PEO Perspective: January 2020

Happy New Year!

I hope 2020 finds you invigorated and ready for a rewarding year ahead.

We are proud of our 2019 accomplishments, which I detailed in the December Perspective. Here’s a recap of some of our programs gaining a lot of recent attention:

ARMY CONTRACT WRITING SYSTEM (ACWS)
Supporting the Army’s modernization strategy is a large part of our mission across our diverse portfolio, and we know from experience that we can’t fight a war without a contracting system.

The Army Contract Writing System (ACWS) is critical to the Army mission, in that it provides full-spectrum contract management from requirements identification to close out, resulting in operational readiness, audit readiness and savings.

Last month Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Procurements (DASA(P)) Mr. Stuart Hazlett and I were interviewed by Jared Serbu of Federal News Network about this important Army initiative and the need across the services for consistent user experience, centralized reporting, and standardized data integration with other business systems.

We are partnered with Army senior leadership and with our sister organization, Navy PEO EIS, in our focus on the critical path. The cross-service collaboration with Navy will lead to shared configurations, with an aim to drive down sustainment costs and get the right information into leaders’ hands to make Soldiers and units more lethal to win our nation’s wars then come home safe – our bottom line goal.

ENTERPRISE IT AS A SERVICE (EITaaS):
I say this often, but it’s really all about the data. Consolidating the information from disparate systems and owning and operating our own data are critical steps toward a modernized network and Army. While we’re shrinking the physical footprint of our existing network, we are also reducing costs and introducing technical solutions that increase capabilities and secure global connectivity.

Enterprise IT as a Service was a rapid, innovative acquisition approach spearheaded by Army Cyber Command (ARCYBER), the Army CIO-G/6 – who determined the requirements _and PEO EIS. Our team was responsible for the acquisition process, which began last April with a Sources Sought/Request for Information for a first of its kind pilot prototype effort that asked industry to propose enterprise-level network and IT delivery options to commercialize IT networks on more than 200 bases around the world. The Other Transaction Authority (OTA) approach allowed for ongoing input from vendors and sped the process in what would have been a much longer procurement period under traditional acquisition practices. Over 40 responses from industry influenced a change in the acquisition strategy. 

The Army was able to leverage industry best practices and methodologies to help inform our requirements approach for the future, issuing pilot site awards to start work immediately in the last quarter of fiscal year 2019. The pilots begin in 2020 at the first three sites – Army Futures Command in Austin, Texas; Fort Polk, Louisiana; and Camp Roberts, California – an Army National Guard site – with no visible disruption to day-to-day service.

Our partners at ARCYBER are managing implementation post-acquisition for this important pilot, which has the potential to inform future production OTA agreements and practices that speed the rate of implementation to deliver network modernization where it is most critically needed.

ARMY VANTAGE
Army Vantage, previously known as Army Leader Dashboard, is an enterprise data analytics platform that connects to and draws relevant data from new and legacy systems in any form, at any scale, enabling leaders to make data-driven decisions and affect real change. Army Vantage organizes and integrates data for near-real time visibility to make it accessible and understandable to Army leaders and designated users.

After a competitive 18-month prototyping process leveraging OTA agreements, the Army awarded a production agreement in December. With Army Vantage, leaders and designated users are able to assess, understand and improve Army readiness and decision-making. This investment is driven by the need for data to be visible, accessible, understandable, trusted, interoperable, and secure.

And the Army is seeing its value.

Most recently, Army Vantage assisted the 82nd Airborne Division with their deployment by ensuring division readiness.  In another example, Army Contracting Command is also leveraging the platform with category management to increase efficiencies in buying power across the IT landscape.

In case you missed it, AL&T Magazine’s second most read story in 2019 was an article about Army Vantage authored by Ellen Summey, PEO EIS strategic communications directorate. Additionally, Army Vantage has received interest on a national scale, with coverage from The Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Defense News, Washington Technology, and more.

Our industry partners are critical to many aspects of Army success, and these three initiatives are no exception, I thank you for the important work you all do in supporting the Army and Soldiers who use these vital platforms, programs and solutions around the world in their day to day missions.

UPCOMING EVENTS
We are kicking off 2020 with a vigorous engagement schedule, starting this month with participation in the annual AFCEA NOVA Army IT Day on January 21 in McLean, Va., where PEO leaders from across our portfolio with speak and network. The very next day, Project Manager Defensive Cyber Operations (DCO) Col. Chad Harris will speak at the 2020 kick-off luncheon for AFCEA Belvoir at the Officer’s Club.

Looking ahead, we have confirmed participation in the AUSA Global Force Symposium in March, and the annual AFCEA Belvoir Industry Days (ABID) conference, this year April 29-May 1, again at the Gaylord National Harbor. More updates and important information will be provided as we get closer to the event dates.

On January 9, Patrick Barnette will relinquish the charter for Land Mobile Radio to to Col. Enrique Costas, project manager Defense Communications and Army Transmission Systems (DCATS). Patrick has been serving as the acting product lead since August 2018, and we are very grateful to him for his service in leading LMR, which modernizes Army CONUS and Pacific non-tactical systems in support of installation public safety organizations and functions, including first responder, force protection and other installation management functions. Ernest “EJ” Wasikowski will take the helm as the Acting PL LMR; I have every confidence that EJ will carry on the important work of this program.

Finally, I’m excited to share with you a project that has been in the making for some time. Great websites are based on an organized, thoughtful organization that helps visitors easily find what they need in a meaningful and relevant way.

In reviewing the former PEO EIS website, we found areas that could use improvement. The navigation was not intuitive, the design was dated and not in keeping with the Army brand and colors, and the site didn’t capture or organize information in a way that always made sense or was easily accessible to customers. Additionally -- and most importantly -- we weren’t entirely sure that we were targeting or reaching the right customers.

The culmination of many months of hard work is a PEO EIS website built on a newer, more user-friendly content management system that follows the Army brand, is easily navigable, and is optimized for mobile devices -- while adhering to all Army standards and regulations for accessibility and security.

We have organized information by mission area, enhanced the emphasis on doing business with us and working with us – encouraging industry engagement and innovation and fulfilling talent management growth and development initiatives – and we have made information clean and easily searchable for multiple audiences.

We hope that you enjoy, use, promote, bookmark and provide feedback for the new PEO EIS website. Our entire team is committed to empowering Soldiers, and keeping them safe and supplied with all that they need to carry out their missions.

Here’s to a safe and happy new year to all.

Connecting the Army. Working for Soldiers.