Getting Better Outcomes from Weapon System Programs

Abstract : CHALLENGES THAT REMAIN TO GETTING BETTER OUTCOMES: How will initiatives like strengthened focus on SE, EMRLS, etc., succeed when incentives encourage starting programs too early, making revolutionary technical leaps, underestimating cost and risk, and promising record delivery times? * Can we employ evolutionary acquisition and trade requirements to match a 5-year cycle and to mature technologies? * Can we provide S&T the funds, organization, and authority to do the necessary pre-acquisition SE and technology development work? * Can we put managers in a position to succeed with a shorter cycle and hold them accountable for results? * Can capabilities-based requirements be controlled so that tradeoffs can be made? * If the solution requires the invention of numerous technologies, is so complex that the government cannot be the integrator, and so expensive that it takes most of a service's budget, is it really a viable solution?