Defense Acquisitions: Fundamental Changes Are Needed to Improve Weapon Program Outcomes
Published: 2008-09-25T00:00:00

Fast Facts:

Highlights:
section_title: Why GAO Did This Study
paragraphs: Since 1990, GAO has designated the Department of Defense's (DOD) management of major weapon system acquisitions a high risk area. DOD has taken some action to improve acquisition outcomes, but its weapon programs continue to take longer, cost more, and deliver fewer capabilities than originally planned. These persistent problems--coupled with current operational demands--have impelled DOD to work outside of its traditional acquisition process to acquire equipment that meet urgent warfighter needs. Poor outcomes in DOD's weapon system programs reverberate across the entire federal government. Over the next 5 years, DOD expects to invest more than $357 billion on the development and procurement of major defense acquisition programs. Every dollar wasted on acquiring weapon systems is less money available for other priorities. This testimony describes DOD's current weapon system investment portfolio, the problems that contribute to cost and schedule increases, potential solutions based on past GAO recommendations, and recent legislative initiatives and DOD actions aimed at improving outcomes. It also provides some observations about what is needed for DOD to achieve lasting reform. The testimony is drawn from GAO's body of work on DOD's acquisition, requirements, and funding processes, as well as its most recent annual assessment of selected DOD weapon programs.
section_title: What GAO Found
paragraphs: DOD is not receiving expected returns on its large investment in weapon systems. Since fiscal year 2000, DOD significantly increased the number of major defense acquisition programs and its overall investment in them. During this same time period, the performance of the DOD portfolio has gotten worse. The total acquisition cost of DOD's 2007 portfolio of major programs under development or in production has grown by nearly $300 billion over initial estimates. Current programs are also experiencing, on average, a 21-month delay in delivering initial capabilities to the warfighter--often forcing DOD to spend additional funds on maintaining legacy systems. Systemic problems both at the strategic and at the program level underlie cost growth and schedule delays. At the strategic level, DOD's processes for identifying warfighter needs, allocating resources, and developing and procuring weapon systems--which together define DOD's overall weapon system investment strategy--are fragmented and broken. At the program level, weapon system programs are initiated without sufficient knowledge about system requirements, technology, and design maturity. Lacking such knowledge, managers rely on assumptions that are consistently too optimistic, exposing programs to significant and unnecessary risks and ultimately cost growth and schedule delays. Our work shows that acquisition problems will likely persist until DOD provides a better foundation for buying the right things, the right way. This involves making tough decisions as to which programs should be pursued, and more importantly, not pursued; making sure programs can be executed; locking in requirements before programs are ever started; and making it clear who is responsible for what and holding people accountable when responsibilities are not fulfilled. Recent congressionally mandated changes to the DOD acquisition system, as well as initiatives being pursued by the department, include positive steps that, if implemented properly, could provide a foundation for establishing a well balanced investment strategy, sound business cases for major weapon system acquisition programs, and a better chance to spend resources wisely. At the same time, DOD must begin making better choices that reflect joint capability needs and match requirements with resources. DOD investment decisions cannot continue to be dictated by the military services who propose programs that overpromise capabilities and underestimate costs to capture the funding needed to start and sustain development programs. To better ensure warfighter capabilities are delivered when needed and as promised, incentives must encourage a disciplined, knowledge-based approach, and a true partnership with shared goals must be developed among the department, the military services, the Congress, and the defense industry.

section_title: Letter
paragraphs: I am pleased to be here today to discuss the Department of Defense’s  (DOD) management of its major weapon system acquisitions—an area that  has been on GAO’s high risk list since 1990. Prior to and since that time,  Congress and DOD have continually explored ways to improve acquisition  outcomes without much to show for their efforts. DOD’s major weapon  system programs continue to take longer, cost more, and deliver fewer  quantities and capabilities than originally planned. Current operational  demands have highlighted the impact of these persistent problems as DOD  has been forced to work outside of its traditional acquisition process to  acquire equipment that meet warfighter needs.
Investment in weapons acquisition programs is now at its highest level in  two decades. The department expects to invest more than $357 billion  over the next 5 years on the development and procurement of major  defense acquisition programs. Given the size of this investment, poor  outcomes in DOD’s weapon system programs reverberate across the entire  federal government. Every dollar wasted during the development and  acquisition of weapon systems is money not available for other internal  and external budget priorities—such as the war on terror and mandatory  payments to growing entitlement programs.
My statement today is drawn from our body of work on DOD’s acquisition,  requirements, and funding processes, as well as our annual assessment of  selected DOD weapon programs. My statement today focuses on (1) the  performance of DOD’s major defense acquisition program portfolio;  (2) the underlying systemic problems that contribute to poor cost and  schedule outcomes; (3) potential solutions based on past GAO  recommendations; and (4) recent congressional and DOD actions and the  extent to which those actions can be expected to improve the future  performance of DOD’s major defense acquisition programs. Our work was  conducted in September 2008 in accordance with generally accepted  government auditing standards. Those standards require that we plan and  perform the audit to obtain sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a  reasonable basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit  objectives. We believe that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable  basis for our findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives.
subsections: section_title: DOD’s Major Acquisition Programs Continue to Experience Significant Cost Growth and Schedule Delays
paragraphs: DOD is not receiving expected returns on its large investment in weapon  systems. The total acquisition cost of DOD’s 2007 portfolio of major  programs under development or in production has grown by nearly  $300 billion over initial estimates. While DOD is committing substantially  more investment dollars to develop and procure new weapon systems, our  analysis shows that the 2007 portfolio is experiencing greater cost growth  and schedule delays than the fiscal years 2000 and 2005 portfolios (see  table 1). Total acquisition costs for programs in DOD’s fiscal year 2007  portfolio have increased 26 percent from first estimates—compared to a  6-percent increase for programs in its fiscal year 2000 portfolio. Total  RDT&E costs for programs in 2007 have increased by 40 percent from first  estimates, compared to 27 percent for programs in 2000. The story is no  better when expressed in unit costs. Schedule delays also continue to  impact programs. On average, the current portfolio of programs has  experienced a 21-month delay in delivering initial operational capability to  the warfighter, and 14 percent are more than 4 years late.
Continued cost growth results in less funding being available for other  DOD priorities and programs, while continued failure to deliver weapon  systems on time delays providing critical capabilities to the warfighter. Put  simply, cost growth reduces DOD’s buying power. As program costs  increase, DOD must request more funding to cover the overruns, make  trade-offs with existing programs, delay the start of new programs, or take  funds from other accounts. Delays in providing capabilities to the  warfighter result in the need to operate costly legacy systems longer than  expected, find alternatives to fill capability gaps, or go without the  capability. The warfighter’s urgent need for the new weapon system is  often cited when the case is first made for developing and producing the  system. However, DOD has already missed fielding dates for many  programs and many others are behind schedule.
section_title: Fragmented Processes, Unexecutable Business Cases, and Lack of Knowledge Underlie Poor Acquisition Outcomes
paragraphs: Over the past several years our work has highlighted a number of  underlying systemic causes for cost growth and schedule delays both at  the strategic and at the program level.  At the strategic level, DOD’s  processes for identifying warfighter needs, allocating resources, and  developing and procuring weapon systems—which together define DOD’s  overall weapon system investment strategy—are fragmented and broken.  At the program level, the military services propose and DOD approves  programs without adequate knowledge about requirements and the  resources needed to successfully execute the program within cost,  schedule, and performance targets.
subsections: section_title: Key Acquisition Support Processes Are Fragmented and Result in Unsound Programs
paragraphs: DOD largely continues to define war fighting needs and make investment  decisions on a service-by-service basis, and assess these requirements and  their funding implications under separate decision-making processes.  While DOD’s requirements process provides a framework for reviewing  and validating needs, it does not adequately prioritize those needs and is  not agile enough to meet changing warfighter demands. Ultimately, the  process produces more demand for new programs than available  resources can support. This imbalance promotes an unhealthy competition  for funds that encourages programs to pursue overly ambitious  capabilities, develop unrealistically low cost estimates and optimistic  schedules, and to suppress bad news. Similarly, DOD’s funding process  does not produce an accurate picture of the department’s future resource  needs for individual programs—in large part because it allows programs to  go forward with unreliable cost estimates and lengthy development  cycles—not a sound basis for allocating resources and ensuring program  stability. Invariably, DOD and the Congress end up continually shifting  funds to and from programs—undermining well-performing programs to  pay for poorly performing ones.
section_title: Initiating Programs with Unexecutable Business Cases Sets Them Up to Fail
paragraphs: At the program level, the key cause of poor outcomes is the consistent  lack of disciplined analysis that would provide an understanding of what it  would take to field a weapon system before system development.  Our  body of work in best practices has found that an executable business case  is one that provides demonstrated evidence that (1) the identified needs  are real and necessary and that they can best be met with the chosen  concept and (2) the chosen concept can be developed and produced  within existing resources—including technologies, funding, time, and  management capacity. Although DOD has taken steps to revise its  acquisition policies and guidance to reflect the benefits of a knowledge- based approach, we have found no evidence of widespread adoption of  such an approach in the department. Our most recent assessment of major  weapon systems found that the vast majority of programs began  development with unexecutable business cases, and did not attain, or plan  to achieve, adequate levels of knowledge before reaching design review  and production start—the two key junctures in the process following  development start (see figure 2).
Knowledge gaps are largely the result of a lack of disciplined systems  engineering analysis prior to beginning system development. Systems  engineering translates customer needs into specific product requirements  for which requisite technological, software, engineering, and production  capabilities can be identified through requirements analysis, design, and  testing. Early systems engineering provides knowledge that enables a  developer to identify and resolve gaps before product development begins.  Because the government often does not perform the proper up-front  analysis to determine whether its needs can be met, significant contract  cost increases can occur as the scope of the requirements change or  become better understood by the government and contractor. Not only  does DOD not typically conduct disciplined systems engineering prior to  beginning system development, it has allowed new requirements to be  added well into the acquisition cycle. The acquisition environment  encourages launching ambitious product developments that embody more  technical unknowns and less knowledge about the performance and  production risks they entail. A new weapon system is not likely to be  approved unless it promises the best capability and appears affordable  within forecasted available funding levels. We have recently reported on  the negative impact that poor systems engineering practices have had on  several programs such as the Global Hawk Unmanned Aircraft System,   F-22A, Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle, Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff  Missile and others.
With high levels of uncertainty about technologies, design, and  requirements, program cost estimates and related funding needs are often  understated, effectively setting programs up for failure. We recently  compared the service and independent cost estimates for 20 major weapon  system programs and found that the independent estimate was higher in  nearly every case, but the difference between the estimates was typically  not significant. We also found that both estimates were too low in most  cases, and the knowledge needed to develop realistic cost estimates was  often lacking. For example, program Cost Analysis Requirements  Description documents—used to build the program cost estimate—are not  typically based on demonstrated knowledge and therefore provide a shaky  foundation for estimating costs. Cost estimates have proven to be off by  billions of dollars in some of the programs we reviewed. For example, the  initial Cost Analysis Improvement Group estimate for the Expeditionary  Fighting Vehicle program was about $1.4 billion compared to a service  estimate of about $1.1 billion, but development costs for the system are  now expected to be close to $3.6 billion. Estimates this far off the mark do  not provide the necessary foundation for sufficient funding commitments  and realistic long-term planning.
When DOD consistently allows unsound, unexecutable programs to pass  through the requirements, funding, and acquisition processes,  accountability suffers. Program managers cannot be held accountable  when the programs they are handed already have a low probability of  success. In addition, they are not empowered to make go or no-go  decisions, have little control over funding, cannot veto new requirements,  and they have little authority over staffing. At the same time, program  managers frequently change during a program’s development.
Limiting the length of development cycles would make it easier to more  accurately estimate costs, predict the future funding needs, effectively  allocate resources, and hold decision makers accountable. We have  consistently emphasized the need for DOD’s weapon programs to establish  shorter development cycles. DOD’s conventional acquisition process often  requires as many as 10 or 15 years to get from program start to production.  Such lengthy cycle times promote program instability—especially when  considering DOD’s tendency to change requirements and funding as well  as leadership. Constraining cycle times to 5 or 6 years would force  programs to conduct more detailed systems engineering analyses, lend  itself to fully funding programs to completion, and thereby increasing the  likelihood that their requirements can be met within established time  frames and available resources. An assessment of DOD’s acquisition  system commissioned by the Deputy Secretary of Defense in 2006 similarly  found that programs should be time-constrained to reduce pressure on  investment accounts and increase funding stability for all programs.
section_title: The Way Forward: Potential Solutions
paragraphs: Our work shows that acquisition problems will likely persist until DOD  provides a better foundation for buying the right things, the right way. This  involves (1) maintaining the right mix of programs to invest in by making  better decisions as to which programs should be pursued given existing  and expected funding and, more importantly, deciding which programs  should not be pursued; (2) ensuring that programs that are started can be  executed by matching requirements with resources and locking in those  requirements; and (3) making it clear that programs will then be executed  based on knowledge and holding program managers responsible for that  execution. We have made similar recommendations in past GAO reports,  but DOD has disagreed with some and not fully implemented others.
These changes will not be easy to make. They will require DOD to  reexamine not only its acquisition process, but its requirement setting and  funding processes as well. They will also require DOD to change how it  views program success, and what is necessary to achieve success. This  includes changing the environment and incentives that lead DOD and the  military services to overpromise on capability and underestimate costs in  order to sell new programs and capture the funding needed to start and  sustain them. Finally, none of this will be achieved without a true  partnership among the department, the military services, the Congress,  and the defense industry.  All of us must embrace the idea of change and  work diligently to implement it.
subsections: section_title: Buy the Right Things: Develop and Implement an Investment Strategy
paragraphs: The first, and most important, step toward improving acquisition  outcomes is implementing a new DOD-wide investment strategy for  weapon systems. We have reported that DOD should develop an  overarching strategy and decision-making processes that prioritize  programs based on a balanced match between customer needs and  available department resources---that is the dollars, technologies, time,  and people needed to achieve these capabilities. We also recommended  that capabilities not designated as a priority should be set out separately  as desirable but not funded unless resources were both available and  sustainable. This means that the decision makers responsible for weapon  system requirements, funding, and acquisition execution must establish an  investment strategy in concert.
DOD’s Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and  Logistics—DOD’s corporate leader for acquisition—should develop this  strategy in concert with other senior leaders, for example, combatant  commanders who would provide input on user needs; DOD’s comptroller  and science and technology leaders, who would provide input on available  resources; and acquisition executives from the military services, who  could propose solutions. Finally, once priority decisions are made,  Congress will need to enforce discipline through its legislative and  oversight mechanisms.
section_title: Buy the Right Way: Ensure Individual Programs Can Be Executed
paragraphs: Once DOD has prioritized capabilities, it should work vigorously to make  sure each new program can be executed before the acquisition begins.  More specifically, this means assuring requirements for specific weapon  systems are clearly defined and achievable given available resources and  that all alternatives have been considered. System requirements should be  agreed to by service acquisition executives as well as combatant  commanders. Once programs begin, requirements should not change  without assessing their potential disruption to the program and assuring  that they can be accommodated within time and funding constraints. In  addition, DOD should prove that technologies can work as intended before  including them in acquisition programs. More ambitious technology  development efforts should be assigned to the science and technology  community until they are ready to be added to future generations of the  product. DOD should also require the use of independent cost estimates as  a basis for budgeting funds. Our work over the past 10 years has  consistently shown when these basic steps are taken, programs are better  positioned to be executed within cost and schedule.
To keep programs executable, DOD should demand that all milestone  decisions be based on quantifiable data and demonstrated knowledge.  These data should cover critical program facets such as cost, schedule,  technology readiness, design readiness, production readiness, and  relationships with suppliers. Development should not be allowed to  proceed until certain knowledge thresholds are met—for example, a high  percentage of engineering drawings completed at critical design review.  DOD’s current policies encourage these sorts of metrics to be used as a  basis for decision making, but they do not demand it. DOD should also  place boundaries on the time allowed for system development.
To further ensure that programs can be executed, DOD should pursue an  evolutionary path toward meeting user needs rather than attempting to  satisfy all needs in a single step. This approach has been consistently used  by successful commercial companies we have visited over the past decade  because it provides program managers with more achievable  requirements, which, in turn, facilitate shorter cycle times. With shorter  cycle times, the companies we have studied have also been able to assure  that program managers and senior leaders stay with programs throughout  the duration of a program.
DOD has policies that encourage evolutionary development, but programs  often favor pursuing more revolutionary, exotic solutions that will attract  funds and support. The department and, more importantly, the military  services, tend to view success as capturing the funding needed to start and  sustain a development program. In order to do this, they must overpromise  capability and underestimate cost. In order for DOD to move forward, this  view of success must change. World-class commercial firms identify  success as developing products within cost estimates and delivering them  on time in order to survive in the marketplace. This forces incremental,  knowledge-based product development programs that improve capability  as new technologies are matured.
section_title: Hold People Accountable
paragraphs: To strengthen accountability, DOD must also clearly delineate  responsibilities among those who have a role in deciding what to buy as  well as those who have role in executing, revising, and terminating  programs. Within this context, rewards and incentives must be altered so  that success can be viewed as delivering needed capability at the right  price and the right time, rather than attracting and retaining support for  numerous new and ongoing programs.
To enable accountability to be exercised at the program level once a  program begins, DOD will need to (1) match program manager tenure with  development or the delivery of a product; (2) tailor career paths and  performance management systems to incentivize longer tenures;  (3) strengthen training and career paths as needed to ensure program  managers have the right qualifications to manage the programs they are  assigned to; (4) empower program managers to execute their programs,  including an examination of whether and how much additional authority  can be provided over funding, staffing, and approving requirements  proposed after the start of a program; and (5) develop and provide  automated tools to enhance management and oversight as well as to  reduce the time required to prepare status information.
DOD also should hold contractors accountable for results. As we have  recommended, this means structuring contracts so that incentives actually  motivate contractors to achieve desired acquisition outcomes and  withholding fees when those goals are not met.
section_title: Recent Congressional Initiatives and DOD Actions Aim to Promote a More Disciplined, Knowledge-Based Acquisition Approach
paragraphs: Recognizing the need for more discipline and accountability in the  acquisition process, Congress recently enacted legislation that, if followed,  could result in a better chance to spend resources wisely. Likewise, DOD  has recently begun to develop several initiatives, based in part on  congressional direction and GAO recommendations that, if implemented  properly, could also provide a foundation for establishing a well balanced  investment strategy and sound, knowledge-based business cases for  individual acquisition programs.
subsections: section_title: Legislation Could Have a Positive Impact on Acquisition Outcomes
paragraphs: Congress has enacted legislation that requires DOD to take certain actions  which, if followed, could instill more discipline into the front-end of the  acquisition process when key knowledge is gained and ultimately improve  acquisition outcomes. For example, legislation enacted in 2006 and 2008  requires decision-makers to certify that specific levels of knowledge have  been demonstrated at key decision points early in the acquisition process  before programs can receive milestone approval for the technology  development phase or the system development phase respectively. The  2006 legislation also requires programs to track unit cost growth against  their original baseline estimates—and not only their most recent  estimates—and requires an additional assessment of the program if certain  cost growth thresholds are reached. Other key legislation requires DOD to  report on the department’s strategies for balancing the allocation of funds  and other resources among major defense acquisition programs, and to  identify strategies for enhancing the role of program managers in carrying  out acquisition programs.
section_title: Recent DOD Actions Provide Opportunities for Improvement
paragraphs: DOD has also initiated actions aimed at improving investment decisions  and weapon system acquisition outcomes, based in part on congressional  direction and GAO recommendations. Each of the initiatives is designed to  enable more informed decisions by key department leaders well ahead of a  program’s start, decisions that provide a closer match between each  program’s requirements and the department’s resources. For example:    DOD is experimenting with a new concept decision review, different  acquisition approaches according to expected fielding times, and panels to  review weapon system configuration changes that could adversely affect  program cost and schedule.
DOD is also testing portfolio management approaches in selected  capability areas to facilitate more strategic choices about how to allocate  resources across programs and also testing the use of capital budgeting as  a potential means to stabilize program funding.
In September 2007, the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for  Acquisition, Technology and Logistics issued a policy memorandum to  ensure weapons acquisition programs were able to demonstrate key  knowledge elements that could inform future development and budget  decisions. This policy directed pending and future programs to include  acquisition strategies and funding that provide for contractors to develop  technically mature prototypes prior to initiating system development, with  the hope of reducing technical risk, validating designs and cost estimates,  evaluating manufacturing processes, and refining requirements.
DOD also plans to implement new practices that reflect past GAO  recommendations intended to provide program managers more incentives,  support, and stability. The department acknowledges that any actions  taken to improve accountability must be based on a foundation whereby  program managers can launch and manage programs toward greater  performance, rather than focusing on maintaining support and funding for  individual programs. DOD acquisition leaders have told us that any  improvements to program managers’ performance hinge on the success of  these departmental initiatives.
In addition, DOD has taken actions to strengthen the link between award  and incentive fees with desired program outcomes, which has the  potential to increase the accountability of DOD programs for fees paid and  of contractors for results achieved.
If adopted and implemented properly these actions could provide a  foundation for establishing sound, knowledge-based business cases for  individual acquisition programs, and the means for executing those  programs within established cost, schedule, and performance goals.
section_title: Concluding Observations on Achieving Successful and Lasting Reform
paragraphs: DOD understands what it needs to do at the strategic and at the program  level to improve acquisition outcomes. The strategic vision of the current  Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics  acknowledges the need to create a high-performing, boundary-less  organization—one that seeks out new ideas and new ways of doing  business and is prepared to question requirements and traditional  processes. Past efforts have had similar goals, yet we continue to find all  too often that DOD’s investment decisions are too service- and program- centric and that the military services overpromise capabilities and  underestimate costs to capture the funding needed to start and sustain  development programs. This acquisition environment has been  characterized in many different ways. For example, some have described it  as a “conspiracy of hope,” in which industry is encouraged to propose  unrealistic cost estimates, optimistic performance, and understated  technical risks during the proposal process and DOD is encouraged to  accept these proposals as the foundation for new programs. Either way, it  is clear that DOD’s implied definition of success is to attract funds for new  programs and to keep funds for ongoing programs, no matter what the  impact. DOD and the military services cannot continue to view success  through this prism.
More legislation can be enacted and policies can be written, but until DOD  begins making better choices that reflect joint capability needs and  matches requirements with resources, the acquisition environment will  continue to produce poor outcomes. It should not be necessary to take  extraordinary steps to ensure needed capabilities are delivered to the  warfighter on time and within costs. Executable programs should be the  natural outgrowth of a disciplined, knowledge-based process. While DOD’s  current policy supports a knowledge-based, evolutionary approach to  acquiring new weapons, in practice decisions made on individual  programs often sacrifice knowledge and realism in favor of revolutionary  solutions. Meaningful and lasting reform will not be achieved until DOD  changes the acquisition environment and the incentives that drive the  behavior of DOD decision-makers, the military services, program  managers, and the defense industry. Finally, no real reform can be  achieved without a true partnership among all these players and the  Congress.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to  answer any questions you may have at this time.
section_title: Contacts and Staff Acknowledgements
paragraphs: For further questions about this statement, please contact Michael J.  Sullivan at (202) 512-4841. Individuals making key contributions to this  statement include Ron Schwenn, Assistant Director; Kenneth E. Patton,  and Alyssa B. Weir.
section_title: Related GAO Products
paragraphs: Defense Acquisitions: A Knowledge-Based Funding Approach Could  Improve Major Weapon System Program Outcomes. GAO-08-619.  Washington, D.C.: July 2, 2008.
Defense Acquisitions: Better Weapon Program Outcomes Require  Discipline, Accountability, and Fundamental Changes in the  Acquisition Environment. GAO-08-782T. Washington, D.C.: June 3, 2008.
Defense Acquisitions: Results of Annual Assessment of DOD Weapon  Programs. GAO-08-674T. Washington, D.C.: April 29, 2008.
Defense Acquisitions: Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs.  GAO-08-467SP. Washington, D.C.: March 31, 2008.
Best Practices: Increased Focus on Requirements and Oversight Needed  to Improve DOD’s Acquisition Environment and Weapon System  Quality. GAO-08-294. Washington, D.C.: Feb. 1, 2008.
Cost Assessment Guide: Best Practices for Estimating and Managing  Program Costs. GAO-07-1134SP, Washington, D.C.: July 2007.
Defense Acquisitions: Assessments of Selected Weapon Programs.   GAO-07-406SP. Washington, D.C.: March 30, 2007.
Best Practices: An Integrated Portfolio Management Approach to Weapon  System Investments Could Improve DOD’s Acquisition Outcomes.  GAO-07-388, Washington, D.C.: March 30, 2007.
Best Practices: Better Support of Weapon System Program Managers  Needed to Improve Outcomes. GAO-06-110. Washington, D.C.: November  1, 2005.
Defense Acquisitions: Major Weapon Systems Continue to Experience  Cost and Schedule Problems under DOD’s Revised Policy. GAO-06-368.  Washington, D.C.: April 13, 2006.
Defense Acquisitions: Stronger Management Practices Are Needed to  Improve DOD’s Software-Intensive Weapon Acquisitions. GAO-04-393.  Washington, D.C.: March 1, 2004.
Best Practices: Setting Requirements Differently Could Reduce Weapon  Systems’ Total Ownership Costs. GAO-03-57. Washington, D.C.:  February 11, 2003.
Best Practices: Capturing Design and Manufacturing Knowledge Early  Improves Acquisition Outcomes. GAO-02-701. Washington, D.C.:  July 15, 2002.
Defense Acquisitions: DOD Faces Challenges in Implementing Best  Practices. GAO-02-469T. Washington, D.C.: February 27, 2002.
Best Practices: Better Matching of Needs and Resources Will Lead to  Better Weapon System Outcomes. GAO-01-288. Washington, D.C.:  March 8, 2001.
Best Practices: A More Constructive Test Approach Is Key to Better  Weapon System Outcomes. GAO/NSIAD-00-199. Washington, D.C.:  July 31, 2000.
Defense Acquisition: Employing Best Practices Can Shape Better  Weapon System Decisions. GAO/T-NSIAD-00-137. Washington, D.C.: April  26, 2000.
Best Practices: Better Management of Technology Development Can  Improve Weapon System Outcomes. GAO/NSIAD-99-162. Washington,  D.C.: July 30, 1999.
Defense Acquisitions: Best Commercial Practices Can Improve Program  Outcomes. GAO/T-NSIAD-99-116. Washington, D.C.: March 17, 1999.
Defense Acquisitions: Improved Program Outcomes Are Possible.  GAO/T-NSIAD-98-123. Washington, D.C.: March 17, 1998.
Best Practices: Successful Application to Weapon Acquisition Requires  Changes in DOD’s Environment. GAO/NSIAD-98-56. Washington, D.C.:  February 24, 1998.
Best Practices: Commercial Quality Assurance Practices Offer  Improvements for DOD. GAO/NSIAD-96-162. Washington, D.C.:  August 26, 1996.
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