Economics | Life, Project Management, and Everything

Shake it Out – Embracing the Future in Program Management – Part One: Program and Project Management in the Public Interest

I heard the song from which I derived the title to this post sung by Florence and the Machine and was inspired to sit down and write about what I see as the future in program management.

Thus, my blogging radio silence has ended as I begin to process and share my observations and essential achievements over the last couple of years.

Some of my reticence in writing has been due to the continual drumbeat of both outrageous and polarizing speech that had dominated our lives for four years. Combined with the resulting societal polarization, I was overwhelmed by the hyper-politicized environment which has fostered disinformation and dysfunction. Those who wish to seek my first and current word on this subject need only visit my blog post, “In Defense of Empiricism” at the AITS Blogging Alliance here.

It is hard to believe that I published that post four years ago. I stand by it today and believe that it remains as valid, if not more so, than it did when I wrote and shared it.

Finally, the last and most important reason for my relative silence has been that I have been hard at work putting my money and reputation where my blogging fingers have been—in the face of a pandemic that has transformed and transfigured our social and economic lives.

My company—the conduit that provides the insights I share here—is SNA Software LLC. We are a small, veteran-owned company and we specialize in data capture, transformation, contextualization and visualization. We do it in a way that removes significant effort in these processes, ensures reliability and trust, to incorporate off-the-shelf functionality that provides insight, and empowers the user by leveraging the power of open systems, especially in program and project management.

Program and Project Management in the Public Interest

There are two aspects to the business world that we inhabit: commercial and government; both, however, usually relate to some aspect of the public interest, which is our forte.

There are also two concepts about this subject to unpack.

The first is distinguishing between program and project management. In this concept, a program is an overarching effort that may consist of individual efforts that, together, will result in the production or completion of a system, whether that is a weapons system, a satellite, a spacecraft, or an engine. It could even be a dam or some other aspect of public works.

A project under this concept is a self-contained effort separated organizationally from the larger entity, which possesses a clearly defined start and finish, a defined and allocated budget, and a set of plans, a performance management feedback system, and overarching goals or “framing assumptions” that define what constitutes the state of being “done.”

Oftentimes the terms “program” and “project” are used interchangeably, but the difference for these types of efforts is important and goes beyond a shallow understanding of the semantics. A program will also consider the lifecycle of the program: the follow-on logistics, the interrelationship of the end item to other components that will constitute the deployed system or systems, and any iterative efforts relating to improvement, revision, and modernization.

A word on the term “portfolio” is also worth a mention in the context of our theme. A portfolio is simply a summary of the projects or programs under an organizational entity that has both reporting and oversight responsibility for them. They may be interrelated or independent in their efforts, but all must report in some way, either due to fiduciary, resource, or oversight concerns, to that overarching entity.

The second concept relates to the term “public interest.” Programs and projects under this concept are those that must address the following characteristics: legality, governance, complexity, integrity, leadership, oversight, and subject matter expertise. I placed these in no particular order.

What we call in modern times “public interest” was originally called “public virtue” by the founders of the United States, which embody the ideals of the American Revolution, and upon which our experiment in democratic republicanism is built. It consists of conducting oneself in a manner in which the good of the whole—the public—outweighs personal interests and pursuits. Self-dealing need not apply.

This is no idealistic form of self-delusion: I understand, as do my colleagues, that we are, at heart, a commercial profit-making enterprise. But the manner in which we engage with government requires a different set of rules and many of these rules are codified in law and ethical practice. While others do not always feel obliged to live by these rules, we govern ourselves and so choose to apply these virtues—and to seek to support and change our system to encourage such behavior to as to be the norm—even in direct interactions with government personnel where we feel these virtues have been violated.

Characteristics of Public Interest Programs

Thus, the characteristics outlined above apply to program and project management in the public interest in the following manner:

Legality: That Public Interest Programs are an artifact of law and statute and are specifically designed to benefit the public as a whole.

At heart, program and project management are based on contractual obligations, whether those instruments apply internally or externally. As a result, everyone involved in the program and project management discipline is, by default, part of the acquisition community and the acquisition process. The law that applies to all government acquisition systems is based on the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR). There are also oversight and fiduciary responsibilities that apply as a result of the need for accountability under the Congressional appropriations process as well as ethical standards that apply, such as those under the Truth in Negotiations Act (TINA). While broad in the management flexibility they allow, violations of these statutes come with serious consequences. Thus, as a basis for establishing hard and fast guardrails in the management of programs and projects. Individual government agencies and military services also publish additional standards that supplement the legal requirements. An example is the Department of Defense FAR Supplement (DFARS). Commercial entities that hold government contracts in relation to Program Management Offices (PMOs) must sign on to both FAR and agency contractual clauses, which will then flow down to their subcontractors. Thus, the enforcement of these norms is both structured and consistent.

Governance: That the Organizational Structure and Disciplines deriving from Public Interest Programs are a result of both Contract and Regulatory Practice under the concept of Government Sovereignty.

The government and supplier PMOs are formed as a result of a contractual obligation for a particular purpose. Government contracting is unique since government entities are the sovereign. In the case of the United States, the sovereign is the elected government of the United States, which derives its legitimacy from the people of the United States as a whole. Constitutionally, the Executive Branch is tasked with the acquisition responsibility, but the manner and method of this responsibility is defined by statute.

Thus, during negotiations and unlike in commercial practice, the commercial entity is always the offeror and the United States always the party that either accepts or rejects the offer (the acceptor). This relationship has ramifications in contract enforcement and governance of the effort after award. It also allows the government to dictate the terms of the award through its solicitations. Furthermore, provisions from law establish cases where the burden for performance is on the entity (the supplier) providing the supplies and services.

Thus, the establishment of the PMO and oversight organizations have a legal basis, aside from considerations of best business practice. The details of governance within the bounds of legal guidance are those that apply through agency administrative law and regulation, oftentimes based on best business practice. These detailed practices of governance are usually established as a result of hard-learned experience: establishment of disciplines (systems engineering and technical performance, planning, performance management, cost control, financial execution, schedule, and progress assessment), the periodicity of reporting, the manner of oversight, the manner of liaison between the supplier and government PMOs, and alignment to the organization’s goals.

Complexity: That Public Interest Programs possess a level of both technical and organizational complexity unequaled in the private sector.

Program and project management in government involves a level of complexity rarely found in similar non-governmental commercial efforts. Aligning the contractual requirements, as an example, to an assessment of the future characteristics of a fighter aircraft needed to support the U.S. National Defense Strategy, built on the assessments by the intelligence agencies regarding future threats, is a unique aspect of government acquisition.

Furthermore, while relying on the expertise of private industry of such systems that support national defense, as well as those that support space exploration, energy, and a host of other needs, the items being acquired, which require cost type R&D contracts that involve program management, by definition are those where the necessary solutions are not readily available as commercial end items.

Oftentimes these requirements are built onto and extend existing off-the-shelf capabilities. But given that government investment in R&D represents the majority of this type of spending in the economy, absent it, technology and other efforts directed to meeting defense, economic, societal, climate, and space exploration challenges of the future would most likely not be met—or those that do will benefit only a portion of the populace. The federal government uniquely possesses the legal legitimacy, resources, and expertise to undertake such R&D that, pushing the envelope on capabilities, involves both epistemic and aleatory risk that can be managed through the processes of program management.

Integrity: The conduct of Public Interest Programs demands the highest level of commitment to a culture of accountability, impartiality, ethical conduct, fiduciary responsibility, democratic virtues, and honesty.

The first level of accountability resides in the conduct of the program manager, who is the locus of integrity within the program management office. This requires a focus on the duties the position demands as a representative of the Government of the United States. Furthermore, the program manager must ensure that the program team operate within the constraints established by the program’s or project’s contractual commitments, and that it continues to work to meeting the program goals that align with the stated interests and goals of the organization. That these duties are exercised regardless of self-interest is the basis of integrity.

This is not an easy discipline, and individuals oftentimes cannot separate their own interests from those of their duties. Yet, without this level of commitment, the legitimacy of the program office and the governmental enterprise itself is threatened.

In prior years, as an active-duty Supply Corps officer, I came across cases where individuals in civil service or among the commissioned officer community confused their own interests—for promotion, for self-aggrandizement, for ego—with those duties demanded of their rank or position. Such confusions of interests are serious transgressions. With contracted-out positions within program offices adding consulting and staffing firms into the mix, with their oftentimes diversified interests and portfolios, an additional layer of challenges is presented. Self-promotion, competition, and self-dealing have all too often become blatant, and program managers would do well to enforce strict rules regarding such behavior.

The pressures of exigency are oftentimes the main cause of the loss of integrity of the program or project. Personal interrelationships and human resource management issues can also undermine good order and discipline necessary for the program or project to organize itself into a cohesive, working team that is focused on a common vision.

Key elements mentioned in our opening thesis regarding ethical conduct, adherence to democratic virtues which include acceptance of all members of the team regardless of color, ethnicity, race, sexual identity, religion, or place of national origin. People deserve the respect and decency deriving from their basic human rights to enjoy human dignity, as well as of their position. Adding to these elements include honesty and the willingness to accept and report bad news, which is essential to integrity.

An organization committed to the principle of accountability will seek to measure and ensure that the goals of the program or project are being met, and that ameliorative measures are taken to correct any deficiencies. Since these efforts oftentimes involve years of effort involving significant sums of public monies, fiduciary integrity is essential to this characteristic.

All of these elements can and should exist in private, commercial practices. The difference that makes this a unique characteristic to program management in the public interest is the level of scrutiny, reporting, and review that is conducted: from oversight agencies within the Executive Department of the government, to the Congressional oversight, hearing and review processes, agency review, auditing and reporting, and inquires and critiques by the press and the public. Public interest program management is life in a fishbowl, except in the most secret efforts, and even those will eventually be subject to scrutiny.

As with a U.S. Navy ship that makes a port of call in a foreign country, the actions of the conduct of crew will not only reflect on themselves or their ship, but on the United States; so it is also with our program offices. Thus, systems of programmatic governance and business management must anticipate in their structure the level of adherence required. Given the inherent level of risk involved in these efforts, and given the normal amount of error human systems create even with good intentions and expertise, establishing a system committed to the elements of integrity creates a self-correcting one better prepared to meet the program’s or project’s challenges.

Leadership: Programs in the Public Interest differ from equivalent commercial efforts in that management systems and incentives based on profit- and shareholder-orientations do not exist. Instead, a special kind of skillset is required that includes good business management principles and skills combined with highly developed leadership traits.

Management skills tend to be a subset of leadership, though in business schools and professional courses they tend to be addressed as co-equal. This is understandable in commercial enterprises that focus on the capitalistic pressures regarding profit and market share.

Given the unique pressures imposed by the elements of integrity, the program manager and the program team are thrown into a situation that requires a focus on the achievement of organizational goals. In the case of program and project management, this will be expressed in the form of a set of “framing assumptions” that roll into an overarching vision.

A program office, of course, is more than a set of systems, practices, and processes. It is, first and foremost, a collection of individuals consisting of subject matter experts and professionals who must be developed into a team committed to the vision. The effort to achieve this team commitment is one of the more emotional and compelling elements that comprise leadership.

Human systems are adaptive ones, complex, which react and are created by both incentives and sanctions. Every group, especially involving creative and talented people, starts out being a collection of individuals with the interrelations among the members in an immature state. Underlying the expression of various forms of ambition and self-identification among mature individuals is the basic human need for social acceptance, born from the individual personal need for love. This motivation exists psychologically in all individuals except for sociopaths. It is also the basis for empathy and the acceptance of the autonomy of others, which form the foundation for team building.

The goal of the leader is to encourage maturity among the members of the group. The result is to create that overused term “synergy.” This is accomplished by doing those things as a leader necessary to develop members of the group that fosters trust, acceptance, and mutual respect. Admiral James L. Holloway, Jr., in his missive on Naval Leadership, instructed his young officers to eschew any concept of perfectionism in people. People make mistakes. We know this if we are to be brutally honest about our own experiences and actions.

Thus, intellectual honesty and an understanding on what motivates people within their cultural mores, above all else, is essential to good leadership. Americans, by nature, tend to be skeptical and independently minded. They require a level of explanation and due diligence that is necessary to win over their commitment to a goal or vision. When it comes to professionals operating within public service in government—who take an oath to the Constitution and our system of laws—the ability to lead tends to be more essential than just good management skills, though the latter are by no means unimportant. Management in private enterprise assumes a contentious workplace of competing values and interests, and oftentimes fosters it.

Program and project management in the public interest cannot succeed in such an environment. It requires a level of commitment to the goals of the effort regardless of personal values or interests among the individual members of the team. That they must be convinced to this level of commitment ensures that the values of leadership not only operate at the top of the management chain, but also at each of the levels and lateral relationships that comprise the team.

The shorthand for leadership in this culture is that the leader is “working their way out of their job,” and “that in order to be a good leader one must be a good follower,” meaning that all members of the team are well-informed, that their contributions, expertise and knowledge is acknowledged and respected, that individual points of failure through the irreplaceable person syndrome are minimized, and that each member of a team or sub-team can step in or step up to keep the operation functioning. The motivating concept in these situations are the interests of the United States, in lieu of a set of stockholders or some fiduciary reward.

Finally, there is the concept of the burden of leadership. Responsibility can be can be delegated, but accountability cannot. Leadership in this context entails an obligation to take responsibility for both the mission of the organization and the ethical atmosphere established in its governance.

Oversight: While the necessity for integrity anticipates the level of accountability, scrutiny, oversight, and reporting for Programs in the Public Interest, the environment this encompasses is unique compared to commercial entities.

The basis for acquisition at the federal level resides in the Article Two powers of the president as the nation’s Chief Executive. Congress, however, under its Article One powers, controls appropriations and passes laws related to the processes, procedures and management of the Executive Branch.

Flowing from these authorities, the agencies within the federal government have created offices for the oversight of the public’s money, the methods of acquisition of supplies and services, and the management of contracts. Contracting Officers are given authority through a warrant to exercise their acquisition authority under the guidance and management of a senior acquisition authority.

Unlike in private business, the government operates under the concept of Actual Authority. That is, no one may commit the government except those possessing a warrant. Program Managers are appointed to provide control and administration of cost type efforts, especially those containing R&D, to shepherd these efforts over the course of what usually constitutes a multi-year effort. The Contracting Officer and/or the senior acquisition authority in these cases will delegate contract administration authority to the Program Manager. As such, it is a very powerful position.

The inherent powers of the Executive Branch and the Legislative Branches of government create a tension that is resolved through a separation of powers and the ability of one branch to—at least in most cases—check the excesses and abuses of the other: the concept of checks and balances, especially through the operation of oversight.

When these tensions cannot be resolved within the processes established for separation of powers, the third branch of government becomes involved: this is the Judicial Branch. The federal judiciary has the ability to review all laws of the United States, their constitutionality, and their adherence to the letter of the law in the case of statute.

Wherever power exists within the federal government there exists systems of checks and balances. The reason for this is clear, and Lord Acton’s warning about power corrupting and absolute power corrupting absolutely is the operational concept.

Congress passes statutes and the Judiciary interprets the law, but it is up to the Executive Branch through the appointed heads of the various departments of government down through the civil service and, in the case of the Department of Defense, the military chain of command under civilian authority, to carry out the day-to-day activities in executing the laws and business of the government. This creates a large base of administrative law and procedure.

Administrative Law and the resulting procedures in their implementation come about due to the complexities in the statutes themselves, the tests of certain provisions of the statutes in the interplay between the various branches of government, and the practicalities of execution. This body of law and procedure is oftentimes confused with “regulation” in political discussions, but it is actually the means of ensuring that the laws are faithfully executed without undue political influence. It is usually supplemented by ethical codes and regulations as well.

As a part of this ecosystem, the Program in the Public Interest must establish a discipline related to self-regulation, due diligence, good business practice, fiduciary control, ethical and professional conduct, responsibility, and accountability. Just as the branches of the federal government are constructed to ensure oversight and checks-and-balances, this also exists with normative public administration within the Executive Branch agencies.

This is often referred to both positively and, mostly among political polemicists in the negative, as the bureaucracy. The development of bureaucracies in government is noted by historians and political scientists as an indication of political stability, maturity, and expertise. Without bureaucracies, governments tend to be capricious and their policies uncertain. The practice of stare decisis—the importance of precedent in legal decisions—is also part and parcel of stability. Government power can be beneficial or coercive. Resting action on laws and not the whims or desires of the individual person is essential to the good order and discipline of the federal government.

As such, program and project managers, given the extensive latitude and inherent powers of their position, are subject to rigorous reporting, oversight, and accountability regimes in the performance of their duties. In R&D cost-type program and project management efforts, the risk is shared between the supplier and the government. And the government flows down this same regime to the contractor to ensure the integrity of the effort in the expenditure of public monies and under the performance and delivery of public contacts.

This leads us to the last important aspect of oversight: public scrutiny, which also includes the press as the Fourth Estate. When I was a young Lieutenant in the Navy working in contracts the senior officer to whom I was assign often remarked: “Never do anything that would cause you to be ashamed were it to end up being read by your grandmother in the Washington Post.”

Unlike private business where law, contractual obligation, and fiduciary responsibility are the main pressures on tolerated behavior, the government and its actions are—and must be—under constant public scrutiny. It is expected. Senior managers who champ against the bit of this check on official conduct misunderstand their role. Even the appearance of malfeasance or abuse can cause one to steer into the rocks and shoals.

Subject Matter Expertise: Given the interrelated characteristics of legality, governance, complexity, integrity, leadership, and oversight—linked to the development of a professional, permanent bureaucracy acting through a non-partisan civil service—the practices necessary to successfully shepherd such efforts has produced areas of expertise and specialization. These areas provide a basis for leveraging technology in gaining insight into meeting all of the requirements necessary to the good administration and control of Program Management in the Public Interest.

The structures and practices of program and project management are reflected in the private economy. Some of this is contractually prescribed and some of it is based on best business practice learned through hard experience. In the interplay of government and industry, most often an innovation in one has been refined and improved in the other, only to find its way back to practice on the originating “side” of the transaction.

Initially in our history this cross-fertilization occurred through extraordinary wartime measures: standardization of rifled weaponry passed down by Thomas Jefferson and Eli Whitney, and for railroad track gauge standards issued by the Union government during the Civil War, are just two examples that turned out to provide a decisive advantage against laissez faire and libertarian approaches.

As the complexity of private business concerns, particularly in the international sphere, began to mimic—and in many cases surpass—the size and technical complexity of many individual government efforts, partnerships with civil authorities and private businesses saw the need for industry standardization for both electrical and non-electrical components and processes. The former was particularly important in the “Current Wars” between Edison and Westinghouse.

These simple and earlier examples highlight the great conundrum of standardization of supply, practice and procedure in acquisition: the need for economy through competition of many sources for any particular commodity or item weighed against the efficiency and interoperability needed to continue operations. Buying multiple individual items with the same function but produced using differing standards creates a nightmare of suboptimization. Overly restrictive standards can and have had the effect of reducing competition and stifling innovation, especially if the standard is proprietary.

In standards setting there are several interests involved that must be taken into account: the technical expertise (technical, qualitative, etc.) that underlies the standard, the public interest in ensuring a healthy marketplace that rewards innovation, diversity, and price competitiveness, the need for business-to-business cooperation and synergy in the marketplace, and the preponderance of practice, among others. In the Defense industry this also includes national security concerns.

This last consideration provides an additional level of tension between private industry and government interests. In the competition for market share and market niches, businesses are playing a zero-sum game that shifts between allies and competitors. Still, the interest of individual actors is focused on making a proprietary product or service dominant in the target market.

Government, on the other hand, particularly one that operates as a republic based on democratic processes and virtues and a commitment to equal rights, has a different set of interests that are, in many cases, diametrically opposed to those of individual players in the marketplace. Government needs and desires a broad choice of sources for what it needs, while ensuring that qualitative standards are met under a fair and reasonable price. When it does find innovation, it seeks to reward it, but only for the limited terms, conditions, and period of the contractual instrument.

The greater the risk in these cases—especially when cost risk is shared—the greater the need for standards, especially qualitative ones. The longer the term of the effort, the greater the need for checks and balances through evaluation, review, and oversight. The greater the dollar value, the greater importance for fiduciary and contractual accountability.

Thus, subject matter expertise has evolved over time, aligned with the functions and end items being developed and delivered. These areas include:

Estimating – A critical part of program and project management, this is a discipline with highly specialized quantitative methods for estimating and projecting project costs, resources, and duration. It is part of the planning phase prior to program or project inception. It can be used to support budget planning prior to program approval, during negotiations and, after award, to inform the project plan.

Systems Engineering – as described by the International Council of Systems Engineering, “a transdisciplinary and integrative approach to enable the successful realization, use, and retirement of engineered systems, using systems principles and concepts, and scientific, technological, and management methods.”

As it relates to program and project management, the technical documents related to providing the basis and structure of the lifecycle management of the end item application, including the application of technical standards, measures of effectiveness, measures of performance, key performance parameters, and technical performance measures. In simplistic terms, systems engineering defines when the item under R&D reaches the state of “done.”

Financial Management – at the program and project management level, the planning, organizing, directing and controlling the financial activities such as procurement and utilization of funds to adhere to the limitations of law and consistent with the terms and conditions of the contract and the its ancillary planning and execution documents.

At its core, financial management within this discipline includes the planning, programming, budgeting, and execution process for the financial requirements of successful program execution. As with any individual enterprise, cashflow for required activities with the right type of money determined by Congressional appropriation presents a unique and specialized skillset under program management in the public interest. Oftentimes the lack of funds necessary to address a particular programmatic risk or challenge can be just as decisive to program execution and success as any technical challenge.

Risk and Uncertainty – the concept of risk and uncertainty have evolved over time. Under classical economics (both Keynes and Knight), risk is where all of the future events and consequences of an action are known, but where specific outcomes are unknown. As such, probability calculus is applied to determine the risk management: mitigation and handling. Uncertainty, under this definition, is unknowable events that will result from our actions and is implicit in human action. There is no probability calculus or risk buy-down that can address areas of uncertainty. These definitions are also accepted under the concept of complexity economics.

My good colleague Glen Alleman (2013) at his blog, Herding Cats, casts risk as a product of uncertainty. This is a reordering of definitions, but not unuseful. Under Glen’s approach, uncertainty is broken into aleatory and epistemic uncertainty. The first—aleatory—comes from a random process, what Keynes, Knight, et al. would define as classical uncertainty. The second—epistemic—comes from lack of knowledge. The first is irreducible, which is consistent with classical economics and complexity economics; the second is subject to probability analysis and risk handling methodologies.

Both risk and uncertainty—aleatory and epistemic—occur within all phases and under each discipline within the project management environment. Any human action involves these forces of cause-and-effect and uncertainty—and limit our actions under the concept of “free will.”

Planning and Scheduling – usually these have been viewed as separate entities, but they are, in fact, part of a continuum, as are all of the disciplines mentioned, but more on that later in these blogs.

Planning involves the ability to derive the products of both the contract terms and conditions, and the systems engineering process. The purpose is to develop a high-level, time-phased plan that captures program events, deliverables, requirements, significant accomplishment criteria, and basic technical performance management achievement that will be the basis for a more detailed integrated master schedule.

The scheduling discipline is tasked with further delineating the summary tasks into schedule activities based on critical path methodology. A common refrain when I worked on the government side of program management was that you cannot eat an elephant in one gulp: you have to eat it one piece at a time.

As it relates to this portion of project methodology, I have, over the years, heard people say that planning and scheduling is more of an art instead of a science. Yet, the artifacts upon which our planning documents rest exist as part of the acquisition process and our systems and procedures are mature and largely standardized. The methods of systems engineering are precise and consistent.

The lexicon of planning and scheduling, regardless of the software applications or manual methods used, describe the same phenomenon and concepts, despite slightly different—and oftentimes proprietary—terminology. The concept of critical path analysis is well documented in the literature with slight, though largely insignificant, differences in application.

What appears as art is, in reality, a process that involves a great deal of complexity because these are the documents upon which all of the moving parts of the program are documented. Rather than art, it is a discipline that requires attention to detail and collaboration, aside from the power of computing.

Resource Management – as with planning and scheduling, resource management consists of a detailed accounting of the people, equipment, monies, and suppliers that are required to achieve the activities detailed in the program schedule.

In the detailed and specialized planning of projects and programs in the public interest, these efforts are cross-referenced and further delineated to the actual work that needs to be completed. A Work Breakdown Structure (or WBS), is the method of time-phasing the work using detailed tasks that integrate scope, cost, and schedule at the lowest level of achievement.

Baselining and Performance Management – are essential for project control in this environment. In this case, project and program schedule, cost, and resources are (ideally) risk adjusted and a performance management baseline is established: the basis for the assessment and control of the project.

This leads us to the methodology that is always on the cusp of being the Ozymandias of program management: earned value management or EVM. The discipline of EVM arose out of the Space Age era of the 1960s. The premise is simple: when undertaking any complex effort there is a finite amount of money and resources, and a target date for the needed end item. We need a method to determine whether the actual work performed in terms of budgeted resources and time is tracking to the plan to produce the desired end item application.

When looking at the utility of EVM, one must ask: while each of the disciplines noted above also track achievement over the lifecycle of the project or program, do any combine an analysis against budgeted time and resources? The answer is no, and so EVM is essential to management of these efforts.

Still, our other disciplines also track important information that is not captured by EVM. Thus, the entire corpus of our disciplines represents the project and program ecosystem. These processes, procedures, and the measures derived from them are interconnected. It is this salient fact that points us in the direction regarding the future of program management.

Conclusions from Part One

Given that we have outlined the unique and distinctive characteristics of public interest program management, the environment and basis upon which such program management rests, and the highly developed disciplines that have evolved as a result of the experience in system development, deployment, and lifecycle management, our inquiry must next explore the evolutionary nature of the program organization itself. Once identified and delineated, we must then determine the place of program organization within the context of developments in systems and information theory which will give us insight into the future of program management.

Ch- Ch- Changes–What I Learned at the NDIA IPMD Meeting and Last Thoughts on POGO DCMA

Hot Topics at the National Defense Industrial Association’s Integrated Program Management Division (NDIA-IPMD)

For those of you who did not attend, or who have a passing interest in what is happening in the public sphere of DoD acquisition, the NDIA IPMD meeting held last week was a great importance. Here are the highlights.

Electronic Submission of Program Management Information under the New Proposed DoD Schema

Those who have attended meetings in the past, and who read this blog, know where I stand on this issue, which is to capture all of the necessary information that provides a full picture of program and project performance among all of its systems and subsystems, but to do so in an economically feasible manner that reduces redundancy, reduces data streams, and improves timeliness of submission. Basic information economics state that a TB of data is only incrementally more expensive–as defined by the difference in the electricity generated–as a MB of data. Basic experience in IT management demonstrates that automating a process that eliminates touch labor in data production/validation improves productivity and speed.

Furthermore, if a supplier in complex program and project management is properly managing–and has sufficient systems in place–then providing the data necessary for the DoD to establish accountability and good stewardship, to ensure that adequate progress is being made under the terms of the contract, to ensure that contractually required systems that establish competency are reliable and accurate, and to utilize in future defense acquisition planning–should not be a problem. We live in a world of 0s and 1s. What we expect of our information systems is to do the grunt work handling ever large systems in providing information. In this scenario the machine is the dumb one and the person assessing the significance and context of what is processed into intelligence is the smart one.

The most recent discussions and controversies surrounded the old canard regarding submission at Control Account as opposed to the Work Package level of the WBS. Yes, let’s party like it’s 1997. The other issue was whether cumulative or current data should be submitted. I have issues with both of these items, which continue to arise like bad zombie ideas. You put a stake in them, but they just won’t die.

To frame the first issue, there are some organizations/project teams that link budget to control account, and others to work package. So practice is the not determinant, but it speaks to earned value management (EVM).The receiving organization is going to want the lowest level for reporting where there is foot-and-tie to not only budget, but to other systems. This is the rub.

I participated in an still-unpublished study for DoD that indicated that if one uses earned value management (EVM) exclusively to manage that it doesn’t matter. You get a bit more fidelity and early warning at the work package level, but not much.

But note my conditional.

No one exclusively uses EVM to manage projects and programs. That would be foolish and seems to be the basis of the specious attack on the methodology when I come upon it, especially by baby PMs. The discriminator is the schedule, and the early warning is found there. The place where you foot-and-tie schedule to the WBS is at the work package level. If you are restricted to the control account for reporting you have a guessing game–and gaming of the system–given that there will be many schedule activities to one control account.

Furthermore, the individual reviewing EVM and schedule will want to ensure that the Performance Measurement Baseline (PMB) and the Integrated Master Schedule (IMS) were not constructed in isolation from one another. There needs to be evidence that the work planned under the cost plan matches the work in time.

Regarding cumulative against current dollar submission the issue is one of accuracy. First, consecutive cumulative submissions require that the latest figure be subtracted from the last, which causes round-up errors–which are exacerbated if reporting is restricted to the control account level. NDIA IPMD had a long discussion on the intrinsic cumulative-to-cumulative error at a meeting last year, which was raised by Gary Humphreys of Humphreys & Associates. Second, cumulative submissions often hide retroactive changes. Third, to catch items in my second point, one must execute cross checks for different types of data, rather than getting a dump from the system of record and rolling up. The more operations and manipulation made to data, the harder it becomes to ensure fidelity and get everyone to agree on one trusted source, that is, in reading off of the same page.

When I was asked about my opinion on these issues, my response was twofold. First, as the head of a technology company it doesn’t matter to me. I can handle data in accordance with the standard DoD schema in any way specified. Second, as a former program management type and as an IT professional with an abiding dislike of inefficient systems, the restrictions proposed are based on the limitations of proprietary systems in use by suppliers that, in my opinion, need to be retired. The DoD and A&D market is somewhat isolated from other market pressures, by design. So the DoD must artificially construct incentives and an ecosystem that pushes businesses (and its own organizations) to greater efficiency and innovation. We don’t fly F-4s anymore, so why continue to use IT business systems designed in 1997 that are solely supported by sunk-cost arguments and rent seeking behavior?

Thus, my recommendation was that it was up to the DoD to determine the information required to achieve their statutory and management responsibilities, and it is up to the software solution providers to provide the, you know, solutions that meet them.

I was also asked if I agreed with another solution provider to have the software companies have another go at the schema prior to publication. My position was consistent in that regard: we don’t work the refs. My recommendation to OSD, also given that I have been in a similar position regarding an earlier initiative long the same lines back when I wore a uniform, is to explore the art of the possible with suppliers. The goals are to reduce data streams, eliminate redundancy, and improve speed. Let the commercial software guys figure out how to make it work.

Current projection is three to four weeks before a final schema is published. We will see if the corresponding documentation will also be provided simultaneously.

DCMA EVAS – Data-driven Assessment and Surveillance

This is a topic for which I cannot write without a conflict of interest since the company that is my day job is the solution provider, so I will make this short and sweet.

First, it was refreshing to see three Hub leads at the NDIA IPMD meeting. These are the individuals in the field who understand the important connection between government acquisition needs and private industry capabilities in the logistics supply chain.

Second, despite a great deal of behind-the-scenes speculation and drama among competitors in the solution provider market, DCMA affirmed that it had selected its COTS solution and that it was working with that provider to work out any minor issues now that MIlestone B has been certified and they are into full implementation.

Third, DCMA announced that the Hubs would be collecting information and that the plan for a central database for EVAS that would combine other DoD data has been put on hold until management can determine the best course for that solution.

Fourth, the Agency announced that the first round of using the automated metrics was later this month and that effort would continue into October.

Fifth, the Agency tamped down some of the fear related to this new process, noting that tripping metrics may simply indicate that additional attention was needed in that area, including those cases where it simply needed to be documented that the supplier’s System Description deviated from the standard indicator. I think this will be a process of familiarization as the Hubs move out with implementation.

DCMA EVAS, in my opinion, is a significant reform of the way the agency does business. It not only drives process and organizational improvement within the agency by eliminating uneven and arbitrary determinations of contract non-compliance (as well as improvements in data management), but opens a dialogue regarding systems improvement, driving similar changes to the supplier base.

NDAA Section 804

There were a couple of public discussions on NDAA Section 804 which, if you are not certain what it is, should go to this link. Having kept track of developments in the NDAA for this coming fiscal year, what I can say is that the final language of Section 804 doesn’t say what many think it says when it was in draft.

What it doesn’t authorize is a broad authority to overrule other statutory requirements for government accountability, oversight, and reporting, including the requirement for earned value management on large programs. This statement is supported by both OSD speakers that addressed the issue in the meeting.

The purpose of Section 804 was to provide the ability to quickly prototype and field new technologies in the wake of 911, particularly as it related to identifying, tracking, and preventing terrorist acts. But the rhetoric behind this section, which was widely touted by elected representatives long before the final version of the current NDAA had been approved, implied a broader mandate for more prosaic acquisitions. My opinion in having seen programs like this before (think Navy A12 program) is that, if people use this authority too broadly that we will be discussing more significant issues than a minor DCMA program that ends this blog post.

Thus, the message coming from OSD is that there is no carte blanche get-out-of-jail card for covering yourself under Section 804 and deciding that lack of management is a substitute for management, and that failure to obtain timely and necessary program performance information does not mean that it cannot be forensically traced in an audit or investigation, especially if things go south. A word to the wise, while birds of a feather catch cold.

DoD Reorganization

The Department of Defense has been undergoing reorganization and the old Office of the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics (OUSD (AT&L) has been broken up and reassigned largely to a new Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment (USD (A&S).

As a result of this reorganization there were other points indicated:

a. Day-to-day program management will be pushed to the military services. No one really seems to understand what this means. The services already have PMOs in place that do day-to-day management. The policy part of old AT&L will be going intact to A&S as well as program analysis. The personnel cuts that are earmarked for some DoD departments was largely avoided in the reorganization, except at the SES level, which I will address below.

b. Other Transaction Authority (OTA) and Section 804 procurements are getting a lot of attention, but they seem ripe for abuse. I had actually was a member of a panel regarding Acquisition Reform at the NDIA Training and Simulation Industry Symposium held this past June in Orlando. I thought the focus would be on the recommendations from the 809 panel but, instead, turned out to be on OTA and Section 804 acquisitions. What impressed me the most was that even companies that had participated in these types of contracting actions felt that they were unnecessarily loosely composed, which would eventually impede progress upon review and audit of the programs. The consensus in discussions with the audience and other panel members was that the FAR and DFARS already possessed sufficient flexibility if Contracting Officers were properly trained to know how to construct such a requirement and still stay between the lines, absent a serious operational need that cannot be met through normal acquisition methods. Furthermore, OTA SME knowledge is virtually non-existent. Needless to say, things like Nunn-McCurdy and new Congressional reporting requirements in the latest NDAA still need to be met.

c. The emphasis in the department, it was announced, would also shift to a focus on portfolio analysis, but–again–no one could speak to exactly what that means. PARCA and the program analysis personnel on the OSD staffs provide SecDef with information on the entire portfolio of major programs. That is why there is a DoD Central Repository for submission of program data. If the Department is looking to apply some of the principles in DoD that provide flexibility in identifying risks and tradeoffs across, then that would be most useful and a powerful tool in managing resources. We’ve seen efforts like Cost as an Independent Variable (CAIV) and other tradeoff methods come and go, it would be nice if the department would reward the identification of programmatic risk early and often in program go/no-go/tradeoff/early production decisions.

d. To manage over $7 trillion dollars of program PARCA’s expense is $4.5M. The OSD personnel made this point, I think, to emphasize the return on investment in their role regarding oversight, risk identification, and root cause analysis with an eye to efficiency in the management of DoD programs. This is like an insurance policy and a built-in DoD change agent. But from my outside reading, there was a move by Representative Mac Thornberry, who is Chairman of House Armed Services, to hollow out OSD by eliminating PARCA and much of the AT&L staffs. I had discussions with staffs for other Congressional members of the Armed Services Committee when this was going on, and the cause seemed to be that there is a lack of understanding to the extent that DoD has streamlined its acquisition business systems and how key PARCA, DCMA, and the analysis and assessment staffs are to the acquisition ecosystem, and how they foot and tie to the service PEOs and PMOs. Luckily for the taxpayer, it seems that Senate Armed Services members were aware of this and took the language out during markup.

Other OSD Business — Reconciling FAR/DFARS, and Agile

a.. DoD is reconciling differences between overlapping FAR and DFARS clauses. Given that DoD is more detailed and specific in identifying reporting and specifying oversight of contracts by dollar threshold, complexity, risk, and contract type, it will be interesting how this plays out over time. The example given by Mr. John McGregor of OSD was the difference between the FAR and DFARS clauses regarding the application of earned value management (EVM). The FAR clause is more expansive and cut-and-dried. The DFARS clause distinguishes the level of EVM reporting and oversight (and surveillance) that should apply based on more specific criteria regarding the nature of the program and the contract characteristics.

b. The issue of Agile and how it somehow excuses using estimating, earned value management, risk management, and other proven program management controls was addressed. This contention is, of course, poppycock and Glen Alleman on his blog has written extensively about this zombie idea. The 809 Panel seemed to have been bitten by it, though, where its members were convinced that Agile is a program or project management method, and that there is a dichotomy between Agile and the use of EVM. The prescient point in critiquing this assertion was effectively made by the OSD speakers. They noted that they attend many forums and speak to various groups about Agile, and that there is virtually no consensus about what exactly it is and what characteristics define it, but everyone pretty much recognizes it as an approach to software development. Furthermore, EVM is used today on programs that at least partially use Agile software development methodology and do so very effectively. It’s not like crossing the streams.

Gary Bliss, PARCA – Fair Winds and Following Seas

The blockbuster announcement at the meeting was the planned retirement of Gary Bliss, who has been and is the Director of PARCA, on 30 September 2018. This was due to the cut in billets at the Senior Executive Service (SES) level. He will be missed.

Mr. Bliss has transformed the way that DoD does business and he has done so by building bridges. I have been attending NDIA IPMD meetings (and under its old PMSC name) for more than 20 years. Over that time, from when I was near the end of my uniformed career in attending the government/joint session, and, later, when I attended full sessions after joining private industry, I have witnessed a change for the better. Mr. Bliss leaves behind an industry that has established collaboration with DoD and federal program management personnel as its legacy for now and into the future.

Before the formation of PARCA all too often there were two camps in the organization, which translated to a similar condition in the field in relation to PMOs and oversight agencies, despite the fact that everyone was on the same team in terms of serving the national defense. The issue, of course, as it always is, was money.

These two camps would sometimes break out in open disagreement and expressed disparagement of the other. Mr. Bliss brought in a gentleman by the name of Gordon Kranz and together they opened a dialogue in meeting PARCA’s mission. This dialogue has continued with Mr. Kranz’s replacement, John McGregor.

The dialogue has revolved around finding root causes for long delays between development and production in program management and to recommend ways of streamlining processes and eliminating impediments, to root out redundancy, inefficiency, and waste throughout the program and project management supply chain, and to communicate with industry so that they understand the reasons for particular DoD policies and procedures, to obtain feedback on the effects of those decisions and how they can implemented to avoid arbitrariness, and to provide certainty to those who would seek to provide supplies and services to the national defense–especially innovative ones–in defining the rules of engagement. The focus was on collaborative process improvement–and it has worked. Petty disputes occasionally still arise, but they are the exception to the rule.

Under his watch Mr. Bliss established a common trusted data stream for program management data, and forged policies that drove process improvement from the industrial base through the DoD program office. This was not an easy job. His background as an economist and his long distinguished career in the public service armed him well in this regard. We owe him a debt of gratitude.

We can all hope that the next OSD leadership that assumes that role will be as effective and forward leaning.

Final Thoughts on DCMA report revelations

The interest I received on my last post on the DCMA internal report regarding the IWMS project was very broad, but the comments that I received expressed some confusion on what I took away as the lessons learned in my closing paragraphs. The reason for this was the leaked nature of the reports, which alleged breaches of federal statute and other administrative and professional breaches, some of a reputational nature. They are not the final word and for anyone to draw final conclusions from leaked material of that sort would be premature. But here are some initial lessons learned:

Lesson #1: Do not split requirements and game the system to fall below financial thresholds to avoid oversight and management approval. This is a Contracts 101 issue and everyone should be aware of it.

Lesson #2: Ensure checks and balances in the procurement process are established and maintained. Too much power, under the moniker of acquisition reform and “flexibility”, has given CIOs and PMs the authority to make decisions that require collaboration, checks, and internal oversight. In normative public sector acquisition environments the end-user does not get to select the contractor, the contract type, the funding sources, or the acquisition method involving fair and open competition–or a deviation from it. Nor having directed the procurement, to allow the same individual(s) to certify receipt and acceptance. Establishing checks and balances without undermining operational effectiveness requires a subtle hand, in which different specialists working within a matrix organization, with differing chains of command and responsibility, ensure that there is integrity in the process. All members of this team can participate in planning and collaboration for the organizations’ needs. It appears, though not completely proven, that some of these checks and balances did not exist. We do know from the inspections that Contracting Officer’s Representatives (CORs) and Contracting Officers’s Technical Representatives (COTRs) were not appointed for long-term contracts in many cases.

Lesson #3: Don’t pre-select a solution by a particular supplier. This is done by understanding the organization’s current and future needs and putting that expression in a set of salient characteristics, a performance work statement, or a statement of work. This document is authored to share with the marketplace though a formalized and documented process of discovery, such as a request for information (RFI).

Lesson #4: I am not certain if the reports indicate that a legal finding of the appropriate color of money is or is not a sufficient defense but they seem to. This can be a controversial topic within an organization and oftentimes yields differing opinions. Sometimes the situation can be corrected with the substitution of proper money for that fiscal year by higher authority. Some other examples of Anti-deficiency Act (ADA) violations can be found via this link, published by the Defense Comptroller. I’ve indicated from my own experience how, going from one activity to another as an uniformed Navy Officer, I had run into Comptrollers with different opinions of the appropriate color of money for particular types of supplies and services at the same financial thresholds. They can’t all have been correct. I guess I am fortunate that over 23 years–18 of them as a commissioned Supply Corps Officer* and five before that as an enlisted man–that I never ran into a ADA violation in any transaction in which I was involved. The organizations I was assigned to had checks and balances to ensure there was not a statutory violation which, I may add, is a federal crime. Thus, no one should be cavalierly making this assertion as if it were simply an administrative issue. But everyone in the chain is not responsible, unless misconduct or criminal behavior across that chain contributed to the violation. I don’t see it in these reports.Systemic causes require systemic solutions and education.

Note that all of these lessons learned are taught as basic required knowledge in acquisition classes and in regulation. I also note that, in the reports, there are facts of mitigation. It will be interesting to see what eventually comes out of this.

Take Me to the River, Part 1, Cost Elements – A Digital Inventory of Integrated Program Management Elements

In a previous post I recommended a venue focused on program managers to define what constitutes integrated program management. Since that time I have been engaged with thought leaders and influencers in both government and industry, many of whom came to a similar conclusion independently, agree in this proposition and who are working to bring it about.

My own interest in this discussion is from the perspective of maximization of the information ecosystem that underlies and describes the systems known as projects and programs. But what do I mean by this? This is more than a gratuitous question, because oftentimes the information essential to defining project and program performance and behavior are intermixed, and therefore diluted and obfuscated, by confusion with those of the overall enterprise.

Project vs. Program

What a mean by the term project in this context is an organization that is established around a defined effort of fixed duration (a defined beginning and projected end) that is specifically planned and organized for the development and deployment of a particular end item, state, or result, with an identified set of resources assigned and allocated to achieve its goals.

A program is defined as a set of interrelated projects and sub-projects which is also of fixed duration that is specifically planned and organized not only for the development and deployment, but also the continues this role through sustainment (including configuration control), of a particular end item, state, or result, with an identified set of resources assigned and allocated to achieve its goals. As such, the program management team also is the first level life-cycle manager of the end item, state, or result, and participates with other levels of the organization in these activities. (More on life-cycle costs below).

Note the difference in scope and perspective, though oftentimes we use these terms interchangeably.

For shorthand, a small project of short duration operates at the tactical level of planning. A larger project, which because of size, complexity, duration, and risk approaches the definition of a program, operates at the operational level, as do most programs. Larger and more complex programs that will affect the core framing assumptions of the enterprise align their goals to the strategic level of planning. Thus, there are differences in scale, complexity and, hence, data points that can be captured at these various levels.

Another aspect of the question of establishing an integrated digital project and program management environment is sufficiency of data, which relates directly to scale. Sufficiency in this regard is defined as whether there is enough data to establish a valid correlation and, hopefully, draw a causation. Micro-economic foundations–and models–often fail because of insufficient data. This is important to keep in mind as we inventory the type of data available to us and its significance. Oftentimes additional data points can make up for those cases where there is insufficiency in the depth and quality of a more limited set of data points. Doing so will also mitigate subjectivity, especially in smaller efforts.

Thus, in constructing a project or program, regardless of its level of planning, we often begin by monitoring the most basic elements. These are usually described as cost, schedule, performance, and risk, though I will discuss and identify other contributors that can be indexed.

This first post will concentrate on the first set of elements–those that constitute cost. In looking at these, however, we will find that the elements within this category are a bit broader than what is currently used in determining project and program performance.

Contract Costs

When we refer to costs in project and program management we oftentimes are referring to those direct and indirect costs expended by the supplier over the course of the effort, particular in Cost Plus contractual efforts. The breakout of cost from a data perspective places it in subcategories:

Note that these are costs within the contract itself, as a cohesive, self-identifying entity. But there are other costs associated with our contracts which feed into program and project management. These are necessary to identify and capture if we are to take an holistic approach to these disciplines.

The costs that are anticipated by the contract are based on cost estimates, which need to be funded. These funded costs will be allocated to particular lines in the contract (CLINs), whether these be supporting contract efforts or deliverables. Thus, additional elements of our digital inventory include these items but lead us to our next categories.

Cost Estimates, Colors of Money, and Cash Flow

Cost estimates are the basis for determining the entire contract effort, and eventually make it into the project and program cost plan. Once cost estimates are applied and progress is tracked through the collection of actual costs, these elements are further traced to project and program activities, products, commodities, and other business categories, such as the indirect costs identified on the right hand side of the chart above.

Our cost plans need to be financed, as with any business entity. Though the most complex projects often are financed by some government entity because of their scale and impact, private industry–even among the largest companies–must obtain financing for the efforts at hand, whether these come from internal or external sources.

Thus two more elements present themselves: “colors” of money, that is, money that is provided for a specific purpose within the project and program cost plan which could also be made available for only some limited period of time, and the availability of that money sufficient to execute particular portions of the project or program, that is, cash flow.

The phase of the project or program will determine the type of money that is made available. These are also contained in the costs that are identified in the next section, but include, from a government financing perspective, Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) money, Procurement, Operations and Maintenance (O&M), and Military Construction (MILCON) dollars. By Congressional appropriation and authorization, each of these types of money may be provided for particular programs, and each type of authorization has a specific period in which they can be committed, obligated, and expended before they expire. The type of money provided also aligns with the phase of the project or program: whether it still be in development, production, deployment and acquisition, sustainment, or retirement.

These costs will be reflected in reporting that reflects actual and projected rates of expenditure, that will be tied to procurement, material management, and resource management systems.

Additional Relative Costs

As with all efforts, the supplier is not the only entity to incur costs on a development project or program. The customer also incurs costs, which must be taken into account in determining the total cost of the effort.

For anyone who has undergone any kind of major effort on their home, or even had to get things other workaday things done, like deciding when to change the tires on the car or when to get to the dentist implicitly understand that there is more effort in timing and determining the completion of these items than the cost of new kitchen cabinets, tires, or a filling. One must decide to take time off from work. One must look to their own cash flow to see if they have sufficient funds not only for the merchant, but for all of the sundry and associated tasks that must be done in preparation for and after the task’s completion. To choose to do one thing is to choose not to do another–an opportunity cost. Other people may be involved in the decision. Perhaps children are in the household and a babysitter is required. Perhaps the home life is so disrupted that another temporary abode is necessary on a short term basis.

All of these are costs that one must take into account, and at the individual level we do these calculations and plan these activities as a matter of fact.

In customer-supplier relationships the former incurs costs above the contract costs, which must be taken into account by the customer project or program executive. In the Department of Defense an associated element is called program management administration (PMA). For private entities this falls into allocated G&A and Overhead costs, aside from direct labor and material costs, but in all cases these are costs that have come about due to the decision to undertake the specific effort.

Other elements of cost on the customer side are contractually furnished facilities, property, material or equipment, and testing and evaluation costs.

Contract Cost Performance: Earned Value Management

I will further discuss EVM in more detail a later installment of this element inventory, but mention must be made of EVM since to exclude it is to be grossly remiss.

At core EVM is a financial measure of value against what has been physically achieved against a performance management baseline (PMB), which ties actual costs and completion of work through a work breakdown structure (WBS). It is focused on the contract level of performance, which in some cases may constitute the entire project, though not necessarily the entire effort for the program.

Linkages to the other cost elements I have delineated elsewhere in this post ranges from strong to non-existent. Thus, while an essential means of linking contractual achievement to work accomplishment that, at various levels of fidelity, is linked to actual technical achievement, it does not capture all of the costs in our data inventory.

An essential overview in understanding what it does capture is best summed up in the following diagram taken from the Defense Acquisition University (DAU) site:

Commercial EVM elements, while not necessarily using the same terminology or highly structured process, possess a similar structure in allocating costs and achievement against baseline costs in developmental efforts to work packages (oftentimes schedule tasks in resource-loaded schedules) under an integrated WBS structure with Management Reserve not included as part of the baseline.

Also note that commercial efforts often include their internal costs as part of the overall contractual effort in assessing earned value against actual work achievement, while government contracting efforts tend to exclude these inherent costs. That being said, it is not that there is no cost control in these elements, since strict ceilings often apply to PMA and other such costs, it is that contract cost performance does not take these costs, among others, into account.

Furthermore, the chart above provides us with additional sub-elements in our inventory that are essential in capturing data at the appropriate level of our project and program hierarchy.

Thus, for IPM, EVM is one of many elements that are part our digital inventory–and one that provides a linkage to other non-cost elements (WBS). But in no way should it be viewed as capturing all essential costs associated with a contractual effort, aside from the more expansive project or program effort.

Portfolio Management and Life-Cycle Costs

There is another level of management that is essential in thinking about project and program management, and that is the program executive level. In the U.S. military services these are called Program Executive Officers (PEOs). In private industry they are often product managers, CIOs, and other positions that often represent the link between the program management teams and the business operations side of the organization. Thus, this is also the level of management organized to oversee a number of individual projects and programs that are interrelated based on mission, commodity, or purpose. As such, this level of management often concentrates on issues across the portfolio of projects and programs.

The main purpose of the portfolio management level is to ensure that project and program efforts are aligned with the strategic goals of the organization, which includes an understanding of the total cost of ownership.

In performing this purpose one of the functions of portfolio management is to identify risks that may manifest within projects and programs, and to determine the most productive use of limited resources across them, since they are essentially competing for the same dollars. This includes cost estimates and re-allocations to address ontological, aleatory, and epistemic risk.

Furthermore, the portfolio level is also concerned with the life-cycle factors of the item under development, so that there is effective hand-off at the production and sustainment phases. The key here is to ensure that each project or program, which is focused on the more immediate goals of project and program execution, continues to meet the goals of the organization in terms of life-cycle costs, and its effectiveness in meeting the established goals essential to the project or program’s framing assumptions.

But here we are focusing on cost, and so the costs involved are trade-off costs and opportunities, assessments of return on investment, and the aforementioned total cost of ownership of the end item or system. The costs that contribute to the total cost of ownership include all of the development costs, external and internal program management costs, procurement costs, operations and support costs, maintenance and life extension costs, and system retirement costs.

Conclusion

I believe that the survey of cost elements presented in this initial post illustrates that present digital project and program management systems are limited and immature–capturing and evaluating only a small portion of the total amount of available data.

These gaps make it impossible, for example, to determine the relative significance any one element–and the analytics that can derived from it–over another; not to mention the inability to provide the linkage among these absent elements that would garner insights into cause-and-effect and predictive behavior so that we have enough time to influence the outcome.

It is also clear that, when we strive to define what constitutes integrated project and program management, that we must learn what is of most importance to the PM in performing those duties that are viewed as essential to success, and which are not yet captured in our analytical and predictive systems.

Only when our systems reach the level of cohesiveness and comprehensiveness in providing organizational insight and intelligence essential to project or program management will PMs ignore them at their own risk. In getting there we must first identify what can be captured from the activities that contribute to our efforts.

My next post will identify essential elements related to planning and scheduling.

Note: I am indebted to Defense Acquisition University’s resources in my research across many of my postings and link to them for the edification of the reader. For more insight into many of the points raised in this post I would recommend that readers familiarize themselves with A Guide for DoD Program Managers.

Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow–Post-Workshop Blogging…and some Low Comedy

It’s been a while since I posted to my blog due to meetings and–well–day job, but some interesting things occurred during the latest Integrated Program Management (IPMD) of the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) meeting that I think are of interest. (You have to love acronyms to be part of this community).

Program Management and Integrated Program Management

First off is the initiative by the Program Management Working Group to gain greater participation by program managers with an eye to more clearly define what constitutes integrated program management. As readers of this blog know, this is a topic that I’ve recently written about.

The Systems Engineering discipline is holding their 21st Annual Systems Engineering Conference in Tampa this year from October 22nd to the 25th. IPMD will collaborate and will be giving a track dedicated to program management. The organizations have issued a call for papers and topics of interest. (Full disclosure: I volunteered this past week to participate as a member of the PM Working Group).

My interest in this topic is based on my belief from my years of wide-ranging experience in duties from having served as a warranted government contracting officer, program manager, business manager, CIO, staff officer, and logistics officer that there is much more to the equation in defining IPM that transcends doing so through the prism of any particular discipline. Furthermore, doing so will require collaboration and cooperation among a number of project management disciplines.

This is a big topic where, I believe, no one group or individual has all of the answers. I’m excited to see where this work goes.

Integrated Digital Environment

Another area of interest that I’ve written about in the past involved two different–but related–initiatives on the part of the Department of Defense to collect information from their suppliers that is necessary in their oversight role not only to ensure accountability of public expenditures, but also to assist in project cost and schedule control, risk management, and assist in cost estimation, particularly as it relates to risk sharing cost-type R&D contracted project efforts.

Two major staffs in the Offices of the Undersecretary of Defense have decided to go with a JSON-type schema for, on the one hand, cost estimating data, and on the other, integrated cost performance, schedule, and risk data. Each initiative seeks to replace the existing schemas in place.

Both have been wrapped around the axle on getting industry to move from form-based reporting and data sharing to a data-agnostic solution that meet the goals of reducing redundancy in data transmission, reducing the number of submissions and data streams, and moving toward one version of truth that allows for SMEs on both sides of the table to concentrate on data analysis and interpretation in jointly working toward the goal of successful project completion and end-item deployment.

As with the first item, I am not a disinterested individual in this topic. Back when I wore a uniform I helped to construct DoD policy to create an integrated digital environment. I’ve written about this experience previously in this blog, so I won’t bore with details, but the need for data sharing on cost-type efforts acknowledges the reality of the linkage between our defense economic and industrial base and the art of the possible in deploying defense-related end items. The same relationship exists for civilian federal agencies with the non-defense portion of the U.S. economy. Needless to say, a good many commercial firms unrelated to defense are going the same way.

The issue here is two-fold, I think, from speaking with individuals working these issues.

The first is, I think, that too much deference is being given to solution providers and some industry stakeholders, influenced by those providers, in “working the refs” through the data. The effect of doing so not only slows down the train and protects entrenched interests, it also gets in the way of innovation, allowing the slowest among the group to hold up the train in favor of–to put it bluntly–learning their jobs on the job at the expense of efficiency and effectiveness. As I expressed in a side conversion with an industry leader, all too often companies–who, after all, are the customer–have allowed themselves to view the possible by the limitations and inflexibility of their solution providers. At some point that dysfunctional relationship must end–and in the case of comments clearly identified as working the refs–they should be ignored. Put your stake in the ground and let innovation and market competition sort it out.

Secondly, cost estimating, which is closely tied to accounting and financial management, is new and considered tangential to other, more mature, performance management systems. My own firm is involved in producing a solution in support of this process, collecting data related to these reports (known collectively in DoD as the 1921 reports), and even after working to place that data in a common data lake, exploring with organizations what it tells us, since we are only now learning what it tells us. This is classical KDD–Knowledge Discovery in Data–and a worthwhile exercise.

I’ve also advocated going one step further in favor of the collection of financial performance data (known as the Contract Funds Status Report), which is an essential reporting requirement, but am frustrated to find no one willing to take ownership of the guidance regarding data collection. The tragedy here is that cost performance, known broadly as Earned Value Management, is a technique related to the value of work performance against other financial and project planning measures (a baseline and actuals). But in a business (or any enterprise), the fuel that drives the engine are finance-related, and two essential measures are margin and cash-flow. The CFSR is a report of program cash-flow and financial execution. It is an early measure of whether a program will execute its work in any given time-frame, and provides a reality check on the statistical measures of performance against baseline. It is also a necessary logic check for comptrollers and other budget decision-makers.

Thus, as it relates to data, there has been some push-back against a settled schema, where the government accepts flat files and converts the data to the appropriate format. I see this as an acceptable transient solution, but not an ultimate one. It is essential to collect both cost estimating and contract funds status information to perform any number of operations that relate to “actionable” intelligence: having the right executable money at the right time, a reality check against statistical and predictive measures, value analysis, and measures of ROI in development, just to name a few.

I look forward to continuing this conversation.

To Be or Not to Be Agile

The Section 809 Panel, which is the latest iteration of acquisition reform panels, has recommended that performance management using earned value not be mandated for efforts using Agile. It goes on, however, to assert that program executive “should approve appropriate project monitoring and control methods, which may include EVM, that provide faith in the quality of data and, at a minimum, track schedule, cost, and estimate at completion.”

Okay…the panel is then mute on what those monitoring and control measure will be. Significantly, if only subtly, the #NoEstimates crowd took a hit since the panel recommends and specifies data quality, schedule, cost and EAC. Sounds a lot like a form of EVM to me.

I must admit to be a skeptic when it comes to swallowing the Agile doctrine whole. Its micro-economic foundations are weak and much of it sounds like ideology–bad ideology at best and disproved ideology at worst (specifically related to the woo-woo about self-organization…think of the last speculative bubble and resulting financial crisis and depression along these lines).

When it comes to named methodologies I am somewhat from Missouri. I apply (and have in previous efforts in the Dark Ages back when I wore a uniform) applied Kanban, teaming, adaptive development (enhanced greatly today by using modern low-code technology), and short sprints that result in releasable modules. But keep in mind that these things were out there long before they were grouped under a common heading.

Perhaps Agile is now a convenient catch-all for best practices. But if that is the case then software development projects using this redefined version of Agile deserve no special dispensation. But I was schooled a bit by an Agile program manager during a side conversation and am always open to understanding things better and revising my perspectives. It’s just that there was never a Waterfall/Agile dichotomy just as there never really was a Spiral/Waterfall dichotomy. These were simply convenient development models to describe a process that were geared to the technology of the moment.

There are very good people on the job exploring these issues on the Agile Working Group in the IPMD and I look forward to seeing what they continue to come up with.

Rip Van Winkle Speaks!

The only disappointing presentation occurred on the second and last day of the meeting. It seemed we were treated by a voice from somewhere around the year 2003 that, in what can only be described as performance art involving free association, talked about wandering the desert, achieving certification for a piece of software (which virtually all of the software providers in the room have successfully navigated at one time or another), discovering that cost and schedule performance data can be integrated (ignoring the work of the last ten years on the part of, well, a good many people in the room), that there was this process known as the Integrated Baseline Review (which, again, a good many people in the room had collaborated on to both define and make workable), and–lo and behold–the software industry uses schemas and APIs to capture data (known in Software Development 101 as ETL). He then topped off his meander by an unethical excursion into product endorsement, selected through an opaque process.

For this last, the speaker was either unaware or didn’t care (usually called tone-deafness) that the event’s expenses were sponsored by a software solution provider (not mine). But it is also as if the individual speaking was completely unaware of the work behind the various many topics that I’ve listed above this subsection, ignoring and undermining the hard work of the other stakeholders that make up our community.

On the whole an entertaining bit of poppycock, which leads me to…

A Word about the Role of Professional Organizations (Somewhat Inside Baseball)

In this blog, and in my interactions with other professionals at–well–professional conferences–I check my self-interest in at the door and publicly take a non-commercial stance. It is a position that is expected and, I think, appreciated. For those who follow me on social networking like LinkedIn, posts from my WordPress blog originate from a separate source from the commercial announcements that are linked to my page that originate from my company.

If there are exhibitor areas, as some conferences and workshops do have, that is one thing. That’s where we compete and play; and in private side conversations customers and strategic partners will sometimes use the opportunity as a convenience to discuss future plans and specific issues that are clearly business-related. But these are the exceptions to the general rule, and there are a couple of reasons for this, especially at this venue.

One is because, given that while it is a large market, it is a small community, and virtually everyone at the regular meetings and conferences I attend already know that I am the CEO and owner of a small software company. But the IPMD is neutral ground. It is a place where government and industry stakeholders, who in other roles and circumstances are in a contractual or competing relationship, come to work out the best way of hashing out processes and procedures that will hopefully improve the discipline of program and project management. It is also a place of discovery, where policies, new ideas, and technologies can be vetted in an environment of collaboration.

Another reason for taking a neutral stance is simply because it is both the most ethical and productive one. Twenty years ago–and even in some of the intervening years–self-serving behavior was acceptable at the IPMD meetings where both leadership and membership used the venue as a basis for advancing personal agendas or those of their friends, often involving backbiting and character assassination. Some of those people, few in number, still attend these meetings.

I am not unfamiliar with the last–having been a target at one point by a couple of them but, at the end of the day, such assertions turned out to be without merit, undermining the credibility of the individuals involved, rightfully calling into question the quality of their character. Such actions cannot help but undermine the credibility and pollute the atmosphere of the organization in which they associate, as well.

Finally, the companies and organizations that sponsor these meetings–which are not cheap to organize, which I know from having done so in the past–deserve to have the benefit of acknowledgment. It’s just good manners to play nice when someone else is footing the bill–you gotta dance with those that brung you. I know my competitors and respect them (with perhaps one or two exceptions). We even occasionally socialize with each other and continue long-term friendships and friendly associations. Burning bridges is just not my thing.

On the whole, however, the NDIA IPMD meetings–and this one, in particular–was a productive and positive one, focused on the future and in professional development. That’s where, I think, that as a community we need to be and need to stay. I always learn something new and get my dose of reality from a broad-based perspective. In getting here the leadership of the organization (and the vast majority of the membership) is to be commended, as well as the recent past and current members of the Department of Defense, especially since the formation of the Performance Assessments and Root Cause Analysis (PARCA) office.

In closing, there were other items of note discussed, along with what can only be described as the best pair of keynote addresses that I’ve heard in one meeting. I’ll have more to say about some of the concepts and ideas that were presented there in future posts.

Learning the (Data) — Data-Driven Management, HBR Edition

The months of December and January are usually full of reviews of significant events and achievements during the previous twelve months. Harvard Business Review makes the search for some of the best writing on the subject of data-driven transformation by occasionally publishing in one volume the best writing on a critical subject of interest to professional through the magazine OnPoint. It is worth making part of your permanent data management library.

The volume begins with a very concise article by Thomas C. Redman with the provocative title “Does Your Company Know What to Do with All Its Data?” He then goes on to list seven takeaways of optimizing the use of existing data that includes many of the themes that I have written about in this blog: better decision-making, innovation, what he calls “informationalize products”, and other significant effects. Most importantly, he refers to the situation of information asymmetry and how this provides companies and organizations with a strategic advantage that directly affects the bottom line–whether that be in negotiations with peers, contractual relationships, or market advantages. Aside from the OnPoint article, he also has some important things to say about corporate data quality. Highly recommended and a good reason to implement systems that assure internal information systems fidelity.

Edd Wilder-James also covers a theme that I have hammered home in a number of blog posts in the article “Breaking Down Data Silos.” The issue here is access to data and the manner in which it is captured and transformed into usable analytics. His recommended approach to a task that is often daunting is to find the path of least resistance in finding opportunities to break down silos and maximize data to apply advanced analytics. The article provides a necessary balm that counteracts the hype that often accompanies this topic.

Both of these articles are good entrees to the subject and perfectly positioned to prompt both thought and reflection of similar experiences. In my own day job I provide products that specifically address these business needs. Yet executives and management in all too many cases continue to be unaware of the economic advantages of data optimization or the manner in which continuing to support data silos is limiting their ability to effectively manage their organizations. There is no doubt that things are changing and each day offers a new set of clients who are feeling their way in this new data-driven world, knowing that the promises of almost effort-free goodness and light by highly publicized data gurus are not the reality of practitioners, who apply the detail work of data normalization and rationalization. At the end it looks like magic, but there is effort that needs to be expended up-front to get to that state. In this physical universe under the Second Law of Thermodynamics there are no free lunches–energy must be borrowed from elsewhere in order to perform work. We can minimize these efforts through learning and the application of new technology, but managers cannot pretend not to have to understand the data that they intend to use to make business decisions.

All of the longer form articles are excellent, but I am particularly impressed with the Leandro DalleMule and Thomas H. Davenport article entitled “What’s Your Data Strategy?” from the May-June 2017 issue of HBR. Oftentimes when addressing big data at professional conferences and in visiting businesses the topic often runs to the manner of handling the bulk of non-structured data. But as the article notes, less than half of an organization’s relevant structured data is actually used in decision-making. The most useful artifact that I have permanently plastered at my workplace is the graphic “The Elements of Data Strategy”, and I strongly recommend that any manager concerned with leveraging new technology to optimize data do the same. The graphic illuminates the defensive and offensive positions inherent in a cohesive data strategy leading an organization to the state: “In our experience, a more flexible and realistic approach to data and information architectures involves both a single source of truth (SSOT) and multiple versions of the truth (MVOTs). The SSOT works at the data level; MVOTs support the management of information.” Elimination of proprietary data silos, elimination of redundant data streams, and warehousing of data that is accessed using a number of analytical methods achieve the necessary states of SSOT that provides the basis for an environment supporting MVOTs.

The article “Why IT Fumbles Analytics” by Donald A. Marchand and Joe Peppard from 2013, still rings true today. As with the article cited above by Wilder-James, the emphasis here is with the work necessary to ensure that new data and analytical capabilities succeed, but the emphasis shifts to “figuring out how to use the information (the new system) generates to make better decisions or gain deeper…insights into key aspects of the business.” The heart of managing the effort in providing this capability is to put into place a project organization, as well as systems and procedures, that will support the organizational transformation that will occur as a result of the explosion of new analytical capability.

The days of simply buying an off-the-shelf silo-ed “tool” and automating a specific manual function are over, especially for organizations that wish to be effective and competitive–and more profitable–in today’s data and analytical environment. A more comprehensive and collaborative approach is necessary. As with the DalleMule and Davenport article, there is a very useful graphic that contrasts traditional IT project approaches against Analytics and Big Data (or perhaps “Bigger” Data) Projects. Though the prescriptions in the article assume an earlier concept of Big Data optimization focused on non-structured data, thereby making some of these overkill, an implementation plan is essential in supporting the kind of transformation that will occur, and managers act at their own risk if they fail to take this effect into account.

All of the other articles in this OnPoint issue are of value. The bottom line, as I have written in the past, is to keep a focus on solving business challenges, rather than buying the new bright shiny object. Alternatively, in today’s business environment the day that business decision-makers can afford to stay within their silo-ed comfort zone are phasing out very quickly, so they need to shift their attention to those solutions that address these new realities.

So why do this apart from the fancy term “data optimization”? Well, because there is a direct return-on-investment in transforming organizations and systems to data-driven ones. At the end of the day the economics win out. Thus, our organizations must be prepared to support and have a plan in place to address the core effects of new data-analytics and Big Data technology:

a. The management and organizational transformation that takes place when deploying the new technology, requiring proactive socialization of the changing environment, the teaching of new skill sets, new ways of working, and of doing business.

b. Supporting transformation from a sub-optimized silo-ed “tell me what I need to know” work environment to a learning environment, driven by what the data indicates, supporting the skills cited above that include intellectual curiosity, engaging domain expertise, and building cross-domain competencies.

c. A practical plan that teaches the organization how best to use the new capability through a practical, hands-on approach that focuses on addressing specific business challenges.

The Revolution Will Not Be Televised — The Sustainability Manifesto for Projects

While doing stuff and living life (which seems to take me away from writing) there were a good many interesting things written on project management. The very insightful Dave Gordon at his blog, The Practicing IT Project Manager, provides a useful weekly list of the latest contributions to the literature that are of note. If you haven’t checked it out please do so–I recommend it highly.

While I was away Dave posted to an interesting link on the concept of sustainability in project management. Along those lines three PM professionals have proposed a Sustainability Manifesto for Projects. As Dave points out in his own post on the topic, it rests on three basic principles:

Benefits realization over metrics limited to time, scope, and cost
Value for many over value of money
The long-term impact of our projects over their immediate results

These are worthy goals and no one needs to have me rain on their parade. I would like to see these ethical principles, which is what they really are, incorporated into how we all conduct ourselves in business. But then there is reality–the “is” over the “ought.”

For example, Dave and I have had some correspondence regarding the nature of the marketplace in which we operate through this blog. Some time ago I wrote a series of posts here, here, and here providing an analysis of the markets in which we operate both in macroeconomic and microeconomic terms.

This came in response to one my colleagues making the counterfactual assertion that we operate in a “free market” based on the concept of “private enterprise.” Apparently, such just-so stories are lies we have to tell ourselves to make the hypocrisy of daily life bearable. But, to bring the point home, in talking about the concept of sustainability, what concrete measures will the authors of the manifesto bring to the table to counter the financialization of American business that has occurred of the past 35 years?

For example, the news lately has been replete with stories of companies moving plants from the United States to Mexico. This despite rising and record corporate profits during a period of stagnating median working class incomes. Free trade and globalization have been cited as the cause, but this involves more hand waving and the invocation of mantras, rather than analysis. There has also been the predictable invocations of the Ayn Randian cult and the pseudoscience* of Social Darwinism. Those on the opposite side of the debate characterize things as a morality play, with the public good versus greed being the main issue. All of these explanations miss their mark, some more than others.

An article setting aside a few myths was recently published by Jonathan Rothwell at Brookings, which came to me via Mark Thoma’s blog, in the article, “Make elites compete: Why the 1% earn so much and what to do about it”. Rothwell looks at the relative gains of the market over the last 40 years and finds that corporate profits, while doing well, have not been the driver of inequality that Robert Reich and other economists would have it be. In looking at another myth that has been promulgated by Greg Mankiw, he finds that the rewards of one’s labors is not related to any special intelligence or skill. On the contrary, one’s entry into the 1% is actually related to what industry one chooses to enter, regardless of all other factors. This disparity is known as a “pay premium”. As expected, petroleum and coal products, financial instruments, financial institutions, and lawyers, are at the top of the pay premium. What is not, against all expectations of popular culture and popular economic writing, is the IT industry–hardware, software, etc. Though they are the poster children of new technology, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerburg, and others are the exception to the rule in an industry that is marked by a 90% failure rate. Our most educated and talented people–those in science, engineering, the arts, and academia–are poorly paid–with negative pay premiums associated with their vocations.

The financialization of the economy is not a new or unnoticed phenomenon. Kevin Phillips, in Wealth and Democracy, which was written in 2003, noted this trend. There have been others. What has not happened as a result is a national discussion on what to do about it, particularly in defining the term “sustainability”.

For those of us who have worked in the acquisition community, the practical impact of financialization and de-industrialization have made logistics challenging to say the least. As a young contract negotiator and Navy Contracting Officer, I was challenged to support the fleet when any kind of fabrication or production was involved, especially in non-stocked machined spares of any significant complexity or size. Oftentimes my search would find that the company that manufactured the items was out of business, its pieces sold off during Chapter 11, and most of the production work for those items still available done seasonally out of country. My “out” at the time–during the height of the Cold War–was to take the technical specs, which were paid for and therefore owned by the government, to one of the Navy industrial activities for fabrication and production. The skillset for such work was still fairly widespread, supported by the quality control provided by a fairly well-unionized and trade-based workforce–especially among machinists and other skilled workers.

Given the new and unique ways judges and lawyers have applied privatized IP law to items financed by the public, such opportunities to support our public institutions and infrastructure, as I was able, have been largely closed out. Furthermore, the places to send such work, where possible, have also gotten vanishingly smaller. Perhaps digital printing will be the savior for manufacturing that it is touted to be. What it will not do is stitch back the social fabric that has been ripped apart in communities hollowed out by the loss of their economic base, which, when replaced, comes with lowered expectations and quality of life–and often shortened lives.

In the end, though, such “fixes” benefit a shrinkingly few individuals at the expense of the democratic enterprise. Capitalism did not exist when the country was formed, despite the assertion of polemicists to link the economic system to our democratic government. Smith did not write his pre-modern scientific tract until 1776, and much of what it meant was years off into the future, and its relevance given what we’ve learned over the last 240 years about human nature and our world is up for debate. What was not part of such a discussion back then–and would not have been understood–was the concept of sustainability. Sustainability in the study of healthy ecosystems usually involves the maintenance of great diversity and the flourishing of life that denotes health. This is science. Economics, despite Keynes and others, is still largely rooted in 18th and 19th century pseudoscience.

I know of no fix or commitment to a sustainability manifesto that includes global, environmental, and social sustainability that makes this possible short of a major intellectual, social or political movement willing to make a long-term commitment to incremental, achievable goals toward that ultimate end. Otherwise it’s just the mental equivalent to camping out in Zuccotti Park. The anger we note around us during this election year of 2016 (our year of discontent) is a natural human reaction to the end of an idea, which has outlived its explanatory power and, therefore, its usefulness. Which way shall we lurch?

The Sustainability Manifesto for Projects, then, is a modest proposal. It may also simply be a sign of the times, albeit a rational one. As such, it leaves open a lot of questions, and most of these questions cannot be addressed or determined by the people to which it is targeted: project managers, who are usually simply employees of a larger enterprise. People behave as they are treated–to the incentives and disincentives presented to them, oftentimes not completely apparent on the conscious level. Thus, I’m not sure if this manifesto hits its mark or even the right one.

*This term is often misunderstood by non-scientists. Pseudoscience means non-science, just as alternative medicine means non-medicine. If any of the various hypotheses of pseudoscience are found true, given proper vetting and methodology, that proposition would simply be called science. Just as alternative methods of treatment, if found effective and consistent, given proper controls, would simply be called medicine.

Three’s a Crowd — The Nash Equilibrium, Computer Science, and Economics (and what it means for Project Management theory)

Over the last couple of weeks reading picked up on an interesting article via Brad DeLong’s blog, who picked it up from Larry Hardesty at MIT News. First a little background devoted to defining terms. The Nash Equilibrium is a part of Game Theory in measuring how and why people make choices in social networks. As defined in this Columbia University paper:

A game (in strategic or normal form) consists of the following three elements: a set of players, a set of actions (or pure-strategies) available to each player, and a payoff (or utility) function for each player. The payoff functions represent each player’s preferences over action profiles, where an action profile is simply a list of actions, one for each player. A pure-strategy Nash equilibrium is an action profile with the property that no single player can obtain a higher payoff by deviating unilaterally from this profile.

John Von Neumann developed Game Theory to measure, in a mathematical model, the dynamic of conflicts and cooperation between intelligent rational decision-makers in a system. All social systems can be measured by the application of Game Theory models. But with all mathematical modeling, there are limitations to what can be determined. Unlike science, mathematics can only measure and model what we observe, but it can provide insights that would otherwise go unnoticed. As such, Von Newmann’s work (along with Oskar Morgenstern and Leonid Kantorovich) in this area has become the cornerstone of mathematical economics.

When dealing with two players in a game, a number of models have been developed to explain the behavior that is observed. For example, most familiar to us are zero-sum games and tit-for-tat games. Many of us in business, diplomacy, the military profession, and engaging in old-fashioned office politics have come upon such strategies in day-to-day life. In the article from MIT News that describes the latest work of Constantinos Daskalakis, an assistant professor in MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory:

In the real world, competitors in a market or drivers on a highway don’t (usually) calculate the Nash equilibria for their particular games and then adopt the resulting strategies. Rather, they tend to calculate the strategies that will maximize their own outcomes given the current state of play. But if one player shifts strategies, the other players will shift strategies in response, which will drive the first player to shift strategies again, and so on. This kind of feedback will eventually converge toward equilibrium:…The argument has some empirical support. Approximations of the Nash equilibrium for two-player poker have been calculated, and professional poker players tend to adhere to them — particularly if they’ve read any of the many books or articles on game theory’s implications for poker.

Anyone who has engaged in two-player games can intuitively understand this insight, from anything from card games to chess. But in modeling behavior, when a third player is added to the mix, the mathematics in describing market or system behavior becomes “intractable.” That is, all of the computing power in the world cannot calculate the Nash equilibrium.

Part of this issue is the age-old paradox, put in plain language, that everything that was hard to do for the first time in the past is now easy to do and verify today. This includes everything from flying aircraft to dealing with quantum physics. In computing and modeling, the issue is that every hard problem that has to be computed to solved requires far less resources to be verified. This is known as the problem of P=NP.

We deal with P=NP problems all the time when developing software applications and dealing with ever larger sets of data. For example, I attended a meeting recently where a major concern among the audience was over the question of scalability, especially in dealing with large sets of data. In the past “scalability” to the software publisher simply meant the ability of the application to be used over a large set of users via some form of distributed processing (client-server, shared services, desktop virtualization, or a browser-based deployment). But now with the introduction of KDD (knowledge discovery in databases) scalability now also addresses the ability of technologies to derive importance from the data itself outside of the confines of a hard-coded application.

The search for optimum polynomial algorithms to reduce the speed of time-intensive problems forces the developer to find the solution (the proof of NP-completeness) in advance and then work toward the middle in developing the appropriate algorithm. This should not be a surprise. In breaking Enigma during World War II Bletchley Park first identified regularities in the messages that the German high command was sending out. This then allowed them to work backwards and forwards in calculating how the encryption could be broken. The same applies to any set of mundane data, regardless of size, which is not trying hard not to be deciphered. While we may be faced with a Repository of Babel, it is one that badly wants to be understood.

While intuitively the Nash equilibrium does exist, its mathematically intractable character has demanded that new languages and approaches to solving it be developed. In the case of Daskalakis, he has proposed three routes. These are:

“One is to say, we know that there exist games that are hard, but maybe most of them are not hard. In that case you can seek to identify classes of games that are easy, that are tractable.”
Find mathematical models other than Nash equilibria to characterize markets — “models that describe transition states on the way to equilibrium, for example, or other types of equilibria that aren’t so hard to calculate.”
Approximation of the Nash equilibrium, “where the players’ strategies are almost the best responses to their opponents’ strategies — might not be. In those cases, the approximate equilibrium could turn out to describe the behavior of real-world systems.”

This is the basic engineering approach to any complex problem (and a familiar approach to anyone schooled in project management): break the system down into smaller pieces to solve.

So what does all of this mean for the discipline of project management? In modeling complex systems behavior for predictive purposes, our approach must correspondingly break down the elements of systems behavior into their constituent parts, but then integrate them in such as way as to derive significance. The key to this lies in the availability of data and our ability to process it using methods that go beyond trending data for individual variables.

The Monster Mash — Zombie Ideas in Project and Information Management

Just completed a number of meetings and discussions among thought leaders in the area of complex project management this week, and I was struck by a number of zombie ideas in project management, especially related to information, that just won’t die. The use of the term zombie idea is usually attributed to the Nobel economist Paul Krugman from his excellent and highly engaging (as well as brutally honest) posts at the New York Times, but for those not familiar, a zombie idea is “a proposition that has been thoroughly refuted by analysis and evidence, and should be dead — but won’t stay dead because it serves a political purpose, appeals to prejudices, or both.”

The point is that to a techie–or anyone engaged in intellectual honesty–is that they are often posed in the form of question begging, that is, they advance invalid assumptions in the asking or the telling. Most often they take the form of the assertive half of the same coin derived from “when did you stop beating your wife?”-type questions. I’ve compiled a few of these for this post and it is important to understand the purpose for doing so. It is not to take individuals to task or to bash non-techies–who have a valid reason to ask basic questions based on what they’ve heard–but propositions put forth by people who should know better based on their technical expertise or experience. Furthermore, knowing and understanding technology and its economics is really essential today to anyone operating in the project management domain.

So here are a few zombies that seem to be most common:

a. More data equals greater expense. I dealt with this issue in more depth in a previous post, but it’s worth repeating here: “When we inform Moore’s Law by Landauer’s Principle, that is, that the energy expended in each additional bit of computation becomes vanishingly small, it becomes clear that the difference in cost in transferring a MB of data as opposed to a KB of data is virtually TSTM (“too small to measure”).” The real reason why we continue to deal with this assertion is both political in nature and also based in social human interaction. People hate oversight and they hate to be micromanaged, especially to the point of disrupting the work at hand. We see behavior, especially in regulatory and contractual relationships, where the reporting entity plays the game of “hiding the button.” This behavior is usually justified by pointing to examples of dysfunction, particularly on the part of the checker, where information submissions lead to the abuse of discretion in oversight and management. Needless to say, while such abuse does occur, no one has yet to point quantitatively to data (as opposed to anecdotally) that show how often this happens.

I would hazard to guess that virtually anyone with some experience has had to work for a bad boss; where every detail and nuance is microscopically interrogated to the point where it becomes hard to make progress on the task at hand. Such individuals, who have been advanced under the Peter principle must, no doubt, be removed from such a position. But this often happens in any organization, whether it be in private enterprise–especially in places where there is no oversight, check-and-balances, means of appeal, or accountability–or government–and is irrelevant to the assertion. The expense item being described is bad management, not excess data. Thus, such assertions are based on the antecedent assumption of bad management, which goes hand-in-hand with…

b. More information is the enemy of efficiency. This is the other half of the economic argument to more data equals greater expense. And I failed to mention that where the conflict has been engaged over these issues, some unjustifiable figure is given for the additional data that is certainly not supported by the high tech economics cited above. Another aspect of both of these perspectives also comes from the conception of non-techies that more data and information is equivalent to pre-digital effort, especially in conceptualizing the work that often went into human-readable reports. This is really an argument that supports the assertion that it is time to shift the focus from fixed report formatting functionality in software based on limited data to complete data, which can be formatted and processed as necessary. If the right and sufficient information is provided up-front, then additional questions and interrogatories that demand supplemental data and information–with the attendant multiplication of data streams and data islands that truly do add cost and drive inefficiency–are at least significantly reduced, if not eliminated.

c. Data size adds unmanageable complexity. This was actually put forth by another software professional–and no doubt the non-techies in the room would have nodded their heads in agreement (particularly given a and b above), if opposing expert opinion hadn’t been offered. Without putting too fine a point on it, a techie saying this to an open forum is equivalent to whining that your job is too hard. This will get you ridiculed at development forums, where you will be viewed as an insufferable dilettante. Digitized technology for well over 40 years has been operating under the phenomenon of Moore’s Law. Under this law, computational and media storage capability doubles at least every two years under the original definition, though that equation has accelerated to somewhere between 12 and 24 months. Thus, what was considered big data, say, in 1997 when NASA first coined the term, is not considered big data today. No doubt, what is considered big data this year will not be considered big data two years from now. Thus, the term itself is relative and may very well become archaic. The manner in which data is managed–its rationalization and normalization–is important in successfully translating disparate data sources, but the assertion that big is scary is simply fear mongering because you don’t have the goods.

d. Big data requires more expensive and sophisticated approaches. This flows from item c above as well and is often self-serving. Scare stories abound, often using big numbers which sound scary. All data that has a common use across domains has to be rationalized at some point if they come from disparate sources, and there are a number of efficient software techniques for accomplishing this. Furthermore, support for agnostic APIs and common industry standards, such as the UN/CEFACT XML, take much of the rationalization and normalization work out of a manual process. Yet I have consistently seen suboptimized methods being put forth that essentially require an army of data scientists and coders to essentially engage in brute force data mining–a methodology that has been around for almost 30 years: except that now it carries with it the moniker of big data. Needless to say this approach is probably the most expensive and slowest out there. But then, the motivation for its use by IT shops is usually based in rice bowl and resource politics. This is flimflam–an attempt to revive an old zombie under a new name. When faced with such assertions, see Moore’s Law and keep on looking for the right answer. It’s out there.

e. Performance management and assessment is an unnecessary “regulatory” expense. This one keeps coming up as part of a broader political agenda beyond just project management. I’ve discussed in detail the issues of materiality and prescriptiveness in regulatory regimes here and here, and have addressed the obvious legitmacy of organizations to establish one in fiduciary, contractual, and governmental environments.

My usual response to the assertion of expense is to simply point to the unregulated derivatives market largely responsible for the financial collapse, and the resulting deep economic recession that followed once the housing bubble burst. (And, aside from the cost of human suffering and joblessness, the expenses related to TARP). Thus we know that the deregulation of banking had gone so well. Even after the Band-Aid of Dodd-Frank the situation probably requires a bit more vigor, and should include the ratings agencies as well as the real estate market. But here is the fact of the matter: such expenses cannot be monetized as additive because “regulatory” expenses usually represent an assessment of the day-to-day documentation, systems, and procedures required when performing normal business operations and due diligence in management. I attended an excellent presentation last week where the speaker, tasked with finding unnecessary regulatory expenses, admitted as much.

Thus, what we are really talking about is an expense that is an essential prerequisite to entry in a particular vertical, especially where monopsony exists as a result of government action. Moral hazard, then, is defined by the inherent risk assumed by contract type, and should be assessed on those terms. Given the current trend is to raise thresholds, the question is going to be–in the government sphere–whether public opinion will be as forgiving in a situation where moral hazard assumes $100M in risk when things head south, as they often do with regularity in project management. The way to reduce that moral hazard is through sufficiency of submitted data. Thus, we return to my points in a and b above.

f. Effective project assessment can be performed using high level data. It appears that this view has its origins in both self-interest and a type of anti-intellectualism/anti-empiricism.

In the former case, the bias is usually based on the limitations of either individuals or the selected technology in providing sufficient information. In the latter case, the argument results in a tautology that reinforces the fallacy that absence of evidence proves evidence of absence. Here is how I have heard the justification for this assertion: identifying emerging trends in a project does not require that either trending or lower level data be assessed. The projects in question are very high dollar value, complex projects.

Yes, I have represented this view correctly. Aside from questions of competency, I think the fallacy here is self-evident. Study after study (sadly not all online, but performed within OSD at PARCA and IDA over the last three years) have demonstrated that high level data averages out and masks indicators of risk manifestation, which could have been detected looking at data at the appropriate level, which is the intersection of work and assigned resources. In plain language, this requires integration of the cost and schedule systems, with risk first being noted through consecutive schedule performance slips. When combined with technical performance measures, and effective identification of qualitative and quantitative risk tied to schedule activities, the early warning is two to three months (and sometime more) before the risk is reflected in the cost measurement systems. You’re not going to do this with an Excel spreadsheet. But, for reference, see my post Excel is not a Project Management Solution.

It’s time to kill the zombies with facts–and to behead them once and for all.

A Little Bit Moore — Moore’s Law and Public Sector Economics

Back in the saddle and have to just find the time to put some thoughts down. In dealing with high tech and data issues one of the most frequent counterfactuals that I have been running into lately is in regard to the “cost” associated with data, especially data submissions. If one approaches this issue using standard economic theory pre-high tech then the positive correlation applies.

But we live in a different world now folks.

I find myself increasingly having to explain that, given that most data concerning business exists in some form other than human readable form, that the classical economic correlation no longer applies. This assertion is usually met with a blank stare.

Thankfully there is a concept that has been proven correct to support this assertion. It started out as an anecdote but has a great deal of credibility attached to it. It is Moore’s Law. For a pretty complete overview the Wikipedia entry works fine. When we inform Moore’s Law by Landauer’s Principle, that is, that the energy expended in each additional bit of computation becomes vanishingly small, it becomes clear that the difference in cost in transferring a MB of data as opposed to a KB of data is virtually TSTM (“too small to measure”).

The challenge that we have had to face in leveraging data is not in the cost associated with data, but in two other factors. These factors involve those of human intervention and software application limitations. Both of these can be ameliorated and incentivized toward maximizing the greater computational and media storage capabilities that appear every 12 to 24 months through the application of Public Sector economics.

This is an area that is ripe for contributions to the literature only because most of freshwater classical economics has been so blind to it because of ideological reasons. Our emphasis on free market fundamentalism has caused otherwise rationale people to artificially draw a solid line between the effects of public policy and expenditure, and private market activity. But it is not that neat and easy. One effects and influences the other.

The proof to this assertion can be found in practical form on K Street in Washington, D.C., for anyone interested. On the the macroeconomic front, practical experience since the 2007-08 crash has been a live course in the effectiveness of neo-Keynesian modeling. Furthermore, in this blog I have documented technologies that were developed in the public sector that were transitioned to the public domain and which created significant private industry market verticals, including the IT sector as it currently exists.

The area that I operate in most often is the Aerospace & Defense market vertical focused on project management where the connection is most strongly seen and felt. Because of this reason there have been a number of initiatives going back to the 1960s to incentivize this sector to strengthen this interaction between public and private resources in order to leverage technological, process, and other developments in order to optimize performance.

Full disclosure on my part: I have been an active participant in some of these successive initiatives over the years: first, during the round of Acquisition Reform under Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger in the 1980s, and again in the late 1990s under Vice President Al Gore’s “reinventing government”, so I come to this subject with a bit of history and practical experience. I am also currently engaged on some issues related to Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition Frank Kendall’s Better Buying Power initiative.

The danger in highly structured public sector industries is that “good enough” often rules the day. Incentives exist to play it safe and to avoid risk whenever possible. This creates an atmosphere of complacency. From the IT perspective, such concepts as Moore’s Law, which has been around for quite a while, tend to be seen as suspect. Thus, economic incentives must be established through policymakers to replicate the pressure for performance and excellence found in more competitive markets.

The way of doing this is to provide economic incentives that punish complacency and that force participants to encompass the latest developments in technology. Keep in mind that we’re talking an 18 to 24 month cycle. The complaint, of course is that this is seen as too rapid a change. Of course, how many Boeing 707s do you still find flying in commercial airlines these days? So the ground rules must be established to encourage a race to the top instead of a race to the status quo.

Welcome to the Hotel (Euro) — You Can Vote “Oxi” Anytime you Like but you Can Never Leave

The recent events in Greece and their ramifications for the European project have been the subject of a good many blogs and news articles lately. From an economic perspective the most noteworthy are those by Paul Krugman, Brad DeLong, Dean Baker, Yanis Varoufakis who was on the ground as Greece’s Finance Minister, and Joseph Stiglitz, among others.

If one were to read the news in the manner of the U.S. press through its sources of record: The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, not to mention the major news networks with CNN thrown in (avoiding avowedly polemical sources like Fox, MSNBC, and the Huffington Post), one would think that the Greek issue is one caused by a profligate country that borrowed a bit too much and allowed Greeks to live over their heads. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The bottom line is that Greece and the EU decided to bail out the banks and investors who crossed the line in investing in junk paper by using public funds. Sound familiar? Think a Eurozone TARP. But in the case of the EU the banks and bad paper investment houses–the inmates in this scenario–run the asylum. With the constant drumbeat from our own oligarchs we have become as a people brainwashed to think that investors and creditors have a right to their money. Our own more draconian bankruptcy laws imposed by the last financial industry-tainted Congress institutionalized many of these attitudes in law. But this has not always not been the case and is not part of our legal or economic traditions. It is certainly not anything like what Adam Smith had in mind.

The operational term in this case is “moral hazard.” The rhetoric of the moneyed interests and their armies of lawyers have deftly tried to invert the meaning of the concept, but as Steve Waldman clearly explains in his excellent interfluidity blog, “moral hazard” is a concept that overwhelmingly falls on investors and creditors. It means, quite simply, that you as an investor are responsible for where you put your money at risk–and that risk includes it being completely lost. There are no guarantees. This was the original rationale of Glass-Steagall: it was accepted that regular working people don’t have the information, time or resources to place their funds, which are meant for savings, under moral hazard. Same goes for things like the Social Security Trust Fund. Play with your own “play” money if you have it, but guaranteed deposits and retirement pensions are off-limits since they are backed by the sovereign currency. Seed corn is not open to being manipulated by cheap paper–that is, until Glass-Steagall was repealed.

The European condition is a bit more complicated only because the EU has never had a consistent separation between its financial elites and civic institutions, given the differences in national traditions and political systems. But one should be able to clearly see the connection between what is happening in Europe within the EU and in other places around the world: the attack on democratic legitimacy by oligarchs and economic elites.

As Joe Stiglitz points out in the post cited above, Greece–emerging from years of autocratic rule and third world-like conditions–was doing quite well economically until the financial bubble burst across the developed western world. Many of the banks that invested in hyper-inflated Greek real estate and other development projects were situated in other countries. The EU under the Euro project is a currency union, and under the Maastricht Treaty that formed this union there were some economic harmonization rules required, mostly pushed by Germany and France, but there is no lender of last resort, no central banking authority equivalent to our Federal Reserve, no centralized budget authority, nor political or cultural ties that would keep old ethnic or nationalist conflicts from flaring up in a crisis. As Waldman explains, what these other countries did–in particular Germany–was to bail out the banks and investment houses making the debt on these bad investments public obligations. This sleight of hand politicized what should otherwise should have simply been written off bad investments. If the Germans wanted to have their own TARP they should have done so. But it was so much easier to push the consequences onto the Greeks given their weaker position in the EU.

Jared Bernstein in his Washington Post article following the Greek “no” vote quoted an unnamed German economist asserting: “How do you think the people of Manhattan would like bailing out Texas?” As Krugman rejoined upon reading the article, Manhattan (and other areas of the country) do that all the time as a matter of course. It was done during the Savings & Loan crisis that was largely a Texas affair back in the late 1980s. Anyone who looks at the net benefits of federal tax payments and expenditures by state can see that the southeastern states–in particular those that made up the old Confederacy, including Texas, get more in federal benefits than they pay in. To Americans this is not a big deal–and my use of the term American to identify my countrymen is at the heart of the question. I don’t know anyone who in reality is a Floridian. Only buffoons and idiots identify themselves as Texans over their identity as Americans.

Here we tend to put resources where they are needed, hence the United States of America. More than two hundred years involving waves of immigrants, over one hundred and fifty years of increasing population mobility, and two major world wars and a cold one–two of these existential in nature–during the 20th century, not to mention 9-11, has militated against the old regionalism. It is not surprising that the assertion that displays such deep ignorance of our own system and society would come from a German economist. I mean this as no mean insult.

When I was on active duty as a young U.S. Naval officer I met a Scottish couple in Spain who worked at the U.K. embassy there. They were amazed by my nonchalance in moving my family from California to a home base in Virginia as part of my assignment. “Do you now identify yourself as a Virginian?” they asked. When I explained that–no–it was all part of the U.S., they explained that they would always identify themselves as Scots, and that within Scotland that people associated themselves with a particular village or region. This was almost 30 years ago, and I am told that such attitudes are changing, but it does point to a weakness in the “European” project, especially given that in the most recent U.K. parliamentary elections that the Scottish nationalist party was overwhelming elected to the House of Commons.

Given my own expertise in history and political science, my concern is directed more to the consequences of Greece capitulating to the EU’s economically and politically disastrous demands. Just ten days ago 60% of the Greek people voted against the conditions imposed by the EU, yet their parliament just approved a package that is punitive by any reasonable and objective measure. Even the IMF has belatedly–and in a largely dishonest manner which I can only explain as some type of EU face-saving approach–clearly stated that the conditions imposed are unsustainable.

The role of Germany is certainly one of the main issues in this condition. Given the way they handled the bad paper of their bankers, Merkel and her party have backed themselves into a corner. So they have done what all desperate politicians do–they have demonized the Greeks. This is all for mercenary purposes, of course, and without consideration for the long term consequences for both the Greek people and the EU. What they have done is show the contradictory fault lines in the entire “European” project. German Finance Minister Schaubel, by attempting to co-opt the Greek threat of a Euro exit by making such terms seem disastrous, has inadvertently made such an exit virtually inevitable. Greece, not wanting to be left out of “Europe” has just voted against its own best interests, its government never really having a strategy for a “Grexit” because they assumed that their negotiating partners were both rational and well-meaning. The government very well may fall as a result.

For what the Greek crisis has shown is that the European project under the Euro is neither a completely democratic one nor is it “European.” The elites in Brussels certainly felt that they had no obligation to consider the Greek referendum on the bailout terms. To them only the banks, the oligarchs, and the political survival of the political parties in the main assemblies of the nations that support them matter. The “democratic deficit” of the EU, in the words of the late historian Tony Judt, and the damage that it can cause, is now on full display. It is not yet clear what will happen, given the contradictory impulses of countries wanting to stay within the single market that “Europe” afford them, the cultural and psychological association to be part of the project, and the punishing loss of national autonomy and democratic legitimacy as the price that must be paid. (Aside from the economic depression and poverty conditions imposed by the EU as the Greeks follow the conditions imposed on them).

One final note: I can’t help but be impressed by the ideological arguments being used as a matter of course for “helping” the Greek people in the long run. As John Maynard Keynes noted, in the long run we are all dead. The tremendous amount of suffering imposed by the EU on the Greek people for their own long-term good sounds much like the fabrications of the old Communists of the former Eastern Block countries who inflicted all sorts of horrors on their own populations for the “long term” good of reaching the perfect socialist state. Now such arguments are deployed in favor of the perfect capitalist state. It is “reform” turned on its head, like “moral hazard.”