Best manufacturing practices survey of Navy's Directorate for Missiles and Surface Launchers: a process for benchmarking program management office teams and processes - Best Practices

Defense AT&L, Jan-Feb, 2004 by Larry J. Halbig, Thomas A. Harvat, Frederick F. Schulz

* Government program office/contractor co-location--which improved communication.

The full BMP survey report is available on the BMP Web site at <www.bmpcoe.org>.

Firsts for BMPCOE

"We were thrilled to receive Clay's invitation," says SuPrise. "Though the BMP program has conducted many surveys of government enterprises [including all services, operational fleet units, and support activities at various echelons] this was our first survey of a PMO."

At first glance, some might consider surveying a PMO to be a stretch for the BMPCOE, but the majority of the best practices recently validated have been in the management area (currently 33 percent of the total BMP database). "For this survey, my vision was to rely heavily on our partnership with DAU, the DoD program management functional gurus," adds SuPrise. While members of the DAU faculty had served on teams for previous BMP surveys of industry, having a DAU member as co-chair of the team this marked another first. "DAU came through like champs," says SuPrise. "Benchmarking DoD PMO teams is a logical and essential step in the evolution of the BMP survey process. Partnering with the DAU provides an exceptional resource of SMEs for our BMP survey teams."

A Survey Team Member's Perspective

"I found great value in my participation on the BMP survey team, and highly recommend that DAU faculty and staff actively seek to participate on a survey team," says DAU faculty member Jill Garcia. She adds that the benefit is three-fold: (1) staying current with organizations' best practices; (2) networking and making contacts with practitioners; and (3) sharing experiences and knowledge with others to improve performance.

A PM's Viewpoint

"We were the first program office to be surveyed by the BMPCOE, and we hope others will follow," says Crapps. "We will let others learn from us and hope to learn from them once they have participated in the survey process. We believe the BMPCOE provides a credible resource for helping members of the AT & L community identify and mitigate program risks." Crapps adds that the BMPCOE mission aligns perfectly with the USD (AT & L) goals, and their developed tools (such as the Program Manager's WorkStation (PMWS) and Collaborative Work Environment (CWE)) enable rapid access to technical guidelines documents and management of geographically dispersed teams.

On Nov. 22, 2002, at the PEO/SYSCOM Commander's Conference at the DAU, the USD (AT & L) introduced his top five priorities for the next 18 months. The updated goals were to:

* Continue progress with the original five goals.

* Re-engineer AT & L.

* Develop acquisition plans for all major weapon systems.

* Complete plans for a future logistics enterprise.

* Accelerate flow of technology to the warfighter.

He stressed to the conference attendees that their work as PMs had "never been more important or anticipated" in fielding affordable, high quality, technologically superior advanced weapon systems.

In today's environment of highly sophisticated and complex warfare, where a single failure can destroy combat resources, bring about undesirable political consequences, and--most important--imperil human life, it is vital that program management functions be performed to the highest standards of excellence, using the best practices available. PEO IWS 3A is already addressing additional challenges of working with suppliers to reduce hardware cost; preserve its vendor base; and evolve both the STANDARD Missile and Vertical Launching System capabilities to meet increasingly sophisticated threats. The directorate remains committed to excellence in communication andto exchanging best practices with other program offices and the entire U.S. industrial base.