Using Commercial Practices in DoD Acquisition: A Page from Industry's Playbook

Abstract

Using commercial business practices, or 'doing business like business,' is a recurring theme of the defense reform debate. The 1972 Commission on Government Procurement called for the 'businesslike' operation of federal procurement. The 1984 Grace Commission sought to apply 'private sector management tenets' across the entire federal government. More recently, the Packard Commission and the 1986 Defense Science Board (DSB) noted the potential advantages of adopting commercial practices in the Department of Defense and, in broad terms, identified some of those practices. Despite the potential advantages that commercial practices offer, however, DOD has yet to implement them on a widespread basis. The exhibit below shows basic reasons for delay.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Dec 01, 1989
Accession Number
ADA220958

Entities

People

  • Alan C. Spencer
  • Bruce D. Sweeny
  • Charles A. Perkins

Organizations

  • Defense Systems Management College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Air Platforms
  • C4I
  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Human Systems
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Application Software
  • Army Procurement
  • Business Administration
  • Computer Programming
  • Control Systems
  • Employment
  • Engineers
  • Government Procurement
  • Industrial Engineering
  • Insensitive Explosives
  • Logistics
  • Management Personnel
  • Military Acquisition
  • Organizational Structure
  • Personnel Management
  • Systems Engineering
  • Test And Evaluation

Readers

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