That chart gives me PTSD. It was everywhere. A stupid, stupid chart and no one paid any attention to it. Theoretically, there was an approved process for everything. But there was always an “important person” who said, “We’re not doing that. We don’t have time. We don’t have the money. Let’s just make it up as we go.” And that ALWAYS meant that things took more time and cost more money and had less quality.
And that ALWAYS meant that things took more time and cost more money and had less quality.
OMG! it’s going to cost more than we thought!
Ok, let’s only get half as many .
Great, now they cost twice as much!
Got it, cancel everything, destroy the tooling, now we only lose 6 million.
That’s better.
I worked DoD acquisition for 28 years including contracts through T&E, DT&E, OT&E then training the operators.
It was a massive disaster on the acquisition and I’ll use the F-35 that started in 1995, first flight in 2000, F-35A in 2006 and full rate production in 2021 (even though it did not pass OT&E as required... As of early 2025, the Pentagon’s test director reported that the F-35 program continues to struggle with meeting test milestones and mission readiness goals and has not yet successfully completed the OT&E phase.