Esper: Army should be more 'hospitable' to innovators

By Courtney McBride  / May 8, 2018

The Army needs to combine greater outreach to industry -- traditional and otherwise -- with less prescriptive requirements to foster innovation and improve acquisition, according to the service secretary.

Mark Esper said May 1 at the Atlantic Council he holds weekly conversations with industry executives aimed at fostering greater collaboration.

"The more we can welcome industry as partners in terms of solving this, the better. And the same goes for academia and . . . the nontraditional defense players," he said. "We're doing a lot of outreach to them to make sure we draw out their ideas and make Army acquisition more hospitable to them."

"We need to continue to move away from long lists of requirements that specify down to the meter, the pound, the whatever the case may be, type of requirements that really constrict innovation, that don't allow industry the opportunity to innovate, to think on their own about that solution that fits what we need."

In conversations with industry, the Army should lay out "what are we trying to solve, what is the environment we face, and put it in their hands to come back to us with their solutions," Esper said.

The creation of Army Futures Command will be central to this effort, he said.

"The biggest challenge to acquisition reform will be changing the culture. And that will probably be one of the last things we change. Culture is probably the most powerful thing within an organization," according to the secretary.

Even so, Esper maintained "there are ways to begin changing the way an organization operates, and eventually the culture."

First among these is the selection of "a very capable, strong leader," followed by the organizational structure and the location, he continued.

"What we're looking for is to put it in a city, a location if you will, that is known for its entrepreneurialism, its innovativeness, that has a rich source of talent, whether it's from industry or academia, and preferably both."

The organization is intended to "remain completely accessible to all those parties, whether it's industry or academia, so we can bring them in, we can discuss what does the future look like with regard to materiel, with regard to next-generation technologies, and then how do we tap into that?"

Esper cited another form of accessibility senior leaders are seeking for AFC: "putting it behind the garrison, on a fort, behind all the security, is not hospitable, necessarily, to industry and to academia."

The service aims "to break down those barriers, both physical and cultural, and invite them in," he explained.