“Elaborate management retrieval systems have become objects of bureaucratic perversion; they serve only their creators and contribute almost nothing to orderly decision-making. We have too quickly forgotten that World War II was won by teams of scientists and uniformed operators working at wooden benches in Quonset huts and going to sea together.”
The savoir faire of Navy managers today is being taxed to the limit of endurance. Exploding technology, coupled with increasing accountability, could lead to disaster unless we strive to keep management procedures in meaningful perspective. Some would describe modern management as “a fragmented attempt to coordinate chaos.” Is it really that bad? Clearly, good management is measured by strong leadership and common sense. Let us test our perspective.
Whatever problems we may find in Navy management today are shared by industry, business, and other government agencies. The number of people in management in the United States has reportedly increased by 50% since I960. Unfortunately, we live in an age of management for management’s sake. Manifestations of trouble in the Department of Defense, however, have been underscored by the President’s Blue Ribbon Defense Panel, which reported on 1 July 1970:
“All evidence indicates that the size of Headquarter’s [sic] staffs in the Military Departments are excessive to what is required for efficient performance of assigned functions. Functional analysis of these staffs reveals an astonishing lack of organizational focus and a highly excessive degree of ‘coordination,’ a substantial portion of which entails the writing of memoranda back and forth between lower echelons of parallel organizational elements and which serves no apparent useful or productive purpose.”
During the decade of the Sixties, we have seen the evolution of DoD management procedures which have contributed to weapons system procurement cost overruns in excess of $15 billion. The Navy’s share of these overruns is more than $6 billion. Industry cannot be expected to take all the blame for this outrageous fiscal report card; clearly, management methods within DoD have made a substantial contribution to the apparent prodigality.
Within the Navy Department, there appear to be three areas of management controversy which, in the opinion of this writer, need immediate attention. All three problem areas are somewhat influenced by DoD management guidelines or requirements, but improvements can be made within the framework of existing restraints. First, we have become preoccupied with paper analyses to the exclusion of more meaningful use of the talents of those preparing the documents. Secondly, research and development efforts are suffering from an inadequate dialogue between researcher and operator, a situation further compounded by documentation requirements and organizational problems. Finally, the day-to-day functional performance of the Navy Department is nearly strangled by lack of authority in middle management strata of the Material Command. There are too many program managers. Their authority is usually ill-defined and their influence, supposedly designed to improve coordination among diverse technical disciplines, often contributes more to chaos than to progress.
The problems at hand do not lend themselves to scrutiny one at a time. Navy organizational structure is like a bucket of fishhooks; a tug at one segment brings out a fistful of entangled participants in today’s management scene. The evolution of problems has been a slow, steady process involving intertwined causes and effects; it has been underway since the end of World War II and is gaining momentum. An attempt will be made to present a collage of problem statements, manifestations of trouble, and recommendations for improvement. Periodically, we shall engage in a nostalgic look at successful practices out of the past. Keep in mind the three problem areas as we proceed: too much paper, confused R&D, and a fragmented organizational structure.
The Navy, influenced by DoD management guidelines, has learned some very bad habits during the past ten years. Tremendous emphasis has been placed on cost-effectiveness studies, and yet, all too often, we procure ill-conceived systems which are delivered late, are obsolete on delivery, and fail to meet specifications. Our in-house technical base has slipped badly because we have spent too much effort on publication of paper analyses when we should have been creating prototypes.
The President’s Blue Ribbon Defense Panel made the following additional observation:
“In recent years, paper studies and analyses have often been substituted for . . . hardware development and testing. As a result, uncertainties which could be eliminated or reduced are carried over into engineering development, where unresolved technical problems are significantly more expensive and troublesome to remedy. In addition, new technology which would improve weapons capabilities is often lost in the process.”
The Panel also noted:
“There is no effective control of contract studies within the Department [of Defense]. While each study must be justified to get funding, there does not appear to be, at any point, an effective mechanism for establishing a relative need for the study, or for determining the extent to which the subject area has been studied previously. It appears from reviewing completed studies that many of them are not objective analyses to provide inputs to the decision process but are rather performed to support positions known to be held by the contracting organizations.”
Vice Admiral H. G. Rickover has probably been the most outspoken critic of studies. In March 1968, he testified:
“. . . I have had some experience with DoD analysts . . . I find them generally illiterate technically. This results in numerous meaningless studies which evade basic issues and only cause delays—sometimes for years. As I have previously stated, I know of no DoD study which has ever had a single effect on my programs other than delay. I believe that the actual power—as opposed to their supposed mere advisory position—of these cost-effectiveness analysts is leading the United States into grave national danger. This situation must be recognized and corrected without delay.”
A specific example: During the past decade the Navy has sponsored 16 major studies relating to the Arctic. Not only has the need for so many studies been tenuous, but also there has been little evidence of intra-Navy coordination of subject categories. Furthermore, we have “paid twice” for several studies because of lack of expertise on the part of contractors. Private consultants take up valuable time while questioning qualified Navy personnel about the details of their study. Finally, there has been no follow-up at all on any of the studies; they line a bookshelf somewhere, nothing more.
Systems analysis is not a “warm puppy.” The proclivity to study and produce software rather than tinker has caused our technical people in laboratories to become prostitutes for bureaucratic overseers in management positions throughout the Navy organizational structure. How many hardware programs have been delayed by the inquisitions: Does it meet the Specific Operational Requirement (SOR)? Where is your Technical Development Plan (TDP)? Even an urgent cry for help from the operating forces must be phased into the paper empire which engulfs the Material Command. Laboratory engineers and scientists, who could build prototypes of many relatively uncomplicated devices for much less than it costs to write a TDP, are sent back to their cubicles like so many medieval monks to scratch away at software. Such bureaucratic arrogance from above is not only ludicrous; it is sinful, and it must be stopped.
“Software” includes the pervasive influence of “brochuremanship” and Program Evaluation and Review Technique (PERT). We live in an era of fancy administrative offices, plush conference rooms, and multicolored brochures and viewgraphs. Elaborate management retrieval systems have become objects of bureaucratic perversion; they serve only their creators and contribute almost nothing to orderly decision-making. We have too quickly forgotten that World War II was won by teams of scientists and uniformed operators working at wooden benches in Quonset huts and going to sea together.
PERT is a product of the Polaris Program, where it worked extremely well. In this regard, however, we have become obsessed with the smell of success. PERT can be helpful in massive programs, but even here, we tend to forget that Admiral William Rayborn, head of the Special Projects Office during the evolution of Polaris, had an unlimited checkbook and unchallenged priority.
Each contract specification which requires PERT means added expense to maintain the chart of program progress in accordance with strict guidelines. This writer recalls involvement with a $100,000 contract in which a subcontractor, a small jobber, was late in delivery of critical weldments to the prime contractor. The press of higher priority business (repairs to a local contractor’s truck body) was given as the excuse. We didn’t have an Admiral Rayborn to “lean on” him, so the PERT chart stood still until the subcontractor was ready to proceed. Furthermore, we didn’t need a PERT chart to tell us we would have to stretch the delivery schedule. The added administrative costs of maintaining PERT charts for small contracts just doesn’t make sense. The delivery date is no less sacred if common sense is substituted for PERT.
Preoccupation with PERT milestones can be disastrous, as reported by the Honorable Robert A. Frosch, Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Research and Development), in a speech delivered on 28 March 1969:
“I have seen overruns in expenditure and unnecessary effort generated by the fact that the linear sequencing of milestones had forced development of a complete maintenance and reliability plan for what was no longer the design, and had not been the design for three months. The machinery forced everyone to grind on and on because, after all, the maintenance and reliability milestones could not be missed without disaster and fear of cancellation of the project, even though the plan being worked out had nothing whatever to do with the hardware being designed.”
What price, Oh modern management?
The examples are endless, but let us look at a few:
Example: In 1967, a contract was awarded to private industry in the amount of $83,053.00 “for updating an existing PERT chart.”
Critique: Shouldn’t we expect some measure of this monitoring capability on the part of the contracting agency?
Example: Also in 1967, a $29,839.00 contract was awarded to a private consulting firm to support a “study of the Navy’s needs for medical research.”
Critique: Is it unreasonable to expect that the Navy should be the best judge of its own needs?
In support of the contention that “brochuremanship” runs rampant, let us consider two recent employment opportunities:
Example: “Visual Information Specialist, GS-13 . . . Manages the development of presentation packages for the presentation of technical proposals and . . . accomplishments to Navy sponsors and decision-making offices employing editorial, graphic arts, photographic and related visual information techniques.”
Critique: When did blackboards go out of style? Why don’t we have our demonstration of hardware performance at sea?
Example: “Physical Science Administrator, GS-15 . . . Serves as Assistant to the Deputy Technical Director . . . with responsibility for . . . marketing program . . . he should be able to instill confidence in those individuals who would rely on his representation as to . . . responsiveness in a competitive Research, Development, Test and Evaluation (RDT&E) market environment.
Critique: Can anyone guess how much time this man will spend at sea?
Enough of taking pot shots at ourselves. Let us look at other manifestations of similar problems elsewhere in the world.
Example: During the height of the Vietnam War, part of the joint military staff was called upon to host a personnel utilization study group which asked staff members to account for the details of their jobs at 15-minute intervals.
Critique: Again, what price, Oh modern management?
Example: A recent article in Science deplored the “. . . level of managerial accountability and proliferation of paper work associated with bureaucracy [which was found to be] an obstacle to constructive work” at the . . . [government] laboratory. The article went on to report that “. . . deployment of funding, overbearing management, and use of misuse of expertise at the Laboratory . . . has put the . . . development program behind that of Britain, Euratom, and Russia by ‘5 to 20 years’.”
Critique: Very sad, if true.
The long arm of the American Management Association has tried to reach into management minds everywhere, particularly in private industry.
Example: In a 1965 AMA study, one of the primary responsibilities of the Development Manager of an industrial concern was noted to be: “Removing props and models from . . . room after meetings.”
Critique: What must be the scope of his secondary responsibilities?
The above examples are meant to convey a simple message: our perspective is entirely out of whack. Management for management’s sake borders on criminal neglect and cannot possibly help the Fleet. Preoccupation with fatuous documentation and long hours spent polishing an image by production of multicolored brochures and viewgraphs can only lead to a very dangerous sense of unreal accomplishment. Effective response to R&D problems cannot be measured in terms of presentations made in the dimly-lit, hushed elegance of Management Information Centers. One is reminded of a comment made by Lord Clark in his recent television series, Civilisation. When referring to early 17th century Roman architecture, he said: “The sense of grandeur is no doubt a human instinct, but, carried too far, it becomes inhuman. I wonder if a single thought that has helped forward the human spirit has ever been conceived or written down in an enormous room.” If there is such a thing as a competitive RDT&E market, the performance of prototype hardware should be the yardstick; the concept of Navy teams composed of researchers working closely with operators at sea should be the mechanism.
And this is exactly what was done during both World Wars.
On meeting the threat of German submarines against the British Isles during World War I, Winston Churchill had this to say:
“A close and fruitful union between the scientist, the inventor and the submarine officer was established, the best brains of the Navy were concentrated on the problem, and no idea, technical or tactical, was spurned by the Admiralty Staff.”
Naval historian Samuel Eliot Morison, addressing the threat of German submarines against Atlantic convoys during World War II, wrote:
“In every aspect of this planetary struggle, men of science worked in laboratories, inventing, developing, and testing new weapons, devices and military equipment for the armed forces. One group of civilian scientists worked side by side with naval officers, even on board ships and in planes. This was the Anti-Submarine Warfare Operations Research Group (ASWORG), an offshoot of the National Defense Research Committee . . . it was not sufficient for scientists to invent a new device; they must observe its use in action in order to make improvements.” Let us examine the World War II researcher/operator dialogue a little more closely and then see what happened during the period immediately after the war. The Office of Scientific Research and Development (OSRD) was established in 1941 under the able leadership of Dr. Vannevar Bush. At first, the Navy was reluctant to accept help in solving operational problems from university types, but after this parochialism gave way to realities, the talents and resourcefulness of university investigators throughout the United States were effectively mustered to help win the war. The ASWORG was one of many team efforts involving scientists and engineers working together with uniformed military types at sea.
The impact of the end of the war generated the problem of winding down the OSRD machinery. A two-pronged redirection process got underway during the period 1945-46. In 1945, some of the still-existing OSRD groups remained more or less intact and became Navy laboratories, but the unwinding process for much university research was alleviated by the Office of Naval Research (ONR), established in 1946. ONR did an outstanding job of bridging the basic research gap for universities during the late 1940s. Amazingly, however, the consequences of this early effort to take up the slack left by phasing out OSRD are still having their influence on the Navy R&D Community.
The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), which existed before World War II, must be singled out early in this discourse, because today it stands alone among other Navy Laboratories. Whereas the commanders of most laboratories (or, more recently, “centers”) report to the Chief of Naval Material, NRL is under the Chief of Naval Research, who runs ONR. It is also important to realize that the Chief of Naval Research does not report to the Chief of Naval Operations, as does the Chief of Naval Material, but rather to the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Research and Development).
Since its formation in 1946, therefore, the ONR side of the house has not been beholden to Navy operators. Furthermore, until recently, R&D projects sponsored by ONR were not necessarily relevant to Navy needs. Senator Mike Mansfield (Dem., Montana) insisted on a provision in the Military Procurement Act, passed in November 1969 which would prohibit the use of funds for a project unless it has “a direct and apparent relationship to a specific military function.” This action has been called the “Mansfield Amendment.”
The language of the Mansfield Amendment has been modified so that it now reads: “None of the funds authorized to be appropriated to the Department of Defense by this or any other Act may be used to finance any research project or study unless such project or study has, in the opinion of the Secretary of Defense, a potential relationship to a military function or operation.” Although the watered-down version has less clout than the original, Senator Mansfield stated on 29 September 1971:
“. . . The effect of the amendment is essentially the same and certainly the purpose of its inclusion in this year’s [FY 1972] authorization bill is identical. I am hoping that the redirection of the sponsorship of academic research out of the Department of Defense as is contemplated by the amendment and its assumption primarily by other more relevant sources, such as the National Science Foundation, will result ultimately in more adequate funding overall within the research community.”
In keeping with these sentiments, Section 205 of the FY 1971 authorization bill contained the following:
“It is the sense of the Congress that—(1) an increase in Government support of basic scientific research is necessary to preserve and strengthen the sound technological base essential both to protection of national security and the solution of unmet domestic needs; and (2) a larger share of such support should be provided hereafter through the National Science Foundation.”
Many basic research contracts were awarded by ONR to university investigators between 1946 and 1969 with little regard for relevancy to Navy needs. While the loss of research/operator dialogue in laboratories was gradual, the breakdown of communications between ONR and the Fleet was quicker and more complete. A large number of ONR managers became university-oriented over the years, and many of them have remained somewhat aloof to this day. For example, an Arctic workshop, jointly sponsored by the Chief of Naval Research and the Chief of Naval Material, was held at the Naval Ordnance Laboratory in September 1969. The needs of the operators, clearly spelled out by the uniformed officers present, were not only ignored, the proceedings of the workshop were not even published.
The controversy over the Mansfield Amendment and relevancy is largely semantic; basic research is needed in many high-priority operational areas, and the present day lack of dialogue between researcher and operator is the real problem. ONR’s posture must be changed. With the expansion of the National Science Foundation during the last few years placed in perspective alongside the shrinkage of the U. S. Navy, we should perhaps consider re-examination of the ONR charter. Surely, we must re-establish meaningful communications between researcher and operator whatever happens.
What about the Navy Laboratories in the CNM side of the house? The lack of dialogue between laboratory scientists and operators gradually increased during the decade of the 1950s, when comptrollers became fashionable. After the urgency of the Korean War faded away, a subtle trend toward a fetish for counting things crept into management procedures. Numbers went flying into boxes everywhere, particularly as computer technology advanced. Laboratory people were driven ashore to take up the burden of fatuous documentation required by the new comptrollers. As a result, administrative staffs increased in size and complexity. The needs of the Fleet took a back seat to the whims of “modern managers.” Overhead costs began climbing in shipyards and R&D activities. But, the added burden of the documentation requirements of the 1960s was just around the corner; it would put earlier complications to shame.
The consequences of Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara’s documentation nightmare are well known and were summed up in a speech given on 19 May 1971 by Robert C. Moot, Assistant Secretary of Defense (Comptroller):
“. . . So far, in the 10 years almost that we’ve been operating the planning, programming and budgeting system (PPBS), we’ve concentrated on the front end of the system, on the ability to improve the choices and program options in the decision process. We have not concentrated, nor have we yet solved the problem of how best to use the system to control the day-to-day operations . . . Unless we follow through with system implementation, which makes for rational decision making throughout all levels, . . . we’re going to be in serious trouble.”
During the decade of the 1960s, we became swept up in the groundswell of package procurement documentation requirements, and these were applied to physically small, relatively uncomplicated systems, as well as to major procurement programs. Management decisions were often based on the contractor’s ability to state his case on paper. Obviously, we cannot require competing contractors to build prototypes of large ships or entire weapons systems, but many devices lend themselves to prototype performance competition. Side-by-side tests of such devices at sea (or in the air) should be encouraged.
In the late 1960s a laboratory consolidation program began which has resulted in the formation of “centers.” This has further compounded all problems because of instant loss of identity by laboratories with longstanding reputations. One laboratory, U. S. Navy Electronics Laboratory (NEL), San Diego, was split asunder. One part became Naval Electronics Laboratory Center (NELC); the other part was put together with the old Naval Ordnance Test Station (NOTS), Pasadena, to form the Naval Undersea Center (NUC). The East Coast version of this melding process has been consolidation of the Underwater Sound Laboratory (USL), New London, with the Naval Underwater Weapons Research and Engineering Station (NUWRES), Newport, to form the Naval Underwater Systems Center (NUSC). Worst of all, the world-renowned David Taylor Model Basin (DTMB) is now called the Naval Ship Research and Development Center, Carderock, Maryland (NSRDC, Carderock).
Aside from the fact that consolidation of activities separated geographically by scores of miles hardly amounts to “centerization,” the alphabet soup of new designations is gobbledygook to those in the Fleet with whom dialogue should be established. Everyone knew about USL or DTMB; reference to NUSC or NSRDC, Carderock, produces puzzled stares.
The July 1971 Department of Defense Telephone Directory lays out before the user an unbelievable array of Navy Program Managers. There are eight CNM-designated projects. Some of these “big daddys” make sense. PM-4, for example, is the Antisubmarine Warfare Systems Project Office; a meaningful ASW program requires coordination of several functional aspects of the overall problem.
The number and composition of PMs in the Systems Commands, however, boggle the mind. NavElEx and NavOrd somehow have only four PMs each, but NavShips and NavAir lead the pack with 20 and 18 PMs, respectively. The total of 46 project managers in the Systems Commands is imposing enough, but proponents of the PM concept would lead us to expect that the horizontal woof of their influence, superimposed on the vertical warp of line and functional command authority, actually produces an orderly management fabric. The results seem to indicate otherwise, however, and here we must face up to the consequences of confused lines of authority.
The prospect of more PMs is almost as frightening as the present spectrum of 46 at this writing. We seem to be expanding a concept without providing proper authority and funding control. Why, for example, do we find an “Airborne Weapons” project office (PMA-246) in NavAir when there are already several individual weapon PMs? Or why an “Acoustic Warfare” project office (PMS-394) in NavShips when the organization already has a sonar directorate and is saturated with individual sonar PMs?
Pick a project, any project. Who is running the show? Are funds dispensed from more than one source? Sadly, the answers to these questions almost always spell trouble.
Lack of well-defined lines of authority and the practice of fragmented funding mean that it takes much longer to solve a given problem. If a system is sent to sea without proper logistic support, who is responsible? Or more important, who is going to correct the situation? Why should it take as long as four years to effect a field change? Why should it take as long as 15 months to correct a computer printout? While a horde of ineffectual managers decide on documentation and scratch for “fix it” funds, fighting ships at sea must “make do.” If someone had been in charge, the problems might never have arisen.
L. F. Peter in his book, The Peter Principle, has provided us with a chapter heading which sets the scene: “Slump and the world slumps with you. Push and you push alone.” In the view of this writer, the Navy middle management population is made up of sincere, dedicated people who are pushing alone; they are unable to get the job done because of confused direction of effort, too many managers at high levels of authority, and a prevailing absence of meaningful coordination.
Effective response to problems is best accomplished by giving good people sufficient funds and freedom of action. Ability, leadership, and initiative should be our first concerns, not documentation requirements and organizational restructuring. The fragmentation of funding and authority in the sidewise-expanding organizational structure of the Naval Material Command represents a topheavy tangled web of confusion; it must be unsnarled. We must cut down on the number of people involved in the management process and ensure that the resultant streamlined functional lines of authority are manned by effective people.
In summing up, let us try to speak out with self-assurance and determination. We must:
► Substitute prototype development for studies. If a good man has a good idea, let us build a prototype. (Then Deputy Secretary of Defense David Packard announced on 11 August 1971 that DoD would pursue a new policy of building experimental prototypes; this should help to lead the way.) Let us put systems analysis in a meaningful operational perspective and not allow it to dominate our lives.
► Re-establish an effective dialogue between researcher and operator; redirect ONR basic research projects to ensure that this dialogue is followed up by meaningful response to the needs of the Fleet.
► Reorganize the Naval Material Command to provide improved communications and easily recognizable lines of authority, along vertical functional lines as much as possible. Streamline by elimination of as many program managers as possible. Upgrade the authority of a few carefully selected individuals so that middle managers can regain identity and assert themselves with more self-assurance. Restore the identity of Navy laboratories.
We must act now. Effective leadership and common sense must prevail. We must throw off the yoke of pedantic management influences if we are to avoid becoming the second best Navy in the world.
__________
A regular NROTC graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1952. Mr. Boyle spent more than seven years in submarines. Having served in the USS Sea Owl (SS-405), the USS X-1 (SSX-1) and the USS Skate (SSN-578), he left the naval service in 1961 and has been engaged in submarine arctic research ever since. His civilian position is that of a Research General Engineer with the Arctic Submarine Laboratory, Naval Undersea Research and Development Center, San Diego, California.