NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — The leader of the Navy said Monday he is looking for industry partners to stop being so polite and start frank conversations about requirements earlier in the acquisition process to speed up how quickly sailors can get their hands on the latest technology.
Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson said the Navy must become a better customer and fundamentally change the way it does business to keep up with rapidly changing technology, otherwise “we will just fall behind.”
One change he discussed involved talking to industry leaders earlier in the process before requirements are determined for a specific project.
“If we tap into that creativity earlier, and say, hey here’s our problem, oftentimes I’ve found that our partners will be able to provide a solution that we probably would not have foreseen,” Richardson said at the opening panel with service leaders at the Navy League’s annual Sea-Air-Space Exposition.
He urged industry leaders in the audience to push the Defense Department to get new technology in warfighter’s hands quicker through a more agile process.
“I want to challenge all of our industry partners to challenge us,” Richardson said. “In these conversations, we’re getting to the point of honesty, but I’ve got to say that the traditional customer relationship sometimes breeds a level of politeness which can inhibit that frank discussion that we need to have in terms of how to enhance that partnership.”
During the question-and-answer portion of the panel, one audience member from General Dynamics Electric Boat raised issue with Navy requirement documents, which he said can stretch to hundreds of pages, and asked Richardson to cut them way down.
“I’m wondering if in terms of streamlining the process and not over-determining requirements we might be able to get to something on the order of maybe five pages that says here’s what I really want for my Navy, how can you help me?” he said.
Richardson acknowledged that the requirement system has “honestly run off the rails.”
Gen. Robert Neller, the commandant of the Marine Corps, said that during most of his career as a customer, he felt things moved “too slow” and caused the U.S. to fall “behind in many areas. But, in his new vantage point as the leader of the Marines, he said the sea services must work to find a balance to get technology to the fleet faster, while ensuring systems are still high quality and allow for adequate competition among industry.
“There’s the tension: How do you go faster in this world when you have rules that are designed to allow everyone in here to compete?” Neller said. “Even if you don’t win the bid, you get to protest. I understand that, that’s business, that’s money and that’s what you do, you have to make money and you have employees you have an obligation to … but we’ve got an obligation to the men and women in our service to give them new gear as soon as we can.”
