Smart Shutdown Guidebook: Considerations for a Successful Shutdown

摘要

It is an absolute pleasure and honor to provide a few words regarding this DAU Smart Shutdown Guidebook. At present, the Department of Defense (DoD) has no formal process to terminate a program and once a program is terminated, has no formal process, education, or training to smartly shut it down. I wish such processes existed when I was an Air Force program executive officer (PEO) and later the Army s acquisition executive, when I had to terminate more than 70 programs/contracts. Once terminated, these programs required significant time and effort to ensure the shutdown was done in the best interest of the warfighter, DoD, and the taxpayer. While the DoD still has no formal termination process, I am very happy to say DAU has developed a very effective guidebook to help program managers (PMs) smartly shut down programs once the termination decision is made. DoD faces a critical fiscal challenge and it is certain that many DoD programs will be terminated. PMs will be asked to shut down as quickly as possible yet do so effectively and efficiently. The question for the PM given no formal process, no training, and no tools is, how. This guidebook provides the answer. Some of the many considerations captured by the guidebook include: personnel, operational capability/requirement need, technology use, facilities/hardware/software, program security, contracting, and budget-related issues. In addition to providing the guidebook, DAU provides assistance to PMs to help them through the shutdown and has done so for a number of programs terminated over the last few years.