Of Matters Military. Mrinal Suman
DAU is a corporate university responsible for the training and career development of more than 126,000 acquisition employees.
The breadth of DAU’s curriculum can be gauged from the multiplicity and variety of the fields its training programmes cover. They include information resource management; acquisition management; logistics; auditing; programme management; business, cost estimating and financial management; production, quality and manufacturing; contracting; requirements management; software acquisition management; facilities engineering; science and technology management; systems planning, research, development and engineering; and test and evaluation.
The United Kingdom
The importance of imparting required skills to the acquisition workforce has been repeatedly stressed by all review committees and commissions. As per the Gray Report, significantly greater skills are required in programme and project management; finance; cost estimating; engineering and contracting; and management information systems at all levels of the British acquisition organisation.
According to the Defence Acquisition High Level Blueprint, the success of the acquisition system depends on the skills and professionalism of people within the acquisition community. Similarly, Defence Acquisition Reform Programme (DARP) also suggested raising skill levels across the complete acquisition regime.
Defence Acquisition Change Programme also stressed the need to concentrate on developing key skills necessary to deliver defence acquisition business, especially in cost- time estimation and project management. Written Ministerial Statement of Defence Secretary Bob Ainsworth of 15 October 2009 on Independent Review Defence Acquisition also vowed to accelerate the improvement of the above mentioned key skills of cost forecasting and programme management.
Consequently, the Defence Acquisition Management Education Programme is providing comprehensive training and development opportunities across all disciplines. Skills-planning is in place across the whole acquisition community for all major disciplines. There is also a fellowship scheme to recognise and retain world class specialists with scarce skills. Joint training is carried out with industry to help share and develop best practices. The Defence Academy in Shrivenham is the nodal centre for imparting acquisition training to the acquisition workforce and members of industry.
France
Recognising the importance of technical skills, France is highly exacting in the selection of its defence acquisition staff. It recruits mainly engineers and technical officials. Candidates must hold a degree in engineering, a master’s degree in science/economics or a degree from a business school of repute. In addition, Direction générale de l’armement (DGA), the overarching authority, engages on contract engineers and technical managers with high level of expertise. Initially the contract is for a fixed term of three years. It can be renewed once and the employee can be made permanent thereafter, if found suitable.
DGA is of the view that the acquisition taskforce must have technical orientation as defence equipment incorporates cutting-edge technologies. It is often said that the French acquisition functionaries are as technologically accomplished as the producers of military equipment. The importance that France assigns to the training of the acquisition personnel is apparent from the fact that DGA has a number of engineering schools under its direct control – École Polytechnique; Ecole Nationale Superieure de Techniques Avancees (ENSTA), Institut Supérieur de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace (SUPAERO), École Nationale Supérieure de Techniques Avancées de Bretagne (ENSTA Bretagne) and Institut Supérieur de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace (ENSICA). DGA’s armament engineers are graduates from École polytechnique. Subsequent training is imparted at ENSTA Bretagne or SUPAERO.
Need for Specialized Acquisition Staff
A nation’s military prowess and continued defence potential depends upon expeditious procurement of military hardware, which entails heavy expenditure of scarce national resources. This critical task must be assigned to the people who possess the necessary acquisition proficiency and attributes. The entire procurement process consists of highly specialized activities. The following activities reveal their complexity, criticality and significance: -
• Preparation of SQR
SQR are structured operational parameters framed by the services for the equipment sought. Infirmities in the preparation of SQR can result in the abandonment of the case at an advanced stage. It is essential that the persons associated with their formulation be conversant with own mission requirements, products available in the world market, level of indigenous technology and its likely development in the acceptable time frame.
• Formulation Of Requests for Proposals (RFP)
RFP is a tender document issued to selected vendors, inviting them to submit their technical and commercial proposals. It lays down inviolable terms and conditions for evaluation and commercial negotiations. It also forms the basis of the subsequent contract document. There is a great deal of sanctity attached to this document as a sovereign government issues it. A poorly drafted RFP with unspecific clauses can lead to multiple interpretations and result in gross financial liabilities to the Government. Therefore, experts in corporate affairs, international law, foreign trade and legal complexities must be associated with its formulation.
• Technical Evaluation
It is a paper evaluation of technical proposals submitted by the vendors. It is carried out under the aegis of the Services Headquarters (SHQ). The aim is to identify vendors whose proposals satisfy the parameters and who should be called for field trials for validating their claims. It is a sensitive task as different vendors offer dissimilar technologies. It is for the Technical Evaluation Committee to understand the technologies, ascertain their degree of stabilization and evaluate their suitability for own operational environment. Obviously, members have to be technically sound and knowledgeable.
• Field Trials
These are carried out by the services. This is by far the most critical activity of the entire procurement process as its basic aim is to authenticate the performance parameters and ascertain suitability of equipment for induction into service. The trial teams have to be appropriately equipped and trained to evaluate equipment with diverse technologies and determine their inter se merit. They should have the necessary expertise and vision to be able to interpolate exploitation of equipment in diverse combat milieu.
• Commercial Negotiations
Once the lowest bidder is determined, he is invited for commercial negotiations. Invariably, a battery of corporate lawyers, financial experts and executives trained in negotiation techniques represent the vendor. They are quick to gauge the depth of buyer’s comprehension of various facets of the proposal and urgency for the equipment. Staff carrying out negotiations needs special training and skills to do hard bargaining to clinch the most beneficial deal.
• Drafting of Contract
It is a legal and binding document for both the parties. Every sentence has to be worded with utmost care. Invariably, the successful vendor is asked to submit a draft contract, which is accepted by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) after scrutiny. As is to be expected, the contract is invariably loaded in the vendor’s favour. At times, the fine print contains many unacceptable terms, which come to light at a later stage. MoD has no integral expertise in international trade, foreign exchange transactions and international arbitration norms.
Selection and Training of Acquisition Staff
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