E-Procurement and the U.S. Military
Abstract
The Department of Defense (DoD) is calling for "transformation" in both how it fights and the acquisition processes that support the war fighters. Meanwhile, companies worldwide are undergoing transformation as they harness the power of Internet-enabled tools, One significant aspect of industry's transformation is electronic or e-procurement. E-procurement consists of multiple electronic facets, including catalogs, bidding, English auctions, reverse auctions, market exchanges, and paperless "end-to-end" systems. To varying degrees, these different aspects of e-procurement allow for simpler and faster ordering, reduced paperwork, easy on-line comparison, fewer human errors, and ultimately, lower costs. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the progress of the U,S, military with e-procurement. A qualitative case study of the IBM Corporation is used as an example for comparison with the military In addition, numerous interviews were conducted with e-procurement program managers in both the government and private industry, Assessments were also made based on recent articles in the business press, Through process teams, the DoD should continue to thoroughly study procurement processes, particularly the "bottlenecks" in the current systems. However, a major cultural change will be required as highly bureaucratic, paper-filled processes become electronic. As such, the highest leaders within DoD will have to fully embrace e-procurement in order to make the organizational changes and financial investments that are required to capitalize on this new way of transacting business in the twenty-first century.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Apr 01, 2002
- Accession Number
- ADA420718
Entities
People
- David M. Doe
Organizations
- Air Command and Staff College