Technology Symposium 2003 • Precision Strike Technology Symposium 2003

PSTS 2003

Call for Papers

Precision Strike Technology Symposium 2003

I

ndividuals desiring to present a paper are required to submit an abstract no later than Friday, June 6, 2003. Presentations may be to the

SECRET level. Abstracts must be UNCLASSIFIED,

non-marketing, address-relevant technologies applicable to the symposium topics, and be no longer

than 500 words. Innovative concepts and ideas are

particularly welcomed, and multimedia presentations are strongly encouraged. 

Abstracts for proposed papers are to be sent to the

Precision Strike Association by:

E-mail: info@precisionstrike.org (preferred)

Fax: 301-475-9367 

Mail: Precision Strike Association

P.O. Box 1606

Leonardtown MD 20650

Requirements & Schedule

Papers should be suitable for a 20-minute presentation. Abstracts should include the intended

classification of the paper and must include the

point of contact, complete address, e-mail, telephone, and fax number. Specific format requirements will be provided to those individuals whose abstracts are selected.

The following schedule applies: 

June 6

Deadline for Abstracts

Week of July 7

Acceptance Notification Sent by E-mail

Oct. 14-16

Symposium 

Papers should address advanced technologies

and Out-of-the-Box concepts that will help

achieve the goals of Precision Engagement

throughout the full range of military operations.

Desired Topics

Weapons

Effects

C4ISR

Targeting 

Strike Transformation

Coalition Warfare

The Precision Strike Association

will sponsor its thirteenth annual Precision Strike Technology

Symposium on 14-16 October

2003 at the Kossiakoff Conference Center of The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics

Laboratory, Laurel MD.

Inquiries For questions, contact Leslie Mueller at

301-475-6513 or via e-mail at info@precisionstrike.org

Precision Strike Technology Symposium 2003 • Precision Strike Technology Symposium 2003
Acquisition

Logistics Excellence

Surfing the Net

An Internet Listing Tailored to the Professional Acquisition Workforce

&

Electronic Forms Library.

Defense Systems Management College

(DSMC)

http://www.dau.mil

DSMC educational products and services; course

schedules; job opportunities.

Defense Advanced Research Projects

Agency (DARPA)

http://www.darpa.mil

News releases; current solicitations; “Doing Business with DARPA.”

Defense Information Systems Agency

(DISA)

http://www.disa.mil

Structure and mission of DISA; Defense Information System Network; Defense Message System;

Global Command and Control System; much

more!

National Imagery and Mapping Agency

http://www.nima.mil

Imagery; maps and geodata; Freedom of Information Act resources; publications.

Defense Modeling and Simulation Office

(DMSO)

http://www.dmso.mil

DoD Modeling and Simulation Master Plan; document library; events; services. 

Defense Technical Information Center

(DTIC)

http://www.dtic.mil/

Technical reports; products and services; registration with DTIC; special programs; acronyms;

DTIC FAQs. 

Defense Electronic Business Program Office (DEBPO)

http://www.defenselink.mil/acq/ebusiness/

Policy; newsletters; Central Contractor Registration; Assistance Centers; DoD EC Partners.

Open Systems Joint Task Force

http://www.acq.osd.mil/osjtf

Open Systems education and training opportunities; studies and assessments; projects, initiatives

and plans; reference library.

Government-Industry Data Exchange Program (GIDEP)

http://www.gidep.corona.navy.mil

Federally funded co-op of government-industry

participants, providing an electronic forum to exchange technical information essential to

research, design, development, production, and

operational phases of the life cycle of systems, facilities, and equipment.

ness opportunities; past performance; paperless

contracting; labor rates.

Navy Acquisition Reform

http://www.ar.navy.mil

Acquisition policy and guidance; World-class

Practices; Acquisition Center of Excellence; training opportunities.

Navy Acquisition, Research and

Development Information Center

http://nardic.onr.navy.mil

News and announcements; acronyms;

publications and regulations; technical reports;

“How to Do Business with the Navy”; much

more!

Naval Sea Systems Command

http://www.navsea.navy.mil

Total Ownership Cost (TOC); documentation and

policy; Reduction Plan; Implementation Timeline;

TOC reporting templates; Frequently Asked

Questions.

Navy Acquisition and Business

Management

http://www.abm.rda.hq.navy.mil

Policy documents; training opportunities; guides

on areas such as risk management, acquisition environmental issues, past performance, and more;

news and assistance for the Standardized Procurement System (SPS) community; notices of

upcoming events.

Navy Best Manufacturing Practices Center

of Excellence

http://www.bmpcoe.org

A national resource to identify and share best

manufacturing and business practices being used

throughout industry, government, and academia.

Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR)

http://navair.navy.mil

Provides advanced warfare technology through

the efforts of seamless, integrated, worldwide network of aviation technology experts. 

Space and Naval Warfare Systems

Command (SPAWAR)

https://e-commerce.spawar.navy.mil

Your source for SPAWAR business opportunities,

acquisition news, solicitations, and small

business information. 

Joint Interoperability Test Command

(JITC)

http://jitc.fhu.disa.mil

Policies and procedures for interoperability certification. Access to lessons learned; link for

requesting support.

Air Force (Acquisition)

http://www.safaq.hq.af.mil/

Policy; career development and training opportunities; reducing TOC; library; links.

Air Force Materiel Command (AFMC)

Contracting Laboratory’s Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Site

http://farsite.hill.af.mil/

FAR search tool; Commerce Business Daily

Announcements (CBDNet); Federal Register;

Under Secretary of Defense (Acquisition,

Technology and Logistics) (USD[AT&L])

http://www.acq.osd.mil/

ACQWeb offers a library of USD(AT&L)

documents, a means to view streaming videos,

and jump points to many other valuable sites.

Director, Defense Procurement and

Acquisition Policy (DPAP)

http://www.acq.osd.mil/dpap

Procurement and Acquisition Policy news and

events; reference library; DPAP organizational

breakout; acquisition education and training policy and guidance. 

DoD Inspector General

http://www.dodig.osd.mil/pubs/index.html

Search for audit and evaluation reports, Inspector

General testimony, and planned and ongoing

audit projects of interest to the acquisition community.

Deputy Director, Systems Engineering,

USD (AT&L/IO/SE)

http://www.acq.osd.mil/io/se/index.htm

Systems engineering mission; Defense Acquisition

Workforce Improvement Act information, training, and related sites; information on key areas of

systems engineering responsibility.

Defense Acquisition Deskbook

http://deskbook.dau.mil

Automated acquisition reference tool covering

mandatory and discretionary practices.

Defense Acquisition History (DAH) Project

http://www.army.mil/cmhpg/acquisition/

acqhome.htm

The DAH Project is a multi-year program to produce a detailed history of defense acquisition

since 1947, to be published in six volumes. The

site features a quarterly online newsletter, project

status announcements, acquisition history links,

and contact information.

Defense Acquisition University (DAU)

http://www.dau.mil

DAU Course Catalog, Program Manager magazine

and Acquisition Review Quarterly journal; course

schedule; policy documents; guidebooks; and

training and education news for the Defense Acquisition Workforce.

Defense Acquisition University Distance

Learning Courses

https://dau.mil/registrar/apply.asp

Take DAU courses online at your desk, at home,

at your convenience!

Army Acquisition Corps (AAC)

http://dacm.rdaisa.army.mil

News; policy; publications; personnel demo; contacts; training opportunities.

Army Acquisition

http://acqnet.saalt.army.mil

A-MART; documents library; training and busiDepartment of Defense
Provides information and guidance on the

requirements for shipping cargo on U.S.-flag vessels.

MANPRINT (Manpower and Personnel Integration)

http://www.MANPRINT.army.mil

Points of contact for program managers; relevant

regulations; policy letters from the Army Acquisition Executive; as well as briefings on the MANPRINT program. 

DoD Specifications and Standards

Home Page

http://www.dsp.dla.mil

All about DoD standardization; key Points of

Contact; FAQs; Military Specifications and Standards Reform; newsletters; training; nongovernment standards; links to related sites.

Joint Advanced Distributed Simulation

(JADS) Joint Test Force

http://www.jads.abq.com

JADS is a one-stop shop for complete

information on distributed simulation and its applicability to test and evaluation and acquisition.

Program Management Community of

Practice (PMCoP)

http://www.pmcop.dau.mil

Includes risk management, contracting, system

engineering, total ownership cost (TOC) policies,

procedures, tools, references, publications, Web

links, and lessons learned.

Earned Value Management

http://www.acq.osd.mil/pm

Implementation of Earned Value Management;

latest policy changes; standards; international developments; active noteboard.

Fedworld Information

http://www.fedworld.gov

Comprehensive central access point for searching, locating, ordering, and acquiring

government and business information.

GSA Federal Supply Service

http://pub.fss.gsa.gov

The No. 1 resource for

the latest services and

products industry has to

offer. 

Commerce Business Daily

http://www.govcon.com/

Access to current and back issues

with search capabilities; business

opportunities; interactive yellow

pages.

Acquisition

Logistics Excellence

Surfing the Net

An Internet Listing Tailored to the Professional Acquisition Workforce

&

Acquisition Reform Network (ARNET) 

http://www.arnet.gov/

Virtual library; federal acquisition and

procurement opportunities; best practices; electronic forums; business opportunities; acquisition

training; Excluded Parties List.

Committee for Purchase from People

Who are Blind or Severely Disabled

http://www.jwod.gov

Provides information and guidance to federal customers on the requirements of the Javits-WagnerO’Day (JWOD) Act.

Federal Acquisition Institute (FAI)

http://www.faionline.com

Virtual campus for learning opportunities as well

as information access and performance support. 

Federal Acquisition Jump Station

http://nais.nasa.gov/fedproc/home.html

Procurement and acquisition servers by contracting activity; CBDNet; Reference Library.

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)

http://www.asu.faa.gov

Online policy and guidance for all aspects of the

acquisition process.

General Accounting Office (GAO)

http://www.gao.gov

Access to GAO reports, policy and guidance, and

FAQs.

General Services Administration (GSA)

http://www.gsa.gov

Online shopping for commercial items to support

government interests.

Library of Congress

http://www.loc.gov

Research services; Congress at Work; Copyright

Office; FAQs. 

National Technical Information Service

(NTIS)

http://chaos.fedworld.gov/onow/

Online service for purchasing technical reports,

computer products, videotapes, audiocassettes,

and more!

Small Business Administration (SBA)

http://www.SBAonline.SBA.gov

Communications network for small businesses.

U.S. Coast Guard

http://www.uscg.mil

News and current events; services; points of contact; FAQs.

Committee for Purchase From People

Who are Blind or Severely Disabled

http://www.jwod.gov

Provides information and guidance to federal customers on the requirements of the Javits-WagnerO’Day (JWOD) Act.

U.S. Department of Transportation MARITIME Administration

http://www.marad.dot.gov/offices/cargo_perf.html

Federal Civilian Agencies Topical Listings Industry and Professional Organizations

DAU Alumni Association

http://www.dauaa.org

Acquisition tools and resources; government and

related links; career opportunities; member forums.

Electronic Industries Alliance (EIA)

http://www.eia.org

Government Relations Department; includes

links to issue councils; market research

assistance.

National Contract Management Association (NCMA)

http://www.ncmahq.org

“What’s New in Contracting?”; educational products catalog; career center. 

National Defense Industrial Association

(NDIA)

http://www.ndia.org

Association news; events; government policy;

National Defense magazine.

International Society of Logistics

http://www.sole.org/

Online desk references that link to logistics problem-solving advice; Certified Professional Logistician certification.

Computer Assisted Technology Transfer

(CATT) Program

http://catt.bus.okstate.edu

Collaborative effort between government, industry, and academia. Learn about CATT and how to

participate.

Software Program Managers Network

http://www.spmn.com

Site supports project managers, software practitioners, and government contractors. Contains

publications on highly effective software development best practices.

Association of Old Crows (AOC)

http://www.crows.org

Association news; conventions, conferences and

courses; Journal of Electronic Defense magazine.

Project Management Institute

http://www.pmi.org

Program management publications, information

resources, professional practices, and career certification.

If you would like to add your

acquisition or acquisition and logistics excellence-related Web site

to this list, please put your request in

writing and fax it to Sylwia GasiorekNelson, (703) 805-2917. 

DAU encourages the reciprocal

linking of its Home Page to

other interested agencies.

Contact the DAU

Webmaster at: webmaster@dau.mil.
Purpose

The purpose of Program Manager Magazine is to instruct members of

the DoD Acquisition, Technology & Logistics (AT&L) Workforce and Defense Industry on policies, trends, legislation, senior leadership changes,

events, and current thinking affecting program management and defense

systems acquisition, and to disseminate other information pertinent to

the professional development and education of the DoD Acquisition Workforce.

Subject Matter

Subjects may include, but are not restricted to, all aspects of program

management; professional and educational development of DoD’s AT&L

Workforce; acquisition and logistics excellence; Defense industrial base;

research and development; test and evaluation; modeling and simulation; commercial best business practices; and interviews with Government-Industry Defense executives.

Program Manager is not a forum for academic papers, fact sheets, technical papers, or white papers (these are typically recognized by their structured packaging, e.g., Introduction, Background, Discussion, Methodology, Recommendations, Conclusions). Those papers are more suited for

DAU's journal, Acquisition Review Quarterly. Program Manager Magazine

publishes, for the most part, feature stories that include real people and

events. Stories that appeal to our readers—who are senior military personnel, civilians, and defense industry professionals in the program management/acquisition business—are those taken from real-world experiences vs. pages of researched information. 

Good writing sounds like comfortable conversation. Write naturally and

avoid stiltedness. Except for a rare change of pace, most sentences should

be 25 words or less, and paragraphs should be six sentences. Vary your

syntax. Avoid falling into the trap of writing one declarative sentence after

another. Package your article with liberal use of subheads.

Length of Articles

Program Manager is flexible regarding length, but articles most likely to

be published are generally 2,000-3,000 words or about 10 doublespaced pages, each page having a 1-inch border on all sides. However,

do not be constrained by length requirements; tell your story in the most

direct way, regardless of length. Do not submit articles in a layout format,

nor should articles include any footnotes, endnotes, or references. Be

sure to define all acronyms.

Photos and Illustrations

Articles may include figures, charts, and photographs. They must, however, be in a separate file from the article. Photos must be black and white

or color. Program Manager does not guarantee the return of photographs.

Include brief, numbered captions keyed to the photographs. Place a corresponding number on the lower left corner, reverse side of the photographs. Also, be sure to include the source of the photograph. Program

Manager publishes no photos from outside the Department of Defense

without express permission. Photocopies of photographs are not acceptable. 

With the increase in digital media capabilities, authors can now provide

digital files of photos/illustrations. (Our author guidelines at http://

www.dau.mil/pubs/pm/articles.asp contain complete instructions on transferring these files.) Note that they must meet the following publication

standards set for Program Manager: color and greyscale (if possible); EPS

files generated from Illustrator (preferred) or Corel Draw (if in another format, provide program format as well as EPS file); TIFF files with a resolution of 300 pixels per inch; or other files in original program format (i.e.,

Powerpoint).

Biographical Sketch

Include a short biographical sketch of the author(s)—about 25 words—

including current position and educational background.

Clearance

All articles written by authors employed by or on contract with the U.S.

Government must be cleared by the author’s public affairs or security office prior to submission. In addition, each author must certify that the article is a “Work of the U.S. Government.” This form is found at the end of

the PM Author Guidance. Click on “Copyright Forms” and print the last

page only, sign, and submit with the article. Since all articles appearing

in Program Manager are in the public domain and posted to the DAU

Web site, no copyrighted articles will be accepted. This is in keeping with

DAU’s policy of widest dissemination of its published products.

Submission Dates

Issue Author’s Deadline

January-February 1 December

March-April 1 February

May-June 1 April

July-August 1 June

September-October 1 August

November-December 1 October

Submission Procedures

Articles (in MS Word) may be submitted via e-mail to collie.

Johnson@dau.mil or via U.S. mail to: DAU PRESS, ATTN C. JOHNSON,

9820 BELVOIR RD, SUITE 3, FORT BELVOIR VA 22060-5565. For

photos/illustrations accompanying your article, send us the original photos or follow the guidance under “Photos and Illustrations”—opposite column. All submissions must include the author’s name, mailing address,

office phone number (DSN and commercial), and fax number. 

Program Manager Writer’s Guidelines in Brief

(http://www.dau.mil/pubs/pm/articles.asp
A Bimonthly Magazine 

of the Defense 

Acquisition University