The Courage Imperative

Abstract

In 2006, the Defense Acquisition Performance Assessment (DAPA) report called for Bold New Ideas and Sweeping Changes. It may be indelicate to say so, but Im not sure weve seen them happen yetnot in a big way, and not on the scale the reports authors seemed to think necessary. Since that time, we have, instead, seen a continuing emphasis on process-centric approaches to acquisition and relatively minor changes to existing policies. To be sure, there have been some changes in recent months. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) even complimented the Department of Defense for making progress in some areas. However, revising a few policies to place more emphasis on something we were doing already is not particularly new or bold, nor does it constitute sweeping changes. These little changes might be good ideas, and they might be helpfulbut they dont exactly meet the challenge laid down by the authors of the DAPA report.

Open PDF

Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Oct 01, 2009
Accession Number
AD1016365

Entities

People

  • Daniel R. Ward

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Human Systems
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Accountability
  • Acquisition
  • Air Force
  • Communities
  • Department Of Defense
  • Electrical Engineering
  • Engineering
  • Governments
  • Human Resources
  • Military Acquisition
  • Observation
  • Observers
  • Systems Engineering
  • Teamwork
  • Weapon Systems
  • Weapons

Readers

  • Defense Acquisition Program Management
  • Military History of the United States in the 20th Century.