On November 14, 2013, nearly 100 defense leaders joined a panel of experts from Booz Allen Hamilton to discuss how mission integration can help the government deal with budget shortages and rapidly put new technologies into the hands of warfighters.
The panel included Trey Obering, Lead Acquisition and Program Management; Greg Wenzel, Lead, Advanced Enterprise Integration; and Steve Soules, Lead, Navy/Marine Corps C4ISR. Each represented a different viewpoint of the government customer: Obering as the acquisition buyer, Wenzel as the engineer, and Soules as the analyst and operator. Multiple military branches were also represented: Obering is a retired Air Force Lieutenant General, Wenzel served as an Army Combat Engineer, and Soules was a former Naval Flight Officer and Operations Analyst.
Based upon their diverse experiences, the panel offered recommendations for acquiring, developing, and managing a government-owned system of systems (SoS), including:
- Vest the authority for budget, requirements, and acquisition at the same level of command to allow for fair trade-offs and prevent requirements creep.
- Use SoS architectures to assist in making the tough decisions on what to keep, cut, and buy from a mission portfolio baseline.
- Think spiral, not linear, development. As soon as a capability is ready, get it into the hands of users, working to upgrade as you go.
