New DOD 'concierge' will identify candidates to fight communication barriers

(Editor’s note: This story has been updated following additional information from DOD regarding “transition concierge” work as a service.)

A senior Defense Department official announced the creation of a new "transition concierge" service that will work to help strengthen communication channels between government weapon system developers and non-traditional, commercial defense companies.

“The concept of a transition concierge is actually the doorway into that community who can act as that translator between the weapon system developer and a non-traditional technology deliverer so that you can marry the two up together,” Dave Tremper, deputy assistant defense secretary for acquisition, integration and interoperability, said at a DefenseOne conference today.

Tremper said DOD is searching for candidates to do the job, adding that he expected the job to be up and running in the “next few months.”

“We are identifying candidate [program executive officers] that we can work with to establish that communication pathway,” he said.

Tremper said there is a “significant language barrier” right now between government weapon system developers and non-traditional, commercial companies.

“There’s tons of acronyms that are used in a day in the life,” Tremper said. “If you take a non-traditional and you put them into that world, a non-traditional will talk about this technology and what it does and [say], ‘My God, it’s disruptive.’ You’ve got warfighters and DOD acquirers who can’t translate the significance of what they are talking about into their weapons systems, and you’ve got tech deliverers who don’t understand the acronyms that the warfighter and the acquisition is using.”