Acquisition Reform?

The Obama administration appears to be set to gut the defense industry. There are three currents which make this observation credible:
1. OMB review of DoD procurement policies.
2. Acquisition reform furor.
3. Verbal and press attacks on DoD contractors.

As a card-carrying member of the military industrial complex it would be humorous to see President Obama and his surrogates make the case against policy, procedure and industry were it not such a serious matter.

I have spent my entire working life either in uniform serving this great nation or as a contractor supporting government acquisition officials. So, I feel uniquely qualified to comment on the base assumption that the DoD is deeply flawed.

My response is, yet it is flawed and none of the proposed solutions proffered by the President will solve the root cause of the problem: political meddling and systemic disincentives to efficiency.

Let me explain. In the old days when the DoD was able to procure weapons systems on time and on budget there were very, very few documents to guide the way of the acquisition professional. Rather it was incumbent upon the DoD to identify, groom and promote those officials who were successful in program management. Since the early 1970’s the number of documents guiding acquisition officials have mushroomed from 3 to over 50.

There is an exponential challenge in responding to multiple guidance documents from multiple agencies which were staffed independently and without coordination. It ain’t easy.

Last year I read a GAO report that offered this sobering fact: a major acquisition program will span 7 Secretaries of Defense, 8 Acquisition Executives and 4 Program Managers. It is amazing that any program is brought to light given the lack of continuity at the senior levels. Most troubling of these soft layers of management is at the Program Management level.

Again from personal experience, it is my observation that most uniformed PMs mean to do the right thing. Unfortunately, they are not properly incented by their Service or by the DoD. Most Major Program Managers are at the pay-grade of O6 (Navy CAPTAIN or Army/Air Force/Marines Colonel) and are eager for promotion. Placing officers in 18-24 month rotations in programs which will take 7 – 8 years to reach maturity forces the PM to make decisions which will ultimately favor either the program or their career. A short rotation forces the PM to self-optimize and make decisions which are most helpful for his/her career while hurting the program the least. I have never met a PM who’d sacrifice their career for the good of a program.

As to the fever of acquisition reform sweeping the Potomac: virtually all of the problems faced in DoD are wounds inflicted by previous reform acts. In fact, many of the same individuals trying to remedy the current situation are those who got us here in the first place.
So how do we fix the problem?

Here is how I’d fix the problem:
1. Require Acquisition Executives serve at least 3 years in office.
2. Require Program Managers to serve at least 4 years.
3. Stand up a committee of Acquisition Officials to review and recommend elimination of unnecessary, conflicting acquisition rules. Think BRAC for acquisition regulation.

That’s it. At least for the moment. It took us 40 years to screw this process up. It will take more than good intentions to make it right again. Once the dust has settled, we can review the bidding in two or three years hence.

Bottom Line: Congressional meddling in the DoD acquisition process has time-and-again resulted in slower procurements at increasingly higher costs. I so no reason to believe this round of acquisition reform fever will result in a contrary outcome.