Sharing
Ever watch toddlers playing together? It doesn’t take long for one of them to decide that something belongs to them and they jealously guard it. Sometimes even hitting other children trying to take the toy. That’s a lot like what sometimes happens in the world of Shared Services. Agencies are sometimes not all that anxious to share their IT systems. On the flip side, other agencies are not usually begging to migrate their systems to someone else’s system. There are bright spots in the Federal Government…just check out our website to see some great examples of Shared...
Read MoreRewarding the Guilty and Blaming the Innocent
When I was a young, steely-eyed Naval Flight Officer attending the U.S. Naval Test Pilot School with no apparent fear of death, one of the classes I took was in project management. I have always remembered the day we talked about the phases of any project: Elation—“This is gonna be fun!” Concern—“This is turning out to be harder than I thought” Confusion–“I have no idea what I’m supposed to be doing” Terror–” If I don’t get this done, my career is over!” Laying Low –“Someone is gonna be blamed...
Read MoreThe Bolympics Begin!
The Defense world is all atwitter at the upcoming peek at the DoD 2015 budget that Secretary Hagel will be giving today and thus kicking off a new round of olympic games, the Budget Olympithon (let’s just call it the Bolympics), which will most likely last until at least Christmas. After two weeks of the NBC olympi-blitz I was growing just a bit weary of yet another human interest story. Unfortunately never-ceasing “breaking news” about the olympics will be replaced with never-ceasing “breaking news” about the DoD budget for the next 8 months . I know I sound...
Read MoreCyber: Too Big Not To Fail
I admit that I am not much of a cyber-techie. I do know a little about computers though. When Microsoft announced they were not supporting Windows XT a while back, I had a bit of a cyber-rebellion because I refuse to spend anymore money on Mircrosoft Operating Systems, which I assume, much like the NSA, report your every keystroke and video back to some central repository for “troubleshooting.” Right….But I instead elected to move to linux. I’ve not noticed a degradation in what I can do, don’t have to worry about virus checkers and internet security programs that...
Read MoreDavid and Goliath
Over the past few weeks there has been a lot in the press about the larger defense contractors worries about “shrinking” (see DoD Budget Cuts: Less of More) defense budgets and the effects on their profitability. Bloomberg News had a piece today about deals dropping for Pentagon contractors. While it doesn’t appear any of the big guys will be going out of business any time soon, they are indeed under pressure to deliver the goods to their shareholders. I would guess that most everyone who has a 401(k) has some amount of money invested in the large defense-related...
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