Stop Reading DoD Innovation Articles
[Insert standard “these opinions are mine and do not reflect the opinions of others real or imagined” statement]
Over the years, I’ve read a few “Problems with DoD Innovation” articles and while observationally correct, they all say the same thing and lack any sort of substance. However, this latest one was the straw that broke this camel’s back for me. It's no more egregious than anything else I've read, but I felt compelled.?The articles I am talking about all center around our largest publicized problem: Acquisitions and Innovation.?Let me summarize all of them for you:
There, you don’t have to read another article, and I’ll dissect this one to prove it.
Full disclosure – I am not saying they don’t have a point, it’s just nauseating to read criticisms about innovation from those who don’t understand innovation. ?(obligatory Man in the Arena quote)
Anything that sets the stage with, “(it’s) unlikely that any significant progress toward overhauling the DoD acquisition process will be made in the near future,” should be immediately discounted because this typically means they don’t understand technology development, innovation, adoption, testing, integration, or any of the “ilities” associated with developing useful systems.?They are focused on NOW NOW NOW.?Certainly, we can be faster and more efficient, but “significant” results from innovators are never fielded 24 hours after the Eureka moment.?Prove me wrong (I'd actually love to be wrong here.)
“Significant Innovation” disrupts processes.?It changes our lives and ways of business.?To think that,
1 – we can build an effective innovation program overnight and,
2 – we can expect “significant innovation” from these initiatives … well … ever ... is a fool’s game
Innovation is simple, but it’s not easy. ?Although these articles will have you only focus on the former.
“… under the DoD’s current organizational structure, defense innovation is disconnected from defense procurement.”
Wholly incorrect, but for non-obvious reasons.? Innovation is not an office, nor a person.?It does not need a job title, office location, or permission.?It takes an idea that people want to work hard toward to achieve.?It’s that simple.?Commitment to the actions required to achieve that idea, by competent people of high moral character is hard.?Motivation wanes when we don’t get results as fast as we wanted.?Frustration kicks in when we hit roadblocks.?BUT – true Innovators take determined action to solve those problems as part of the natural process.?To suggest we can’t innovate because there is no connective tissue undermines precisely what disciplined innovation accomplishes.?Now, if you want to say we lack discipline in innovation, then there might be a point worth exploring.
?“The report then provides a brief history…”
Yes, got it... we’ve created “teh interwebz,” GPS, and a whole host of other cool stuff.?Matter of fact, without government funding there might not be transistors, lasers, RADAR, LEDs, etc.?To lump over 100 years of moving technology from basic science to mass commercial products by comparison of what we’ve done over the past 5 years is maybe the worst argument in this entire piece.?Yes, acquisition needs to be revamped.?That’s almost literally the definition of innovation .
?“The report notes that DoD has made some positive strides … (through) innovation offices, such as those run by the?Defense Innovation Unit ?… AFWERX, NavalX, and the Army Applications Lab.”
?Ugh.?Honestly, we aren’t innovative because we set up an office or pasted big vinyl letters saying “Innovation Starts Here” in our break room.?(tongue in cheek).?This is simply senior leadership acknowledging we have an innovation problem and are setting resources aside to get our people’s support. ?
?“Primes consistently choose subcontractors they know and trust. Why? Because the top goals for programs of record are on-time, on-budget, on-spec platforms and systems, the report notes, not innovation. With those primary goals, it’s safest to go with contractors you know and trust.”??
Yeah, don't hire someone you trust to get the job done, that would be awful. Would you hire a 3-man team to build your house??The one they designed, when they felt like it, for whatever they wanted to spend??Of course not, this is ridiculous.?But all things being considered equal (which they never are), fair point. ?But SlickLabs , 10XTS , Chargin' Charlie Construction are my small businesses and shouldn't be hired to create ultra-wide band, heat-resistant THz antennas.?Those take resources and massive experience, usually in the form of big teams.?I am certain the taxpayer wouldn’t be a big fan of spending $5M over 2 years for me to produce a “lessons learned” paper just to give a small business a chance. ?Is there a balance? ?Sure, and that’s something we are absolutely working on.
“The result is that DoD’s current approach to innovation “is more akin to innovation tourism — with the DoD sampling the local fare of the United States’ various tech hubs” than a long-term strategy.
Yes and no.?The article literally points out we’re insular, then takes a jab at us for reaching out.?So which is it??In the short term, the strategy makes sense, or at least was worth experimenting with.?In the Air Force, the strategy under Dr Roper was, in part, to somehow show the AF was open for business to “non-traditional” tech companies.?Did it work??Well, I don’t think you can say it didn’t work.?The various locations, designated as hubs, definitely got us introduced to more technologies from small businesses than we had traditionally been getting.?On the other hand, how many innovation hubs do we need and how effective are they??Debatable.?Hubs have become an economic-developer’s safety net.?“We held 38,000 meetings last year.”?Great.?How does that keep us on the leading edge of innovation??So I will concede it doesn’t appear to be a long-term (read: sustainable) strategy.?But in our defense, strategy, like innovation, is an iterative process so we will be working on that as we learn how to do business better ... with better businesses.
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And for non-traditional defense contractors, “just as selling a few souvenirs will not sustain a local business, winning a few small R&D contracts will not keep a young tech company permanently afloat.”
Agreed, but how many other organizations offer the opportunity for non-dilutive, non-interest-bearing capital??Certainly no angel, VC, or bank I've ever spoken to. Is it perfect? ?Not by a long shot. But we’re (read: taxpayer) is not in the business of “keeping a young technology company permanently afloat.”?We have requirements that have serious consequences, and we need those to be met.?As the best innovators inside the fence solve problems to fix the acquisition mess, there is an expectation we are partnering with the best innovators outside the fence who can solve their problems to continue our fruitful relationship.
The report notes that innovation offices are not to blame, because after all, “A group of small, disconnected, sparsely funded offices housed under the research enterprise cannot be expected to transform the culture and technological capabilities of the entire DoD acquisition system.”
Thanks for the back-handed compliment??Again, stop reading this garbage.?I guess I need to put an ad in Craigslist: “ISO Time Machine” so we can let the Wright Brothers , The Barn Gang , The Traiterous 8 , and even Col Boyd know they can’t change an entire system.
"Three recommendations, which it acknowledges are not comprehensive, but are actionable today, including:
1)?????Define innovation goals and increase transparency.
2)?????Share and use market intelligence across the acquisition ecosystem.
3)?????Create safe spaces for collaboration"
1 - Goals/transparency: yup.?we’ve been asking for this for some time.?Should be part of a holistic innovation strategy.?Would be very helpful to let everyone in and outside the fence know how to effectively engage to manage expectations and stop seeing these ridiculous articles.
2 – Sharing intelligence: oh communication is hard??Tell me more.
3 – Safe space: OK – I am trying to use my words here… didn’t the article just criticize the hubs??That’s exactly what those do… if nothing else.?I don’t know what they mean by safe space, I wouldn’t consider them dangerous.?If they mean freedom to express ideas, fine.?But for the record, dumb ideas absolutely exist and should be ruthlessly killed . This doesn’t mean we get to be jerks about it, and certainly doesn’t mean rank has any privileges in innovation.
One thing is for certain: “The DoD must act immediately to implement a true innovation strategy using the authorities it currently has at its disposal,” the report urges. “The country cannot allow perfection to be the enemy of progress.”
Oddly left out of this conclusion: Water is wet.
What drives me nuts is we’ve been here before.?We’ve been successful at it.?In general, these articles are right (maybe for the wrong reasons). ?If we’d only look back at “how” we did it before and how we can be better today, we’d stop seeing these articles.
Hint – Start with some basic principles:
“In life there is often a roll call. That’s when you will have to make a decision. To be or to do? Which way will you go?” – Col John Boyd
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3 年One of the biggest issues I've seen is that the DoD has created these Innovation Hubs/organizations, but not addressed the core of the problem. By creating the hubs, they are implying (and even outright stating) that innovation can't exist in the existing organizational and process structure. I remember when DIU-X was created ("X" being eXperimental) they said the intent was to demonstrate new ways of doing business and then bring those successes back "inside the fence". But that hasn't happened. Then to make matters worse, statements were made that our people aren't innovative and that we needed to look to small businesses and commercial industry to find the ideas. This was a slap in the face to the workforce that was battling the organization and process as well as the larger companies. But the DoD still continues to stand-up these external organizations (and populate them with the same people that are sitting in the existing organizations) and claim success.
International Sustainment Branch Chief at Air Force Life Cycle Management Center
3 年Too many don't understand the concept you put plainly here, "Innovation is not an office, nor a person.?It does not need a job title, office location, or permission.?It takes an idea that people want to work hard toward to achieve.?It’s that simple." And as you stated before that, " simple, but not easy." It's easier to create a process, guide, flow, or some magical tool that will make us innovative. Easy, but those things fail without addressing the culture, people, and our behaviors...which is hard. Very hard, but not impossible. Clearly not impossible, because as you described through and through, it's happening. It's been happening. And notably, happening, in the face of the challenges and limitations also described. Keep it up DoD. Keep striving to strike the delicate balance of cautious innovation that brings next gen thinking to national and global defense. Remembering that lives, not just convenience may be at stake, so there are legit reasons to temper speed and simplicity. And thanks Slater for the reminder to push for and expect better from ourselves and each other, while recognizing our best along the way.?
International Sustainment Branch Chief at Air Force Life Cycle Management Center
3 年Technically your article says DoD un-sucks at innovation. Kinda like a Slater in Wonderland approach about to traverse a rabbit hole.
“Anything worth doing, is worth doing repeatedly!”
3 年Kind of surprised by this article. Especially since many of your points are in violent agreement with the report you're dumping on ??. I think your criticism is a bit too deferential to the status quo. Yeah, we have serious requirements that need serious expertise in the companies we hire. But when a 9-figure prominent prime can spend years delivering nothing, and then have their deliverable shipped in a year by a new Air Force team with heavy warfighter involvement, we have a problem. Doesn't mean the problem is with the prime, necessarily. But like a drunk looking for his keys under the streetlight, it doesn't help us to innovate where it's convenient, we have to innovate where it actually matters. And that means within the procurement/acquisition system. You were surprised a bit about their recommendation for collab spaces given that they didn't like hubs. But I didn't read their report as saying hubs were bad... just that they were low leverage. So stuff like that makes me a bit confused by your critique. It's almost like we read different reports. I take yours to mean that either we don't need innovation as much as we think we do, or that we *are* innovating and we're doing a good job at it, actually. If either is right, I'd take exception to both of those. We have lots of innovators working hard, but we can't confuse "working hard" with "delivering outcomes", and I think the report is right to note that we've been falling short on the latter and still need to improve things to maintain our lead.
Co-Founder - CTO, 10XTS
3 年It was quiet an interesting read and I really loved the references. What also resonated with me was expecting change and innovation in a 24hr span. Just because your Amazon package comes to you in such short time frame doesn't mean it took that long to innovate the industry. Everybody wants to print and highlight overnight success, except for few lucky Bitcoin millionaires, true innovation takes years.