Studying Acquisition Strategy Formulation of Incremental Development Approaches

This is a study of the challenges that acquisition professionals confront in formulating the Department of Defense’s preferred acquisition–incremental development. The research surveys acquisition professionals to recommend the components of an acquisition strategy associated with a typical acquisition program undergoing program/project milestone review and approval. This work provides insights into how program managers use typical programmatic decision inputs (requirements, technology maturity, risk, urgency, and funding) to formulate the components of an acquisition strategy. The results suggest that acquisition policy should perhaps require a justification for most programs of record if an incremental development approach is not planned. Adoption of the recommended acquisition policy changes would make the defense acquisition system more responsive to the warfighter by fielding improved capability as quickly as possible and reducing risk of the eventual delivery of the full required capability.

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An Analysis of Communication Between Program Managers and Contracting Officers and Its Effect on the Performance of the Defense Acquisition System

10.21236/ada632382 ◽

2015 ◽

Author(s):

Allison B. Penn ◽

Michael W. Loya ◽

Tristan C. Gilbert

Keyword(s):

Acquisition System ◽

Defense Acquisition ◽

Program Managers

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Systems Engineering of Unmanned DoD Systems: Following the Joint Capabilities Integration and Development System/Defense Acquisition System Process to Develop an Unmanned Ground Vehicle System

10.21236/ad1009275 ◽

2015 ◽

Author(s):

Francois Furman ◽

Andrew Christensen ◽

Casey Fillinger ◽

Joseph McLaughlin ◽

Timothy Britt

Keyword(s):

Systems Engineering ◽

Acquisition System ◽

Unmanned Ground Vehicle ◽

Defense Acquisition ◽

Ground Vehicle ◽

Development System ◽

System Process ◽

Vehicle System

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Defense Acquisition, Public Administration, and Pragmatism

National Security ◽

10.4018/978-1-5225-7912-0.ch039 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 774-792

Author(s):

Keith F. Snider

Keyword(s):

Public Administration ◽

Minor Role ◽

Potential Contribution ◽

Defense Acquisition ◽

Philosophical Pragmatism ◽

A Minor ◽

Relationship Of ◽

The Relationship ◽

Administrative Theory ◽

Acquisition Professionals

This chapter explores the relationship of U.S. defense management to public administration. It argues that public administration, as a field of study, plays a minor role in defense acquisition, because acquisition has unique characteristics that separate it from the mainstream of the field. The tenuous connections between acquisition and public administration have led to an issue of academic legitimacy in that the discipline has failed to respond to the needs of acquisition professionals. The chapter then presents a discussion and illustration of philosophical pragmatism as a potential contribution of administrative theory to acquisition practice, and it concludes with thoughts on the potential for acquisition to adopt pragmatism as a guiding way for thought and practice.

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Measuring Perceived Risk of Pitfalls Associated with Systems Engineering Tradeoff Analyses

Engineering Management Research ◽

10.5539/emr.v6n1p68 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 6 (1) ◽

pp. 68 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Matthew V. Cilli ◽

Gregory S. Parnell ◽

Robert Cloutier ◽

Teresa Zigh

Keyword(s):

Systems Engineering ◽

Perceived Risk ◽

Relevant Literature ◽

Research Area ◽

Acquisition System ◽

Military Operations ◽

Defense Acquisition ◽

Trade Off ◽

Trade Offs ◽

Military Operations Research

The U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has recently revised the defense acquisition system to address suspected root causes of unwanted acquisition outcomes. One of the major changes in the revised acquisition system is an increased emphasis on systems engineering trade-offs made between capability requirements and lifecycle costs early in the acquisition process (Cilli, Parnell, Cloutier, & Zigh, 2015). Given that systems engineering trade-off analyses will play a pivotal role in future defense acquisition efforts, this paper takes an in-depth look at the state of systems engineering trade-off analysis capability through a review of relevant literature and a survey of systems engineering professionals and military operations research professionals involved in defense acquisition. The survey was developed to measure the perceived level of difficulty associated with compliance to the revised defense acquisition system mandate for early systems engineering trade-off analyses and to measure perceived likelihood and impact of potential pitfalls within systems engineering trade-off studies. The survey instrument was designed using Survey Monkey and was deployed through a link posted on several groups within LinkedIn, a professional social media site, and was also sent directly via email to those with known experience in this research area. Although increased systems engineering activity early in the life cycle is a compelling change for DoD, the findings of the literature review and the survey of practitioners both indicate that there is much to be done in order to position the systems engineering community for success so that the improved defense acquisition outcomes as envisioned by the architects of 2015 DoDI 5000.02 can be realized.

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