Probing the "It Depends" Variables - 30 years for Defense Systems Management School

Program Manager, May, 2001 by Dr. Alan W. Beck

A Look at DSMC's Three Decades of Teaching Management in the Political Context of Changing Situations

"It depends" has been the campus joke, motto, answer, and starting point for three decades of program management education. Frustrating to those who seek single "right" answers, a starting point for inquiry into cause and effect for those who seek deterministic answers, and a constant reminder of complexity and nuance for all of us, the "it depends" is loved, hated, or simply accepted as just part of our business.

Complexity of Challenge Calls for Practical Training

In 1971, when David Packard dedicated the Defense Systems Management School at Fort Belvoir, he called for it to be an academy of management where the best and brightest from all walks of the acquisition community could come to study and understand our complex challenges of managing defense programs. A leader of the initial curriculum, Dr. J. Ronald Fox of Harvard, identified the complexity of the challenge and stressed the need for practical training to equip leaders to manage in this complex environment. Fox called for a curriculum to help students with "...defense program management and procurement the problems encountered, the options for dealing with these problems, and the methods for selecting from among the options." To analyze and select from options requires insight into the "it depends" drivers.

Fox also noted that the original Curriculum Committee did not stress the behavioral sciences' role in helping managers deal in the complexity of program management. [1] In the 1970s, I also would not have given much attention to teaching government program managers about behavioral choices and preferences. However, as I have learned more about human behavior and leadership, I have become convinced that understanding our preferences helps in choosing actions and considering others' recommendations in our complex context, where knowing what is behind "it depends" is a key to success. Our choices in teaching, learning, and leadership depend on our assessment of the situation in context, viewed from the lens of our preferences.

The purpose of this article is to give you my theory-based professor's perspective on how DSMC has dealt with the "it depends" challenge for the past 30 years. The three-decade perspective is mine. I attended the Program Management Course (PMC) in the 1970s and have taught at DSMC since 1980. I came to DSMC with experience in teaching at the U.S. Air Force Academy, at the U.S. Air Force Officer Training School, and as a part-time adjunct in graduate school. At DSMC I learned to question my assumptions on teaching and learning, and to tune in to what the theorists were saying about how to best help adults learn and perform.

The Little Boy

"It depends" seems to be most frustrating to those who prefer a simple and structured situation where there is one right answer. In DoD program management, the situation is often complex, with multiple paths or possible ways to act and no single right answer. PMC students, beginning in the 1970s, were introduced to this issue with an Air Force video, The Little Boy, which was based on the classic poem by Helen F. Buckley. [2] Prior to his death in 1986, Professor John Demodovitch of the Air Force Institute of Technology came to show and discuss the little boy's "red flower with green stem" story at the opening of each PMC class. [3] Shortly after Professor Demodovitch died, DSMC established the "Demodovitch Award" for creativity and innovation. He challenged students and faculty to be flexible and creative in the "it depends" world of constant change and complex context.

For a few classes in 1987 and 1988, the Little Boy video was not shown at the start of each PMC as a means to introduce the "it depends" context dimensions. As the "New Vision" PMC curriculum was implemented in 1987, the old integrated System X, or "SX" case study approach was changed to one of simulations, with a less-structured and more open-ended approach. Increasing numbers of students seemed unhappy with the more open-ended part of the SX curriculum, which often had no "right" answer, but called for creative solutions based on analysis of "it depends."

In 1988, after I became responsible for the PMC curriculum, I stopped paying for a motivational speaker on the first day of PMC and resumed presentation of the "red flower with green stem" story to all PMC classes, much as I had seen John Demodovitch do for many classes. So since 1972, most senior people in program management have seen the story in the Little Boy video, and have some insight into "it depends" and how individual and organizational management style may nurture or quash creativity and innovation.

Spectrum of Leadership Choices

Do you prefer rules and structure more, or an open-ended style of "no rules -- just right?"

The Little Boy story gives us a way to look at ourselves and others as we reflect on our preferences for doing things "by the book" (MilSpec?), one way with one right answer -- or of allowing, encouraging, or permitting creativity in multiple approaches. The story shows a teacher training a little boy to only respond when given specific directions, so he would draw a red flower with a green stem or mold a vase exactly to the teacher's class (military?) specification. Soon the boy loses his creativity and initiative, and just waits to be told what to do and when to do it.